And afghanistan appear beyond. To have a discussion about this, weve assembled a dream team with experience in the region. Im going to introduce them briefly. And trust me, introducing them in a time efficient manner requires a lot of distlation of their incredible accomplishments across decades of u. S. Foreign service. Im going to start on my left, your right with ambassador gerald federstein who a veteran in the u. S. Foreign service. He was ambassador to yemen in the obama at ministration. Administration. From 20132016 has had many other crucial posts including deputy chief of mission including pakistan and the departments Counterterrorism Bureau and elsewhere in the region, ohman, lebanon and tunisia. Hes Senior Vice President of the middle east institute which is a leading think tank in washington. Immediately to his right is ambassador patrick fills who is peth and executive director of the u. S. Qatar business council. He has a 35year Foreign Service career with many distinguished post including his u. S. Ambassador to qatar. And as advisor to the commander in chief for Central Command which is the u. S. Military command with coverage of the middle east region. Hes also been deputy chief of mission in jordan and in United Arab Emirates as well as a counselor in syria as well as other roles. Ambassador newman is the American Ambassador of diplomacy, served three times to algeria, bahrain and most recently to afghanistan from 20052007. He served prior to that in baghdad coordinating the political aspect os the military intervention at the time. He was deputy assist at that particular time secretary in the affairs during the clinton administration. And has had other senior roles. I think you get the idea theres a tremendous amount of collective expeer tease on the middle east and adjoining areas here. Last, but not least closest to me to moderate this is Debra Mccarthy who served as u. S. Ambassador to lithuania. Not in the gulf. [laughter] john during obamas second term. She was principles secretary of state for economic and Business Affairs and served among many other roles as deputy chief of mission in nicaragua and as Deputy Assistant secretary for narcotics and law enforcement. She is going to take it from me in a moment and moderate a conversation for about 45 minutes with our expert gets before we open it to all of you. For your questions, youll see people going around with note cards. Please, pass your questions and theyll bring it back to us. And chad and luna will bring it to to pose to our panel. Thank you again to our guests and we look forward to our conversation. [applause] well, i feel very privileged to be moderating the dream team. By the way the dream team was the Basketball Team from lithuania. I wont go into that. As you can see with the vast experience they have all across the middle east from young years in the Diplomatic Service to the senior years in the Diplomatic Service, i wanted to start the panel as follows to talk a little bit about whats happening inside the region. Then well get to whats happening between the u. S. And iran. And then if we have time well put it in the bigger geo political context. So to draw on your deep history knowledge of the history of the culture and obviously of our bilateral relationsle i wanted each of you to talk for a couple of minutes on the Power Dynamics that are taking place today within the region. And specifically to talk a little bit about how iran is perceived by its neighbors in the gulf. So jerry, would you like to start. Gerald thank you, debra, im delighted to be here with all of you today. The basic elements of the Power Dynamics in the region are particularly the competition between iran and and the major states of the of the g. C. C. , saudi arabia, United Arab Emirates and iran and israel as well. So when you look at when you look at the reach of the region of what youre looking at really is the reaction of the other states to what is broadly perceived as irans expansionist programs in search for hegemony in the region and the reaction of those states what they see as a threat from an expansionist iranian state. And that, of course, plays into what were going to be talking about later on in terms of u. S. And iran and the other states. So three aspects of iranian behavior very quickly. One is the Ballistic Missile programs. Second, is iranian interference in the internal affairs of its neighbors, and in the gulf context that means yemen and bahrain. And third, is iranian support for terrorism and how the region responds to those three perceived threats. Debra you want to comment . Thanks. The older threats are real and theyre perceived ond the gulf side. You have to take one thing into context. This is not a new development. I talked to many all of whom say it was the same. Weve been around in this area for the last several centuries. Weve looked at iran as a predatory power, someone trying to control us. So this is not terribly new. In fact, if anything for the small states of the gulf probably within the last century or so have gotten more difficult because one is saudi arabia on one side which both have a disbute iran. And is seen as expansionist and he gem nistic in those states. All of whom have reacted the same way which is trying to find an outside protector. It was the british, the gulf states were prepared to how could i say, give up a certain amount of independence in return for their protection. After the british left, there was a bit of a hiatus because we were seen, the United States were the remaining super power who were seen supporting both saudi arabia and ian until the iranian revolution. They saw iraq as a valuable not ally, but a balance to both countries for years. Saddam husain was seen acceptable except kuwait. When we took him out we disturbed the balance of power. So iran is the strongest country in the gulf far and away and without outside protection would be the old the principle threat to the gulf states. However, this is not to say that there are not other threats as well such as saudi arabia. Ok. Thanks. Thanks. An deaf it inly a threat perceived differently than other countries. The u. A. E. Years ago looks at