Could they do that . It is just not going to happen. So it was easy for me. So you have this urban legend of accountability that permeates the book. If you walk into the concourse with george h. W. Bush and you look to the left we have the first line of defense. To be in a space and nobody else is allowed to be in. I was doing a briefing downtown and then to talk about global situations. In said on a scale between one and and how would you rate the cia and said keep in mind we dont do 8310 if you were there theyre asking the department of commerce the questions. [laughter] that is what i try. Because what actually happens inside cia or nsa real people extraordinary asked to do extraordinary things. I want to ask somebody who goes the extra mile so Charlie Wilson from the House Appropriations we wouldnt have gotten that without him not breaking any laws for the subcommittee of defense with the directors flexibility together with their real flexibility that made it possible that we sat there to move 500,000 from one account. But if we have to do a write. So a couple comes to mind. But the National Security adviser i can have a straightforward conversation with and i would call up i have a decision to make i will make that decision and i dont know if i was even inviting him i may jump over the side but for ever willing to cover your back on one of two restaurants last shows so or Public Affairs officer said is meet the press here . I called steve i have been invited to be on meet the press it he said good. Good luck. No political guidance left or right to so he had the confidence that allowed us to stabilize and just to throw out one more name i was selected to be director with that phone call that i want to talk to you okay. I got a pretty good understanding. Find steve it was an unhappy incident in day tracked him down. I got in touch in said harry doing . Reconsidered to be the Deputy Director of cia . Were really depends on who was the director. But i am the one making this call. [laughter] he said i will get back to you assure he talked to his wife and said if you are number one i will come back. And we had a wonderful relationship. With the 5 00 meeting to make a decision. Very often i would do the input in simply turn to them and say so given that decision somewhere else to you all right with that . Then we were in the room and everyone else left the room i am looking in stephen he is brown science dealers. To do everything peas two boys would make these types of decisions . We were in the same law firm for a time we would negotiate settlements we would talk about who is the good cop period who is the bad cop. You had something happen with that agency and it has been bracing experience it to have a chapter on that. Letter the concerns of the future of the electronic infrastructure and what is salient and what do we need to do about it . In time and in terms of the time line. And i and director of the nsa i guess so called monday night the system is down. What do you mean . What part . All of it. We were unable. We were collecting it but could not move it or process it. We were down more than 72 hours that america was pretty much not collecting intelligence for half a week and that is a big deal. That is the skirmish line in the top me several things. I space inherited a National Treasure if this goes belly up there is no course of action there is nothing more dangerous than standing still. And we outsourced it. Not constrained by the federal budget to refresh the itt to get somewhere close to the to to for centuries. I have been concerned about the vulnerability of the electric grid generally and what it could take down is our electronics and a grand like soup to nuts in roughly chronological i dont have anything here for cyber. Wait a minute. All little here or there but no aggregation and started to write and it would dash out of me. How much of that has fundamentally changed of American Life the way we fight wars or collect or protect intelligence into step back this is a pretty detailed history of the lsi book slow but for those of us in government to get to the office in the National PressOperations Center but fundamentally the structure of the u. S. Government to conduct operations that is the speed of light for government for a decade. But anyway i really tried to lay that out. We can have that with the cyberdream. I dont think it is quite accurate and we are more public about it. With that accusation to fall back to this cyberdomain as a domain. They think they keep the comments coming. It is very controversial and they take that headon. Here we are i was there for a lot of it now we have to live with the consequences. Take just a minute to expand your fascinating characterization of the caa cultures. With the analyst to the faculty and University People who make things with your fellow steelers fans with science and technology. One of the parts of the book a. [inaudible] shade and family life with espionage. It with the Agency Culture you seek cia it is nebula never singular. Most days it is plural noun not in the book but john brennan our successor tries to cut through those cylinders of excellence. You have got to learn. I love your to in your final chapter of a great guide to those in a senior position to be the only superpower in the room but dont act like it. Guidance to the station chief. Thank you. Fix booktv covers though wider rate from nonfiction books on history history, biography, science. One of the few places is not the only place to see and hear a lot of different