One of the things that i loved about the l. A. Times festival of books way before i was our book editor, when i was driving and showing up early in the morning is that we have all of those panels with four authors who are novelists or authors who are people that dont get to see each other. There is a moment they have saying something they are coming up with at that instant and its that exchange of ideas that can only happen in the moment. Watch our live coverage of Los Angeles Times festival of books all weekend april 22nd and 23rd on cspan 2. This weekend on q and a. I really learned the value and discourse. So the way i interact with people who i dont necessarily agree with has completely changed. High School Students attending the Senate Youth Program where they shared their thoughts about government and politics. I can safely say at the end of this week im sure im uncertain of what i believe and i think thats a good thing. Hard work and fair chance for everybody to reach the top will turn out to be not an equal result but equal chance for everybody. Sunday 8 00 eastern on cspans q and a. A twoday visit included a visit with President Trump at the white house. Yes he spoke to students at George Washington university. This is an hour. [ applause ] good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Let me say im steven knapp. If you have an opportunity to look outside it affording a pretty broad view of our nations capital. It affords an excellent view of our monument, the Washington Monument right over here. Thats how we like to think of that. This location is rather extraordinary here. If you drew a line from the state department to white house and another line from the reserve it would intersect where we are sitting now. It tells you about the importance of this location and affords us an opportunity to discuss global significance. Im delighted to welcome you to todays discussion, a conversation with his exlen si who is the secretary general. We are honored he could make time during his brief visit to washington to come to our campus. Let me knowledge his exlen si who is ambassador and his excellencey. We also have with us former governor of Commonwealth James gi gillmore. I would like to welcome the honorable curt vulkur i mentioned that because thats where some of the founding discussions and negotiations for the creation took place. We have a pretty intimate historical connection right here. Other connection of George Washington university include addition to his role a former Elliot School alumni include the late general who was nato preem from 1993 to 1997 and the honorable rose who began her service as deputy secretary general becoming the first woman to hold that post. He began his career as state secretary of the environment after earning his post graduate degree. He was first elected to his countrys parliment in 1993 and served in a variety of leadership roles. He served as Prime Minister from 2000 to 2001 and again from 2005 to 2013. He lead a transformation and increased norways spending in the alliance and regularly committed norwegian troop to nato Peace Keeping missions. He has shared the United NationsHigh Level Panel and the high level adviser group. He also served as special envoy on climate change. As secretary general of nato he has transatlantic and strengthened ties to secure peace and Economic Development in europe and beyond. Please welcome him. Thank you so much thank you so much for those kind words. Thank you to all of us for having me here today. It is a great pleasure to meet you all because to be here today is to be one of the most recognized constitutions when it comes to educating leaders especially within diplomacy. As you mentioned in nato we have several people who have their education who are graduates from the school or work very closely with secretary general. I am also delighted to be here because originally my plan was to not become but to become an academic. My plan was to do Research Within economics and as i start to teach at the university in economics. I did that for two years. So if you fail as academic you can become Prime Minister of secretary of nato. I will be very brief. The idea is that we will have an introduction. I will really share with you some very brief remarks or reflir reflections and then we will be available for questions. What what i will say is nato is the most successful in history for two reasons. Reason number one is that we have been loyal to our core value, our core task ever since we were founded back in 1949. We have promise to protect each other one for all. All for one. If one ally is attacked it will trigger response. This strength of the unity has been so the unity, one for all, all for one is the main reason why nato has been such a successful alliance. The other reason is that nato has been able to adapt to change. So when the world is changing nato is changing. For almost 40 years nato was focused on one actually only one task, and that was to deter the soviet union from attacking western europe. We helped ending two ethnic wars. We helped fight terrorism in afghanistan and we did what we did in nato land which is called Crisis Management for beyond our borders. We did it from the beginning of the 90s until today. Now nato has to change again. We have to manage crisis yopd our borders in afghanistan. It is especially the case after illegal illegal and the use of force against russias assorted behavior especially against the ukraine. We are increasing the