iran, they just moved up the middle. But they have real enemies. But there are things that are changing in the gulf. The leadership of the states in several cases has changed and is yoirning, and is perceived for more dynamic courses and in some cases particularly in saudi arabia and the u. A. E. Breaking away from the traditional conservative almost passive defensive approach to power and this sort of feeling mousse cue la chure and challenging much more so muss cue la chure and challenging much more die namics. At the same time you have monarchies defending monarchal systems. And theres a tendency to say in the west, monarchies, old news, a trash heap of history gone. Weve done that too back in the 960s when arab nagsalists came. Wrong. They outlasted all the other regimes. And they are doing it now in some cases. But doubling down theyve become more repressive. Theyre less tolerant, particularly the u. A. E. Saudi arabia of various kinds of criticism while liberalizing the social benefits. So its a mixture of on one respect very liberal regimes and our Christian Churches are open. Jewish centers are open. Various places. And internal repression if you get out of line. But theyre all still pretty popular. I would say their chances of of remaining are pretty good. You could get into various different cases. And nothing is guaranteed. But the chances of them surviving in this form of government rather that they are not moving to democracy. And they are doubling down on not moving. And for them, the lesson of the arab spring is this thing is awful. Look what happened when you pulled down these regimes. You got chaos. Bloodshed. Youve got all kinds of disruption that is still going on, a lot of loss of life. And thats not a pretty picture and we dont want to go there. And the last thing i would just say in passing is without trying to bring it up is that these countries are very different from each other. Theres a tendency in the u. S. To, you know, see the smaller gulf states as being very much you know, theyre little saudi arabia yeahs. Theyre all bunch of guys running around in bed sheets. But theyre very different. Omanis have better relakeses with the iranians. They have historical differences with each other. I wont go through them except to say that the notion that they are similar in how they regard their citizens and how they work with each other and how they work with their own people, the idea that that is the same in each of them is in fact, completely incorrect. Thats a good point. Let me turn now to the relationship the United States has with saudi arabia as we build up to other things. We have a storm defense and security relationship. Many have criticized the u. S. For overlooking saudi, political and human rights abuses. The u. S. Congress attempted to pass excuse me, a resolution to end military involvement in saudi arabia yeah war in yemen. This is in reaction to the human suffering in yemen but tools the khashoggi killing. Can you give us an inside view of the u. S. Saudi relationship . How does it work . And in particular, how does our diplomacy balance security interest with our support for human rights in this part of the world . Thanks. And its actually its a very difficult pa lance balance to strike because as ron said, were dealing with political systems, with with systems of government in society that are very different from ours where the where the ability to the two sides to really understand one another and to and to coordinate and corporate is limited cooperate is limited. What we have with saudi arabia is a relationship that goes back at least to the end of world war ii and in some ways even before world war ii that has been built around two core pillars. One is energy and recognition of arabia as the parment paramount producer of oil in the world. And therefore a major anchor for Global Economic security. And then the other aspect, the other pillar is what we have done with the saudis over the course of these past 70 years, in order to promote Regional Security and stability, partially in terms of building up saudi arabias own defense capabilities. And the second aspect is how we work with the saudis to promote to promote Regional Security in places like afghanistan where we work very closely together. All the way through to the gulf to syria, to iran. So these have been Core Principles at every u. S. Administration has pursued going all the way back to the roosevelt administration. Republican, democrat, it doesnt really matter. We have a stressful situation where we have different differences. And those differences reflect about the rights of citizens, the interaction between citizen and state, the rights particularly for women, for other human rights Civil Liberties where this has created real tension and friction between our bilateral relationship. And so the question is how do you address that . How do you balance between the partnership that we have preserved for all of these years against what has been this kind of fractious period in our relationship . In my view and in the view of the Obama Administration and now the Trump Administration, we need to look at what the core u. S. Interests are in the region which are primarily the stability and Energy Pillars and to to what extent or the other do you then press on these human rights. My own view is that we have not pressed as much on the human rights side as we should recently. We should take the khashoggi murder more seriously than we have. We need to correct that balance. But i also believe that at the end of the day, we do need to recognize that preserving a good, strong saudiu. S. Relationship is important for us to achieve our broader objectives in the region. I just wanted to add a note pers a new perspective in bahrain when i was there last because we tend to be very certain of our moral reck tude as we look as Something Like the murder of mr. Khashoggi. But what i got from bahrain from sunni and shiah. Hey, wait a minute, we absolutely depend on our security from saudi arabia. This crown prince is undertaking absolutely Critical Reforms that are central for the stability of the place. By the way, you guys have your relationship with