Transcripts For CSPAN2 Michael Rubin Brian Katulis Seven Pi

Its become a land of endless wars. Tragically, despite decades of intense and often wellmeaning american attention and expenditure billions of dollars, u. S. Policy has more often than not been a failure. Maybe the caveat more often than not is to kind. Its been an absolute failure if one accepts the basic aim was to foster stability and a better life for the people of the region. Of course the ones ultimately responsible for a country success or failure of the people who live there. But the catastrophe of todays middle east raises a lot of questions about whether the United States should continue to be engaged in the region, and if so, how . In this regard the editors of aid money, Michael Rubin and Brian Katulis, and their cocontributors, have given given us a gift. They identify seven factors that affect stability or not and examine what they mean and the role they play. The pillars that they identify our legitimacy, islam, arab ideology, the militaries, education, economy, and governance. I personally found many of the authors perspectives to be unique and a useful basis to begin looking at old problems in new ways. Whether it can serve as a basis for a new bipartisan approach in the current poisonous political environment here is anyones guess, but at least the authors are trying to provide some factbased reality and analysis to encourage debate. So with us today, starting with my left, is Michael Rubin who is a resident scholar here at aei, a veteran of the Bush Administrations iran and iraq team and has a phd in iranian history. He contributed to chapter our legitimacy in the region. Next is Brian Katulis whos a Clinton Administration veteran now with the center for american progress, with extensive experience in the arab world. Prior to joining c. A. P. , he lived in egypt and palestine where he worked on governance issues for the National Democratic institute. He contributed to chapter on governance. And then we have Kadir Yildirim whos a fellow for the middle east at the Baker Institute at rice university. He researches both pluralism in the middle east and the interplay between religious authorities and Foreign Policy. He contributed to chapter on islam. We are going to try to keep the conversation lively, and i will interrupt to keep everybody from not just going on and on and on. We will talk for a while and then we will open it up to questions from the audience. So to start im going to start with michael. And ask you, whats special about this book . What you do think was lacking in the scholarship or the analysis that required this kind of approach . If a look at the last half century of american interaction in the middle east, by any metric like you said introduction, the u. S. Hasnt been successful and is that democrat or republican thing. What we wanted to do was, number one, get away from analysis based on the use political calendar. Thats too easy and it doesnt work. But more broadly do a fundamental rethink of some issues and drivers in the region. Region. In terms of legitimacy, for example, theres common core assumptions to the United States that its all about Good Governance. Thats what builds legitimacy but when we are in war in iraq for example, people are willing to forgo in some cases Good Governance just as they could have Kurdish National flag or a shiite kurd flag over certain buildings. We also wanted to identify and look at the impact of things we hardly ever talk about in the United States. Im sorry, in the region. Disruptive technology, hows that going to change things . How is foreign aid impact if legitimacy is a Good Governance . Then is for a right thing . Another conclusion, just one of the broad issues that was no surprising to me personally when brian and i traveled across the region was that many people if we asked the question, what represents the most legitimate government in the middle east . People tend to do Something Like lebanon, and get lebanon is often thought about in the United States and, frankly, many parts of the middle east as an abject disaster. And so we were trying to grapple rent some of these issues from a much more academic and less political or partisan approach. So what is legitimacy and why is lebanon seen as more legitimate than other places . First of all we need to abandon this notion that onesizefitsall. Thats not easy for american policymakers to do. But ultimately people one of legitimacy for whatever theyre identifying the one of representation for whatever their identity was. The problem is of course identities change with time. What was clear, however, is that people were increasingly finding themselves disenfranchised. This isnt just an issue of the arab spring. Its not just an issue of the at the iranian protests, but the gist seems to be a failure of the traditional isms in the middle east which is why the chapter reimagining or reconsidering all the ideologies at play because come take the example of iraq. Order of iraqis were born after the 2003 war. War than 60 of iraqis were born after the 1991 war which means no one has a functional memory of what life was like under Saddam Hussein among a broad swath of the youth. Therefore, they are no longer willing to accept what we might have problems from some of the islamist groups, for example, but at least were not Saddam Hussein. People are looking at this generation which seceded Saddam Hussein and seceded these other ideologues and dictators in the region and saying these guys dont represent us. We have in the United States as much as we complain about politics, usually 9095 incumbency rate in congress. In place like iraq its around 1216 . People are adrift and that makes it a very dangerous moment. So brian, you wrote about a governance. Yes. The form of governance that has evolved or been imposed on iraq since saddam was overthrow overthrown, is it working . Do you see it working . Did iraqis have to come up with Something Else . Does the United States have to help iraq come up with Something Else . Great question and ill answer that and a second. I first want to highlight the subtitle of the book is, what really causes instability in the middle east. My simple answer after spending nearly two years with Michael Rubin on this project is its Michael Rubin and neocons for warmongering. [laughing] its a joke. Your question on iraq, quite obviously before this latest episode, if you see whats happened in the last week and then what was happening just a few months before that, young people in the streets of baghdad and in major cities in iraq questioning their old order, e political order in iraq. Protesting corruption, poor services, and a bunch of things that quite frankly to go around the region like we do and we get together and quite regularly, are the sorts of things that impact every country in the middle east. This sort of crushing demographic social, economic pressures. Inside of iraq come to at your question, quite clearly despite multiple elections the Current System of governance and government is not helping the people. One of the point of this book, and its not a new point because you go back to the arab u. N. Human Development Reports of 16, 17 years ago is though structural factors that contribute to stability are quite weak. In those 15, 16, 17 years since they have gotten weaker. I think in a place like iraq quite clearly and this is where i joke about michael, we do have our differences. He was in favor of the iraq war. I wasnt. He was against the iran nuclear deal. I was. But the one thing we agree upon is to dig deeper and wider want to do this book and in the chapter on governance, i talked a bit about iraq but not about its national governance. I talk about this experiment encompassed that emerged under the Islamic State if its been a couple of pages on it and it shows you that responsive governance and discontent with a government that is not responding plants the seed for the sorts of instability that we saw under, happen and iraq under the previous prime minister, that groups like the Islamic State exploited. We should have learned by now many years after the iraq war that the United States cant fix these factors but its important to factor these fundamental Building Blocks for stability in our analysis as we see today. The hot takes over going to next and the cycle of escalation which i think is quite dangerous. Isis was a new phenomenon. Right. And there have been failures, a failure of Good Governance, failure of leaders in the middle east for a long time. Right. So why at this moment did a group like isis have an opportunity to rise and at such a profound impact . Multiplicity factors. Some of it tied to this generation transition are you just simply have a youth bible that is crushing. Bubble. If governments are not responding to people who rise n various different forms. The isis model which you can was shortlived and i dont think as much legitimacy in the long run was created in response to an ineffective government. There are more tools now in a place like iraq under Saddam Hussein it was a dictatorship. There wasnt as much open space for people to produce change and i think the theory that was behind the iraq war in 2003, and we dont want to go back and debate that, but the theory was flawed in that simply if we just topple regimes and eliminate or decapitate the top, then some of freedom will spread. We know that didnt happen. I think wide accelerated in the Islamic State in particular is that you had multiple fights going on inside of iraq, civil war first, and then a system of governance that simply wasnt responding. Thats the main point is as conditions are still there. Iraqis are still look at their National Government as come with a caretaker government. Carol, i would challenge the notion the Islamic State was all that new because if they go back in history theres any number of millennial movements, whether it was the seizure of the grand mosque in 1979 or go back a century before that. What if you want to draw out from what brian was talked about and its a number subissues on governance, beyond simply