voices on a lot of different topics. But they have a story to tell to have that opportunity to bring that to our viewers. Were talking about isis with the viewers in the feedback is vital to cspan in general and we listen to our viewers. So we take that into account to bring them into the mix. We have tweets and Facebook Comments with the program for the audience to interact with the author to answer their questions and share their comments. We know there are so many people that our big readers and interested it isnt just about to have an author get back up on stage to tell you what to think for the history as they say it is but the viewers actually asking questions. If they want to find out more information they can go to our web site. We have the schedule is always available and they can see all the different programs we offer and aa general schedule it is all at booktv. Org Richard Engel talks about reporting from the middle east for over 20 years. This is about 45 minutes. [inaudible conversations] [applause] [inaudible conversations] a greause] hello everyone. Welcome florida great crowd on behalf of the odors its entire staff will come to rue politics prose. This wouldb this is say good time to you turn off or silence your cellphone. And we have microphones onon either side if you could step up with your question that would be great becausee we are recording this event. Wele i am very flees to welcome richard to talk about his new book and then all hell broke loose. You recognize him as the chief correspondent for nbc news where he reports regularly mostly the middle east with things exploding in the background. We are glad to have him here in this environment. This is the story of his two new decades of reporting beginning in cairo where he went after graduating college with a romantic idea to become a foreign reporter. Correspondent. Well learn about his education, picking up freelance work two reported for a Major News Network that led to a kidnapping in syria. With the astute analysis of which i heard him say this morning i have never seen it worse. Of that middle east has been in where it is headed and they just want to tell you not surprisingly we will cut q a a little short summary can help everybody get their books mind so he has a plane to catch. [applause] first of all, is a pleasure to be here cannot remember i have seen so many s people in a bookstore and that is encouraging on so many different levels. Buying this book and keep the industry going. The book is about the middle east and moved out there 20 years ago i graduated college in 1996 with the idea i would go to a place of a lot of news the middle east seem like a good choice and i would become a great Foreign Correspondent. Ive moved to cairo i really looked at the map than about where will i go . Saddam hussein and iraq was not an option syria not much, jerusalem yes but probably over saturated. So i thought egypt. L said even if it doesnt work out it was egypt which was great to. Rrived compact a couple of suitcases and some savings and rented an apartment and had an incredibly rich experience. People were welcoming they wanted me to convert to islam constantly, David Brinkley into their homes and feed me. I was never alone. Alone. While that can be tiresome but itt was a great way to become familiar with the culture to learn the language within months i had basic conversations in arabic if you need to communicate there is no water with 1 million degrees you have to learn to talk to people. I started reporting for local this papers with the International Radio bin pieces for newspapers. Has been and i have been doing it ever since its been 20 years. I still live in the region i am here a couple of times a year to see family and encourage you to buy. Haaughter] but i have been living there 20 years. Actually after having looked at the region it is a model. It is flawed you could pickles or find reasons why it does the work but i like to sink as a way to an understatement the middle east right now. Is a row of houses. E, look liket and theyll look beautiful, but they looked like they have been there forever. Nobodys taken care of them. It is just crumbling and 20 years ago there was a structure in place mubarak mubarak, as Saddam Hussein hussein, it was established a year and a locked in placece, but it was a lot of appearance inside there is tremendous rocked nepotism nepotism, corruption, ignora nce cover religious tension kept at bay by those carried out and write in these old houses if you dont open the windows or the doors you make it worse. So that was the situation. Of very fragile paradise may and instead United States put the shoulder through the wall of iraq to start a sequence of defense that we still experience to this day so eight years of direct military action started to destroy the status quo to unleash the demons in the Obama Administration they were supporting the revolution in egypt and supporting in libya but not serious though a way to go through the middle east. So then two of leash with the old system as we knew it is broken. I have never seen it worse as a period of chaos. In to be that physical a embodiment and if you continue this model you can speculate where it will go from here. To see a series of strongman reemerging themselves in egypt is the first example and there is more to come. They will embrace this but be very careful because after periods of chaos when people embrace the fascist bad things can happen. There is a of a tendency and we will see how it goes with other governments to