weded to a party line. and they have years of hard won scholarly expertise vetted by peer review. years of effort to put into understanding a problem. and they bring to this to tavenlt and if the normally squabbling party converges on a view that the government is taking a wrong step, the government should listen. this argues that this expert opinion debate is one of democracy's big advantages over aut oksies. and that there's a strong support for this. however, this basic conventional wisdom fails to distinguish between what we might call normal uncertainty that international relations normally has, endemic, and the profound deep uncertainty that follows, paradigm shattering events like the fall of the wall and 9/11. and i suggest an argument along the lines that for two reasons at least actually scholars may not be able to put their best foot forward in precisely the sort of circumstances that this conference is dealing with. . . no carrierringconnect 1200 if the government happens to be powerful like the united states, that influence the future of a lot. scholarsñi are at an informatiol disadvantage. independent scholarly experts may be at a cognitive disadvantage. they may make particular kinds of investments in particular kinds of reasoning and knowledge that are not well-suited to uncertain times. scholars have two things that differentiate them from governmental experts. they have theory that they care a lot about and invest a lot in. non-government of experts place huge investments in theories. they also have systematic research with the date are historians, political scientists, or other social scientists. they seek to understand things in general. historiansxdçó may claim they dt seek to do this. i beg to differ. any major historical account contains a powerful explanation. that is a very different intellectual enterprise then deciding what to do in a massively fluid situation what what happened after the fall of the berlin wall or in september of 2001. the strength that scholars have in normal times is an incoming handicap in theseçó uncertain, rapidly moving times. with that. i am -- when the paradigm is cut loose, it changes things. i will go quickly here. ñithe bottom line on 1989 is tht the scholars were way behind the curve. they were much slower than the government to see what was happening. when they did figure out what was happening, the overwhelming preponderance of scholars who were experts on these matters all thought that the idea of rapid unification was a very dangerous move. overall, their views were much closer to those of margaret thatcher than those of helmut kohl and george w. bush. it was very dangerous for a variety of reasons. their theories predicted massive change are almost always associated with war. you saw this as a moment pregnant with the possibility of war. that is what motivated the back to the future arguments. the bipolarñi divisionñr of eure has maintained peace. rapid unification of germany will in fact and bring that will d -- bring back multi-clarity that will bring war. that was his argument. -- it will bring that multi- polarityw3ñiçó that will bring . there were a lot of reasons. the bottom line is that scholars were behind the curve and overestimated the risks involved with rapid unification. this is connected to the conduct of style but i am talking about. ñialmost the clearest case we he is theçó expansion that began to hit the radar screen in the middle of 1990. we had a powerful scholarly consensus against the idea that nato was central to europe. i do recall a lot of historians were not at all shy about applying the historical knowledge to contemporary politics. john dalgattis he had never encountered the decision that met with more opposition from historians and the expansion of nato. they predicted a lot of bad things would occur if we insisted on forcing nato into central europe. russia will align with china in a massive geopolitical alliance. russian democracy would collapse. russia would oppose the united states consistently throughout the world. overall, it would result in a significant near-term cost to the united states. george kennan called it the most catastrophic decision united states has made in the post-cold war world. this was often grounded in theory and the radical analogy. there was the theory of the balance of power. this was the situation in which you have a humiliated great power excluded from a post-war settlement that would balance internal and external factors with the other key great power out there, china. it was not just the political scientists making this argument. it featured prominently in the argument of historians. this argument failed to update the theory of the balance of power to completely different settings. the world was not multi-polar and russia did not face the same choices as in the 1930's. russia did take a course that was less favorable to the united states. the magnitude of the costs incurred -- even if you associate today's relatively recalcitrant russia, if you associate that with nato expansion and say it is because of the expansion that we have russia, the magnitude of russian opposition and alliance behavior is a pale shadow of what was predicted from the scholars. they were talking about geopolitical shift that would change the landscape. there is a very interesting case with iraq. we have a build up to the war with a short window for scholars to develop their arguments. it was only late in the game that it became clear that the invasion was likely to happen. the window for scholars to figure out what was happening and come up with arguments was smaller than you might think. the scholars who opposed this were exactly the same people who exhibited what in hindsight seem to be shortsighted analysis in the previous cases. they argued that this was a bad idea primarily on the following four arguments. the policy of containment and sanctions can work. they were defenders of the policy in washington that was discredited. they said that war would be very costly. saddam hussein probably use wmds engaged in urban warfare. war is very costly. third is the china shop argument. you invaded. you own it. it will be difficult to hold together. it will probably be a prolonged occupation. fourth, it will divert resources from the important struggle against al qaeda in afghanistan. those were the key things of their argument. my time is up. i would say that all the arguments adopted in the three decisions i have talked about, this one looks the best in hindsight. that said, it is very different than the arguments that you hear now. it is -- nonetheless, it