russia even though putin goes around murdering dissidents in various countries. Why are you so hung up in danger of destroying this relationship and bringing us into danger as well over one killing here when you tolerate multiple killings over there . I dont say thats the view we should take. I just lay it out for you to understand that there are difference consensuses and different views at looking at this thing. Debra i want to turn now for the u. S. Relationship with iran. Its been 40 years since the u. S. Hos tack taking in iran. Since then weve had no official diplomatic information or embassy in iran. Our interests are represented by switzerland. While there was extend contact, most communication today is done via press statements and announcements. Ron, you lived in iran as a younger officer and also were the director of the iraniraq office. Youre one of the few who actually lived inside the country. Can you talk a little bit about how from that perspective with such limited contacts, how can we manage our relations . Badly. [laughter] debra ok. Next question. [laughter] its true, we tend to look at it very superficially. As they tend to look at us. Its a very long period. Debibblet that theres a great splits in view within iran. And there are people for whom the revolution a key peace of the revolution is maintaining the ideological friction. So it creates by the way, i had a great time in iran. I really enjoyed the people. And people who go visit iran tell me they find iranians far more welcoming to americans passing through than many of the iran states although our the arab p with government is much better. In iran as in america, you have a deep division of people as to whether you ought to have relations as whether you ought to improve your relations whether thats a good thing. So when you get into negotiations, you have there as you have here a need to show that youre really doing something that work well. In order to pass fight your domestic critics. And of course, since the same situations exists here that sets up a situation in which for each side a successful negotiation is one in which they have to show that theyve done really well, which usually means that they do things that the other side cant afford you to show and to pass fight their critics. So thats not an impossible situation as the Nuclear Agreement showed. But it is a very fraught situation in which to hold out negotiations making it particularly fraught when you have an approach that says well tell you what we want and we really dont need to talk to you again. Debra afterwards youre going to answer questions about what it was like to live there. The u. S. Pulled out of the it. And they warned that they start withdrawing from the deal. This past fall there was a report that president rahani and President Trump and with the support of french president macron reportedly wanted to list the sanctions in exchange for iran to remain a nonNuclear Weapons state. What do you think of the prospects of the u. S. And iran getting back to the table . Go ahead. Debra and if you disagree, all the better. I dont think question do it on our own. I dont believe that the American Government and the iranian government have any formulas whereby the two of us can get there. Its got to be what mckart is trying to do, but i suspect very strongly, its got to be on a grander level despite france despite its glory. The p five plus one is probably the only vehicle alone, all the principle members of the u. N. Security council and the e. U. In effect trying to gang up on the wrong side. Gang up may be the wrong term but to Start Talking to each other because frankly, i dont believe that given the dynamics that ron was describing that theres any leeway on each sigh to make the necessary even cosmetic concessions that would permit us to come together and have a serious conversation. And what would be worse would be coming together with each side having expectations of the other and not having them met. And frankly without going into too much detail, i think were heading into a train wreck with iran which could be very damaging with the worlds economy if that should be in the gulf because of what it would do. So i think it is behooves us and perhaps the iranians to try to get more International Intervention to make something work. Ill take a little bit of issue with pat and take a slightly more optimistic view. And that is, if you look at the obama policy on iran, and if you look at the trump policy on iran, what you would see are two policys that are die metically opposed. Obama theory of the case that which affected in the Iran Nuclear Deal if jcpla was basically if you address what was the Key International concern about iranian behavior and that was its pursuit of a Nuclear Weapons capability, if you put in place an agreement to to address that, then over time by bringing iran into closer relationship with the community, addressing their economic concerns doing other things, you could then set up the possibility of getting the iranians to address these other issues that i mentioned earlier that were also of broad concern about the missiles, about the interference, about support for terrorism. The Trump Administration is taking the opposite view which was we cant wait. Were not going to wait for the iranians to come around on their own. They wont do it. And therefore the only way to get them to move on those issues is to basically beat them with a stick until they cry uncle. Where we are right now is that we never really had the opportunity to see whether the obama approach would work. The trump approach clearly has not worked. And what we saw with the Macron Initiative was an effort to to basically begin the dialogue again, and to bring the u. S. And iran together at the table where they could begin to work through some of these issues. I actually think that they can do that. And its very clear from both the position of donald trump himself and from what the iranians have said that both sides jinljerly are interested in finding a way to get back to the table. Neither of them wants the train wreck that pat is concerned about because both sides recognize that a train wreck kills