trevelyan whose group ask called ngp van, he works with democrats, also joining us is chuck defeo of the republican national committee where he serves as chief digital officer and shane d'aprile. let's begin with you, mr. terrell january, if we could. -- trevelyan, if we could. what exactly are the components of a digital campaign? what type of tools are used? >> guest: well, so i think it's actually evolving. i think historically the digital tools were largely thought of as the e-mail tools and the online contributions, the web site, but i think it's evolved. our company, for example, also offers tools that enable sort of the shoe leather side of the campaign, so the canvassing, the phone calling, the direct mail. and then i think you're seeing many more marketing channels come online where now there's person addressable tv ads, online ads, you can actually do person addressable interactions through social networks, so i think now there's a pretty wide swath of things which you could call digital. >> host: chuck defeo, anything to add to that answer? >> guest: yeah. i think it always starts with the data. back in 2002, the rnc, we were the first committee to target ads at specific pokes who we want -- folks who we wanted to talk to, so we progressed that through the 2004 cycle and all the way up til today. it always starts with the data, and even when we're doing it through social media, whatever channel and in sync with whatever it is you're doing offline as well. that's effective to mote rate and turn out your voters. >> host: how has it advanced from even the 2012 election? >> guest: i think what we're seeing is a greater proliferation of use. we saw, you know, it's a presidential campaign. and what you end up seeing you've got a republican and democrat presidential nominee that have billion dollar budgets, that have greater resource to be able to do things and kind of to that beta testing, if you will. we're seeing these statewide campaigns really embracing a lot of what was brought into that cycle and push it down into the network and lower ballot races and be able to support them with some of these cutting edge tools that we may not have been able to do in years past. >> host: stu trevelyan? >> guest: i think one of the more interesting things that is happening this cycle that didn't happen in 2012 is around relationship data. even the obama campaign when they did their targeted sharing program, that wasn't something where they collected a lot of data about who contacted who. we have a product that we call the action center and the ddd has employed it, the afl-cia, planned parent hood, and that allows people to leverage their social capital on behalf of the candidates and supporters that they believe in. and, you know, i think that's a whole new set of data. the voter file's fantastic, lots of different channel data is interesting, but i think we're getting to a place where in addition to knowing who you need to target, you're being able to learn who you should target as the messenger to that person, right? when stu asked peter to do things, he does them, but when stu asks chuck to do things, he doesn't. and i think that's going to be an interesting area. it found very first inning for us. >> host: mr. d'aprile. >> there's this big question of how all of these tools and tactics scale. can you both speak to how that's actually occurring, how are the what we saw in the obama campaign, how are these tactics scaling down to down pal ott races, congressional and even below, and how are both of you respective -- both of your respective organizations actually involved in applying that? >> guest: so as the republican national committee, we support every republican race in the country. what we've done is stood up multiple new tools to actually motivate and move out voters that may not have turned out in previous elections. there's always been that base of who you know if they're going to turn out to vote, they're going to vote for you. how is it we're pushing those tools into some of these other races to make sure they are showing up at the door with a walk-up rather than paper. how is it we make sure the e-mail list is actually being integrated with the voter file. there's a number of tools to sync up both digital and offline or physical world and to make sure those communications are all in sync and also to lay off what stu -- i agree. we've moved from the broadcast era. we're still at the tail end of what we've known as really from the early '60s as broadcast television has dominated. so as we involve into addressable television and all that stuff, it's really moving into a relationship era. and so we've known that in the commercial sector, that if you are going to -- when you build brand advocates, when you actually have someone who's actually advocating for it and influencing their sphere of friends, how is it we move to just knowing what the message is , we need to do a better job of making sure we mow who the right messenger is to deliver that message. >> guest: so i think there's a couple elements. so, one, you know, the dnc has used our band product at a 50-state contract since 2007, so that's, you know, that's something that's in bred in all the democratic campaigns up and town the ticket at this point, you know, whether you're running for city council or senate or president. they're all using the band. and that's, you know, that's had great advantages where people are able to move from one campaign to another. actually over to the afl-cia, over to planned parenthood, over to the dnc and use the same tool. and that goes to the second point which is there's a good number of organizations on the democratic side who have done a fantastic job in training people. so the new organizing institute has been one of the sort of leaders in that area in terms of training a whole cadre of people who have skills with digital products, data and are able to take those skills down ticket to state legislative levels. you also have, i think a third piece is the analytics where the analytics, you know, the cave and the obama campaign was, you know, that was a source of a lot of the innovation of '12 over '8. and some of the analytics companies, you know, blue labs, clarity campaign labs, catalyst have been able to push that down so it's now reaching small organizations and small campaigns. and so even at the sort of congressional level nobody's really dealing with, you know, a sort of anonymous target universe, right? it's all driven by scores at this point. >> we talk a lot about the tools and the tactics, but really it's more about the people. and that seems to be the real difference, the talent difference and the training aspect that stu talks about. chuck, i want to ask you what is the rnc doing specifically to close that education gap on technology and analytics? what we know out of the 2012 cycle is you have got -- forget about organizations like the analyst institute and align that have done a lot of that work. we know now there are democratic operatives that are all over country that have specific experience applying these tools, and, you know, doing this type of analysis whereas republicans are a bit far behind on that human element. how is the rnc closing that gap? >> guest: well, i think it starts with the more you do something, the more you're going to get comfortable with and better at it. and so what we've done is we've put our permanent ground game in place. so this is a fundamental shift of what the rnc is and what its mission is, and our chairman has really turned the organization and focused it into a permanent boots on the ground organization where we have people in multiple states that are embedded in a community, and they know who their precinct is and who their folks they're talking to. and then it's about putting those tools in their hands and is putting them to use. so we could send them off to a two-day training, which we have done, but at the same time, they're going to get better at it the more they use it. so when we talk about these tens of thousands of volunteers that we have in place that are permanent, that have made a commitment to stay with us through this cycle and the next cycle and on, it's as they start to use the tools we've put into their hands for months now, and some of those folks as much as a year, the more they use it and the broader that base of tens of thousands of permanent volunteers become, the more professional we're going to be about it. >> do you think republicans need an equivalent to noi? is there anything that is sort of an equivalent? >> guest: so i think is there, has there always been some training program? i could go back to into the early '90s when go pac was training either a state rep or statehouse candidate as well as the staff to run campaigns, and you kind of build up. there's always been institutions in place in our party. there are still institutions in place. some of the democrat partnerships have gotten institutions that train our people. >> host: stu trevelyan, you talked about analyzing. what exactly are you analyzing online? >> guest: well, there's always kinds of -- all kinds of data, and i think that's the challenge, sort of the explosion of big data, how are you going to focus on the important things? there's all types of information on quick stream, who opened what e-mail, who clicked on what piece of information, where people are coming from, online advertising campaigns are driving people, you know? and, you know, i think one of the real important pieces is to intersect that with the offline activity, right? say, for example, you might have a universe of people who are your target universe, and you try and door knock somebody three times, but they never answer the tour. you want to make sure that person is in your online advertising universe, right? because they're pretty much not interacting with you in that interpersonal way. you know, i think there's all kinds of data like that, sort of observable data, and then there's all kinds of other consumer data, right? so there's what newspapers you read, you know, what magazine subscriptions you had, all kinds of consumer information about likely income, household status, etc. and those all go into sort of, they go into, you know, the molding shops and come out with the scores that say, you know, how likely are you to vote, how persuadable are you, you know, are you likely to care about the environment? should we be pitching you on the environment or the economy? so that's sort of how the data ends up getting actionable. >> host: what about specific groups? seniors, ethnic groups, etc. >> guest: yeah. i mean, you know, that's basic segmentation, you know, so that's not really sort of the modeling piece. you can just basically go off your information of who's in different age ranges. yeah, i think age ranges are a fairly wasteful way to target just in that they don't, you don't necessarily know that much about a person just based on their age, right? even at certain age ranges, you know, if it's a 45-45-10 country, even if it's 60-40 at a particular age, that still means you're going to waste a lot of money just targeting at an age range. >> stu, a question about the obama 2012 data, the dnc is, you know, has the bulk of it, and they've talked about, you know, kind of a slow process of transferring that. could you kind of walk me through a little bit how that data is being used, who's in charge of how that data's being used and what, you know, 2014 democratic campaigns are actually making, how many are actually making use of that data and for what. >> guest: so the ids from the obama campaign inform all the basic models so that the dnc vote builder which is sort of the combination of our product, van and the voter file and the additional information, that has a number of set models in it. and all those models in it use the ids. there were more ids made by the obama campaign than any other campaign. so there's an ability to look across a wide swath of people and have information on a lot of those people with those ids. so those scores are available to everybody whether you're running for city council, congress, 123459, governor -- senate, governor, and so, you know, they're having a big impact on races because these models introduce a lot of efficiency into campaigns. particularly, you know, i think it's sort of revolutionary for these small campaigns where, you know, chuck was at the rnc in 2004. i think back in that day it was probably $250,000 for a model or