peter rodman was. first is by henry kissinger and in his statement henry kissinger said, the highest task of a public servant is to take his or her society where it is two where it has never been. ..

>> whether it in his service with presidents are active presentation if the great debates of our time from

outside cover my he abdicated his beliefs in a way that set him apart to from and above the cayennes of ad hominem attacks in partnership that we have so often to base political discourse in the country. when he came to brookings peter quickly established himself above all others for an accomplished veteran of the ecological for the conduct was marked by a civility and generosity and he was an exceptionally generous and gracious colleague. this book "presidential command" is about how modern presidents succeed and fail. peter engages in the issues of leadership and how the president sets the zone. he explores the question of scope and the breadth of what a presidency entails today and

what it means to succeed. he deals with the complexity to succeed in some areas and what that means for the overall perception of the presidency when other areas are not so successful. and what is the nature of mount -- managing the threat of today's global world. and he also deals with the question of bureaucracy and how not to become entangled with it and not allow it to be an obstruction and yet the dangers that exist when you ignore it completely. the punchline is fairly straightforward he says the best model for the management of the white house by george h. w. bush the 41st president, and that it was the most collegial and smoothest, at a cabinet of heavyweights and among those of course, was brent scowcroft

a small and gracious and respect romantic who is known as the enforcer and teaches us something about how it is possible to succeed and have a gracious character in washington at the same time. of course, two characters were heavyweights during the administration are whiffs us today. >> i have lost weight since then. [laughter] >> one is secretary lawrence eagleburger in addition to being a heavy weight of this time he was irreverent then and irreverent now and will continue to be which is why we invited him because he keeps us entertain but also smart in his comments secretary eagleburger rose to secretary of state having been a career foreign service officer. idle think anyone has ever done that? that is a unique park in his career. he has been

ambassador, foreign service officer in the sense that of someone who had expertise are engaged in policy that understood what it meant to move issues to the bureaucracy and get things done. and with secretary eagleburger is eric edelman new-line of have the benefit of working with eric and be friends with for many years. in his loss position he was under secretary of defense for policy for two very different people. he has been ambassador he has been a principal foreign policy adviser for both dick jd and eric alesco eric edelman knows something about diversity and leadership as well. and a tremendous lecture and has a chance to read and not

hear them deliver. these are the individuals that will start us off for the discussion now ask them both some questions then open it up to you. secretary eagleburger? >> you said almost everything that i could say about peter. one of the most remarkable in my view maybe he was not so young as he got older but he was still young as far as i am concerned. this book shows it is beautifully written and it is very clear he has learned a lot as he went through the whole process he is one of the few people i could say worked with us so what rest of us worked for henry but he was as much the junior partner may be been very much the partner and

the interesting part of all of this is i cannot remember any particular defense. he had a remarkable sense of humor. but the only event i can remember that had very little to do with him other than he and i were with henry and others in paris for negotiating trying to get the hell out of vietnam. and all of the vietnamese from one side and all of the americans of the other peter was at one and and i was at the other. there were some other people in between. one of them on that side, henry got into an

argument that 194 about five minutes each side arguing about the facts and finally they said no mr. secretary he is directed to look on page 38 of your briefing book you will see that his statement is the correct one. there was a dead silence and remember looking at peter and he was having a terrible time to keep from laughing. finally from the depths of his cavernous just he said dick put up fewer the chair and move it to the other side of the stable. [laughter] of the labor side that i can relate to peter is that we were both horrified and the be

used and i thought henry would end up killing him but he was much more nicer than i expected but any way this book is remarkable and peter was remarkable. he is one of the few people that i know that i think henry looked close to being a son as any. i think every day in a hot hospitals and henry called him and you don't get tough very many people for had raised. i will leave it for that you don't need to save a thing about the book at this stage? other than say it is an excellent book. i think he is right and i think of all of the administration's i have lived

through or partly the through. and bush 41 i guess that is the right number. it is in my judgment is not a partisan comment but in my judgment he did as well to perform along the lines what peter thought was the way to proceed. he was far better at it than anybody else that i saw all of nixon came close. i am not saying it is not about his ability as president by running the staff making the decisions that he made was clearly above a and beyond. icahn the one thing that i will never forget when we went

to kuwait had asked mr. sadam hussain to leave, in the preparation for that, the president was on the telephone day after day talking to any world leader that made a difference and a lot of them that didn't. i've found it absolutely amazing what he was able to do to talk to other world leaders like the syrians and talking them into coming along with us in this epic to get rid of sadam have. out of kuwait. there any arguments why it was not sensible for the president to remove the sadam from power at that time but if for none other but then to done so at that point* would violate all of the agreements and the president made with the whole understanding that with the

various people he talked into coming along with us to remove sadam from kuwait. the arguments that were made later, never mind their screaming and yelling at that time. it was only made once and it is clear he could have done so. what to do so would take the advice of the certain people that became vice presidents later on that i think would happen very unwise to try to do. but anyway i will let it go into u.s. some meaningful questions if you are up to it.

[laughter] >> thank you. let me say whether privilege and privilege is to be on the same stage with secretary eagleburger with whom i had the privilege of working when i was much younger, had little more her and was. >> really think i have kept is my hair. [laughter] cement carlos mentioned have now were press secretary eagleburger and my most immediate in government as bob gates as career officers in the respective services uniquely came to a commando organization and it has always put me in mind a little of the comments at tom lehrer the musician, a mathematician and satirist made work days a few years ago when mozart was my age he has been dead two years is people like that the me to realize how little you have

accomplished and life. >> that is like the boy scouts songs. >> he was always my undersecretary and i am delighted to be here with him and i am very grateful to carlos, a strobe talbott and brookings for hosting this event because i think peter's exxon booked has not received as much attention as about to have and in part i think because, i think it is my speculation that washington post book world went out of business they stop doing a book review at the post and peters book suffered from being published the same month as we had the presidential transition going on in the united states and is a wonderful opportunity to talk both about the book and peter. that may make of few comments about peter personally before the book because as i read the

book i heard peter's voice speaking to me just as when we would touch base at the end of the day at the pentagon connected by our secure video devices to discuss the events of the day but also discuss national security decision making and his aspiration to write this book. i think it was a day she was in a prequalified because like larry eagleburger he served at high levels of state and defense and white house and they're not that many people that have that range of experience i think spring of 2007. but he had been thinking about it i know. my first in counter was not a person but in print for growth he had written a review in

