Transcripts For BBCNEWS HARDtalk 20170110

With further wintry showers. Some rain and maybe even some snow over Higher Ground in the south. You are watching bbc news, the top stories just after 830, Jeremy Corbyn says he isnt wedded to the idea of keeping freedom of movement for eu citizens during Brexit Negotiations and he also clarified his position on the issue of a pay cap on top earners. You could set a limit on top pay that i think it is better to look at the issue of ratio because that would encourage wage rises lower down. Police in your coming to the child found badly injured yesterday in the city who later died. Katie rough was 7 year old and discovered in the woodthorpe area. A 15 Year Old Girl is being questioned. Documents leaked to the bbc show a 47 per cent rise in psychiatric attendances at A E Departments in england, over the past four years. You are up to date. Now its hardtalk. Welcome to hardtalk. Im stephen sackur. The waiting is almost over. Were about to see what kind of impact President Donald Trump will have on the us and the world beyond. Today, my focus is the international arena. My guest has been close to the centre of us Foreign Policy making for three decades. Richard haass was a Senior Adviser to both bush president s and has offered his insights to the president elect, too. From big power diplomacy, with russia and china, to global trade and climate policy. How different, how unpredictable is trump going to be . Richard haass in new york city, welcome to hardtalk. Thank you, stephen. Youve just written a book with the cheery title a world in disarray. In your opinion, does the election of donald trump to the Presidency Add to that sense of a world in disarray . Its more the world the 45th president of the United States will be inheriting. Its the result, in part, of things the United States has done but also failed to do. Its in part simply a result of the end of the cold war, the loosening up our international relations, the rise of certain countries like china and so forth. This is the world hes inheriting. Where i think he may have added it slightly, have added to it slightly, and notjust him but first in the american political campaign, candidates, including him, were saying things and endorsing positions which, shall we say, were untraditional. The fact that senator sanders, Secretary Clinton and donald trump, all three rejected the major pending trade agreement, the so called Trans Pacific partnership, that itself was a major departure from things. 0bviously, during the transition, some of the things hes said and done have added to it. But i would put the lion share of the explanation, if you will, for the disarray hell inherit and this daunting inbox hes going to inherit more from things the United States and others have done orfailed to do. Right, so what youre laying out is a proposition is the preconditions are there for disarray and that a us president , whoever he or she may be incoming, can only do, and you just used your finger and thumb there, can only do a little bit to change that sense of disarray. So, to me, that is a recognition from you that actually the United States of america and its Commander In Chief have much less agency and leverage in the world than they used to have . Perhaps, but i wouldnt drive it too far. I think what weve learned is that when the United States stays aloof from the world, the world is not self organising. The centrifugal forces tend to get much stronger, and when the United States does engage in the world, we still have more capacity to act and to lead than anybody else. We cant control it, we cant determine it, but we can shape it more than any other single actor. Lets talk a little bit about trump, because were going to get the big picture, believe me, but it is important to tease out what weve learned from the weeks of transition that weve all witnessed. Donald trump has a very particular style. Youre a guy whos steeped in Foreign Policy making, youre systems, a machines sort of guy. You know the machine really well. Donald trump doesnt seem to operate inside the machine, he operates primarily through messages on twitter. Do you worry about the style thats hes bringing to washington . He certainly different, as you say. This wasnt exactly the style of diplomacy i studied when i was a student at oxford a0 years ago. I grant you that, stephen i worry a little bit. I worry that twitter is all too easy a form of communication. I do it myself, as i expect you do. Youve got to think once or twice before you press send. I think the United States, as a country, has to think more than once or twice because so many others are counting on us and twitter can be something that you, youre not doing it in a careful enough way, and if others are basing their security and their calculations on america, then weve got to be very careful with what messages we send. And its notjust about twitter in itself, its also about the degree to which the United States incoming president actually listens and actively seeks advice. There have been a few symbolic moments, if you like. One was when asked on fox news whether he was reading the president ial daily brief, the intelligence brief, he said, yeah, but only sort of reading it once a week, i get it when i