eastern part of the lines and we are deploying forces to poland and also in the southeast of the alliance. So we are adapting once again to respond to more challenging and difficult security alignment. Actually we strongly believe as long as nato is united, as long as nato is firm and predictable then we can and should engage in political dialogue with russia because russia is our neighbor. Russia is here to stay. We are to manage the relationship with russia in the best possible way. It is in our and russias interest to reduce tensions and to find better ways to live together. This is the main issue i hope to discuss with you in the coming hours. Thank you so much. Im ready take your questions. Thank you. [ applause ] my name is curt. I am for international leadership. Im a very proud alumnus of the Elliot School even before it was called the Elliot School, longer ago than i plan to state publicly. It has been a great privilege to have gone here and have a career billed upon that. Secretary general, i will open up the question and answer with you. Well bunch them a few at a time. I want to give priority to students here at the Elliot School. Think about what you want to ask and get your hands up early. Secretary general, we have heard from President Trump and this administration both during the course of the president ial campaign and since then many many things. Nato is not obsolete, they need to pay their share. Well decide whether we defend them based on whether they have paid their dues or not. We talk about how much germany owes the United States. Nato needs to reform, needs to deal with counter terrorism. We want to Work Together with russia. Rush thsia is a threat. Just about everything you can imagine. You can chart this and say theres been a movement. You have had a lot of interaction. I know you have been on the phone with him. You had a meeting with him in washington. You met with secretary mattis. You met with secretary tillerson. I know you met Vice President pence as well. The message to me has been very consistent in all of my interactions, in all of my different conversations and also in his security and his whole team. The message has been all of the time that they are strongly committed to nato, that they see the value of their people so when for instance President Trump and secretary mattis understand the importance of nato have to do more. Yes, i welcome that. When they stress the importance i welcome them. We need it in nato. We need more nato allies invest more in defense. We have to remember some allies, they spend it on the United States, of course but united kingdom. They have a target and this year romania declared they will meet the target into the 17th and declared they will meet 2 target next year. So nato is adapting, is changing. The answer is they are going to absolutely 2 and beyond. You articulated support for nato. Part of the question is are allies willing to support nato . Do you see them doing that . Yes. What we have seen is that of many years of decline across europe and canada we actually saw that in 2016 we saw cig n e significant increase. We saw an increase in 3. 8 in terms or 10 billion u. S. Dollars. That is a significant increase and amount for defense. We still have a long way to go and much remains, but at least the europeans have started to move in the right direction. As i said, some allies have a guideline and others have declared they would meet it this year or next year. So what we discussed what i discussed yesterday was how can we make sure we keep optimum momentum, that we are able to see this development. What we promised in ways in 2014 when we made it was to stop the cuts, gradual increase and move towards spending 2 within a decade and we are starting to do that. My top priority has been to focus on defense spending because of this important strength. One more thing and that is that what we call a defense investment pledge is not only about spending. It is about spending more but also spending better to be more efficient and work closer together. It is about the capabilities we need and about contributions to nato operations. So very often we speak that the pledge is about cash capabilities and contributions. All of that is important at the same time. In your remarks you said nato want to deal with deterrence and defense but also to have dialogue and outreach towards russia and to try to Work Together with russia. Does russia want to Work Together with nato . Yes and no. We see it is difficult to accomplish any kind of understanding or real dialogue. We have to continue to work for dialogue. It is hard to predict how it will be in the future but im absolutely certain we have to do what we can do diffuse the tensions and avoid a new cold war and thats why we pursued this approach to russia, deterrence and defense and dialogue. This also something which is very much based on my own experience because norway we have a land border and we have a border in the sea where thats lot of oil and gas and so on. I was able to develop a pragmatic working relationship with the soviet union and later on with russia on issues like energy, like border as we agreed on the border and environment and military issues where you have some search and rescue exercises together. It is regular contact with armed forces or Russian Armed forces. This corporation to the north takes place not despite nato norways membership because our membership provides the strength, the platform to engage with russia. I strongly