a lot of people including the engineers. So so birthrights to get back to the table. And the period that were in right now, is the maneuvering between these two sides to figure out who is going to be the Stronger Party when they sit down at the table. But i do believe that they will sit down at table probably some time before our president ial election next year. Well, optimism is free. So one might as well indulge. [laughter] but having said that, im not quite as optimistic as gerald. I would just note two things. One is the legacy of suspicion and distrust. Not only in american legacy, theres a huge iranian legacy going well back into the 1950s when we overthrew an iranian government there which they never forget. Like i remember my friend john leimbert who has been an advocate of the two stories. He has a favorite story talking to an iranian but he said you have to get over that hostage stuff, you know . And he said, yes, i agree. We should. But you have to get over mosadek. Never. They have a history of reaching out to the United States. Later and feeling that in each case we walked away and betrayed things. So i do not think we are going you know, we will see. Weve got some risky for anybody to make predictions. The time shortened up that you can remember. You could see this. I think what is more likely what im seeing is theres a flinching. Theres a recognition of what i was talking about train wreck possibility . Thats not just the iranians. The saudis the u. A. E. On the various sides of this, how do we talk about this . How do we deconflict. I think its possibility that we may avoid the ultimate stupidity at war. Because there is ooh recognition of how dangerous that. Is theres a tentative reaching out looking for ways to lower the temperature and deconflict. But ill im very pessimistic given the long history. And finally, the iranians made a sense of ah irks i we made an greet. Whats the point because you cant trust the americans to hold than an agreement. And then accelerated when you look at syria with this administration of you know, you cant even trust them to keep their own policy straight. So why get into this . Im very pessimistic. Some day i think it has to happen. But not in the last year before an election, i dont if i could just add, to the one obstacle conversation in september, the central issue was they were not able to decide whether or not u. S. Sanctions would come before the call or after the call, but the two had and youo make the call are absolutely right. I dont think it will be an easy negotiation. We know it was not an easy negotiation in 2015, but the reality is, whether you like it or not, the one thing that maximum pressure has done is that it has inflicted real economic pain and therefore, they have a strong incentive to try to figure out how to deal with that in a way to get sanctions reductions and i dont think they are going to do it because they love us. I dont think they are going to do it because they really want to get back in our good books, but i think that both sides will make the decision to go back to because bothable sides recognize that it is in their interest. Im going to add one time one thing, which is that i ran that at the state department and the last time we squeezed iran, we got very good at sanctions. We have capabilities today that we did not have last time, and they were pretty good. We are very good at sanctions. There offeringd courses on how to evade american sanctions, but they havent got the capacity to do that. We have dug ourselves, we collectively, have dug ourselves into a public position, pompeos ultimatum was very much the austrian ultimatum. Ands surrender everything then have the leadership commit suicide before we talk to you. I dont see this administration easily backing off it. I dont see the iranians trusting us that if we have a conversation, that it will happen. I remember when we did have the whichiranian president in we decided that if we were nice to him, it would not work and it might help the hardliners. This is the mindset that the iranians are working from. We are going to come back here a year from today and say it was right. [laughter] right, were not going to be able to get back together. We may have to meet at a bunker. [laughter] the United States has a Strong Military presence in the region. We have the fifth fleet in bahrain. I know several of you have served in the gulf. You will be hosting 5000 military personnel, 10,000 in qatar. The role of Kuwait International airport. We have sent more personnel to saudi arabia and launched Maritime Security initiatives in the region. Countries arelf increasing their own capabilities as well. How does this affect Power Dynamics in the region and our interests . One quick one. Partly, there is this rush to become the owners of the biggest , meant ton the world buttress their ability to deal with the iranians. Importantly, a power play between the gulf states. They dont trust each other. The recent one country was blockaded by its neighbors. I dont know how much justification, but they convince themselves that the only reason the saudis were not coming across the border was the saudis didnt want to telegraph and they credit tillerson with stopping a ground attack. Leaving aside the quality of military forces, what is on the books, saudi arabia is a much larger, more powerful country and at the same time, the uae. Saw the military as having two functions. One was deterring an attack and thendly, dealing with potential of an order a breakdown of order in saudi happened,something which is something they talk about a lot. I think the uaes buildup of military force is aimed at iran and throwing his weight on the council. My experience is the uae has the they have been chipping away at the uae border for generations. Thatnk a large portion of is part of the jockeying for power between the gulf states. You asked particularly about the military balance and how gulf states change that. The short answer is very little. These are fundamentally weak states. Fundamentally aware of their weakness. The uae has made a real effort to expand the quality of its military and to some extent has succeeded and shown