readers at gw or at costco? [laughter] >> guest: costco was kind of tough. people are shopping big. shopping for big things there, and they want you to deliver the best product you can, and i told them, read the book. >> host: pretty good. so, mr. secretary, as we heard, in the introduction, you have worked in city government, federal government, you have been a republican, democrat, you're a lawyer, an army intel officer, you have been longtive assistant, special assistant, executive assistant, which in as -- director of the u.s. office of special rights, congressman, white house budget director, white house chief of staff, so what is left on your bucket list?

>> guest: well, i'm waiting for the pope's position to open up. [laughter] i enjoy being back home in carmel valley, as i said, i have a walnut ranch out there and it's nice to be home working with a different set of nuts. i'm enjoying that. >> host: almost all of your life experiences and your positions are enviable but you have done one thing i'm not sure everyone here would be jealous of. you have been roommates with senator schumer. >> guest: yeah, we were all kind of bachelors back here and our wives were back in the district, and we came back to washington and we were all kind of living separately, and george miller had a house up on the hill, and george miller eventually -- we were all friends and would good out to din. he said why don't we all kind of stay together?

so we all moved into george miller's house and it was four congressmen, myself, george miller, of course, our already, chuck schumer, and a guy named marty russo from illinois, and chuck sumer and i were on the bottom floor and he slept on the couch, and i had a bed that i moved into one corner of the room downstairs. this was truly animal house. this is really animal house. and chuck was the kind of person -- i mean, chuck would munch on anything. my son every once in a while would come back and stay with me, and he would buy cereal because we didn't have any cereal there. we didn't have any food. we just -- most of the time ate out. so he would by cereal for himself, and schumer, before heed go to bed, would eat the damn cereal. and my son would always wake up and say, what he hell happened

to my cereal? i said, i'm sorry, that's schumer took care of that. so, it's an early washington lesson. >> host: mr. secretary, you lived the most amazing life and for those of us here in washington there's so many aspects to learn from, and to -- in wow forthy fights "you go back to the beginning and talk about when you were running for congress, and you talk about tip o'neill, later was your speaker, came out to campaign for you and it didn't go so well. >> guest: well, no. tip came out and it was wonderful to have him. big irishman from boston, came out, and we did a fundraiser with democrats, and tip went up there and he said, i just -- i want you to do everything possible to work for leo

panetta. >> host: in good friend leo. >> guest: and he said it several times, and fortunately most of the crowd kind of took it in stride because he was enjoying himself. he had a few scotchs and was in good shape. and everybody enjoyed the evening, but from then on, when i did get elected, and i went to congress, there was another congressman whose name was norma net a. he was japanese-american. and tip would constantly wind up calling me norm, and called maneta leon, and the real problem was the carter white house screwed it up as will. the carter white house, when they italian prime minister came to town, they invited norm maneta to the white house. and when the japanese prime minister came to town, they invited me. and finally norm and i put a baseball team together and we

said we'd played under the sign of the rising pizza. this was our team. >> host: one thing we see in this book, mr. secretary, is wheeling and dealing with congress, see you helping one pass for president clinton's crime bill. we saw in speaker o'neill a very effective -- what is that he did and you did then that now is missing? >> guest: they rolled up their sleeves, and wanted to get it done. probably the best way to say it. tip o'neill, who was political, democrat from boston, all politics was local with tip, but tip had a heart that i think was unmatched in terms of wanting to do the right thing for the country. and so whether it was reagan or

carter or whoever was president, tip was really devoted to trying to help not only the president but the country, and so even though it might be somebody from the opposite party, he felt it was important to move legislation, to move proposals forward. i'll never forget with ronald reagan, when reagan was riding a high, and we brought the bug to the floor, and i was on the budget committee at the time, and we brought the budget to the floor, and we lost the budget book. lost the budget book. which is devastating to majority party to wind up bringing a budget to the floor and have it be lost. but a lot of the southern democrats sported ronald reagan and that happened. and tip didn't miss a beat. lost it, republican budget came

up, it was passed, he didn't stop it. he didn't shut down the congress. he basically said, this place votes by majority rule, and it did. and he lost the vote. but he said, we're going to move on, and we did. and what was refreshing about him was that i think he really respected the fact that the house as an institution has to have the opportunity to vote on issues, and he also believed -- you hear it talked about now, which is regular order. but what regular order meanses the way the damn legislative process is supposed to work. president sends up a proposal, it goes a committee, goes to a subcommittee, subcommittee holds hearings, subcommittee marks up, goes to the full committee, full committee marks up, adopts the bill, goes to the rules committee, and then goes to the

floor, where amendments can be offered on the floor. and that process allows members to be a part of the process, which is missing today. if members can be part of the process, if they can be engaged, then they own a little piece of that bill. and as a result of it, they'll help move it through. that's why a lot offings in my time was bipartisan. >> host: that's also something else missing now, that adept working of congress, and you have said that there was a grand budget bargain to be had between boehner and the president. why didn't that happen? >> guest: well, you know, look, first and form most -- foremost, i remember when the whole simpson-bowles recommend came out -- this was a commission that the president appointed. the president -- when they

reported their report, and it was bipartisan, some members that didn't support it, but it had a bipartisan vote supporting simpson-bowles, and the president asked me, should he support it? i said, you should. you should support this, mr. president. it's your commission, they've been working at it, it's bipartisan, you may not like each of to the pieces but the fact they came together is important. and i said, look, if you support this, chances are the congress is going to have hard time with this proposal. but you will be in the right place. you'll be in the right place. well, for whatever reason, he didn't support it, and so we go to the budget negotiations, and there was this kind of back and forth, and joe biden was kind of leading the charge, trying to develop an approach. i think there was a moment there where everybody kind of stood by

what they thought they had agreed to, that we could have had a budget, but there was some last-minute wavering and i don't know whether it was the president or boehner -- probably both of them, they were getting heat probably. boehner getting heat from the republicans. i'm sure the president was getting heat from the democrats. but at that point, when there has somewaverring, that i think spelled trouble then. >> host: i know that you hear an earful as well from people on congress -- democrats as muching a republican -- how they feel neglected by this president. why is it that he has never managed that relationship with the hill, even with the democrats? >> guest: i think that -- part of the process in this town has to be the engagement with people

who are in political positions up on the hill, who you may not like. let face it. governing is tough. governing means you have to deal with people you may not like. 435 members of congress, 100 members of the senate, all from different parts of the country, some are smart, some are not smart, in are honest, some are dishonest, some want to do the right thing, some don't. it's a real mixture. it's cross-section of america represented up there. and there are a lot of people -- particularly today there's probably more in terms of numbers -- of people that are just very tough to deal with. and yet, the challenge in legislation is to engage people. i mean, why -- >> host: why doesn't the president do that? >> guest: i think the president believes that part of it is that he presents an issue and the logic of an issue, and that people should embrace it, and he

is not -- the difference between bill clinton and president bara, both are extremely bright, both capable, quick studies when you brief them in terms of understanding issues, they ask great questions, and deep down, both want to do the right thing for the country. make no mistake about it. they want to do the right thing for the country. the difference is, bill clinton loves the political engagement. loved the process of rolling up your sleeves, dealing with individuals. he loved politics. he loved dealing with members. he knew every member's district, members would come in and he would say to them, you're running the wrong campaign. you know, you're running on the wrong issues. let me tell you what you ought to run on. and he would tell them what the issues were they would run on. and so he was engaged in that process, and that makes a difference. i think president obama is not