something like that, you know? [inaudible conversations] >> guest: and we were doing models two or three times in a cycle versus continually refreshing them over the cycle. it was a different time. >> guest: so i think now, you know, for a small campaign that's only going to spend $50,000 to be able to use a model to determine who they should be targeting in their can vas is amazing. >> this may sound like an obvious question, but what's the measure of success here? what democrats are hoping, they can overcome that traditional disadvantage they have in a midterm year in terms of the turnout dynamic. so is the measure of success they get closer, that they don't lose the senate? i mean, what's the measure of success, because we know there are a number of firms run by obama campaign alums that are doing this modeling. >> guest: sure. i think different companies are going to have different measures of success. so for my company, for example, our measure of success is did we have as much impact as we could have had, right? i think, you know, anybody who's honest with you, they'll tell you we're talking about a couple points here, right? if you were going to lose 55-45, your field gauge, your digital game is probably not going to put you over the top. so we can control, you know, the victors, write the history, and i'm sure chuck will be out here after election today when you're likely to have a number of victories saying we've caught up on technology and >> guest: it was really the political organization, the field team who was knocking on doors, and for more than a century it's how campaigns were run. but then as television came online, we shifted our models of how campaigns worked, so i think we're on this cusp of what i keep talking about as the relationship era. stu alluded to it. they are still extremely important, they're going to continue to be for quite some time. but as we move to better understanding who we're communicating with, who's the right messenger to commune candidate to them -- communicate to them, besides just that e-mail you're getting in your inbox, and i know a lot of people are getting a lot of them, but also besides that ad, it's all that goes underlying it. that's what i said, it starts with the data, it starts with understanding who that person is we're talking about. so the individual scores. we brought in a whole data science team inside the rnc, we're still working with some of the experts within our party that have always been there helping us build up that internal capability within the rnc. but starting with the observable data we've been building for two decades can, taking the science and better understanding who we're communicating with, a lot of times sometimes campaigns make the mistake of using that just offline, using that in your direct mail or knocking on doors. we've completely integrated that approach into everything we're doing. so our e-mail file is actually deseparated with -- integrated with our voter file, and these segments we're moving and even actually into more one to one type e-mails we're moving into, all of that is from who's the right person to communicate with it. we broaden that out to all channels, online and off. >> host: give us a sense quickly of how digital technology and its use in campaigns has changed from 2004 to today. >> guest: so what i think -- this is, sometimes everything old is new. the 2004 campaign, we were the first ones to build an app where you could go and download a list of voters and then walk your neighborhood on your own. we were the first ones to do the house party concept where you could then take that house party and then expand it into people going and knocking on doors in your neighborhood. so you could -- all that stuff was hen completely driven -- was then completely driven off the voter file. we were the most expensive presidential campaign by that day. so ten years ago moving forward, can campaigns have gotten a lot more, presidential campaigns. but the ability for other down-ballot campaigns to be able to do those kind of tactic, and, again, stu alluded to, this it's just the cost structures have changed to be able to do some of the things we were doing ten years ago. how do we broaden it within the party? that's a focus of what we're doing. when we talk about the community of vendors who support our candidates, it's how do we make sure we provide that level at the republican party, at the rnc and within the party infrastructure to make sure that all that access is there? we need to do a better job of making sure that no one goes without. because, again, if you get into a two-point race, these tools make a big difference. >> to pick up on that point, we're looking at that period from 2004 to today. do you have to be the out party to create the innovation. >> is that what drives, you know, that desire to, you know, not only catch up, but surpass? because it certainly seems to have tone that for democrats. >> guest: you know, i think that's right, although i would say that's a correlation, not a causation. you know, so i was a little depressed to see chuck end up back at the rnc because he did a great job in 2004. in 2004 the republicans were ahead of us. and it did take, you know, being out of power for, you know, it took a couple things, right? obama in his primary also was the challenger. he couldn't do things the normal way or else he would have lost that primary. and so i think it's metropolitan just whether you're -- more than just whether you're in or out. if you look at the 2012 campaign, for example, theoretically by that strategy or analysis, romney should have been the one innovating, but instead it turned out that driving analytics throw every part of the campaign -- which i think was the real innovation of the campaign -- came out of the obama campaign. i think that might be a little too facile. it's sort of like, you know, there's so few data points, right, in these presidential elections that people draw a lot of causality when it's really just correlation. >> chuck, the stated goal of the rnc with its incubator and tech program is to encourage openness, accessibility, not really terms that most people in politics associate with national political committees. >> guest: yep. >> what has changed structurally at the rnc to create that culture, and how far along are you in creating the culture you want? >> guest: well, there was a commitment to investing that the chairman made immediately after the 201 cycle, and we moved from a period where, you know, going into that '11-'12, the rnc was not in a financial position to really make the investments we needed to and have the support of a presidential nominee. coming back and looking at where we needed to go as a party, there were some fundamental changes that needed to be made, so we broke down some internal silos that translated into organizational silos and also translated into technology, multiple technology decision makers and data silos. we broke down a lot of those silos, and that manifested into pair bell lumbar labs. our main process is to actually say everyone's going to have access to the analytics, the predictive analytics, the scores that they need. everyone's going to continue, as they have for two decades, to have best political data that is accessible. and then we're going to continue to actually provide the tools and bring it up to speed, the kind of tools that you need to have no matter what candidate you are. we're going to make sure those tools are available to you in a general election. once we start that level basis, that's why we sync up very closely with our political department. i was just in a long meeting talking about our field program talking about how the things we're doing in line and on data to support that. how do we make sure no those practices are here for our 2014 election, but this isn't just a 2014 plan. this is a fundamental shift of what the rnc is and what we see as our primary mission, and we made the institutional changes that we needed to do, and we're just -- we're at the end of year one of the program, and we're going to continue it on for years to come. >> to you see the rnc's role to kind of close that fragmentation on the right when you look at, you know, data and technology, it's fragmented, certainly, in comparison to what happens on the left. is the rnc, should they be charged with fixing that? >> guest: well, i think there's a different way of looking at it. you alluded to concepts of open source. when you look at what our job is, our job is not to pick winners and losers, our job is not to pick one company that even has to use. our job is to set standards that basically says here's what we think, here's the level that we need to operate off of. it's available to everybody. go innovate. so to the point where a certain level of candidates respect going to go without -- aren't going to go without, we're going to make sure you have what you need. at the same time, if you're a company, an innovator, a entrepreneur that wants to take it up and inknow vase beyond what we're able to do in the rnc, we want that. we want that competition. we want people to take it farther than what we're actually to do inside our building. >> host: stu trevelyan, what are some of the drawbacks of a digital campaign? >> guest: well, there are a new. you see a lot of people walk in the door who, you know, they're a candidate or a consultant, they say, well, can we do the als challenge thing? can we just go viral? that's really not how it works. those things either tend to be just lucky or the by-product of a lot of hard work, right? so, you know, in our world, you know, we don't try and go by luck, so there's a lot of hard work of, you know, building up that supporter base, you know, activating them, and then maybe you'll get -- you won't know and which exact thing will go viral, but one of your things will go viral. i think that's, you know, one of the, one of the respects. i think, you know -- one of the elements. i think, you know, some of the other challenges are, you know, we're kind of seeing it now, there's very few barriers to communicating. and so, you know, my friends at the dccc have told me that all is lost, right this there's a pretty healthy debate going on in the democratic community, you know, is that good strategy, is it not? all i know is they're raising a ton of money so, you know, god bless them, all those guys. there are perils of overcommunicating that nobody ever had to deal with when, you know, you just never had so many volunteers that you could overcommunicate at the door. >> host: same question. >> guest: so i think it's about understanding the tools. so i regularly talk tools in the tool belt. so when i have conversations with folks who aren't digital, aren't technology, they have different skill sets. so if you want to hammer a nail, you don't go get a screwdriver. if you want to turn a screw, you don't get a hammer. so understanding what each one of these tools are designed for, that's all they are. these are just tools. they're different types of tools, highly sophisticated tool, and each of them you can get an outcome that you're looking for. yes, everybody wants viral. but outside of that, understanding what the tool is, that is our job to basically understand, to get people to understand this is what this can do. this is the most -- tell me what you're trying to accomplish, and i can start applying some of the tools and tell you what you need to do from a programmatic perspective. >> host: shane d'aprile. >> we've seen partisan and nonpartisan companies, i'm interested in both of your perspectives on whether or not technological innovation in the political sphere should come from partisan-only firms or should wemore broad than that? -- we be more broad than that? >> guest: so i think, you know, there's a historical fact that partisan companies have been able to partner more closely with the party organizations and the campaigns and, therefore, have been able to take the innovation, say, for example, of the obama campaign and drive that through the entire democratic universe. i don't think -- i wouldn't necessarily put it that should partisan companies or nonpartisan companies be driving innovation. everybody's welcome to play, i just think it happens to be true that the partisan companies have played better and innovated better, and i think that's a respondent on partisan companies like mine to actually be better because of those partnerships. >> guest: so a partisan company can