a certain ability to use it effectively. The saudi military has shown very poorly. It went into yemen and has really done badly. It reminded me of when they went something my father said to me when the russians the soviets every afghanistan country is entitled to the vietnam of its choice. [laughter] i think the saudis found theirs. First of all, they are economically powerful, militarily weak. Aten tend to exaggerate lot of the buildup of supply is so they dont have to use it. I remember reading once that there was a technique of writing their camels in a circle to stir up the dust so the enemy would be frightened by the size of the force and you would not have to fight them. There is some part of that still going on, i think. Have in our missed oil refinerieshe. These things are all extraordinarily vulnerable to missile attack, as the iranians have just shown. It is crippled very quickly in the war. And they have a small population. They cannot have a large military. They can hire a certain number of mercenaries to help them, but they do not have the population base to have a Strong Military. Cases, they have gotten used to farmers doing this. The saudis have military experience including the first gulf war and in none of them have they shown any particularly military skill with one exception. We are talking about less than 2 million people. These are fundamentally weak states. They can get more powerful, to some extent, for their own protection, not to the extent that we can use that as a change in our relationship. I would say that there are two critical developments over the last 10 years that have these decisions, particularly by saudi arabia and the uae, to build their own internal security capabilities. , rightlyhe perception or wrongly, that u. S. Commitment, u. S. Interest, u. S. Onlingness to carry through our longstanding defense and fadingy umbrella goal is. You can go back to the Obama Administration, even back to the george w. Bush administration and see a declining level of interest and commitment to the gulf states that has played out. One issue is the collapse of the traditional sunni arab leadership, particularly the internal forces that egypt has 20102011, the collapse of syria, of iraq as leaders of the sunni arab world and therefore, you have seen two things. Statese rise of the gulf interview that they are now responsible for leadership in the sunni world, and that is compounded by the younger leadership, the more ambitious, aggressive leadership. Andave mohammad bin salman as a result of these two things, we have seen two developments. One is that they are no longer relying on the United States. You see that both in their turn toward a more positive, focused relation with russia and china, but you also see it in turns in terms of their decision that they are going to take on greater responsibility for their own security, their own protection, than they did before. For are not going to wait the seventh cavalry to come over the horizon anymore. They are going to take that on themselves. We can talk about whether they are good at it or not. It doesnt matter. The reality is, theyre going to pursue it and that has strong locations in terms of our own role and responsibilities in the region going forward. I can add one quick point to this. Heardmber of times i have semiinformed american commentators say that we are now in Oil Exporting Country reinforces this perception that when the balloon goes up, we are not going to come for it. It is absolute nonsense. What about putting this into larger context before we get to the questions . What relevance does the gulf region have in the broader geopolitical competition between the u. S. And china and between the u. S. And china . Russiaeen the u. S. And and between the u. S. And china . I will take a swing at china, because i dont thick it has to be part of the competition. I forget the numbers, 60 of their energy comes from the gulf. For whomis one country a major war in the gulf would be catastrophic, it would be china. I am speechless at the chinese refusal to get involved. Simply their hope local history basically dont want to get involved. They have bent to our sanctions, our blockade. They are the country that has the most to lose and they are not doing anything. Believe that not the chinese see themselves moving into the gulf. Guy whomir putin is the has played a weak hand very well. Russia does not have the economic or military or diplomatic capacity to really challenge the United States in is a masterbut he at identifying vacuums and figuring out how russia can move in. He is him but he who has a vision of russia as a great power. Russia,e didnt by dint of its status should have a seat at the table when these issues are debated in the middle east. He is going to do that, but at the end of the day, he is not our competition. The competition the u. S. Has in terms of great powers is china. China is eating our lunch economically. They are becoming increasingly the number one economic partner for the gulf states. That is going to continue. Pat that the chinese are perfectly willing to let us take on the hard issues of security and stability in the region while they focus on building their economic relations and prospering through their relationships with the gulf states. I think that is also changing. I dont think it is an accident that the only to enable facilities that china has outside of Mainland China are in pakistan, which cords the which guards the strait of hormuz, and djibouti in africa. They understand their security survivalmic depends on access to the waterways. Can i say, their own no Chinese Military forces they are in djibouti. They certainly have the capability of using military. They are gingerly moving into some of these more aggressive positions. You are absolutely right that what they want to do is they want us to take the headache, than they will take the money. I do think what you are seeing is overall, less stable world. I agree with my colleague, the gulf states are less secure in their relationship with us. They are therefore looking elsewhere and particularly to russia. , they are looking at their own defenses and building them. These