believe that we should not be afraid of talking to russians. They are there to stay. They are our biggest neighbor and it will help all of us if we are able to improve the relationship with russia. And final question from me and then well pull from the audience in particular. Did you and the president discuss ukraine and how does ukraine fit in west russia relations and giving ukraine and of course we are concerned about the situation in especially Eastern Ukraine and the fact that russia illegally annexed crimea. It is the first time one country annexed apart another country by force. So this is of course cease for ukraine and also which has been so important for the peace and stability in europe. So nato and United States provide their defense structures, the armed forces, the defense institutions, train them. We have different trust funds for cyber, for command and control, so nato, nato allies provide Political Support to ukraine. At the same time, i think its important to understand this is not only about ukraine. Because nato has the main reason why we have implemented this strong reinforcement to our collective defense, the response force, deploying forces in eastern part of the alliance is is because of ukraine. The illegal annexation of crimea and support of russia, is the main reason why nato has strengthen their collective defense in europe. Making sure that no nato ally experiences anything like what ukraine has experienced with russia since 2014. Is. Thats very important for the nato allies, for ukraine itself . Of course, it is important for ukraine itself that we provide support, that we help them with modernizing the law forces fighting corruption, helping them in command, control, cyber, many other areas where we work with ukraine. And allies also provide training of ukrainian forces. But the way to solve the problem, and the crisis in ukraine, is through negotiations, through political solution and the only basis for that is the minsk agreements. Were calling on russia to use all its influence on the separatists in Eastern Ukraine to make sure that they fully respect the minsk agreements, meaning respect a cease fire, which is not respected now. Withdraw all heavy weapons from the contact line and allow the International Observers to do their work, to observe the implementation of the cease fire. Thats a precondition for any effective minsk agreements. Students, i see in the third row in the center. We can take this one here. Given the current euro skeptic and anteglobealist governments in poland and hunga hungary, the elections in france, do you think there are any internal threats to nato. Were going to take a couple. There is another one in the center soocenter aisle. Since the end of the cold war, what do you believe has been natos biggest mistake in its interactions with russia and what do you believe has been natos biggest success in its interactions with russia. Were stay in the center aisle for now, in the very back. Thank you for coming to speak here. I had a question in regards to how nato is going to respond in syria. You spoke about successful interventions in the balkans as well as afghanistan. Given in mind the nato bombing in libya, how do you plan to respond to the chemical weapons in syria. You can see why students in this school go places. Its more difficult, the questions i get from the journalists, so this is no. Internal threats and challenges, i think its important to remember that nato is the alliance of 28 democracies. In democracies, there are different political views, some are against nato, some are for nato. In my country, some politicians have been against nato the whole time. When i was a young i was also against nato. So but the reason why i say it is we should not be afraid of open debate. We should not be afraid of people having different opinions, even criticizing us. Its wrong, but i think thats part of living in democratic societies. Yes, there are political parties, organizations, in nato countries, which are critical, either towards nato as an institution, or at least critical towards part of what we do. And to be honest, im not afraid of that. I think that nato has proven again and again that it is a strength that we have open debate, different views, and that we are developing our thinking by confronting different views. And then improving our understanding of many different and difficult issues and policies. And nato has proven again and again that despite differences, despite the fact that we elect some conservatives or some liberals or some social democrats, people republicans or democrats what it is. Coming from different parties with different views, they have always been able to agree on natos core task. And that is that we are safer together than alone. And as long as we stand together and protect each other, we prevent conflict. The best way to prevent conflict is to send a very clear message to any potential adversary that were so strong. So its now chance, if you try to attack one ally because the alliance will be there. Coming from a small country like norway, the strength we feel being a neighborhood to russia by having the Alliance Supporting us, is the reason why, also, europeans feel as safe as they do. So yeah, my answer is that we should not be afraid of the fact that there are different Political Tendencies in the European Countries because thats part of a natural development, debate process in democratic societies. The next question was russia, greatest mistakes and greatest