affair. and proceeds by contra rebels, 7:00 pm eastern on c-span 2. >> explore the wonderful array of mother's day gifts waiting on c-spanshop.org. discover home decor and accessories. something for every c-span mom. plus every purchase goes toward supporting nonprofit operations, scan the code on the right or visit us online, c-spanshop.org. >> journalists discuss us/china relations at a potential second cold war as part of a global dialogue at georgetown university in washington dc. they looked at how foreign policy is perceived abroad, this is an hour and 1/2.

>> thank you, everyone for coming today, thrilled to be with these wonderful writers. we will be talking about the relationship between the united states and china and thinking about that under the paradigm of a second cold war whether that's helpful or not helpful way of looking at that relationship. let me tell you about the people up here. the author of the book we need new stories, ece temelkuran is a writer, a turkish novelist and journalist and grateful to

have her here. mohsin hamid is a novelist and author of many books. it's wonderful to have him here. and anne appelbaum, historian of the soviet union and the cold war, and her books include iron curtain, great to have you here. when we are done, you should get notecards at some point today and if you have any questions, pass them to the end of the island we will read those in the last half-hour of the event. i want to start with you, mohsin hamid . what do you think of this idea of a second cold war with china and specifically how it might look to people who are not in the united states or china and how you think of that idea as we embark on this relationship with china which seems to have got more intense in the last decade? >> thank you. happy to see so many of you

here since the last event, nice to have you all here. the first thing i would say is the definition of cold war, even calling it a war in itself is of you from the summer. i come from sudan so i have an african perspective on the chinese/us relationship and the difference between the two, and the way influence has spread across the world and how that translates into each party's agenda has been very different, china has spent a huge amount of time for good or for ill in building strong infrastructure and strong cultural connections with the continent. i room are being about 8 or 9 years old and members of chinese embassy coming to schools to participate in

cultural exchange with china. there was considered attempts to have chinese tv programs, cultural programs initiated with east african governments, the difference between the engagement with china and the us have meant at our level, this is seen as a very urgent and pressing crisis but where there are economic interests from which china draws a lot of influence, those areas do not see it like that. they just see china as a benign partner and a lot of economic and cultural projects and the benign aspect is a crucial one because the way china has

established these programs particularly big infrastructure projects, they done without any sort of political outage. there's not been any demand for any pressure that these states follow a chinese agenda on the global stage if that makes sense. contrast that to the way the united states has applied its influence or extended its power particularly in west africa which has been very aggressive and militarized, a lot of, not particularly structural clear which makes it seem quite sinister so lots of marine activity particularly in the fashion so it is seen as sinister and below the radar and having an agenda that is

about securitizing africa and securitizing economic assets, minerals and other assets america wants to protect rather than being a partnership with those countries. so in summary to answer your question, the view of a cold war 2.0 is a very specific place and not necessarily reflected in how many other parts of the world engage with that. >> how do you think about the question. i want to return to china and africa but how do you think about it? >> the first one wasn't really cold in my part of the world or your part of the world as well. our dictators, pakistan and turkey in the 1980s, my generation of kids were pakistani, yeah. it wasn't very -- cold.

because we grew up -- i am a fruit of that cold war in that way. the most educated part of the population was either exiled, tortured, killed, imprisoned, lost their jobs, lost their families. it was pretty heated for a big part of the population. so now it's going to be heated in another way. not necessarily for the united states but in ukraine for instance. the previous panel was quite interesting in the sense that there was the stock of neoliberalism was the triumph and ideology but now it is coming to a end so we have to turn to the rest of the world and take the leadership to

change this situation and so on. the first time they took the leadership which was during the cold war, many coups in my part of the world being turkish military coup in 1980. it was done to turn the economic system of the country to free market economy because there was this massive labor movement. to impress there should have been a coup which at the end of the day happens with cia support and now it is interesting to listen to these views, we are going to take the leadership again and going to be very amazing. sounded to me like that panel so i wanted to pickup up on that a little bit. that is what i wanted to say.

