Retired general tony zinni proposes ways to make her use of force around the world more effective. He argues the world should rethink its use of police and be more skeptical of using force to solve our problems. This is about an hour. [applause] thank you. Thank you. I wanted to talk a little bit first about how the book came about. I often get accused of maybe setting the stage for events and is an author watch whats going on now and having a book like this it seems like Perfect Timing unfortunately. I started out to write a very different book than this. I was really thinking about the way conflict goes today compared to wars and military interventions of the past. I think all of us know, reasonably talk about the greatest generation, world war ii, the good war. We were attacked and we as a nation came together. We had clear objectives. They were men like marshall and fdr and others that were in leadership positions. And we managed to handle it in a way that seemed very satisfying in the end. It was the first time in our history that the winner paid reparations when you think about it. Up until that point it was unheard of. The loser has to pay for the w war. If you think about the Marshall Plan and everything we did, it was the winner that took our adversaries and raise them up. Germany and japan. I think in many ways that has always been our model. When we think about committing our military that the good work. No wars are good of course but its a good war in the sense that it seems just. Everything they did seem to be from the perspective of the moral high ground. The leadership was is in place. We have a strategy. We had an end state so these sorts of things were set in concrete as a way that we would commit our military. Think what has happened since them. The korean war the vietnam or iraq afghanistan somalia and many other smaller communities. They are very unsatisfying. They didnt have clean lines. The reasons we went in my defense they were difficult to understand. The way those wars were handled and that decisions were made it just didnt seem to fit that model. There is an american way of war which basically is relatively straightforward but the kind of complex we are into now seem not to fit that. The book i started out to write was basically oriented to the battlefield. What do our troops go through having to adjust to this . They are trained for that sort of good war model but they find themselves now in murky commitments, no clear political objectives. They are on the ground trying to rebuild nations and strange environments. I started it from the point of view of the soldier marine on the ground. Something im very familiar with. But as i went along and did research for the book a couple of things struck me. One was that you know the troops when you are out there and with them on the ground they get it. If you go down to the village level they understand whats happening on the ground. Most of them, not all of them, adjust, adapt. Its the decisions that get made somewhere else that caused the problems read the more i started to look at this somewhere else i found how far removed from the battlefield that was. All the political decisions that are made and analyses that are made before reagan put boots on the ground its all the decisions and political machinations that go on while our troops are out there and in the midst of these kinds of conflicts. That is why the title of the book before the first shots are fired how america can win or lose off the battlefield. Oftentimes we get our troops in a position where they are at a disadvantage before they even the military term cross the line of departure in some way. So i sort of switch my focus to all these things that go on off the battlefield and therefore the commitment of troops, the political commitments. The nonsetting or setting of objectives and right now you can see whats happening in terms of what seems to be in decision, reluctance, trying to get a grasp on whats happening and we have become a nation that is transactional and reactive to crisis as opposed to having some sort of strategic design and understanding where we want to go, how we want to employ force. Secretary clinton and secretary gates had said that our Foreign Policy is over militarize. Something that might strike you as may be odd is that most of the generals and admirals, the vast majority feel the same way. Our military gets committed to nation building. It gets committed to missions that are unclear. We get bogged down and mired down. They find armor of military personnel trying to rebuild ninth century societies into jeffersonian democracies and free market economies. We dont have a whole of government approach and this just seems to get worse and worse as we go along. The moment i decided to shift off that battlefield and into this part of what goes into dealing with conflicts is a statement made by then secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld. We were into iraq and things were not going well. A reporter asked rumsfeld doesnt this look like vietnam and he bristled at that statement. He said no wars are like the last wars. No wars are like the next wars. Every war is in its own and its very different. I said you know, ive been in the military 40 years. I see similarities. I see patterns. So that sort of triggered me to look at the patterns. What is it that we can use as a framework to examine this and look at this . First of all you can look at the reasons we intervened. We would like to think as americans, we intervened our interests are threatened in some way. Not so clear. Wnd and iraq that wasnt there in the gulf of tonkin incident that didnt happen. We have had manufactured reasons for going to war. Back in the 20s and 30s the banana wars and the caribbean promoted or business interests there. There are times we have gone to war for territorial expansion back when we were filling out the United States so the reasons are very clear. The first part of the