benefits. First of all, im not that kind of person, you know, i have a list on my where i remember my greatest mistakes. I forget them. No, but i think its im not able to point at one thing which was natos greatest mistake. Again, its partly linked to the first question. Because we are an alliance of 28 democracies, sometimes it takes long time to make decisions, sometimes its not clear, but that very often reflects the fact that in a democratic constitutional to 28 democracies, its not always the perfect solutions, but they are sustainable, theyre very strong because theyre anchored in 28 nations. I think that the biggest success is just the fact that we have been able to prevent war. That we have been able to not only prevent war with 12 and 16 members which was what we had in the beginning. Now actually 28 members, where former countries in the warsaw pact now join nato. Europe was traditionally the middle east of the world. We were fighting and fighting each other for centuries. And then since the Second World War there has been no conflict involving nato countries or attacking nato countries. Then the response to syria. Syria is a very difficult. Very dangerous and very complex situation, which affects nato very much. Because syria is bordering nato. Syria is bordering turkey, which is a nato ally. We participate and support the fight against isil. Natos not on the ground in syria, but we provide surveillance planes, we help them with an air picture. But when it comes to the use of chemical weapons. Thats totally unacceptable. Its horrendous and its violating international law. And those who are responsible must be held accountable for any use of chemical weapons. There, the air strikes against the Syrian Air Base some days ago was a u. S. Operation, military operation, based on u. S. Intelligence, but it has received great understanding among nato allies. Because they understand that it has to have a consequence when someone is using chemical weapons. Whats next for nato and syria . There has been no call for any nato presence on the ground in syria. Some nato allies are present there, the United States are present there with special operations forces. Uk and allies help train forces to fight isil. And turkey is also present in the northern part of syria. I think thats underlines the complexity of the situation in syria. And there has been no call for Nato Alliance to get involved directly in the conflict in syria. Very good. More questions, well take this side of the room and next time well do the other side. Glasses and the tie . Good afternoon mr. Secretary general. My question is reflecting on your opening speech. In the recent years weve seen changes in the Global Security, the cyberattack, the lone wolf terrorism attack are new challenges to Global Security. How will nato adjust itself to facing the new challenges in Global Security . And how will nato working with its members to fight against the Unconventional Warfare that a lot of countries is facing recently, thank you. Great, thank you very much. Well go to the front row right here in the corner. Im a student here, i want to ask what is the nato role in libya and its unstable now. There are many militias fighting, they are supporting a different militia. Take control of the country or is it forgotten now. Lets go back on the lefthand side. Woman with her hand up, stand up, yes. Wait for the microphone. Hi, thank you for coming. My question insure that countries in nato fund within ratio, basically. Fund how do you insure that countrys funding ratio so one country isnt i see. Countries paying to their proportional size or wealth. Yes. Proportionality, libya, cleaning up our mess. And cyber well modern threats and challenges. First, cyber hybrid, all these new threats. I think that one thing we have to understand is that before it was easy to distinguish whether it was peace or war. Actually nations declared war and was possible to say that now its war and now its peace and the war was taking place, welldefined area and it was very clear when the war ended. Now theres a much more blurred line between peace and war. And its much harder to say exactly when did the war against isil start and when will it end and where does it take place. Of course, it takes place in syria and iraq. It takes place also in the streets of nato allied capitals where isil is responsible for terrorist attacks against innocent civilians. It takes place in cyberspace. Its harder to say we dont have an exact date when it started and we dont have an exact date when it will end. The fact that its a mixture of civilian and military means of aggression and much more blurred line between peace and war. Nato is adapted to that too. More and more intelligence, more surveillance, more ability to early warning, all of that is aimed at being able to respond to more hybrid threats, which is phrase we use for those kind of threats. Also the fact that we are really stepping up when it comes to cyber defenses. We have declared soviet Cyber Attacks can trigger article v, meaning we regard cyberattacks as serious as a kinetic attack. If we have a serious cyberattack we can trigger article v. We are in the process of establishing cyber as a military domain. We have air, sea, land, but now we also have cyber has a military domain. We have done a lot of other things for instance, help hg allies. Estonia is playing a key role again in sharing best practices, improving their cyber defenses. Again, nato can do more, of course, and