book/>> i didn't, probably because of the volume that i talked about. i took notes to keep track of what was going on. we were talking about this earlier. my wife came out with a book and i lived that process twice with her. as anybody knows from personal experience, writing a book seems to me something that is very demanding. and i wrote for a living for 21 years. ien i came to the vp office, said i am not writing speeches because i found that really hard. i am looking to relax a little bit.

>> on the next "washington journal," maryland represent i donna edwards discusses the 2014 elections and turning out women voters, and walter johnson talks about the ilitary and diplomatic options available concerning iraq. you can always join the conversation via facebook and twitter. "washington journal" at 7:00 a.m. on c-span. >> the i.r.s. has reported ex- employee's computer had recycled and her emails

lost. >> well, transparency and freedom of information, my colleagues and would gave conservative grade liberal or conservative. the access to freedom of information has been a joke but this administration has perfected the delays and excuses. and it's shocking, because i feel strongly the information they withholdal belongs to the public because we own it, but there's no sense of that. they covet it as if they are a private corporational protecting their trade secrets. >> emmy award-winning journalist cheryl at can i son on the changing face of journalism. sunday on c-span's "q&a."

>> up next barry posen. the director of the m.i.t. securities studies program on the use of military forps and the use for restraint. this is part of a conference hosted by the american conservative. it's just over an hour. >> he is the author of several works, the military doctrine nd most recently his -- making the case for restraint as an american interest in 2007 and expanded in those arguments in his new book which main points he will be presenting to us today. laying out the strategy

professor posen calls -- and lays out the grand strategy of rep straint intended to replace it and then makes match of this new strategy with the appropriate military means necessary to carry it out. anyone interested in foreign policy will welcome it. i'm glad to welcome professor posen. [applause] >> i have to get used to showbiz, the life. well, i want to thank the organizers for inviting me. thanks for the nice introduction. thank you-all for coming out. it will come as no surprise to you, like many people in this

town, i'm flogging a book. it's relate told restraint. i'm going to give a very encapsulated version of the argument here this morning. the book essentially has four parts. it describes the evolution of post cold war u.s. strategy and offers a critique of how that strategy has worked. that was fun to write. it lays out the political outlines of an alternative, a little more difficult to write, and it lays out the military aspect so four-structure military defense budge tote afford to strategy that i talk about or -- so it's a relatively tidy package. it doesn't settle every issue. opens a lot more issues probably than it closes. should always talk about where you're starting from.

and i have a fairly narrow definition of grand strategy. grand strategy is about ensuring this country against threats to its territorial integrity, its sovereignty, safety and its power position insofar as the power position is a means to those ends. so not every ounce of power is worth every other ounce. you want its efficiency to achieve those ends. grand strategy is a theory about how to create security and connects together political and military and sometimes economic means ends. it offers reasons for the connections and it sets some priorities about what matters the most and what matters less. ow, the problem i see, and i think the previous panel talked about it a little bit. there's a considerable degree

of consensus in the american foreign policy elite on grand strategy. and that, i think crosses the political parties. and i think john iken barry at one time called that strategy liberal hi gem any. it's liberal because of the american project, which is to spread both liberal institutions and liberal ideals around the world. it's hedge monic because the project depends on a very great disparity between the u.s. -- and all others and i wouldn't say at almost any cost but willing to spend high cost to sustain it. and once you look at what matters in strategy, it's about thearg matters. terrorism matters, rising

powers matter, revon shouse powers matter. just about everything matters to this strategy. so it's not particularly well-prioritized. and the way that everything matters is not always clear, nevertheless there is this remarkable consensus, and that consensus was born at a particular moment in american history. what krauthammer called the american bone to pick which caught on. when the cold war ended the united states was left with a really great gap between it and other great powers in the world. the liberals won. the totalitarians lost. so this gave birth to kind of a muscular liberalism. there's oddities about this. because this meant the united states was also one of the most secure states in world history. really secure. still is quite secure in my judgment.

and yet despite the security, the united states has been incredibly activity, and that activity has generated quite a lot of military activity which is quite more of a problem, puzzle. bob who worked back in the building across the river, he has a nice briefing chart in a briefing he was giving a year or two ago that showed, at least in terms of frequency, per unit of time, the united states has been at war in some way or another about twice as often after the cold war ended as it was during the cold war. so there's a very secure country, nevertheless fighting like crazy and fighting for what? basically about spreading liberal ideas or defending liberal ideas, liberal institution. now, i think this project is unnecessary. in part because the u.s. is inherently a very secure country. it's pretty rich country in

terms of industrial tech in a logical capabilities and national endowments and will remain one of the top two or three economic powers in the world at least for the rest of my lifetime. we still sit behind these vast oceans that separate us and other countries and compliant countries to the north and south. and nuclear weapons are obviously a more than two-edged sword, but one thing i think is clear is nuclear weapons states are not going to be conquered by somebody else. the risk of trying to conquer a country that has nuclear weapons are so high that conquest is kind of off the table, so that's an extra source of protection for sovereignty. we also have a great military backed by a great r & d system and a military that builds really fine weapons after huge

cost, can do it. and then there's this question about international trade, which some people worry about and always hesitate tight talk about it when i'm in a room with dan dresser, but about 1/3 of america's trade is in this hemisphere, right? and much of -- many of america's trading partners are scattered around the would. it would take an awful lot of things to happen in the world to so disrupt an international trading system that the united states couldn't find partners. i don't worry about trade as a national security objective. some do. i believe charlie mentioned that this morning but be that as it may, if you think you want to be trade, the united states would have plenty of trading partners even if it weren't active as it is. the liberal enemy is running to problems that have deep

underpinnings. i argue that it's wasteful and the military strategies costs will grow, not shrink. my thinking is kind of motivated by a certain general if you find mental theories about the political world. and i'm a realist. realism is a big tent, but there's some things, processes, international policy realism kind of eloom nates for one. and one is if a power as great as ours has sharp elbows and is pretty active, it's going to generate some action and by balancing the power of a state as good as we are. but the united states, the distance between the u.s. base capabilities and economic potential and that of other states actually shrinking, right? so other states are getting more capabilities to balance

and we're seeing that they balance. russia and china have tried to eat or build or rebuild their military power. to the extent that they can. largely to annoy us. they sometimes will concert their action. others throw monkey wrenches in projects rendering them more difficult and costly. so we're seeing a bit of balancing behavior. not as much as people like me predicted to be brutally honest but we're seeing some and given the economic trends we're going see even more. ow, other states, cheap bribe. there was an illusion earlier to moral hazard. europe and japan spent months of all their shares of g.d.p. on defense. japan about 1%. the u.s. is spending 3.5% or 4%.