have a business interest in innovating. sometimes at the end of day, partisan companies are partisan for a reason because they have a mission oriented that most for-profit companies don't have. so the approach we've taken is we're looking for the best available products. we've taken our social media command center and everything we're doing from an ab littics perspective is actually a product called sprinkler that isn't partisan at all. we just said this is the best in class product available out there, and is we felt like it could -- they were willing to work with us on some of the innovations we were working for, so we've been a beta client for them on some of their features. as a result, we've got one of the most sophisticated social media programs that they have of think of their thousands of clients. so we're willing to work with nonpartisan companies. we also at the same time work closely with several partisan firms. when we think about data science and the scores we're working with, those are folks that tend to come from a political background. so is, of course their companies are going to have more of a partisan bent. so that makes sense not only from just when you think about the source of where people are coming from, but also just from a perspective of they need -- we need somebody that understands cam indianas and understands -- campaigns and understands some of the rhythms of it. having worked mt. private sector and the be political world, they're two very different world s. you need, again, basis of understanding of really where the source of sophistication and source of expertise is going to come from. >> host: and finally, gentlemen, chuck defeo, we'll start with you, is the technology growing exponentially when it comes to campaigns, or have we hit a plateau? >> guest: no. i don't think there's a limitation of innovation. again, it's adoption, understanding how to apply it and thinking through more about how you scale it. so when we move into a presidential cycle, you're going to see, again, heavily funded campaigns that are going to look for that next innovation. my personal belief is we're on the cusp of that relationship era. it's how to we take what has really been a one-to-many program and make it look more like a one-to-one program. and campaigns that are able to do that more effectively, in my honest opinion, are the ones that are going to start looking more innovative and will be seeing better results. but there's multiple forms that could take in, so strategically how they choose to invest and where to go as campaign entities, we're going to see. i think we're going to show up really, really well this year. i have a lot of confidence in our candidates and in our campaigns, and so i think we're going to have a good november 4 in 2014. but it's all up to us and our community of republican activists to see where we're going to go in 2016. >> host: mr. trevelyan. >> guest: so is, yeah, i think moore's law applies, right? i think we are seeing sort of an increase in the rate of change. i think you see that across the different channels, right? just in the last, you know, year you've seen, you know, address can bl tv ads pop up, right? that's not something that existed last cycle. the prevalence of online ads that are targeted by voter file be, you know, the social channels are now person addressable. so i think you're seeing that there is many more channels that people are going to have to manage, and that's sort of like why we went down our pathway with our innovation platform which is sort of like a hub and smoke model where you can -- spoke model where you can have a hub, we know chuck across some of these models, some of them are going to have ngp van, some are going to be oh people, and we can plug in a new spoke, and i think chuck's exactly right with the relationship data. i think we're in the first inning of that. i think it's going to be really interesting to see where that goes. >> host: gentlemen, thank you very much. shane d'aprile is the publisher of campaigns and elections. thank you as well. >> our campaign 2014 kohage continues with a -- coverage continues with a week full of baits. tonight, the georgia governor's debate, and at eight live on c-span2, the montana u.s. senate debate with u.s. representative republican steve danes and democrat amanda curtis. tuesday night at 9 on c-span, the south carolina governor's debate between five candidates. and thursday night live at eight eastern, the iowa district debate between u.s. representative steven king and democrat jim mo work rer. powrer. >> c-span, created by america's cable companies 35 years ago and brought to you as a public service by your local cable or satellite provider. >> the foreign policy research institute and the be kennon institute host a discussion on u.s. efforts to promote democracy internationally. speakers include former ambassadors to the czech republic and georgia and international relations scholars. live coverage today at 9 a.m. eastern on c-span2. >> defense secretary chuck hagel was the keynote speaker at the annual meeting of the association of the u.s. army. he commented about his proposal to reduce the active duty army force and the importance of maintaining readiness through i its people, capabilities -- through its people, capabilities and international partnerships. this is about 30 minutes. >> the united states army helped define me, and i've always been very proud of my service as a soldier. it allowed me to witness courage and nobility that i would never have had the opportunity to see if i had not been a soldier in the united states army. it affected me. and i know it helped me and maybe even made me a better person. i know my brother tom, who served with me in vietnam, feels the same about his service in the united states army. so i deeply appreciate, general sullivan, the privilege to address not only the strongest advocates for america's army, but also our one million plus active duty guard and reserve soldiers. to understand the place of honor they hold across our military, one need only look to the words of navy seal and recently-retired admirable bill mcraven who earlier this year said there is no more noble calling in the world than to be a soldier in the united states army. together we had a time of great transition for the army and the nation it serves. in december as we responsibly end our combat role in afghanistan and transition to a train and advise and assist mission, the afghan national security forces will be fully responsible for their country's security. an accomplishment made possible by the tremendous sacrifices of american troops, our isaf partners and the afghan people. as the army emerges from over 13 years of large scale combat operations -- the longest in its history -- it faces new challenges. the world is becoming more volatile, less predictable and, in many ways, more threatening. at the same time, our defense budgets are declining. the theme that you've chosen for this year, trusted professionals today and tomorrow, is well suited to describe the kind of soldiers america will need as we navigate this period of change and uncertainty. before i address where the army is and where it's going, we should remind ourselves and the american people of where the army is coming from. over the past 13 years, more than one million soldiers deployed to the wars in iraq and afghanistan. one out of six of these soldiers was deployed to both countries. more than half a million soldiers, 30% of them guardsmen and reservists, endured all multiple deployments. and as ground forces, they shouldered a very heavy burden. they fought in the mud and the sand and the streets doing most of the fighting and dying and adapting under fire to a kind of conflict far different from what the army trained and prepared for during and after the cold war. 70% of u.s. personnel wounded in action over the last 13 years were from the u.s. army. and countless soldiers have come home with visible and invisible wounds of war. our end during obligation to take care of them and their families is a sacred respondent that we must always uphold. through the crucible of combat and a grinding counterinsurgency campaign, the american soldier fought on. and as a result, today's army is as battle tested as it's ever been. of all the soldiers who served in iraq since 2003, nearly half are still on active duty or in the guard and reserves. of those who served in afghanistan, almost two-thirds are are still in the army. the strength, the resilience and dedication of these soldiers are what the army is about, are what make the army the foundation of america's national security and our military's global presence and engagement. and the army's contributions to our security are as critical today as ever. we see it in west africa where soldiers from fort campbell and fort bragg will soon deply as a key part of america's contribution to the global effort to stop the spread of ebola before it becomes an even more grave threat. we see it in poland and the baltics where soldiers from fort hood's first cavalry division are reinforcing and reassuring our allies in the face of russian aggression. we see it in iraq where soldiers from the big red one, first infantry division, are deploying to train, advise and assist kurdish and iraqi forces in the fight against isil. and we'll soon see it in saudi arabia where soldiers will help train and equip members of the moderate syrian opposition. the president has been very clear that he will not commit our armed forces to fighting another ground war in iraq or become involved in a war in syria. this is not because we think that wars cannot be waged without committing troops to combat. our strategy in iraq and syria does require forces on the ground. but they must be local forces, and we will help them, we will support them, we will train them. this is not only the best way to degrade and ultimately defeat terrorists, but it is the only sustainable path to defeating terrorism and extremism. this is a critical point that chairman dempsey and the chiefs of defense from 21 other nations discussed yesterday at andrews air force base. at an important conference that helped reip force our coalition against isil. in the near term, the army is unlikely to repeat another iraq or afghanistan-type campaign. that is, regime change and occupation followed by nation building under fire. however, this does not mean that demand for the army diminishing or that the army's place in our national security strategy is eroding. it is not. while there are no longer 150,000 soldiers in ground wars in iraq and afghanistan as there were phi years ago -- five years ago, there are still almost as many soldiers either deployed or forward stationed in nearly 150 locations around the world. that includes some 80,000 soldiers in the pacific command area of responsibility. more than any other. with nearly 20,000 soldiers in south korea standing ready to fight tonight, there are also 40,000 soldiers under central command, 28,000 soldiers in europe and thousands more in both africa and south america, some of whom i visited in colombia last week. the demands on the army will only grow more diverse and complicated going forward. threats from terrorists and insurgents will remain with us for a long time, but we also must deal with the revisionist russia, with its modern and capable army on nato's doorstep. and as discan resultative technologies and destructive weapons proliferate in the hands of state and nonstate actors, the specter of so-called hybrid warfare looms large. where our adversaries marry the tactics of insurgents with the tools of advanced armed forces and their sophisticated technologies. the army will remain essential to helping deer the and confront every national security threat facing our country. there will always be a need for a modern, ready, well-equipped, well-trained standing army. but maintaining a ready and capable army as we come out of the 13 years of continuous large scale combat will not be easy. for the army to fulfill its role as a guarantor of our national security, our soldiers must continue to be exceptionally well led, well trained and well equipped. that's especially true because the global security environment is more unpredictable than ever with crises erupting at any time, crisis cease that require america to reed the world in response. -- to lead the world in response. we must not forget the lessons of history. we've seen how quickly a battle-hardened