Transcripts For CSPAN Fmr. 20240704

Tools to be ready for anything. Comcast supports cspan, along with these television providers, giving you a front row seat to democracy. Rear admiral Mike Studeman former director of intelligence hosted a strategy session on chinese aggression, hosted by the Hudson Institute. This is just under an hour. Welcome to the Hudson Institute, i am brian clark. I am director of the Hudson Center for technology. We thank you for being here online and in person for a discussion about china and challenges facing us there. It is about the recent report we released, but also looking at new approaches for how to deter china, given the eroding nature of u. S. Military dominance and the challenges of emerging technology. Joining us, rear admiral Mike Studeman, former director of intelligence at indo Pacific Command and former commander of Naval Intelligence and long serving officer with many storied positions including being the first Senior Intelligence officer for china, as well as serving as a special assistant to the chief and the fleet forces command. Also with us, ezra cohen, former acting under secretary for defense in the trump administration. And also my colleague and coauthor who wrote the report with me. Thank you for being with me today. I am looking forward to this discussion about dealing with challenges posed by china. Mike, lets start with you. The study we just released talks about the eroding nature of u. S. Dominance, the challenges that china poses in terms of geographic and economic advantages. Where do we stand right now with our ability to deter chinese aggression. Using traditional approaches we have mounted the last 20 or 30 years, such as deterrence by denial . Admiral studeman we were in the same company in 1988. We were projecting ourselves forward, i do not think we would have found ourselves in these chairs. I trust bryan. We worked together on the navy staff and a lot of capacities. He has contributed some astounding intellectual thought, giving considerations for not only the navy, but the joint force. The challenges are legion with regards to our competitor, china. I agree we need to be looking at all forms of influence that will prevent a combat environment or crisis that could be devastating for the globe. Not just china or strategically owned positions, because if you go after taiwan ultimately what will ensue will lead to the downfall of the chairman and party secretary. And i think he understands underestimates this. If you take a look at the correlation of forces, what would ensue with multiple players, there is no real winner in any of this. Where we need to invest our time and energy is in prevention, the right kind of thoughts and clear understanding. Miscalculation can lead you down paths, spirals, that ultimately might tempt somebody to take a military solution to something that i think would be catastrophic. How do you prevent . You need capabilities to prevail. The dod has invested in longrange fires and things to ensure we maintain the right capabilities for any contingency. At the same time, a lot of our efforts need to go into the shaping of elements. I believe we have a number of things underway that way, but the challenging environments we face today means that you dont stop your adversary from doing something. You want to shape it so they dont take the most extreme action. What can you live with, tolerate, and what can you not tolerate . When do you need to move . What are the triggers for you to bring more capabilities forward or work with allies and partners to be able to handle any kind of situation . These are tough challenges and everybody is working through it. Chinas behavior has been the most destabilizing element in the west pacific so everybody is concerned and everybody west of International Dateline is highly attuned to ensuring china doesnt miscalculate. Mr. Clark in a lot of ways, we are talking about competing in this confrontation that is preceding war. A lot of the defense departments focus has been on, how do we deny before it starts . That approach leaves open a battlefield of confrontation that allows china to gain in that competition. Ezra, you had a lot of experience in your preundersecretary days and special operations and intelligence world, it seems like a lot of the opportunity is in the persistent confrontation we see that china has been acting on or initiating in a lot of cases. It seems that we should be in there as well in that fray. Mr. Cohen i think the department has made some positive moves toward institutionalizing irregular warfare. That is the lingo. I think more needs to be done. Right now, the chinese have engaged in quite sophisticated irregular Warfare Campaign in the pacific for the past 10 to 15 years. During that time, we were obviously forces that would normally conduct warfare operations, obviously focused on the global war on terror. Now that that has largely ended, it is an opportunity for us to refocus special Operations Forces on conducting regular warfare in the pacific. An advantage of irregular warfare, it allows us to have many off ramps to conflict and push the adversary toward an offramp, not just create an offramp but push them towards an offramp. Bryan, in your paper, you do a good job with how regular warfare which is much less expensive, we can create the environment that will keep things preconflict. That is what the objective is. Prevent activity from going to conflict and that is where the Department Needs to do more. Mr. Clark it seems to make a lot of sense, but that is not where effort has been. Dan, why is it the department seems to be guiding the entire Defense Budget to stopping china and why does that not work anymore