writing about different parts of richard holbrooke's life and career, vietnam, bosnia, afpak, and exerts from his own work, including his wonderful book and a lot of, you know, more speeches and essays. and we think it gives an incredible portrait of holbrooke both in his own words and reflections on his career by people that knew him well. >> we've been talking about with susan weinberg. :

grossman took over for the late richard holbrooke when passed. are you saying ambassador grossman is now in islamabad or kabul or on the way to kabul? a. >> we understand that mark grossman is in kabul and he's in part of these talks about the transition of power from international forces to afghan forces. that's going to start in july with a drawdown of u.s. troops and is going to take place within the next 2 1/2 years. the talks started today with afghan, u.s. and pakistani officials. they were scheduled to resume tomorrow. it's not clear -- we haven't verified where they were taking place tomorrow but a series of talks did take place in kabul today. i will have you stand by and check on how he's doing. mark grossman in kabul right now for these talks. i want to bring in tom foreman at the data wall for us. set the scene for us where this is and what's going on.

richard holbrooke's sp

richard holbrooke, connie martin came to us, bunch of people and said you know, we think you guys would be perfect to put together a book that really captures richard holbrooke's spirit and what he said gore and the work he did. and our plan was to publish on the upcoming anniversary of his death in december. derek salai and samantha power are the editors. wonderful contributors writing about different parts of holbrooke's life and career, vietnam, bosnia, afpak and we also have some excerpts from holbrooke's on work including his wonderful book and a lot of speeches and essays and thinks he has written over the years and we think he gets it gives an incredible portrait of holbrooke both in his own words and about reflections on his career by people who knew him very well. >> we been talking to susan weinberg, publisher of public affairs books, one of the perseus group's imprints, public affairs books.com is the web site. a. >> up next on booktv, after words an hour-long program where we invite guest hosts to interview authors. this week author michael totten on his first book, subor th

richard holbrooke. >> this is a book that we are very proud to be involved with.richard holbrooke's widow came to us and a bunch of people and said you know, we think you guys would be perfect to put together a book that really captures richard holbrooke's spirit and what he did. our plan was always to publish on the upcoming anniversary of his death in december. derek shall i am samantha power are the editors. we have wonderful contributors writing about different parts of his life and career. vietnam, bosnia, afpak and we also have an excerpt from holbrooke's of work including his wonderful book and a lot of you know more of his speeches and essays in and things he's written over the years. we think he gives an incredible portrait of holbrooke both through his own words and about reflections on his career by people who knew him very well. >> we have been talking with susan weinberg, publisher of public affairs books, one of the perseus groups imprints, public affairs books.com is the web site. >> what are you reading this summer? booktv wants to know. >> hi, i a

. >> richard holbrooke's widow, they came to us, a bunch of people, and said, you know, we think you guys would be perfect to put together a book that really captures richard holbrooke's spirit and what he stood for and the work he did. and our plan was always to publish on the upcoming anniversary of his death in december. samantha power and derek chalet are the editors. we have wonderful contributors right about richard's life and career, vietnam, bosnia, and we also have some excerpts from holbrooke's own work including his wonderful book and a lot of, you know, speeches and essays and thinks he's written over the years. and we think it gives an incredible portrait of holbrooke both in his own words and about reflections on his career by people who knew him very well. >> we've been talking with susan weinberg, publisher of public affairs books. public affairs books.com is the web site. >> so, matt, here's my question. the book is written in a breezy, popular style, and it has sort of a breezy optimism to it. you write at one point, and i'm quoting here, the innovative capitalist c

from washington, vali nasr, a professor of tufts university and was on the staff of amssador richard holbrooke. i am pleased to have both of them on this program at this time. i start here in new york with general keane. the military-- petraeus, admiral muen in testimony-- seem to say "this is not the decision we wanted but we can live with it because the commander-in-chief has decided this is way we go." >> yes, certainly. i think they probably gave him about three options, identifying the risk in each option and put forward a recommendation themselves. i'm somewhat confident their recommendation was a very modest withdrawal of forces in 2011 and mainta approximately the same number of troops getting 4,000 or 5,000 less through 2011 and into 2012 so a reduction of some 30,000 troops is significantly different, i believe, than what they recommended. what's happened, charlie, when the president made the decisio to ealate the war and provided 30,000 forces, they had requested 40,000. they knew they had two campaigns to conduct, one in the south and one in the east. because they had 30,000 versus