need it, he said. I dont have to be told because, you know, im like a smart person. I dont have to be told the same thing in words every single day. Again, speaking as a guy whos been inside the system, that isnt really the way things have worked. Do you think its the way things should work, that a guy operates on his gut . I hope not. Theres that old expression, i think it was the former governor of new york, that you campaign in poetry, but you govern in prose. My own experience, from having worked with four president s, is when you govern, youre dealing at a level of detail that outsiders really cant imagine. I myself found the daily Intelligence Briefings quite valuable, quite important. They actually do change quite a bit from day to day, particularly when they give you the broader brush, sets of analyses, as the cia and others do. So, to be perfectly honest, i hope that mr trump establishes a better Working Relationship with the intelligence community, and if he does, i think hell actually find it to be a valuable resource that will help him govern. Weve already seen one important episode. When it came to the allegations which have emerged, which have been verified as far as the Us Intelligence community is concerned, from cia, fbi, director of national intelligence, all of them adamant that there is compelling proof that the kremlin authorised a hack of the Democratic National committee, because they wanted to influence the us president ial election. Donald trump chose to side with putins message, rather than the message coming out of his own intelligence chiefs. Now, thats something that happened, its not something we have to speculate about. How damaging is that . It is, i think its raised questions about his relationship with the intelligence community. Again, im hopeful, im not predicting, but i hope its repaired. I think it raises questions also about us policy towards russia. I would simply say that this hacking was not an exception, it wasnt a one off. Weve seen russia do what it did to ukraine and crimea as well as eastern ukraine. We saw russian intervention in syria, which was a war crime, i would argue, by any measure and standard. Theres all sorts of evidence that the sort of political machinations they did in the United States were not an exception. I expect were going to see an awful lot of that in places like germany, as we approach the elections there. What we need is a comprehensive policy towards russia that, among other things, would say, youll only get sanctions relief if we see measurable changes and improvements in your behaviour. I would also argue that we need to look very hard at Re Militarising nato. After the end of the cold war, the United States and european allies essentially stripped nato of a lot of its military and its land components, and i would think they need to be reintroduced in places like the baltic states. Not so long ago you were in trump tower talking about, i wasnt there and privy to it, but i imagine russia came up. What youve just said runs diametrically in opposition, again referring to twitter, to the opinions of donaldj trump. Quote, i always knew he was very smart, talking of vladimir putin. Having a Good Relationship with russia is a good thing, not a bad thing, only stupid people or fools would think it is bad. So tell me a little bit about this private conversation you had with donald trump. Did you try to put him right, as far as youre concerned, on russia . In our conversations russia actually didnt figure all that prominently, it was more about developments in the middle east, developments in asia. It was about trade, it was about immigration. We havent spoken in the context of the Hacking Report by the intelligence community. What ive been saying publicly on that does disagree somewhat. Our goal should not be a better relationship with russia, per se. What our policy should be is we want a better relationship, but only on a basis of russian behaviour that takes into account our interests and what we think are the norms of the international system. So we dont want to have, if you will, a cosmetically improved relationship, we want to have a substantially and thats really up to mr putin. Yeah, well, its sort of up to mr putin, but its also up to the United States. For example, the degree to which in response to the intelligence communitys conclusions about hacking, whether theres mileage in more sanctions. For example, Senatorjohn Mccain and a bunch of other Republican Congress people have said that they now want to seek extra sanctions on russia. What would your view of that be . Sanctions are one of the possible responses. I might be more interested in certain types of cyber related responses. As ijust mentioned, id be interested in strengthening our military capability, both outside ukraine and nato countries. Id also be more interested in providing certain types of defensive Military Help to ukraine. Theres already a lot of sanctions on russia. Id have to be persuaded that additional sanctions would make a significant difference. Im not interested in symbols, im interested in substance of things that will send a message to mr putin that he will receive. But im not fighting your point. Does donald trump agree with me . I dont know. The evidence, at least