Lady have contracted covid19. This is a serious moment in which our shared American Values of empathy and charity must be on full display. Its also a moment where the resiliency of our institutions will be tested, as one that highlights the critical importance of medical sciencebased guidance and research. 7. 3 million infected americans and those who have lost their lives, i spent some time every morning in contemplation and prayer for all of them. I turned to the entire first family. They are in my thoughts and prayers this morning and i hope you will join me in wishing them a quick and full recovery in the midst of these challenging moments. And now today gathering, as part of our brookings series, this conference is part of a greater effort to empower voters with factbased, datadriven nonpartisan information to better understand the policy matters discussed by candidates running for office in 2020. The importance cannot be overstated, especially considering the theme of todays event. As witnessed in the lead up to the 2016 election when russian agents launched a Misinformation Campaign against americans, information can be easily weaponized to great effect. Cane types of operations rob individuals of their confidence and desire to exercise their own sacred democratic rate, to vote democratic right, to vote. Especially as the election day draws nearer. Recent reports indicate the kremlin has begun to deploy Artificial Intelligence systems to create false social media accounts and that adds to the urgency of the issue. For those of us who have been following the topic, we know this has been happening for years. Technologies such as bigficial intelligence and Data Analytics have matured and become interconnected. Ifernments must catch up they are to not be left behind. There is also an overwhelming need for a whole of Society Approach to protect everyones right to a fair and democratic process. So i am pleased to welcome an excellent set of panelists who join us today. They will speak across three separate panels and we are honored to have such a distinguished group. Welcomeeeply honored to Lieutenant General h. R. Mcmaster from the United States army as our keynote speaker. A visionary leader by any standard, and a dear friend. He has dedicated his life to Public Service again and again. He has tirelessly demonstrated his unique brilliance as a soldier, scholar, and one of the best officers to come out of west point. I know him to be a gallant and heroic leader in combat and he has translated that into the moral leadership which has defined him since. His reputation as an academic has earned him a high praise for , dereliction of duty. A book of lessons still relevant. I have little doubt his second will rise tolished the same pedigree. Share when we were together, he was instrumental in supporting our efforts via leadership of counter Corruption Task force which was all about transparency. He demonstrated without fail his Core Principles of ethics and integrity. I was proud to stand alongside you then and it is a pleasure to honor you this morning in this crucial conversation. Iserating this discussion dr. Fiona hill, a person of great integrity. Dr. Hill is an expert on european and Russian Affairs and most recently served as the senior director for European Russian affairs in the National Security council. This will be an excellent panel and i hope you listen closely to what they have to say and the views they will express. Reminder we are on the record and streaming live. Please submit your questions via twitter. On thank you again, it is wonderful to see you. Thank you for your commitment and getting up early in the vital issues you will express today to help us express our democracy. Fiona, the floor is yours. Dr. Hill thank you. The reference about getting up early is the fact that he is in a. M. Ornia so this is 6 30 although he has probably already been up for hours, paddle boarding which he used to do back in the day. It is wonderful to see you. We are delighted you are willing to join us. Your book frames the discussion we are hoping to have today. In the book, you take on all of the challenges facing the United States and the National Security arena. I was wondering if you could kick us off with thoughts on how we have to tackle the battle graham in the the battleground in the information sphere. You tried to tackle headon during your service in the military the issue of russian Information Warfare and what you russiaolleagues would use psychological operations as part of their campaign. Should start thinking about this issue as we move on today. Thank you for joining us. Mr. Mcmaster thank you. What a privilege it is to be with you. You are such a great example of service to our country and what a privilege it was to serve with you back then on staff. And to be with john allen, my former commander and someone who leads by example. Thank you to brookings. What this conference is doing is part of the answer to the of Information Warfare so much has to be a whole of society response, which begins with education. It is a privilege to be with all of you. I would like to try to be brief. I thought i would tell the story i tell in the book. Friday before columbus day timend in 2017, about this in 2017, i was walking down onnut street in philadelphia my way to the Foreign Policy research and just to Research Institute to give a briefing. I was charged with designing the future army and i commissioned a study 18 months prior on russia and the invasion of ukraine. Of expertsinations from all different field psychologists,ng engineers, historians. It was an excellent story excellent study and i wanted to share the findings and get some wayback on as i was on my to the think tank in philadelphia, my phone rang and it was the white house asking me to go to maralago the next day. I was there the next tuesday afternoon. Because russia sustained campaign against ukraine was part of the study and it struck me as i came into the white house that we should have seen 2016 coming. This is not a threat that came out of the blue. I thought what i might begin with is what we did in the first year after the 2016 election to respond to this threat of Information Warfare which is designed to drag us down. Even from this speech you gave new years day in 2000, restore russia to National Great this. Greatness. I think probably around 2005, decided, iprobably will not be able to take on the eu and United States headon. Toelieve a prudent approach the west has been to drag everyone else down under this theory theyd be the last man standing. One of the personal ways he is isng this in his campaign misinformation and denial and one way to do it is to conduct Information Warfare with the purpose of polarizing our society, hitting us against each r, reducing debt obtain pitting us against each other. As we look back at 2016 and place the election in context of this much longer and sustained campaign against us, what i believe is the case is that around elections, especially in large countries like ours which would be very difficult to influence the outcome in a direct way, that what the kremlin tries to do is sow doubts about the result of the election. 