army can wither into a force that is ill equipped and ill prepared to carry out its mission, and we've seen the consequences. in july 1950, five years after america's military victory in world war ii, the soldiers of task force smith were sent to the first battle of the korean war with orders to halt the north korean advance. they were undertrained, underequipped, outnumbered and unprepared. and within hours of engaging the enemy, task force myth was routed, ultimately suffering a casualty rate of nearly 30%. soldiers paid for poor training, poor equipment and poor leadership with their lives. we've also seen how past drawdowns sought to protect the training and equipment that is the essence of military readiness. when general sullivan was army chief of staff in the early 1990 after desert storm and the end of the cold war, the army made the difficult but necessary decision to reduce size of the force in order to safeguard readiness. with no more task force smiths as its mantra. as general sullivan said at the time, and i quote: the reason we cut the tuitions was to keep what we retained trained and ready. today no more task force smiths must once again be our motto. we need to maintain an exceptionally ready army. but because of the steep, deep and abrupt defense budget cuts that sequestration has imposed on us, last year the army had to cancel so many critical training rotations that we had only two active duty brigade combat teams that were fully ready and available to execute a major combat operation. thanks to the budget compromise that the president and congress reached last december and the army's relentless focus on training, army readiness has improved from where it was a year ago. with 12 out of 37 brigade combat teams that are trained to the highest levels of readiness. while this is a direct result of the army's ability to adapt to unreasonable budget constraints, it falls short of what i believe is sufficient to defend our nation and our allies with minimum risk. we must continue to put readiness first in the current budget environment which is why we have modestly reduced the size of the army and protected training and maintenance in our budget. trading readiness for capacity is the path to a hollow force. our soldiers deserve better than that. they deserve a stable and predictable budget that gives them and their families the training and the support they need. but despite temporary relief, sequestration remains the law of land. if congress does not act, it will return in 2016, stunting and reversing the army's readiness just as we've begun to recover. and requiring even more dramatic reductions in force structure. the military as a whole will face a similar readiness crisis if congress does not accept the program cuts and compensation reforms we have proposed in our budgets. across dod we could face a $70 billion gap in our budget over the next five years if congress prevents us from moving forward, moving forward with these changes. and we would have little choice but to make up the differences through cuts to readiness. dod's leaders understand that there will be less resources available. but the army and our military needs congress to be a partner in responsible, long-term planning and budgeting. and we will continue to urge congress to put an end to sequestration, an irresponsible deferral of responsibility. i greatly appreciate general sullivan's and asusa's support for ending sequestration and also for your support on many of our hard but necessary trade-offs made to protect readiness in dod's budget proposal. we must also continue to press congress to join us in making these tough decisions. because our challenges will become far more difficult and far more dangerous the longer we defer the tough choices. army leadership has expressed their concerns about cloud of uncertainty. i've been very clear, chairman dempsey has been very clear, we've been clear with congress, with our troops, with their families and with the american people. i share many of these concerns of the army's leadership. but as we work through our current budget challenges, the army must still face the new reality of shrinking resources, sustained demands and a more competitive and unpredictable strategic environment. an environment that our current defense strategy remains capable of addressing. the army and our entire military will need to continue thinking critically about its future role and missions to insure that it is not only ready, but relevant for both the short and the long-term missionings. it will need -- missions. it will need to continue to learn, adapt, evolve and innovate. readiness demands agility. i want to commend secretary mchugh and general odierno for taking the critical first steps in this direction. setting the course for the army's force 2025 and beyond and shaping the new army operating concept unveiled over the past week here at ausa. i will continue to work closely with pote of them -- with both of them and all of our army leaders to build the army the nation needs, the army the nation deserves and the army that our troops need for the future. to succeed, i believe the army must renew its commitment to readiness across three critical resources; its people, its capabilities and its partnerships. first, the army must keep a laser focus on the readiness of its most precious resource, its people. because soldiers, to quote general clayton abrams, are not in the army, they are the army. our soldiers need to be well trained at all levels from the individual to the brigade. and they must be prepared to face challenges from across the spectrum of conflict. the continuities of warfare remind us that even as we prepare against high end threats like cyber and precision miss sills -- missiles, the human dimension of war is inescapable. we cannot forget what we've learned about counterterrorism, counterinsurgency and building partner capacity. we must retain those skills. at the same time, our soldiers must also be ready for full spectrum operations. that takes time. it takes resources. to be ready for the range of challenges we'll most likely face in the future, soldiers need to experience nonlinear, full spectrum training that mimics today's complex operational environments. this kind of decisive action, this kind of decisive action training is best conducted at the army's combat training centers, the joint readiness training center at fort polk, louisiana, and the national training center at fort irwin, california, which i will visit next month. at these brigade-level training centers, soldiers are immersed in realistic threat scenarios where they fix a dynamic mix of guerrilla and near-peer conventional opposing forces. in addition to preparing soldiers for full spectrum operations, decisive action training helps develop the kind of agile, adaptive and innovative leaders that the army needs to be ready for future threats. many army leaders already recognize that in a volatile world with a wide range of missions, we can no longer get by with training soldiers what to think, we must train them how to think so they thrive in conditions of uncertainty and cay -- chaos, that are unpredictable to our adversaries. going forward, whether we can keep our soldiers ready in the future will depend on congress' partnership in providing the resources to fund the training our soldiers need. second, the army must be ready with the right capabilities. both today and in the future. insuring that the equipment our soldiers currently have is well maintained and that we continue to innovate going forward. more than any other service the army is well suited to this task. because the army knows its key weapons platforms for everything tell comes down to the -- still comes down to the soldier. it also knows that a capability is about more than just new technology or equipment. with less money. it's also about how we creatively use our technology and equipment to achieve our objectives. the army has begun adapting capabilities to be ready for the most likely missions of the future. prepositioned equipment stocks can support a wider range of operations. and even flying apache helicopters off navy ships to gauge how army aviation could contribute toly to haval surface -- la tomorrow surface welfare, enabling combat helicopter pilots to monitor feeds and operators' weapons from linked aerial drones and testing driverless resupply convoys that can free up manpower for more important tasks. to stay ready for future challenges, the army must keep innovating for the long term with our ongoing rebalance to the asia-pacific, the army could broaden its role by leveraging its current suite of long range precision-guided missiles, rockets, artillery and air defense systems. these capabilities would provide multiple benefits such as hardening the defenses of u.s. installations, enabling greater mobility, greater mobility of navy aegis destroyers and other joint force assets and helping insure the free flow of commerce. this concept is worthy of consideration going forward. such a mission is not as foreign to the army as it might seem. after the war of 1812, the army was tasked with america's coastal defense for more than 100 years. finally, one thing we've learned over the past 13 years is that the army is effective at more than combined arms maneuver and wide area security. it's also exceptionally effective at training and exercising with friends and allies, helping them grow stronger while improving interoperability for the future. building partner capacity is one of the army's most valuable capabilities which is why the army must continue taking steps to expand and diversify its partnerships. while insuring that this critical mission continues to be embraced throughout the army's institutions. though we must also be clear-eyed about our missions. building partner capacity cannot happen in a vacuum, as we've seen in iraq this year. political context is critical. as is ethos, esprit de corps and especially leadership. today the army is better positioned to work with partners because of its regional aligned forces. nearly every unit from division headquarters to theater enablers to combat brigades is now aligned with a geographic region which makes it easier for the army to provide tailored, responsive forces to engage with our allies and our partners. and pause soldiers receive specialized cultural, regional and language training before deploying, they can were the understand local -- they can better understand local underlying social, political, economic, historical factors that all are involved this securing. ultimately, making them more effective in accomplishing the mission, shaping the security environment has now become a core competency for the army. so rather than return to garrison, our soldiers must remain prepared to engage around the world. those stationed here at home must be trained and ready to respond to a full range of contingencies, whether a mission includes building partner capacity, reassuring and reinforcing allies or providing humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. across all these efforts, people, capabilities and partnerships, keeping the army ready, ready for today's and tomorrow's challenges will not be ease -- easy. the future security environment remains uncertain, and trying to predict it will continue to be as challenging as ever. six months after austrian archduke franz ferdinand was assassinated in sarajevo, president wilson spoke to congress, and he predicted a growing cordiality among nations for shadowing an age of subtle peace and goodwill. he spoke those words 101 years ago. we all know that history proved the president wrong. the so-called war to end all wars was anything but a war to end all wars. a century later, we cannot know, we cannot know for sure what conflicts, challenges or threats the next 100 years may bring or the next 10 years may bring. we cannot say for certain whether history will be repeated or made anew. but we must prepare our institutions, must prepare our institutions for the unexpected and the uncertain. that is the greatest responsibility of leadership. we know there are risks, we know we will make mistakes, but the american people depend upon an army to be prepared. they trust that army. to be prepared. they expect and know the army will be prepared. and i know, everyone here knows those who represent today's army in this room know that we will not fail them. gordon sullivan, to you and ausa and everyone in this