if you look at the most dire projections under the budget control act, at some future point will get down to perhaps 2.5% of g.d.p. i hope we do. i doubt that this will actually happen. but it's still a lot more than others spend, and it's interesting that while others sort of tell us that they feel frightened, the japanese tell us they feel frightened. the australians tell us they feel frightened but their defense budgets have not gone up. they have in some cases gone down and even in this concern about china, and the japanese. i believe the australians actually cut their budget. so these allies that profit greatly from the american incentives but don't do much and don't contribute that much when the chips are down. i do like to include a

parentheses and many of our allies do send soldiers to the fight and a good many soldiers from allies died in afghanistan. i think those soldiers were ill used in some ways by their government. i'm sad they died and honor their service just like service of our own troops but when you look at the resource behind them and the various types of caveats put on them when they participant it looks to me like their governments are trying to make a minimum contribution and a at a lot of costs of keeping us happeny rests on the backs of those european soldiers. so it's petchingtly rational to have the -- it's rational to husband their power and rely on the power of others, right? so we're in a situation where the americans will be -- i'm exaggerating but to watch the americans spend themselves into

securing themselveses, they will be happy to have us do that and then they will spend what they have to on defense. other allies, also because of what nterest also exhibit i call reckless driving. some of them are allies and hers are wannabe allies and tend to do things that are mainly in their interest. the georgian government drove recklessly and got itself in to a war with russia. another, if you want to use this concept, reckless driving, there can't be a worse reckless driver than maliki. he drove recklessly before we were there and after we left. same for the karzai government i think the israelis are reckless drivers. they do things that are

reckless and these countries all seem to expect the americans to rescue them, and typically we do. they feel too secure. as i like to say to my friends who talk about how everyone doubts the american's credibility. said at least as far as our allies, ewe don't have too ittle credibility. we have too much. they don't talk down -- don't look at what they say. look at what they do. what they do shows they really trust us. another problem happening in the world which is not generated by my theory, i kind of like consume these national intelligence county critical -- council documents. there's lots of stuff in there that you can find information to support many positions, but the thing that i find arresting

is that the base, the gap and base capability of the g.d.p. between the americans and other consequenceial powers is shh rinking and if you look into the out years it all but shrinks. and when you go into the numbers you can still show the united states the s going to be ahead on many indices but in terms of the capabilities, there's going to be -- it's going to be easier for others to tilt with us. so that's important, you know, and it's easy to forget that during cold war the u.s. outweighed the soviet union. g.d.p., purchasing power bay factor of two. it almost never has more than half of our g.d.p. and pdp, right? stupid words. stupid acronyms but never had more than half of america's

g.d.p. chinese g.d.p. and purchasing power did equal ours this year. chinese g.d.p. is half ours in market prices. they could not have sold half of that. 10th chinese were already moving in the direction of being a pretty tough competitor. and one doesn't have to make linear extrapolations that the thing that says they are a per capita g.d.p. equals tours know that this country is going to be much more able to tilt with the united states as the years past, barring some major social -- which can certainly happen. now, aside from the near great powers, capabilities are spreading to smaller ones. bill talked about that this morning. weapons are turning up in surprising places. there's a strange fact that the iraq war in real dollars cost vietnam cans more than

in real dollars. the vietnam, the other side had open mastercard accounts in the arsenals of china and russia. that's not true of the adversary we faced in iraq. i floodeled around trying to do a cost comparison, and this is pretty soft analysis, but looks to me maybe on the basis of what we can measure, we out spent the other side by around 10-to-1 in the vietnam war and in the iraq war 100-1 or 200-1. and that's basically in a fight yourself to a kind of stalemate, a kind of a stalemate that had some positive potential embedded in it but basically still a stalemate that when we took our hands off the backseat of the bicycles, the bicycle wrecked. so the trends are not good. right? if it costs -- if it requires

this type of cost ratio and these type of lumpy sums able to to bring a country of 25 million with maybe 5 million or 10 million people in it of people who don't really like us to a point of stace sis, future wars of this kind probably aren't smart. it's a way of grinding up american capability. now, there's all kinds of things within those numbers that are part and parcel of it. which we can talk about later. put amounts of money are into it. when you look that the sort of any amount of money to prevent casualties kind of calculus. this is, in a way, kind of a dollar measurement of the political con sthraints i think leaders actually do believe, which is that ethey believe that they got a lot of

americans killed in these wars and then people started to ask questions. but part of the incredible patience of the american people i think is the ability to suppress the casualties. so you will spend any amount of money on money that you borrow in any case. ut another problem, which does become a kind of political analysis is the problem of identity politics. now, my colleagues write about this. people don't agree on it. there's quite a strong position in political sthines nationalism and/or ethnicity are not nearly the strong forces some think they are, but i'm from the other camp. i think nationalism and ethnicity and affiliation are all very strong forces. and whether they have gotten stronger in the last 25 or 30 years than they were in the proceeding 25 or 30 years, i don't know, but they seem

plenty strong to me. think there's things going on in the world that keep identity politics a powerful force. some of it has to do with modernization and urbanization and growth and there's a lot of things that stir people up and cause them to fall back on their communities as a force of security. and this i think is a very important phenomenon. and the united states in some ways, well, i think in many ways doesn't really understand nationalism kind of always often is surprised by the problems we have. so one problem you have with nationalism, which i think is something most people would agree on which is if outsiders show ip and start tell you go how the live and organize your politics for you, there's a good chance local people aren't going to like and there's a good chance you're going to cause solidarity and lit be against you. there's a good chance it will

happen than way, and it's worked out that way for us stand second thing is that in this world of per meant of social mobileization, strategy of liberal hi gemty kind of makes the americans the face or the seeming agent of social changes that peoples are experiencing as being quite unpleasant and difficult, right? now, if they get to the other end of, this it may lead to liberal states around the world. freer states and richer states but the process of change is wrenching. and to make americans the face of this is probably not so smart. it's the kind of self-targeting we do. you would think a different foreign policy would mitigate a bit. and finally, and bill was talking about this earlier. the marriage of large numbers of 18-year-old males who are

deadly weapons with identity politics, with the diffusion of technology, means outsiders who come to visit, right? with scarce military manpower, because we've all professionalized our forces, are basically going to have a handful, right? this is -- i think we've seen this in the past that we're going to see it, another contribution to cause. so what's the remedy? restraints. be restrained. focus on the main potential problems. i think there's still three potential problems. ne is the old one. a hedge mon in your asia. the british before us, the americans, we have been worried that a power could become so strong in the eurasian land mass and dominate the area and make trouble for us. as i spoke about earlier, it's hard to make trouble for us but

i don't feel like i'm smart or wise enough to be sure a successful your asiaa hedge mon is going to be successful for the united states. o i think to make sure the united states is protecting itself from a hedge djimon emerging. in the west the russians are a shadow of themselves the europeans are able to deal with whatever problems the russians create on their own. i mean, the americans shouldn't have to be involved in this anymore. and in the east china, bears watching for all the things i've said earlier and what we have seen in chinese behavior but they should be careful about rushing the net for a cold war and even if china requires some form of containment to me it seems unways to balance a coercion in the way we -- precisely because

chinese seem more capable than the russians were not at this moment but probably in the fullness of final. the americans will need real allies if we ever have to do this again, allies that contribute. 23409 free riders and cheap riders and wreck less riders that we have accumulated during the cold war. at the time it was an easy way to run the alliances but if we ever have to do this again, i don't think that's the smart way to do it. so china, watchful, vigilant, yes. rush the net to a cold war? no. ougs the coalition the way it has been? no. we've got to re-engineer the way we elicit contributions now. second, proliferations, very hard problem. if an economical basket case like north korea can build

nuclear bombs i'm not confident a world of zero nuclear we seasons in our future and a world of no knew clear proliferation is in our future. i think it can be managed and we can confine to it states that can be trust deterred and keep it out of the hands of groups that cannot be deterible and as a way of prevent it's nuclear proliferations the gains do not outweigh the costs hat we should do is be working cooperatively with other nuclear powers we need a variety of tools. symptom cases it's just going to be tricky. and i think we have to accept that. is that right because alternative is going to visit places and up a them and i

think the cure ends up being worse than the disease. the final problem is the example of al qaeda. this is all in the press. we have a new bogey man. icis. i think we have to accept that if there's been one kind of nihilistic organization that identifies the united states as the source of all their problems and identifies violence directly against the united states as some sort of a solution, if there could be one, there could be more. and i think we have learned that because of the twhoorled we created, which allows a lot of movement of peoples and has produced a lot of capability in groups, we have to be alert to the possibility that there are threats to the u.s. safe. these are not going to bring down the republic, but it would be better if it did not happen, right? so what do you need to do? well defense is a big part of that. the country hardening up the