book talks about what i call triggering events. What are the events . Sometimes their leadership actually creates a reason to go to war. Remember the red line in syria . We have had had president s who have drawn red lines. We have had president s who have articulated president ial doctrines that basically says we will fight here. Thats all well and good when you say it publicly but there is sort of a the nuance to this. You sort of tell your adversary under what conditions he would fight. That adversary if the advantages to him can create that situation to force you to do something. President s need to be much more careful about red lines. Our current president has probably learned that lesson. Sometimes we have created this situation are set the condition under which we have fought. The first part of the book deals with the series. Its not as cut and dried as you might imagine. The second has to do with how we analyze, how our Political Leadership says okay we have a crisis. Help me understand it. We were watching our president go do that now. Tell me about what i need to know. What are my options . Here its critically important to look at where does the advice come from . Its not as clean as the intelligence guys coming in and laying it out. I talk in a book about how different president s have handled this. Eisenhower with the. Eisenhower was the solarium group and persons with key advisers the kissingers the brzezinskis the cheneys that dominated the advice in one way or another. President s that have used their cabinets and relied on a National Security council or a handful of trusted advisers of the advice in the analysis, the intelligence sometimes has been good and sometimes has been catastrophic in misjudging events and how that has led us to a decision. I talk about president ial decisions in the book. Whats going to the president s mind . Is there a degree of emotion . Is there Something Else thats happening . Did this catch them by surprise or is there something beyond just the analysis that leads to that decision . Also the strategy that is created. Before you even decide to step onto a battlefield i can tell you this from a military generals point of view, tell me what you want me to do. I was a student at the National War College as a lieutenant carnell and we had a representative come to speak with us by the name of newt newt gingrich. Newt said to us someday some of you will rise to higher rank. You will be generals and your political masters are going to tell you, go do this. Attack dessaure intervene here. He said it is critical for you to ask this question and then what . Nothing about iraq. We went in and the mission was to take out saddam. We did in three weeks. We stayed there for 10 years. Okay mr. President , saddam is gone and then what . Said the same thing in afghanistan. Get al qaeda. We didnt Pay Attention to the mission and now ill qaeda is gone and we are standing there in the middle of afghanistan and then what . We are still there. So if you dont see this clearly through, if the political objectives are not clear begin to mission creep. The military doesnt understand what theyre supposed to do. You get bogged down in missions like nationbuilding there may be unintended in some way. Theres another part of this now that has become more critically important as we have gone on. Its what i call in the book the battle of the narrative. The enemy now has become very sophisticated. Look at isis. Look at how they handle social media, how they dominate the media. These horrific scenes of beheadings and the atrocities and genocide. That place was certain audience. They are recruiting just fine. There is a battle that goes on to make the case that you are right and just. Theres a battle of the narrative that goes on this says to the American People i want you behind me. I call this in the book my federal american speech, the bully pulpit. This was terrific. 240 some marines and others that we lost there. And the stomach and the political pressure for going into a place like granada just was not there. And this cabinet member or cabinet had told me that the president was given the advice, mr. President , do not go into granada. This was the worst thing did you could do right now. You will never sell it to the American People, and it will be politically damaged. Tell me the president turned around and said, is there a potential for american lives to be in danger . And the Intelligence Officer that was briefing said, sir, there are american medical students that could be at risk. He said, then the decision is clear, legal wendy reid noted comments to our butts. My job is to explain it to the American People, but he had a clear purpose in mind. You know, our politically difficult it might be it was a higher order that went into his Decision Making. Right or wrong. In this case it was the risk to americans, american interest. But more than that american lives that might be addressed. This battle of the narrative now has become a significant. I was doing an assessment in iraq and afghanistan for the generals out there before i retired several years ago when i was amazed to see something and did not see in my time in active duty. There were actually staffs actions that did nothing but work the narrative, the message. We were in a communications battle now, and it is not just there at the operational level but at the strategic level. It is not only you verses are potential adversary, it is you verses the political opposition in your own country. That constantly goes of paris of that communication becomes extremely necessary. Now, when the balloon goes up and we have to commit our military, it is not like booktv the turnaround and create a military. You have a military that is there. We have a military structure. What goes into making the structure . Well, during the cold war we pretty much can make some judgments three new with the enemy was doing, and an arms race. Very expensive. Remember eisenhowers