as a deterrence option . Mr. Patt it is great to be here with unconventional thinkers. We can agree this is undesirable and the department has a role in preventing this. It is something we can agree on and it is natural the department goes there. How much do i buy . Seeing things through this kinetic lens. If we go back to how do we invest in prevention . One theme i am excited about is the role of technology. Not just in better weapons, but for deterrence itself, to support irregular warfare and support understanding of whether or not we are near an escalation threshold. These things are difficult to do forced planning around, fund in the budget. It is at the intersection of operations and intelligence. There are not obvious entities associated with them. There are not program and funding lines. It is cutting the other way the department is structured. We struggle to shift gears and we stay in our comfort zone where there is very clear scenario that is undesirable. Mr. Clark there is a lot of equity outside congress advocating for a more traditional approach. Something they can plan against and make money against. Mike, we should mention things they can do to prevent conflict in the intervening time. A lot of people have been raising alarm bells that china is imminently going to invade taiwan. Though there does not seem to be much evidence. Are we looking at imminence in terms of invasion of taiwan . If not, what can we do to forestall that possibility . Rear admiral studeman i think we need to back up and say, what motivates china to increase harassment . In beijing youre saying what amounts to walking away from our one china policy. There is more chatter than ever about solidifying taiwans du jour independence. People are talking about more and more visits to taiwan. The u. S. Is tone deaf, almost autistic in regard to whether their actions created other actions. They have this massive buildup of the Chinese Military deployed across the first island chain and beyond and doing many coercive things. The South China Sea and other places claiming strait, and stretches of territorial places in the sea. It has got everybody concerned. Therefore the natural reaction is to increase your defense defensive capacities. Get more realistic with your training, then work with your partners. This is what taiwan is doing, japan is doing the same, the philippines, the list goes on throughout southeast asia. China sees actions designed to contain them, encircle. There will be a new nato in asia and they push harder because they see they need to break out, have freedom of action and achieve the rejuvenation and dream they have set out for themselves. There is a weird perception element that gets to your point of, how do you shape those . Those are very sticky. A totalitarian government. You are dealing with you have a dictatorship. It used to be a oneparty dictatorship but under xi jinping it is now one man and it is very clear. Check your Political Science definitions. How information moves, who is going to speak truth to power, those things tend to be harder in those kinds of systems. You dont know what kind of information flows to who is the ultimate decisionmaker about what to do next. Do i increase my forces around taiwan to try to exhaust them to signal to the United States there is a penalty for apparently moving towards changing the status quo . The military is being used in a way that no other instrument has been effective in shaping matters in the chinese mind. Economics hasnt done it, a informationlly, warnings diplomacy hasnt done it. , so they are left with the military instrument and they are using that actively to say, if you do not hear my concern and see they are approaching a red line, i am going to use the military and do it in strengthened ways, including missiles flying over taiwan to demonstrate a political point that they want to arrest what they see is a negative trend toward increasing taiwans independence. Maybe de facto shifting to du jour. That is going in the wrong direction for the chinese, therefore, they are acting to bring that back in. This is a fundamental perception in thinking that requires you to look at yourself and say, what does american policy and state craft need to look like in this environment . Sometimes the best rule is not a big military platform moving it in different directions. That needs to be complementary to integrated assurance, not just focused on allies and partners, but sometimes your opponent whoever that may be. , we need to assure beijing we arent doing something that changes the status quo of taiwan. It is the fundamental kernel of insight you need before figuring out, what is my next move . Mr. Clark does this mean we need to lead open leave open the possibility that china could lead to a peaceful institution with taiwan . When we presented that concept to the dod and the government, there is resistance. The feeling is we cant let them get anymore influence or control over taiwan. That is unacceptable to the you are setting up the need for confrontation because beijing will see that as the path to their objective. Rear admiral studeman washington did not set out to put taiwan on the agenda. They worked with the middle east issues, ukraine, europe, russia invasion. Nobody said lets lift up the issue and solve the problem. In fact, our policy remains that the status quo with taiwan is where our ultimate objective lies. No change, except providing enough armaments to ensure the p. R. C. Doesnt think they can move quickly. You have a massive military and you need a little help with taiwan. To provide for its own defense. That is what it calls for in the taiwan relations act. That is what we are doing. The status quo is