into that kind of personal political engagement. he wants to work with people, he wants to work with people on the issues, but to get it done, it's like everything else, it is a personal process of basically wooing people, listening to them, understanding what their needs are, understanding how you can convince them what is in their interests to do the right thing. it is that entire process that ultimately results in getting things done, and that is where the president has to engage in terms of dealing with the issues that now confront the country. >> host: one of the many personal relationships you explore in your book is your relationship with the former prime minister of israel. clear lay lack of trust there. tell us about that. >> guest: he and i were friends going back to the clinton administration when i was chief

of staff. i had the opportunity to work with ehud. we developed a strong friendship. he has a really remarkable background in terms of the history of his family, and he always used to ask me the history of my family, and i told him that. so we both kind of shared just warm family histories. he played the piano. i play the piano. >> host: who better? >> guest: i'm sure he is better. but we both enjoyed classical piano, and he is somebody who i found you could really talk with in terms of what is in the interests of israel, what's in the interests of the united states, and how can we work together to try to serve the interests of both? and as defense minister, when i was secretary of defense, we had

some tough issues to deal with because at one point, netanyahu had indicated that israel was prepared to go ahead and strike iran, because they were very concerned that iran was developing this enriched fuel, that they could speed to the development of a nuclear weapon, and so their feeling was, this represented a threat to the state of israel, and they had the obligation -- that's how they viewed things -- they had the obligation to protect their country and that's what they were going to do, and i can remember president was worried about that. that we were suddenly going to have a war break out in the middle east. i talked with ehud about it. i said, look, we share the same goal. we do not want iran to have a nuclear weapon. but if you attack them, you're just going to give them black eye, they're going to come back you will have destroyed the international coalition that has

developed all of these sanctions and put pressure on iran. i said, and besides that, they'll then come back with a vengeance in terms of developing a nuclear weapon. whereas if you -- if we do this together, united states has an even greater capability to make sure that we really do damage to their ability to develop enriched fuel. and we talked it through. and ultimately ehud thought that we did have a better capability to frankly do it if we had to -- i think the combination of him, talking with netanyahu and others, convinced him that they were willing to hold off until we could see what happens with iran and ultimately the negotiations. so, it was a strenuous moment for me, but the joy i had was working with him. we also worked together on providing military aid to israel, and one of the weapons

we provided to them was a weapon that involves the missiles that can strike down the missiles that were coming out of gaza recently, and it was very effective. at bringing down those missiles, almost 90% in terms of effectiveness. and we -- both of us were responsible for helping to put that weapon in place. >> host: in the introduction we just heard there was a quiet from a very favorable review of "worthy fight" in the by david ignatius. the headline of the review is: why didn't panetta speak up sooner? would it have been better to speak out at the time and perhaps resign on principle? >> guest: well, frankly issue was always one who believed in speaking up and letting the president know my views.

i never hesitated that way and i have done that throughout my life. i always thought it was important. i did it with bill clinton and with barack obama, which is to tell them what you think. tell them if you think they're going to do the right thing or the wrong thing, they may not like you, they may not like your views, but on the other hand they should. president of the united states should not have just a bunch of yes people around him. >> host: does this president have that? >> guest: i think at the time i was there with the national security council, no, there were a lot of people -- >> host: what about now. >> guest: secretary gates and secretary clinton others that spoke their mind. i don't know now. i honestly don't itch can't speak to how it works now there some good people there, obviously, but -- >> host: do you worry there aren't enough voices? >> guest: i worry that you have got to have individuals on the

staff or in the national security council that are will tolling challenge what is being presented and tell the president about their concerns about certain paths that it may be taken. that is extremely important. i can't tell you how true this is, but i've seen it as chief of staff to bill clinton, and i've seen it in the white house under this president, and i'm sure it's true under other presidents. people get in a room with the president of the united states and they're immediately intimidated. and they don't want to say something to the president that might offend him. and as a matter of fact, one of the things i've often sensed, even in national security council, sometimes everybody is trying to read the president. where is he going? and then they all try to then march in line. and that is really important for a president of the united states to be exposed to a lot of

different views. president ultimately makes the decision, but to be supposed to a number of views that -- be exposed to a number of views that can present to him, what are the consequences of different decisions and what is the impact in terms of the country? so to go to your question, would state my position, and present it, and sometimes the president would agree, sometimes not. i do have to say in the four years i was there, i think the president largely agreed with the operations we were involved in, agreed with what we were trying to do at the department of defense. >> host: that's not much of an endorsement. largely agreed with the operations? >> guest: well, he embraced the operations but there was always some of the operations where you had to -- there was a discussion as to just exactly how we would do it. and we might do some revisions as a result of that. but he strongly supported the operations that we were involved with, and i think he was right in doing that.

certainly he supported the operation against bin laden, which was very risky, and i give him tremendous credit for making the right decision. >> host: a line in your book that has gotten the most air play is too often in my view, the president relies on the logic of a law professor rather than the passion of a leader. >> guest: there's nothing wrong with having the approach of a law professor in teaming with some of the issues you have to confront at president. i don't mean the presidents who use a law professor's kind of approach to analyze issues, but in the end they need to have a heart of a warrior. they need to be able to take on the battle and get it done, and that is the challenge. i've seen this president do it, but i would like to see him do

it more. i would like to see him engage in the battles that have to be fought, in order to try to get legislation passed on the hill. i would like to see him engaged in the effort to try to do what needs to be done to get a budget deal passed, to get immigration reform passed, to get infrastructure funding done, to get trade legislation passed, too do an energy bill for this country. these are all important issues. and i know that congress is resist extent and they're tough and they're people there that basically want to bring -- tear down the government and not make it work. but you can't just sit back and say, i guess we can't get it done. you cannot say that. you have to continue to push. you have to continue to look for openings. you have to continue to work with those people who will work with you. it demands constant, constant pressure, to be able to make it work. that's the nature of being a

president of the united states, you have to constantly be in the ring fighting for what is right for this country. have you heard of. [applause] >> host: have you heard from the president since the book came out? sunny i have not. we sent him a copy of the book. actually, we sent it to him a couple months ago. never heard anything in terms of commenting on the book. >> host: how do you take that? >> guest: i don't know how. i assume that they probably have now read the book. >> host: what do you think your next encounter with the president will be like? >> guest: you know, i really have been around almost 50 years in politics, and i have engaged presidents and i've engaged

members of congress, and sometimes you challenge people, sometimes you fight people in the process, but in the end, you roll up your sleeves and say, that's all part of what our democracy is all about. sometimes we agree, sometimes we disagree, and i respect those that i work with and i respect this president, i want him to succeed in every way. i respect the office of the presidency. and i certainly will continue to respect him and the office no matter where i am. >> host: cover of sunday's "washington post" outlook had a second piece by aaron david mill with the headline-disappointer in chief. why has this president failed to meet so many people's expectations. >> well, you know, look. i think that the president has -- certainly in the first

term -- i think he did take on the issue of the economy, and was able to turn the economy around. i think that is to his credit. he took on the issue of health care, and was able to put the affordable care act in place. that is to his credit. i think he made the decision on bin laden, which was a tough decision. i think that is to his credit. i think that for the first four years, this president was a very strong president, when it came to being able to push the issues that he wanted and being able to provide the leadership on foreign policy issues that he needed to provide. i think that in the process of doing that, there are these deliberations, there are -- you know, part of the process in the white house -- and i remember bob gates being concerned about it, he wrote in the book. which was that when you're in the national security council