are policies they feel they are forced to, because they cant rely on the relationship they had with us. If they are not able to supplant that relationship, the russians will sell them bombs but will not come to their defense. Their capabilities for the equipment remain weak. You have a relationship where we are not quite backing away we have a lot of troops there still but they are not sure of us and it is not clear what we are actually prepared to do when they are making better relationships with countries with which we are uneasy, but which in the end wont solve their dilemma, and building up their arsenal, but without the real capacity to deter the people they are most worried about. When you add that altogether, what you have is a less secure region and a more dangerous one. When you had the solid u. S. Everybody knew what was what and therefore you did not mess with it. Now, you have one very shaky and ruled and that has has room for mistakes. We will now turn to questions. Thanks so much for being here. My name is chad, i am a firstyear student interested in international policy. Increased see the wave of protests impacting the future of the Iranian Regime . These are the current ones . The gasoline subsidy . You want to predict the future. This is really tough. [laughter] they are posing threats. Awaregime is incredibly of the dangers of these riots. Fact thateing the afterare social cracks these years since the iranian resolution. I personally doubt that this period of riot will lead to much change. The older leaders of the revolution really learned from the revolution itself was how they gain strength and you period revolution where the shaw had put down these revolts ofore and in the period revolution, he vacillated. He used force and then you have bigger demonstrations and he moved back and forth. As he vacillated, the demonstrations got bigger and bigger. If there is any lesson that the older revolutionary leaders have carried away, it is not to make the mistake of the shah. I believe they will put these riots down, and they have a lot of force, but they dont have leadership. The revolution had the leadership and the leaders could come forth and take hold. I think you have something here that is of the least very interesting and shows you how much satisfaction there is whether after this you get something else. I dont believe these riots themselves are going to lead to a lot of change. I would agree completely with that. Coherent orof a popular Iranian Revolutionary presence abroad right now, the United States has chosen to the singlehaps most hated iranian exile organization. People like giuliani and former general jones go off and give speeches. I think i saw something today which said that they have ra killed about 100 demonstrators in iran and i agree that they are going to do whatever they need to do in order to stop these demonstrations. They have been very clear. What you need to remember is that the shah he was taught by the iranians. That they went into to usend held the shah the extreme measures he has used in order to stop the syrian uprising. Iran and iraq have much more potential for political change, but that was not the question. Thank you for being here. Junior in the undergraduate program focusing on diplomacy and international security. The next question we have for you is, how to u. S. Relations in the gulf interact with relations for israel, in particular, example with u. S. Involvement in saudi arabia in yemen impact israel . Theory in the Trump Administration that, because the israelis and the gulf share the same concerns about iran, that there was therefore an opportunity to actually push forward this idea of what is called outside in, that in other words, if you get the wealth states to take steps to normalize the relationship with israel, and to open regardlessrelations, of where the israelis were in negotiations with the palestinians. I think that what we have seen over these past couple years is that that expectation, that idea , was badly exaggerated. Quietly,o sides under the table, israel and the arabs are working closer together, the gulf states are more willing to be open about the nature of some of their relationships, particularly on the security side, than they were in the past. Nevertheless, there is a cap on how far they are going to be willing to go in the absence of some Movement Toward resolution of the palestinian issue, and particularly, what is called the fullinitiative, which is normalization between israel and the arab world in exchange for the two state solution. Is the position, it is still the position, and the reality is unless there is something that addresses palestinian requirements, you are not going to see the gulf states go beyond that. Point, iould add one have seen this before over the course of my career. I can think of three instances when american policy, beginning alliance that read to the overthrow of the monarchy in iraq. The gulf states allied against the soviet union and a couple , when Alexander Haig was building trying to build an alliance against i even forget if it was the soviet union or iran at that point. Again with the gulf states. We have done this several times. If we have no memory, it is always a fresh idea. [laughter] next question. What are the most effective strategies for combating iranian backed groups in the middle east, such as hamas and the forces in iraq . Havent seen one yet, it is hard to know what the strategy will be. Can i just say simply in one sentence, doing our best to fix the problem so you dry up the swamp in which they dwell. In other words, if you try to deal with them directly, they know their turf, they know how to survive in that turf. Progress on the palestinian issue, i dont even know how to deal with iraq. I couldnt begin to suggest. Iraq is an interesting case, because iranians have gotten a lot of power in iraq. Iranians are not well liked in iraq. Often make the mistake somehow theyhat are close to the iranians. They forget that eight years of the iran, iraq war with thousands killed. The foot shoulders the foot soldiers were mostly she. They never went against their own government. , it waserved in iran