The russians . Since you cant, then its how you do it with the russians rather than whether you give the russians a role or not give them a role. And nobody here is, looking at age bracket here very few would be naive, frankly nobody here believes that any of us pursue policy without an interest. We obviously have an agenda. Be obviously have an interest. But the Positive Side i see in all of this is we all know we cannot do alone. So there will be a point in time we will have to start engaging the other. And probably there will be setbacks where we move away. I am from my contacts with russians over the last year, they now clearly that there are major operations are not sustainable long term. That they need to move from that phase to political phase. And i would argue also, i dont think that the vienna talk ss took us to a new level, but theres no question that the intervention by the russians created a sense of urgency be it that the west got scared that theyre going to play their role again, or on the ground that all of the parties came together for the first time, the regional parties as well and came to vienna. Created a sense of urgency this issue has to be dealt with. So, in that respect i actually find the intervention as a tool not the policy. The intervention as a tool. I see it tactically having had a reasonably positive effect. Now is the policy right depends on what we do after intervention. In other words, if this ends up being different parties simply using force without a policy paradigm that we work on to try to solve the isis issue or syrian issue, youre going to have a lot of difference forces on the ground and its going to be very very dangerous for all of us. And therefore, the result would be this is more negative than positive. It causes all of the different parties, be that as i think Henry Kissinger said the russians have been out of the middle east or most of the middle east after 73 war and now back well, theyre back. And theyre back for a reason. Nobody else was there. And there were a lot of problems. But as a middle easterner, frankly, i will engage the west as much as i can to help solve whats happening in the middle east and i will engage the russians equally so to help solve that. From the middle eastern perspective, theres tremendous sensitivity and a little bit of exaggeration, frankly, how many conspiracies the west has managed to get the middle east to where it is. Im not a big conspiracy fan although you give me a lot of ammunition to and move in that direction. But nevertheless, we cant solve this without the west and we cant solve it without russia. So my argument to all of you, frankly, is yeah sure they have interest, sure they have agenda, sure they want to pla i a role there. But how can i take advantage of that rather than is this going to be a coalition where we all embrace the same goals exactly and walk at the same pace, or are we is our competition, necessarilying mutually exclusive we have to hurt each other more than we gain. It depends. If, i, frankly believe that engaging russia United States a good thing and i also believe that they understand that theres only so much you can do without engaging other parties but im not ready to say yet this step per se is the beginning 0 the solution. That depends on the politics after that be. Beyond the sectarian issues that are involved there instead of motivations of gulf states versus iran or iran sectarian motivations, do you detect in all of your travels across your region of the world much sensitivity to the humanitarian cost and attributing the blame for that to iranians and russians and assad, a lot of hofs thesis one point of world diplomacy ought to be at least agreement on that, on stopping the barrel bombing. Some sort of ceasefire that at least stops the depredations against civilians and its the clear the source russianmade aircraft, flown by syrian pilots presumably with russian materiel. But is there a sensitivity there . Is that not even in the secondary or tertiary level of conversation . Six seven months ago, i would argue that you could look at the center and east of the arab middle east as being more sensitive to western interventions, and russian interventions and the center to the west more sensitive about the russian intervention. Now, whether its because of real politic or otherwise, there stills a lot more sensitivity regarding the russian intervention in the western part of the arab world particularly the gulf. I think theres a larger degree of real itchismism, can they be pushed in the positive drixds . Irection . How many arab lead beer leaders been there . We dont agree on everything they do, we dont disagree on everything they do. Cant we afford to do it without them . If we could, id do it without them and the americans. But we cant. Sure. And i actually believe that while they may have policies, that we differ with they are rational people pursuing those policies. I believe in the value of diplomacy trying to engage them because i have no other alternative and, secondly, i am ready to have a for living in quote unquote the aviation term is in an open society or own skies, there will be competition. It doesnt really concern me much. But the point i think is middle easterner, we have to emphasize much more, is that the debate shouldnt be aabout whether it is whether it affects western interests and russian interests but it should be focused first, not exclusively, first, does this help solve the problem of the region . Thats my part of the departure. Part of that leads me to come to conclusions that are completely real politic do i think we can i mean, if there was a clear solution to how we move from where we are in the tragedies in syria to a new syria, wed do it but there is no clear solution. Even if you drew it up, and i can draw up a couple of farm laormulas the process of getting there is complicated. One of the issues raised, how long first of all, does or does it not, then how long if he does aboutbashar stay . Clearly negotiating about a new syria, it shouldnt be reinvention of the old syria. But to get