>> i think my own personal sense is a new cold war would be a complete disaster for the world, we have enough challenges without spinning our energy on trying to destroy each other. other things, i grew up next to one of the great battlegrounds of the last cold war, in pakistan next to afghanistan. so i grew up, we had a dictator backed by a huge amount of usaid, weaponry to islamise pakistan and tearing up the social fabric and teaching us we should support the mujahedin in their fight against the atheist soviets and setting up all these training camps for the mujahedin so the experience

was weaponry flowing into the cities, heroin everywhere. and the complete transformation of pakistan's national character, the rise of militant groups who became terrorist groups and we won. the soviet union was defeated. great victory was won in the cold war and pakistan and afghanistan lived happily ever after. this informs our view that they are almost always completely disastrous. each time we sublet to another one, vietnam, afghanistan, iraq, ukraine, the moral argument is always whether the

soviets doing, and democracy. the argument is always persuasive and the people who live in these places, generally speaking find their countries completely devastated by these things. america tires of the exercise, and up abandoning the region or the place and we have a disaster. that informs my sense of the desirability of this sort of thing. the other thing i would say in terms of what is going on, i think at the moment in the world we are experiencing something like covid. the real danger of covid turned out not so much that it would kill us but that our body would have exaggerated immune response. the immune response would ravage our lungs and brain and

other parts of the body and go haywire in response to a perceived threat and damaging ourselves. my sense is in a sense the united states is going through something like that right now. the united states establishment looks around the world and sees all these threats and is gearing up to respond to these threats in a way that i think will be devastating for the body of the world. for me, how do we not do that is very important. i will go on but in a nutshell i think being skeptical of the degree to which we consider other enemies to be our adversaries, the pakistanis look at india and be aware of the rise of the multi-government but indiana, a huge population of people with whom one can cooperate collaboratively similarly to the us and the second part of it is don't view the threat as

quite as threatening. the second thing, last thing i will say is be much more critical and skeptical of your own side. in pakistan we have a corrupt and self-interested national security establishment. so does the united states. the united states, i'm old enough some of my friends are living very well, the united states legalize corruption by allowing people to work in government department particularly military departments, to preside over massive purchases, go to the private sector, receive enormous payments from the same people they were supposed to recommend and engage in this legalized corruption at much of america's militarized foreign policy is based on that like pakistan. i will stop there but those are my initial reactions. >> i object to cold war 2.0 on

a lot of grounds. i am not sure who uses it. i hear it used as a provocative phrase but i'm not sure who thinks that way, how many people are planning to divide the world between america and china. at the implication of the phrase that we were divided like we were in the past. i don't believe the world divides up that easily or that simplistically. i don't think the original cold war did either. the mistakes were made in the cold war were always to do with the us or the other side or the soviet union perceiving enemies and allies when in fact it was more subtle, vietnam is a famous example of that, we are the south vietnamese halide

with the united states because they were capitalist or because or for other reasons, north vietnamese attacking because they were communist or because they were nationalists so we allowed the world to be divided into these two camps but made an easy frame for people to make judgments and lead to a lot of mistakes. same is true of the soviet union, even more so. i actually think there are divisions in the world and i don't agree with you that all enemies and all conflicts are matter of perception. i think there are -- what we do see arising is certainly a network on the autocratic side, china, russia, iran, venezuela, zimbabwe, north korea our country to do now work together, they have nothing in common ideologically, they don't meet in secret rooms like in a james bond movie and make

decisions about what they should do. it's not a simplistic group but it is a group who have some things in common and one of the things they have in common is their desire to repress their own democratic activists and their own population and in order to do that they fight both ideologically and in some cases really against the democratic world. one of the reasons for the russian invasion of ukraine, it's a colonial project with russia deciding to re-create an empire but another reason they are doing it is the idea that ukraine could become a democracy and make its own decisions and be aligned with other democracies around the world was an ideological challenge to vladimir putin which he couldn't let go. if you fail to understand that then you won't understand why the war is being fought and

couldn't can justify it. so that there is a loose alignment of powers who have reasons, to mystic political reasons to repress their own democracies and to create difficulties for the democratic world, that is just a fact of life. i wouldn't call it a cold war. i wouldn't call it cold war 2.0. i don't think it is a simplistic frame you can put on top of the world, there's no berlin wall that divides east and west in some obvious way and i think there are autocratic behaviors and practices inside most democracies, maybe this one in particular in the fight against those is just as important as the struggle internationally. at the same time i would agree with you that there are allies whether the russian opposition or the hong kong opposition or