reach out and it doesnt have to be chaos horror dictators but after we will reach back. I hope one day if they have influence can guide the region to leadership but it doesnt have to be Saddam Husseins iraq. That is the framework but that is through my eyes to what i know in the places i have lived in the characters i meet along the way and 200 to six pages of anecdotes so you key and follow along on this journey that has been a 20 years dirty and then moving along in the process watching all hell breaks loose and it has broken loose. You have to see how it comes so with that preamble i would like to take some of your questions. Please approach a microphone while you do that i will take the opportunity to say thank you for coming for the book so we have roped. [applause] having bitterly part of that world for decades a show of men and women looking at an entire generation better now in their 20s would hope qc w for these people and what can be done globally . The reason i worry we will see strongman arises because the new generation has lived for the last 15 years in a period of terrible strife. Living through the complex with this of arab persian conflict at purged the kurdish conflict even between cities it is easy for someone to come along to say remember what it is like give were right side will make it go away. Also there is a belief that is spreading in the middle east that the United States is responsible for all of this. Is responsible for this in venetia conflict this is 1,000 years before the declaration of independence. But if you live in baghdad and have been the last 15 years the memories of Saddam Hussein are receding and the reality of the divide is daily you can pick a date to when you remember that beginning in 2003. See you can see how they make that Mental Association the americans created this to me and she a divide. Thankyou once again for being here in responding to talk about one of the potential strongman of turkey. Ac we were going. To have that reassertion. I got it got. Just for the sake of time because with turkey we could do a whole week it is one of the most interesting dynamics as the strong men tried to reach emergency the empire because when there is a breakdown of order russia tries to reestablish its sphere of influence it had decided the way is to make an alliance with some kurdish groups and it wants to spread its wings. And he wants to reestablish and has been trying to do that. But with mixed success. Peace po he has been blamed for read the writing a war with the new wo so his goal of establishing a new world order, he and a few others are still trying to do that but he picked a fight with russia to limit the project in so far the middle east is not lining up to stand behind him so he is pushing the project and agenda with limited success. And i am looking back. [laughter] the solidarity is there. Thanks for being here once again. Ulletproof ves i dont recognize you without your bulletproofwe vest. [laughter] but much of what we know comes from watching your interviews sudafed is a huge responsibility. You are respected journalist we have lost much men in resources and the damage it has done in iraq and afghanistan. Hit with so we entered after 9 11. So then Building Seven comes down after the two towers there is a lot more to this yy. Day you have any kind of information . On 9 11 attacks . No. I have not studied the aftermath but the answers that you seem to be looking for i am not the person that has those. In i m m the least dealing with the aftermath i was not inas do your court in washington or the midwest. So keep asking that question i just dont have anything more to add to that debate. What about football . Engel, [laughter]our name i honestly did not know your name before this weekend but i read about the kidnapping of the news team and yourself in 2012 and april of last year it was retracted is this a false like as a group wants to make another group look bad or disguise themselves to pose as others . So if so what role of ourr government had like john mccain berlin see graham that was pushing to arm the freeze syrian army. Were they responsible for the kidnapping . There are two questions. Just to make it more clear clear, three years ago i was in syria with the team with Close Friends and colleagues and we were kidnapped and held by masked gunmen in moved from place to place. While we were there thes, whole time all of us including arabic speakers believed they were ricci lawyer listed people who were the shia militia by the way theyre acting it is seemed credible. Made it. We got out of this horrible experience a lot of thin we moved on. A couple of years later they said the people that grab you look again so we did. We spent two months to try to find out who and where and i do think that these people were in all likelihood going to the point how complicated were though loyalties are often not what they seem but i think they were thugs a and wanted iran and some posing as a regime willis. Nvolved to write think this was a conspiracy no. Think it was much more local. Rr hello. I am a current defense reporter in this seems it was the you were in a region long before others arrived. So where would you go . [laughter] get out of this town if you want to be a Foreign Correspondent by definition you have to be foreign. [laughter] lets get the world and this is what i tell young journalist, think about what though world will look like kids 20 years. I took the cue ball it was the middle east. E bohr interco boring. If it was 96 and may have led