Transcripts For ALJAZ The Bottom Line 2020 Ep 3 20240713

Hi im Steve Clemons and i have a question President Trump wants to reduce the american presence in the middle east and replace it with nato how would that work lets get to the bottom line. Last week during his self congratulatory speech after the assassination of iranian general cost him selling money President Trump made a vague request today i am going to ask data. To become much more involved in the middle east process over the last 3 years under my leadership our economy is stronger than ever before and americas achieved Energy Independence these historic accomplishment shades our strategic priorities. But does that mean the North Atlantic Treaty Organization was established by western countries more than 70 years ago to provide collective security against the soviet union after the collapse of the u. S. S. R. And after the 911 attacks nato became involved in places like afghanistan in iraq so whats next assuming responsibility for stability in the middle east would nato accept this new mandate and what would it mean on the ground fortunately we have 3 people in the room who have all the answers Alexander Vershbow i know i mean sandy was the deputy secretary general of nato until 2016 and before that the u. S. Ambassador to the alliance hes now with the Atlantic Council Heather Conley was a u. S. State Department Official working on europe and is currently director of the Europe Program at the center for strategic and International Studies and finally now gardner is a Foreign Policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation and former aide to Lady Margaret thatcher in the United Kingdom welcome all thank you very much for being here but before we start lest you think donald trump made a statement about nato in the middle east on a whim the next day he followed up with this exchange and i actually had any. Need to know and then you have middle east you know they told me i said what a beautiful name nato member good name straight u. S. M. C. And like the song y. M. C. A. Everybody nobody could remember us m. C. S. It think of the song y. M. C. A. Now everybody says it they dont remember the previous name of the big deal. Commonly known as nafta you know if you add the words if you add the 2 words released at the end of it because thats a big problem thats a big source of problems and they told me just that worked beautifully thank you that. Heather setting the Village People and y. M. C. A. Aside is the term serious he seems to be serious seems to be giving this some thought on nato playing a much bigger role in the middle east well certainly the trumpet ministration has been encouraging nato very strongly to focus on counterterrorism to focus on china so this is ministration has trying to set new priorities for nato which in fact when the leaders gathered in december in london really embraced new domains like space continue the counterterrorism operation and then focus on china so u. S. Leadership in having made a look at new directions that is nothing new but talking about a a nato like structure in the middle east also a very old idea that is that were going to use doing im not entirely sure and i think this is where we have to have the conversation because a nato like collective Defense Organization in the middle east is something very different than looking at how nato could be more proactive in the middle east but see whats important to note is that the president s decision on assassinating general solo money suspended but Nato Training Mission in iraq and forced many of our nato allies to leave iraq because the security situation became untenable and theyre uncertain about the staying power in the jury ability of u. S. Forces in iraq and without that guarantee our allies cannot be in iraq or syria or elsewhere so theres some huge challenges about saying were going to know youre not a big youre not highly confident that this is a big plan i think it is an idea that said now in search of a strategy a framework and a policy you know i heard you the other night and was very impressed that you you saw more. Solvency in this that i think many others that have looked at this tell us what you think about nato playing a greater role in the middle east. Well i think basically President Trump is making an appeal already for nato allies and partners to play a bigger part actually in terms of burden sharing in terms of of you know western operations in the middle east in fact i dont think that we are going to see the expansion of nato to the middle east i think thats a thats a nonstarter altogether but at the end of the day this goes back to President Trumps central message to the Nato Alliance which is that there needs be a greater degree of burden sharing that the u. S. Cannot overwhelm the entire burden on its own and we need to see nato partners putting more boots on the ground spending more money in terms of military operations and i think what we saw at the nato summit was pretty significant in the present really taking ownership of nato he started off as a nato skeptic hes now the biggest offender of the Nato Alliance taking on the menu mccraw claims that nato is in effect brain dead and so i think this is really a pitch for nato to step up to the plate to do more but i dont think youre going to be seeing any expansion of the Nato Alliance so do you think nato is brain dead today no i mean. I have a little clip from your macro on i defending that statement of the trip from president. And see. All the words. On. The. So now just before you leave your subject as im fascinated by this question and i i know that youre a supporter of Boris Johnson and its interesting mix within nato of what i would call nationalism kind of tied together with folks like macro and maybe america that are principled internationalist how does the equilibrium between those sorts of personalities get set well i think what is most interesting about it is that the u. S. And the u. K. Really all the all the 2 powers that are committed to the Nato Alliance headed by donald trump and Boris Johnson who is a monument croll i think been doing his best to undermine the Nato Alliance the socalled international its being basically sticking a knife into the back of nato and of course big ideas have a European Union on me in effect