there i cant simply talk to my friends. I have to talk to the other parties on the ground. And as angry as i understand and i respect and i agree with the syria opposition in their anger with bashar, there are a lot of other despicable characters frankly, on the ground that are of tremendous threat to the middle east. So again, its not im going to talk to these and im going to talk to the others. It complicated. Because of the complexity we need to engage each other as mature rational people understand i may differ with you on some interests but nevertheless its better to engage you rather than say your interests are different from mine and therefore we wont play cards. Before we turn to broader questions and discussion, if i may take the privilege also of asking you nobody mentioned the word turkey which along with egypt and the arab world is close to my heart, a lot of my professional experiences there it seems to me there has been a major turn in turkish relations a dramatic one i was there until a year ago, we had putin visits back and forth between thenprime minister and later president people around now president erdogan praising putin to the skies publicly. And then very dramatic turn even before the late november shootdown of the airplane in russianturkish relations, going back to almost a cold war kind of rhetoric making us all rather anxious. Any insight or comment on that . How that is playing, how that is factoring into mr. Putins outlook on the region and what hes trying to do in syria . Or even prospects for managing it . I would not say that mr. Putin has changed his agenda due to the shootdown with turkey. I think that inevitably before turkey can be an ally in this fight and what happened to the incident with russian airplane is one look, it just benefited mr. Putin because it enlarges his strategy of confront confrontation with whomever in who challenge russia. In the russian political opinions conflict with turkey, this is more complicated than syria. Mr. Putins policy of countersanction on european union, closing egyptian flight for tourists and now once again prove that russias strong, can somehow in all abandon economic relationship with new one who can challenge the russians. From my point of view what is going on with turkey, from moscow, it seems so, its just another kind of propaganda from mr. Putins side. If i can add if you read what mr. Putin said yesterday in his press conference about turkey and the United States im not going to repeat it it wasnt very polite but sort of again, linking turkey with the u. S. And so turkeys now, again, part of the general, you know propaganda that you see in the russian tv and what the russian officials are saying about the west being out to threaten russia and theyve even had things on russian tv suggesting it was the u. S. That told the turks to do this. Really . Yeah yeah. Between maybe not turkey and u. S. But definitely between turkey and but nato is the u. S. Exactly. And as far as the other russian airplane that went down over sinai, looks like two sides are overcoming that . Which two . Egypt and russia. Different sides. The fact is plane went down. There is an official Committee Investigating that. And theyre bound by only coming up with public statements once they have conclusive evidence. So i say this from past experience having followed the egypt air crash way back in 99 they cant come up and say we expect this or we think its this. They have to say this is the evidence that says soandso. They will ultimately come out much later than intelligence sources or other government officials. Russians have said that they think its a terrorist act. So in terms of the public statements theres a difference between russians and committee. But the Egyptian Government has not said anything because thats not it role per se. Either whatever it is, its a tragedy and we need to find out what it is and whether done by a terrorist or not, its important to find that out. But nobody has questioned that if there is terrorism in this, and we havent denied that as egyptians, we will make that announcement frankly in many respects. Its never going to be an excuse what we use cynically. But if it is clear that a terrorist, if thats much clear answer than if you say, well, somebody got through your security system. So theres no reason to hide this. Countries are moving toward collaboration on getting improving security so that aviation yesterday i saw something in the media that we invited eu Security Team to come in and check the airport processes back home and the airport facility seemed to have passed that test. Look, we are a nation that will only really thrive if we have tourists. We need to ensure tourists feel comfortable beyond how much it cost us. No question we will make extra effort to ensure that. If no further interaction among panelists ill throw it up to the audience. Well try to move around. Maybe judith . Yes. If you can bring the microphone. Thank you. Very good panel. Id like to address my question to you, but let me start by saying that, clearly, the misconceived strategically catastrophic war in iraq by the u. S. Disrupted an unstable status quo and made the arab transition which was necessary eneverybody vittable more vicious, violent faster virulent, everything now can say about it probably helped create isis. Nevertheless, when we look at the problem the lack of arab leadership, arab willingness to participate and help, whether its militarily helping Syrian Refugees except jordan and lebanon, the weakest of the weak, the gulf states are totally absolutely completely preoccupied with their allergy to iran, they dont talk about syria or isis, the lack of cohesion in the arab world that e egyptian is a big country with big u. S. Armed military, maybe you cant do it without the International Community and its now become russianamerican problem, but how do we do it without something, something coming out of the arab world . So far theres next to nothing. Well, theres no answer to the problems, but i wouldnt say theres annex to nothing. The proposal to create an arab Rapid