"the american spectator" about secretary kissinger the book was called side show. peters review was called sideswipe. and this led to an extraordinary exchange in the pages of the spectator. shawcross later attended two subsequent editions of sideshow when it came out. years later they found themselves on the same side of the debate and jointly penned an article for "the american spectator". i know just before he died period we were considering whether or not to do a joint op-ed on iran and which they shared a common opinion. , the episode speaks volumes about peter's uncommon ability to debate issues and a depersonalize to manner almost in a bipartisan manner to allow him to reach across the

political divide. that is something that strobes comments made by carlos earlier. i first got to know peter rose a junior foreign service officer serving george shultz are as what larry eagleburger referred to as the kiddie corps. peter was working with stephen bosworth, ambassador bosworth and subsequently became his successor of policy planning and we work together in the aftermath of the failed me 17, 1983 agreement between israel and lebanon that george shultz a broker. and i think larry will remember the memo that peter rowe for secretary shultz when but agree million ruins and u.s. forces have withdrawn from lebanon and a long period of syrian domination he wrote

a memo saying our involvement should be punctuated not with a period but with a ; because we would of indebted -- undoubtedly need to revisit the issue again. he argues and rights that lebanon was ronald reagan's biggest foreign policy failure but as they would have a some 20 years later as rear reignited as colleagues at the pope pentagon we had to deal with the issue. i should say peter b. wyss the board met was a little awkward. he had been a mentor, he was somebody i have looked up two, a role model and we found ourselves in the awkward situation of him being by subordinates. a less gracious person would make them more difficult with his natural grace made a very easy relationship. as i held down suspected he became my indispensable

colleague and ally and enter agency fights but he and i agree as two veterans of the reagan administration misadventure we have a moral charged to preserve that country's hard-won independence in the aftermath of the cedar revolution in 2005. so it is no surprise november 2006 peter found himself the first senior defense official in more than 20 years of to board a teeseventeen transport our aircraft carrying their first choice -- forces under the national defense's which was a strategy and made four trips to lebanon to follow up. i think the first episode i apologize for the slide

excursion but it tells you a couple of things come a first is an incredible capacity for taking the long view of many situation. second, the moral seriousness of which he approached all issues despite the very clear realist pedigree and predisposition. peter had a wicked sense of humor about the interagency process which larry mentioned and is on display in the book. he and i frequently would talk about the interagency process and political environment in washington and a joke about two new yorker cartoons that we had both notice. one came out in the '80s in the beginning of the reagan administration which showed attila the hun with a group of his barbarians pillaging a village and against the backdrop, one refugee says you can say what you want about him but at least a has a coherent foreign policy.

[laughter] the other new yorker cartoon was of more recent vintage and shows the deceased government bureaucrat rate -- waiting outside the pearly gates but denied entry by saint peter. of the democrat says tell you think this represents the criminalization of policy differences? [laughter] no matter how me times peter and i talked about these cartoons and always managed to bring a smile to his face. i think they spoke to two with peters concerns for national security policy making which he describes in the book. one is the need for active, engaged presidential leadership and vision. both in the articulation and the execution of policy. peters book routes itself firmly in the classic study

presidential power and he offers what peter says himself as a quote apologetic support for presidential authority and he describes very well in this book i think the increasing difficulty of exercising that authority of the family of national security agencies has grown, institutions have become bureaucratize and the political environment has become increasingly poisonous. although it was painful as a career foreign service officer to read the unsparing analysis of the state department consistent failure to provide residents with strategic advice or guidance or innovation i think he unfortunately is right on target and he is merciless and is of critical to assess cabinet members who serve more as spokespeople for their respective institutions than as instruments for the president's agenda inside

executive-branch. halfway through the book he captures his conservative philosophy to approach the different philosophies and the carter and ford and nixon administration. he describes the balance system that carter had developed and the more hawkish national security advisers. and he writes "it makes perfect sense of the organization chart the masks a fundamental flop. the schizophrenia of the president of his world view and resulting policies" end quote. nixon and kissinger he writes, reignited and a tragic conservative view of history in which complex are not always reconcilable and enemies must be resisted. there is a consistent you how the world works and human nature is designed. it sees the whole world relating disparate events which is one of the meaning of taking a strategic review. whether one agrees or not have

a philosophy ensure consistency. carter was quote an engineer by training not a politician and the subject to increase aid to be part of the american pragmatic issue to look at cases case-by-case sometimes by 12 and then another. lawyers come out of a similar tradition. peter concludes that a senior carter aide has commented to me that carter has no consistent philosophy of foreign policy other that would have gone on in the predecessor administration was bad. his concern for consistency and coherence those throughout the entire book and although he specifically said it is not a book meant to contribute that go off per -- over the observations with an invitation to struggle which ring the executive and legislative branches over foreign policy can nonetheless of poles the case for the

institutional of the presidency as opposed to the congress. the very last minute used to have from pewter was send an e-mail about the results of the baker hamilton commission on the war powers which you sure this matter that the administration should not fall four. i replied he should not worry that the bush 43 administration would never yield anything with defense of the presidential prerogative. his well brought studdies i think offer many insights about civil military relations, and the decision making style as carlos and knowledge. i think he is scrupulously fair and dispassionate. he writes about the clinton presidency of which she was great -- which he was quite critical over the lessons the presidential administration learned over time that they

empowered many like strobe talbott and george mitchell to resolve differences and bring together the power of the president's behalf. the also provides i think, the very best analysis and critique of the bush 43 administration. including the 10 year and departure of his and my very controversial boss donald rumsfeld for although he does not refer to the burgeoning scholarship on intelligence and leadership style his work and conclusions are consistent with the body of literature that has emerged. i am sure he would agree with princeton university fred greene stain who studied the presidential differences concludes quote emotional intelligence may be the most successful of failure -- factor in the warehouse am aware of the presidential contender that has what emotional intelligence all else may turn to ashes by hope of the spirit