this, monarchy versus republican and so forth, but what does this mean for the nature of american diplomacy if we are still in many ways limiting ourselves to interactions with representatives of governments who are under siege, whether those governments know it are not . Are we missing the broader picture both in terms of diplomacy and intelligence when it comes to the middle east. Obviously we use the broader picture a lot. So whats the remedy to that . The United States has to do with the government that are in power, no . To some extent. To some extent we have to do with the governments who are in power but, for example, how much time to diplomats spent outside the walls of embassies versus talking and just interacting on a local market as opposed to simply interacting with government . We dont want to bring in u. S. Policy too much but one of the aftermath of benghazi putting the root of that crisis aside is just the lockdown upon which american diplomats find by themselves. When you go to beirut, both bright and i went to beirut together, the u. S. Embassy in beirut was living under the same security parameters they did during the civil war. Thats an important point. Its a tactical point. Theres a Strategic Point which i think for use policy in the middle east we are quite likely at the end of a 40 year period that began with events in 1979, the Islamic Revolution in iran, soviet invasion of afghanistan, and a number of things that led to the u. S. Having its engagement primarily be focused on what our military does. And look at where we are today. In discussing and worrying about whats the next move and what will our military do. To me this point that michael makes, which is tactical but its important, is our diplomats and that Diplomatic Service has been decimated. They are our eyes and ears and understand societal trends and where with like all a bit more blunt. More broadly, and the last point is i think it opens a a questin of whether the United States should actually be spending a lot of aid money and other things and countries that Something Like the capacity to do this. Maybe theres a strategy for thinking more modestly about our engagement come thinking about those outposts with a relative progress in places like tunisia, for instance, so maybe a dollar spent in tunisia and time spent in tunisia may ultimately be a lot better than in other parts of the middle east but we dont even have that discussion these days because we are reacting to sort of mostly military moves and military centric moves and not thinking about how do we diversify the portfolio. I do want to follow up on that part of what to bring Kadir Yildirim into the conversation. Is religion more important in the middle east today than it was before . It is. It is very much so, but i think one of the fundamental misconceptions about middle east in terms of religion, politics, we tend to assume that this has been the case all the time. If you go back 40, 50 years ago what we see is the dominance of secular government, secular ideologies and how islam parties and groups, they were existent many of them but they were much smaller, much less influential in terms of policymaking, in terms of the naval to affect of the groups in this society, or how governments were acting in terms of Foreign Policy or domestic policy. But over the course of the last 40, 50 years things have changed dramatically i think. The iranian revolution was a big turning point, but also more importantly, something that brian had mentioned, secular ideologies have failed throughout the middle east at the route 1960s and 70s and early 80s. Failed as leaders in jimmy . In terms of policy. The fundamental issues were political and economic and that failed to deliver on their promises, on what people were expecting. And this is what precipitated the rise, the rising i think significance of these religious groups, islamists or later on fundamentalist groups, and later on more violent extremist groups throughout the region. They key problem here, their rise was not just in terms of their own popularity, within their borders. Save Muslim Brotherhood in 2011, 12, 3040 of the vote. But more importantly, i think they were able to dictate the parameters of the discussion in terms of the policy issues that were ongoing. Their rise influenced secular groups, nonreligious groups, medical groups so much so that they felt the need to bring in religion to their own discussions, to their own sort of policies, sort of proposal so to speak. One good example i think is whats happening in turkey today. Erdogan and akp have come to power in 2002, and hes been, hes in massive politician but he is so successful. In terms of changing the political sort of system in turkey in such a way that the secular parties are unable to determine the agenda, political agenda. They are unable to discuss issues and i went outside of the parameters set by erdogan himself. One problem here is that if you think about this in terms of religious competition, that means you or political activists, both religious and nonreligious, will try to cater to the demands, the religious demand because people will want more of that. That is curious, curiosity in political debate. But erdogan has not been uniformly successful. He was successful in growing the economy certainly in the early years, but he has run into trouble, more trouble now and is run into political pushback. Islam, do you see him using islam and his religious beliefs more as a Political Tool to advance his political career, or do you think that this is just so indigenous to the people of turkey that every politician Going Forward is going to have to encompass religious beliefs more into their plans . Right. I cant speak to his personal beliefs. Thats beyond my sort of focus as a political scientist. What i can tell you is that religion is an important element of his political discourse. When you look at overtime, the changes in terms of the intensity that he emphasizes religion it is political discourse. You only look at the time until 2011, 12, 13 from 2001 2001 whe party was first established, religion did not play as significant a role. But once his political prospects i think receiving as a result of the Corruption Scandal first and then later on other issues that has come up, losing elections to some degree losing popularity, then he started using more religion only because he wanted to bring in some of the more conservative elements especially among the kurdish voters in turkey and some of the nationalist. Depending on the time he has used religious discourse. This is really important. This is not just for erdogan but other politicians in the region. Going back to an issue that brian mentioned about tunisia, i fully agree. A dollar spent in tunisia will go much further compared of the part of the world in terms of United States<\/a> should continue to be engaged in the region, and if so, how . In this regard the editors of aid money, Michael Rubin<\/a> and Brian Katulis<\/a>, and their cocontributors, have given given us a gift. They identify seven factors that affect stability or not and examine what they mean and the role they play. The pillars that they identify our legitimacy, islam, arab ideology, the militaries, education, economy, and governance. I personally found many of the authors perspectives to be unique and a useful basis to begin looking at old problems in new ways. Whether it can serve as a basis for a new bipartisan approach in the current poisonous political environment here is anyones guess, but at least the authors are trying to provide some factbased reality and analysis to encourage debate. So with us today, starting with my left, is Michael Rubin<\/a> who is a resident scholar here at aei, a veteran of the Bush Administration<\/a>s iran and iraq team and has a phd in iranian history. He contributed to chapter our legitimacy in the region. Next is Brian Katulis<\/a> whos a Clinton Administration<\/a> veteran now with the center for american progress, with extensive experience in the arab world. Prior to joining c. A. P. , he lived in egypt and palestine where he worked on governance issues for the National Democratic<\/a> institute. He contributed to chapter on governance. And then we have Kadir Yildirim<\/a> whos a fellow for the middle east at the Baker Institute<\/a> at rice university. He researches both pluralism in the middle east and the interplay between religious authorities and Foreign Policy<\/a>. He contributed to chapter on islam. We are going to try to keep the conversation lively, and i will interrupt to keep everybody from not just going on and on and on. We will talk for a while and then we will open it up to questions from the audience. So to start im going to start with michael. And ask you, whats special about this book . What you do think was lacking in the scholarship or the analysis that required this kind of approach . If a look at the last half century of american interaction in the middle east, by any metric like you said introduction, the u. S. Hasnt been successful and is that democrat or republican thing. What we wanted to do was, number one, get away from analysis based on the use political calendar. Thats too easy and it doesnt work. But more broadly do a fundamental rethink of some issues and drivers in the region. Region. In terms of legitimacy, for example, theres common core assumptions to the United States<\/a> that its all about Good Governance<\/a>. Thats what builds legitimacy but when we are in war in iraq for example, people are willing to forgo in some cases Good Governance<\/a> just as they could have Kurdish National<\/a> flag or a shiite kurd flag over certain buildings. We also wanted to identify and look at the impact of things we hardly ever talk about in the United States<\/a>. Im sorry, in the region. Disruptive technology, hows that going to change things . How is foreign aid impact if legitimacy is a Good Governance<\/a> . Then is for a right thing . Another conclusion, just one of the broad issues that was no surprising to me personally when brian and i traveled across the region was that