and you're secretary of defense you feel like you want to be able to have the president hear what you have to say, and i think there was a sense that the staff in the white house sometimes got to the president first or tried to move the president in a certain direction, and then wanted the defense department to go along with that particular position. and i think that is what offended bob gates because he is somebody who believes in the process of policymaking in the -- >> host: did you have a similar -- >> guest: i had some of the same experiences in dealing with the staff and for that matter, i'm sure that secretary clinton did as well. so some of that is frustrating. >> host: but just to stick on this for a second. what did you experience that either disappointed or frustrated you in regard to the staff? >> guest: you know, it's the process of having your policy people develop a strategy, develop the elements of the strategy as to what you think

should be presented, and as you're about to present it, having white house staff basically say no, no, no, don't do that. do this, or do something else, to try to effect exactly what you're presenting. and i think the president is entitled to the best views from the secretary of defense, from his military leaders, and that those shouldn't be shaped necessarily by what the white house staff wants. what that white house staff needs to do is to allow a process that provides the best views from the secretary of state, from the secretary of defense, to be presented, so that the president ultimately can make a decision. not to back-door the process in order to shape those decisions before they go to the president. >> host: you have seen this president behind the scenes more than almost anyone, and as a leader, as a manager, as a person, what's he like behind

the escapes? you write about how president clinton, to blow off steam and doodle would work crossword puzzles. what does this president do? >> guest: i do don't think he does crossword puzzles. i think he is very serious-minded. he basically looks at the issues, reasons the issues. >> host: what's he like? does he joke around? what is he like? >> guest: no. no. he -- look, i think he likes basketball. we talk about basketball sometimes. likes she the sports going on with'll talk about that. but he night -- >> host: he is not a chatter. >> guest: not a chatter. sure as hell isn't bill clinton when it comes to chatter. [laughter] >> guest: much more serious, much more disciplined. bill clinton was not very disciplined. [laughter] >> guest: but breck broke is very disciplined in the way he

behaves. so a very different character. for me, i know bob gates kind of reflected a frustration with that process. but i have to tell you for me -- i understand kind of that process, having been through it as chief of staff and certainly having been in politics, i understand that kind of process that goes on there. in the end, i really do think that even though we had to fight our way to it, even though we had to fight sometimes the white house staff in the process, that in the end, the president would pretty much agree with the positions that we recommended, and gates said that and i said that in the book as well. >> host: doesn't sound like a very pleasant place. >> guest: you don't want to go to the white house if you're looking for pleasant. [laughter] >> guest: go to the caribbean or go to hawai'i. but don't go to the white house. the white house is -- it is a

place where you have to engage. if you want to get it done, you have to roll up your sleeves and have to get into the process. and i frankly -- i like the process of engaging with people. enthough they may not agree with you, the challenge of talking, of debating, of saying why you should do something, was really -- it's really important. let me give you an example. on -- we had captured a number of russian shies who had been placed here -- russian spies who had been placed here, and we lad to proceed to arrest those spies because we were concerned one of the might go back to russia. so there's ten of them. very smart move by the russians they place hem here a long time ago, they developed their community relations, they married, have children, they

become part of the community, and then ultimately they move into spying. fortunately we were aware of what they were doing. we were going to see to arrest them, and the problem was that the president was meeting with medvedev, and so there were some people that said, you know, maybe we shouldn't arrest them. because it might upset our relations with russia. and i said, excuse me? we have russian spies here. i want you to envision the "washington post" headline if we don't arrest these people and pick them up. and even though there had been some debate, i could see the lights go on in their eyes. when i said that. and the result was they said, okay, we should go ahead and do

this, and we did, and thank god we did it. but that part of the process. >> host: the takeway there when the secretary says, excuse me -- mr. secretary, while you were shopping at costco, josh earnest said our strategy against the islamic state is succeeding. his full sentence is: we're in the early days of the execution of that strategy but certainly the early evidence indicates that this strategy is succeeding." >> guest: you know, i think that the right pieces are in place. i think it's being tested, though. >> host: because -- >> guest: i think the jury is still out as to whether or not ultimately we're going to be on the right path in terms of dealing with isis itch think the right pieces are in place.

we have our troops trying to help with the iraqis. we're going to arm the rebels. we have airstrikes, strong coalition put together to try to go after it. but isis is well-trained-well-funded, they are individuals who are well-armed, and they have combat command that knows how to make this move on the ground. they're going against cab ban any. they're moving in anbar province. they are kidding us on different fronts. i think we are the ones that are going to have to be able to adapt to their strategy and be able to confront them. we're in the process of doing that. i have full confidence that we'll be able to do that. but it is going to take time. it is going to take time. and we may very well suffer some losses in the interim. >> host: mr. secretary, when you say the jury is out on whether they're on the right path, what

worries you about the current path? >> guest: i think the key is that you really do need to have sources on the ground that can tell you what is happening and what is taking place. so that you know what the targets are that have to be struck, you know what the dynamic is in terms of the ground forces that are moving and trying to make a difference. now, in iraq, i think it's pretty clear that we can develop, i think, iraqi security forces to be able to go in and retake the lan that was lost. the real key there is whether or not we can get the sunnies to be part of the effort. if we can get the sunnies to be part of national guard, part of an effort to do it, then i feel very confident that we're going to be able to move that in the right direction. syria is a much different ball game. it's chaotic, we don't know what is going on the ground and the key is can we develop the

sources we need in order to get that done? understand, in counterterrorism, which we have been involved with for a long time now, the key to counterterrorism is having the ability to identify those targets that the leadership -- what the targets should be and being able to hit those targets. to develop those sources in pakistan took us three years. to develop those sources in the yemen took is one year. so it's going to take time to develop the sources of information we need in order to be able to conduct the operations that i think would be effective at disrupting and defeating isis. >> host: one more on this. on sunday, on "state of the union," senator mccain said that candy crowley of isis, they're winning and we're not. >> guest: i don't -- i think that's going pretty far for senator mccain to say that's the case, because they obviously

have moved forward. they've gained territory. they do represent a threat. but these airstrikes have been effective at stopping the momentum at really inhibiting their ability to move as fast as they wanted to move. so we have been effective at stopping the momentum. the real question is, can we continue to do that? can we continue that pace? and can we continue the toe hit the right targets? so that we are effective in using air strikes? that's going to be the challenge. i really do think that we have come a long way in this war against isis, and that we have at least set them back. the real challenge now is can we move against them in a way that cannot only disrupt them but defeat them? >> host: mr. secretary issuing mention secretary gate's autobiography a couple of timed. you have a great moment in "worthy fights pechowski when you're getting ready to make

this extraordinary move over to secretary of defense and you first learn the job would be open when secretary gates took you aside after a meeting and said, leon, i'm about ready to go and i just want you to know that i'm going to recommend you to succeed me, and in the book you point out that he left something out. in the book you say i didn't know then, and on alarm from book's memoirs he also suggested hillary clinton, colin powell and michael bloomberg. >> guest: that's right. and bob gates, when he said that, we had gone to lunch for -- used to have regular lurch ford the intelligence operations cia, dni, and others within the intelligence operations. dia. to talk about intelligence issues with the secretary. and so it was after one of those lunches when he pulled me aside and said, i want you to become