of presidential transition folks in the new ministration will find time to consult beaters thoughtful book. his insistence on the necessity of preserving their president's ability to have real choice among alternatives, the danger of policy making by consensus, monitoring policy constantly and keeping the discussions of the principles and deputies the strategic level or cautionary notes that would serve any administration well. it makes a tremendous companion piece it is a shameless plug for brookings for the excellent book that has done about dangers transitions probably to conclude with a finding from the archives of a think has a bearing on the vision of the state policy dysfunction and today's proceedings it was found by two very distinguished scholars of four relations in the ashton papers and passed on to me and when i shared it with peter, he

roared with laughter. p and i agreed it was as much a description of the interagency process that we knew as the north atlantic treaty organization which it is meant to describe percolator 1970 from it erfurt -- service officer congratulating secretary atchison for winning the pulitzer prize for his memoir. the author tells as ascend quote i always admired your vision but eight months here have led me to have second thoughts. like sex and 82 is a good thing to be knowledgeable about and experience on occasion but it can become quite wary. the work at dirhams is interesting although it does not match washington beyond that i have been constantly amazed how stupid gamble headed the department has become since i left. it is signed larry

eagleburger. [laughter] thank you very much for your time and attention and i hope you repeaters book. >> are you serious? >> i did not make that up. [laughter] i have a footnote it is in box nine of the atchison manuscript at yale university library. congratulations. [laughter] >> i was lucky enough when acheson was brought back to consult when did call was being did go. i got to know him and he was a wonderful man. he also wanted to assassinate did call which also shows he was slightly other day.

[laughter] >> let the record show. [laughter] actually i will resist the temptation to start off with "the new yorker" cartoon and attila the hun and the word consistency and the concern for the points that eric made about richard nixon foreign policy. there is the search and analogy to draw but anyway we will go back to the question of the transition at the end of the time of bush 41, there was certainly one major whirled change. there were other crises that are developing on a smaller scale, one obviously somalia became much bigger in the eyes of the world and another in is

when a secretary eagleburger that you know, better bid anyone else. but then you look at the transition that occurred from bush 43 down to president obama. very different kinds of circumstances but again one major world changing event the economic crisis that will fundamentally change the way that we conduct economic and political affairs across the world. then to other conflicts that are certainly not minor, why is iraq and afghanistan. perhaps this is one of the most difficult periods in the conflict of foreign policy because the teams are not well established comedy move from one leadership team to another, one group is trying to figure out how to pass information to another, there are different in theological perspectives.

i guess one of the things i want to come back to the two review to look at the question of transition, are there things you would draw from from the experience that you had back in 92/93 and looking at the current transition with losses that you think they're particularly important that either come out of your personal experience of a transitional process of what the president needs to do in order to effectively manage and provide leadership with this kind of ventura period as new teams are developed? secretary? >> first of all, i think it is inevitable that way move from administration that has been in office to terms, excuse me one second. and is replaced what i will

not describe as amateur and i do not mean it in the pejorative sense but coming in new and with or without definite plans on what he wants to change. that would apply to the present administration or move it back to when we left and clinton came in. let me give you an example of the almost inevitable thing that will happen. as you probably recall, president bush had sent some troops into feed in somalia. nothing more than giving food to the people that were starving. he had 12 presidents day she had called president-elect clinton at the time and 712 do this and did not ask for the

okay but was namely doing that. where the like that are not and i think if president clinton had objected i think bush would not have gone ahead but clinton did not. but bush made it very clear he was going into feed and get out. no intention of staying. in fact, president bush said i hope we will be able to have accomplished all of the feeding and be out before your inaugurated. it did not work that way and in fact, we were still in somalia when clinton came into office park. i think the president with the advice from several people who had been involved in the somalia thing earlier decided

to stay on and hopefully put some stability back into the country that had been. whenever the name of the leader come i cannot remember now but was doing nothing more than killing people every chance he got. we had very clearly, in fact, i went to the un to talk to the boutros-ghali that we were going to go win and feed and get out and he was not to have any assumption that we were there to stay. the clinton people and i honestly think that this is something that so croft -- these so-called experts persuaded president clinton there is no reason he said have any at this point*

we got into some serious trouble. then the new administration ran as fast as it could to get out. i think a lot of bad signals were sent but my point* is a different one. but i am convinced if they had had any experience or they could dump the problem in their laps it would not have made the mistake that the admiral convince them to stay on and it was largely one man who convinced the president as far as i know, convinced the president tuesday and at some cost to him as an early stage in his administration which by the way is another thing. this administration now is going through the same thing. namely the only thing any other new administration ought to be thinking about very hard

when you come into office on the foreign policy side to better be careful not to get yourself into difficulties early on in. that is so easy to do with the slight misinterpretation of what is going on which is what happened to president clinton in this particular case. but when you do these transitions on domestic policy, that is pretty much a given committee incoming president will now was much about almost as much at least and maybe more about the issues they of the outgoing one but when it comes to foreign policy unless the candidate who becomes president is very knowledgeable on foreign policy issues, it is the time to most easily get himself into difficult times. and one of the examples that i often use in terms of trying to talk about barack osama, i

do not mean osama. jesus. the president needs to watch out for something that jfk. when he went to paris, and he came away with having less soviet leader's there was a clear impression he was a dilettante he did not know anything and not easily hornswoggled. people still say and i think correctly one of the major regions one of the cuban missile crisis. because they miss judge kennedy because of the first impression which by the way something else i notice and peters bookie talks about a fair amount toward the end when he talks about

personality and how that affects the impression several leaders. but again my point* is in foreign affairs it seems to me and we have seen it too many times where it is very easy for the incoming president to make mistakes. it should be incumbent on the outgoing president to do everything he can not to put the new president in a position to make those mistakes. but i think for example, right now the questions about after the first 100 days there was some issue the president apologies and so forth give the wrong impression to world leaders. the same sort of question in terms of be careful what you do until you are in office long enough to have a better sense. i know that makes as much of

an answer but i will tell you i think it is that transition period that it is most likely that he will make a mistake and it is most likely that you will give an impression to your opponents of what kind of a character you have a and it may be totally wrong because you will be coming in without much knowledge of what has been going on. and you can make some serious mistakes. >> i guess maybe a couple of things to take from that with the clarity of the mission that it is engaged in and how to stress it as clearly as possible, the issue of purposefulness and resolve and how you convey that particularly if you try to distinguish yourself from a predecessor. and in some ways, i think both of those are issues whether or not you think they have demonstrated it now or not it certainly has been talked about.