the uranian women's movement. those are also allies if they were to work together and with one another and people in a democratic world we could achieve things so i do think there's an ideological conflict in the world, i hope it will never look like cold war 1.0. >> you want to respond to that? >> let me ask about one thing. you spoke about the initial cold war and some of the mistakes the united states and the soviet union made, seeing people a certain way based on the way you laid it out, this idea of having autocratic countries that are allied in some way, they pose a challenge democratic countries. where might it be more autocratic that they are allied with us to fit into that, saudi arabia or egypt or india?

>> it's not a framework that includes every country. vietnam is an extreme example that doesn't have as its primary goal undermining. it is not a revisionist power. doesn't seek to change the world order or take human rights language out of the united nations so you can point to them, saudi arabia plays on one side and sometimes the other, india, you can say sometimes aligned one way or the other. i am stressing it is not a simplistic framework and not every country fits into it and not every conflict fits into it. i am simply saying that there is a network of autocracies who do have as one of their goals the repression of their own democratic opposition, and they

have tools, information warfare makes it sound too exciting, you could just call it propaganda. they have tools in which they seek to spread autocratic narratives, spread the narrative of democratic decline and dk, that's one of their projects, they seek to preserve our kind of kleptocratic system which allows them to steal and hide money and they do that with the cooperation of people in the united states and in europe as well. they also help one another so there are several examples of that, venezuela is a country that has an extra ordinarily unpopular government. why his it remained in power so long, partly because the autocratic world supports the madura regime. the russians sell them weapons and the chinese solemn surveillance technology and invest in ways some of the chinese investments around the

world may be benign, some of it is directed in such a way that is of use to dictatorships. iran place of extraordinary role in venezuela given there's no historic relationship between iran and venezuela, what do they have to do with each other? the only thing they have in common they both are interested in, oil and getting around sanctions so they help one another do that. so the rescue of the russian dictator, that was mostly a russian project but was done with others too but they do see one another, they have some joint projects and many differences between them as well. >> i've written down a question, follow-up question about how other autocratic regimes work.

i appreciate attempts to complicate the framing and give it some nuance. even within that training there's more nuance as well. i'm struggling to get my head around the uniformity of these, i'm saying they have group interest related to advancing their own agenda or oppressing their own people but i will speak about iran in particular, there's a kind of regional conflict to it as well and one of the difficulties particularly when iran comes at this it is seen as axis of evil

that has no ideology apart from some sort of disruptive anti-us hegemony agenda but has its own regional context, probably no dimension. there's lots of nuances to iran's security in the middle east. it is a country that locks into other countries like venezuela or has brought interests in opposing the us that lock, interlock with the us and china but also has a long history and a long history of religious schism but also a long history of shiite dispersal into the peninsula.

i am not justifying the, giving a benign motivation. just trying to give some color to how the motivations of these countries may manifest broadly into anti-us, anti-western -- using an example of iran, representative, interlocutor in a region with a shiite population in many countries that have collapsed system is themselves and iran becomes inner antigovernment or tehran becomes a central force in local political dynamics. the way people talk about proxy forces in iran that they are very easily and directly connected, the houthis are connected on the other side of

the puppet chain or even other small terrorist networks in the region. it is not that straightforward. there are influences and desires that marginalize the region and political forces in the region would like to impose or equalize. iran is the central force behind that. the point i am trying to make is in that complexity there's more complexity that means that it is i think we should hesitate a little bit to categorize places in countries like iran as purely or even primarily acting from an agenda of democratic suppression and imperial or us hegemony resistance. there's a regional context, and axis of failed states and oppressive government around

that. >> let me ask something separate from this conversation which is both of you talked about during the cold war coming from countries where us policy was imposed in some way by elected leaders, things you've discussed and that was a huge part of the cold war. the cold war also especially in europe was something many free democratic countries wanted the united states support during. and the conflict with china, there's all kinds of things going on in africa and latin america and much of the world but there's also countries in east asia, japan, south korea, democratic countries that want to draw closer to the united states in part because of fear of an aggressive china.