being changed by xi jinping, who has said that taiwan has to be recovered to be part of the rejuvenation by 2049. He has unilaterally set out to change the status quo and started to build the capability to do that. This is the fundamental issue at hand. It is not about our policy but beijings policy. Mr. Clark ezra, if this is about china having this perception that they are being pushed back by the u. S. And its allies and their behavior, how do you start to shape that in a way that makes them is concerned that makes them less concerned without backing down . The u. S. Can back down and be conciliatory, which seems like one path. Or convince allies for those to be conciliatory. How do we go about trying to assure china without undermining the assurance of our allies . Mr. Cohen i think the first thing and mike started to point at this, is this goes down to xi jinpings decisionmaking process. We need to improve our understanding of the decisionmaking process. You dont just do that through intelligence collection, but through what you talk about in the paper which is probing and doing things to elicit certain responses that would help us understand the decisionmaking process better but also for us to shape the decisionmaking process as well. I think that that needs to be step one. Right now there is talk in the u. S. About deterrence. But the problem is all the money we are spending is not deterring, it is actually increasing the hostility. One of the things we need to do and part of that also has to do with our understanding of what xis risk tolerance is. It is also understanding his risk tolerance. Once we have those two things , a better understanding of those, we can start drafting action that actually will create the off ramp and avoid conflict. A big part of this is the u. S. , there has been a lot of talk in circles for the past 20 years on this idea of regime change. Knocking off our major opponents. That of course is not if xi believes that is our aim, not just maintaining the status quo with taiwan, but if he believes we want to go farther than that, we can say goodbye the idea of keeping everything preconflict. That will almost certainly guarantee there will be a deadly war. I think that kind of gives you a few ideas. Again, sailing an Aircraft Carrier and putting these armaments right into their face, sure, it shows that we can project force. But we also need to be more mindful of what that might be doing to xis decisionmaking. And i dont think it is creating the effect that we actually want. Mr. Clark mike, you mentioned we are doing a lot of things today that are trying to shape the environment during this peace time or competition period and it seems like what beat what might be missing is that feedback loop of how these actions are defending affecting decisionmaking and risk tolerances and perceptions inside the chinese government. Do we try to implement that feedback loop . Are we trying to create the control theory model where we can see the impact of our actions and eventually be able to understand what might be happening . Rear admiral studeman it is the reason the Intelligence Community exists, to have a strategic intelligence and insights and have feedback loop where we can monitor and adjust our policy if they are not achieving the right effects. We have hard target countries that are closed societies, paranoid, operational security, and china is tough to truly understand. We have good insights because the money the taxpayers spend on the Intelligence Community that goes to amazing anxiety few new Amazing Things where if you knew what we were capable of in terms of learning these insights about others intentions, you would be very proud. At the same time, we dont have enough, and we need to have greater understanding so we can map out decisionmaking circles and who influences who and how choices are being made. We have seen evidence of the fact that information doesnt flow as quickly or as cleanly through the chinese system and we get the reactions tell us. They probably dont actually know what happened here or there. We are knowledgeable enough to know that that system is clunky and that there is no way to potentially guarantee that you can get the right sort of information at the right time. This is the scary thing with regard to the chinese view towards cutting off communication with the u. S. Military. Not having hotlines. Their belief is, first, the u. S. Attitude ought to be you have to respect china, not say bad things about china, and then, maybe if we can trust you, we will have a line open to you. They also believe if we have a hot line that we are prone to more risky behavior because that is the safety net. So dont give the americans a safety net to say they created a crisis and they want to negotiate their way out of it. Just dont give them a safety net and maybe they will be more conservative with their forces and behavior. All of this, whatever the logic is, leads to very little official communication. This is a very dangerous trend in terms of our ability as major powers to truly work out our issues. Mr. Clark right. So, dan, is there a way for us to employ technology to improve the ability to generate the feedback loop . In the absence of the official Communication Channels . Mr. Patt absolutely. Even if there are no phone calls and formal communications, there is signaling that happens every day. We may not be aware of how our actions are perceived. We may not be aware of all of the signals they are putting out and vice versa, as you have talked about. It is likely not aware of all of that. It is important to recognize there is that foundation of communication today. And second, of course we have a remarkable Intelligence