many people if we asked the question, what represents the most legitimate government in the middle east . People tend to do Something Like<\/a> lebanon, and get lebanon is often thought about in the United States<\/a> and, frankly, many parts of the middle east as an abject disaster. And so we were trying to grapple rent some of these issues from a much more academic and less political or partisan approach. So what is legitimacy and why is lebanon seen as more legitimate than other places . First of all we need to abandon this notion that onesizefitsall. Thats not easy for american policymakers to do. But ultimately people one of legitimacy for whatever theyre identifying the one of representation for whatever their identity was. The problem is of course identities change with time. What was clear, however, is that people were increasingly finding themselves disenfranchised. This isnt just an issue of the arab spring. Its not just an issue of the at the iranian protests, but the gist seems to be a failure of the traditional isms in the middle east which is why the chapter reimagining or reconsidering all the ideologies at play because come take the example of iraq. Order of iraqis were born after the 2003 war. War than 60 of iraqis were born after the 1991 war which means no one has a functional memory of what life was like under Saddam Hussein<\/a> among a broad swath of the youth. Therefore, they are no longer willing to accept what we might have problems from some of the islamist groups, for example, but at least were not Saddam Hussein<\/a>. People are looking at this generation which seceded Saddam Hussein<\/a> and seceded these other ideologues and dictators in the region and saying these guys dont represent us. We have in the United States<\/a> as much as we complain about politics, usually 9095 incumbency rate in congress. In place like iraq its around 1216 . People are adrift and that makes it a very dangerous moment. So brian, you wrote about a governance. Yes. The form of governance that has evolved or been imposed on iraq since saddam was overthrow overthrown, is it working . Do you see it working . Did iraqis have to come up with Something Else<\/a> . Does the United States<\/a> have to help iraq come up with Something Else<\/a> . Great question and ill answer that and a second. I first want to highlight the subtitle of the book is, what really causes instability in the middle east. My simple answer after spending nearly two years with Michael Rubin<\/a> on this project is its Michael Rubin<\/a> and neocons for warmongering. [laughing] its a joke. Your question on iraq, quite obviously before this latest episode, if you see whats happened in the last week and then what was happening just a few months before that, young people in the streets of baghdad and in major cities in iraq questioning their old order, e political order in iraq. Protesting corruption, poor services, and a bunch of things that quite frankly to go around the region like we do and we get together and quite regularly, are the sorts of things that impact every country in the middle east. This sort of crushing demographic social, economic pressures. Inside of iraq come to at your question, quite clearly despite multiple elections the Current System<\/a> of governance and government is not helping the people. One of the point of this book, and its not a new point because you go back to the arab u. N. Human Development Reports<\/a> of 16, 17 years ago is though structural factors that contribute to stability are quite weak. In those 15, 16, 17 years since they have gotten weaker. I think in a place like iraq quite clearly and this is where i joke about michael, we do have our differences. He was in favor of the iraq war. I wasnt. He was against the iran nuclear deal. I was. But the one thing we agree upon is to dig deeper and wider want to do this book and in the chapter on governance, i talked a bit about iraq but not about its national governance. I talk about this experiment encompassed that emerged under the Islamic State<\/a> if its been a couple of pages on it and it shows you that responsive governance and discontent with a government that is not responding plants the seed for the sorts of instability that we saw under, happen and iraq under the previous prime minister, that groups like the Islamic State<\/a> exploited. We should have learned by now many years after the iraq war that the United States<\/a> cant fix these factors but its important to factor these fundamental Building Blocks<\/a> for stability in our analysis as we see today. The hot takes over going to next and the cycle of escalation which i think is quite dangerous. Isis was a new phenomenon. Right. And there have been failures, a failure of Good Governance<\/a>, failure of leaders in the middle east for a long time. Right. So why at this moment did a group like isis have an opportunity to rise and at such a profound impact . Multiplicity factors. Some of it tied to this generation transition are you just simply have a youth bible that is crushing. Bubble. If governments are not responding to people who rise n various different forms. The isis model which you can was shortlived and i dont think as much legitimacy in the long run was created in response to an ineffective government. There are more tools now in a place like iraq under Saddam Hussein<\/a> it was a dictatorship. There wasnt as much open space for people to produce change and i think the theory that was behind the iraq war in 2003, and we dont want to go back and debate that, but the theory was flawed in that simply if we just topple regimes and eliminate or decapitate the top, then some of freedom will spread. We know that didnt happen. I think wide accelerated in the Islamic State<\/a> in particular is that you had multiple fights going on inside of iraq, civil war first, and then a system of governance that simply wasnt responding. Thats the main point is as conditions are still there. Iraqis are still look at their National Government<\/a> as come with a caretaker government. Carol, i would challenge the notion the Islamic State<\/a> was all that new because if they go back in history theres any number of millennial movements, whether it was the seizure of the grand mosque in 1979 or go back a century before that. What if you want to draw out from what brian was talked about and its a number subissues on governance, beyond simply this, monarchy versus republican and so forth, but what does this mean for the nature of american diplomacy if we are still in many ways limiting ourselves to interactions with representatives of governments who are under siege, whether those governments know it are not . Are we missing the broader picture both in terms of diplomacy and intelligence when it comes to the middle east. Obviously we use the broader picture a lot. So whats the remedy to that . The United States<\/a> has to do with the government that are in power, no . To some extent. To some extent we have to do with the governments who are in power but, for example, how much time to diplomats spent outside the walls of embassies versus talking and just interacting on a local market as opposed to simply interacting with government . We dont want to bring in u. S. Policy too much but one of the aftermath of benghazi putting the root of that crisis aside is just the lockdown upon which american diplomats find by themselves. When you go to beirut, both bright and i went to beirut together, the u. S. Embassy in beirut was living under the same security parameters they did during the civil war. Thats an important point. Its a tactical point. Theres a Strategic Point<\/a> which i think for use policy in the middle east we are quite likely at the end of a 40 year period that began with events in 1979, the Islamic Revolution<\/a> in iran, soviet invasion of afghanistan, and a number of things that led to the u. S. Having its engagement primarily be focused on what our military does. And look at where we are today. In discussing and worrying about whats the next move and what will our military do. To me this point that michael makes, which is tactical but its important, is our diplomats and that Diplomatic Service<\/a> has been decimated. They are our eyes and ears and understand societal trends and where with like all a bit more blunt. More broadly, and the last point is i think it opens a a questin of whether the United States<\/a> should actually be spending a lot of aid money and other things and countries that Something Like<\/a> the capacity to do this. Maybe theres a strategy for thinking more modestly about our engagement come thinking about those outposts with a relative progress in places like tunisia, for instance, so maybe a dollar spent in tunisia and time spent in tunisia may ultimately be a lot better than in other parts of the middle east but we dont even have that discussion these days because we are reacting to sort of mostly military moves and military centric moves and not thinking about how do we diversify the portfolio. I do want to follow up on that part of what to bring Kadir Yildirim<\/a> into the conversation. Is religion more important in the middle east today than it was before . It is. It is very much so, but i think one of the fundamental misconceptions about middle east in terms of religion, politics, we tend to assume that this has been the case all the time. If you go back 40, 50 years ago what we see is the dominance of secular government, secular ideologies and how islam parties and groups, they were existent many of them but they were much smaller, much less influential in terms of policymaking, in terms of the naval to affect of the groups in this society, or how governments were acting in terms of Foreign Policy<\/a> or domestic policy. But over the course of the last 40, 50 years things have changed dramatically i think. The iranian revolution was a big turning point, but also more importantly, something that brian had mentioned, secular ideologies have failed throughout the middle east at the route 1960s and 70s and early 80s. Failed as leaders in jimmy . In terms of policy. The fundamental