>> i will argue with the first one not that it is not important or should not be done, but it in the case that i mentioned about somalia, i think it is very clear that people coming into office as we were going out had a totally different estimate of the situation in somalia. we could tell them what we thought but the people who word rise in the president thought it was a different situation so it is not that they were not clear about their mission but it was the wrong mission. you have that question of learning what is going on before you make your judgments. >> also buy could jump been on this for a second. part of the strength of peters book is it refocuses attention on how much our system of our national security decision making is president centric.

it is in comparison to the united kingdom when we have a change of prime minister as we may have been the u.k. over the next year the new prime minister comes 10, the old prime minister leaves but the permanent bureaucracy is still there and there is a continuity that does not exist in our system. i remember my first ambassador of foreign service stan lewis describing what it was like to have the nsc staffer at the end of the johnson administration on january 20, watching the trucks pulling out with all the files that were taking off to the johnson library. and the new people coming in and having absolutely nothing on which to rely. the danger i think of the transition process is his president's which is just an expansion of larry's point* presidents are not likely to

be particularly well staffed and a matter how smart they are no matter how much they think they know there will be a staffing process that past to support them to reach these judgments and assessments of what is going on. that process has become much more difficult over a period of history that peter describes. i mentioned as a the book from steinberg and campbell. people may have read it i will give you my summary version and five seconds. it is what i refer to as the three stages of transition. the first is both sides a one to have the smoothest transition never the incoming say we hit the ground running the ongoing says we will not the dropped the baton and handed off cleanly than human beings get involved in the process broke and it gets more complicated and the second stage is the outgoing tide say we want to describe the policy

we have developed in the reason is because we have learned through hard experience these policies work and it is not partisan. we're not trying, yes, the incoming guys so you may think this is our prize pig but we think it is a pig and it goes into the trash. by now of the third stage which is the incoming team saying this is more screwed up and we thought. it will take us four or eight or 12 years to dig out of the disaster hour predecessors created in the outgoing guy say we cannot believe this is the team that supposedly is wallace in the campaign and now they cannot even organize a decent and as the meeting. it is the inevitable process to some degree because it is inhabited by flawed human beings but i agree it is a

period where a president can make serious missteps he should be speaking to staff of his administration carefully and where i would make up plea for two things, that we not use the confirmation process and the vetting process to so little political scores and create points. the president needs the team that he chooses to put into place as someone who is been subject to a long senate old about something that had nothing to do with me. and is very deleterious to rational policy-making and people should remember the transition process unfortunately now last into the early fall of any administration because of the difficulty of getting, a

clearing, and confirming people i frankly think we should have the worse than it confirmable positions in the washington-based executive branch. >> before opening let me stay with this element the relationship between the leadership and bureaucracy. the president has been elected to be a leader and said antonia the reality is the presidential decisions are not actions. they have to translate into something. increasingly the kinds of actions that might have been associated in foreign policy world with the there a policy position that could result in arms control agreements or a military action whether like a

hierarchal system that command leads to specific action is more ambiguous in today's world. iraq and afghanistan are probably as good a demonstration of that as you get because the whole process of trying to figure out how do you make, how the work of a country to help it function again and help build the state and make it viable? it is much more complicated it is not the military issue or one that you can decide on by decree but it takes capacity of bureaucracy and takes they action of the host country as well. so much more complicated environment that we operate in. both of you have been closely associated with executive power and in the midst of bureaucracies and see how those function to the leaders. it is interesting in your reflection now and the

situation with a new president at thomson and her tries to set the tone and make decisions about issues like iraq and afghanistan and pakistan incredibly contacts -- complex for the administration to step and that translates to action was device to have four men to actually succeed of that type of environment? >> be careful. >> let me just speak for the bureaucracy. i will talk about state and defense. the national security council as a bureaucracy is actually the one that is most easy for the president to control and the reason why the president frequently ends up after the election campaign talking about how they will restorer cabinet government rely on their own personal staff

because that is the one they can reach out and control most easily. i mentioned in my opening remarks and the pain i experienced the an accurate description the department of state i do not want to speak for secretary eagleburger but for myself, as a group is just one of the talented groups i have ever been associated with. to in terms of the quality of the intellect and capacity of the individual yet we as an institution is almost always less than the sum of our parts. i think it requires particularly strong leadership by secretary of state combine the powers of foreign service and i would say it's fairly reflects peters feel i would be interested in larry's view that if you read the book he

would say henry and george salts were the two secretaries of state that got the most out and got it to play the role that about two pele by providing clear strategic guidance and leadership bottom powering foreign career service officers like larry eagleburger to occupy senior leadership positions and to make the building produce useful advice for the president. in the department of defense it is frankly a lot more complicated because it is a bigger and more complex organization with huge budgetary resources and enormous programs that develop of lots of inertia up. we will have a very interesting test bed for all of this in terms of bob gates a 10 year or so and tenure as secretary of defense in the obama administration he has established himself in the

department that he will have real challenges now for the relatively simple policy right and in the comparably more difficult challenge of dealing with cancellation of multi-year were multibillion-dollar defense programs and orchestrating a defense budget and program that is consistent with a national strategy. >> let's take a look at the situation now for example,, i may be way off but i personally am very worried about the administration looking adds afghanistan as they are a pro in assets i think we should be well on the way into getting ourselves into another vietnam if we're not careful.