targets. we've done a lot of that since 9/1 is, in ways more than we possibly should have. you do need a certain amount of offense. but it should be used spareingly. and the main thing you need is intelligence. you need -- if what you want is groups who dyed to get into this business, you want to be able to identify them and you want to be able to hunt them. hunting them is more important than killing them. they have to feel hunted because if they feel hunted they spend resources trying to protect themselves rather than spending money on trying to attack us or os. any bun these things, if you per sue it to itsal ultimate you can get yourself into all kinds of trouble so, i try to talk about moderate views that keep costs in a balance. this is a subjective statement. now regional strategy. think we should turn most of

our alliances into more political and less military kinds of exercises. this is particularly true of the north atlantaic treaty organization which i think our work there is done. c , i tend to be a small conservative in doing these things. ou cannot turn off these alliances but over a 10-year period, think that's a reasonable period for making changes in the way we do business. first of all, i would have a commander for europe so they can run their own affairs. in the purgs gulf we have to think about what we can do and what we can't do and what matters and what doesn't matter. at most what i think the united states could do is keep one oil state from aggressioning against another oil state, probably is in our or

somebody's interest that large amounts of the production capability in that country not be in the hands of a single power. but this is actually pretty easy, because it's in the end about keeping iran and saudi arabia apart and preventing iran from thinking about conquering saudi arabia and neither of is thinking about it, so it's not very hard work. in the purgs gulf our relationship with these regimes relative to their internal politics and whether there's a game that's worth a candle in trying to keep regimes alive who have become in many ways congenial to us. it's just strange. it doesn't seem like it can last forever. and do americans really want to be in the position of helping that regime survive by fighting on its side of the internal war even if it's enemies in that seem pretty awful too.

we got involved in the wars in iraq and paid a high price and i think saudi would be worse. that's the temptation. anybody in oil knows the biggest producer in the gulf is saudi. they are the big casino. if that government would change for the worse we would have to make some adjustments. the question is are those adjustments more or less difficult that actually trying to fight a war in saudi arabia to protect that regime? suspect they are. so asia's the hardest case, but i still think we need to do some things to try to change the relationships. one of the things the americans should be doing is they should not be afraid to cut military forces from the region or move them when it makes strategic sense, right? when it makes strategic and political sense. the locals should get used to the idea that american military forces come and go on an

as-needed basis. they are not there to protect them for all time against all things. i've been puzzled why we don't take advantage of the difficulties we have had in find agnew base for the marine helicopter squadrons that we haven't taken this advantage to justful marines out of them. think we're getting ready toial rink the marine corps? et's shrink it in okinawa. airplanes, fighter planes, ships, i understand. the marines there, small force. >> generally we have to try to convince wreck less drivers that we're going to be less supportive. we have to set a high bar for wars of choice. military strategies, i don't want to be talking too long about it but i wrote an article called command of the commons which is an updated conceptization of command of the sea in modern time and i

think that's the kind of thing that the american military should be focusing on, is that right the americans that will need command of the sea if we ever do need to go back to the your asia land mass to help prevent the rise of the hedge mon. the command of the sea gives you some capability to exercise i wouldn't say a gentle but kind of limited coercion versus countries involved in international trade. it's a nice tool we have -- hedge mon -- if you're concerned about terrorist groups and your need to hunt them, you need access to the rest of the world. command of space helps you with the intelligence capabilities it needs to support this and the natural supporting capability, these are things that america's strong suits cater to the tech in a logical military skills the american

military has and things we have in plenty. it's going to sure in re-organized countries which is the thing we do not generate aplenty. my defense budget which you've got smaller than the present one, the army is a big bill payer. every military is this rinks in every posture i offer but the army shrinks a lot more and pains me a little bit because back in the cold war days i was kind of a friend to the army because i thought the central front was kind of important, and i cared a lot about how things went. but in this day and age, i think the navy is the american army of choice. so in closing, the book is simple. the u.s. is a mighty lending period and scarcer resources at home. should be a parentheses, this is because of our politics. we can generate more security resources at home if our politics were different but our

politics are not different. we are cutting entitlementses and defense spending because of our politics. it's easy enough to waive our hand and say this is a political problem that will go away. just because there's a little problem doesn't mean lit go away. we got here through an elaborate process and the judge et control is to act and a reflection of -- if that changes, ok, you could go back and spend 57-6% on g.d.p. on defense forever and run this -- hedge ammanic way for 40-50 years. but that's not what it's saying. it would take something sforblee flip our politics in another direction. so more powers -- more politically mobilized and armed groups of every kind all so the u.s. can play a much tighter game.

to me implemental adjustment looks insufficient. we need to set policies more rig lousely and subas i dies the security and others muchless generously. thank you. [applause] >> we have time for a few uestions of professor posen. >> yes. go ahead, sir. >> john with the american conservative. professor, how about our allies? can you add to here in the view of the prior panel what we have compared sometimes to athens eaninged land our empire, but we have all these allies of that in many cases can trigger

events that get us into wars very closely we have discussed a few islands and uninhabited in the pacific. can you elaborate how would you strategy work with endure of our allies and their commitments and can they drag us into wars? the worst example is serbia triggering the first world war. >> is that it? >> yes. >> so this is the problem i talk about in the book of reckless drivers where i see that you see reckless drivers as well. this is a problem with -- management. but i think acknowledging the problem is the beginning of wisdom, right? so i think first of all you have to get used to the idea that these allies are not your little brothers. they are states with their own interests who are pursuing their own interests in the context of their relationship

with you. that's point one. point two, we have to figure out ways to -- this is going to sound more scowersive than i mean it. but the allies have to see some sort of cost to their reckless driving. and the americans, as i said earlier, do exactly the opposite. in other words, we are obsessed with the credibility of our commitments to our allies. and every time some irl problem happen chance gets them up set and they point their foings us and say we're concerned about your credibility, we roush to re-assure them so we overassure the re-assurance side so i think we have to do some things that suggest this is a two-way street so sometimes when they can ask to be reassured we say, we're sorry. we don't care about this issue. some it can be done privately. think in general as the american military shrinks, which it's going to do and as

the global foot print shrinks people will scratch their heads and say if most of the american forces are concentrated somewhere and the american military strategy is essential lay maritime strategy which permits them to come as well as go, then we have to stand up a little bit toinator american support. those are a few ideas i have in the book, but i think, you know, when i talk about this book starts with an argument. i think there's work to be done on trying did advise a whole diplomatic approach to the problem that you're talking about. to the problem of disciplining the wreck less drivers. as well as encouraging the free riders to do a bit more. yes? >> first, thanks so much for your presentation. i really enjoyed it and enjoyed your book. the question i wanted to ask

has to do with what i think is a growing fear of stress and if the united states is indeed in relative decline and the united states has anchored this international system in the post-war era and if there sancht country or cothration could replace the united states in that capacity that in the next say 20-30 years and this is actually an scenario the n.i.c. report points out that we might be headed towards a system of global disorder. maybe that's -- >> that was global disorder but go on. >> in an air of american decline if another coalition can't supplant it that wisconsin we might be headed for a world of anarchy not in the realist conception but in the global disorder. one, do you share that concern? and in the scenario of global disorder if it were to emerge how would your idea of

constraint emerge? >> well, first of all, i'll say something that i guess is uncharitable. this is a wonderful argument for protecting the status quo. so when you hear it, you should ask questions, right? hich you're clearly doing. a world in the small number of great powers is not a twhoorled can't -- organize, right? in other words, if there are three or four or five or six great powers, that's not 50 trying to make a deal, is that ight that's five or six. alagopolies work and monopolies work. - so why not an alogapoly, right? why not an monopoly with

interests overlap in contribution to where they don't? so i'm less -- in other words, when the problem is presented as a binary problem, either the american-led order or anarchy, o me, it seems like an overdiagramtyization of the outcome. people in our business, they are obviously concerned about change, and rightfully ncerned about change -- [a popping noise in the audio] >> is that my heartbeat? did it sound ok? ahh, the fun of technology. [laughter] so people are rightly concerned that we are always concerned. but i don't think that's inevitable or even likely. the second thing which i would add -- [popping noise continues]