room, thank you for your continued leadership and allowing me an opportunity to give you some of my thoughts and to recognize you for what you do. thank you. [applause] .. personable addressable online ads. in action to person addressable interactions through social networks. i think now is a pretty wide swath of which you can call digital. >> we moved it from the broadcast era, still at the tail end of what we've known as really from the early '60s, broadcast television has dominated. and so as we evolve into a addressable television and all that stuff is moving into a relationship area. we have known that in the commercial sector that if you're going, when you build brand coming of someone who is advocating for and influencing their spirit of friends. how is it we move just knowing that only what the message is because we got good politics knowing what the right messages to deliver to people. do better to make sure we do the right messenger is to deliver that message. >> tonight at nine eastern on the communicate is on c-span2. >> here are just a few of the comments we've recent receipt from our viewers. >> i've been battling my local cable provider here, cablevision, in new jersey for over 18 months now to stop offering c-span in high-definition. >> i never do anything like this before i thoroughly enjoyed this program. i like the history channel where i live in naples, florida, and i thought this was absolutely really magnificent. i just sat glued to my chair for the whole hour. and i will continue to turn back to this broke them again. >> i just want to first start off by allowing c-span to know that i do not watch any other channel on my cable selection, besides this. and c-span one, two, and three, so i really want to show my appreciation for this, for your services there, and your ability to we keep it mixed up and really keep alive a. >> continue to let us do what you think about the programs, call us at (202) 626-3400, e-mail us at comments@c-span.org or send us a tweet at c-span hashtag comments. join the c-span conversation, like us on facebook, follow us on twitter. >> the foreign policy research institute in the kenyan institute host a discussion on u.s. efforts in promoting him hocrisy internationally. where ambassador to the czech republic and georgia and representatives from the state department of international relations scholars are among those taking part in this. the first panel will be focused on whether to provide assistance to democratic countries. it will be a break and a second panel starting at about 11, look at the effectiveness of current u.s. democracy assistance programs. should begin any moment now. live coverage john c-span2. [inaudible conversations] -- live coverage on c-span2. [inaudible conversations] >> all right. [inaudible conversations] >> all right, good morning, everyone. i think we will get started. i am met with chomsky, director of the kennan institute. i'm very pleased to be able to cosponsor and present this conference to you. welcome all of you this money. is a question this is a time and important subject to it's always been important subject but i think and never has it been more timely for us in particular in the russia ukraine former soviet world, the question of whether democracy, the development of democracy, democracy building and democracy promotion matters, whether can be successful in what other tools it takes to make it so. these are questions i think we will address today, particularly compelling now. everything questions on which many other important questions hinge, including those of security and ross petty, not only for the region that we work on at the kennan institute but for the wider world. i look forward during the insights that are panelists have, that all of you have ever looked forward to spirited discussion. and four and the full over to ambassador, i want to thank them, adrian basora for taking point on organizing this entire event for many months now which has become more and more and more compelling as we've approached the date as well as ambassador kenneth yalowitz who unfortunately, due to trans siberian syndrome i guess recall, he just came off a two and half week train journey from beijing to moscow and picked up a cold undertake, you remember, we all got on the train last year. was not able to join us today. i also want to thank my deputy, will pomerantz, will moderate the next panel, melinda haring, madison brady, and many others have made this possible. ambassador before, i think will introduce the first conference. >> -- ambassador badora. >> thanks very much, and welcome to you all. ken has the dual head of have a bit associate with the project of democratic transition for the last nine years since its inception, and being a global fellow here at the kennan institute, so working with him, with will pomerantz and matt rojansky, we put together. you are trying to give us the credit. it would not at all the possible without extraordinaire cooperation we've had with you. so let me thank you have a wonderful team here at the kennan institute and the wilson center, and for these wonderful facilities that you have provided as well. it would be very hard to imagine a more appropriate venue for today's event than the woodrow wilson center. given that president wilson started it all in some sense a century ago when he called for the united states to strive to make the world safe for democracy. furthermore the timing could not be more opportune. as matt suggested it was opportune we started planning it last spring, even more so. this is the 20 for the anniversary, give or take a couple of weeks, i'll the fall of the berlin wall and the entire change of central europe, the revolutions in central europe. but it's also a season of severe testing or threat to democracy. in many of the same countries where things look promising two decades ago, but also most notably in ukraine and hong kong today. we are extraordinarily fortunate in having as our lead speakers today two of the most revered are respected american figures in the field of democratic transitions, carl gershman, for over 30 years president of the national endowment for democracy, and larry diamond, who is right in the front row, second row, one of our most imminent scholars of democratization as you know based at stanford university in the hoover institute. and we are also pleased, very pleased to have asked a panel several outstanding younger scholars and practitioners in our two panels. who have been chosen for their fresh perspectives and the often dissenting views from the conventional wisdom of the traditional policies of the last 30 years. indeed, one of the goals of this conference -- could we have, if they're our guests in the back row, could we have them move up? we don't need to use all -- the reserved seats can be used at least for this session rather than you having to all be stuck in the back. if you're able to stay full session. as i started to say, one of the goals of this conference is to engage the younger generation in deciding what we should or should not do. what we should be system from doing. -- be system in the area of democracy in the air senator coats appropriate the next generation of a major voice in or relating the new consensus, hopefully what we'll get is a new consensus. you have bios but i think it is only two of our speakers by name. you have bio in your conference packages. you have bio information on all of them. our goal today is have a really intense and focused discussion where people of a chance to engage, the panelists have a chance to engage with each other. they have dissenting and differing views. and then leaving plenty of time for discussion with you. so that is why we're going to dismiss a lot of the formalities. before going on, thomas malia was agreed, whose her fourth panelist is stuck in traffic. he's pretty confident in being here in time to engage in the discussion, but we just want to explain that will be hopefully part of the agenda. here are the three central questions that we've asked our speakers and i ask you, the audience president and the audience is in the webcast. to think about and focus on during this entire day. three questions. three topics. three issues. first, showed support for democratic transitions continued to be a major goal of u.s. foreign policy? particularly in view of a drastically changed circumstances that we face today as compared to the 1990s. what prior is surely give to democracy support when it conflicts with other major u.s. national interests? that's the first cluster of issues. the macro issue. there's room in the front row your keeping use the reserved seats for now. please, up. second issue, if we should continue policies of active support for democracy abroad, what do we need to do differently to make it work more effectively? where should we focus our efforts in the coming decades, and what should future democracy assistance programs look like if we indeed continue that? third question, if we should no longer continue providing active support to democratization abroad, then what should be the alternatives to our present policies? it's not enough to say no, no, no. no, no. , we haven't done anything right, tell us what we should do differently. for example, should america still work to support human rights and basic freedoms abroad at some level? or should we entirely instead drop this traditional deeply rooted in of u.s. foreign policy in favor of a more cold i reality, a pure realpolitik. before going any further, let me underline one key definition in framing today's discussions, central for proper framing of the discussions. what we do not mean by democracy support is the imposition of democracy through external intervention on the model of afghanistan, iraq or other places. instead our focus today is on the pros and cons of assisting and nurturing existing attempt at transition, and supporting new locally driven attempt to transition when and if they occur as we did the velvet revolution, for example, or so many others, the roundtable agreements in poland come to mind powerfully as well. just a quick word about fpri, foreign policy research institute, and our project, its project on democratic transitions. by the way the acoustics all right in the back row? we think of ourselves, i think we are an innovative agile think tank based in philadelphia we especially pride ourselves in trying to maintain an independent outside the beltway perspective on global issues. this is why we dare to tackle so many issues that are debated and disagreed on in washington and try to take them from a different perspective. a few we might build a help the new middleground. your conference folders come if you don't have one i think there are some still outside on the table outside. this is thomas melia. welcome. you made it t through the traff. i mean you made it safely. so you have in these folders conference folders, you have a one page summary of fpri's activity coming up here today with us as pri's president, alan luxenberg, right here to introduce our luncheon speaker. so you have a little bit of chance and there are several of us here who are members who are scholars affiliated with fpri to the program on democratic transitions. when fdr invited me almost 10 years ago now to start this program, to set up a program on democratic transition come is mostly the postponement of transitions that we focused on. and at that time the leaders of the orange revolution had just come to power as you all recall, and the energy and initially positive outcomes that seem to be happening in the first months and couple of years of that revolutionary movement, and more importantly of the many precedents of the 1990s, successful beginnings of transitions of that period, led many, i would say most analysts and policymakers to believe that the prospects for post-authoritarian transitions, not only in the post-communist world but prospects for democratization in formally authoritarian commissioner very promising, but only in the kindest countries, former comments countries but also in other areas of the world. of course, when the russian, soviet federation fell apart, people were even more optimistic. today, by contrast we see authoritarian regression in many of these same countries. as well as deeply disappointing results over the past three plus years in the so-called arab spring countries. therefore, the background for our coverage today is one of significant, i recalled democratic