2016, i think the kremlin was as surprised as trump was that he won the election. And there was a Campaign Ready to go and that they actually initiated prematurely, Hillary Clinton won the election but it was rated. Rigged. Then they shifted it too if the election had been fair, donald trump would have won the popular vote. This is what we are encountering today. Tookmmarize the actions we to protect ourselves better this is we had to identify the problem more fully. Dramaticallyre toward collecting and analyzing not just against us but also our allies and breaking apart our alliances and rendering the transatlantic relationship. Is the ira and as we would counter certain elements of the effort, a sustained effort, it is not going to go away and they are not going to stop. So understanding the nation the nature was important. Related to it was the necessity to pull back the curtain on this and show it to the country. Inoculating ourselves against this Information Warfare. Theere impeded by president s unwillingness to call out putin directly. We talked about this a lot. Why is this . What i determined is the president , and i mentioned this and write about it in the book, he conflates three separate questions. Did russia intervene in the election . Yes, they did. Did they care who will win . I dont think so. Effort is to divide on immigrationce and and gun, for example. And to reduce our confidence in the process. Third, if they wanted trump to win, did they put their finger on the scale and did it have an impact . The third question is what the president s worries about president worries about. So he conflates all three. That is unfortunate because education is important. , think we made progress, fiona on protecting election infrastructure. The president and others so doubts about it. Sow doubts about it. The kremlin wins. Andsecurity office stood up they are doing effective work. These are very competent people. They understand what is at stake and are working with a decentralized process. Federal standards are established and they are working diligently to protect the infrastructure itself. And then what i think is also extremely important is the Cyber Warriors is less encumbered than they were in the past. I will not go into details but there was some reporting about this in connection with the difference between the 2016 election and the 2018 election. Fiona, i will stop there. A final observation. It is important to focus on the election and the Information Warfare around it. But it is also important to understand this is a sustained campaign and we are extremely vulnerable to it. New tools are available to the russians that the soviets did not have when they began this sort of activity in the 1920s against the United States. Principal among those is social media, which is having a destructive effect on our particular these companies and Business Models that are essentially making you the commodity. Moneyso the advertising and drive to get more clicks by showing us more extreme content that reinforces our predilections and political leanings and stance on issues. That is magnified even further by the pseudomedia and the toxic atmosphere around that, as well as now Mainstream Media and cable news in particular, because of this phenomenon in which it now americans go to a particular station that is associated with their political leanings, so we do not have a common, authoritative source of information either. So i am looking forward to this conversation and i am so glad brookings is taking this on at this critical time in our country and the free world. It is great to be with you, fiona. Thanks. Mr. Mcmaster dr. Hill thank you so much. You managed to cover the entitle the entire battlefield we will cover today. In the first panel, we will try to unpack the history of the sustained campaign. You are right. This has been going on for a long time and it is not going to go away. In the second panel we will try to talk about the domestic information you have touched on. Because i think this is the dilemma we face and i would like to get back with you on this that when we were in government, we were the National Security team. Everyone was reluctant for all the right reasons to call it a battleground and we have seen how that has played out in negative fashion when it is referred to by colleagues in the pentagon. People do not want to see the National Security techniques bleed over into home although we know the russians hold a lot of the techniques they deployed against us at home in dealing with their own domestic opposition. So that is the real challenge for us and i would like to get back with you about how did we tackle the issue of what is happening on the domestic front while also producing an incredible amount of information. And then on the third panel we what we have to do ourselves to tackle this beyond what the government has done. But i have some questions already from the off from the audience. Have to put on my glasses because they are small. The audience wants to ask about do different actions and how we basically disentangle the domestic front from the International Front . Russians, colleagues created fake news sites, and in fact in some cases, they have managed to recruit american freelance journalist right for them and theyve targeted both the left and the