i am not arguing that we should be going into this afghan situation with the intent to win a war. because it is clear that is not saleable to the american people right now. but the the question becomes is it wise to put your toe in there and you find out the water is harder than you expected? again, my point* is i think there is a real need, this administration came in close to iraq and at least to some degree to confuse me at least then turns around and says we have to win the war in afghanistan. said puts troops into afghanistan. but again, with a clear understanding that it will be limited deployment and limited

deployments happen what have gotten us into these situations time after time. of my argument is not as so much if you're going to do it, you have to do it to win although that would be my argument rather if you have to go when they're too when it then don't do it all at least in the case of afghanistan. we very careful about what you will do and think it through more carefully. my point* is not that i am knocking on afghanistan as such but i would be very, very surprised if the military that is going to be advising the president and bob gates, we know for a fact that petraeus has a different view of what ought to be done in afghanistan that is becoming clear. but here is a new administration, one that comes in with certain philosophical

conditions. antagonistic towards iraq, antagonistic in general supported by those or antagonistic to the military excursions. and now trying to plan one and my point* again they need to take a deep breath and start talking to the military in a more serious way then i think up to this stage they have because if nothing else i suspect at least petraeus will tell them if you do what you're thinking of doing now you better be careful because we may be another vietnam. my point* is when you cut it as a novice. i don't know any other word to use, and you have some members of your team that is not a novice but have been out of office eight years, more than

that, so now they are trying to catch up. it gets back to my point* when you first come into office you had better be on foreign policy issues and much less concerned on domestic but on foreign policy issues you can get yourself into so much trouble on the early stages but it then becomes difficult to dig your way out but i would hope particularly in the case that we're talking about write now, afghanistan, they will spend eight good bit more time thinking before they act. >> i think this begins to illustrate the complexity of the role of presidents the guidance and direction the president can give in the way the constraints of that and i think afghanistan is a particularly good example of some of those complexities

because first of all, it is no longer seen as afghanistan but just the issue. one of the questions that goes back to your point* from learning i would certainly give a positive score looking at it as a much broader issue as afghanistan, pakistan, and the wider region and how those issues have a critical factor to have a realistic sense of what needs to be done. in the question of realism of defining the mission one of the central bank said is a factor in afghanistan is is counter-terrorism more counter insurgency? the two have different implications for the type of presence you need on the ground and the administration has come back and said we have looked at this what we need is a counter insurgency strategy not a counter-terrorism if we succeed which means a greater on the ground military presence building of the afghan military to police

capacity but radically increasing the civilian capacity on the ground. the question comes back to the issue of bureaucracy and how bureaucracies relate, do you have the capacity to do that when you turn back to the bureaucracy? i think that is where the wake up call will end up coming back to this of frustration because we have not created days we have traded bureaucratic structures that are consistent with the nature of the world that has changed and i think that will be a longer-term challenge as it goes forward. that the president wants to execute presidential command. the nature of the government behind the president will change and its capacity as well. >> one other point* i wanted to make which another single flop among the president is uncertainty which jimmy carter is a classic case and the

classic case with in that case is obviously the neutron bomb where this particular bomb would not ruin any buildings would eviscerate the people that happen to be in it. he got the germans all cranked up to finally be willing to accept the deployment of helmut schmidt and then one week or two of when it was to be deployed, he changed his mind and the consequences he worked very hard to convince the politics that this was a good thing to be deployed in germany and now house to retreat in a hurry. it damaged relationship between helmet and smith and carter from then on.

but he did a number of time in his decisions of what use in the way of force, and those who had been imprisoned in the embassy in tehran if they were going to go win and free them. he change the instructions to be deployed. i know for a fact three times. because a friend of mine was in the agency at the time and was running the thing. they said that that had happened. i can come to my point* is this is where a president can be terribly clumsy is on the question of being uncertain and changing his position so many times. the only other thing that could be worse this someone who was to determined to do whatever it was he wanted to

do and ended up with 500,000 troops in vietnam. you can cut it either way. but it is nevertheless, if that is the personality problem to some degree at least. . .

and in this case, he is the guy that can go and in the morning and sit down with the president across the desk and say this is what is going on in afghanistan, mr. president, i think this is maybe what you want to do here and he has a way into the president that i don't care what else you say is that an

advantage. having said that, i do think what the secretary of state is a very tough cookie and i suspect within some limits she will be able to take care of herself. what isn't clear yet but wouldn't be to me at least is how that relationship between her and the president is bring to shake down given the fact they were at swords' points here not many months ago and i can't believe the love and affection between the two of them is necessarily terribly high. that doesn't mean they can't like good adults put that behind them but i would suspect she will have substantial impact on

the president as is likely to be possible within this is administration. i think she will be a effective secretary of state where the president is concerned. i don't know what other people may think but if you analyze her and also remember the president himself isn't a particularly an expert at foreign affairs, i think she will have a fair degree of independence although when it comes to the choice between general jones and her and advice given to the president i think the fact that jones is closer physically may mean he will have a somewhat greater influence on the president then she put and by the way, you cannot overdo this

question of the physical presence, close to the other person. it can work two ways. in the alpheus case it was part of what led to his demise because it got on the nerves not just the president dustin the other senior advisers to the president had the time. it was because he was now the ring at him too often but it does make a difference particularly in a case like that with general jones where i would assume he has had enough experience with high level people that he has a good feel how far you can go and how far you can't go. so i think that relationship is likely to work pretty well all the while also will tell you that you cannot be confident of anything until you see it work for at least a six month period. >> let me start on afghanistan

and allies where i largely agree with larry. i'd expect three gates gave an interview edna or so ago that said it best, which is extremely disappointing that our allies who in many ways face the same challenge we do with constant plotting not only against our homeland but their homeland from these areas along the pakistan and afghanistan border where al qaeda and its affiliates continue to plot a tax, but the governments in europe haven't seen fit to make the case to their own public that this is a challenge built just for the united states and the united kingdom but for them as well and i don't think that in any way gains the contribution of allies who have stood up and take an enormous casualties like the canadians, the danes, the dutch, increasingly the french have played a role. but for an alliance of 26 it is

a fairly apathetic showing and i agree with secretary gates it is a failure of political will and european governments and by suspect the discussion of why that is will be a longer conversation. >> on the relationships among, let me say one other thing about that which as i do think there is a danger for the administration in the long term. it goes to some of the things leary was talking about earlier in terms of our presence in afghanistan and rule in afghanistan. this is a mission in which a couple of years ago was described as one that had been turned over to nato and international security force, isaf. and as we take a growing role in the larger percentage of troops and allies proved less capable of contributing, what that does to the political support at home for continued u.s. involvement