on the surface, would suggest not. But again, well have to wait and see what he actually does when he governs. At the moment you are an independent observer, a commentator on what were seeing from trump. Politico, for example, which gets some stories right and some wrong, said in mid december you were one of the top tips for the number two job at the State Department, and that trump was actively considering you. Any news on that . Would you take the job . Given everything weve discussed so far, could you conceivably work for a Trump Administration . Well, i think the answer is, when asked if i could work for any president , and ive worked for four, you can only do it if, one, you have a similar conception of thejob, what it actually would entail, and more important, that your in sufficient alignment on the major policies. You dont have to agree on everything, stephen, but youve got to agree on enough of the big things that you can faithfully and effectively represent them. I think in my case we would need to talk about it, because theres areas that ive written about. Look, ivejust come out with a new book, ive written a dozen books before, so my views are not a big, dark secret. It wouldnt make sense for me to be there, unless i thought i could have a real chance to affect policy, to influence it and that we were sufficiently in sync, so i could be an effective representative of this president and this administration, and those would be issues that we would have to resolve to their satisfaction and to my satisfaction. Let mejust say, i dont know if im seriously being considered for anything. I dont know if ill be asked to do anything. 0bviously wed have you back if you do know that. As you say, your analysis of a world in disarray seems to me to have several conclusions. Im going to be very shorthand about them, but you say that the United States needs to be realistic in its ambition, it needs to match its vision of ends with means, rather than having very ambitious ends but not the will and the means to enforce them. Im just wondering, lets talk about some other key areas. For example, nato, which of course i think 70 of the burden for spending in nato comes from the United States. Does the United States, in your view, have an obligation to maintain that level of commitment to nato . And what would happen if, according to donald trump and some of his advisers, if the United States got much tougher with allies and said if you dont front up more money, were going to back out . Well, i wouldnt recommend that. I think the europeans need to do more, not so much spend more, though that would be welcome, they need to spend what they spend more intelligently. The problem with European Defence spending is not so much the level, but that its not co ordinated, so you have tremendous areas of replication and you have large areas of shortfalls. But sure, i think the United States and europe both have to spend more on defence, simply because the threat environment Going Forward is a lot more robust than we imagined it would be ten or 20 years ago. Thats simply a fact of life. You began with a larger point, and i take it, which is any time in Foreign Policy you have a gap between your rhetoric and your actual capacity, you run into trouble. Weve had that in the middle east lots of times in recent years, where we said certain people must go and we didnt have policies to back it up, or when the syrians used chemical weapons, we didnt respond forcefully. So i think that ought to be a lesson. Weve got to narrow the gap between american commitments and rhetoric, and american capabilities and actions. But the danger, and again im referring to stuff youve written in the book, the danger is that at times that looks like america abandons key values and principles. For example, just pluck a couple of the air, youre suggesting America Needs to talk less loudly about human rights inside china or inside russia. America needs to push less hard to expand the nato family, to countries like georgia and ukraine. Now to some people around the world, you might call it realism, they might call appeasement. They can call it whatever they want. They would also be dead wrong. In the case of a country like china, look, the priority, what we need to focus on for the next couple of years is not trying to make china democratic, no matter how hard we press, its not going to happen. What we can perhaps do is get china to work with us to deal with the pressing north Korean Nuclear Ballistic Missile threat. In Foreign Policy, as in policy of any sort, you have to choose your priorities where your interests are greatest and your capacity to make a difference is greater. In the case of ukraine and georgia, bringing them into nato, i would say they dont meet the qualifications. In the meantime, weve got our hands full meeting the commitments we already have in nato. Going back to the guy who may or may not be your future boss, donald trump, and the issue of china. When he tweeted out that he saw no reason to be bound by the one china policy, and he was absolutely thrilled that the president of taiwan had given him a phone call, in your view that was not representing Americas National interests very cleverly, yeah . No, and i made it very clear in what i said and