it took decades, including great heroic efforts by the late richard holbrooke. >> i recently visited pakistan. the united states has clear expectations for this relationship. as president obama said last night, the united states will never tolerate a safe haven for those of americans. we are looking to pakistan to take concrete actions on the goals we share. defeating violent extremism has taken some money innocent ones. it secures a stable and democratic and prosperous future. these are tough questions to ask of the pakistani. there are many causes for frustration. we should not overlook the positive steps of recent weeks. counter-terrorism corp. continues. several key extremists have been killed or captured. as i told the pakistani, america cannot and should not try to solve pakistan's problems. they have to eventually do that themselves. we cannot walk away from this relationship and ignore the consequences. pakistan is a nuclear arms states sitting at the crossroads of a strategic region. we have seen this movie before. we have seen the cost of disengaging from the region. this h

i agreed wh richard holbrook is focing this aid in a more intense way in the right areas was a priority. and mark grossman whose come in to relie, to take over richard's responsibilities and i know the secretary of the state and all of us are working to tr toate good the tality of the money focused in the right way. >> there are those who worry that while the leadership isi may very well be as you said no way complicit in osama bin laden. the same elements may somehow be involved in the security of the nuclear weapons. and i'm told that pakistan h an acceleration of nuclear weapons than any country in the world. >> the concern about security for nuclear weapons is one i shared many files with the general, and retired general who is responsible for the overall nuclear program. and certainly sharing it with general pasha. it's really in the kiani portfolio, if you will. and everything that i've seen from security standpoint, charlie, is it's getting better. and it's, you know, we have actually extended resources in support of assisting them, our government has, not the pentagon. andthey h

we have wonderful contributors writing about different parts of richard holbrooke's life and career, vietnam, bosnia, afpak, and exerts from his own work, including his wonderful book and a lot of, you know, more speeches and essays. and we think it gives an incredible portrait of holbrooke both in his own words and reflections on his career by people that knew him well. >> we've been talking about with susan weinberg. : >> i'm going to introduce my panelists, and somebody give me a sign when he have 15 minutes for question and answer. and what's our time frame here? an hour total. so, at about 4:00 5 we'll break for questions -- 4:15, we'll break for questions. so if you hold for them the end, if we have a lot of people dying to speak, we'll start earlier to my far right is my friend, bob weil, the executive editor for norton. he works with annett gordon reid, jg ballard and patricia high something, and hey has been in publishing in one form or another since we both got out of college many decades ago. to my immediate right is johnny temple, a small publisher in brooklyn, new york.

amazing web site where i can go to your web site and y what was the last time you interviewed richard holbrooke? when was the last time you interviewed john updike? i can find those interviews and that is an incredible cultural sour, actually. >> people like that had 2, 30, 40 interviews. i think holbrooke had 50, john updike maybe 10, 20. anyway, this. it seems to me that the most important event... what wasit originly post-america was released when? >> 2008. 2007 is basically when i wrote it. i'm trng to remember if i have that right. >> rose: so you wrote it before we knew the implications of the global financial crisis. >> absolutely. >> rose: what did it tell you? once you had written this and you include in here now the impact of the global financial crisis on the way the world was moving. >> that's probably the most significant shift. it's funny you say that. because the financial crisis-- which i didn't predict, i talked about the problems of too much loose credit and low interest rates but i thought it would be a garden-variety financial crisis, the kind we had had many times in the la

it therefore took decades including great heroic efforts by the late richard holbrooke and his teams,the border. i recently visited pakistan and had, as we say in diplo-speak, very candid conversations with the leaders. we have clear obligations for the leadership and the united states will never tolerate a safe haven for those who kill americans. we are looking to pakistan to take concrete actions on the goals we share defeating violent extremism which has also taken so many innocent pakistani lives, ending the conflict in afghanistan, and securing a stable democratic prosperous future. now, these are obviously tough questions to ask of the pakistanis and there are many causes for frustration, but we should not overlook the positive steps of just recent weeks since may 2nd. counterterrorism cooperation continues and very several key extremists have been killed or captured. as i told the pakistanis, america should not and cannot try to solve pakistan's problem. they eventually have to do that themselves, but nor can we walk away from this relationship and ignore the consequences for a