not good for in a rocky politician to be seen as too close to the iranians. Now, there is a lot of pushback and the iranians do best in iraq when the country is unstable, because then they can work the Different Power Centers for their own interests. They always had the risk with a stable iraq being a threat to iran again, as it was all the way back to the eighth century. It is not a new thing. Right now, they have a hard time. One could say that things one should not do our much clearer than exactly how to affect it. Of foreignersed messing about in their lives and their wars. Gotright now when you have backlash against iranian pressure, it is a good time for us to shut up and sit down and not be very heavily involved. You can consult quietly with people, but you have got a very volatile politics, things going in a direction you kind of like. Usually to dore something. This is one of those places where we are much better off right now you may see an opportunity to do something useful, but dont assume you have to. Quick point. Oft to set rest is question iranian she control shia control. Best al terms, at that requires a certain historical perspective. I hope you all understood that. If i can just add, the huthi experience in yemen, i think it andpens the point that ron pat were making and that is that each of these instances where the iranians have been able to , to buildrelations alliances, relationships, is really unique to that particular set of circumstances. In the case of yemen, where you also have ahis, you relationship with iran, yet they relationshipd that and the iranians have exploited the relationship with the huthis in order to achieve an objective that they had, which is to put pressure on saudi arabia. Nevertheless, the issues that conflict thatthe is going on in yemen right now are issues that are internal to yemen. Fightings are not because they are partners of iran. They are fighting because of their circumstances in yemen. The best thing we can do, to the extent that we can do it, is to help resolve those internal issues. If you deny the iranians the vacuum that they have been very successful at exploiting, then you can deny them the air they need to develop these relationships and that is true with hamas, it is true in iraq, it is true with has bilal in lebanon, and it is true with the hezboll inn with lebanon,a and it is true with theh huthis. You have to actually know something and Pay Attention to the differences and you cant do this on the basis of twodimensional policy and soundbites about iran. We will go to the next question. Can the Arab Coalition of trusted to combat terrorism . Maybe sometimes no. Mostly no. It depends. The saudis were good partners for us and fighting against al qaeda in the arabian peninsula. We had a lot of success. There was one particular instance you may not remember called the printer cartridge bomb attacks in 2010. Na. Was right when i got to sa smuggles an attempt to explosives on board an airplane in printer cartridges. We would not have known about that had it not been for saudi intelligence. And also the british. Been instances where in fact there were extremely important partners for us. She there are other areas where we work closely together. Of have the larger issue where saudi policy has exacerbated terrorist. Livia being a good example libya being a good example. How does turkey fit into the equation . Badly. [laughter] turkey has a lot of its own agenda. It is feeling its oats. Turkey has helped in certain areas. It has helped combat extreme movements. In parts of syria, you have turkey being quite tolerant of movements that are aligned to the islam estate. The turks are worried about other things. Far more worried about kurdish terrorism than the Islamic State. If helping works, they will help. Us is against a stronger interest, they will not be so helpful. This is like turkish policy 2. 0. Same view right after the breakup of the soviet union. The lift was way heavier than they had the capacity. Now they are kind of trying some of that again. They will find that their , their reach, exceeds their grasp. There is an internal dynamic. President erdogan really did make a difference for turkey. , he hase along the line had problems. The problems reflect themselves in election results. Like most leaders who want to stay in power. During your comments toward the beginning of the session, you commented on the potential of some sort of movement in iranianu. S. Relations. What does the recent rise in tensions between israel and iran, marked by the Israeli Air Force strikes against targets in syria a couple of days ago, suggest about iranian ambitions in syria . What are the risks of this turning into a larger conflict . This is one of those places where i dont believe the two countries really have an overview of the other one as a threat. Ishink a large part of this iran tried to maintain its control of influence in syria. Large part this is israeli domestic politics. It is really useful to have the iranians as the bogeyman. I dont think at either country wants to have a war with the other. There is no doubts that the iranians were far more invested damascus. Ime in access to lebanon and to hezbollah through syria is incredibly important. The iranians see the ability to expand their military with has as well asria lebanon. They see it as useful in terms of threatening israel. The israelis have responded. Thenteresting thing is that israelis have responded very aggressively. They have gone after an iranian arms depot. They have killed a number of iranians in syria. They have killed a number of iranians and iraq. The response from tehran has been zero. The two sides have decided that this is a game theyre going to play. How does the current state of u. S. Iran relations affect u. S. Diplomatic efforts in afghanistan . What is happening in afghanistan, the iranians, it is useful to remember, were quite supportive of our intervention in afghanistan. Differencebig between how the iranians look at iraq and afghanistan. They used to have a military onrcise when they exercised the iraqi invasion of iran. Afghanistan is not a strategic threat. I had probably the last meeting