to compete with nato and and i think its a disastrous ideas no wonder the Vladimir Putin things and he is a great idea because of course well split the Nato Alliance we can nato and i think this is the usual mischief making coming from mcchrystal which is also unusual calls from a french president but i think that everything mccrone is saying is designed that should weaken nato role then strengthen it steady nato at a crossroads now has donald trump simultaneously asked for its powers to be expanded to department where it where many with leaders dont know why it exists. Well nato is always at a crossroads its always in crisis and it usually is the constant right usually finds its way forward adapts and is very good at adapting but i think that this is a serious moment for a number of reasons 1st of all macross challenges serious i think part of it is designed to shift nato focus more to his number one security concerns which are the instability in the extremism in the middle east and north africa in that sense he may have some overlap with President Trump but i think theres also a lot of new threats that are on the horizon that nato is just beginning to play catch up on including the rising threat of china not only in the east asia context but in europe and europe that really nato a nato. Id like to leave the name intact youve got to find pedigree right 70 years of success. But i think coming back to what President Trump is saying i think he is trying to make nato more relevant in his own peculiar way and i think he is you know not only preoccupied with the immediate aftermath of his strike against all the money which is i think thrown u. S. Strategy in the middle east into some kind of tailspin but i also think hes correct in saying that these are the kinds of threats that nato has to be more capable of dealing with hes been saying this for a long time even before as president especially in just 1st year when he had his 1st meeting with nato leaders leaders it was then that he 1st stressed the need for nato to do more against terrorism in the middle east and they do has actually been responding my concern is nato is what grade would you give nato on its response and when when when you were there and then i was there and since i think i need to get best a c. Plus they talk the talk they talk about the strategy of projecting stability to their wider neighborhood which sounds really nice but when you look at the actual programs and initiatives that go with that its pretty much a hollow shell theres very few resources that are being put behind these programs. And. I think the southern allies themselves who should be doing more in their own neighborhood are very ambivalent about have. No do more and i think were going to see that in the debate over the president s latest comments. Of talks the talk but when it comes comes to the crunch they dont think nato is the ideal instrument for dealing with the middle east and where does turkey fit into this equation theres been a lot of debate about turkey and the kurds emanuel macros comments about nato came after turkey seemed to move in a different direction without coordination with other nato members. And i. Pretty sure that turkey is not going to be thrilled with a greater nato presence in some of these countries because of its close relationship with iran nile have you where do you see turkey in this you look at turkey as a sound nato ally. Unfortunately not actually i think that took his role as being very destabilizing and very negative in recent years we saw all that and the strong statement amply displayed recently with it with this campaign and in syria turkey should be expelled no i do think turkey should be expelled i think turkey is too important a nato ally for it to be expelled and of course took he has played a very Important Role in recent nato operations especially in afghanistan but i think the direction the tookie is taking at this time is an extremely dangerous poff and turkey has to decide whether it wants to remain and could really to the western alliance or whether want to take a different different polls but im very concerned about the direction that tookie is is taking and took he really needs to make a very very clear choice in the coming years but i have to say i think that. Popularity domestically is declining which is a good thing i think a lot of took a very uneasy with the direction that the country is taking at this at this moment have elected your view of turkey too but you know part of the the legacy at least for the last 70 years of nato turkey was there at the signing as well one thing is that the administrations have come and gone theres been different personalities in all of these jobs in leadership in all these countries but nato is sort of. Steel and has been resilient and has continued to function but are we at a crossroads on turkey well i think again niall is right turkey is causing instability in the region particularly in the eastern mediterranean. Turkey was brought into the alliance in 1952 so wasnt a Founding Member but it was done so in part because turkey and greece were under such heavy influence by the soviet union so as now so this was a very geo Strategic Initiative to contain the influence of the soviet union but turkey has always been a problematic and challenging member of the alliance but the alliance to stanleys point has always found ways to to bridge that gap i think the bridge though is starting to get more brittle. As a present heir to ones decisions that hes making and your absolute right present mccalls frustration explosion and the brain dead comment was really the frustration of turkey militarily and unilaterally intervening in Northern Syria for the 3rd time and of course that does create an alliance challenge should an ally intervene theres a problem they call upon the alliance for support and collective defense then you bring the alliance into it so big challenges and of course nato has always had a challenge since 91111 defining what they call a southern strategy and thats that counterterrorism nato works best when its training its doing so Security Sector reform infusing the values unfortunately nato allies cannot sustain forces in the middle east without the United States and its critical enablers when we remove those enablers which we do sometimes