richard holbrooke who passed away not long okay.ing to have a very unhappy ending no matter what the united states did. you spoke to him a lot. did he believe that? >> at the end of every war, there has to be proper diplomacy. it's not about putting troops in and withdrawing you have to bring a war to closure. at this point in time, you have to think about how are we going to get an agreement that everybody in the region will be willing to live in accordance and bring peace to the country. >> it sounds losty and impressive, but almost undoable with pakistan right now. they don't like the united states by all accounts listen what's going on in afghanistan and don't trust the united states. given the cost, $10 billion a month for taxpayers, a lot say it's not worth it. >> absolutely. this war at the pace it's going and the cost it's going is not sustainable. we cannot do it long run. the happy with pakistan is a big problem. a lot of planning was based on the close relationship with pakistan. if pakistan is not going to be working wit

which gets to my final approach, which is it is time -- i hated it the day that richard holbrooke toldme that phrase, time to put afghanistan and pakistan and india, bangladesh, sri lanka back into south asia bureau. it is time to break them out a sitcom and pacific command and deal with this part of the world holistically come and think about it as integrated part and only when you start thinking about it as an integrated part are you likely to develop policies that will work in dealing with it. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you bruce antoni for that rosy assessment. bruce, i want to start with you. is there any way that folks involved in india and islamabad could have not known that bin laden was there? >> that is in my view the 64 million-dollar question of this year. there are only two possibilities. and just to make sure we have a strategic things here, the villa that mr. bin laden was living in since probably 2006 is less than a mile from their military academy. at the end of, the beginning of april this year, chief of army staff ion he gave a speech at the kabul milit

it therefore took decades, including great, heroic efforts by the late richard holbrooke and his team. the trucks are now rolling across the border. i recently visited pakistan and had, as we say in diplo-speak, very candid discussions with its leaders. united states has clear expectations of this relationship. the united states will never tolerate a safe haven for those who kill americans. we are looking to pakistan to take concrete actions on the buckles we share, defeating violent extremism -- on the goals we share, defeating violent extremism, ending the conflict in afghanistan, and securing a stable, democratic, prosperous future. these are obvious the tough questions to ask of the pakistanis, and there are many causes for frustration, but we should not overlook the positive steps of just recent weeks since may 2. counter-terrorism cooperation continues, and several very key extremists have been killed or captured. as i told the pakistanis, america cannot and should not try to sell pakistan boss problems. they have to eventually do that -- to solve pakistan's problems. they have

the late richard holbrooke was eloquent when he would talk to leaders about this. you have to start with some of the smaller [unintelligible] there are a number of issues, the economic perspective and prospects for the region are simply enormous. the business community in pakistan is a bright spot. they should engage more actively on that. it will take a lot of work. >> let's bring afghanistan into this. reconciliation between the taliban and afghan government has taken on new urgency since the death of bin laden. the administration has accelerated some of its direct talks with the taliban. there have been at least three meetings between afghan government officials and a taliban official close to mullah omar. it seems like the pact will have to go through islamabad. how can the u.s. bring the pakistanis on board with the peace process when significant elements still see extremist groups in afghanistan as part of their nation's strategic that with regard to india? what role should other nations play in this process? >> that is a fundamental question. i spent a week

and building on the efforts of richard holbrooke, we are intensifying our regional approach to the af-pac challenge. that you discussed earlier today. the third areas effectively managing our major relationships. for starters our allies which is timely topic given the president's trip to europe last week. we worked hard to revitalize our atlantic & pacific alliances and sharpen them for the modern challenges we face and this work continues. when you sit in a bilateral meeting with a european leader and hear the long list of issues we're working on together, endless list focused on everything around the world you realize just how crucial our allies are. across the board we count on them to help share the burden and their contributions have been impressive. 40,000 troops in afghanistan, cooperation on iran, leadership on libya, help with guantanamo, joint efforts on climate change, counterterrorism, global development, nonproliferation and so much else. we're deeply mindful that we share not only a long history of working effectively together but also the common values and interests that ma