>> is my heart beating again? [laughter] the second thing you're not supposed to believe these things. i kind of have a soft spot for new clear weapons. they make great power relations a little bit different than the way they have been in past anarchies. so the principle powers are not really in a position to prey upon one another. it's wildly risky now. people will often say, well, what do we do about japan? it's not a nuclear power. what about germany? it's not a nuclear power. i say nothing is forever, and this is a sin. it's a sin in american dis course to say that in the fullness of time, a world war ii will be sufficiently far behind us and japan and -- can be normal developed states with the normal developed weapons

they have. so this sort of mitt gates the anarchy concern. so i think the larger question -- and i'm not sure i agree with bill on every point. but the related question is there's large parts of the world where the states are weak. right? and weak states both mean that they are scopes for wars against all and weak states also mean that natural disaster s that come along like earthquakes and others that come along because of things we've done to the environment hit harder. so there may continue to be significant parts of the world where things are not very pleasant, right? and the question will be, how is that going to be managed, right? and that's kind of a -- that's not -- for me that's not much of a security question for us.

there are americans who care about that, and i -- those problems, some of them may require our military power, and my answer is always that just because someone sometimes engages in philanthropy with military power doesn't make philanthropy something other than philanthropy. and if we decide to embark on thaten philanthropy we should ask ourselves, why are we doing it? what are we willing to today? what are the odds of success? what should we pay in terms of -- even that complicates things too much for interveners and ll basically probably induce fewer interventions but nonetheless there will be fewer interventions. i just think you ought to understand what you are doing before you do them. >> i want to bridge between something i heard in your remarks and something we heard just prior.

you mentioned that you do perceive that there's at least some evolution of identification among individuals and then a new global order with the subnational with more local allegiances. and in the last panel we heard such identity -- religion, nationalism and subnational identities may be posing a threat to the state. you seem to be fairly strongly set on the global order of interaction between the states. you see this identity in any way as threatening the more prevailing state versus state or if you could elaborate more on your notion of non-state actors' roles in all of this. >> i think the question is, a threat to what state? in my parts of the world where we see intense identity

politics, it's because the states were weak or the states were only half formed. right? so in iraq -- even under saddam hussein or under the assad regime. under mubarak in egypt. the state has a police and war-making institution which was actually pretty strong. these states have been very hard to shatter. and we -- and continue to be hard to shatter. right? on the other hand, because of the conditions under which these states were born, they didn't have to do the same things the western states had to do. they didn't have to cut the deal with the middle class and nurture the economy, because they either lived off the cold war or raw materials. right? so these warfare states are grafted on to policies that are not fully formed and not concluded.

and there's going to be a tension between these two things. right? and that's going to endure. collapse, states can and when they do these identities that are present will either form their own little state lettes, because eople want a vy on thises -- so you will get that or single states. single states in name but multiple states in practice. right? if you ask me where i think iraq is going orr where i've basically been suggesting for years iraq should go, it should be self-governing regional entities that are as much as possible in these situations ethno t with the religious maps.

and those groups will want to form state-like entities, right? so states have functions and people want them but the problem is groups don't want to live under other states there's an old european joke that why should i live in a minority in your country when i can live as a minority in mine. >> robert osgood was my mentor and wrote -- it -- was pretty well known as a major realist but also wrote a book called "ideals in self-interest" which speak to america's role in the world and one of his points was that the elite must establish a grand strategy that links economics, politics and military to end -- convince the american people that it's within their interest and within their ideological point of view, and a change in the grand strategy seems toe change

the assumptions underlying international economics and politics. what's the role of leadership in changing the grand strategy? it's not just going to evolve. it's going to have to have some kind of leading spokesperson or leading politician. do you see that coming? and is that necessary? it is , i think -- necessary. and whether it's coming or not i think is an open question. one of the things that caused me to write this book -- "restraint" book. s what appeared to me is the disappearance of debate in the united states in replacement with the debates about strategy and minor tactics make it seem as if they are debates about

grand strategy, right? so it's often about tools and priorities but the basis higemity, i -- once wrote a book about clinton strategies and read every one of their document answered started out with a certain coloration, but by the end, they were liberal -- hi gemtists. so the demonstrates found their way to liberal higemity and the elites who staffed the security positions in both parties, what they disagree about often seems rather minimal to me, right? and you know, you can't look at what's happened to american media and say that there's anything about the way disagreements are presented that would give american people or those who watch tv some sort of sense of more fundamental

choices. so here we're having a screening debate about whether to bomb or not to bomb the outskirts of baghdad. this is not productive. that said, alternative views that were, you know, sort of like the dracula movies, this is the way you keep the ogre away. you couldn't even voice views that gave any credit to any isolationist position during cold war without being laughed out of the radio. that is no longer true. when my friends, who began thinking about restraint 60 years ago. there was a little bit of -- even i, because i used to have a different set of views. sometimes i would view the olations -- isolationists -- there are a variety of folk, many in this room, institutions in town that are trying to

formulate and share with a lighter audience different concept wallizations -- so some people may genuinely wish to be as isolationists as america can e. so we're sharing these ideas and it's no longer laughable. it's no longer can be dealt with by just saying one or two voodoo words and making it go away. -- at we look at the what public opinion polls are making of the views in american society, it is clear that there is some feeling out there in the policy that the americans have done too much and the world can do less the americans have be too open and too active

and not all of that is pretty. so there's per meant but there's ferment in the body of politics about this. five, six, seven, eight years ago, people who defended the present strategy would found table and say to someone like me, you're -- your strategy is not consistent with the liberal values of the american people they want to see implemented in their foreign policy, right? now, you will still hear that, but it rings hollow now. because the american people, to the extent one can define their attitudes, have discovered some of the costs of this project. and they are not just sitting around over the breakfast table weighing these things there's some large-scale set of intuitions saying, this does not seem worth that much, right? now, i always say to people on the other side of this debate, i say, look, what i want you to

do is go to the american people with an honest story of what the strategy costs and see if you get all kinds of support. but that's what i would like you to do. go with an honest accounting, right? a colleague had an article in -- was it the "times" about front-loading your assessment of the cost for veterans of war? i don't know if that's exactly the right thing to do, but conversations that talk about plausible costs rather than low balling which is the way we sell everything in america. we low ball the cost. that would be something they would expect from them that they have been been doing --ause i think they know they know that a more honest discussion of cost of the american people and duration of this project and the uncertainty of the outcome would make a lot scratcheaded americansa

gee, youd and say cannot come up with something better than this? i like the book i wrote. i think things came together. i think it is the direction the country to go, but we need more voices, and the situation seems to be receptive to those voices. what your view of the future of the nato alliance is, and you said earlier that you wanted to turn alliances more political than military. do you believe the crisis in ukraine is an attempts to

legitimize an essentially anachronistic alliance? and the second question has to do with saudi arabia. is it correct that you stated earlier that defending the current saudi regime would be worth the potential cost of losing the largest oil producer in the region, and if that is the case, what is your view of the saudi sponsorship of jihad which we are currently engaged in fighting in the middle east today? really big questions. you worked two in. [laughter] and must vladimir putin -- unless vladimir is the