most people would say the most successful aspect of the us cold war policy was various policies in europe at different times during the cold war so i'm wondering how to think about that, how to separate out if you should separate it out, democratic countries who want the support, the help of the united states from these aspects of the cold war that you guys eloquently talked about. >> there's this word democracy that has been used like a signal in these conversations when talking about politics in those countries are democracies which is why the us wanted to to protect democracy against vladimir putin or this or that and in that, very nuanced and complicated frame and so on but then i have to make this point. can we all get real please? right before of letter putin

attacked ukraine, zelenskyy was just a joke. he's now an amazing, extraordinary world leader and he is doing amazingly. i am stunned, but it was, he was a comedian. his election was the pinnacle of cynicism about democracy and american way of democracy if you will. >> why is that? he was elected with a huge percentage of the vote. >> exactly. he was a comedian. >> but he ran a political campaign and was very popular. >> people laughed and elected him and he became an amazing leader. >> i was there. i don't think people were laughing actually. you can have different views about what he was doing or how he ran his campaign but he had a very specific set of points,

he was seeking to appeal to a particular population, mostly middle lower middle-class ukrainians especially from the southeast and he had a constituency and he won. you might not like him or think that that -- a good person. >> anyway. keep on with this democracy thing. you said during the cold war europe has help from the united states. the marshall plan. >> a lot of aspects of united states support for western europe during the cold war. >> became a price. marshall 8 was brought to europe during the second world war. it came with a political price as well. bringing them into politics or the conspiracy or this

democracy, it is all natural that my part of the world when they hear democracy, we are bringing democracy to the other part of the world they are cynical about it. they are not trusting it anymore. this is the last panel and i am a bit tired so i will stop here. >> i don't really believe in this democracy autocracy distinction. among the democracies that are being lifted to china, and india, our country was rapidly becoming less democratic and the population of india more than all the other countries in islamic democracies put together, we are concerned about the number of people who live in democracies in the world and if we look at the effects of the current alliance what we see is the alliance

against china is causing america to do the same thing in the 1980s, to take an unsavory partner who is destroying the social fabric of its own country in the service of the greater goal of fighting the enemy of the day but i don't want to do this, i don't necessarily agree with the framing of the idea to establish an empire the chinese -- i want to focus on the united states. perhaps the most useful thing i can do on this panel is to say it is worth questioning those who live here the assumption the united states is fundamentally benign. how do we come to this assumption? was the united states benign in iraq? was it benign in afghanistan, in the original afghanistan situation? was it benign in pakistan and turkey and all over the world?

we pretend america made mistakes in the past but now we are good, we would never do a coup today. that is not who we are. we learned all of this. the sad truth for me, being old enough to serve to be with people and been in harvard, there's a theoretical obsession that is utterly devoid from the lived experience and foreign policy. the mckinsey consultants, you come up with better ways of running them and i enjoy this,

i left it, became a novelist. advising my wife as she runs a small restaurant in pakistan, mackenzie, i learned theory but the reality of things is quite different. it is worth questioning, historically america hasn't been benevolent actor. it has been well intentioned but blundering in ways that destroyed the lives of hundreds of millions of people. the idea that i would like them to adjust the conversation and the idea of humility, we have learned this. we know our countries are not fundamentally benign. i'm skeptical of any national security argument a leader presents about the relation to afghanistan or india. i am thinking i don't know if i

believe this which americans are much too quick to assume they are benign. i would suggest the rest of the world is not convinced. look at the un general assembly in these important issues, palestine, ukraine etc. . the world is not persuaded. >> the votes on ukraine have been overwhelmingly against russia. >> the russian invasion but sanctioning russia and all of this stuff. there is a reason for that. in america it is understood that vladimir putin wants to conquer the world and rebuild the russian empire. i think many people around the world look at america, let's poke at russia a little bit, poke at china, pick at was -- whether taiwan might declare itself independent one day. i'm not saying america is a