right. Weve seen other countries do that in regional arenas as well, not just targeted against the United States but targeted against enemies. Its a broader phenomenon right now. Media, asbout social Kellyanne Conway put it, everyone has their own alternative facts and we dont have anything to pull them all together. And the idea of click bake that everyone talks about. Many news and Information Industries come up with splashy headlines to put on the messaging and pass on to others. Toy want you and others click on it to pass things on. Youve been out of the government now and also out of since Stanford University has an incredible amount of senior staff and specialist working on these topics. How have you started to recognize the problem that we face in the nsc about how do we put the domestic and foreign battlefield together . Mr. Mcmaster they have to be completely integrated. Its not only this challenge to our security, but its many other challenges. They dont obviously respect borders, and the move rapidly. An overseas challenge is one we have to cope with domestically. Once these threats penetrate our counter themve to at extraordinary at high cost. Terrorism, we have to remain engaged abroad and understand better the threats that will affect us at home. I think theres some organizational implications for this as well. I think one of the organizational impediments is the bifurcation of the National Security council between it and the Homeland Security council. I dont think that makes any sense. I think the senior director is there, the weight is structured, ought to be some self synchronization that works across each of those offices, from understanding better the threats overseas or to a country that areia, and those currently coping with more Homeland Security related issues , not only affecting the elections, but countering russian disinformation and denial. So there are structural i think changes that have to be made. Think it worked ok, but there are some structural aspects of this that we need to work on. You need an organization that has the tools to understand better what the threats are from cyber disInformation Warfare and also have the tools available to address it. Those tools are not just cyber tools. Those tools are other informational tools, also sanctions, Law Enforcement actions that can be taken, and the effort is to be able to mobilize all elements of likemindeder and partners. This is in the private sector, it is extremely important, for example, for government to have a trusted relationship with investigative journalist, for example, who probably our best equipped to uncover if you look at the track record, most of the best stories, the best reporting on how russia does this come a what their objectives are, how they are infusing these false personas insights and thought control has been from investigative journalism. Are organizational changes that need to be improved. Mainu are alluding to, the effort has to be on trying to convince everyone, but also in the media, dont be our own worst enemy. We talked about how russia is trying to divide us on certain issues. Dividee also trying to us in this vitriolic, political environment we find ourselves in. We make ourselves susceptible to it, i think, the president says something that is offensive and divisive, the reaction on the others is equally offensive and divisive, and we pull ourselves apart from each other. Withrsations that begin what we agree on, we immediately go to what we disagree on. I think a lot of this example setting, in our media, i think journalists as a profession have to ramp up our standards. In part because of the new information environment, and also because of the vitriolic parts of the environment. Ofrnalism is in a phase selfdestruction right now. This now more than ever, to be of the highest standards. We americans need to up their thectations and go to authoritative sources of information, rather than be drug down to the morass of the pseudomedia and the less responsible elements. How do you restore trust . In a lot of these institutions . In many of the other institutions of the government. Obviously weve been thinking about that a great deal as well. Weve had the politicized nation all of in many cases the governments National Security approach to dealing with an external threat, and in the time that we were there and the time after you left, its actually gotten much worse as well. We had a lot of mastic actors not really wanting us to get our act together, the deep state working against the interest of individual politicians, believe trying to push back against National Security threats. Obviously writing your book, getting out and speaking to as many audience as possible as part of doing this kind of event, but how can we penetrate the noise domestically to get all of the audience that we have to reach across the entire country to realize that we are facing a common National Security challenge, the battleground that we are all in private and we need to have some trust in some institutions. How do you think we do that . Mr. Mcmaster a great opportunity lies in the fact that we do have influence over how we are governed. To demand better from elected leaders, for for sure. And we have to restore dignity of our institutions. The doubt that we have in our own government, the deep state narrative is damaging. This is not a new phenomenon, really. It has taken on it has gone to a whole new level. Your testimony before congress, you made it so clear in your testimony that we need to transcend this partisan politics and restore things in our government and in our institutions. I have truman threats coffee tremendous confidence in her institutions, with the covid response, there are areas that we have to improve, but its our government, we all have a say in it and we all have a say in setting out a course of reform from our leaders. I think its just the democratic process, and i think that it begins maybe with congress, i dont know. I think that if there could be an example set for the american people, it could be by their representatives in congress, and flexnk that congress will and also helps to create the polarization that we are seeing, they can also therefore at least be a source for bringing us back