caricatured, sort of committed rebuild the soviet union character he has been portrayed, if he is not that person and it's that he is essentially a traditionally european statesmen try to do the best for his country, trying to grab gains where he can, catering to a nationalism in his own country, etc. -- unless there is a whole lot of energy coming out of russia, i do not think this will inject that much new life into nato. i think before this happened, you could sort of see what was happening to nato. gentile,nd of agen incremental, hollowing out of forces on the continent. the europeans would have continued to spend less or not spend more and shrink their forces, right, so all forces

were going to shrink, yet all of the rhetoric would have remained the same, and all of the activities,ligious shall we say, right, so you have newings, you announce strategies, you commission new all of these pseudo-energy that nato generates for itself to make it seem like a living institution would all have continued, and only a handful of folk like me would have been pointing out that the emperor has no clothes. everyone would have continued to bask e in the american claim that they would come back and defend if anything bad happened. this is very congenial. europeans are very good and convincing be americans that we have an absolute obligation, and absolute need, etc., etc. that i think was the trend. now will that trend continue

because of ukraine? i think it probably will. to take a cheap shot here, i thought the president was kind of misguided to run off to europe and offer $1 billion worth of exercise money over the next year as if the problem with maninly ours. even if you want to do something, the allies should have been obliged over those meetings to say for every dollar we generate, we will generate $.50 of exercise money. this is an alliance. the president did nothing to convey the image that this is an alliance in which the allies need to pony up. the alliance enlarged itself to include poland in the baltic -- that was a decision made collectively. that means everyone is on the hook to defend poland in reassure poland, not just us. that is the way it should be. it is not the way it is going to be. that is my prediction.

so i do not take my advice is going to be followed. i do not think the notion that there is going to be a renaissance because ukraine is going to happen -- i think it is a bump in the road on a kind of a slow decline of the real capabilities of the alliance married to a continued set of political assurances and roadshows, and of course there will be the opened its door he speech by -- there will be the obligatory speech at the end of his or her tenure, every american have to pound the table and make a speech that the future of nato depends on the contribute of their fair share and how the horrible it is they don't, and everybody nods their head and the european say of course we need to do more, and that is the end of it. why do they feel compelled to go through this exercise i do not know because it has no effect. on saudi, i may not have been clear -- i do not believe there is any -- i do not believe in america's interest in the world's interest in the free

flow of oil are sufficiently great to make a ward with the saudi regime worth it to be american. i think it is a big flat circle, a zero, a target for every jihadist entrepreneur in the world, so i would say this is something we don't want to do and we should not do. what to make of saudi involvement with jihadis around the world? some people believe that this is a real and deep thing, and other people would say no, no, they are only supporting the moderates. story, butravel this i do believe that the weight of evidence is -- would suggest muchthe saudis do not do to keep resources from flowing out of their country and other gulf countries into the hands of

people who are really not very and ill to thed united states, and it is a puzzle to me that given all the money that we spend not only of intelligence but all the energy financialn tracking how, someat some way, if we have saudi cooperation we cannot do more about this. i am not telling you my conclusions. he saudi is clearly have their own interests, and what they went to understand is that their interests are not always with hours. >> that is all the time we have for this panel. thankd like to please professor posen. [applause] >> thank you all for coming out. i appreciate it. >> we will reconvene here at 11:15. we have a bit of a break. please enjoy it and come back. thank you.

[captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] morning, johnhis bolton, 4s u.s. ambassador to the one on iraq. the prez obama on iraq. that is followed by a news conference with house republicans after leadership elections. >> this weekend, american history tv is live from the gettysburg college civil war institute, saturday morning starting at 845 eastern, you will hear peter carmichael on robert e lee followed by a brooks simpson on ulysses s. grant, and later the story on the burning of chambersburg. this weekend on american history tv on c-span3. currentep in touch with events from a nation's capital using any phone anytime with c-span radio and audio now. -8888. call202-626

every weekday, listen to a recap on washington today. you can also hear audio of the five network sunday public affairs programs beginning sundays at noon eastern. c-span radio on audio now. -626-8888. >> now, john bolton who spoke at the policy conference. it is 10 minutes. >> to every month, monica, and thank you, ralph

look at the issues that you are concerned with, of religious thedom, individual freedom, family, all of the things that motivates you to the work you do , to draw the ring around those freedoms and to protect our way of life here at home, the absolutely critical variable is to provide for the common defense is the preamble to the constitution says, and let's be isy clear -- barack obama not the filling that constitutional responsibility. [applause] this is a president who does not give priority to national security affairs, a gets in the way of what his religion is, which he told us in 2000 it was fundamentally transforming america, and every day that goes by leaves the republic weaker.

you said everything about foreign and defense policy is proven wrong. we give even a famous reset button with russia, which has resulted in arms force and use against the sovereign nation, and terrorists being shifted from one nation to another. wittgenstein in the middle east today where the president's power -- we can see it in the middle east today where the president's power leads to complete chaos. today, the "wall street journal" reports this morning that president obama believed the all al-maliki government needs to change. after 10 years or more of incessant criticism of the bush administration's policies in iraq and the middle east, today, barack obama came out in favor

of regime change in iraq. how about that? more than a day late and a dollar short, but the president's lack of attention to american national security affairs is something that our adversaries all around the world have seen. newough every day brings stories of the decline of american influence, our friends moving away from us, our adversaries increasing, the pace and the scope of their challenges, the bad news is really still to come because friends and adversaries alike can see that there are only 2.5 years left. to us it looks like a long time. to our enemies, it looks like a short time, but what it means is that the pace and the scope of the challenges we face likely tonally is increase. many people that try to answer the question -- what is it that motivates barack obama to follow the policies he pursues?

and i would like to just explore that a little bit today because i think it is critical for the debate that we ought to be having in this country about the proper place of america in the world. issue of great philosophical importance, and the president has a view of america's place in the world that puts him at odds with the long line of presidents, democrat and republican alike, going back to frank lyn franklin roosevelt. he is the first president since roosevelt not to wake up every morning and have is his first thought -- threat is the --what right does the united states have against the today? adam smith said the first duty of the sovereign is to protect the society can be violence of other societies, but that is not barack obama's first priority. instead, he is somebody who sees

problemas part of the in the world. he sees america as to assert, to privilege, too successful, and joee said famously to the plumber in the 2008 campaign about spreading the wealth around, internationally he does not see anything wrong with spreading the power o around. ais is the first time that leader of the democratic party has felt that way, but it is the first time he has been president. going back to 1988, george h.w. bush set up michael dukakis, his opponent in that election, said my opponent sees the united states as just another pleasant country out there somewhere on the u.n. rollcall between albania and zimbabwe. and that is how barack obama sees it as well. obama was asked on his first european trip by a reporter from

england -- and do you believe in american exceptionalism? listen to obama's response because it informs what we have seen of his policies in the past 5.5 years. the president said -- yes, i believe in american exceptionalism, just as the brits believe in british exceptionalism and the greeks believe in greek exceptionalism. now let's parse that sentence the way the president would. in the first 30, he said yes, i believe in american exceptionalism. so although siebel is a i don't come i have just proven you wrong, but then in a second 2/3 of the sentence coming to that back. countries in3 the line, just as the -- you get the point. if everybody is exceptional, then nobody is exceptional. that is what he is saying. in his view, if america is part

of the problem, then the answer inward looking, declining america. he actually thinks that this will make the world a safer place. he thinks that it is american isrength that provocative, but he is 180 degrees wrong. it is like looking at the world through the wrong end of the telescope. it is not our strength that is provocative -- it is our weakness that is provocative because our adversary see the opportunities and take advantage when we turn away from the world, when we are not prepared to act, and they act instead on their own agenda. now right before us today, we see the consequences in iraq of america withdrawal, and it is a laboratory experiment, something you really get in international affairs. we could have kept a residual american force in iraq to help andilize the country