Community. There is this frontier of being able to collect more data and and operationalize that and push that information to a broader force. More military commanders and others across the government who are able to form or shape their actions by it, working toward some model of Mission Command around this. This is where i think there is a real potential for technology. One of the things that happens all around us is as computers and Information Systems become ubiquitous, there are so many more signals than their used to be. A simple example, we can take commercial satellites and radar and we can process those images to get change. Was there something built here or not . But is from a commercial source. As we start to understand the ability to create new indicators and warnings that are appropriate and push them forward across the government to military commanders. I think it is really exciting to measure a baseline and help us understand it at a more granular and realtime level, how things that we are doing are affecting the baseline or how the baseline is moving. Mr. Clark ezra, it seems like one of the challenges is how do we orchestrate this on the u. S. Side to take a probe and evaluate the response, turn that into a recommendation for another probe. To get to mikes point of how do we understand the decisionmaking process, you need this iterative set of actions and reactions to narrow down the uncertainty. Mr. Cohen it needs to be done 100 times faster than we do now. We cant wait 30 days unless 30 days to respond to something, unless the delay is intentional. I have no problem with intentional delay, i have a problem with intentional unintentional delay, which is where we seem to be stuck right now. The biggest thing right now is there is no question if there is if this gets to conflict, there will be a global commander for china. There will be one person who is clearly in charge of the effort. The problem is we dont want to get there and we want to avoid that. Really, what we need today is one person i do think we need somebody whos singularly responsible for countering and engaging in this preconflict activity with china for commanding that on our side. That is one thing. One of the reasons for that is simply to be successful in this preconflict stage, it is not just about what the u. S. Military is going to do. It is about what the entire power of the u. S. Federal government is going to do. Being able to change together a u. S. Military action with a doj action or an action from the treasury department, being able to do those things in concert is extremely important to be successful in the regular warfare stage. Space. That cannot be done under the current construct in the government. There needs to be one person responsible. The other thing is there is the fundamental authority problem, which is that all of our legal analysis and how we conduct Analysis Centers around this idea of what is the likelihood of escalation . If our understanding of escalation is completely off, then we are always going to get to the answer that the new operation, the potentially more effective thing, is not permissible legally. We have found ourselves in this very loop that is just stalling us out because of that. I think to break out of it, again, we talked about this before, but i think one step toward breaking out could be a singular person in charge and we are missing that today. Mr. Clark rear admiral studeman i do think all roads lead to the National Security staff and the president and how they want to conduct their relationship with china and what they want to have veto rights on and what they want to have Mission Command be and do. You find the sensitivities are so high today that i think there is deep concern about not holding very closely everything significant with regard to china. And to focus on, as part of our major strategy, to work with our allies and partners and work with the good guys and build up capacities and deepen relationships, and be able to create an environment which demonstrates in fact that there are a number of partners that would be unwilling to allow violence or intimidation to rule the day anywhere, but particularly in a sensitive area with the economic engine of the 21st century there in asia. The problem is that there is so much that our society is unaware of with regard to china, and there are many allies and partners that are unaware of many of the chinese activities. If you have overly tight controls in the information domain, the insights you learn may feed into, i want to adjust my ability to go test over here. Those are operational elements. The strategic game is to use your information power, highlight what your adversary is doing which violates International Norms or would exact reputational damage on them such that it would mean that the cost for doing this again and again are higher and higher than thinking about some other means or method. Today, if you look at the information domain, we are under utilizing this instrument of national power, because of tight controls and inability to delegate and trust there are a number of agencies and departments that in fact would stay within the boundary lines that would be issued from seniors, and to be able to then do the job of rapid exposure of malign actions in the regular warfare zones. Which all of our friends care about. Our sensing systems are not perfect either. Which means we have to be able to get more eyes and ears forward than we do. We have invested in too many big platforms that are slow lumbering and cannot get to the right places. We need more persistence which requires more numerous ways of sensing that we can do so with our partners in a sharing regime, which allows