together. Everybodys voice is a bit louder at the local level, demanding that they work , andher across the aisle begin conversations with what we can agree on and how we can Work Together to overcome our challenges and take advantage of opportunities and build the future for generations to come. Ms. Hill this ties into a few the questions that weve got here. One question, and it may be a bit of a tall order, from an attorney, has asked are there any means to apply greater focus in public reckoning on elected officials who deliberately engage in dissemination of foreign power propaganda . We do have some means if people are caught deliberately disseminating foreign power propaganda, we got the Foreign Agent registration act and other mechanisms, but i guess the, and ive gotten questions from School Teachers and students here, is when some of that disinformation is following the same political purposes, which was again, one of the problems that came up in the testimony referenced. Mr. Mcmaster and it was a bit personal for us. Cyberr aspect of Information Warfare is that the russians have actually engaged in campaigns that are directed at disrupting the effectiveness of our government and of government institutions, in our case the National Security council staff. These socalled fire mcmaster campaign, and also that campaign went after individuals on the National Security council staff, individuals who in the past would just be working hard every day for the country in the white house. Thosehink that exposing who are waiting and even unwitting agents of the russians is tremendously important. I think we can begin with employingons that are americans and putting them on the payroll to enhance russian propaganda. From anyo takes money Russian Media arm ought to be profoundly embarrassed about their unamerican and disloyal activities. So i think exposing people who engage in that activity is important, to use may positive social pressure to convince people that its not worth that paycheck theyre getting to act against our own society and act against our nation. And there are some extending examples of this. There have been even members of congress who have been extraordinarily sympathetic about russias agenda and ecially super helpful to our old colleague from the u. K. Used to call it implausible deniability. So i think this is a big aspect of it. What we dont want to do is have overzealous effort to hunt down the russian sympathizers, but i think there asians for exposing agents of the russian government. There are a lot of other actors who have the same approach, maybe that is one of the things. To call everyone out from extremist groups and those who are adopting the same approach, and if you said the pseudomedia and the internet websites who also get traction because of sewing disinformation and divisive content. Mr. Mcmaster absolutely. And china is getting better, they are taking a page out of russias book here and there have been some landmark studies, the first of those was done in australia, extremely well done. And the cooper institution where i am did an excellent study about two years ago on chinas influence. What is important to understand is russia and china have different objectives in mind, but they are clearly learning from each other. Chinas method used to be to elites and use them as mouthpieces for the Chinese Communist party. These are people who have had extremely profitable andtionships with china dominate the narrative on any issue. But now what we are seeing is, they are going after more targeted audiences, like the russians do. And theyre getting more involved in politics, in particular in the midwest, for example, they try to build trade against Enforcement Mechanisms that the administration is going to employ. Ms. Hill thats a very important point because we do see a lot of these actors to have a broader strategy, promoting the role of National Tariffs andmoving getting sanctions threemaster there are issues, they want to drag us down, first and foremost. They want sanctions remediated, they want us out of afghanistan, and out of syria. Those were the policy messages that there disinformation was really aimed at. Overall from a Foreign Policy shift toward a neoisolation sentiment. The new left interpretation of history on the far left applies to us as the problem in the world, and russia has reinforced that narrative. Or on the far right, which is associated with an ideological argument for u. S. Disengagement as an unmitigated good. It is infected with strains of i oversimplify, but there is a russian push to reinforce the neoisolation sentiment in america as well. Again, what russia would like us to do is to withdraw so they can feel the vacuum, as they did in 2014 tribute russia intervened in the syrian civil war. Think that nature abhors a vacuum, and russia is all too ready to fill it, even with the small amount of resources they have available. A contextand there is to all of this. We may not be in the same systemic struggle that we were in the cold war, but we are still in a struggle wherein many of the International Actors do want to have the maximum numeral ability on all kinds of issues, and is more effective if they get the United States out of the way. So as not just kind of exaggerating what is going on here. One final set of questions ive had from people here that i would like to get you to speak then youll have another moment to get across some of the points you think are important, a lot of people writing and from schools, from universities, kind of asking about the military education, also from the state department about, how can we educate people to effectively discern disinformation . That was something you did in the army back in the day, because you injured the army in the cold war or at the end of the cold war. Just kind of at the very end of it all, but you were trained right from the beginning to spot a psychological operation and disinformation. What have you taken away from that that can be helpful to apply at a much larger scale for young people who are just starting out . Mr. Mcmaster first of all, thanks to all the teachers who are here. You are actually heroes. My mom taught for 35 years in philadelphia. Paragraph i quote our friend zachary who is a wonderful