were constantly looking for what more we can do. Nato is adapting to these kind of new threats. Libya was not a stable country when nato went into libya. There was a civil war going on. And we implemented the u. N. Mandate. And we helped to stop the killing of civilians, which gaddafi regime was responsible for. If theres anything we can learn from the libya operation is that one thing is to implement the military operation as we did. But its extremely important to stabilize the country afterwards. Nato didnt have mandate, but, of course, the whole international community, including nato, the u. N. , the e. U. , all of us, have a responsibility for not being more present afterwards. And for me, that underscores the message about the prevention, its better than intervention. And also the important of training local forces, enabling them to stabilize their own country. So we are now we are in dialogue with the Libyan Government or the government of national accord, and the Prime Minister there on how nato can provide support to build defense institutions, to help them stabilize their own country. Its not the easiest situation, but at least i think thats the best thing to do is to try to work with the u. N. Recognized government and help them to stabilize their own country. Then burden sharing or defense spending. Its a very simple rule. Or guideline. And that is that every nato ally should spend or invest in defense 2 of gdp. And gdp reflects in the way the income or the wealth of the nation. Rich countries spend more than not so rich countries. And as long as they spend 2 , its a fair burden sharing. The problem is that many allies spend much less than 2 of gdp. And, therefore, a way to obtain fair or balanced burden sharing is to make sure that all spend 2 or perhaps even more. And thats exactly what i have been focusing on. Thats exactly what has been a main message from President Trump. But thats a very bipartisan message from the United States. That canada and those european allies that spend less than 2 have to increase defense spending. We have started, we have a long way to go but we have started to move in the right direction. Well take this side of the room now. Students here, second row, right here, the young woman in the gray sweater. The Largest Military buildup since the 19d 50s, how is russias russias military buildups the largest. Back further, the gentleman with the beard. Thank you your excellency. Various staff on nato who are part of the Turkish Military were targeted by president erdogans political purges. How does nato plan to respond to future political upheavals or even human rights abuses in its member states. Well go in front of you, the woman with her hand up, thank you. Thank you, mr. Secretary general, earlier in the in your remarks, you mentioned that natos greatest strength is that its able to deter its credibility. Given the actions in crimea in 2014, which you referred to earlier, how will nato assert their credibility in europe and in what ways should the United States also take action to reassert their credibility within the nato organization, thank you so much. Great. Thank you very much. Over to you, secretary general, russias military buildup, restoring credibility and the situation of military officers assigned to nato billets being called home after the coup. First on the Russian Military buildup, weve seen a significant buildup in russia over many years, as you said. Since 2000, they have approximately tripled defense spending in the real terms. Not only spending more, but also, you know, they have developed a new and more modern equipment, they are exercising more. And theyre having more aggressive pattern of exercises, they exercise both Nuclear Force and conventional forces. They have a more rhetoric, which is aiming at intimidating neighbors. And most importantly, they have been willing to use force. Use force against georgia in 2008, against ukraine in 2014, and they continue to use military personnel to support and help to support and destabilize Eastern Ukraine. And add to that that they are also active in cyber hybrid threats and actions against nato allied countries. This is the reason why nato has adapted. This is the reason why after many years of reducing defense spending have started to increase defense spending and the reason why we have start today deploy forces to the eastern part of the alliance. Having said that its extremely important that we dont overdo it or overreact. If we end up with a new arms race, a new cold war, we are risking just to increase tensions. Even further. And not increase our security, but decrease our security. Thats the reason why nato has been continuing to work for a political dialogue with russia. Then turkey, its correct that they recalled staff from the nato command structure after a failed coup attempt. This has in the very limited degree affected nato operations because they have replaced them. So there are new officers there now from turkey. I have underlines very much that of course turkey has the right to protect itself. They have suffered terrorist attacks and it was a failed coup attempt, theres a bomb, the National Assembly, wars in the National Assembly in ankara and it was strong impressions to see the National Assembly and the damage builded building and that and the parliament was bombed when parliamentians were inside the building. Hundreds of people were killed. Those behind the failed coup attempt should be held responsible. The important thing