us to know exactly what the next move has been. And if necessary, taking the video clip or photo showing the chinese water hosing a philippine ship or dumping trash into the jet engines from australia. Those are the things that the information environment should be exposing so beijing has to own them. Because ultimately you want to condition that country to be a true responsible and stable. Responsible stakeholder. You want people to understand what their intent and activities truly are, not just what they are saying from their podium. Mr. Clark right. Just to follow up on that, the idea of using this sort of exposure, naming and shaming for lack of a better term, is that going to be sufficient to cause china to back down on its more aggressive actions and the potential for it attacking those neighbors . Rear admiral studeman i think using that instrument is better than not using that instrument. Providing a convincing case in evidence of what chinas behavior looks like. Will china stop . Probably in some areas not, if the strategic objective is to continue to intimidate taiwan. They will probably pay that price. But the rest of the world is watching. Other nations that dont have the benefit of knowing what is going on, our responsibility is to share the insight you have with a number of people. It is not good enough to keep it within classified channels so that your own decisionmakers are the most omniscient. You need to use that information for effect. And that requires a sense that you have to use it quickly be for it becomes perishable. And this can also be a tool, a probe within its own right. This is a way of revealing or watching how the chinese respond and what are the things that cause them to react and pull back. As opposed to things that might be more aggressive. Rear admiral studeman it highlights the true character of the chinese, the true nature. People want to understand the nature of the danger. If they understand the nature of the danger, they can plan, if you are indonesia, south korea, you can figure out what your strategy needs to be along with policies to be able to deal with what is a genuine depiction of the nature of chinas rise. Everybody is in search of understanding that ground truth. Mr. Cohen and i will just say, it is not just about can we share the intelligence or information we have with the leaders of our allies and partners in the region . But we need to inform the populace in the region. Obviously in the regular space it is extremely important. If xi does decide to push this towards war, knowing the population in the region will not be very kind to him, that is something important. We need to create that condition. I will say that i think this idea of this rapid ability to rapidly get information out to the population is something the dod and state of harmony to work the state department have to work closely together on and the Intelligence Community. That is a place where i Hope Technology will help us get over that coordination inertia that we are stuck in right now. I think that is what you are alluding to. Mr. Clark dan, do we have ways of being able to get information to allies and partners, populations, more quickly . There are things like voice of america, etc. Are there other mechanisms that might be at play here that can be used in an era when there is an increasing number of i number of deepfakes and ai generated content . Mr. Patt i think this is one of the most exciting areas for the dod. There is so much potential and technology. What we have witnessed in the last 20 years is an explosion in algorithms and communication. That is sitting on the floor, it is free for the taking and for the dod to apply for this. Absolutely, rings of networks to be able to share with the most trusted allies and with other partners and allies together, i think those are very powerful tools, low cost. These from there, you are able to start taking input from those partners and allies as well to build more complete picture and to deploy analytics against that. Mr. Clark mike, in the report, we talk about the idea of trying to use probing and actions to create uncertainty for china in regards to its likelihood of success, in particular military action. You are saying instead of creating uncertainty that we need to create certainty and assure them we are not only going to publicize their actions on a world stage and make it available to allies and partners , but we will continue to do that Going Forward and we will always be providing this watchful eye on their behavior. Rear admiral studeman we have this phrase about providing strategic predictability and operational unpredictability. It is supposed to be a guide for us. The chinese see operational unpredictability and strategic unpredictability. You see the dilemma. We need to work on our strategic part of it. Where do we stand . Is it status quo for taiwan . Where do we put that stake in the ground to make sure there is no confusion, because debates among the elites with regards to taiwan provides using signals, provides confusing signals, including debates that exist in congress. Then you get the visitation which suggests that we are going to treat taiwan as a de facto nation. There is a political element there. We need to do appetite suppression on the political and strategic activities to carry the highest symbolism that forced china to think whether or not we are actually living up to our word. They dont believe we are in a status quo environment. Then we have a problem. Keep in mind, the paranoia people that exist in the ccp are inclined to not believe your first explanation that there has to be some other and they will discard the first, even if it is true. We need to work on