in afghanistan. I argued that that was a bad decision. I lost. They remained fairly supportive. Everyone was basically supportive. It became a little bit more belligerent during the time of ahmenijad in iran. They are concerned about the growth of the Islamic State and afghanistan. We are perception that not going to hold up our continued involvement in afghanistan. That is what they are doing. You have a definite warming of selations between the iranian and the taliban, as you have with the russians and the taliban. Perceptionsed on the that the Islamic State is a bigger threat and you cannot trust the americans to hold up their end on afghanistan. They will walk out and leave chaos. Turning to humanitarian issues, how concerned should we be about the human cost of iran . Ons on iraq how much we should be or how much are we . Should be. If you are looking at it from an ethical point of view, it is a little bit like our sanctions on iraq in the lead up to the 2003 war in which we took a position that the humanitarian car races we created in iraq was about saddam hussein. We try to sell that domestically. Same storyo sell the and iran, i dont think it will be sold. There has always been a bit of a humanitarian crisis. With a few exceptions, i think the iranian government will do a good job of convincing the iranian people that it is the americans fault. Important a really point. The official u. S. Position is we are not interested in punishing the iranian people. We want to put pressure on the regime. The weight of u. S. Sanctions is falling on the common people. Wife is in the tourism business. Married a few years ago. She used to lead tours to iran. I told her to. She said the americans on her aboutwere always amazed the warmth of the reception they got. The fact that the common iranian people like americans. Felt as though if it were not for the political differences, they would be able to have a Good Relationship with us. We are not the reason your life is so difficult. When the day comes, and it will normalizeould like to our relations with iran. We would like to get back to business with iran. There will be Popular Resistance within iran to doing that. It will make it much harder to achieve our objectives. Sanctions are in effective tool if you outline clearly the behavior you want to change. In the current long list of , there is noiran desired behavior enunciated. We do not have a clear policy of what we want them to do. Toyou outline what you want have. We are able to allow exceptions and allow certain things to go through. The intent is really for the behavior of the state to change. The Trump Administration, as i just said, is not known to know exactly what it wants to achieve. The pressure is played up politically. The longer they run, the more they hit. I would make the same point. The deepest line of clarity, and situations, of many is about change in behavior. Or regime overthrow. There is no reason to make the concessions necessary. You are just weakening yourself. It only makes sense if you wanted to have that agreement. The way we talk about this leaves you very uncertain of what the policy will be tomorrow. It is very targeted on russia. Stop hitting us. We will sanction and we will use more offensive ways. Any other questions . Last question. It is between this and cocktail time. [laughter] how can students interested in middle east diplomacy best succeed . The first one. Succeed at what you are doing right now. Do well in school. Get to know as much as you can about the middle east. There is no magic formula. A well educated person who has educated himself on the region, who has a real interest, not just academic, but you need to develop a visceral interest in the area like all three of us have. That is the best way. Did you choose it or stumble into it . This when i chose. I had 3. 5 months in graduate school after joining the military. Really where i began to develop a strong interest in the muslim world. We could all pontificate for hours. You will never be fully expert. You have to recognize what a colleague told me. She said you will never understand this country as clearly as on the day you arrive. You think you have a perception. You get into the details. You learn more and more. It gets harder and harder. Recognize that this is a lifetime business. What you come out of here is with a basis on which to go forth and learn. Prepare yourself with the history. Have ane countries that enormous sense of history. This is often an impediment to them. You need to understand the history. Go and you learn to listen. My late boss was very involved with arabisraeli negotiations. He said we have to understand the psychological motivations behind these. Said listen deeply enough to be changed by what you hear. It is in a normally important point. Peoplewant to get other to do things your way and like it, you have to know what their way is. You have to spend a lot of time listening. I very early on had to make a choice between studying russian and studying arabic. Toealized if i was going spend the next 20 years of my life and that part of the world, i like lamb more than i like cabbage. [laughter] while on that note, i want to thank you gentlemen. Make it to the audience. [applause] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2019] one more round of thanks for this panel. [applause] live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Morning, aaturday discussion of government surveillance and privacy issues. Then, the recent anniversary of the jonestown massacre. Watch live at 7 00 a. M. Eastern saturday morning. Join the discussion. I hang my head in shame. There is very unfair, personalized reporting. I think you ought to know that opinion. You are going to be disappointed in me down the road. I think your industry is wrecking all of us. That was pretty heavyhanded. Very disturbing. We are hearing that today. The press is the enemy of the american people, according to President Trump. The press is not the enemy of the american people. Night, a talk about the tension between american president s and the press. Sunday night at 8 00 p. M. Eastern
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