without notice and without consultation that ally cannot sustain their presence so what i want if we want allies in the middle east and the u. S. Has to build some credibility and sustainability and predictability and its force. And i think its important to remember that concern about nato being brain dead was partly about turkeys action but was also about u. S. Greenlighting of the turkish intervention in Northern Syria and raise questions about the reliability of u. S. Leadership and i think this latest initiative unfortunately may be raising some of the same questions particularly. As Everybody Knows that it was a half baked idea that just kind of came spontaneously i mean the saudis applauding this comment of the israelis applauding at jordan and im trying to think now we dont have on the show but but leadership in the arab world when they heard this is something some of these countries said yeah were were all up for that and i think theyve been fairly quiet and waiting to see what it actually means i dont think it means a new organization or certainly doesnt mean expansion of nato membership but it does mean seeing the europeans step up to bear a bigger share of the burden and thats a good idea but as heather said the europeans cant do this by themselves if the president is talking about europe literally taking taking over and the u. S. Can exit the middle east. Hes kidding himself nato doesnt function without a strong going to what is the point of equal whats the right balance there because when you look at u. S. Contributions to nato staggeringly large u. K. Next got britain france italy is like way way down so i ive been looking into the numbers but theres another side of it which asks the question is there a moral hazard problem thats been created by the us essentially being there as a guarantor as a guarantor of last resort on all of these issues and does it not make sense for the u. S. To step back and say were going to step back and you ought to do more and nato whatever form it is not that the u. S. Would be absent but the u. S. Might not be leading as much and certainly i think that would be consistent with president obama as well yeah i think its been a position of many administrations going back years from the inception of nato and the europeans need to carry more of the weight and i think this is an opportunity to rebalance its not going to be a sea change i think the u. S. Is the driver of the strategy in the region the u. S. Needs to stay engaged but i think they can call upon the allies to put more troops into the Training Missions that are. In iraq and other parts of the region putting more resources into some of the other nato programs that are helping stabilize north africa and places like morocco tunisia maybe put some more ships into the eastern med and. Its the persian gulf part of the freedom of navigation strategy so the u. S. Doesnt have to do the heavy lifting there this could all be done under a nato flag it could be done on an Ad Hoc Coalition basis but the bottom line is the europeans should be doing more in these kinds of areas i am interested in what net add President Trump has brought to this debate about the middle east in nato and what was there before lets listen to a clip from a previous president were bolstering our efforts on natos southern flank the alliance will increase our support to Naval Operations in the mediterranean to stop arms traffickers and go after criminals that are exploiting desperate migrants and were going to do more to help partners from north africa to the middle east to georgia strengthen their own defense capacity. Now obama is meeting some of these same comments before so what we are is what were seeing from president really continuity not not new you know i think you do see a high degree of continuity of every recent president has campaigned for greater levels of burden sharing greater defense spending among nato partners so trumps message isnt essentially different actually to that of of Barack Obamas i think the difference is that trump has been a lot more forceful actually in of law than seeing the message she yes and i think that has had a real impact on overall there was a defense spending among nato allies significantly higher actually and you install them for the nato century general has consistently and repeatedly made this point u. S. Leadership of the Nato Alliance at this time is fundamentally important but its also working and its having a real impact so i think overall donald trump is actually being very successful on the nato front but the message that he is conveying is is very similar to the message thats being conveyed by the last few u. S. President s and u. S. Leadership i think is absolutely vital it has to continue because if the u. S. Step back on the world stage i hate to think what would what would happen i mean European Countries really do not have the the strength and the resolve all the levels of military spending to lead across across the world and so American Leadership is fundamentally important and i think the europeans and cells would be absolutely frightened to death if the u. S. Actually stepped back on the world stage. Trump all he likes but the reality is the french depend like the rest of europe on the the u. S. Security umbrella and im sure he understands that privately how much briss i mean ive if you are asking this question do we have about you know approaching things like the middle east in nato is role i interviewed former senator George Mitchell a while back and i asked him not just about the israel palestine negotiations he was in with but the broader middle east and americas role europes role and he basically said look. Theres a sectarian battle going on between the sunni and the shia theres a shia crescent we talked about general salim ahmed back then and irans Transnational Terrorist Networks and they said they need 400 years to work this out give us a call when its over otherwise stay out and i am interested when you look at a lot of the proxy conflicts in the region you look at saudi iranian competition turkey competition in the region whether or not nato is too full of itself to think that it can inject itself easily into these conflicts and even stabilize them given their scale i think youre making some important points and it gets back to it and