warning about the militaryindustrial complex that was growing. People often forget the first part when he said our arms bust the mighty. We were in this very expensive arms race. President eisenhower was looking at a federal budget that over 50 percent went to the defense and National Security. Over 50 percent, which means the rest had to be split up amongst other programs that were vital to our nations wellbeing. Right now it is less than 15 percent that is x going down. But what can the military can you afford . What kind of military should you have . In an environment like this with the fed survey, hard to understand, difficult to predict our intelligence community, what do you mean . Where the you accept the risk . This is a difficult decision for our pentagon and other some. I am critical of the process of making this decision in the book. Lets talk about that it is not based on strategy. It is usually based on political decisions. When it goes to congress to decide on which programs to fund or not to fund is usually made on the basis of, what do you make in my district the process, what kind of military to step above. Remember that image of Donald Rumsfeld out there in kuwait when that soldier asked him, you know, my god, we have equipment here that cannot stand up against improvised explosive devices, having to go to the junkyard and put pieces on. And rumsfeld made that insensitive statement that you go to war with the army that you have which was an unsatisfactory answer. Unfortunately, it is true. Now, we can adjust and adapt quickly to what the need is, but you have to have structure. President when the cold war when it really began at the end of world war ii we decided that we needed a military that could fight two wars, two major conflicts, very expensive engage in a hightechnology arms race with the russians and soviet union and red china, the two wars are potentially red china and the soviet union. President kennedy decided it is two and a half worse because he thought the communists had inspired insurgencies around the world, the way they would engage as because no one wants to go to nuclear war, well, now we needed this robust military created in the 60s and on into the 70s that was huge, to be able to fight to now for spirited the end of the cold war he said two major theaters of operation, maybe in iran in the north korealike commitment. Right now today we can maybe do one of those with the cuts that we have taken. Now, defense is expensive. That will be the first one to tell you that. Affordability is a major question. Other parts of our society that need tending to, and we need to expand our resources, but the big issue is where do you take the risk and how do you judiciously applied that military force . When the decision is made to go when, beside a strategy another decision, what are you going to do on the ground . What we in the military call the operational design. Remember, general patraeus said, well, we will conduct a counterinsurgency which means that we will rebuild afghanistan and iraq. You know, rebuilding a nation is expensive, timeconsuming to, it takes a lot of resources and a lot of troops. And if the political does not understand that you could have a good sense to do something on the ground that the political will and the numbers of troops of authority and resources provided are not sufficient to do. That is what happens to us. That operational divide has to fit the strategy. There is no strategy we will get into what is commonly called mission creep. Wars do not end the way we would like them to as in the past where we go and sees the nations capital, a vietnamese military forces, plant our flag, and theyre is a clear winner. Does not happen that way anymore. How do we measure success . It could be aboard an Aircraft Carrier and declare victory and find yourself years and years still mired down in the Mission Accomplished that did not get quite accomplished. So the metric cetera used, how do we decide whether we are winning or losing, succeeding are failing . You dont have a strategy, and operational design. That is unclear. And how to wars and . Another part of the book. You know, sometimes wars and in ways that creates more problems. Even though there is a seeming victory. Charlie wilsons work, and many of you may have seen that. A member of congress decided that we would fix the soviet union, give them their vietnam and afghanistan. We went into afghanistan and supported what became the al qaeda and said, punish the soviet union, and the soviet union will be thrown out of afghanistan. What can be worse than that . Well, we ended up with al qaeda after doing that. I was testifying before a Senate Foreign relations committee. I said to the committee, this was a big mistake, wrong war, wrong place, wrong time. Savant is contained. Why are we going in to iraq . And i had one senator said, i dont understand you, general. What can be worse than Saddam Hussein . Well, look what we have in iraq now. What we have in iraq now. Saddam hussein was evil and bad. Can something be more evil and worse . We are learning that lesson. So sometimes be careful what you wish for. The outcomes that one and could leave open the possibility of ending up in a worse situation. In the military where certainly not perfect, but i will tell you, we try. We study every battle, fight, war. We spend a lot of time on Lessons Learned. We want to understand what we did wrong, right, where the threat is. We spend a lot of time trying to get it right the next time. I want you to think about this because the commitment of the military comes in two parts. The on the ground parks, boots, troops, the application, but theyre is a second part which is what this book is about, all of the political decisions that it wrapped around. Now, we hold dear a principle that i subscribe to and would fight and die to protect, civilian control. That is what we need and should have. The decision to go into war, use our