ourselves. Look in the mirror and find out whether we need to strengthen conversations with congress to understand that just sending code ells after codells over there, whether or not that is wise. If it is going to lead to something beneficial, or is it simply creating more unnecessary friction and doesnt actually help . Are you accelerating our crisis or are you decelerating the crisis . I do think whether you are in the executive or legislative branch, whether you are part of the military or other agencies, we need to look hard at whether or not we are doing what we need to do to send the clear, honest signal and live up to that. These other things are going to be moot. You can try to shape and expose behaviors but fundamentally on this particular court issue, if core issue, if china believes they have to act because otherwise time isnt on their side, then you are going to head right down that funnel into something we talked about earlier. Which is not good for anybody. Mr. Clark ezra, in terms of operational unpredictability or operational uncertainty, what are the tools we have in terms of military operations or are there things we can do in the economic and diplomatic world that create that tactical level of uncertainty without affecting the strategic relationship . Mr. Cohen i think what you are getting out, bryan, is this idea that we obviously want them to understand where we are going to where we are not going to go. We do have a lot of tools, both in the cyber realm, all throughout our state craft, economic tools that we have at our disposal. At least creating enough. I think there is not room for uncertainty. It is that uncertainty around xi jinping. If xi feels that he is not getting reliable information, or the people around him dont really know whats going on, i think that will affect his ability to make a decision and at least make the decision to go into taiwan. I think that there are a lot of places we can increase our efforts. This comes down to having a coordinated Government Strategy and really the Campaign Idea not the dod but governmentwide campaign. We need somebody to bring that altogether. How do you pair a cyber action with an economic action . Right now, these things are loosely coordinated but not really happening in concert. Mr. Clark mike, if we try to create uncertainty in the middle in the inner circle that xi relies on for information and advice, is that a problem or is that where we should focus our efforts . Or should we try to keep stability and certainty at the highest level in terms of art our strategic level actions and focus our uncertainty efforts at the tactical and operational level . Rear admiral studeman it depends what you want them to be certain or uncertain about. I want them to be certain that if they try to do something violently and against their promises, we go back to the 1970s in regard to taiwan, that there will be a certain level of devastation and that their results will not just be uncertain but will likely onboard a major defeat like what they have seen in ukraine. Taiwan is now wise. They have watched hong kong, and essentially the freedom is crushed and hong kong by chinas own choices. They are now awake, i would say. And they are on path to maintain their own system of democracy right now. I think there is enough evidence that the reaction would be devastating militarily. We learned from ukraine, dont underestimate those who unite no matter what the history is, unite to rise up and demonstrate a signal of their displeasure. I think you find that in europe. If you are in xi jinpings position, and youre thinking, i can get my military ready by 2027 and when the geopolitical conditions look good, if i can then move, i will move. The issue would be a high level of uncertainty, not only that militarily they can successfully do a quick operation, but secondarily, that every other Major Chinese objective is going to be jeopardized by this one particular operation, including xi jinpings desire to have a big legacy. That those who would evaporate like that and that is the certainty they want them to have. It actually is the most probable and most likely outcome. So i dont want things to be uncertain. Mr. Clark and that was your point that there are tools on the economic and diplomatic side that can help promote the certainty that the International Response would undermine xis opportunities to pursue his other objectives and goals. Rear admiral studeman and that it will ruin his legacy. And i think there is ample evidence out there but perhaps the chinese are not perceiving it and that is something we should do more of. That this wont cement xis legacy. This will lead to the downfall of his legacy in the eyes of the chinese people. The key thing is, his decision will be based on the trust he has in his forces, and i think that is really an area of focus. Mr. Clark im going to ask audience questions in a minute. Dan, operationally, we could create more uncertainty for china with regard to how we are going to operate and beat and being successful in an evasion on the terms they would find accessible. Acceptable. What are those things and are we doing those things today . Mr. Patt maybe i will briefly zoom out and say i dont we are doing enough of that. And that is partially because we have a narrow view of deterrence by denial. Imagine there is this binary trigger that there is an invasion of taiwan and it triggers a military response. That comes across and makes the u. S. Plan around that. Not only do we think about this scenario, think about what to deploy. It ends up acting as a form of prevent defense. We take all of our resources, put them against this one scenario. There are many possibilities that could