issues were political and economic and that failed to deliver on their promises, on what people were expecting. And this is what precipitated the rise, the rising i think significance of these religious groups, islamists or later on fundamentalist groups, and later on more violent extremist groups throughout the region. They key problem here, their rise was not just in terms of their own popularity, within their borders. Save Muslim Brotherhood<\/a> in 2011, 12, 3040 of the vote. But more importantly, i think they were able to dictate the parameters of the discussion in terms of the policy issues that were ongoing. Their rise influenced secular groups, nonreligious groups, medical groups so much so that they felt the need to bring in religion to their own discussions, to their own sort of policies, sort of proposal so to speak. One good example i think is whats happening in turkey today. Erdogan and akp have come to power in 2002, and hes been, hes in massive politician but he is so successful. In terms of changing the political sort of system in turkey in such a way that the secular parties are unable to determine the agenda, political agenda. They are unable to discuss issues and i went outside of the parameters set by erdogan himself. One problem here is that if you think about this in terms of religious competition, that means you or political activists, both religious and nonreligious, will try to cater to the demands, the religious demand because people will want more of that. That is curious, curiosity in political debate. But erdogan has not been uniformly successful. He was successful in growing the economy certainly in the early years, but he has run into trouble, more trouble now and is run into political pushback. Islam, do you see him using islam and his religious beliefs more as a Political Tool<\/a> to advance his political career, or do you think that this is just so indigenous to the people of turkey that every politician Going Forward<\/a> is going to have to encompass religious beliefs more into their plans . Right. I cant speak to his personal beliefs. Thats beyond my sort of focus as a political scientist. What i can tell you is that religion is an important element of his political discourse. When you look at overtime, the changes in terms of the intensity that he emphasizes religion it is political discourse. You only look at the time until 2011, 12, 13 from 2001 2001 whe party was first established, religion did not play as significant a role. But once his political prospects i think receiving as a result of the Corruption Scandal<\/a> first and then later on other issues that has come up, losing elections to some degree losing popularity, then he started using more religion only because he wanted to bring in some of the more conservative elements especially among the kurdish voters in turkey and some of the nationalist. Depending on the time he has used religious discourse. This is really important. This is not just for erdogan but other politicians in the region. Going back to an issue that brian mentioned about tunisia, i fully agree. A dollar spent in tunisia will go much further compared of the part of the world in terms of Foreign Policy<\/a>, because its a newly democratized context. Lets underline over all support for a lot of these religious groups, political groups is economic and political issues. Once this issues are addressed western for most i think we are most likely going to see a decrease in their support but i think thats really the key. So are the tunisians, presented want to follow up on tunisia a separate one. Say what you want to say and ill ask something of. You use this phrase repeated, using the religion. He talked about molson and the domestic context of turkey which i think a spot on as to understand the people leaders use religion in islam in the other way. The i wanted to make, two points. This this is about power. Its not necessary about faith or the right interpretation of religion if there is such a thing but its about power. Secondly, in addition to the domestic use of religion, what i see in the middle east right now are multifaceted come multidimensional, petition for power and influence. And the use of islam i turkey, say versus saudi arabia which has its own sort of definition and out tries and uses islam as the birthplace of it. And then the calories. But im main point is a first point, this is about power not about some sort of ancient hatred and some sort of essentialist interpretation of religion pic its about leaders trying to stay in power by appealing to sort of different themes and also trying to compete with what they see as adversaries or the competitors in the region through the use of thats the most and analyze an interesting aspect of it because it spills over into media fights and into all sorts of things and its something that frankly the book doesnt cover itself but its part of the thing that america wants a better Foreign Policy<\/a> and approach need to understand that this is in addition to military moves and the use of terrorism and other things, a key part f the struggle and competition for power. One of the things i want to ask kadir of the book is just how rapidly things are changing. So if you look 40 years in the future and you have a complete new set of the majority of each population hasnt even been born yet. Is religion, is made influence for religion going to be a mosque or will be social media . And is it going to be legitimate theological rulers or our leaders, or is going to be populist leaders . If so, how are traditional muslim scholars looking at this raisa piper listen, and do you really think the way which people can sue religion is going to rapidly change, putting aside whether the United States<\/a> can even keep up with that . I mean, great question. Some of my research actually directly find address this question. So a couple years ago we started the project trying to look into how religious authorities is sort of distributed across the middle east among religious leaders, primarily muslim leaders, and what we found is there a couple major findings. One of them is, islam political groups, political islam actors actually a great popularity. People do look up to them as religious figures, religious leaders. This is something really important thats been rising, thats been changing a lot. In terms of social media or mosques, i think that to change that was precipitated at the turn of the 20 century, more than a century ago. Islam is little bit different. It has sort of a free market of religion very much like protestant is of interest unity. Its about a central authority. It doesnt have a hierarchy. What this means is everyone can be a religious leader as long as people willingly support our follow these people. The group of collective class of islamic scholars were big for almost a millennium between end of ninth into tenth century up until the turn of the 20th century in islam. They were the class as religious authority here they were eminent religious authority but once they started waianae, once they started dying, so to speak, there was a big void in terms of who was the eminent religious authority. This is when we see the rise of political islamism early on in the muslim world. This is the process thats going to be evolving with the rise of social media more so. I dont know what would happen in four years but definitely not a mosques, i dont think. Things are changing fast and quick on this. There emerges some form of the central hierarchical authority, things will be pretty sort of distributed. Is islam a force of stability or not in the region . It depends on what we mean by stability. If you look at turkey, it is a source of stability. Its an authoritarian way but its a force for stability. If a look at some of the context, lets say early 2000s 1990s in turkey again, it would be a force for instability because it was three of the opposition. It was pushing them in trying to get more political space and representation or change policies. So it totally depends on the context i think. I dont think islam by itself is different than many other religions. It depends on the political context, depends on actors, depends on overall circumstance in terms of what kind of a role it is built in this country. And iraq for example, or in syria it can be force for instability but in tunisia, at this point in time it can be a force for stability. If the seeming commitment for democracy in the words of in terms of modern democracy. I think this is one of the major issues where witnessing now inside iraq although its not being framed that way in the media in that window look at the grand ayatollah who is the march of the most prominent shia religious figure he is apparently extremely cognitive of what the popular opinion is, and instead of simply lead to get he has to worry about following get because if he goes too far out and in a this friday sermons in pronouncements he risks being exposed as emperor wears no clothes if the young People Choose<\/a> not to follow him and, therefore, we see a caution that really hasnt been there, if i will, since he lived under Saddam Hussein<\/a>. Thats exactly religious competition. These religious leaders are not blind to whats going on around them. They know whats going on. They follow them and they adjust the discourse. Whether these are traditional religious authorities or islamists. They know whats going on and they will cater because ultimately what islam does, what religion does for them, they may be faithful believers but islam, religion is a tool, a political resource that you want to make use of and you want to make sure it helps you in terms of your power, struggle. This is really the key point. From time to time to talk about reforming islam. Does that have any value . Is that something, and i would throw this out to all of you, is that something that the west should be encouraging . What does it even mean . Its happening. Its an organic process that i see is happening, and my own view is when you say the west, im taking that as mostly government and things like this. I dont think necessarily