reads relatively well in hindsight treated it is the least connected to the scholars own theories. the scholars making the analysis disconnected themselves in many ways from their previous intellectual investments in grand theory and explanation. to conclude, i would say that overall the scholarly performance in these three episodes is not amazing. it is less good than many would have you believe after the fact. it seems to be a disconnect between building general theory and explanation and making decisions under the circumstances. there is an implication. scholars frequently criticize policy makers. there have been many calls for humility. my paper certainly adds to the call for humility on our part. i think we can do better. i think we can provide policymakers with better insight. it will involve a very difficult trick in uniting the general with the particular. that is the hardest job as caller has to do. >> thinks you, bill wohlforth for those cool but there comments. -- thank-you, for those cruel but fair comments. the panelists seemed to have assumed that p i am assumed thatutin -- the panelists seemed to have assumed that i am more lighke putin than gorbachev. rather than comment, and want to ask the general question to get things started. i have many questions. i have been struggling to narrow it down to one. it is a question that everyone may want to weigh in on. there are many particular disagreements among the panelists. let me ask a general question. if we agree that there is a disruptive moment for a punctuational moment, turning point, threshold -- how do you know you are in one of these at the time? i ask this for a couple of reasons. we choose 1989 for obvious reasons. their questions about whether the bush administration responded in the right way or as well as they might have. 1991 million -- 1981 might have been the real opportunity. i am highlighting that there is disagreement on how much potential there was in 1989. how much of the turning point was 9/11? the leading argument has been that the bush administration overreached. they thought the world had changed more than it had on 9/11. how do you know you are in one of these? if you can figure that out, how do you decide how much leeway the united states has? how much has the world changed? how much can be reshaped by the united states? anybody care to take a stab at that? >> because you mentioned punctuational moment, a talk about how international relations involve a number of different disciplines like history, sociology, and economics. we could pay more attention to biological theory. i talk about the concept of punctuated equilibrium. the argument is advanced as a counter promotion of gradualism in evolutionary biology. the idea that great changes evolve gradually over time. he did not believe it was true. he believed the fossil record showed they have long times of equilibrium punctuated by extremely dramatic changes. in the broader paper but not in my comments, i talk about trying to look at these moments and the aftermath. i suspect that they are profoundly significant in that they cast a long shadow over much of the fifth with frigid cast a long shadow over much of the future. -- i suspect they are profoundly significant in that they cast a long shadow over much of the future. if you do not know it, it is not one. these are world change in events where it is clear that something is quantitatively different than before. if it does not rise to that level, i would say it is not one. the challenge of the policy makers is to get off the mark quickly. timing was of the essence to come up with new concepts quickly, to keep your enemies off balance. never interrupt your enemy when he is in the process of making a mistake. do not give him time to realize he is doing it. that is in the hands of the policy makers. >> if the soviet union had been collapsing to the same time the berlin wall opened, everybody would have known. it would have not just been a punctuational moment. it would have been bigger. the east germans did not open the berlin wall. the berlin wall was opened by the people. that is like going over niagara falls in a barrel as a policy maker. you cannot anticipate this. on the other hand, you have to deal with it. if someone had told me the soviet leader's had not mobilized to stop the wall from being breached, i would have told them they were crazy. that is what happened. it cannot be anticipated. the momentum of the debt carries forward. the collapse of the soviet union is more predictable. it is something one could have conjured for a couple of years. it strikes me as an event that one to plan for. -- it strikes me as an event that one could planned for. there is a continuation of the world economy. nato was extremely important in getting together with europe after the fall of the central front and the berlin wall. i never would have predicted that nato expansion would have gone to the degree of the crane detaching from the soviet union. -- i never would have predicted that nato expansion would have gone to the degree of the ukraine detaching from the soviet union. it would have seemed very unlikely. i am not going to cry about that. things happen in the world that tell us that we are wrong. policymakers and scholars are quite united on this. maybe they were not. but i do not know. those dealing with the day to day may have had a better perception i. it is critical when things that you believe turn out to be false. you have to deal with that and figure out where to go from there. >> that is a great question. it is easy to say in hindsight when you are in such a moment. when it is unfolding, it is much harder. the work i did comparing governmental and non-government experts suggests that the government's work quicker to realize that the assumptions of predictions that would have been true for 40 years were not true under these circumstances. the scholars and outsiders were slower to update. i think that is partly because of information. those in government had better information. i also think the scholars were more wedded to the concept that developed over four years. when something happens outside of the expectations, it is reasonable to except it as an anomaly. as the events pile up that are not consistent with the paradigm you have in your head, that is when you start to update. in hindsight looking back at my own career of international relations, i am struck by how long it took them to realize that much of what they thought they knew based on the cold war experience did not apply to great power politics anymore. we can debate this. the question on 9/12 was if