disillusionment, and much questioning as the efficacy of u.s. policies in support of democracy abroad. therefore my hope today is that we will come away from our proceedings, this conference, with a clearer sense of whether this current pessimism or discouragement is warranted, and whether democratic retrenchment, either on the ground in countries overseas or in the u.s. policies in support of democracy abroad, whether that retrenchment is inevitable or whether there are new rationales and new approaches that might permit us to deal more effectively with these resurgent autocratic trends. so those are the three questions, and that is, and i want to stress once more our desire for real dialogue, not talking past each other, not making speeches but looking for alternatives to the extent that any of our panelists or any of the audience disagree with current policy. so we've asked our speakers be very brief in the initial presentations, and they've all said they will try to stay very short but our moderator who is kindly stepped in for ken yalowitz at the last moment because of his flu, has promised to be very strict with his gavel and his clock, his watch, and so presentations by our for panelists, vinegar brief round where they can respond to each other at a pointer to the maven some led by the others, comments, and then we'll open it. above all the want of your comments and questions of think about your questions but please keep them brief. your questions and comments, but these keep them brief when the time comes. i think will have a microphone, is that correct? when the time comes for questions. so what we are seeking here is really engagement and discussions that really stimulate fresh thinking and help break new ground. so thanks to our very large turnout, as you can see we have moved the sessions into this large auditorium in which no food is allowed. the result of that, when we come after the second panel we have a very short time to move intothe wilson dining room in order to permit our luncheon speaker, our keynote speaker, larry diamond, at proper time to make his presentation. he has agreed to speak as you beat. when you into the coverage and, very important that you grab your lunch, beverage quickly, sedans we get started very promptly. larry will speak, doctor diamond will speak for 30 minutes and then we will have 30 minutes of discussion. immediately after that we will write in the same room go into the final panel that you see on your program, and the idea that is to have four different, three '04 different members of the organizers of this conference give you their takeaways. they will be different take with but we view this as a starting point for further discussion and further deepening of our understanding of these issues and what the way forward is on these issues. now, as you probably have noticed, the cameras in the back, the entire, the c-span is broadcasting all of these proceedings, all the proceeds in this auditorium life. unfortunately for tactical reasons they cannot switch over to the lunch session, and the entire webcast, the entire conference will be webcast and will be available on the can institute and the foreign policy research institute websites. finally, we encourage you to tweak and ask questions using the hashtag democracy matters, all one word. so thank you, well, for stepping in their country turned over to you to strictly keep to the agenda. thank you. >> well, thank you very much, mr. ambassador. and welcome to the first panel on revisiting the case for democracy assistance -- revisiting the case for democracy assistance. we have a group of distinguished speakers. their biographies are in the panel but this is really a distinguished group they can get to the basic question about how to prioritize democracy promotion and where to allocate different resources as we go forward. the first speaker is carl gershman to it is of course a great privilege for me to introduce carl gershman who not only has led the national endowment for democracy for decades, but was also my boss for a good seven years. coral, the floor is yours. >> is this on? thanks very much. it's a great pleasure to be your. i've been given 10 minutes to give you a picture of a world. i'll do it as a snapshot and speak in jordan. so i will raise a lot of issues. you'll be able, w with all the talk about all of them. very different today than it was 25 years ago, 30 years ago when he got started. when the third wave of democratization press, communism collapsed and the marks appear to be dominant. it was a great of a a lot of allusions in my view. democracy was supposed the inevitable. all countries were thought to be like poland which we were going to welcome united states and there was no longer needed in the views of a lot of people. the government could step in and do the job that these issues were no longer terribly sensitive. there was something called the transition paradigm where democracy which is progress and transition countries according to certain stages, marc plattner here and larry pollution article by tom carruthers on that and 2002 but it was a period which i think, charles called it a vacation from history. today i think we're a lot wiser. withstand how difficult it is to build democratic societies, especially in countries of that lacks strong institutions and middle-class. now the strong resistance is from the old establishment. this doesn't mean people don't want democracy. they are fighting for it. china and russia, venezuela and saudi arabia, from pakistan. it doesn't mean there hasn't been, and it doesn't mean there's been some kind of failure of democracy promotion which in my view trivializes the problem which has five broad dimensions. the first is that there is a growing effort by the world's hypocrisy to push back whose purpose, and whose purpose is to control civil society and independent media, to contain democracy, to project their own version of reality into the flow of information around the world and to modify the international norm and body in the universal declaration by elevating the principle of sovereignty above all others. we call that the pushback. the second is the dismal fate of recent efforts to achieve successful democratic transition, most notably failure of the arab spring uprising to produce any significant gain for democracies fade -- state. these uprising which generate such hopes for democratic progress had succumbed to authoritarian backlash and the growth of extremist movements, autocrats have successfully retained power and would have faced a concerted challenge they have not hesitated to use the savage violence as we know industry. the third problem involves backbiting in countries that were once considered stable or newly consolidating democracies but which are now experiencing this verge of populism, extreme nationalism threats to independent media and civic institution. thailand, the trend toward the liberal the marks in hungary, the growing centralization of power in turkey, the retreat in venezuela and other countries in latin america our example of such backsliding. the weakness of the response of the worlds major democracies to the challenges posed by the new authoritarian assertiveness is the fourth problem your speaking to the conference on ukraine in asian partnership that we organize five years ago, said adecco, politics, that politics worth economic interests are put above basic political values are not only immoral, they are suicidal. thinking about ukraine today, the ukraine -- has said the valleys sacrifice the security, we will lose both. the suicidal tendency to elevate the near interest over values is today's stronger than ever in both europe and the united states. he was speaking about the weakness of europe but the united states is also at fault in the silence in latin america towards the erosion of democratic freedoms in many countries has been deafening. we live in a time when the words of the poet william buckley hates has special relevance. the worst are filled with passionate intensity. the fifth problem has been a crisis of democracy in the united states and other leading democracies, a crisis that has many to mention, political polarization a governmental paralysis, our failed to rebuild infrastructure and my new human capital are controlled entitlement spending. and the financial crisis of 2008 that undermined the influence of standing of use and other democracies, the impact by the rise and shine which claims be an alternative model of autocratic capitalism. now, the situation is by no means all gloomy. i will point very quickly to three factors which go in the other direction. while there has been a democracy recession, as larry has called, there has not been in reverse in the number of electoral democracies which peaked at one of 23 is now according to freedom house at 116. that's not a reverse wave. there's also been democratic resilience during the economic crisis of 2008 which surprised a lot of people that weren't massive collapse of democracy with economic crisis and there were democracy movements today with real vigor in hong kong, ukraine, the maidan and other countries. we must also recognize some of the fundamental problems that affect the state of democracy and little to do with the success or failure of efforts to a democracy. however, effective or ineffective some of them might have been. first and foremost we have to commit ourselves to the restoration of american leadership in the world. this is the expression of american arrogance or a reckless form of overreaching but rather it is the recognition of a fundamental geopolitical reality. the world without u.s. primacy, sam huntington wrote two decades ago, would be a world with more violence and discord and less democracy and economic growth than a world with the united states continues to more influence than any other country in shaping global affairs. president obama himself acknowledged this point in his speech last year to the u.n. general assembly when he told u.s. disengagement a danger of the world, and to mistake and would create a vacuum of leadership that no other nation is ready to fill. the urgent challenge is for the is to exercise leadership in a convincing manner so that the vacuum is not filled by the hostile powers or by chaos and violence. the problem today is not overreaching as some analysts want to say or trying to impose democracy in other countries, which is ridiculous to assert today. we need to return to a policy of real engagement. that doesn't mean draining our resources by getting bogged down in these wars but it does mean acting of our diplomacy with military power in deterrence and yet does of which we will have little leverage in negotiations with countries that do not share our commitment to peace and the rule of law. why should they negotiate series if they feel they have the option of achieving their objective by other means including the use of force? why should we hold back from providing ukraine with the wherewithal it needs to defend itself? i would call your attention to the article in the "washington post" led by senator levin and send in off. by the restoration of his leadership will not be possible unless we have the political will and capacity to bring the spiraling u.s. debt under control. over the last decade the growth of the gross federal debt has tripled and now exceeds the total use gross domestic product. want a many reasons for the continuing public search, content search in public debt, including the 2008 fiscal crisis, the wars in iraq and afghanistan, the principal tactic has been in comments many which is gone from less than one-third of the federal budget deficit to go to more than two-thirds today. in the words of robert simonson, the welfare state is taking over government. other priorities are subtly being squeezed out from investment in infrastructure and human capital to international programs and even defense spending which is expected to shrink by over 40% over the next decade. but there are things it can be done to address the other problems i mentioned, even though there are no quick or magic bullet solutions to in conclusion just give a quick list of some of these things. the efforts to push back against the growing autocratic oppression must be continued and expanded to allow this been going on in this area but more needs to be done. president obama's statement on defending civil society made last month in his speech to the clinton global initiative is a step in the