military, authority should rest with our people and expressed through elected representatives, a principle that we hold dear and i think is critical to democracy. But there is an obligation that goes with that. Just like the military men and women who have to study and learn those lessons, build a career, go to school, be educated on how to prosecute. Where is that at the political level . Where the president s and secretaries and congressmen and women understand what they need to do . Where is the education, Lessons Learned . Less and less military experience. So we have a mismatch and those that are required to set the strategy, policy, and politics as steeped in the lessons they should learn as the military is on the ground. Theyre is a disconnect in many ways. And i wrote the book because i wanted as much as i could inform the American People about this part. You can go to bookshelves in this store and see the military history piece topic of those books and see all that is written, all of the studies, the analysis, the history on how the fighting has gone. You do not see many books on how the political Decision Making process went. You know, how we ended up on a battlefield do is to fail from the beginning, a flawed strategy, how the dominance may fall in Southeast Asia if we do not defend vietnam, where we have gone in and not understand the people on the ground and the culture, gone in and not had a strategic design under which we could operate them understand the political objectives. This book is about that part of it, which i have seen from every side. It is something we have to fix. The decisions of how we spend our money, how we build strategies, much of this has become a lost art. Where are the marshals, the strategic thinkers. We have become a reactive society. We do not understand how to look and examine what threatens us and how we should react. In summary that is the book. Since scared she anthony. Are in a situation right now where this would be glaringly right in front of us, as we said, but it is timely enough for us to look at this and see this process clearly in front of us. I am glad to take any questions or comments that you might have. The political process. Absolutely. When our nation was turned we came together and found a way to work together. We saw this in the world wars, a Democratic Administration and Republican Congress as we did in world war ii, marshal who was a political, chairman, vandenberg, marshall, different political perspectives but saw the need to defend the United States, promote and protect our interests. It is a poisonous atmosphere. As a military academic might you consider throwing your hat in the ring as a vicepresident ial candidates . First question. Second, spoken seriously and from the heart in terms of the need. Second, we all remember in 2006 when the initiative to create three semi autonomous regions that passed the senate and then was all of a sudden plowed under. Retrospect might we not be heading that way . Forget that, how would you see that proposal at that time, how does it look today . The first part of your question since my parents are married and not eligible for political eligible for Political Office and so i choose not to run. I hate politics in them apolitical. On the second one this was a very important question. An adviser to the vietnamese marines. I where their uniform. I spoke to language. I really saw another american. They operated the length and breadth of the country. Operations, we move in with the people. So i got to see the war from the side of the people. I mentioned this vignette. I was in one village, and i was living with the village chief. His wife and family prepared a meal, and it was evening. She came to me and said, what do you want me to die for . What do you want us to die for . And a strange question. She said, why are you here . I said, well, we are going to bring democracy, freemarket economy. And this was in the northern part of south vietnam. She pointed south toward saigon and said, now, how can i believe that when i look at what is in saigon. Rotating generals. We are there and of losing american lives. One corrupt general after another is taking over the government. You know, the answer was always, that is there decision. We cannot control that. If we are going to put our lives on the line to you know, i do not see macarthur in japan saying you can take any kind of government that you want. Eisenhower in germany. Why do we do that, accept karzai in afghanistan. That becomes us. That identifies us. And so when you do that to get to your point what we are doing is, we walked into tell you how it is going to be a and then give you something you cannot live and die for. My argument with Vice President biden is walking in at the beginning of the conflict and then dictating of the country should be structured and saying, well, you need to split it out. Well, do you . Do we know enough about that . What does he know . And it may end up that the country does is put up, but eventually that has to be something where we empower the people to make the decisions. We ought to not stand for corrupt government if we are going to invest and give our treasurer and the lives of our greatest treasure, men and women in uniform out there to protect. We have sort of lost that standard is what bothers me. Now, i think you certainly can offer creative alternatives to government. Maybe thats iraq looks like the united arab emirates, here in the south, this in the areas, and they come together in some loosely fitted system, but i think that we can help them create options that they can live with. But to dictate and had a shoot from washington our solution to the problem and to accept corruption is not the way to go about it. Sir. [inaudible question] our enemy seems to be someone our friend if you how do you explain . Well, let me give you something in principle and then go to the specific points. I do not think that we should be working with them are