we need to play a role in that. I look back on certainly right now we have a president who when he ran as a candidate he said i islam hates us. And the use sort of an interpretation of islam which i think is quite dangerous, tailoring to certain political constituencies here. Deeply unhelpful. Im not making a comparison or pillow between the two. When the u. S. Did things like appoint special envoys to the organization of islamic conference, i thought it was anywhere from irrelevant to may be slightly unhelpful because i dont think it should be u. S. Policy to sort of encourage some sort of reform of islam. Its a religion. Its going to have strands that are more extremist and more reformist and its organic and is playing out. Im not a muslim but my friends who labor in america or in europe, their different ideas about the own faith and religion, and i would stay away from sort of that as a use of engagement. When president obama spoke in cairo there was an idea of muslim engagement that a lot of my friends in the inner world and a little bit offensive, especially those friends who is a christian or were not muslims of the tradition but not of faith and wanted to be engaged with the egyptians for Something Else<\/a>. Let me approach this a slightly different way, not surprisingly for my liberal friends. I think one of the issues with american policy is caught in a trap is due to our own navelgazing. One of our most interest experiments is in morocco when it comes to the program in which women are educated to be Community Prayer<\/a> leaders alongside men. And morocco, of course, has a theological and intellectual history that goes back well over a millennia. Except when you talk to american officials about what morocco is doing in the moroccan model. Oftentimes what you hear is about morocco is peripheral. Morocco is irrelevant to the broader islamic world. But intellectually and theologically whats happened in morocco traditionally is much more significant than whats happened in saudi arabia. Saudi arabia of course had the advantage of oil which is why a much more minority interpretation spread. But we seem to be doing saudi arabias work for them when we are so dismissive of other trends. Because we see from our Vantage Point<\/a> ms peripheral and so sometimes i would argue it looks like try to make us with a little bit, our own perspective from washington can actually get in the way kadir. I will agree with grinder has to be a limit to what we do in terms of the sort of religious debate although we cant ignore completely. But on the other hand, our first will should be first do no harm. I dont necessarily disagree with you but i have a bit of a different take i think. I dont disagree with you but i disagree. [laughing] i do think that islam is in great need of reform. I dont think theres any denying to that. The muslim world has a great problem in terms of underdevelopment at this point in time with the violence. Im not saying religion causes violence but there is a pervasive case of violence throughout the muslim world. If you look at the muslim world today, i cant remember the figures but eight 849 muslims e being killed today are being killed by other muslims. That i think is a very important statistic. We have underdevelopment and education in the muslim world. A lot of issues and problems, and when great book that addresses these issues recently published by Cambridge University<\/a> press highly important book i think that looks into these issues very critically. But the point is theres a great need for reform, and religion weather would it or not is being used or justified or is used to justify ongoing trends, issues and problems in the middle east, a great problem of patriarchy, a great problem of gender inequality. In tunisia recently just last year there was debate about introducing legislation for equal inheritance, and the most progressive of Islamist Party<\/a> opposed this legislation. What are you going to do with it . This is really important issue. I do think there is a great need for reform in islam because i think islam or muslims rather are still trying, in my opinion, trying, are struggling trying to come to terms with it here modernity. This is a big issue i think. This is a big deepseated issue that needs to be addressed but with the current state of affairs its difficult to come to terms with that part of the problem come something i tried to emphasize about how dismissive and have been so influential. They have been able to change the mindset that only of those who are considered but also on the secular sigrid all of these come look at the issue of lgbt issues for example. A century ago i think the muslim world was much more progressive on this particular issue, for example. Many of the issues, ethnic, religious diversity i will argue the muslim world was much more aggressive a century or two centuries ago. This is i think really the crux of the issue. This is when i said islam is are so important, not so much because they have 30 or 40 support either support but because they were able to shape, received the mindset of a lot of people in their society. Were going to make the same point i think a jamaican lgbt and its a story from one of our trips, and he can crawl. We went out and met with officials of talk to people but what universities and i remember we were in morocco. Mohammed the fifth university. Asked to do a sore town hall with students, University Students<\/a> and it was one of these given takes we said look, were from america and he might find this alarming or interesting that a lot of people are puzzled about america today. The student harassing us was great honor was happening here. We asked him this one question whats different about your generation from your parents generation . One woman had a head covering regime is some of us are lgbt and lesbian and we talked about openly and then they debated for at least ten or 15 minutes. Whether they could bring some home to the parents, for example, lgbt. He you pointed out in other countries like iraq, its necessarily the case, taboo. Again speeders things like the Younger Generation<\/a> turn to ship back of the questions whether the generations weve had over the last 40 or 50 years which are identifying here are the outlier or the signifier of a continuing trend. Its not just about individual level but Public Policy<\/a> level, i think that was much more tolerant about many of these issues that it is right now. I mean, how many muslim majority countries if the Death Penalty<\/a> or of the kinds of penalty. These are important issues. Can you build a mosque in saudi arabia . Why not . I understand maybe if you want to exclude mecca because of religious reason of whatever, what about the rest of the country . I think this is a big problem. Fair enough. Does this change had to come organically or is there a role for, i dont know, clerics . Is a role for government leaders . How this reform you say reform is needed. How does this reform come about . It a taboo subject right now. Its very difficult to introducing the subject. In several countries those people, individuals, whether they were scholars or just prominent figures who wanted to introduce debate and discussion about islamic reform have been essentially castigated. Some of them were penalized for other reasons but it was a pushback from government officials or others in terms of their stance or being critical of islam. This is what they understand from introducing debate about islam. The fundamental issues again going back to socioeconomic developments, you have good Education Systems<\/a> where you are able to introduce critical thinking, analytical thinking. You improve equality in the country. You improve socioeconomic or economic development, wellbeing of a lot of these people in these countries. I think its very difficult. Were in a think tank so were going to be prescriptive for a second. Actor in the Bush Administration<\/a> about 2002 theres a case of the egyptianamerican sociologist who was imprisoned in part for what he is talking about in terms of reform and the Bush Administration<\/a> held at Something Like<\/a> 120 million worth of aid i think it difficult for the back to the Reagan Administration<\/a> look at the issue of application and islam. There was a sudanese scholar wh who, he talked about how reform should include the need for reverse, putting the early verse of correct me if im wrong, at some later versus and, of course, he was executed. The point of this is while the United States<\/a> with separation of church and state, does that mean we can ignore religion and other countries and can we use the leverage of our purse for example, in order to create some sort of space so the people hoping most bold on the course of reform dont end up in prison or worse . This is important number one, listening and understanding of what we were sake of getting diplomat outside of the wire. The fact the tragedy abbasid amr christine to skilled in benghazi was adept at doing this and was as powerful i think as some elements in our military. To understand what are the social dynamics i think support. Number two, keeping the speedf democracy governance and freedom on the u. S. Policy agenda i think its really important and obviously its been downgraded under President Trump<\/a> i was a bit thats the preexisting condition, that that actually started, the process of that having as much focus in terms of what our diplomats do, it started under the Obama Administration<\/a> for a number of reasons. Because of water to pull back. Because we defined and theres this disorder debate about democracy equating it with an interference by the sort that rush and it at her own economy and its totally you think the marks something the United States<\/a> should still i think what mike was saying about the breakin, when someone is in present weather in saudi arabia or others, we need to raise our voice and make it part of the conversation and ambitious about it. Theres no reason why cant be a bipartisan issue. Thats that deserted promotion of democracy as speedy the strategical was great a safe