secretary of defense. and i said, bob, no, i am -- i really do think it's time for me to go home. we just got bin laden. i said, it's a good time to get the hell out of here and go home. you know? when you leave washington, leave on a high. and so i said, i've -- i really want to go home, and i've done this. we did well. and i think it's necessary he said no, need you to do this. i think you'd -- you understand the troops, you understand the need to really protect them, and do it. and i just -- i really resisted. i said, go and get somebody else. look at others because there are others. i said, colin powell and others. they ought to be recommended and do the same thing. and then bill bailey, the cleave of staff, followed that up and

basically made the same offer, and i told bill, i said, look, talk to others. because this is -- i really don't want to do this, and i'll at the you the reason. i said, i don't want to stay beyond four years in the administration, and if i'm secretary of defense, frankly, you ought to have somebody that's going to stay longer in that position, and they said, no, that doesn't make any difference. you'd be great. do it, get it done. and i just said, no, i said, look at others. and try to make that decision. and then i think it was on one of the flights back to washington where the president called me directly and indicated he want ped me to take that position. and again, you know, throughout my life, when the profit the united states usually asks you do something out of respect nor office you do it. >> host: when you read your book, next to secretary gates' book, you have the feeling on

some of these national security questions there haven't so much been camps as we so often say in the press but there have been types between the president has either taken action or resisted action that is almost him and all the advisers on different sides. did you experience that? do you agree with that? >> guest: i have to say when i was there, that there was a very good give and take in the national security council, and that we all had a chance to kind of present our views to the president. look, matter of fact, when weapon did the bin laden operation and the president rent around the table and asked for everybody's views, many of the people around that table thought that the operation was too risky. i could understand it. we didn't know for sure whether bin laden was there. we were going have to fly 150 miles at night into pakistan, and be able to conduct

this commando operation, not really knowing what kind 0 resistance we would run into. so there were a lot of people around the table, including secretary gates, who was very concerned about the risks involved, as were others. and i remember when the president asked me, i said, look, mr. president, i have an old formula i've used going back to congress, which is that when you face a difficult decision, think about asking the ordinary citizen in your district if you knew what i knew, what would you do? and if the ordinary citizen knew that we had the best information on the location of bin laden since tora bora, and that this was the one opportunity to try to get our number-one enemy issue think the average citizen would say, you have to do this. and in addition to that, i had tremendous confidence in the

ability of special forces to conduct the operation. now can the president didn't decide that night. and frankly, if you had to count around the table, i'd say probably there was a majority that were opposed to the operation. >> host: and you were for. >> guest: i was for it, and i think secretary clinton was for and it others that were for it as well. but i didn't know. i didn't know. next morning, we had everybody in place, and the president called and said, it was a go. so, that process is okay. i think that's the way it should work. everybody has to present their views, but in the end, president of the united states make the final decision. >> host: the president talked about how he had to go to white house correspond ends dinner do a comedy routine and keep a secret. we learn in the book you also at that dinner were at time magazine's fable you, too had to

keep it a secret. >> guest: we all had to keep our mouths shut. we had to laugh at the jokes on bin laden that were going on at the time. >> host: when you were named dcia dish have to ask you -- when you were on the hill and even in the white house, you were very grateful -- you were not known for being discreet, and you become dcia, secretary of the defense, suddenly the keeper of the secrets. how did you pull that off? >> guest: it was tough as hell. it was tough as hell, because you're right. as a member of congress, i was very much engaged with the press, and would talk with them about what was going on, and was always enjoyed that relationship, and even in the white house as chief of staff,

enjoyed a good relationship with the press and with others, and really kind of liked the give and take of the process. and now i'm cia director and i got keep my mouth shut. and it's much tougher because you still want to have that engagement, you still want to be able to say, what's going on and what is happening? that is one of the things you like about this town, is the ability to kind of look at different pieces and who is on first and who is not getting anywhere, and who is trying to screw who. that's all kind of fun in this town. but as director of the cia, we had to keep it confidential. the good example was on the plane when i would take a trip as cia director, there was no press. we didn't bring press along. and so i'd go into a country and

they'd take me to wherever i went, visit with the leadership, went to visit with our stations, and got out of town. when i was secretary of defense, we had a whole hoard of people from the press that were part of our contingent. >> host: you got sick of jeremy? >> guest: i'd sic him on them. and trying to be able -- frankly, the first few times when i was secretary of defense, got in trouble for making comments that i would make to people on a -- swear a little bit. i'll share with you a story. gandolfini, when he played me in this movie "zero dark thirty" he wrote me a note and said, i'm italianer you're italian. i now you don't like the way i played this role but a i have a great deal of respect for you. i called him up and met him a

couple times before and said, look, i'm glad -- just glad they picked an italian to play my role. i said, but you did a great job in the movie. it's a movie. and you really were fine. he said, yeah, but you know, it was one thing that really bothered me, was that they made me swear a lot. and i said, you know, that's the one thing you got right. [laughter] >> host: and speaking of swearing, there's a rumor in here about rahm. >> guest: two things that rahm. >> host: you said there war a rumor after you worked together in the clinton white house he got his language from you? >> guest: i doubt that very much. and in here you tell about when he worked for you in the christian top white house, a brass plaque he had on his desk.

undersecretary for -- we can't say it. >> guest: i mixed audience iwant to bring -- >> guest: by the way, the story i do tell in the book is that rahm is a real go-getter. and he moves and he does it and times the'll step on anybody to try to get it done, and the president said -- actually, him and both george stephanopoulos, the president said issue really think we ought to move them out. i was becoming chief of staff and i had worked with george and of course had worked with rahm, and they're both very bright, capable people, who have a good puts on the political side, especially george, and rahm was somebody, when you till hem to take the hill, he takes the hill. so i didn't really want to lose them. so i kept saying to the pret, look, met me work with them. let me bring them under my wing and we'll try to make sure that

i control what they're involved with, but i really do think they could be valuable. and so i managed to -- instate of having them walk into meetings, weibring them in when i wanted them to be part of a meeting, and i think it really worked out and the president finally became comfortable with the fact they were there, because both of them were extremely bright, extremely able, and i think it's an example that sometimes people who are good may be tough, may be brazen, may get in your face, but the key is do they do the job? and if they do the job, you damn well want to keep them. >> host: we would love to bring you into the conversation. there's a couple microphones here. we'll take your questions while you're doing that, in this book, a number of times secretary clinton is on the same side of an argument as you, and the

effect of this will be that should there be a clinton presidential campaign, this will be very helpful. >> guest: well, i'll leave that up to the candidate to decide. there are some -- one of the thing is try to do in the book is to basically kind of shake the system a little bit so that people understand that in order to really get things done that you have to do, you do have to roll up your sleeves and you have to fight for it. >> host: you're saying he -- she did. what was she like behind closed doors. >> guest: she was very tough, but she was very thoughtful. she knew the issues. she didn't speak without knowing the issues and what she was saying, and i think it was always effective when she did speak up, peopleliened. >> host: because in a debate, if she wants distance from president obama she can say,

don't listen to me, listen to secretary panetta. i'm sure i'll be quoted a lot. good and bad. >> host: but was that your intention or simply the effect. >> no. write the book to basically tell my story, and i'm pleased i did. but others will do with it what they will. >> please say you you are. >> frank, i wonder if you could add governor of california to that bucket list. applause. >> guest: nowow, i've been in public life almost 50 years, and going back to my time in the army and all of the other positions that i've held, and i've really enjoyed it. i tell about the positions, and i really do now enjoy going back to my home, and to my wife, and to our dog, bravo, and our sons