cooperating. That does not mean that we need to be in bed together. That is part of the confusion and complexity of the situation we find ourselves and it let me Say Something about enemies. We have had a lot of enemies who are now close allies. The first hundred years of our existence our greatest enemy was great britain. Now our greatest ally. It very much looks like our closest coalition allies. Todays enemy could be tomorrows friend and ally. I do not think that will happen with the examples of assad en iran. These other potential enemies have transformed into something that is more akin to our government style and concept of government. So it has made easier for us to cooperate. You will find yourself in this position. Im going to tell you a little story. I was with a couple of friends from the middle east. When we were about to go into iraq this time. The last time after 9 11, and president bush was making the case for war. And he was saying something to the effect that this conflict is going to be about the forces of freedom, democracy against the forces of authoritarianism, dictatorship, Saddam Hussein when a friend of mine, persian verses arab. You are unleashing something that we have tried to keep tamps down for a long time. This is the devil you are going to unleash. The other friend on the other side said, this war is about sunni versus shiia. Now, the people were right. If the president understands those other two levels. When you say we are partnered with assad, assad is closely aligned with the shiia. Isis is a sunni radical movement. Some of our closest allies are sunni that oppose isis. So what you are saying is when you say the same interest, when you start peeling an onion vacuum now find more complexity. You find a religious element and ethnic element. You find different elements that crisscross and create even a bigger problem not as simple as the one we just described. So when you set to sort out enemies and friends it becomes a much more complex effort in this environment. Yes . [inaudible question] sympathy with the president when he says he does not have a strategy for isis he said . Yes. Qaeda i mean, i am trying to understand what he was trying to say. If we take him the words as they were given, he did not have a strategy. What bothers me about that is there should be of middle east strategy, a strategy for syria and iraq. Isis might have been a wild card he did not expect, but it has to fit an overall strategy. If it meant that he did not have a military plan for immediately responding to this, then that is not a strategy. That is an operational plan. So either he did not have a strategy or does not understand what strategy is. Either way i am troubled by the comment. You know, and it has yet to be explained. The strategy is not just a military action. Strategy is how you employ diplomacy, your power of information and influence, your economic power. It encompasses all the elements of government and power. It is building of coalitions, forming of assistance to help and governments, changing social programs and other things that might in the Regional Peace succeed. In addition to a military part, but that is just one part of it. That is not a strategy in an of itself. Yes, sir . I think that we need. [inaudible question] i like more captain replaced. Okay . And you are right, for conventional war you can train people to fight a conventional war in 90 to 180 days. You can get very good soldiers. To fight a small more than i am sure you read the small war marine corps manual. A small war takes a long time. You have to the language training. It takes about nine months and then about six months of practice. So you are talking about 45 years. Capt ripley stated to me that he had to fight tooth and nail to the marine corps to get them to train. He said, how could he tell without that training, without speaking the language, how could he tell 600 marines to go in and commit suicide to blow that raged . He could not. And my question my question is to my think that we should have american French Foreign legion, essentially a small war, we should have when thousand howards, a thousand ripleys, a thousand a million excuse me, and million vance, a million captain hoffmans. We should create this, small wars manual. I would like your comment. I mentioned a lot of things, and i know that you had this same position as captain ripley. What you just said is what john kennedy said. He said of course, this is the cold war. We are going to confront communism in a different way because the unthinkable is to engage in a potential war which could lead to nuclear war. That is not going to be on the table. We still have to deter, stay ahead in the arms race, but we will engage daytoday of these communistinspired insurgencies. He wanted to create a force that specialize in this that had language training, for and area development, and he did. Special forces. Special forces has grown larger in the special Operations Forces were all the services commit to this, each of the services, army, air force, navy, marine corps have special operations units. The special forces themselves are organized into groups that specialize on parts of the world where they have the language training, worked day today as advisers, are involved in that environment, specialize in that low level of low intensity conflict the you were talking about. In addition to that we create a whole other set of officers called for an area officers. These are officers to go to school to learn about the culture the language. And when we first created then we had a problem. They could not get promoted because these were artillery officers, aviators, and others that chose this as a second course and were finding themselves not competitive for promotion. Many of us who were regional commanders really took on the services of an extremely valuable people. They have to have a promotion track. And that has changed. They are becoming successful in their own right