protect the sacrifices that americans had made over the past 10 years, but the president was determined to withdrawal all american forces, and he did. he used the pretext -- and that is a vertical point -- the pretext, not the reason, but the pretext of not achieving the agreement to justify the withdrawal, and today you have chaos and i n iraq, chaos in syria, chaos dropping middle east, so that our close ally, israel, finds itself in jeopardy across the world, and particularly from iran's growing nuclear weapons program. what is the president answer to this? he says first he want to change the regime in iraq, something he would have criticized the bush administration for and did so before. he said he is going to send 300 military advisers to iraq to al-malik he

is essentially helping iran since malik he is a puppet for tehran. and i know this will calm all of your fears -- he is going to send john kerry to baghdad. [laughter] you know, he was scheduled -- this is a perfect example of the obama policy at work -- he was scheduled to make a statement in the white house today at 12:30, and he was over 45 minutes late in making that statement. why? almost certainly because they were still making up what he was going to say. and this is the prospect that we face from now until the end of this administration. i believe as part of the overall national debate that we are having and the critical issues that you are raising on the domestic scene and internationally when it comes to issues of religious freedom -- we have got to have a national andte on this country

america's proper place in the world. are we a force for good, for stability, to protect our own interests -- as i think all of us believe -- or are we a force for instability and trouble as barack obama believes th? inexperiencedand president because those issues were not debated adequately. we cannot afford for that to happen again. all of you will make the decision on house and senate races and the presidential race, probably take many different candidates, but one thing we have to ensure is that we cannot leave our countries undefended because if america falls, all of our freedoms are lost, and that is the critical reason why providing for the common defense is a constitutional imperative and absolutely clinical in the coming years ahead. thank you very much. could luck to you. [applause]

>> about $10 million in bonuses was paid out by the v.a. system over three years while that it -- while veterans to with long health-care delays. today, the committee holds a hearing about bonuses that the veterans affairs department. it is live and 9:30 eastern on c-span3. next, president obama announces that he will send 300 military advisers to assist iraqi forces but no combat troops. this is half an hour. >> good afternoon, everybody. i just met with my national security team to discuss the situation in iraq. we have been meeting regularly to review the situation since isil, terrorist organization that operates in iraq and syria,

made advances inside iraq. i said last week, isil poses a threat to the american people, to the region, and to u.s. interests. today i want to provide you an update to how we are responding to the situation. first, we are waiting to secure our embassy and personnel inside iraq. as president i have no greater priority than the safety of our men and women serving overseas. so i have taken steps to relocate some of our embassy personnel and we have sent reinforcements to better secure our facilities. second, at my direction, we have significantly increased our intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance assets so we have a better picture of what's taking place inside of iraq. this will give us a greater understanding what isil is doing, where it's located, and how we might support efforts to counter this threat. third, the united states will continue to increase our support to iraqi security forces. we are prepared to create joint operation centers in baghdad and northern iraq, to share

intelligence, and planning to confront the terrorist threat of isil. through our new counterterrorism partnership fund we are prepared to work with congress to provide additional equipment. we have had advisors in iraq through our embassy and we are prepared to send a small number of additional american military advisors, up to 300, to assess how we can best train, advise, and support iraqi security forces going forward. american forces will not be returning to combat in iraq. but we will help iraqis as they take the fight to terrorists who threaten the iraqi people, the region, and american interests as well. fourth, in recent days, we positioned additional u.s. military assets in the region. because we increased intelligence resources, we are developing more information about potential targets associated with isil. going forward we'll be prepared

to take targeted and precise military action if and when we determine the situation on the ground requires it. if we do, i will consult closer with congress with regions in iraq and the region. i want to emphasize that the best and most effective response to a threat like isil will ultimately involve partnerships where iraqis take the lead. finally, the united states will lead a diplomatic effort to work with iraqi leaders and the countries in the region to support stability in iraq. at my direction secretary kerry will depart this weekend where we'll be able to consult wour ith our allies and partners. just as all iraqis must respect iraq's territory integrity, all of iraq's neighbors have a vital interest in ensuring that iraq does not descend into civil war and become a safe haven for

terrorists. above all, iraqi leaders must rise above their differences and come together around a political plan for iraq's future. shiia, sunni, kurds, all iraqis must have confidence they can advance their interests and aspirations through the political process rather than through violence. national unity meetings have to go forward to build consensus across iraq's different communities. now that iraq's election has a new parliament should convene as soon as possible. the formation of a new government will be an opportunity to begin a genuine dialogue and form a government that represents the legitimate interests of all iraqis. now, it's not the place for the united states to choose iraq's leaders. it is clear, though, that only leaders that can govern with an inclusive agenda will be able to truly bring the iraqi people together and help them through this crisis. meanwhile, the united states will not pursue military actions

to support one sect inside iraq at the expense of another. there is no military solution inside iraq. certainly not one that is led by the united states. but there is an urgent need for an inclusive political process, a more capable iraqi security force and counterterrorism effort that deny groups like isil a safe haven. in closing, recent days have reminded us of the deep scars left by america's war in iraq. alongside the loss of nearly 4,500 american patriots, many veterans carry the wounds of that war and will for the rest of their lives. here at home, iraq sparked the debates and intense emotions in the past and we have some of those debates resurface, but what's clear from the last decade is the need for the united states to ask hard questions before we take action abroad. particularly military action.

the most important question we should all be asking, the issue that we have to keep front and center, the issue i keep front and certainty, is what is in the national security interest of the united states of america? as commander in chief that's what i stay focused on. as americans, that's what all of us should be focused on. in going forward we'll continue to consult closely with congress . we'll keep the american people informed. we'll remain vigilant, and we'll continue to do everything in our power to perfect the security of the united states and the safety of the american people. with that i'm going to take a couple questions. i start with colleen nelson of the "wall street journal." >> mr. president, do you have prime minister maliki -- can maliki bring political stability to iraq? >> as i said it's not our job to choose iraq's leaders. part of what our patriots fought

for during many years in iraq was the right and the opportunity for iraqis to determine their own destiny and choose their own leaders. but i don't think there's any secret that right now, at least, there is deep divisions between sunni, shiia, and kurdish leaders. as long as those deep divisions continue or worsen, it's going to be very hard for an iraqi central government to direct an iraqi military to deal with these threats. and so we consulted with prime minister maliki and we have said to him privately, we have said it publicly that whether he's prime minister or any other leader aspires to lead the country, that it has to be an agenda in which sunni, shiia, and kurd all feel that they have the opportunity to advance their interest through the political process.

we have seen over the last two years -- actually dating back to 2008, 2009, but i think worse over the last two years, the sense among sunnis that their interests were not being served. that legislation that had been promised around, for example -- had been stalled. you hear similar complaints that the government in baghdad has not sufficiently reached out to some of the tribes and been able to bring them in to a process that gives them a sense of being part of a unity government or single nation state. and that has to be part of the reason why we saw better

equipped iraqi security forces with larger numbers not be able to hold contested territory against isil. probably reflects that lack of -- a sense of commitment on the part of sunni communities to work with baghdad. and that has to be fixed if we are going to get through this crisis. >> thank you, mr. president. americans may look at this decision that you're making today as a sneak preview of coming attractions. that the number of advisors that you're planning to send in may be the beginning of boots on the ground scenario down the road. why is iraq's civil war and in the national security interests of the united states, and are you concerned about the potential for mission creep? >> i think we always have to guard against mission creep. let me repeat what i said in the past. american combat troops are not going to be fighting in iraq

again. we do not have the ability to solve this problem by sending in tens of thousands of troops and committing the kinds of blood and treasure that also already been expended in iraq. ultimately this is something that has to be solved by the iraqis. it is in our national security interests not to see an all-out civil war inside iraq. not just for humanitarian reasons, but because that ultimately can be destabilizing throughout the region, and in addition to having strong allies there that we are committed to protecting, obviously issues like energy and global energy markets continues to be important.