wrote in the aftermath of those comments of his, that i thought it was counter productive. That we finessed this problem with china and taiwan quite successfully for decades, and what that has allowed us to do, is to go ahead and forge a respectable relationship with china. And by the way, its been good for taiwan as well. Its flourished economically, it represents a democratic model thats something of an alternative, to say the least, to what we see on the mainland. So my sense of if it aint broke, dont fix it, so i disagree with the idea of questioning the one china policy. The more we talk and the more we run round some of the key issues facing the globe today, the more im thinking, despite your caution about declaring trump a major addition to the uncertainty and disarray in the world, thats precisely what, in substance, you do seem to be saying, on a whole raft of issues. Well again, i never assume there is a correlation between what was said during a campaign, and how people govern. The purpose of campaigning, shockingly enough, is to get elected. The purpose of governing is something very different. So well have to see. But assuming i continue to be on the outside of things, and i think thats a pretty good assumption, where i see areas of policy i agree with, i will stand up and say fantastic, and where i see policies i disagree with, i will criticise them. Thats been my stance during the last eight years of mr 0bama, and that will be my position Going Forward, again assuming i continue to be here at the council on foreign relations. Im interested in this concept you developed, correct me if im paraphrasing it wrongly, but this idea of sovereign obligation. That is the idea that nation states these days do have obligations that run far beyond their own borders, in terms of collective action on key issues facing the world community, whether it be trade issues, Global Trade Issues or the huge challenge of climate policy. Do you believe the United States. Go on, what were going to say . No, you go ahead. I want to know if you believe the United States, looking forward, is going to be meeting its sovereign obligations . I dont know. My role here is to fight for it. This is what i think is smart and necessary. Were living in a global world. Nothing stays local for long any more. What goes on inside countries is no longer simply their business alone, whether its a coal burning electricity plant, whether its a virus that comes out like zika or ebola that can affect everybody, whether its terrorists or hackers, what weve learned is nothing as local, everythings potentially global. I believe this ought to become the intellectual compass, so to speak, of american Foreign Policy and that we ought to be consulting and talking with other countries, and also companies and ngos and others about how we deal with this global world, in which all these challenges you mention are far ahead of their responses. Will the Trump Administration do this . I have no idea. Im going to. The clue is in the mantra put america first. That doesnt seem to be recognising collective obligations in the sense youve just talked about them . Obviously not, but again that was a campaign slogan. Whether thats a Governing Slogan we will have to see, and even if it remains a slogan, what will it actually mean in the way of policy . For example, does the United States change the basis of its Regulatory Framework when it comes to where we are on climate related issues . Does the United States actually pull out of paris . I hope we dont pull out of paris, indeed the Paris Agreement is a model of an international agreement, where countries retain the ability to decide for themselves what it is they want to do or dont want to do when it comes to Greenhouse Gas emissions, and they simply pledge to do their best, but they set their standards for themselves. Its not being imposed on them. So it is fully consistent with american sovereignty. Im hoping that the Trump Administration comes to see it this way. Its the argument ive made to people around mr trump privately already, that people should think twice before they see the Paris Agreement as a problem. Let me tap into your personal experience to something we touched on early on in the interview, but i would like to get a direct thought from you on it. Its about the way in which people acquire Policy Making Powers in the National Security and Foreign Policy arena. I mean, you worked at the coal face for 30 years, you served a number of different president s, you worked as an official in the State Department and you took, in the end, some of the top jobs in National Security and state, but you sort of paid your dues. What we see in the Trump Administration is a secretary of state, rex tillerson, who has come straight from the ceo position in big business, as we know, with an oil company with major ties in russia. We see a Defence Secretary who has almost literally come straight out of uniform, who has not had any sort of political experience. We see, for example, a son in law of the president , with absolutely no Foreign Policy making experience at all, who is now, it seems, in a post where he is expected to make middle east peace. What do you make of it all . Laughter. I think in the case of the secretary of