historian, in his observation that the Great Foundation is an educated populace. Just recognizing that we do need help educate young people, all of us ourselves, about how authoritative authoritative sources of information influence us. This netflix show that just came out, the social experiment, thats great for people to watch, its entertaining, and it can highlight the dangers of social media in a way that is acceptable to a broad audience. Belting products that clearly identify the danger associated with developing products that clearly identify the danger associated with disinformation, with something they can do. We can educate each other as we are talking about, but we can just come together in various things that are available to us and have discussions and reject this vitriolic discourse, and restore faith in who we are as a people. And then i think that understanding how our administration is using technology and exposing it is a big part of that. The other aspect of this is civics education. I really believe that weve kind of lost our way and allowing this interaction that we see now , interaction between what you might call identity politics bigotry and racism, and how that creates centrifugal forces that are pulling us apart from each other. Many people, especially in the younger generations are losing confidence in our american experiment in democracy. I think with what Civic Education should do is focus on wonderful,cus on the radical idea of our revolution, the sovereignty of wise people, with neither king nor parliament, but with the people, and then recognizing the great gift of our declaration of independence, our constitution and bill of rights, but also recognizing that america was flawed at the creation because of the contradiction of the horrible institution of slavery. But then we can celebrate that we have emancipated foreman when people in our most destructive war in history. And then again, we can still be disappointed because of the failure of reconstruction, the rise of jim crow and the ku klux klan, separate but equal, and again, we should restore faith in our ability by recognizing that the Civil Rights Movement andantled prejudice inequality of opportunity, and then recognize that there is still the factor inequality that we have to work on, and we will work on, and we will get there. But we can only get better if we work on this together. What i worry about it is what you might call the end of empathy, where now there are certain movements, the socalled cancel culture on the far left, or these bigoted movements associated with White Supremacy on the far right. Nobody even acknowledges the need to talk to each other, to respect each other, and i think these are minorities, this is not who america is, so those of us who still have confidence in our country, who recognize the work that we have to do, we have to amplify our voices and convene as many people who are willing to convene so we can come back together. Ms. Hill thats really very important point. We have to talk to country up on what the problems are, not keep talking it down, because thats when everybody else from the outside will pile on as well. Mr. Mcmaster you are a case in point, because you are one of our greatest citizens and you are an immigrant. I dont think there are a lot of people trying to immigrate to china right now. That is one of the greatest strengths of our country is one of the draw is is the draw we have internationally. I write about the need to improve our confidence against threats like russian cyber Information Warfare, but also the need to restore our confidence in our ability to implement a sustained and and reasoned Foreign Policy, but also our confidence in who we are as a people. Youl weve got growing up in philadelphia, and american micro c underscores this, and all of us play a role by going out and voting, that we all know that one of the problems we had in 2016 was it a razor thin margin in the electoral college. Thats one of the things that engenders all the suspicion about what actually happened in the election. Andverybody realized referenced voting 55 years ago, it took a lot of time for people to get the vote. There were a lot of struggles for that right of citizenry. Confidence, weve should go out and vote. It is a closeif election, have confidence. This is where, i think the federalist papers are worth antifederalist papers and what was on their mind. The they had in mind was bloody wars of the 17th century in england and a desire to avoid and Oliver Cromwell figure, for the transition thats going to be forthcoming here, the executive branch has no role in it. There has been all this talk about, and its really superfluous, because it is the courts and the congress that will completely determine the outcome, if its close, and its a process we ought to have confidence in. Think what is been most irresponsible comments early this is the theme the russians will pick up on and try to use against us, is this idea that there should be any break in the very bold line between our democracy, ourr military has to stay out of the policy parts of politics. This is one of the reasons why im not going to endorse anybody, im not going to sign any letters or any of that stuff. Can create the impression that the military is taking aside. I dont know if youve noticed this practice in recent years were each party comes up with dual list of generals and admirals, like i got more than you and vice versa. I respect peoples decision to support their candidate as an individual, but i think collecting these lists of people i think congressll control in january . Stay informed leading up to election day with cspans 2020 coverage. Watch the candidates debate and election results. Watch online at cspan. Org or listen on the free cspan radio app. Cspan. Your unfiltered view of politics. The competition is on. Yearsrt of this studentcam video competition. Students, high school be the part of the National Conversation by exploring an issue you want the president and 2021. Ss to address in people with your documentary. 100,000 in cash prizes including a grand prize of 10,000. The deadline to submit videos is 2021. You will find rules and more information on how to get started our website, studentcam. Org. Joining us