and our grandchildren, and having the opportunity to enjoy my family. so, that's what i'm going to focus on. and also we do have an institute for public policy think panetta institute for public policy to inspire young people too get involved in public life. i real use do think we have to get young people interested in getting into public life because they represent our future, and very frankly, they're the ones that have to make a difference. >> host: good question. sir. >> kyle suspecter from d.c. a lot hat been made since your brock came out the centralization of the staff, talked about the white house staff controlling a lot. people saying that the national security council is making a lot of tactical decisions instead of providing strategy to the president. i'm curious, do you think that's the case, and if the process is broken as you mentioned earlier, what should we do to fix it? >> guest: ate a good question. by the way, is hasn't just

happened in this administration. this has been a process that's been developing over the last 20 or 30 years. and in white houses. and what has happened is that more and more power has become centralized in the white house. and in the white house staff. and a lot of what you're seeing is reflective of drawing kind of the decisionmaking process away from the departments, away from the department of state and the department of defense and bringing those decisions into the white house through the white house staff. now, no question, that proximity to the president is power. closer you are to the president, the more power you have. and so what has happened is that more and more of these issues, domestic issues, defense issues,

national security issues, are drawn into the white house, and the result is that that turns out usually a lot of the decisionmaking process and so when the departments are called in, they're playing catchup. they're playing catchup. and it distorts the way the process should work. and i understand -- presidents get comfortable with having the people around them. they can walk down the hall and walk into an office and talk to somebody about a problem is taking place or crisis, and so members of the cabinet are not really part of that process anymore. members of the cabinet are largely used for photo ops in the cabinet room in the white house. that's quite an extraordinary statement. >> guest: it's true. it's true. people who are very good, by the way, and capable -- most of you

probably -- you know a few of the cabinet members, most of them you don't remember who they are, and the fact is they're good people, trying to run their deeps. they know they're deeps, know the palsies but the aren't brought into the process the way they should be. and so somehow what you have to do -- i really do think you need to begin to reduce the amount of people in the white house staff. you still have the key positions, and you have to open that process up more to those that are in key positions in the administration so they can play a better role in providing their views not only to the white house but to the president at well...

i want to thank you for that. c thank you very much. it's one of the worthy fights that i talk about was the fight to protect our coastline. just very quickly during the reagan administration secretary watts ahead of the interior department, decided to put up the whole coast for sale and to the highest bidder for oil sales. i remember going to watt and saying what the heck are you doing? i understand you have to sell some of these areas for oil drilling but what about big sir? what about these national treasures? we want to protect them for the future and he said no let's make

the process worked through. that's when we were able to put legislation together that stopped that process for moving forward and ultimately what i did was introduce legislation to create the national marine sanctuary which protects the area for the future so it was a great cause. [applause] >> kai, i'm erica. thank you so much for being here. i am curious about the tension between short-term response and playing the long game when it comes to security and i'm just wondering how do you strike at balance and responding in a wa way -- versus laying the groundwork for sustainable future? >> while that's a very good question and the reality is that you know when you are implementing defense strategy it has to contain both the short-term element and the long-term element. the short-term element basically

using isis is an example is that you have to stop their momentum. that's the short-term strategy. you have got to stop them. so whatever it takes you have to basically stop them and at the same time you have to be thinking about what is the long-term strategy here? what are the long-term objectives and part of the problem that i think everybody recognizes is that i can see the objectives there. we can put the iraqi military together and i think we can get them in the right place. we have a ground force that can hopefully move against isis and regain the territory that has been lost. we can do that backing it up with airstrikes and with help from our people on the ground embedded with the force. i can see the objective there and i can see a clear path to really being able to push them back. syria is much more difficult and i don't see that kind of clear

picture about just exactly how are we going to deal with syria. yes we are going to try to develop an opposition force and that's going to take time. we don't even know if there's something called the moderate opposition force that we can really make work here so that's going to take time to do in the meantime what the hell do you do in terms of confronting ices? you need to have targets. you need to be able to stop them from doing some of the things that they are doing so syria is going to be a much tougher game to try to think out but if you were going to conduct a war against isis you have got to think both about the short-term to make sure you are putting them on their heels but you are also going to think about the long-term objective in order to ultimately defeat them. that's going to take a longer period of time. >> good evening. following on the last question but looking beyond iraq and seriously move into it. into a new era and i wonder what

you think about why, what is the goal for counterterrorism strategy? >> a good question. i consider all of what we are doing now is part of a kind of larger continuum that goes back to 9/11. we all have short-term memories in this country. i just had a chance to visit the 9/11 memorial in new york city and it's a punch in the stomach to walk through that memorial and see what happened to this country and what happened on that day. it's tough to bring those memories back but the fact is we were attacked. we were attacked by al qaeda. they killed 3000 people. as a result of that attack we went to war against al qaeda, a war on terrorism because they weren't enemy, because they

attacked us and because we did not want them to attack us again so we went to war. frankly we did a pretty good job at going after them using counterterrorism capabilities. we did undermine the strength of their leadership but now we have this metastasis taking place with isis with boko haram, with al-shabaab and other elements involved in terrorist. i think we need a comprehensive strategy to deal with terrorism. part of it is counterterrorism using that capability to target leadership to go after them to undermine their ability to ever be able to attack this country. part of this has to be cultural educational in dealing with how do we prevent young people from choosing al qaeda, choosing isis as something that they would do. that is a much tougher strategy but it has to be part of how we

address the threat of terrorism. we can't just do this on the military side. we have got to do this on the side of how do we improve the opportunities for the future, their education, their ability to enjoy the opportunities that life has to offer. to do that, we are going to have to work with other arab countries to get that across. saudi arabia is doing some of that. the uae is doing some of that. i think we have to incorporate those kinds of strategies as part of the effort to address this war on terrorism. >> i'm a student and public policy. thank you very much for your public service. so what do you think about the role of the united states compared to the role of the united nations and international peace and security? thanks. >> a real good question again. you know obviously all of us

would love to have a united nations that could work effectively to try to deal with the crisis in the world and i think that was the design of franklin roosevelt and harry truman in establishing the united nations, that this would be the primary vehicle to hopefully deal with crisis, to hopefully deal with the challenges of the world. unfortunately the united nations has fought down particularly in the security council and its ability to respond to crisis. almost anytime a crisis breaks out we would like the u.n. to respond and that's probably the best way to try to get countries together to do it and immediately it hits the wall and vetoes in the security council and nothing happens. so ultimately continues to fall back on the shoulders of -- to respond.

the president himself said when people get in trouble they don't call russia. they don't call china. they call the united states and as we have seen a recent event at the united states is providing that leadership nobody -- nobody else will. i wish that were not the case. we would love to see nato and air countries come to the floor and say let's get together to respond to these crises. it's the united states that drives the process and that frankly has to be the role of the president and it has to be the role of this country. we have a value system to ensure that we are the leaders in a world that is facing a number of dangers. >> i'm sorry. we are running out of time. we can take two more questions. this gentleman and then you have the final question. >> mr. secretary it's an honor to speak with you tonight. my question to you touching on something you spoke about earlier is what advice would you give a young person today who wants to start a career in

public service? >> you know i think probably the best advice is to jump in and get involved. we take polls of young people at the panetta institute and they are discouraging because young people are turned off by the dysfunction and they are turned off by the sense that public servants aren't really doing what they are supposed to do. they're just they are just fighting each other not getting things done. so the inspiration i have to get into public service is not just my parents, not just the army by the president to says ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country and i look at public service as a higher calling. now that is tougher. now that is tougher so my recommendation is for those of you are interested, get in and see what it's like.