in afghanistan will be the problem with the administration to wrestle with and i agree to a rematch with what larry said the need to be careful about their rhetoric because it could come back to bite them in the future. on their relationships among principals and the relationship between national security adviser, first of all i stipulate truth in advertising and speak from no inside information i left the pentagon january 16th and i have not been present at meetings and don't know how it's going. i would say the challenge for general jones, former senior military defense and knows his way around town but the major challenge will be to develop a personal relationship with the president which he did not have upon entering office. and the fact of the matter is there's a number of people in

the white house and on the staff who have pre-existing close personal relationships with the president including dennis mcdonough on the staff as well as tom donnelly, national security adviser so i think that will be the major challenge for general jones to establish their report and become the president's senior counselor in the white house on matters of national security. ic to signs i find troubling. it seems it's been extraordinarily quick for the knives to come out and clearly inspired leaks in the press about the role he is pleading, and i noted watching the post story talking first hundred days of the administration wins the tick-tocks account of the president's response to the

missile launch by north korea during the prague summit that the description of the decision making included the president sitting around his hotel with david axelrod and mark when he decided how to respond and the national security adviser presumably was traveling on the trip was nowhere to be found in the story. i don't know if he was a truly fair or not but it's worrisome to me that he wouldn't have been a part of the decision the president had to make on the fly before he went out and gave his speech. i believe secretary clinton will be very a formidable secretary but i think for her the key challenge will be to go back to something you said, carlos, secure the resources for the department of state to play the role but we expect to play in a fully resource counter insurgency which is what was the

administration's positions after the afghan policy review was complete and so, getting those resources for the congress and deploy and then effectively i believe will be one of her absolutely biggest challenges and i would be interested in larry's view of this. i am not quite sure how you make that work in a department where you have to deputies. >> you don't. >> we are at the end of our times i am going to ask the to a few to think about any final comments you want to be fuss with. you might want to comment on this resource issue and one other issue in closing if you feel like addressing this meeting with final thoughts is the question of breath versus focus. there are huge issues in the world today but can in fact and in fact are taking the

leadership of this country in many different directions and the economics area, iraq, afghanistan, pakistan, north korea, geopolitical issues like china, russia. there are existential questions like security and climate change and so, this question of presidential command becomes a particularly challenging one as well because you don't simply command that. it's a very complex world in which to deal with and any final thoughts you can leave us with on how to manage this kind of complexity would be of interest to people as well. so let me get back to the two of you and actually eric, i'm going to ask you to go first and the secretary will give a final word. >> i think it is an enormously complex set of challenges the administration faces. i think peter's played in his book which i think is compelling is that the ability of the

president and his team to look at issues in relation to one another as opposed to one office and develop a strategic view is absolutely crucial. it's crucial for two reasons. one because you have to have a strategy if you were going to be effective but it's also crucial because if you don't, you don't have a theory of the case to explain to the american people why it is you are doing things in different arenas. so i take this is quite important. the law requires the had been a station to develop its own national security strategy which is meant to frame a series of documents in the department of defense, the quadrennial defense review, the national defense and national military strategies and i think that will be a place the administration not intellect

will effort because it's very important for them to figure out what they as an administration think is the strategy for the united states and the way the various issues they are confronting are related. and i think that because very famous lee howard mcmillan was asked what drove his agenda when he was prince minister after he left office in the mid 60's and he replied events, dear boy, even as and this like all others will peter evan bayh ebenefits most of all they cannot predict and on less they have the theory of the case down the will teachers and willy-nilly from one side of the other as the carter administration was. >> larry? >> well, first of all to a degree is a complicated world and it has gotten more so and

part of the problem is we make it more complicated. peter and his book refers to regan s partly successful, partly not because he paid attention to maybe five things that were important to him and then didn't pay attention to much of the others. that wasn't an increasingly complicated world that is not necessarily the wrong way to deal with issues if you can identify five or ten that you have come and your president, and have to stick with all the time and you have got confidence in some of your support in its -- subordinance, i don't see that is the optimum but it would be an increasingly complicated world exactly what you're going to have to do and you do then have to find capable advisers

that you can rely on and if you find you can't rely on them you better get rid of them pretty fast. so, on and going to start by saying that while yes, i think that george bush, bush 41, i never remember the numbers but i think that's the one, that's the president on some of the most closely, i thought he was superb on foreign affairs. i think he lost on domestic issues. ..

>> i don't know if you saw the news this morning with north korea having renounced the armistice so we're now supposedly back at the condition of the war that i thought, that was my warburg by forgot all about that. i thought maybe we had one bad. but i am not so sure now. that is now back with us.

we can assume it is all a bunch of hogwash i do not happen to think it is. i just don't think you can count on those people having any sensible reactions to anything. r.i. would not be surprised if they put one-off somewhere but this world is increasingly, we have gone from the relative stability of the cold war we went from the cold war the only thing we had to worry about is of the soviet union finally got a leader who got drunk one night and finally pushed the button and was prevented from doing so by his six generals the that normally have 10 in the way but there was a stability in the world between the united states and the soviet union and the chinese to know a world in which there is no stability

you can count on for more than 50 minutes. one example we have learned what has happened today whether it is or is not a significant event we will find out at some point* or another. put this sort of issue means have the president organizes himself and his staff of organizing himself as best as we can, he will have to deal with problems there is a problem that i did not have to do with. it will not be fun. anything that can be done to help the president organize himself is terribly important to get it done because we spent 15 years in ignoring fed nuclear weapons issue. the one way we should have paid attention to it which was

not trying to negotiate some sort of agreement on reducing there rather get the nuclear powers to come together to say that maybe it could not have done done but we never really tried. we should have come together and said to everyone who wanted to build a nuclear weapon, if you put your finger in the hard water, what you call it? the light-water, excuse me, whenever it is. we will cut off. we should have done that 15 years ago. we did not now we will mean that this president or the one that follows will be convinced with an exchange of nuclear weapons somewhere in this world between now and the end of his second term if he has won. >> i think certainly one of the things that comes out of