and able to rise through the ranks. You are right on in what you say, but we have built into our system. We have civil affairs, psychological operations, special forces, special Operations Forces, and all of the services are required to participate and commit. The small wars manual is right now obviously being revamped to reflect the times today and the lessons we have learned through iraq and afghanistan. Sir . Do you and other generals play chess . If so, is there any test strategy that could be applicable in a political military context . Most of the generals i know play golf. [laughter] i was asked what is my proudest achievement in the military. I never served in the pentagon and never learned to play golf. We were game. Were gaming probably about the mid 80s began to rise in lead and so we war game on many dimensions on things as simple as tabletop games, terrain models, to very sophisticated computerbased gaming and even a mixed real field exercise to my computerbased, and others have integrated that in major ways, testing war plans through these systems. Each of the services are then combined, an elaborate computerbased gaming system. You obviously have to build with software and data to get in all of the capabilities we have and potential enemies that we have. After vietnam when we were building he all volunteer force and rehabilitating the military, one of the things that we felt strongly about is that we lost the emphasis on operational. We were not measuring success of our leaders, officers and in ceos based on operational capability. We have become great administrators. We were managing well, not leading in an operational sense. Each of the services and in the jury perspective created these tests, if you will. You are allowed to make mistakes, challenge ourselves in the exercises, but everyone will be evaluated. You will be evaluated under operational competence. You have to demonstrate. Does not mean that there are times you can make mistakes and try things and experiment, and we sort of had in the 80s and 90s a renaissance. Talk about maneuver warfare, studying the art of conflict and combat and war more so than we had in the past. It was something that was sort of a regeneration of understanding what our profession of arms was all about. The answer to your question is yes, but it is more sophisticated than chestnut believe me. [inaudible question] we did. We did. Iraq, there was a war plan in place to handle iraq it was thrown out by the political leaders because they said Donald Rumsfeld said it is old and stale and on the shelf. Time and time again. Adjusted every year, approved by the joint chiefs of staff, force is allocated. It required 380,000 troops. Why . Because we knew that we had a field of orders. You had to control the operation as you roll back the regime because if you did not seal the borders of kind of crazys would come over. If you did not control the population they would kill each other into an. You had these brilliant to civilians who had not gone through the gaming, analysis , understanding that the intelligence gave us. Remember, he said, it will be a liberation, flowers industries, a cakewalk. We can do this with 130,000 troops. Those flowers were ak47s, unfortunately. Sir . If you were advising president obama about isis, what would that advice b . Hi there are parts of things we need to do right away and parts of things that will take a little time that need to be added to this to get a strategic framework. The first thing is, you have to drive isis out of iraq whenever it takes. Now, if the air strikes in support of the kurdishmargaret i was in kurdistan within the past murder. Theyre fighters need military support and equipment. The revamped Iraqi Military, we will have to change the Security Assistance program because they were devastated by the attacks and need to bolster the military. But whenever it takes, even if it takes as putting groups of boots on the ground and i am not afraid to say it because it is a capability and saves casualties. The first gulf war, desert storm, storming mormon. We resolve that in a matter of hours with very few casualties because use overwhelming force. Dont try to be cute and incrementally applied troops paraded him with your sunday punch. The first thing is get them out of iraq. The second thing is build up the Iraqi Military and what it would take in the way of advising and equipment and necessary support. The third thing is, with this new government in iraq, this government we have to put pressure on. They have got to be more inclusive. P excluded the sunni and to a certain extent the kurds. The only way youll get to the sunni to reject isis and stand up and plays if they feel they have something to stand up and fight for. That story i told you about, tell me what i am supposed to die for. The other thing is, build coalitions and the region and internationally. Why are we not at the you and now getting a resolution for the authorization of the use of force allowing us to build coalitions. George h. W. Bush before he went to kuwait to knock out saddam, which we could have done easily on our own, james baker went to the you and and got a resolution authorizing the use of force. We built a coalition in the region of all the Muslim Forces to work sidebyside. We build another coalition with the british, french, even the japanese and others contributed, all because we had that the International Legitimacy of the u. N. Resolution. And if necessary to strike into syria and particularly at isis at would do that, too. These other pieces that need to come about in the short term. [inaudible question] you dont understand what i am saying training and equipping does not put back on in the military. They have to have something to fight for, if they look back at the capitol and see a corrupt government that is not responsive to the needs of the ethnic group or religious group, why will they fight despite all the training and equipment you give them . The key to make why do americans fight for america . You know, it is something they believe in. Their is a government system, a concept, a constitution, something that we fight for a way of life. If they dont have that come all the training and equipment in the world is not going to make a difference. What do you think isis and others are so powerful . They have an ideology, however corrupt and distorted. They have something that they believe in. You can waste your time giving them tanks and artillery and everything else. You better give them a reason for being there and doing what they have to do. Yes, maam . [inaudible question] what has happened let me take you from a u. S. Perspective. We have signed on to be that mediators. I have that mission as a special envoy for two years. What struck me, we never really understood the complexity of this situation. This cannot be resolved in a summit. Cannot be resolved with a special envoy pleaded cannot be resolved with someone saying, give it nine months and we will solve it. This does not this requires working groups on the ground. Take the issues are called the final status issues, issues like the status of jerusalem, right of return, borders, many others, water, all sorts of issues. Each of these requires experts from both sides and mediators and others to work out the details. The agreements that we had in principle, oslo and the ones that have come about where everyone signed up, the people on both sides said, well, what does that look like on the ground . What does that mean . We have never done the details. Their is a big absence. The arab league should be involved. They will have to assign up. You need to open up multiple channels of communication, a private channel, formal channel, and most importantly an unofficial channels to flow of ideas. When we would offer ideas or think more creatively about potential situations i found on both sides it was politically difficult. You bring in retired academics, retired government officials, retired military. I cannot meet for your ancestors. Everyone one step tell me i dont really give a damn. We are doing this for your grandkids. Look forward. What kind of arrangement can your grand kiss live under . You are both here. It is a fact of life. No one is going anywhere no matter what. How do we make this work . Asman del lot of time with the kids from feed the peace. It is tough. It is not an easy come by on, believe me. They have had difficulty understanding. They come with some of that. They try to work it out. I spend an entire day with that. I was sitting in the middle of them as they were sitting on the floor. They ask me questions like this. Finally one girl stood up and said, general zinni, a sweet kids can figure it out, why cant you adults . That really hit home and gave me this sort of focus. The focus is on the future, not the past. If you focus on the past, focus on principle, you cannot get it done. You have to be creative and think about the future of those grand kids out there and what kind of future they can live under and how they bring themselves together to see who they are, each other, because they are the future. They have to live under this. I would make one other point. Peacemakers in this part of the worlds dont do too well. Their legacy you know, look at some dot. He signed a Peace Agreement and was killed by his own people. King hussein in jordan was almost killed by his own people. Scott made a tremendous offer. His political career was ruined after that. So those that reach out for peace willing to take the risk in this part of the world, the legacy is not there either. Peacemakers may be blessed, but they are certainly not appreciated in their own time or may be immediately after which is something that we have to change because it will take a lot of courage on either side to take a risk and may be to compromise. There cannot be a solution where one side is a winner and one side is a loser. It will not work. [inaudible question] thats right. Yes. Sir . We know that the middle east is dysfunctional. The question is, besides the middle east where we know how things are, dont you think also that the foreignpolicy establishments is also a dysfunctional . Absolutely. The question was about the Foreign Policy, the major powers being disruptive. We can see that now. We have here of trying to figure out whether it is still cohesive, acting as a single entity. Foreign policy is confused, over militarized, still struggling to understand it. We have a leading role in the world. The russians have stepped back. The Decision Making. How aggressive and causing problems. The superpowers are not acting like adults. It is a great point. I can take one question. Are really good point about entities getting into the makes and coming up with a viable solution that will make a difference. Meanwhile, you have political leaders who are not willing to step out of the way, it seems for this to occur. So the idea sounds great, but how do you get people to relinquish their power is and say, i am going to take give it up to the intellectual, the people who have the best experience who can do this kind of thing to make it work. Youre seeing people get thrown out of office. Dictatorships around the world, khaddafi, look where assad is now, what happened to mubarak. People in the streets are now beginning to either vote in the ballot box or vote in the square in some. Iraq, you said they have to have a purpose they are just trying to survive. That is what their purposes. We just saw the iraqis get rid of maliki. Israel and palestine. Whoever is in office. Then need to a form coalitions with odds and ends is a very dysfunctional system, democratic system, but the more Political Parties look how bad it is with us, which is true. A situation that is even worse. The palestinians bifurcated they took the plan and revamp a little bit. They had an idea that instead of the leaders arguing about this to my take the plan, flesh it out an