horrible country. i am saying america makes a lot of mistakes and i would think it is worthwhile having a much more humble attitude that says first do no harm lose let's not be so certain that we are right in our conviction. not saying vladimir putin is right or china is right but around the world only a madman would prefer putin's russia or these are wonderful countries but when i come to america and i hear americans talk about foreign policy i am baffled by the series of disasters to get the complete conviction that this one would be different. >> it is also worthwhile to define what is a threat and what is not a threat and who is a threat to, and to frame

certain enemies as uniquely threatening to the world order as a democracy, asking, they were threatening american security or american european security, rather than abstract values that everyone aligns, america has expansionist allies, and they pretend to be ideological, and actually at odds with it, being close to the regime, i will tease out this sort of moral and value base upon which we should view

these threats, as uniquely threatening to something essential and stabilizing in the world today. you will see this contradiction. so america, there was a vote in the united nations when russia invaded ukraine and condemnation of it, sanctions and money laundering laws, then you have weird anomalies that have interests that align with america, the largest money-laundering operations in america, one of america's closest allies, the united arab emirates, neither america nor europe wants to mobilize two factions to sanction the uae or punish them in any way because it is an economic ally of the us in that region. so i think it is worth stepping

back and showing we are all alarmed by expansionist regimes and regimes that use social media, propaganda to undermine elections across the world but i would like to suggest that maybe the things we are owning that our we are uniquely alarmed by when they trespass on america hegemonic interests that are uniquely threatening to the rest of us and this goes to my original point about how china is perceived in africa as opposed to the united states. >> did you want to say something? >> there are several things that could spark my curiosity. what is the benign do no harm policy for the united states when russia invades ukraine? is the benign do no harm policy

to say hands off we won't do anything? or is it to help the ukrainians defend themselves? i am a ringer here because i am american but i spent half my time in poland as well. in poland and in germany and sweden and finland and the baltic states. the invasion of ukraine is an immediate threat and the danger and people understood that if russia wins the war or able to consolidate along the border there is an immediate military threat to us and we are supposedly american allies. this is your cold war scenario. a number of countries wanted very much for the united states to help ukraine. not to fight, hopefully we won't get to that but wanted

them to help. is the benign, humble, do no harm attitude hands off, we are not touching this conflict, you guys work it out? what are you saying? and by the way, there's a lot, quite a lot of humility in the city and a lot of people who don't think we should do anything. and in the united states were unanimously everyone is in favor of intervening everywhere. >> a playback of other countries, playing a back how america preceded and there's a statement a lot of humility, conducting policy with of the world. the statement would be regarded as the one that is preposterous, washington dc.

>> and everybody in the room is humble. . >> don't start on october 7th. they have been attacked, 12 people -- and let me respond properly. two seconds. the russian invasion didn't come from norway. february 2022, leaving aside what i might think of it, what many americans thought about it, it was the question of is

the movement of nato to do the border of russia, likely to make these countries more secure or less? >> incredibly secure for 30 years. we can look at this one of two ways. i would look at it from the standpoint of ukraine, let us say america is correct saying ukraine should be a member of nato. >> american ever said ukraine should be the net member of nato. there was no nato decision to make ukraine -- >> not that ukraine has become -- using this sort of future tense, that one day ukraine ought to become a member of nato. it should be invited to become a member of nato. exactly.

had this policy made ukraine safer? i don't know. might argue this is fantastic. >> if ukraine were a member of nato it would have been safer. we can agree on that. may be we don't want to go down this road. >> you asked this, what should america have done? i think that we should look at what happens, i think it was a mistake to take nato up to the russian border. more expert than any of you. let us remember to come back to the question, let us look at what has happened to ukraine. let us not let ourselves off the hook.