space for the reform to happen and thats the main point is if you dont and this is why im skeptical of the top down attempts to reform the places like saudi arabia because if you do that while maintaining your position as an absolute monarchy and dont give organic space for people to debate religion or other issues, its likely to fail. The third point, simple one and bullets to what you at the top, carol, is dont do harm. Wars are one of the worst things and unnecessary wars that enhance the hardliners and hardline interpretations of religion. Sort of extremists feed off this and this is what i think we have to have new stuff of engagement in the middle east. Try come learn a lesson from the last 40 years especially the last 15 years or so and then talk about whats the right level of engagement and the smells in this diplomatic political social space and understand whats happening. I want to clarify one thing brian said or add to it. Im not contradicting you. Dont worry. Ill do that later. When it comes reform oftentimes will talk about reform and when the milk these things that reform its apples and oranges. Take saudi arabia. What is reform absolute monarchy . Its a reform absolute monarchy. Its not a democracy. Sometimes it seems that our conversation in congress, with regard to what is reform versus what is understood by people in the region are two different things. When the class the crease between those different definitions it can actually make things a lot worse. Im going to ask can i in terms of what role does, can United States<\/a> play, i think its very important to understand that any kind of intervention, i think those safe spaces should be created but i think the way they are great is very important because antiwesternism is so much ingrained in political islam fundamentalists, or even amongst secular. Any kind of intervention by the u. S. , by European Union<\/a> or European Countries<\/a> is going to be deemed as problematic, and thats why those kinds of interventions in terms of creating those spaces should be done really very carefully because its going to undermine you are going to basically make the issue very toxic. Whatever a person says or does after that point onward is going to be a problem. What happens in the case of iran when iranians will say even when were not touching someone, if we are not supporting so that theyre supported by the americans it is for damned if you do and damned if you dont. Shouldnt we use our ability to compel governments not to arrest certain people . Not necessarily compel them not to rest since they will be slandered him out of what they do. All im saying is i think it should be done in a way thats going to thats not going to undermine the biggest goal. Thats a constant problem of the american democracy. Im going to ask one more question that open it to the audience. Theres a a whole chapter in ts book on the military, which i found very interesting. A big point that was made is that the militaries in the region have attempted 73 coups since 1932, and succeeded in 39 of them. The point being that the militaries are often a force for instability, not for stability. It also hammers the point that a lot of these militaries suffer for lack of united training, fk of equipment. The United States<\/a> has spent decades Training Officer<\/a> corps, whether its in turkey or egypt or wherever. It is sold billions of dollars worth of weapons to a lot of these countries. Was that for not . And how can you say so many of these militaries are underresourced when it seems like all we do is spend military aid. A couple points, consider the collapse of the Iraqi Military<\/a> in 2014 at we invested 25 billion dollars in that. Of course we also invest a great deal in afghanistan as well. Now, a chapter assassinating so im glad you highlighted it. A couple things that come into play. One of the reasons why aside from perhaps being destabilizing in their own countries, militaries should have big question mark over the is of course they seldom one wars. They seldom professed do what they say theyre going to do. Part of that has to do with differences in culture with regard to shame. When a sergeant in basic training breaks down, when the drill sergeant breaks than a new record guide isnt to break them down its to make the header soldiers. Likewise, in the navy when the chief breaks and someone to make them a a better set of pilot bt if honor is perceived rather what to do this and have an application on your ability to correct mistakes. Putting that aside and bring this to what bryant was talking about, rightly so, in having diplomats the front and center picky to look at a country like pakistan, pakistan during i think 2007 you had that kerrylugar amendment which was a bipartisan approach to say look, fates of american diplomacy should be military and the cia even though thats what its been for decades in pakistan. They put forward a 7 billion aid package and it made antiamericanism worse. Why . Because the military which is about to get cut off from this gravy train started, through the rumor mills and so forth that this money was meant to christianize pakistan which is nonsense and it was also an insult, all the counting mechanism were insult. When it issues we have to do with acrosstheboard as we try to get diplomats front and center, it doesnt make sense resourcing the state department and saying thats going to solve the problem if youre stuck behind walls. When it comes to military in egypt and pakistan i think there is what i would call a cycle of extortion, in which we give money in order to have the local militaries fight the islamic insurgents. But at some point the idea has dawned that if we defeat the islamic insurgents, then we are never going to be able will be cut off from the money. When you look at the egyptians and Islamic State<\/a> and northern sinai, for example, which is it . The Egyptian Army<\/a> cant defeat the Islamic State<\/a> because it dont want to or their incompetent . Its one or the other. When it comes to the military in general is not just the coup issue. When bright and i were also in egypt together, and you could argue perhaps cut president sisi some slack for making some of the corrections which he did to make economically which were 50 years overdue, but instead of filling a platform for new economic development, what is that is the militaries coming for the unique interests and is repeating all the mistakes which the military made of the previous 50 years five decades which means what sisi is doing is gratuitously cracking and human rights rather than improving the status of egyptian society. If i could add some thoughts because i i agree with what michael said. What i i was translated for, te last 40 years and especially the last 15 years of use policy we need to have strategic questioning of using arms sales and military aid as the tool of engagement with these societies to produce stability in the source of things were trying to get at in this book, if that makes sense. Because it has not succeeded in place like egypt which we talked about before. Internally i think it is tilted the balance of power against freedom and its corrosive and it doesnt lead, it creates, reinforces what is essentially still us eight centric system and also reinforces the authoritarianism which again i dont think its a sustainable in the long run. Bigger picture you look across the region and especially hundreds of billions that we either sold or delivered to goal states and others, there needs to be serious questioning because when i look at it there is a dangerous and dysfunctional dependency on the u. S. Military approach. Look at it today. Look at it just this past week. A lot of these militaries in the region himself cant defend themselves. Look what happened in september in saudi arabia. How the hell did that happen if we accept then sort of defensive systems and things like this . Thats the main point is you sit in washington is theirs is episodic and largely tactical and emotional debate that it think in some ways i think its important, its a reflection of a lot of americans saying what the heck . But its often a strategic. Often assumes that this sort of tool persistence or sales. If we cut it off then we read them the right act and thats it and they will change. I think we need to have somewhat of a phase back from this tools and synthesize other aspects. Because what we them with all of these arms sales has not produced the stability in the region and its ideas countries themselves. Okay. Anybody have any questions . Can we just ask that you identify yourself before your question . The gentleman in the back. Jeremiah with the association of the u. S. Army. I had a question about the arabisraeli conflict. I think for a while especially in the 90s there was this belief that all roads to middle east stability went through solving arabisraeli conflict. You see kind of realignment especially now between israel and some of the Sunni Arab States<\/a> in the middle east . What do you see as the continued importance for regional stability of that conflict today . What i would answer very briefly is decades of incitement remain. Even if governments and the diplomatic posher many of the gulf states have altered. That doesnt necessarily trickle down to the various populations in egypt, saudi arabia and so forth. What i would say, brian alluded to how we went from mohammed that that university. Whenever i travel either with bright or individually i will try to do roundtables at universities because theyve much less of a a Civil Servant<\/a> diplomats intimacies do. When noting something university in iraq, one of the things that were strange was in this threehour session note when product is you want. Abel brought up saudi arabia quite a bit. What argues the problems are looming so great about the region that people are focusing on their own immediate problems. That doesnt mean the arabisraeli conflict is an important but it would say theres a greater, broader perspective throughout the region and perhaps traditionally american diplomats of that. I would say theres a shift but