state, nominee rex tillerson, this is someone with an awful lot of experience around the world. Im not worried at all about him. Id say the same thing about general mattis, who is going to be running the pentagon. The real question is whether you can get a National Security Council Process that works. There i think theres some grounds for concern, because you have so many people with positions of power at the white house. Youve got a president , a Vice President , a chief of staff, a chief strategist, a National Security adviser, now youve got a special adviser, so its a lot of people. The question is how are you going to orchestrate this . How are you going to make sure that the policy is made in the right way, and more importantly, implemented in a way that is consistent with the decisions . I think thats an enormous challenge for this administration, whether they can get that right. You rather diplomatically didnt address the one name i put to you, that some regard as most controversial of all. Mr trumps son in law, jared kushner. Youve been around the middle east diplomacy and peacemaking effort, does it seem to you credible in any way that he should be given a key role like that . Id say well see exactly what his role is and how it fits in with everybody else. I dont know mr kushner, but i would simply say the idea of trying to re establish a degree of Strategic Trust between the United States and israel is essential and if he could help do that, bully for him. I would say great. Right now you can imagine scenarios the us and israel could face over the next couple of years; the collapse of jordan, some problems with iran, another war with hezbollah in lebanon. So anyone who could help bring these two governments together, i would say that would be good. In terms of the Israeli Palestinian peace process, quite honestly i dont think it much matters who works on it. I think the prospects for advancing that, at the moment, are close to nil. The parties are so far apart and the essential prerequisites. Ive been involved in Northern Ireland, in cyprus, ive been involved in middle east peacemaking, and youve got to have protagonists that are both willing and able to make serious compromises. I simply dont see that between israelis and palestinians right now. So i wouldnt think this is an area that deserves an awful lot of focus. Were out of time, so its a brief one. 0n the eve of the trump presidency, are you optimistic about the next four years of Foreign Policy making, yes or no . In a word, i am worried, given what the inheritance is. I think anyone has got to be worried. Richard haass, thank you very much indeed forjoining me on hardtalk. Thanks for having me. Good evening, fairly lively weather over the next few days. A week Weather Front crossing the uk overnight, not a great deal of rain. Pretty strong winds associated. Cold north westerly wind. Behind this cold front. Some rain into scotland and Northern Ireland. South across england and wales and it will become patchy. Lots of showers behind which will turn increasingly wintry over the Higher Ground of scotland. A cold night, single figures for major towns and cities, below that in rural spots. Hideki called in the wind, a feature of things through tomorrow particularly cold. We will see gusts of wind is getting to 70 mph, maybe even a bit more. A strong cross wind blowing through the Central Lowlands of scotland. Blustery with those showers in Northern Ireland and scotland. Northern ireland and scotland. Northern england will be quite windy, to the east of the pennines. Not too many showers as we go further south but quite blustery with the strongest winds a bit further west. Its a day of sunny spells across the southern half of the uk but breezy. Lots of showers in the north and increasingly the snow level coming down a bit. Some snow level coming down a bit. Some snow over Higher Ground. 4 degrees in scotland, but it will fill called in the wind, 8 degrees further south. In the evening, showers in Northern Scotland and some snow showers cropping up in Northern Ireland and northern england. In scotland, snow will get down to low levels. Further south, scotland, snow will get down to low levels. Furthersouth, not too scotland, snow will get down to low levels. Further south, not too cold but chilly, five or 6 degrees. Cold in the north. Patches of ice as well. Rain gathering in the south west by Dawn On Thursday and some questions about how far north it goes but it looks like it will cover much of wales and southern counties of england and questions over how much cold air with which will have an effect on how much snow we will see. Some snow in the hills of south wales and Southern England but a lot of rain. Further north, brighter spells but wintry showers and it will feel cold on your thermometers, only two or three degrees for glasgow, newcastle and belfast. It will field two or three degrees below freezing, a cold day on thursday it will feel. This will head down the north sea coast, lots of isobars, it will be windy. Still some wintry showers, mainly towards the east and west coast but inland, cold windy but bright on friday. Hello im ros atkins. Welcome to 0utside source. The first stop is washington. 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