happen. Some stay below the threshold and others that are more ambiguous. And maybe provoke other things. Not only does it drive the plan but also how we operate in predictable ways. If you think there are other scenarios possible, unit have you need to have forces that are ready to act on and they need to train and develop alternative ways of operation. So you can think about yes, operating our forces in ways we generate continue surprise and operations of the admiral spoke to. Technology can support that. A lot of things we do in the indopacific have been obvious to many. There are many things we are doing in our campaigning that actually take what dan is talking about and puts it in practice. I agree that we can scale that up. But the concepts are well entrenched within the thinking and planning for the components all the way up. That is underway. You would be proud of some of the ideas that have been converted into the thinking there and with a sense that the other guys will be able to use machines to aid predictability. The whole notion of making sure that you give data to those machines now so that they are completely on the back heal. That is a notion that has translated into operational we cash operational planning activities. Translated into operational planning activities. We have a keen sense of how to play that. We are in the spot to implement some of the ideas talked about. Mr. Clark i am going to see if there are questions from the audience. We will bring the microphone around. If you want to state your name and affiliation and i will go from right to left. We will start with you. She is bringing the microphone to you. Given the obsession with cognitive warfare for decades and the strategy built around that, how do you think they will respond to Something Like this . Rear admiral studeman great question. Do you want to talk about cognitive warfare . Rear admiral studeman this is embedded in the chinese approach and i do believe they are throwing their instruments to be able to engage. We are debating this kind of thing and in talking about china and taiwan, we havent talked about anything else china is doing or any of the global challenges that face us. The penetration of our society , how hollywood is essentially owned. They cant talk about china, you cant do a movie or tv series about china, because they have penetrated. The east is influencing the west, not the other way around, in serious ways. Here we are talking about one threaded issue. That is effective cognitive warfare. When your propaganda and tools are penetrating a society so deep that we cant have a lot of open discourse about china and we cant have the Entertainment Industry or our basketball teams actually express their First Amendment rights to talk about different things. That suggests to you that chinese cognitive warfare has been darn successful in our country. That is a good point. In the work we have been doing in cognitive warfare, people tend to think of this as brain control and mind control of individuals. It is much more affected and applied to societies or populations. Exactly. Next question. You, sir. I am stanley kober. Whenever i hear a discussion like this, i think back to vietnam. We had the treaty and the resolution and the North Vietnamese were not deterred. We bombed North Vietnam, rolling thunder. They were not deterred. Why do you think deterrence will work better with china now than it did with North Vietnam . Mr. Clark good point. Rear admiral studeman i have some thoughts on that. Mr. Cohen i think what we have been talking about today though is the things that are currently being hatched up in this idea of deterring through overwhelming force is not working. Really what we need to shift more to is shaping xis thinking such that he does not take actions that will lead to war, not that we are just going to go with overwhelming force and scare him off with that. I think there is a difference and that is what i think dan and bryan have been looking at is that technologically, how can we do that and make better acquisitions that dont create deterrence, but change the thinking of the adversary. That is the difference. Rear admiral studeman i think that is really well said. The reality of the matter is that if it was really just the threat of overwhelming u. S. Force, the rest of u. S. The threat of u. S. Dominance is eroding. China has the worlds biggest navy. They are able to field targets faster and cheaper than we are shots on targets. There has to be something different. There is tremendous opportunity for the u. S. To achieve its objectives if we shift to focusing on operational uncertainty and if we focus on shaping decisionmaking. I would say there are all forms of deterrence. The economic instrument is probably the most powerful. The question of how to potentially use that comes up. I think the chinese are very wise to that, and they are trying to insulate their economy from what we have done in ukraine in such a way that will allow them to reduce blunt maybe the best form of influence there. We have to be very attuned to that, when our instruments become duller overtime, what does that mean for shaping and influencing someone elses sovereign choices . And we need to be realistic about that. We cant get back to just sanctioning the heck out of them and the problem will be solved. I do think we have to have a very clear understanding of the limits of our power. I think we need to have the distance and incentive. The strategic view is you dont want china to be beleaguered and beleaguered country and act out in ways that are highly disruptive. You want to bring china into see that it can actually use the International Norms and laws to benefit its own