they, legislative assistant on capitol hill. become an intern on capitol hill. get involved somewhere in the public policy sector. learn how the process works or fails to work. learn from that. don't get caught up in the politics of left and right, democrat and republican. get in, learn it, stand back and evaluate what is it that you can do in order to make a difference? let me tell you something. the most important thing you need to know is you can make a difference. i can make a difference in the jobs i have and i can tell you is young people get interested in government they can make one hell of a difference. frankly i would like the stalemate in this town to change from the top down. i would love it if the president of the leadership of the congress decided to start working together to deal with it. i don't know if that will happen but i do know one thing.

if that does happen it will change from the bottom up and voters will say okay, we need to have people who are going to be willing to engage and do you know what? people your age let me tell you something. why am i hopeful? because i have seen men and women in the military in uniform put their lives on the line to fight and die for this country. and if you're not willing to fight for this country there should be leaders that are willing to take a little bit of a risk to govern this country. [applause] >> the former student body president of monterey -. >> my name is mckenzie and i'm a senior at the university of maryland. i study international relations and governmental politics. a lot of pressure for the final question but i have always been

interested in the relationship between the department of state and the department of defense. could you speak a little bit more or an interesting anecdote about when you went head-to-head and onetime when he had to work together to push something through that would work unless you cooperated? >> each department obviously has its own bureaucracy and they all kind of operate in their own area. and yet when you are dealing with a critical issue like afghanistan or isis or other things, it's really important to work together. you have the diplomatic arm of the government working with the defense arm of the government to be able to work together to get things accomplished. frankly a big part of that is personalities that are involved. i just have to tell you

secretary clinton and i because of our history working together we were able to work together because i said to my staff work with their office to get this done. and so we would set up conferences together. we would go to conferences. we went to the u.n. together to meet with the defense officials from the different arab countries to try and develop their security capabilities. she was at the table. i was at the table. we went to australia working with the australians to try to develop and improve that alliance with the australians. we did things together in europe. we did things together elsewhere and having that partnership was very important to our ability to deliver. it wasn't like we were competing against each other. too often there is a lot of competition. who gets the credit for at? who's trying to get it done and so there is kind of a tendency not to really work together.

but if there is a strong personal connection and by the way don't forget this, in washington you can pass laws. you can build new departments and it doesn't mean a thing unless you have good people running those departments and running those agencies. in the end that is what determines whether or not it works. we are about to get the hook so think of a political question of personal question. political question, do you think there should be another president clinton? [laughter] >> i think that there should be somebody who runs for the presidency who has got great experience and great dedication this country and if that happens to be named clinton that's okay with me. >> if hillary clinton ran for president would you support her? >> sure, absolutely. >> after her last campaign the

headline was panetta's lament, they had no plan. it says the money they brought in the clinton campaign should have done a much better job and how will it be different this time? >> well you know it's a huge challenge now. there are so much money in politics now that it scares "the hill" out of you in terms of this kind of open warfare that you see playing out on television between the various paths associated with it. i understand the game. you have got to raise money in order to compete against money and i'm sure clintons do it better than anybody in terms of being able to raise money and that's okay. but i really do think you have to broaden that effort so that ordinary citizens are conjured dating funds to a national campaign rather than just relying on big packs to provide that money. too much fund-raising is done in

new york, chicago, silicon valley, l.a. where the big money is not enough of that fund-raising is done among the american people themselves. >> secretary why do you think she should be president? [laughter] >> you know she is somebody that i have seen who is dedicated to this country. she is smart and she is experienced and she is tough. what the hell else do you want? [laughter] [applause] >> on a light note you are a foodie. you were even a foodie before we called them foodies. you would have the best christmas parties. where do you like t when you are in washington and? >> you know, there is no place in washington that compares to

the food i get at home. [applause] and listen and make my own. for those of you who know what it is my mother used to make gnocchi and my -- he taught me how to make it and i get have to go to a restaurant who makes it as good as i do. >> it's time to sign some books i want to thank all of you that are watching in livestream land and thank you too political for live streaming us and thank you for being here in person. thank you to politics and prose for pulling this together and thanks to sixth and i for this amazing setting and thank you secretary panetta. [applause]

[inaudible

>> it goes in a way, and goes to the equipment question you asked me. secretary rumsfeld famously said to soldier, you go to war with the army you have. and that's true. but what i add is, then you better make it into the army at you need as fast as you can. and that's what i think we did not do.

>> i have to ask you this. you mention in the book, and i think i have this right, that your good friend brent scowcroft, very senior national security official was in bush 41 i think it was, the first bush administration, opposed the invasion in iraq. you never really address the issue as far as you're concerned in this book. had you been part of the ministratministrat ions in, would you have supported the iraq war? >> well, i say in the last chapter sort of in reflections that i don't know, it's hard for me to say what i would have advocated in 2003. i, like a lot of people in the congress and most of the countries in the world, initially all accepted the argument that saddam had weapons of mass destruction.

that's a u.n. security council resolution 1441 got passed, intelligence services of even russia and china thought he had these weapons. and in that speech that i referred to a few weeks after the invasion, i said i have supported the original decision for that reason. but i say in the book toward the end that, you know, i had argued strongly against going to baghdad in 1991, in the first gulf war, because that would have meant to try and overthrow the regime, to get saddam would've meant occupying two-thirds of iraq you can think it would be our problem. and so we were unanimous in the first bush administration in opposing the idea of going to baghdad, and we took a lot of grief for it, for not completing the job. we tended not to get that criticism after march 2003

anymore. but i argue, maybe i would've made the same argument i did in 1991 about going to baghdad. i also might have been far more skeptical because my intelligence background. i might've been far more skeptical of the intelligence case that he had weapons of mass destruction and others were around the table, just because i have a pretty good view of both the strengths and weaknesses of our intelligence capabilities. so i think i'm you know, to be honest i think it's hard for me to say what i would have advocated in 2003 with 10 years of hindsight. >> right. could you talk a little bit about your effort to get these more hardened vehicles for the troops in iraq? you were surprised to learn that there were these vehicles in development, these m. raps, mine resistant ambush are connected

vehicles that you say when or where toward reducing casualties. how did you get that done? i know that, for example, senator biden was it out of much of your criticism helped you a lot in that regard. >> and i give him credit for it. in the book. actually it's a lesson that try to hammer home to the senior civilian and military leaders in terms of paying attention when they read criticism in the newspapers not to go into a defensive crouch but to go find out whether the story is true or not. it was a newspaper, it was a newspaper series in the "washington post" that put me on to the problem with wounded warriors at walter reed that led me to fire the secretary of the army. it was a newspaper story where i first read about these mraps, heavily armored vehicles, at a rate in "usa today" that the marines had about 300 of these

vehicles in anbar province, and in over 1000 attacks not a single marine had been killed was writing in one of these vehicles. i had got some briefings on it, and i wanted to buy these things in large numbers. there was no within the department of defense at the senior level, either civilian or in uniform, who supported that decision. and that basically said, well, we are going to do. and this is one place i'm very critical of the congress in this book, but this is one place where the congress did the right thing and they did it in a timely way, and they gave me all the money i asked for. we ended up buying 27,000 of these vehicles for iraq and afghanistan. one of the measures that meant the most to me, i mean, there are lots of statistics out there in terms of lives saved and lends that weren't lost, but when i first became secretary and visited the army's burn unit