right direction if there's real policy. the effort by the house foreign affairs committee, ed royce, eliot engel, to reform the governance structure of the circuit greatest like radio liberty and radio free asia is an important step to account for the information offensive that is being laid out today by russia and other autocracies. of the difficulty of achieving successful democratic transitions, i think it's important civil society and protest activists to learn some lessons from past failures such as the need to prepare to engage in political action and take responsibility for governance in the event that the protest movements lead to the downfall of autocratic regimes. the protest movements must start thinking strategically. this is happening in ukraine today with a lot of the protest leaders taking part in the elections that will be held next week. there are many things that need to be done to reverse or retard what i called democratic backsliding. corruption has to be fought with real determination and in addition to what condition of an assistance programs, something that larry has talked about and i soon will raise today, i think we need to look for new ways to integrate into development strategies, efforts to explicitly build the capacity of independent media which can provide a means for economic growth and accountability against corruption. we also have to develop strategies to strengthen democratic culture by supporting groups committed to building tolerance society also by helping to connect to these groups, civic movements like the new citizen movement in china. with the enough movement in senegal. to connect these movements so they can learn from each other. obviously, we also have to maintain and build up efforts to support indigenous democratic actors to craft remember that democracy must come from within. it can't be exported or impose. this has been the model and its work. steady, cutting edge support over the long term tailored to each local situation. this thought needs to be comprehensive, involving grant support, training, networking like the world movement for democracy, research and political solidarity. democracy activists need all of that, and they place special emphasis on the need for political solidarity at a time when autocratic regimes are cracking down so harshly. finally, we must find a way to rebuild the sense of democratic conviction in the u.s. and europe. i'm just back from the czech republic and i was struck that our friends there are as concerned about the growth of cynicism and illusions about the dangers they face as we are here, some of us are here. we will soon be something the 20th anniversary of the velvet revolution with a ceremony in the u.s. capital unveiling a bust. which were member how strongly he felt about the suicidal character policy that that never economic and security interests so proceed about freedom and human rights and his concern that sacrificing values to serve interest would end up undermining both. i think the best way to rebuild a democratic conviction is to connect americans to people on the front lines of democratic struggles around world, people who know the dangers and/or prepared to sacrifice to defend their dignity. drawing spirit from them and maintain a lifelong of support for their work is important not just for them but for the security and future of her own democracy. thanks. >> thanks a much, carl. >> thank you much. it's a pleasure to be here. let me just note, since i am definitely with the naval war college that my comments today aren't my own opinion and do not reflect any official position of the college or of the u.s. navy. those of us that come from the american realist tradition accept the proposition that american national security in the long run is enhanced by the existence of other well-established stable democracies. on the most part they provide higher standards of living, more responsive to the citizens. generally find ways to resolve conflicts without going to war. they are better, they're transparent and how they engage their affairs. where the rub comes in is two things. the first is that in the short-term, democratizing states lead the user to greater insecurity. those were for me with the work of ian bremmer and his j. curve, you generally have drops in economic prosperity can the general have drops in security, the work that snyder and mansfield and others have done which is you open up close societies, you run the risk of greater complex mix of this great security problems for the u.s. because we generally don't like to see this order, particularly and key parts of the world as we're seeing now in the middle east. second reality that we face is that oftentimes states that democratize can become democracies, may become less close partners of the is in security matters, specifically the case if the u.s. had supported an authoritarian regime that preceded it, then a new regime comes in and they seek to distance itself to a may not seek to adopt the full template of u.s. security agenda. with the difficulties in our national security establishment in being able to reconcile a commitment to the long-term which is to have spread of democracy and then realizing that short-term impacts of democratization may not be supportive of the u.s. security interests. we, of course, have seen this in parts of latin america, parts of the middle east we have seen in some parts of asia and then across the eurasian space. then, of course, we come back to the question, well, what about our model in eastern europe, central and east europe? i think it is important for us to take a few minutes to look at how and why come under what conditions american nationals a good interest and a commitment to democratization went hand in hand. that will help us tease out some of the factors we should look for when we're trying to reconcile in other parts of the world some of the distinctions that are there. first thing, of course, is that east european states had clear security threats when they were escaping from the soviet bloc. they were always have been concerned about a resurgent russia. they were concerns in the time in the 1990 about germany. these states have real security issues that led him to seek partnership with the trendy. this, of course, is where conditionality played a big role because the united states could make demands and requests of those governments that if they want a closer security and political relationships wit wite united states, if they want a membership in there, if you want to be involved in the european union, there were standards they would have to meet. so that we could say that we could use that as a very important lever for pursuing and encouraging domestic reform. we also had a certain degree of competence in the 1990s that we could support a process without having to worry about outcomes. that is, we did not have come we did a look at many of the central and east european states and say, only a few the political parties here are pro-western and pro-american, and the others to be anti-american. and may be opposed to an american agenda. it allows us to focus on process rather than of them. we did not have great worries when the polish communists came in after solidarity's term of government that all of a sudden they were going to rip up everything that had been done, reverse poland's direction. in fact, the ex-communists in poland were as supportive of western emigration from membership of nato, membership in the european union, of solidarity in any of the other political movements in poland. that allowed our democracy promotion efforts to avoid the appearance of trying to pick winners and losers in their domestic political process. weighted breakdown in russia in 1996 where we pretty much had a sense that yeltsin's victory, boris yeltsin's victory was an american imperative. we had to make sure that the other did not win the final round of the presidential election. so that is where we begin to see some deviation from that where it wasn't something about supporting process. it was about looking at the outcomes, political outcomes that we wanted, and then as we've gone back and looked at that with a willingness to have to come from is the process, to allow the democratic process to be compromised in order to ensure that president yeltsin would have his second term in office. and finally one critical part of the central east european experience, which may not be replicated in other parts of the world was that the fact that the united states government put its full faith and credit behind the democracy process was very important to local government looked at that as part of the validation of the reform process that they were doing to the fact that u.s. officials, ambassado ambassadors, the government functionaries were involved and for supporting this process was seen as a positive for the process. and so, therefore, look at this experience it can be contagious that it worked in east europe, and we had the idea that every country is poland a moment to do is take the polish model and applied elsewhere and will have the same results. i think if we misapplied eastern european expansion to go in eurasia today and in the middle east, it can lead us to a contradiction but it leads also to disappointment on our part. why isn't it working out the way it is supposed to? why aren't we seeing the emergence of political movements that both support democratic process but also aligned themselves with the u.s.? we can see different reasons. we see certainly in the middle east that popular opinion is not particularly supportive of the u.s. national security agenda in the region. so democratization if we want to have more popular input and have governments are run, the trade off is to accept that there's going to be governments depended -- if there depend on there will of this is for legitimacy it will constrain what they can do in terms of cooperating with the united states. sometimes political movements that are seeking interim democratic reform are not seeking security goals that favor the united states. the green movement in iran was not going to necessarily dismantle iran's nuclear program. it was not going to be a big part of the issue so we could support them, or not support the as the case may be, whether not we should do that because it supports our values is one thing but the argument that some of supporting that movement was going to lead to a geopolitical change in the middle east, the facts don't seem to point that. we don't have the same sweeteners in terms of european union and nato expansion in other parts of the world. we can't offer that kind of conditionality to say there's a light at the end of the topic is a very much what helped to keep the east europeans on the track and on the straight and narrow between the balkans, that the idea that there was an end goal of joining the european union and nato, we don't have those tools and other parts of the world and maybe more difficult to encourage that. certainly the rise of china allows for the possibility that we could use that as conditionality, but they could also flip in the other direction which is we become so anxious to be allies for china that will overlook a multitude of democratic sense at home if it means we're putting people into our camp. finally, just on the last question, the last 30 seconds or so, i think we need to recognize that this tension is you. we can't wish it away between are short term security interests under long-term values. some the things we may want to discuss any open discussion, does this mean we need to separate some aspects of the democracy promotion agenda from day to day diplomacy and governance? do we want to have more civil society participation, less micromanagement from organs of government? the extent to which democracy movements feared u.s. government involvement because that may leak into being tagged as u.s. agents. and, finally, just to end on this point, i think we have to recognize as the democracy promotion movement regains its initiative, as i think it will, we will have to live with the facts that the leaders that are produced as a like to say more meru swen adenauer, and the people come to power, they will be democratic but not necessarily going to sign up on the u.s. agenda. with the difficulties in the past with leaders like neru. we prefer they be adenauer's and i think we need to find ways to expect that how are we going to interact with the future neru's that will be