the book today is that peter saw presidents to succeed is one that encouraged debate and honesty and encouraged a civility and are able to translate that as the two of you have said into consistency and policy. think you'd been extraordinarily pleased that we have been able to have this discussion around this book can extract lessons that have come for in this discussion today. a unless he would be looking at us saying they did this because of something i wrote what fools. [laughter] peter rodman of a great book "presidential command" and it is an honor to do this in his memory. thank you very much. [applause] >> the late peter rodman former senior fellow in foreign policy of the

brookings institution served on the national security council of presidents nixon, ford, reagan and george h. w. bush. he died in 2008. you can read his biography and other articles at the brookings institution website. and searches name. >> the perseus the books group here at the book expo america of this year public affairs is doing something different susan weinberg is the publisher. what are you doing? >> the perseus but group decided to take up a challenge this year to publish a book in the 48 hours on the show floor from the opening day thursday at 4:00 thursday saturday at 4:00 and we will have a book party than a few would like to stop by and celebrate. the idea to do the book that bass was showcase a lot of

things that are happening in publish saying that the way the electronic files and format and all of the printing technology how much is changing and opening new opportunities in publishing and bookselling. the other was to continue and more intensify collaboration of other companies. lots of companies with other ideas that can be very innovative and when we announced we were doing this week that we would ask them to help and many of them came to us we want to be a part of it and we want to helper we have over 20 companies participating in the project with us to create the book. >> host: let's walk over here because you have a goal schedule of events and a story board. >> of course, the first thing we had to do what is of what? we have the idea for publishing but we had to have a good book. the way we created was from crowd sourcing restarted it

website and spent one months of fighting people through all kinds of social the working mechanisms inviting people within the industry and outside of the liberal to contribute to the book. we have had contributions from new zealand, japan, all over the united states it has been a from project. >> host: what is the book about? >> guest: seek wells fargo it is the first line of as the eye and yet written a sequel to any book ever written. it could be like call me ishmael which is moby dick dieing or it could be something like it was not the best of times it got a lot worse than a tale of three cities. we created the idea and of 4:00 on thursday restarted the editing process of picking and organizing the sequel winds. we also said to the art director we are not sure how the book will, also renewed a few covers that we can look at

and pick the best one when we have contributions and comments from people at the show. >> host: when you pick a cover is that one of the first things? >> guest: net one of the first things when you talk about a book but when you are getting ready to actually published a book. that is when you know, what the book is and this is an important marketing tool and it is the closing the book wares in public isa we never send it out naked. >> host: we have four covers why did you decide on this one? >> guest: when we put these four together on the board we got a lot of comments but this thing i love to watch it is they're very quick of this reaction once you start talking about a cover, for getting people in bookstores don't discuss the covers. they have been very quick this roulette -- reaction. when we have these four covers up here, everyone's i went to this one. >> host: why? >> guest: reit ast people

about that they said it is about books and that common-sense the wells are from older books and here they are and their loved about the cover then the electronic greeting device right there. some people got it right away some people did not get it they may enjoy it more because the cover had a two-step response. this we felt would fade and people could not read it or see it and these two were fund but people really gravitated to the books on this cover. we also had he will join us at a cover meeting that was pre-announced we had booksellers people that happen to come by and they came and gave us comments. we also send the covers out on twitter at the same time and we got a response from people who have been falling the response with their comments and this was a very, very heavily unanimous choice. so that was a collaborative process and we decided this

would be the cover its. >> host: we have a finest copy of the book. two things are is the introduction and the editor. >> the editorial director of public affairs talking with jeffrey who was a linguistic university of california berkeley came up with the idea together. lived edited the book and we asked seth if you write the introduction it, jeff has written several books for us he is the common tours on npr and had to seem to have the right touch. >> host: let's pick one page and see what we find and you can explain it. as i lay on dead and dying. >> guest: there were a lot of the zombie contributions. there were a lot of contributions from certain authors. i don't know if i have the right in front of me but if we

come over here we do have some people who have that information is the you have the sheet of the most sequel titles? that is what we're looking for write now. >> host: what are you working on? >> guest: i am working on the digital audio edition. right now i am 18 for a final audiophiles to come from michigan from our audio studio i will prove them right here in the booth with headphones and once i am okay i will up love them and let vendors know that the honorable music is an overdrive they can pull down the files and put them on their sites and we will have the audio edition. >> host: you have already recorded in the audio edition? why in michigan? >> we have a great relationship with the studio.

he has done good work for us he is fast and reliable and he was willing to do it in one day. we got him the manuscript at 11:00 a.m. and he got us at 5:00 this morning. he is say it book producer. now did digital downloadable audio will be available to sell and distributes. >> host: will lead be available on the amazon kindle? >> guest: every format that there is it includes the amazon kendall, "the reader" everybody who says we want to offer this. and i believe many you can buy these books today. >> host: susan my bird how important is the book to your business? >> bair very important because they represent innovation and away to continue reading another form and format.

the evokes right now are a small percentage but the potential is how they add to the late rita book is significant. in this world where everything happens so quickly we have been able to get them out faster than the print books and sometimes women have but book that is very time sensitive that we did on the financial crisis we release it as the e- book it took fibers six weeks to get the physical book out there but the message was so * sensitive will let the readers have as the e- book first. here we are showing all of the things we're doing today which is the second full day of publication and will end at 4:00. we have the book website created right here at the booth. we created a reading group guide it was a great meeting where we have librarians and company reading choices that

does guides and helps groups organize the seventh you do that on a normal basis? >> guest: not for all books with a significant number. a lot of publishers do it is a popular way to help teachers doing the books in classrooms and librarians we had a couple of librarians join us and we have some great ideas for a reading group based on books the sequel but also pulls and a lot of interest in reading and ways of talking about books and what people remember and how they matter. teachers said we will use this as a classroom assignment and we suggest that stores put that in the store with a lot of classics around it. it was a very collaborative project. it is something fun for everyone to have it is a role to play a part of the meeting at 1:00 will be very interesting. that is our decision whether and how many to print for the general public.