at brooke army hospital in san antonio, it was absolutely full. because most of those young men had been in humvees that are blown up and became funeral pyre's for them. by the time i was within six months of leave it at secretary, that burn unit was nearly empty. and so ultimately everybody can read to the practice is a really good idea, let's get on with it, probably because i said so as secretary of defense, but there was a lot of opposition. and begin because these vehicles warmed in anybody's long-term procurement plan, and they were more worried about what do we do with them after the war than what could they might do in the war. my attitude is, particularly when you're dealing with the lives of young men and women, is when you're in a war you are all in, and whatever it takes to

protect them, whatever it takes to give them the tools to do the job and then come home safely, you make that investment. if you of all this surplus at the end of the war, so be it. >> part of the book, one of the most disturbing parts of the book, because there was a method that was available to the military to save lives, yet for narrow reasons of bureaucratic agendas, it wasn't implement. how do you fix a problem like that going forward? it seems to me like that is cultural and the culture no doubt survived after you left. >> is a leadership issue. i'll give you another example. it's even more shocking in my view. the medevac time, the time for medevac in iraq was one hour, called the golden hour, that helicopter could be dispatched, pick up a soldier who'd been

wounded and get into a hospital within an hour. in afghanistan it was two hours, and i said i think it should be an hour, just like in iraq. both uniform civilian senior officials came to me and had all these statistics about how the death rates were comparable for medevac in iraq and afghanistan, despite the time difference and so on, and, therefore, because of his sisters declared obama should it wasn't worth -- statistically since it was a wash it shouldn't be significant. if i'm a soldier and i've been blown up, i want helicopter there as quick as possible. i said we're just going to do it. and so we sent more helicopters, several additional field hospitals. i made that decision in january of 2008 or nine, i can't remember which. and by july something like 80%

of our medical evaluations were taking place in less than 40 minutes. but the problem in part it seemed to me was that the people who were in charge of these things weren't looking at them from the soldiers standpoint. they were looking at it from sort of 30 or 40,000 feet. the of the problem in the pentagon that i talk about that relates to all of these issues is that there are so many different elements of the department of defense who have to be on board, who have to agree to anything forward, that any one of those elements, whether it's the money people or the technology people or the budget years, or whatever, can basically slow down or stop something from happening.

only the secretary of defense has the authority to override everybody in the building and they were just going to do. >> norge requires a leader with a considerable willpower and commitment to getting this thing done. i wanted to ask you -- >> there's nothing like getting the attention of the senior military and the pentagon as a whole, like firing some people. >> which he did a lot of i can tell from -- >> i held people accountable. my attitude was, in the case of both walter reed and the nuclear issue, which was in back in was in back in front of us went up by both the chief of staff and secretary of air force, i didn't buy them for not knowing about the problem in the first place. i fired him because once they knew about it they didn't take it seriously enough. that's the kind of accountability that it needs to be exercised more frequently in washington. >> how did you feel about losing stanley mcchrystal?

>> well at first, i mean, i felt he committed a terrible error, and i say so and the book. getting access to this reporter come and mcchrystal is probably one of the most effective combat generals we have had since world war ii. both as command in afghanistan and as commander of the joint special operations unit in iraq and afghanistan. he did a lot of damage to our enemies and people who are killing our troops, but the world of politics and the media was a new battle space for general mcchrystal. and he was a brand-new second lieutenant in that realm, and as effective as he was in the command position, he stepped out of line in some of his interviews. but i felt when the report, when the article came out about him

with the quotes that seemed to disparage the vice president at the national strategic pfizer, and others, my worry was that if he left, if he was relieved, that we might lose the war in afghanistan right then and there. we now had by that time he was the timeline. the president had decided, which i supported, of being all out, all of our combat troops out by the end of 2014, and he got along well with karzai. he knew the battle plan. he knew the brigade commanders. there was a familiarity there and i worried that finding a replacement would take months to get confirmed, and then more months to get acclimated enough to speak. so i was deeply worried that relating the crystal would be a huge setback in the war, and then it was the president in

discussing whether to relieve mcchrystal who said, how about david petraeus to take over? anand immediately, adding to the president a lot of credit for the idea because it hadn't even occurred to me, but that alleviated a lot of my concerns because petraeus new battle plan, neither brigade commanders, new karzai and had a good relationship with him, and so on. so i felt like we really wouldn't lose much time in the war if mcchrystal were replaced by petraeus. and i told, as i say in the book, you know, i wish stan had given me something to defend him with, that the story was wrong and some particulars. but as i write in the book, it was sort of like he was at west point again and just saying no excuse, sir. and so under those conditions, as a right in the book, i

thought the president had no choice but to relieve him. >> i found that part a little bit puzzling but there was a history as you point out. for those in the audience who don't know, stanley mcchrystal was a special operations command who had tremendous success in iraq before going to afghanistan, was a war hero, had caused taken out of battle this very feared al-qaeda commander, zarqawi i think it was, and was msha mini in capturing saddam hussain, a revered soldier who stepped in afghanistan made some very unfortunate and candid remarks to a rolling stone reporter. when he was called on the carpet, and this is after i gathered he had made some of the unfortunate remarks in london, not sensational but rather off the reservation and not closely tracking with the presidents of preferred policy positions, making the president met. he had already had a couple of strikes against him when this came up.

you said general mcchrystal to take any steps to defend himself, even though there was possibly an argument that he could've used. why? >> well, i think, first of all i think, i think stan was, i'm assuming some things here because i never really had a detailed conversation with stan about why he didn't defend himself, only that he didn't. but i think that he knew he had made the decision to allow this nontraditional reporter to be a part of his entourage. i think he was stunned by the article, and it may not come an army inspector general report suggested that he may not have known about a lot of the statements that were made by his

staff to this reporter. and so i think he didn't quite know how to respond. he did want to throw his staff under the bus, and so i think he did what he saw as the ethical thing for a commander to do under the circumstances, which was to take the hit. >> one portion of this book to -- >> let me just say to build on one of your observations, i mean there was a lot of ill will towards general mcchrystal in the white house because during the fall of 2009 when we were debating options for afghanistan, including whether to go with what he had recommended, this 40,000 additional troops or other options with smaller numbers that had been advocated by the vice president and others, there were a number of leaks and public statements by the military, including a general mcchrystal, that made it appear to the white house that,

and to the president, that the military was trying to box him in and force his hand to adopt their option in terms of the 40,000 troops. i tried to convince the president that i could see where this suspicion came from because of these leaks and public statements. the president saw it, and others around them, vice president biden and others, saw it as an orchestrated campaign by the military leadership. i tried to argue that there was not a campaign, not orchestrat orchestrated, that if it had been orchestrated they would've been a lot smarter about it, but i was unsuccessful in that. but it did lead to an undercurrent of ill will toward him that, when this article then came out about six months later, he really didn't have a cushion. >> that was the last straw. i think as you write in your book that actually you describe

this as a pretext that the vice president used to have mcchrystal fired. >> know, the way i described is that i think mcchrystal handed his opponents in the white house the ammunition with which to get rid of him. >> i want to talk to you very briefly about your political battles in washington on capitol hill. you do not paint a very flattering picture and this is not big news of our political process in washington. what struck me was your very detailed accounts of interaction with democratic and republican members of congress who, behind closed doors, wood to you that the policies that you were promoting were actually things that have to be done or should be done or were going in the right direction, but when they came out and faced the lights and spoke to the press, that was a totally opposite description of the situation and they were highly critical of the president