to poland. Is probably go but i was looking at the map thinking the middle east well be the story of my generation so i say to you go home and think about it for a couple of day ispahan well will be the story of the next 20 years . Maybe it is the environment so therefore go to where it will be the most impacted go to where the puck will be now where it is now. Here. Feet where politics will be over the next 20 years then go there. So africa . I think that is interesting the collision of the environment and urbanization will define you may have missed it. In the last ted are 15 years and hundre two major american ground war is in the middle east one did that a go particularly well. Rs . These are foreigndl correspondents will you do better to get more action than that . Probably not. I doubt the 101st Airborne Division will ever be deployed in baghdad began. I could be wrong. But i dont anticipate another war like iraq so look at the map think of the pieces then figure out where you want to be. The ap as we warmup over the next 20 years but it is a great experiment. [laughter] once you think about it and drink some wind. [laughter] and then drink some more. [laughter] i am happy to be standing here in front of you stateside were both here safe. I appreciate your service before you think we for mine. L i have to thank you for yours. [laughter] my question relates to strategic tools of power. Anytime there is an International Crisis we look to the military. But we did well but what can we do better diplomatically to not to engage foreign leaders but that people . Thanks for your service. You were in one of the most dangerous in frigid the beautiful parts of afghanistan. Were we out there together with the vehicle broke down . I was not there for thatnk but you utilized my not. Thank you very much we borrowed equipment. [laughter] i was the fame and boy. Pe [laughter] i hope we return to the equipment. [laughter] the problem with american diplomacy but the engagement is the u. S. Continues to retreat to go deeper and deeper into that castles that is not the diplomats running the show but the Security Officers as says to they can meet a and when and for how long. So were losing contacts youasty cannot just listen to communications from behindd the wall you lose contact have n contact, as the texture. Former so with cultural integration the former u. S. Conflict right in the center of this city is rented out for profit and next door a Cultural Center that shows i italian movies to take language classs with parties and if it ended generally stayed behind theik walls with the meetings better put a mine. He castl so they need to try to in gauge said know why we dont have a cultural better. They dont really exist. But that is part of the al reach. But something simple like that. Local kid from the neighborhood can change your impression. Did lawrence of arabia influence your career . Yes. [laughter] as painful as it is to say when i moved out i was a kid to the middle east. I wanted to do this when i was a very young boy. I was 13 with my family we were in morocco and we read a very glamorous hotel and i was sitting on the steps waiting for my mother took about who was always welldressed and put together and from another era. Nd i i , was waiting with a Horse Carriage rates in the center of marrakesh and says you should work there one day . So i said there are he said in an to so was it just lawrence of arabia . Know it was just so whole east coast to do something exotic. Gat i still like the concept and i will have to ask but yes there is. Q about strong women who were dictators there could be the installation of the puppet regime refiners lowes to bring democracy to steer. Is there any with syria or libya or but for the government to put in their own puppet absolutely. Will they succeed in those to be proposed will surviveogre. Some will feet of work in progress but i hope so i think i think it will be hard because they have had some bush but they will want to live under the oppressive societies. Invented as if. But if someone moves so that is something that ise lesserknown that you might but then you just have took read the articles and books i rigo lot of books on the middle ages. My pets to be so very old give this a and i find them interesting. There is no block gore tweets but the glory he and the aha and then to learn more about the subject they and. After spending time but to have the oppression of the governments but if you were desperate you dont have a lot of choice. So hopefully there is a possibility but it would isot interesting is a case and then means to be certified to meet debt the way that this but she cannot wait to get to work because the market but they dont really want to see things change. To have fun but kelso st. St. Spiritual points above attention but that opportunity was the insert to create a more water is society if youre always living hint to belfour with a dozen to your head to dont have a lot of choice. That is bernie sanders. [laughter] [applause] luckily enough to do with any domestic politics why will not even though theyre preparing to with the if you put the fed is bomb will become aware the memorex but i e short answer is yes. S. Isis is fairly short. It will not win it has say a losing strategy. But then it becomes contagious. Here, it [laughter] itself but but that is because the upper body is weak and will become stronger and with all those religious groups and the generally history movest th on. And that policy. It is tough but people are afraid of that head