not a realignment yet. I used to live in the west bank in cost in the 1990s they lived in the region. Theres a shift in in the itst as high priority, by the dont see see a realignment in that i dont see what in essence minigolf officials and other say look, we had this relationship that in the closet underneath the table with israel. Mosey on intel and concerns about iran. Were not going to come out publicly so long as theres this sense of injustice, this sense that theres not a sustainable just a resolution to the israelipalestinian conflict which add i dont see the pathway there at all. If you look at the reactions to it, of President Trump<\/a>s initiatives, whether moving embassy to jerusalem or the Golan Heights<\/a> decision. It was muted in the streets in official, saudi arabia and other countries had conferences i condemned this. The issued communiques and thats all you got. My main point is i dont see realignment mean like open relations between a lot of these countries breaking out that any sort of sense of the pathway to resolving the conflict between the israelis and the palestinians. Anybody else . My name is bill. Ive written a a little bit abt the middle east but not as much as any of you have. I thought when you talk about the middle east in your book, im not sure how for east and west you go but i think your discussion today is mostly focus on that little area from lebanon to iran. Is that right. Was recovered different authors mr. Byrne examples but we cover from morocco to iran, although that of pakistan. The chapter in education focused heavily on north africa. Okay. One quick, and then a question. When you say while we may be here take a look at all these problems as religious issues, one form of religious extremist against another had remember in many cases religion has been adopted as a tool to gain power, not the other way around. My comment is, may be the exception to that is afghanistan. Where i think religion is driving come people are trying to take over the country, are doing it for purely religious reasons, but thats a Comment Period<\/a> the question is, in the area you focused on there are two ancient historic divides. Theres the religious divide between the sunnis and the shiites, and theres the ethnic divide between the persians and the arabs. I think im not wrong that the war between, more people die between the war between iraq and iran and died any other conflict all put together in the last 40 years. And my question to you is, in the long term, how do you see i think we see a little bit of that now, right . Because because in iraqi people you have a question . Yeah. In the longterm do you see those two to fight which do ultimately creating more stability or overcoming the other . First of all, just one small factoid. The way and ethnicity estabrook is been considered in the middle is was originally geographic starting in the 1920s and 30s. It shifted to link cubistic linguistic. The point is egypt on over to morocco was not always considered arab. They put that aside, another factor in the middle east you are right in terms of the sheer scale of the war. If we want to put it was happen in syria, however, that may have surpassed the iraniraq were consort and the Great Lakes Region<\/a> in africa. The reason why sectarianism seems to be so contentious right now in the middle east is only ten or 15 of the muslim world may be shiite but if you draw circle around the levant in the Arabian Peninsula<\/a> and a rant its about a 5050 parity which is why ever since around the beginning of the century, theres been a sense that absolute everything is in play. But in conclusion what i would argue is that people who are hellbent on having a conflict will always come up for an excuse to have one. That can be political, that can be religious, it can be some other aspect. What i wanted to avoid with this and the reason we are doing a rethink is we were not try to come up with a political sign spirit of where one size its all. Fits all. I think the centerpiece of the struggle, i dont know whether those things will be resolved. In some ways they arequite large and big but the centerpiece is from the bottom. And that struggle that is happening and i think accelerating, the thing that people thought was over two or three years after the arab uprising is not over and my guess now that we are in a new decade is that that is actually going to accelerate when you look at those structural, just the basic metrics of where the societies are going theres going to be some change and the question is whether that change is fast or slow, the pace of it or whether it moves in the right direction however you define that or try to go back thousand years. And i think those internal tensions in societies and what weve seenthe last year in particular is rise of nationalism throughout the countries of the region is going to be where the first immediate arena where it then impacts those other sort of arenas you talk about. Shia sunni but people are going to look to what most proximate witches their lives, whose running them and whether those who are ruling them are doing so justly and with a sense of effectiveness and thats where i think it will be a big part of the debate this decade any questions . I spent a lot of time in the middle east last 20 so years. I guess im wondering , im getting everything in english and french from 100 years ago at the Ottoman Empire<\/a> and you just mentioned nationalism. Seems like thats an unheardof thing until recently. Do you see, you actually see the nationstates either recombining like i hate to say biden wasright on something but there really is three places. Do you see nobody wants to give up their boundaries. Their Current International<\/a> boundaries which to me is one of the issues that the city and like i say the kurds are promised her to stand that they never got which they are spread over 4 countries and none of those countries want to give up, its like whats going on with turkey in syria but do you see a day when like a kurdistan exists, the current boundaries get shifted to more natural coherent in the city. Out of sponsor that briefly. Generally speaking i should take a little bit of issue because of course you are right. When you look at a map of the middle east and you see a Straight Line<\/a> that an artificial border. That doesnt mean its an arbitrary country so most people in the middle east live traditionally along the coast or along rivers. So when you consider egypt and 90 percent of the population living along the nile, it doesnt necessarily matter where you draw the border. Egypt has a sense of being egypt. If i had to go back through any of these countries, end of course only became independent i think in 1932 but in 13th century arabic literature people talked about the concept of iraq. People talked about the concept of lebanon or syria long before they formally became independent so when it comes to the artificiality of states id say the most artificial state of course are jordan, qatar, the emirates and kuwait. But that many of the others and we see this with how they retroactively extend back their National Myth<\/a> have some basis in legitimacy that really isnt going to change much. If the question is the kurds, the kurds are the largest people who have been if you will dispossess and is not 4 countries was because of world war i because of the treaty in the 17th century is what created the iran iraq border problem occurred is are you going to have one to stand or could you have for thisnotion that were going to have one , we have two romanians, one of which is called mold a lot, to albania, one of which is called roosevelt and we have 22 arab states so you could see some border adjustments, yes but i dont think youre going to see a wholesale revision of the massive middle east as somehow illegitimate because i think its a lot less illegitimate than sometimes the grievance industry would have us accept. Can i just add a little point to that . Arent we already seeing some adjustment of border whether its the turks coming over the border into syria and claiming some land, we have the iranians and the russians play a huge role in syria,who knows whats going to happen. You know, i saw does not have control of his country. The israelis have now made formal claims to the goal on. Dont we see already a change. Theres a difference between wholesale adjustments and im also not willing to argue when you had whats fundamentally an unresolved order issue, thats separate from existing recognized borders. It comes to turkey i think this is a major challenge with everyone because you can comment on this but when we look at thefact that cyprus remains occupied ever since non1974 , when we look at him and rob was in northern syria, turkish civilian post office is sprouting up, i would worry great deal about the evangelism of everyone and whether the world is going to be in a position to respond to that whatever his ambition is but we have an expert here so ill defer. The real problem is i think the International Context<\/a> has changed, has moved on from what it was 50, 60, 70 years ago in terms of the legitimacy of changing borders. Everything is said by and large on this, its by choice. That certain people want to leave and the others agreed to it. Im not sure whats will happen in the northern sea. Turkey is expanding, i think theres some University Branches<\/a> or faculties open. But is the world evergoing to see that or just as a Turkish Occupation<\/a> . It by default occupation. Highdefinition, but im not sure how far you want to go with that it may depend on whether you can write an agreement with us on in russia in terms of what kind of autonomy will get there. Mike threaten the turkish kurds so to speak. It remains to be seen but i think the way its those, it continues this way. I dont think theres goingto be a lot of legitimacy. To this point, i think theres a really important you point you make you i think the issue is key and will be whether whats happening de facto, was playing out already rather than where the formal lines are, we havent talked about yemen. And