i was saying this is almost in a way about u. S. Leadership nato is engagement in the middle east is predicated on a durable predictable u. S. Leadership policy and we know what happens when the United States removes itself see syria see libya russia fills that vacuum iran fills that vacuum instability continues to grow nato can do more i think there would be the political willingness to do more because our european allies are directly impacted by instability in the middle east and north africa but there has to be a framework and it gets back to your earlier point about we seem to have 2 modes of leadership the United States does towards the rest of the world particularly nato either were in charge of it and were directing it and allies to do what we say and this this this force mobilize or or we say were not interested you have this we have other things to do we have to find a 3rd way which means that the u. S. Provides the predictability and the framework but that other allies must step forward but the kicker is that the u. S. May not be able to actually dictate how that other ally will manage that operation and we have to be ok with that and we have never defined that 3rd way and weve created this cycle of degraded and right where the allies have made and the. U. K. Is particularly and i think that theyve made a strategic bet that the u. S. Will always be there and they will follow under their coalitions well this is basically saying the u. S. Will not be there when youre going to in our last couple of fasting conversation id like to just ask each of you a you know just give us a quick very fast tutorial on if we gave you a lot of power to make nato resilient and to survive in the future and to play a role in the middle east what are the things this president needs to think about to get it right rather than wrong sandy. Well if i could get my wish i would like to see the years you get your wish you getting the europeans actually having more of the capabilities to carry out operations without as much depends on that as a real states or if they dont it well i mean i think we have too many interests to literally cut them off right but we should keep the pressure on for greater burden sharing greater investment in the right capabilities and we have the french talking boldly about how theyre the leaders in intervening in north africa but if the u. S. Werent providing intelligence aerial refueling. The french operation would grind to a halt so theres a lot of hubris on the french part but i think coming up with a more balanced paradigm for nato should be our goal for the next 10 years and i think trump in his own strange way may have started the debate that could actually get us moving in that direction where there would be your recipe for the rise for the president to be the president of europe couple prescriptions europe must spend more in defense capabilities they must enhance deploy ability and readiness and they need the political will to execute the u. S. Needs to be a predictable responsible partner and knowing what they can count on and for the president he has to understand that you cannot compartmentalize the security relationship right cannot attack our allies with tariffs and sanctions undercut europes leaders politically but then expect them to follow your leadership when you need them now im going to give the last word to you well as us have this as we certainly need more investment by nato allies more capability on the part of nato allies but at the same time we need to see nato poland as stepping forward putting more troops on the ground in iraq and syria for example so i hope that we all seeing the beginning of the end of the. Iran nuclear agreement. Just not interrupted you would pour more into what donald trump is called endless wars well we need to see i think you know european allies wake up to the fact that the Iran Nuclear Deal is dead in the water we need to see European Partners applying sanctions against iran. And standing up to water is a tremendous threat i think to the free world in toronto this time thank you id like to thank you all for being with Us Ambassador Alexander Sandy vershbow former deputy secretary general of nato Heather Conley former u. S. Diplomat for europe and now gardner head of the Margaret Thatcher center for freedom here in washington d. C. Thank you all as triffitt discussion so whats the bottom line nato has been the security blanket for a lot of countries with the United States the u. K. France germany turkey and others just tossing that blanket wherever they want now its clear that there is a dissension in nato between Key Stakeholders on what the security blanket should cover will the middle east be next none of the experts that you just heard from agree with donald trump that a nato me is in the cards and how i can get the Village People singing y. M. C. A. Out of my head donald trump could only push so far the middle east is not going to become a nato obsession and thats the bottom line. The 21st century began with extraordinary Economic Growth across much of latin america. But since this halted in 2008 theres been a political shift to the right on a continental us socialism on thrives. On attention goes on a journey to me leading left wing ficus to understand why that politics have lost ground to some dramatic. Knots in america a giant in time oil coming soon. In a 2 part series. On g d you know observes the lives of 2 children. Over 20 years. Where insights into circumstances that shaped lives. In a rapidly changing world. 20 years of mean starts with blood and learning and you will do story on aljazeera. When investigating crime an admission of guilt is the ultimate corroboration. 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Well im a clock and there are the top stories here on aljazeera and 1st sudans government says its halted an armed revolt by members of a disbanded Intelligence Unit who were angry at the terms that they had been offered upon the dismissal the 1st major challenge from within the security ranks in the Transitional Government which took power in august it morgan reports now from the capital khartoum. The operation. Opening fire in the capital they reject. Them after the unit was dissolved months ago and they opted to retire rather than join the military tensions were high people