we have some order for the book in the system, we're talking to other retailers people are hearing about the book and we will have two with imperfect information how may copies to print and how we can best get them out there. our goal is to get finished physical copies distributed by june 15 which is very aggressive and frankly if he were doing on the ground you could not do that quickly but with this project we believe that we can. >> host: is there ever a time you decide we will not print any copies? >> guest: no. not a book that we have already decided to publish. that does not happen. people have talked about a business model what it will launch a book as the e- book first? and then bring in the other copies that is a model some people talk about that we traditionally have not gotten there yet. a 3:30 p.m. we will have a q and a with all participants over 20 companies who are

participating with us and any press and booksellers someone to come and ask questions about the project and a 4:00 p.m. we opened the champagne december one-two be sure to intergroup -- introduce clive. what was your role in this? >> i am the main editor of the book so my role is the front and. cooked up with the public affairs officer and with might and israel colleagues realize that all submissions coming through the website and decided how we would select them and arrange them within the book. we did that on thursday come on friday we saw how how they had all but now and what the pages look like really moved a lot of material around we found we are a little short and a little longer that is

what happens when you design pages through a database but at the end about 4:30 p.m. yesterday we ended up with 144 pages and have proofread at least twice. it was the proofreading job from hell because not only are we doing in a convention center with a lot of distractions but so many sequels are very these variations out on the theme is hard to keep track of you have seen it before. >> host: the website is up and running? >> guest: it is. we had to close contributions for the printed book on thursday for the sake of the project we wanted everything to take place within 45 hours. we said thursday at 4:00 p.m. but you can still contribute on the website. >> host: let's see the final website if you can pull led up. this has been a 48 hour project to produce this

book, it in a long-term project, what would you do differently than what you are doing here at the convention center? >> guest: probably we would just give people a little more time to do the task. we are truly publishing this book everything we do we have done for this book but we don't often say everybody's sit in the same room and do it at the same time. every task we have done if you try to do every book is quickly people may get tucker out so we would not keep them there from 4:00 p.m. until 11:00 p.m. and one editing session we will let them do it over a few weeks but really it is compressing what we do and doing the things, all of the things that is really necessary for publishing. >> host: we want to show the website book thus be 13.com. from public affairs you can see the website. thank you both very much.

>> oxford university press in 2009 has several new titles coming out. the senior editor with oxford, susan what are some of the new titles? >> would be thrilled for the we have a range of new books and i think i will talk more about political ones than the ones that have applications. real enemies i know there's a lot of talk about conspiracy theories see them all the time on the internet. this is the author who spends time saying what does that mean for american democracy and how does the fact there have been a conspiracy theories over a long period of time what does that mean about americans and what they think about their government and do they trust government? it looks at pearl harbor, the fear of using government and what happened after the kennedy assassination and there is huge literature and it comes up to 9/11.

unfortunately it will never go away so the author spent a lot of time and internet sites and to set for research. >> host: what comes naturally? >> has won two awards it has worked for 20 years on this a book on i miscegenation lot. she said it was an important topical issue by the time she finished did it should not be so unusual any more. it should not be something that people still have an issue at a book travels from the civil war up to the president and looks at the many different groups that have been defined as non-white and the laws that have been made against all sorts of unions and love relationships in a society and help people got basically taken to court and others judged what their race was. she ties into gay marriage today so it is a topical book in the sense that the proposition to california is not much different than what

miscegenation law was all about 27 what award did the author win? >> guest: to awards. one was for political institution from political history and of price for a beloved historian who passed away a few years ago the best book of cultural history. the author is a professor at northwestern history at northwestern organic also a professor of ethnic studies. it is her second book and it is a labor of love. >> host: the day wall street exploded. >> guest: it is excellent not about the economy but a book set in the twenties when there was actually a real explosion on wall street. this is the first book and a wonderful storyteller beverly gauge eight instructor at universities to talks about america and the age of terror. she started this well before 9/11 nablus she was talking about what happened on wall

street and it is a real detective story. >> host: one other book is the wilsonian moment. it is a new generation of scholarship and a new methodology. what is really exciting there has spent such a division between people who study the united states and the rest of the role. focusing on countries and individual topics, this is a person who is part of the new generation of national historic looking at woodrow wilson's ideas coming out of the 1919 paris peace conference that ended world war i and he was spreading rhetoric about self-determination and nationalism and giving colonial people the hope that they could form their own nation so he takes the wilsonian ideas and look at how they traveled with different countries and led to uprisings the following year china at career at and egypt and those are only some of the

country's because this author who reads a lot of languages and spends time in all countries during archival work and brings together an intellectual political and global history it is the first book and also has won two awards. >> host: where does the title come from? >> guest: it is something the author believes the spirit of that age. the lincoln momentous important but the wilsonian moment gave rise to a sense of fulfillment there'd be a new future coming out of the ashes of world war i. >> host: oxford university press and a couple of their new titles.

>> host: welcome. i am ralph peters it is my distinct privilege and a lot of fun to be able to speak today with one of the most talented young writers i have ever match. a very brave young man of 1318 his book, it "to live or to perish forever" two tumultuous years in pakistan" they were tumultuous.

great to see you. congratulations on a terrific book i can only be me in the jal less. this book has a great back story. at the ripe old age of 27, newly married, he persuaded your wife that a great idea for a honeymoon would be to go to pakistan and live among the people for two years. set aside how she responded but you are still married so obviously it worked. can you tell us more about the background of this terrific period of what it is really like? you nailed it, the people, the smells, the feel of the air took me back. >> guest: thank you. right at the time i was graduating from finishing graduate school in the summer of 2005 i received eighth fellowship from current world affairs it is a foundation funded with a crane foundation and they send people on to

your writing fellowships i got it originally to go to iran they had major problems getting in i said i don't know anything like pakistan but it seems like a dynamic entry. they sent reader the only instruction being too not come home right about what you see it i thought about i can handle that and to make matters even more err complicated i left on valentine's day and a bribe to pakistan at the time the protest against the publication of the blasphemous cartoons was going on and i was frightened i would literally walk off the airplane and be ripped apart. it did not go that way it was a fantastic two years. that is the basis of the book and how we got there to begin with 47 i read a book as a reader and writer but it is very much your. it is astonishing the