we were in a world where we have fundamentally news estimated the balance of power. the question on 912 was if we were in a world where we had fundamentally wrong week estimated the balance of power. with the passage of time, it is less possible -- plausible that the that was a harbinger of a new era where government was powerless. one of the reasons why governments seem to be prevailing is because of what they are doing. if they were not doing the counter-terrorism they are doing, we do not know that the bells would have worked out the way it has so far. >> i wanted to say something about 9/11. i think i disagree with mary that it was a punctuational moment similar to the fall of the soviet union or the berlin wall. what was it then? if you think back to the anarchist attacks the year before with the bombs going off , the combination of anarchism and nihilism that 9/11 represented, and then we factor in the history of the last eight years, it increasingly appears that with john and i are saying -- that what john and i are saying is that 9/11 was not a seizucesure but was taken to ben by the bush administration. in their position, are probably would have done the same thing. the political costs of saying these are anarchists and it is unlikely to happen again, you just cannot do that. it may be that policy-makers are more hamstrung by political forces that will not let them get away with what i just said, even if it happens to be true. maybe it is. maybe it is not. >> for the paper, i was defining punctuational moments as those that had a dramatic impact on u.s. policy. it seems to me that 9/11 will apply under the constant. >> let me open it up to questions. identify yourself. right here. >> one of the interesting questions is whether there are other turning points or moments that we did not see. i would argue there is a long potential list of 1945, 1946, the beginning of the soviet expansion in eastern europe. 1953 to 1957, the end of stalinism. one of the issues the government internally debated for a long time was the reality of the soviet split. that had profound geopolitical effects. i would argue that the real punctuation all event -- that the real punctuational yvette was perestroika -- that the real punctuational event was perestroika. others became more likely. as historians or political scientist, to you think there are missed punctuational moments in post-world war ii history? >> i certainly do. i think the cold war began to end in east asia in the 1970's. economic forces from nixon on have run roughshod over the division of east asia that came out of world war ii and the korean war. a punctuational mom is certainly the reforms of 1978. everyone realizes in retrospect that it was important. -- a punctuational moment is certainly the reforms of 1978. it is not thought of in the same way as the berlin wall. we knew that sooner or later china would wake up and get rid of maoism and join the world system. it makes it less of an earth shattering event simply because it is what we would expect or predict. i think it is a huge thing. it transformed china immeasurably. >> you are absolutely right. i say in the paper that punctuational moments are not limited. these are very this similar events -- these are very dissimilar events. i wanted to compare them as moments that had dramatic impact on u.s. policy. it is in no way limited to those two. the way i am trying to use the term is as a unique moment when the long-term and short-term combined. you have long-term forces developing that have the triggering event. it becomes obvious to the most obtuse that things have changed. i am trying to think of a specific moment. the morning of september 11. try to find the moments that are specific yet some allies the changes that have an impact. i am trying to think of these as when commodore perry gets off the boat. it does not just have to be western or european. that is how i am trying to use it when it comes to a particular moment. it is the moment when things changed and now we have to do things differently. >> right here. >> you are right. i supported the right of the people of poland and the czech republic to choose freely which defensive alliance they would be members of. that was not a popular point of view in the mid-1990s. what really concerns me and what i would like to your reaction on is afghanistan. i pointed to that in my paper. what happened after the operation had been carried out. i wonder about this. do you think when you look back after the invasion of afghanistan in 2001 that one of the points that stand out for the whole decade is the sense that the cause of the overwhelming support of the operation, the problem could be solved much more easily in a way that the general consensus carried over onto policy-making for afghanistan after the yvette? was it easier to solve with regard to domestic public opinion and would be easier to solve abroad? people who worked on afghanistan argue along those lines. it was so easy to achieve with regard to creating consensus at home. afghanistan could be written off much more easily. >> should we answer each? are you collecting? >> i have no scholarly it were for answering your question. -- i have no scholarly warrant for answering your question. i study the 9/11. . they started to argue that we were diverting resources from the necessary struggle against al qaeda. there was the position yes afghanistan and no on iraq. that was from the very beginning. i do not know if they followed it up with real analyses of afghanistan showing that they needed more resources. i can say that there were people on the left who said it should go through the u.n. and that osama bin laden should be handed over to an international court. that was not the position of most mainstream security scholars. they did not think it could possibly work. they never thought this would work. they thought we would have to go to troops. they thought it would take at least half a million troops to do with afghanistan. when it worked, to their credit, the scholars said, "holy moly, they deserve credit for a brilliant strategy." it is important to remember how unexpected the fall was and how much it seemed to be a smashing success. there was skepticism it would work but widespread applause when it did seem to work. >> i remember going to in why you -- nyu for a lecture series. i did not know your view on the afghanistan war. all i knew was that i cannot imagine an american president not going after the taliban. he would be thrown out of the office the next chance the american people got. 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