and of the pentagon. you've been in washington or you've been in government and longtime. do you think that our dysfunctional politics are any different from the way they have ever been? >> well, television contributes. i say in the book that when the red light on the television camera would go on in a hearing, it had the effect on members of congress of a full moon on werewolves. [laughter] and i guess the way i would put it and the way i write about in the book is our politics in this country as the center makes nuclear have been rough and tumble from the very beginning, and quite vituperative. even george washington in his second term came in for a lot of hits, as did all of his successors. but what is different now and what is happening over the last i would say quarter of a century

is that we have lost the -- congress has lost the ability to do the people's business. so it's one thing to argue and fight, said terrible things about each other. that's been going on for our whole history, but the inability to pass legislation to deal with serious problems i think is a relatively new phenomenon. and some of it is institutional, has to do with gerrymandering and the fact that in house maybe only 50 or 60 seats are now competitive, and so the only elections that really matter in a lot of places are the primaries where you've got to appeal to your party space with your democrat or republican. what we had for the first half of my career where what i would describe is a large number, and i'll just take the senate, senators who were center, center left, center right, figured a way to put together coalitions

and get important legislation passed. the list will be familiar to all of you. these bridge builders as far as i was concerned for people like bill cohen, bill bradley, jack danforth, john warner, david boren, sam nunn, nancy kassebaum, republicans or democrats, and the list goes on. and maybe the last one to leave because of frustrations was olympia snowe. so you've got this large number of people, most of them could've been reelected for ever, who left in disgust because they couldn't get anything done. and i think that's the new phenomenon over the last couple of decades that is especially worrying. now the other theme though in this book and i think this as an important point to make, to spite my frustrations and even my anger at the congress, the reality is i got a lot of things

done with the congress. most of my predecessors did they were lucky to get two or three or four big military procurement programs canceled that were over cost, overdue, or no longer relevant. i cut nearly three dozen and ended up getting congressional approval, or acquiescence come in all of them. i cut almost $200 billion out of the pentagon's overhead, and even eliminated a combatant command. and i got the congress to support me on the. partly it was because i had an enormously strong support of president obama and the beautiful it behind me, but it was also working across the aisle with members of congress of both parties and figuring out how to move the agenda forward. and so i argue in the end of the book that we do have these

institutional problems such as gerrymandering, what i consider the weakening of the role of congress in governance because of the weakening of the committee chairs, and a variety of other things. but at the end of the day, the problem you can begin to i think address the paralysis, not necessarily the polarization but the paralysis by people just, by people at the white house and people in the congress beginning to treat each other more civilly. by people being willing to listen and take ideas from the other side, i'm not demonizing the other side, of not distorting the facts purposefully. i think there are a bunch of things just in terms of the way people treat each other in washington that could change the tone and the reason, the chairman of the house forum affairs committee when i first became secretary, a few months

in told me that my arrival had been important because i changed the tone of the way the debate was being carried on in iraq and other things. so i was able, i guess the undercurrent of this book was i was able to make washington work, but the way you make it work is through the way you treat people. >> since we're on the subject of politics, and we're running out of time, very quickly or to ask you, you mentioned deep in the book there's a little description of a phone call you gotten from the senate democratic leader harry reid who wanted a defense department, he said, to spend the money on research, on irritable bowel syndrome. this is while you were dealing with wars in iraq and afghanistan. there's a great deal of danger here in deploying certain metaphors and i'm going to try to avoid that. how did that conversation go? >> well, i very politely told them that i would look into it.

[laughter] he came out yesterday and was very critical of the book, to which my response was, you know, it's just a fact of life that members of congress vote on things they haven't even read. [laughter] [applause] >> welcome as they say you have to pass the bill to find out what's in it. he actually called you up and when asked what he would be interested in running with president obama as his vice presidential candidate. how did that conversation go? >> it was one of the more bizarre conversations i've think i've ever had. he called up and we were talking about something else, and then all of a sudden he said, you know, i was largely responsible for talking president obama into running for president. i heard that from a lot of people on the hill. and he said, but there's no

candidate for vice president. how long have you been a registered republican? i said, well, i'm actually not a registered republican. and he said, welcome where do you stand on abortion? i said, i don't have a stand on abortion but somehow that's never come into the national security arena. he said, how long were you in academic? i said, not all that long. he said something may come of this or nothing, but i just wanted to check. i hung up the phone and it just started to laugh, and i said that is really weird. [laughter] and as i said in the book, i never told anybody about it because i didn't think anybody would believe me. >> budgeted end up working for the president nonetheless. one serious issue that's been raised by this book, and i think an ethics, the way the government functions issue that came up early on in the coach of

the book was there was a lot of hand wringing about these conversations that's what with president obama and the focus was always on the conversation with president obama, not with president bush but you revealed much there as well, were held in confidence, and, indeed, the president often invokes executive privilege with congress to prevent exactly this kind of information from coming out in the public so that there could be a free flow of ideas and a kind of free exchange of information. how did you work through the ethics of that? i came away thinking this was actually a public service that people learn a lot about the way their senior government leaders make very difficult decisions, both republican and democrat. but you were disclosing something, and i have no doubt that both presidents didn't anticipate that this would be in the book. how did you work through that? >> well i think first of all, i think modern presidents have

pretty realistic expectations about what will be written, but that said, i think from my standpoint what was important, a couple of things important. the first is if you actually read the book, the conversations i described almost entirely paint these presidents in a positive light. because it shows them of pushing back against the military, asking hard questions, not being, not allowing himself to be spoonfed information, and not just acquiescing because some guy with four stars on his shoulder said without did you dust and so and so. so it shows these presidents doing what i think americans would help the commanders in chief would do. and it underscores that these two presidents, just like almost all of their predecessors, have disagreed with the military at

various times and made decisions that the military had not recommended. but the second piece of this is, this book is dedicated to the men and women of the u.s. armed forces. and i wrote this book in substantial measure for the troops and their families. and one of the things i wanted them to see under both of these presidents, and in both iraq and afghanistan, i wanted them to see what the washington battle space looked like. they knew what iraq and afghanistan looked like, but i wanted him to have some insight into the real world of what was going on in washington, as big issues associated with these wars were discussed. and to give them some sense of the passion and the amount of time spent debating these issues and the decisions that they would make. and i think that it is a

realistic portrayal of the wars that were being fought in washington at the same time there were wars being fought in iraq and afghanistan. final point. people'people's memories are sh, especially in washington, but the reality is all through 2010, senior white house staffers were leaking what the president was thinking and what is conversations war, his criticism of the military, and so on and so forth. on a routine basis in the newspapers. southern ocean that what i describe in the book as the presidents of growing reservations about the decisions he made, is absolutely no news. the newspapers were full of that information all through 2010 in the first part of 2011 spent i do agree with you.

your descriptions of both bush and president obama are often very laudatory but there is quite a bit of critical commentary in there as well and i think one portion of this book strikes me as very much in that vein. you take president obama to task are being what i would characterize as an uninspiring military leader. he didn't bring enthusiasm to his role as commander-in-chief, especially as regards the afghanistan war. and i think had a conversation with rahm emanuel where you make that point that the soldiers needed to hear, that the president was behind as you called it the nation. and you drew that conclusion from your interactions with them in these inner councils. >> yeah, in trying to weigh this and balance it, i supported