we also have an interest in making sure that we don't have a safe haven that continues to grow for isil and other extremist jihadist groups who could use that as a base of operations for planning and targeting ourselves, our personnel overseas, and eventually the homeland. if they accumulate more money, they accumulate more ammunition, more military capability, larger numbers, that poses great dangers not just to allies of ours like jordan which is very close by, but it also poses a great danger, potentially, to europe and ultimately the united states. we have already seen inside of syria that groups like isil that right now are fighting the other extremist groups or an assad regime that was nonresponsive to

sunni majority there, that that has attracted more and more jihadists or would-be jihadists. some from europe. they then start traveling back to europe and that over time can create a cadre of terrorist that could harm us. we have humanitarian interest in preventing blood shed. we have strategic interests in stability in the region. we have counterterrorism interests. all those have to be addressed. the initial effort for us to get situational awareness through the reconnaissance and surveillance that we have already done, coupled with some of our best people on the ground doing assessments of exactly what the situation is, starting,

by the way, with the perimeter around baghdad and make sure that's not overrun. that does not foreshadow a larger commitment of troops to actually fight in iraq. that would not be effective in meeting the core interest that we have. >> very quickly, do you wish you left a residual force in iraq? any regrets? >> keep in mind, that wasn't a decision made by me. that was a decision made by the iraqi government. we offered a modest residual force to help continue to train and advise iraqi's security forces. we had a requirement which we require in any situation where we have u.s. troops overseas, and that is that they are provided immunity since they are being invited by the sovereign government there, if, for example, they end up acting in self-defense if they are

attacked and find themselves in a tough situation, that they are not somehow held before a foreign court. that's a core requirement that we have for u.s. troop presence anywhere. the iraqi government and mr. -- and prime minister maliki declined to provide us that immunity. i think it is important, though, to recognize that despite that decision, that we have continued to provide them with very intensive advice and support and have continued throughout this process over the last five years to not only offer them our assistance militarily, but we have also continued to urge the kinds of political compromises that we think are ultimately necessary in order for them to have functioning

multisectarian democracy inside the country. >> bni faith has been slow to provide a significant weapons training for the security operation. with the expansion of the syrian war into iraq change your mind about the weapons and training you are now willing to give them? is that what -- can you explain on what you are doing now? >> that assessment about the dangers of what was happening in syria existed since we -- since the very beginning of the syrian civil war. the question has never been whether we thought this was a serious problem. the question has always been -- is there the capacity of moderate opposition on the ground to absorb and counteract

extremists that might have been pouring in as well as an assad regime supported by iran and russia that outmanned them and was ruthless? so we have consistently provided that opposition with support. oftentimes the challenge is if you have former farmers or teachers or pharmacists who now are taking up opposition against a battle hardened regime with support from external actors that have a lot at stake, how quickly can you get them trained? how effective are you able to mobilize them? and that continues to be a challenge. and even before the situation

that we saw with isil going into iraq, we had already tried to maximize what we can do to support modern opposition that not only can counteract the brutality of assad, but also can make sure that in the minds of sunnis they don't think that their only alternative is either mr. assad or extremist groups like isil. >> you think what you might be doing is what the secretary of state alluded to? >> i think the key to both syria and iraq is going to be a combination of what happened inside the country working with moderate syrian opposition, working with an iraqi government that's inclusive, and that's

-- and us laying down a more effective counterterrorism platform that gets all the countries in the region pulling in the same direction. i alluded to this in the west i talked about it today with respect to the counterterrorism partnership fund. there's going to be a long-term problem in this region in which we have to partner with countries that are committed to our interests, our values, and at the same time we have immediate problems with terrorist organizations that may be advancing. rather than try to play whack-a-mole wherever these terrorist organizations have pop up, we have to build

effective partnerships, make sure that they have capacity. some of the assets that have been devoted solely to afghanistan over the last decade, we've got to shift to make sure that we have coverage in the middle east and north africa. you look at a country like yemen , a very impoverished country, and one that has its own ethnic divisions. we do have a committed partner in the president and his government, and we have been to help to develop their capacities without putting large numbers of u.s. troops on the ground. at the same time as we got enough c.t., counterterrorism capabilities, that we are able to go after folks that might try to hit our embassy or might be trying to export terrorism into europe or the united states.

looking at how we can create more of those models is going to be part of the solution in dealing with both syria and iraq, but in order for us to do that, we still need to have actual governments on the ground that we can partner with and that we have got some confidence are going to pursue the political policies of influenciveness. in yemen for example, a wide ranging national dialogue that took a long time, but helped to give people a sense that there is a legitimate political outlay for grievances that they may have. >> thank you, sir. going back to where you see prime minister maliki playing a role at this point, you said that it's time to rise above differences. there is need for more influencive government. is he a unifier? how much clout does the united states ultimately have with any of the leadership in iraq at this point, really? >> well, we still provide them significant assistance.

i think they recognize that unlike some other players in the region we don't have territorial ambitions in their country. we are not looking to control their assets or their energy. we want to make sure that we are vindicating the enormous effort and sacrifice that was made by our troops in giving them an opportunity to build a stable, inclusive society that can prosper and deliver for the basic needs and aspirations of the iraqi people. and at the same time they are a sovereign country. they have their own politics. and what we have tried to do is to give them our best advice about how they can solve their political problems now that they are in crisis, we are indicating

to them that there's not going to be a simple military solution to this issue. if you start seeing the various groups inside iraq go to their respective corners, then it is almost certain that baghdad, the central government, will not be able to control huge chunks of their own country. the only way they can do that is if there are credible sunni leaders, both at the national level and at the local level, who have confidence that a shiia majority, that the kurds, that all those folks are committed to a fair and just governance of the country. right now that doesn't exist. there's too much suspicion and

mistrust. the good news is that an election took place in which despite all this mistrust, despite all this frustration, despite all this anger, you still have millions of iraqis turn out. in some cases in very dangerous circumstances. you now have a court that has certified those elections and you have a constitutional process to advance a government formation. so far at least, the one bit of encouraging news that we have seen inside iraq is that all the parties have said they continue to be committed to choosing a leadership and a government through the existing constitutional order. so what you're seeing i think is as the prospects of civil war

heighten, many iraqi leaders stepping back and saying, let's not plunge back into the abyss. let's see if we can resolve this politically. but they don't have a lot of time. and you have a group like isil that is doing everything that it can to send the country back into chaos. one of the messages that we have for prime minister maliki, but also for the speaker of the house and the other leadership inside iraq, is get going on this government formation. it will make it a lot easier for them to shape a military strategy. it will also make it possible for us to partner much more effectively than we can currently. >> given the prime minister's track record, is he a unifier? can he play that role after what we have seen play out over the last couple weeks?