emerging, particularly in the middle east and asia and that ultimately we hope across the eurasian space. >> thanks for much, nikolas. barak? >> thank you. i'm going to be very brief and say that on the democracy assistance has been successful. i think tom or others will probably make a strong case for it. i agree with all of that. i think it has been very successful and that would just leave it at that and focus on some of the challenges. i should say also that i'm coming from the world bank and these are my own views, not of the bank but no one at the bank tried to study so there's a democratization movement going with in the bank, too. i think ideas matter and i think how we frame problems in the world matter. and i think if we look, if you just watch five or 10 minutes of news, you get the sense of security crises out of control, that we've got border crisis and we've got terrorism and the long war, and we've got drug wars. there's just all of these problems. the ebola panic, and we just see the way that we frame the challenges, that we have today. there's a very heavy emphasis on there's a world that is eventually going to do everything we can to keep ourselves safe and keep all these threats from abroad from wreaking havoc at home. this is not the first time that we've seen the world of this with the this is a recurrence. indicia. you can go back to after world war i, the immigration crises and close the borders, or the communist threat in the 1950s. and other treats of her history we've been able to rebound to the ship and hope we get a more balanced focus on the balance -- the problems we face today but i think it's fair to say that we are in a period where u.s. foreign policy is very heavily influenced by security concerns above all those. and i think that matters because it determines policies, determines the types of programs, that we act to protect our national interest. i'll give you a contrast with the way that we frame problems of the world bank in which is about the poorest of the poor and how do we ensure inclusive roads? every time i have a project proposal i need to say this is going to benefit the poorest in society, this is but an economic conclusion. and you can see how it would have u.s. foreign policy, that was based on trying to spread prosperity abroad and increased economic conclusion would like these to a different set of policies than we have today, which is where i see everything is a security crisis. we have agricultural food security, water security. my favorite new program, its fishery security. in west africa right now the navy is helping farm or fishermen in west africa and prove the security of their fisheries. now, of course they sure security is one way we could talk about the issue but we could also talk about sustainability or development. and that might lead us to a different set of proposals rather than having the u.s. navy taking the lead in fisheries development and working with fishermen in west africa to increase the economic opportunities. and if we frame issues in terms of security challenges, and as all of these threats to our security, then we have to accept that the military is going to take a lead and we now have an intelligence community more than a dozen agencies -- i stopped count when i was doing some research on what i was going to say today, and it leads us to, well, sort of blending, we got the national security agency doing spying abroad and here we are not quite sure everything that's going on. leads us to accept a level of lack of accountability on military affairs because, well, the world is a danger's place advantages sort of accept that this is a things are going to be. and i think in the context of lack of faith in our own democratic institutions, this grates a very serious problem. i think i saw last week the latest pew poll had trust in government about somewhere around 20%, which means that a large core of obama's supporters, including me, don't have a lot of faith in the way things in the washington is broken is not just passionate it's a reality i think we have five months of congress not being in power. going around saying we've got perpetual war in syria, this ebola crisis, but meanwhile, our own congress doesn't really seem to feel any need to act. and so i think that this creates -- just be clear i'm not predicting any coups and attorney. this guy said they will be a to in the trinity are not predicting anything like that but i am saying that an excessive reliance on the military in a situation where we lack confidence in our own elected officials who we can control is perhaps not a great situation to if we want to rethink about the balance between security and democracy at about how we can engage abroad in a more productive way to local bring about a more peaceful world, we might want to think about actions we can take on our own to perhaps restore a bit of confidence and credibility in the way we think our own government functions. and so adrian -- ambassador as they would talk about this, you're saying that everything is bad and there's nothing that we can do, so give me some actual ideas to give me a place to start of these the government could realistically do. and so i've come up with a list of ideas that i think hopefully we can consider. first, i think we need to end giving surplus military equipment to police and fire bombs, giving them tanks they don't need is a good for police. certainly not good for us. and i think that maybe perhaps many people abroad sal was going on ferguson, missouri, and said what to expect? why wouldn't he put up arms up against their own people? i think more transparency in u.s. military programs would be a nice thing. we have wars going in somalia and yemen and pakistan it would be nice if we had a bit more knowledge about, about who's being killed and wants the source of this intelligence. how many innocent people are we killing, and not allowing the cia to classify anyone of military age male is a potential combatant. some more transparency in our drones programs and certainly more transparency in our military programs all over the world. i work mainly in africa. i think it would be nice if we brought a bit more democracy to our security affairs. i think nsa surveillance, the nsa's deliberate attempt to weaken the internet in order to improve its capacity to spy on people. i think that would be something that hopefully we can get a bit of a handle on. and i think it would be nice if we talked a bit about the way that we extended order and security into this 100-mile barrier inside the united states, which includes everyone in washington, d.c. because we are within 100 miles of a coast. that gives the border patrol a bit of -- how would you call it? enhanced capacities for interrogation, that i think are a bit worrying. so if none of these are possible, and if you're going to sit and tell me, well, all of these ideas are far outside the realm of what's achievable given the secured a crisis that we face in the world today, then essentially what you are telling me is that efforts to perhaps redo some of the problems in our own democracy are not possible, and if that's the case then we will have a very hard time trying to sell the idea of democracy credibly abroad. thanks so much. >> thanks. tom. >> thanks, wil, thanks for the invitation to join this conversation this morning. in the spirit in which ambassador badora launched as a little while ago, i been thinking about, this is an interactive kind of event. i've been listening intently to each of the three previous speakers, and it may seem at some level that they presented alternative schools of thought or approach to this question so not sure i'm allowed to say this but i agree with all of them. i agree with, in particular, with the way nikolas framed the trade-offs we see our understand of potential short-term benefit our short-term need for such long-term. that's the world in which i live everyday in u.s. government as a sit around tables from that is as pretty as this but trying to talk about how we integrate our interest in strengthening democratic governance and respect for human rights into our policies, very sparse of the world, policies that are driven increasingly by the security imperatives. we are long past the cold war the friend international operating environment for us so neatly, but now there's actually a hot war under way in this global campaign against extremism, violence and terrorism that is in the ascendancy of some key parts of the world. and so that drives, that friends a lot of our discussions about what can we do about democracy in egypt or bahrain or are sure by john or uzbekistan, the principal parts of our relationships for so many countries are driven by national security imperative. that is not theoretical and abstract long-term. it's urgent to the present of a united states laying awake staring at the scene in the middle of the night is who's going to be killed next in the united states or in one of our embassies around the world. i think that that has to be appreciated as we think about how we continue to build out democracy, support and democracy assistance. at a moment come into we are 25 years after the velvet revolution, when is this loss of confidence in the loss of sense of purpose. i was at the same meeting carl was at in prague last week organized by a lot of friends of democracy in eastern europe and the world, and this is, this is kind of the framing art. you may recall the check velvet revolution of the check revolution 25 years ago. i love that there's kind of posters that emerge in the pit. a last week at the forum 2005 congress owes a lot of back drop on the art and this is the cover of the program for the conference, this is a tweet from democracy. i miss how loved i was 25 years ago, tweets democracy forlornly. because the way things democracy is succeeding or durable are worth promoting big i think this cynicism, this gloominess has infested a lot of concerns like this and i'm troubled by that. because i don't think that things are going -- i think we have to appreciate the immensity of the challenge we have set for ourselves. those of us have made the world's troubles, the world's challenges our own here in the united states need to appreciate that it's not going to be quickly or easily done. carl talked about the illusions of the 1990s when it seemed easy after the fall of the berlin wall and the collapse of apartheid and transitions and other parts of the world. we may have gotten too greedy or somehow thinking this was easy, that the transition paradigm's were going to implement themselves and that all we had to do was go along for the ride and take credit for it sometime. but i think what we're finding is that some countries have governments and military establishments and tribal leaders and others who are really much more clearly opposed to this democratization and we encountered in some places and in some periods in the past. so really we are up against much more determined opponent i think than we thought in the '90s in sony parts of the world. they are doubling down on the opposition to our support for civil societies, for fair elections, for political pluralism, for independent media because i think we need to be thinking more strategically and more carefully, and that means also thinking more long-term. i don't think we're going to effect a significant transition in any country for two reasons. one is because it's not up to us. it's been said here that the future of other countries will be determined by the people who live in those countries. and i think we need to acknowledge that in our discussion about democracy assistance, that it's not so much about us and what we do or how wil we do it or how much moy we have, actually about what of the dynamics of who are the leaders in other societies who want to bring the countries into a more modern political arrangement. .. >> we are doing that. and i think that we need to be doing it in a strategic, patient way that acknowledges that it's not just about us, but we need to be prepared for when people have a moment to move their countries in a better direction that we will be supportive of them in the ways that we have been when there are willing governments in various parts of the world willing to accept our technical advice or political assistance. in ways that we continue to do. the millennium challenge corporation is very effective in a certain range of country

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