Deployment force was one step towards well we need to have the capacity and the tools to deal with threats are not always call on others to do that. That has not gone through. It up to debate. Some countries are not comfortable with that. Two days ago the saudis came up with another coalition about terrorism. Thats just the beginning. But it reflects that the arab world is starting to look at what can they actually do. If i mean, i understand that theres no question that there is the humanitarian pressure and i think as you said correctly, jordan and lebanon have carried a lot of this egypt, though it not on the border has actually 400,000 Syrian Refugees now we need and the kuwaitis have an annual conference where they provide Financial Support for the refugees is this going to be completely alone by the arab world . No. Therefore the point i made at the entd 0 of moo commenty comments so must disrupt among the parties in the region or some of them and the west, some of them and russia, unless we have a better political understanding of what are the limbtationlimitations of the competition, unless we have this grand not grand bargain, maybe thats too much but a grand understanding, youre not going to get a strong commitment to arab forces or strong commitment for western forces or Russian Forces thats sustainable. All of this formula will fail unless we have a Stronger Political understanding. Thats why as much as id like to say i have the answer im going to do it, i was hoping to say i dont have the answer i need to talk to people that will compete with me and may have different agendas. But thats my point. If i think this is what your point is judith, if the point is arab needed to do more ive been saying thatzt8z for years now, so i have no problem with that at all. Fred, you have been calling for an Arab Stabilization force based largely on arab contribution, with jim zogby had his annual poll come out a week or two ago, which showed substantial public support, for me a little bit surprising more than i detected. Any assess on the prospects. I mean if if the United States were to mount the kind of Diplomatic Campaign i think it should, as an al ternive to the president being forced to deploy american soldiers and marines in the wake of a parislike incident occurring in the United States i think the going in assumption would be certainly at the leadership level in the region, a very, very, very suppressed appetite for putting Ground Forces into Eastern Syria against isil. This is an appetite that would have to be stimulated by the United States. I dont i would not, in the least, try to shortchange or understate that the difficulty this particular administration would have in making the case that were in this for the duration, well provide the leadership and well put skin in the game. So there may be, you know, there may be substantial and growing Popular Support for decisive military intervention against isil but my going in assumption is that the leadership level, the appetite for ground intervention would be very much under control. You dont have your hand up, and youre part of the next panel, but for an eastern arab perspective, any comments on either this issue or any or ones weve got to hear . You want to save it for the next panel. Ill save it. Over to this side. Sir, with your hand up. And back and then hell come around. David colton, my question to the panel from my question to the panel is to hone down on the question of quoten quote the russian offensive. Let be very candid, the russian offensive has been a flop to date. The progress has been measured in scant kilometers. They have maybe about 50 aircraft sorties, mostly with unguided bombs and if you recall under the soviet union there were 8,000 troops stationed in syria at the time. If you look at the Current Ratio of the russian military, which is about 71, 61, and you actually work through the military requirements to maintain a sustained operation, i put to the panel, putin cant do it. More importantly, the iranians have taken enormous casualties not just among senior generals but at the Second Lieutenant level. If the panel may know, the iranians are talking about on state tv and there are reports that the iranian troops are actually pulling out, meaning that the russians themselves are going to have to add more ground pounders. And i put out to you how much of what were seeing with putin is the same kind of bluff he tried to daunt with ukraine . He has tried to get away with a lot on cheap. And i throw it to the panel out, when push comes to shove, how much can he really do . You want to respond to that . Its a very good i think its a very good question. I agree that for hoping to achieve some credible result it would impose much more deploy much more forces there. Actually, i would say that economically, and financially, it not a big problem for russia to send Ground Troops to syria because the operation looks quite cheap compared to russian expenditures. Whether they will do this or not, my personal position is that they actually will try to do this in some foreseeable future. The minister of defense said, the minister of defense, he will go i think it may happen. Of course i know there are a lot of casualties and russians are starting to question. But the logic of the operation, as it unfolds, asks mr. Putin to intervene on the ground. So this is my point. Of course, they will not succeed, this was my point, no one can succeed in fighting Islamic State, as the point, except the local forces, which i think are the kurds. If it is the west and russians want to go further with this they should promise kurds independent state there on some lands, so kurds can secure from the influence of the Islamic State and this can help. Neither russians or americans will succeed. My point is russians will try to start it. How to go further, i dont know. Isnt the point that selfof you have made earlier including fred, that the russians are not trying to succeed against isis, really, as proprofessor also said. Each they engage in the ground operation, they will it will be what i