>> i think the test is before him and other iraqi leaders as we speak. right now they can make a series of decisions. regardless of what happened in the past, right now is a moment where the fate of iraq hangs in the balance. and the test for all of them is going to be whether they can overcome the mistrust, the deep sectarian divisions, in some cases just political opportunism and say this is bigger than any one of us and we have to make sure that we do what's right for the iraqi people. and that's a challenge. that's not something that the united states can do for them. that's not something, by the way, the united states armed forces can do for them. we can provide them the space, we can provide them the tools, but ultimately they are going to have to make those decisions. in the meantime, my job is to make sure that american

personnel there are safe. that we are consulting with the iraqi security forces. that we are getting a better assessment of what's on the ground, and that we are recognizing the dangers of isil over the long term and developing the kinds of comprehensive counterterrorism strategies we are going to need to deal with this issue. and that's going to involve some short-term responses to make sure that isil is not obtaining capacity to engage with us directly or our allies and partners, but it's also going to require some long-term strategies as well. because part of what we have seen with respect to isil is -- a broader trend that i talked about at west point, rather than

a single network, a discreate eet network of terrorists, this fluid combination of harden terrorists, disaffected local leadership, and where there's vacuums, they are filling it and creating the potential for serious danger for all concerned. >> any word on what you're willing to do -- >> our view is that iran can play a constructive role. if it is helping to send the same message to the iraqi government that we are sending. which is that iraqi only holds together if it's inclusive. and that if the interests of sunni, shiia, and kurd are all respected.

if iran is coming in solely as an armed force on behalf of the shiia, and if it's framed in that fashion, then that probably worsens the situation and the prospect for government formation that would actually be constructive over the long term. >> what is your sense of that right now? >> just as iraq's leaders have to make decisions, we have indicated to iran it is important to avoid steps that might encourage the kind of sectarian splits that might lead to civil war. and the one thing that i think

has to be emphasized -- we have deep differences with iran with a whole host of issues. obviously, what happened in syria in part is the result of iran coming in hot and heavy on one side. iran obviously should consider the fact that if it is -- if its view of the region is through a sectarian frames, they could find themselves fighting in a lot of places, and that is not good for the iranian economy or the people over the long-term. i suspect there are folks in iran that recognize that. iraq in chaos on the borders is not in their interest. but old habits die hard. we will have to see whether they can take what i think would be a more promising path over the

next several days. all right? thank you very much, everybody. f on transparency, and i think my colleagues would give a similar great, whether they are liberal or conservative. he freedom of liberation process have become a joke. it was already well on its way prior to the obama administration, but this administration has perfected the stall, the delay, the reductions, the excludes -- the excuses, and it is shocking because i feel like the information they withhold and protect many times but to the public, we own it, but there is no sense of that when we asked for it. they covered as if they are a private corporation defending their trade secrets rather than understanding what they hold is information that is gathered on our behalf. >> emmy award winning journalist attkisson sunday night

8:00 on c-span's "q&a." republicans house director kevin mccarthy of california to be the next house majority leader and louisiana coppersmith steve scalise to be the majority whip. 's follows eric cantor primary loss. speaker boehner joined mr. mccarthy and mr. skilling's to speak to reporters. -- and mr. scalise to speak to reporters.

as our new majority whip. i want to thank all of my colleagues who did participate in the selection. competition is a good thing. our job is to stay focused on the american people's priorities. we have made their priorities our rorty's. the american people are still asking where are the jobs, and our job is to make sure that we're doing everything we can to promote our economy, to create more jobs at higher wages for , and i will people now turn to our new majority leader kevin mccarthy. >> person will foremost, i want constituents and my colleagues for the trust that they instilled in me. america is struggling. we're struggling with a stagnant economy, a failed hair care law, and so many are living paycheck to paycheck.

individuals for people before politics. i make one promise -- i will to makery single day sure this conference has the courage to lead with the wisdom to listen. and we will turn this country around. >> thank you. thank myant to colleagues and constituents for the honor that they interested in me to be the next majority whip. i am looking forward to bringing a fresh new voice to our leadership table. and joining with this team to help confront the challenges that people all across this country are facing. we have got solid conservative solutions that are going to solve the problems facing our country. we reached out to the president to join us in solving those problems, but we are going to continue to move forward in the house as a united team, building a stronger team to address those problems, and continue to work to get our country back on track and our economy moving again. >> this has been a big day for the republicans, and i am proud to stand with our new leadership

team for the 113th congress. congratulations to our new majority leader, kevin mccarthy, and our new majority whip steve thanse, and more anything, we are united. we are united in our effort to move america forward, make america strong, to make sure that moms and dad have more opportunities to provide, bring him higher paychecks for their children. we are united in getting americans back to work. we are united in getting the job done here on capitol hill. we want to be putting forward solutions rather than continuing to see in action out of the senate, and we are going to continue to work on behalf of people who have sent us here to make them proud and to give them more opportunities. >> let's take a couple of questions. >> my question is for mr. scalise. host[indiscernible]

how did you have this number down? >> we built a strong team that was representative of our entire congress. i'm proud to be the chair of the republican study committee, which is 170 six members of our conference, and i were to record part over that year and a half that i have been chairman to build consensus, to move and service solutions forward in a way that unites our conference and salts policy is in our country. the results but i've had over that year and a half have been brought to a broader conference, toluding numbers recognizing help strengthen our team to help strengthen america. we build a really strong team. a team that is very representative of our entire time, which shows that our conference wants to move forward even stronger so that we can do an even better job of addressing those problems facing the country and now have the white instead of not working

with us to join him in addressing those problems as well. >> [indiscernible] americais a win for because we will be more united team moving forward. there are so many bills that we passed to get our economy moving, that solve row problems, but the senate is not even want to act on. the president does not even want to engage. he wants to sit in the oval office with a pen acting like there is no legislative branch. people want to solve real problems. with this method sends a that the houses are united to address those, now we are waiting to let the senate and president follow suit. there areaker -- probably a lot of grassroots republican out there, the kind againstd for dave bratt eric cantor saying -- are you guys getting me? we got him out because we wanted more it conservative leadership, and they elected a guy from california.

a guy who was a grandson of a cattle rancher, these son of a firefighter. only in america do you get that opportunity. they elected a guy who have only grown up through the grassroots. they elected a guy that spent his time going around recruiting many of these individuals to get the majority. had to struggle for whatever we wanted to overcome. i think that is the greatest part about america. that they always give you the privilege and the opportunity. that is what this party brings as well. i would like to give an opportunity, people will be very impressed about what we're going to do and where we are going to do. >> the irs has reported that x irs official lois lerner's crashed computer was recycled and ernie mills have been lost. today, the irs commissioner testifies before the house ways and means committee about the loss of e-mails and the

investigation of the alleged irs targeting of conservative groups. you can see it live starting at 9:00 a.m. eastern on c-span 2. about $10 million in bonuses was paid out by the phoenix the a health system -- v.a. health system while the veterans dealt with long delays. today, there is a committee at the veterans affairs department. it is live at 9:30 eastern on c-span3. >> for over 35 years, c-span has brought you a look at public affairs events from washington directly to you, putting you in the room at congressional hearings, white house events, briefings, and conferences, and offering complete gavel-to-gavel coverage of the u.s. house -- all as a public service of private industry. we are c-span -- created by the cable tv industry 35 years ago and brought to you as a public service by your local cable or satellite provider. watch us in hd, like us on facebook, and follow us on twitter.

>> live today on c-span, "washington journal" is next, and it not :00 a.m. eastern, the u.s. house returns for work on defense billion spending bill for 2015. oning up in 45 minutes "washington journal," maryland representative donna edwards discusses the 2014 elections, and democratic efforts to turn out be female vote. at 8:20 a.m. eastern, north carolina commerce and walter jones talks about the military's political and diplomatic options available to the u.s. in iraq. [video clip] >> we have had advisors in iraq through our embassy and are

prepared to send military advisers to support iraqi forces going forward. ♪ host: military advisers are headed to iraq. onwant to get your views what the president had to say yesterday here on "washington journal." 202 is the area code. (202) 585-3881 for republicans. (202) 585-3880 four democrats. (202) 585-3882