we almost, but to me the really interesting discussion about whats happening in yemen and whether there can be aresolution to the conflict , if you move on beyond the politicized thing is what was yemen for this conflict and it doesnt hang together. I tried to address this about the centralization. And i think again, if we want to be serious about diplomacy and using these other tools, understanding how different groups have defined their relationship to the Central Government<\/a> for our regions do and joe biden tried to do this 10 or 15 years ago when hehad the biden plan for iraq. Which again, a lot of this doesnt translate well back to our own politics and is not that meaningful because its got to be organic and the point i make is this notion that was brought up about the colonial powers, yes they made mistakes and i think it would be a mistake to go back to that model tried to redefine borders. As i was trying to say about islam and reform its organic. We have to watch and see how it develops and in a place like yemen, we have to understand with more texture which is what we tried to do in the book what are the factors of dominance and political legitimacy in different islamist groups. They themselves they can create these new arrangements that have more staying power than what we have right now. And of course nationalism has developed over the last hundred yearsand some of the state. And im sure im going to get a complaint from the jordanians about coming calling them artificial. I, moshe nelson with grant borden. Thank you for these remarks, its been wonderful. Youve covered a lot of topics in a short time. One thing that was mentioned, there are greatly was on social media and the influence of technology and digital diplomacy. In influencing conflicts. We saw through both revolutions and a surviving military coups, and in one way or another in turkey the influence of immediate responsiveness with social media, can you touch upon digital responsiveness and how that may introduce to diplomacy or even intensifying conflicts in the middle east . If i could start with this and try to relate to the book , i think the twitter and facebook revolutions as they were called of the arab uprising in 2011 produced enormous capacity for people to organize against something, to be against something, to tear things down and i see that dynamic and social media here in our own policy debate that is largely used as a tool paragraph or disagree with a lot of people but its not all that useful and im talking just in these countries, ill get the us diplomacy. It has not yet, i havent seen a great case or case study of building consensus and diving political movement. Look at our current president , uses his troll power very effectively to biden fragment post political coalitions at home and keep people off balance my main point and i know some Tech Companies<\/a> were looking into this seminar years ago these tools they developed were used to extend freedom, to tear down authoritarian rule and things like this. Now were in this dangerous moment with china and saudi arabia, uae and other countries that are democracies, they are using the tools to reimpose control and in very repressive ways. They tried to squelch dissent and debate and thats that. I dont see right now the us playing any meaningful serious role in all of this including in the test case of aaron and michael, i hope he disagrees with me on this point theres a much is wrong about the nonpolicy of donald trump and who knows what he said at 11 00 at the top. But when the protests started again in iran earlylast year , i think all we really thought was an oped and a political rhetorical approach of this administration to talk about the freedom of the ringing people but i didnt see any, and maybe there were different movements but there was no serious move to talk about how we help arrange themselves to protect themselves and have sort of vpn and others. Youre probably more attempt at understanding the technology but have a space for people to communicatewith each other. In iran , those who are in favor of the current regime and talking about military led regime change just tools of engagement with society and we dont even talk about that now because of the nature of how bad our government is an hour debate because you cant even raise it so i think if we moved to a more functional space, less dysfunctional here at home it would be interesting to talk about how we can use these tools to engage broader sectors of society , back to michael diplomats be behind walls. None of us really dont have to be behind walls because after this panel i can connect with somebody conceivably in iran or saudi arabia or palestine. And have a conversation, but i dont see those tools being used in diplomacy very well right now. A few other ways to look at this, when it comes to the diamond model that every strategy should have a diplomatic informational military and economic component and the whole is greater than the sum of the parts the United States<\/a> traditionallyhasnt been me i and the diamond. On the basis of our information strategy as it is, its be truthful therefore through through you build credibility. The drawback to that is that truth is determining what the truth is is slow at which point after three or four days the news cycle has moved on. I talked to people involved in information strategies in the usgovernment who say we are still afraid of doing anything wrong that we end up doing nothing right. Especially on the military side of this. That said, one of the things and if the basis of our counterinsurgency strategy and problem areas is to win hearts and minds, the iranian influence operation strategy has traditionally been to throw stuff at the wall and see what sticks there is one case in 2007 in which one of the iranian moderate newspapers i think i heart which is actually a website affiliated with rossum johnny said the goal of the americans is to convert afghanistan to christianity and create a new andalusia. And okay, absolute nonsense but then theres some contractor in indiana who puts biblical citation numbers on a sniper scope and biscuit picked up in the local media and next thing you know its on al jazeera so that poor illiterate farmer said i didnt believe that iranian propaganda but maybe theres nothing there and its just enough to get in the way of our strategy. Going more to what brian said with getting off the wall, i had a conversation early on in the trumpet ministration with someone who was a very high level official. And basically said look, in the middle east when italk to people in the middle east , including principals, including prime minister, foreign minister, im using what or if its turkey im using signal or if its iran im using telegram and if we are still picking up the phone and calling people, its like dealing with 20thcentury solution to a 21stcentury problem. So that ultimately goes into the practice of diplomacy which i think is hard to change. This has been a very rich discussion and im sure that we could go on for probably another hour that we have to leave it there though red asked all our speakers,to michael, to brian , thanks to you. Thank you for coming. Weeknight this month we are featuring book tv programs showcasing what available every weekend on cspan2. Tonight socialism, Kentucky Republican<\/a> senator rand paul assesses his book the case against socialism on the history and rise of socialist ideology in america. Then its Current Affairs<\/a> editorinchief nathan robinson, author of why you should be a socialist. After that, economists Robert Lawson<\/a> and Benjamin Powell<\/a> socialism sucks about their travels to socialist countries. Tv this week and every weekend on cspan2 area. Tonight on the communicators, from the annual state of the net conference internet archive creator rooster tail talks about documenting the internet. We collect about 800 million pages every day. The total collections about 800 billion. Url so its actually kind of cute and turned out that turned out to only be part of what we do. We also archive television, abc, nbc, fox but also International Television<\/a> and if you go to td. Archive you can search to find a list of what other people said and be able toput those in blog posts and the like. The idea is to make it so people can quote compare and contrast critically about what happened on television. Watched the communicators tonight at eight eastern on cspan2. Cspan has roundtheclock coverage of the federal response to the coronavirus pandemic and its all available on demand at cspan. Org coronavirus. Watch white house briefings, updates from governors and state officials, track the spread throughout the us and theworld with interactive maps. Watch ondemand anytime unfiltered at cspan. Org coronavirus. Tonight a special evening addition of washington journal of the federal response to the Coronavirus Crisis<\/a>. Join us at 8 pm eastern with john barry, author of the great influenza. The epic story of the deadliest pandemic in history and flutter congresswoman Debbie Wasserman<\/a> schultz on the response to the virus in her district. Join the conversation on the Coronavirus Crisis<\/a> on washington journal primetime tonight at 8 pm eastern on cspan. Thanks all of you for making time in your day to join us. Our gathering includes ambassadors and representatives from across embassies including iraq, jordan, morocco, tunisia, turkey, yemen, the netherlands, norway, australia, zimbabwe, will be in ecuador so from the four corners we come to hear you. We alslc","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"archive.org","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","width":"800","height":"600","url":"\/\/ia902907.us.archive.org\/4\/items\/CSPAN2_20200406_190100_Michael_Rubin__Brian_Katulis_Seven_Pillars\/CSPAN2_20200406_190100_Michael_Rubin__Brian_Katulis_Seven_Pillars.thumbs\/CSPAN2_20200406_190100_Michael_Rubin__Brian_Katulis_Seven_Pillars_000001.jpg"}},"autauthor":{"@type":"Organization"},"author":{"sameAs":"archive.org","name":"archive.org"}}],"coverageEndTime":"20240716T12:35:10+00:00"}