this is done in accordance with the rule of law. This is something i have raised in ankara several times. Because, of course, the rule of law is important when you have this kind of processes after a failed coup attempt. Deterrence. Russia used military force against ukraine. But it is important not to mix that with nato deterrence. Nato deterrence is about deterring any adversary from attacking nato allied country. We have been extremely successful in doing that. There have been no attacks against a nato country since nato was stestablished. Ukraine is not a nato member. Its not a failure of nato deterrence that russia used force against ukraine. We of course condemn that use of force against ukraine, regardless of whether ukraine is a member of not because its violating the sovereignty and integrity of ukraine. We support ukraine. Our deterrence is credible. We have made sure it continues to be credible by deploying forces, especially through the eastern part of the alliance. Were going to start to wrap up a little bit. Id like to engage in a dialogue about a couple things here. One of them, im not as forgetful perhaps as the secretary general. I do think of some nato mistakes. But one i think that is current in modern times, i think nato was a little slow to recognize that russia had changed. It wasnt the russia of the 90s we were dealing with anymore. We were seeing a military buildup, we were seeing aggressive behavior, the invasion of georgia, the pressure on georgia before that. And nato was still playing by the old book. I think nato has adapted. The decisions of the wales summit, the european reassurance initiative. I think this has compensated with that tremendously. But i think we were slow. Maybe thats the way democracies behave. Maybe democracies naturally dont want to go there unless they absolutely have to. On the other side of that, i think the greatest thing that nato has done at least in the last 25 years, keeping the peace is obviously the obvious one. The other thing that nato has done was to inspire countries to reform to become democracies, market economies, establish the rule of law, protect human rights and to then allow them to join with other countries to share that Common Security in a wider area. This is often referred to as nato enlargement. I think that even that terminology gets it wrong. Because what it really is about widening a space of prosperity and democracy in europe. We have the ambassador of montenegro which will be natos next ally. The documents signed two days ago i believe by President Trump. And then we also have the ambassador of georgia is here. Ambassador of estonia is here, joined nato in the prague enlargement round. If that is the first off, i wonder if you agree is that one of the great achievements of nato . Where do we go from here on this process of inspiring that kind of reform and seeing more countries become part of that democratic and secure community . I absolutely agree with you. I think that i mentioned preserving the peace, but, of course, the fact that so many more countries are now part of a family of democratic nations. Being members of nato or the European Union has really helped to promote stability, peace, prosperity in europe and nato enlargement is very much a part of that. So i agree. Second, nato is continuing to expand, meaning that we soon have montenegro as our 29th member. The United States have now finished a ratification process. So it only remains to have protocol completed the ratification in the netherlands and spain i think it is. We hope to see montenegro as a full member in june in not so many weeks. Then we are working with georgia. Georgia is implementing impressive reforms. Strengthening the democratic institutions, modernizing their defense institutions, structures, and fighting corruption. All of this is partly at least because of that aspiration to join nato. I always underline that, of course, to implement that kind of reforms is good because you move closer to nato. Even if their aim is not to move closer to nato you should be able to fight corruption and to strengthen democratic institutions. Double reason to do it in a country like georgia, which is aiming for a nato membership. And we support them, nato supports them with these reforms process. Natos door is open and we will continue to stress the message that the enlargement or whether nato is going to have more members, its up to the applicant country to decide. No one else has the right to intervene or they dont accept a country. Ladies and gentlemen, im afraid thats all well have time for today. Please join me in thanking the secretary general of nato. [ applause ] this weekend, on American History tv, on cspan 3. Saturday at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on lectures in history. Professor Jeffrey Johnson on the 1916 bombing at San Franciscos parade. The worst act of terrorism in San Francisco history. What happened next after 2 00 p. M. About a half an hour into the parade. The local press would deem one of the most pathetic results of the explosion and of the parade. At 10 00 on reel america. The 1915 film on the firing line with the germans. Look in the back, hes kneeling with a pipe in his one of the few times you see a pipe. Loading film in his camera, thats what i think hes doing. Watch the guy there, he just got hit. Sunday at 6 00 p. M. Eastern on american artifacts we visit the portrait gallery of the second bank of the United States in philadelphia. Inside, what we