country. Its rise is greatly attributed to the International System it desires to change in certain ways. But how do you get them to have the epiphany if their standard of living, the stakes for the ccp, leadership and the country are better when embedded as a responsible country in the International Order than some kind of rogue Maverick Country outside of it. That requires both carrots and sticks, and a lot of swallowing our own pride and talking about different issues and having those discussions that lead us i and leading us to a better place. As it is right now, we are in this spiral of declining relations and friction that seems to be growing every week. We have got to figure out a way to course correct, both countries. And others. To be able to get ourselves into a better place. I do believe you are right. If you only look at this as the problem between the relationship of the u. S. And china as a deterrence problem, you will fail every time to get the strategic outcome we are looking for. To followup on that, we need to leave open the potential for china to be able to grow economically, grow its influence and national power. As long as it does so as a responsible player. It seems like a lot of the rhetoric on the u. S. Side from elected officials, they say basically we have to keep china in its place, prevent china from being able to get more influence around the world. It seems like that is a recipe for making china feel like they have to act out. Rear admiral studeman i think we need to responsibly put efforts there at the same time keep an eye on the fact that the way they are thinking on beijing has a different objective and method for achieving those. Many of those are machiavellian. It is the end justifies the means. I do think this is one of most complex problems we face in the 21st century. For a reason. And we cant boil it down to just the simple thing about deterrence. And i gets to the idea of denial strategy. There is a strategy that has to involve china too. That is one additional element and the list goes on. The prevent defense is a terrible play to just keep doing from the beginning of the game. One section in our report bryan talks about, competition, and in a way, you can think about this competition as it is about the strengths of bonds with allies and other nations in the pacific and across the world. And whether they are cultural or military, the offense the u. S. Should be playing should be about strengthening those, building eight tighter Network Building the tighter network of allies around a sense of value. That has to be the model for winning the game in the long term. That model of competition does not need china to disappear. It does not need the ccp to collapse. That is a competition we can pursue. Certainly the military, but beyond that, many instruments of the u. S. Power. Just one last thing, and i will say there is a lot of good talk about this now. What we are talking about, there is talk from the pentagon and they will go to a conference or something and say all these things we are saying. Then they go back to their office in sign another 100 Million Contract to support the denial strategy. I just think we really need to move off of this now, this idea that it is just going to be denial. That it is just going to be this hard power deterrence you are talking about. But we need to see more than just words. There are a lot of words now. There needs to be money decisions mr. Clark mr. Clark that are made. We have time for one more question. In the back, sir. In times of the safety net or hardline with china, do you think it would be ok to give them absolutely. I think all countries, particularly ones that may have some contention related to disputes, whether it is ones that are maritime or island base, an example would be that, needs to ensure that they can call and clarify intentions. And to be able to deescalate and not let one particular mistake that may have happened with a pilot or mariner out there lead the country to then go down and exacerbate something that could have been controlled much earlier. How do you nip things in the bud . Because mistakes will be made. I think that is the great concern. In asia today, in the indopacific, there is a lot of dry grass. The potential for one spark to get spreading much sooner is higher if you dont have the ability to shower cold water on it. That is where the hot lines come into play in multiple countries. They should have if they dont but many have lines to the chinese. That is particularly problematic between the u. S. And china right now. Mr. Clark i think that is a good place to end it. Is there anything else you guys wanted to bring up before we stop . Thank you very much. Thank you for being here. We appreciate your time and your time online as well. For dan patt, as are cohen, and admiral Mike Studeman, thank you for coming to the Hudson Institute and have a great day. [applause] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [indiscernible conversations] a healthy democracy does not just look like this. It looks like this. Where americans can see democracy at work. With sit it where citizens are truly informed. A republic thrives. Get informed straight from the source on cspan, unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. From the nations capitol, to wherever you are, you will get the opinion that matters the most, your own. This is what democracy looks like. Cspan, powered by cable. Announcer tonight, a number of republican president ial hopefuls, including ron desantis, kk haley, and of a crowd must solemnly, speak in a fundraising dinner hosted by representative ashley hinson. Watch at 9 30 p. M. 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