if there are million dead, young ukrainian men and women, if the country is devastated, if the way afghanistan it's looking now, then have the ability to say that we were wrong. >> whose fault will that have been? there are two ways, one, russia could occupy ukraine and there would be a million dead in concentration camps. >> let's look at these us interventions, if they tend to produce destroyed countries with millions of dead people, let as say perhaps -- >> the us helping ukraine defend itself, that is -- you are blaming the us for what is happening to ukraine and not russia. >> not blaming the us for what's happening in ukraine, from my standpoint i do think that it was a colossal blunder

on the part of the us to push toward the russian border, the russian deal as well. when you say the russian video, the simple thing of it, people might think differently from you. in my case i do. i want russia. i don't want vladimir putin -- many members of the american political establishment also believed it was a bad idea. if ukraine is devastated by this war, could we have done something different, that's all i am trying to say? >> there is also an issue, back to the issue of timing and history. if you feel like it's a different moment now, there's a

lot more humility, and that affects or chills american interventionism, that's not an accident, not a coincidence. it is a result of years and years of foreign policy blunders that produced not liberation, freedom and might be frustrating, came at a time people came to the realization, that's what it sounds like, the music stopped in ukraine after 20 years of war on terror in dc, and military establishment had an idea for the moral context and framing and wrapping of these was also false. even though this war might seem justified to support intervention. the argument and logic for that cannot be separated from all

the wars where the system did not work. a simplified view, you're up against 20 years of mistakes, this is the right time to intervene, you will get it right this time so that is on the very people you are entreating, support the absolutely tragic and justified argument in ukraine. there's a long history to that. >> we will do questions in a couple minutes, misery and u-boats, said something i thought was interesting, talked about how people in other areas of the world perceive the united states and perceived china and what you haven't said

is you yourself feel that way. you talk about a phrase like some people perceive when it comes to taiwan in the united states the us is poking the bear and you talked about how china was perceived in africa sometimes more positively, but neither of you said this is my take on how things are going, you talked about perception. is there distinction there? if so, what is it, are you talking about analyzing -- >> it is important, my perception is important, my perception -- >> you are on the panel. i will give you my perception of other people's perception. perception is important because that is how you mobilize blocks of alliances. one of the notable things off of the russian invasion of ukraine was african countries were not easily marshaled to

vote against the war. apart from three or four american allies and israeli allies after the israel/gaza war began, it became clear that america's inability to create goodwill and forge strong connections with these countries and russia's ability to do that i sinister means by the wagoner network, by gold and minerals, trade between these countries, a more tactile, more real relationship with these countries. whatever you think of that, that has an effect, these countries do not vote and give you not just the practical backing but the moral backing for your position. there's a global pinion, a global opinion that matters not

just to give moral value but to give them the sword of backing to mobilize huge amounts of money after the agenda and that is less, america is less able to do that because of these perceptions. china back to my original answer, china is years ahead of the united states in that effort. >> perception is not the biggest harm that foreign policy put upon humankind i should say. i think thanks to what happened since the iraqi invasion, we lost our faith in political action thanks to the interventionist policies of the united states. don't know if your member i am old enough to remember, i was one of the spokespersons for

the not to work campaign in turkey and the entire world on the same day went on to the street to say no to war. but then:powell dangled the huge, said there's nuclear weapons in a rack and we are going to bomb it and suddenly the bombardment started and all those people, generation of people if you look at it from a certain perspective a generation of people lost faith in the united nations. what happened? this is after the cold war there was no cold war. what happened? what happened was we as

humanity put together a system and decided to be more humane and dignified and just and law-abiding and humanity, all that works suddenly, and then it is gone. so this actually broke people. you are talking about ukraine. jeremy corbin and i were in athens and did the athens declaration after russia started the war and said that we want peace and so forth. it was like a joke seriously. jeremy corbin -- i am not the cute face in that picture. how did we come to this?

how did -- how did we come to the streets wanting peace to this situation where i don't know if you can remember there was nobody, let's make peace, everybody who was supposed to say no to war were siding with us policy and kill more russian soldiers. we are talking about what the cold war did to the world and what effect of the cold war can do to the world. the first one ruined the faith in humanity on a global scale. it is inspiring and important what the american people and

american youth do today, what they are doing is wanting peace for everybody and wanting dignity for everybody. it is better to listen to them rather than talking this real politics power. that kind of thinking product here. >> i want to turn to a couple questions. we talked about democracies and autocracies a little bit. the question is to what extent are you fueled by ideological divide as opposed economic rivalry. we haven't discussed this which without getting into a debate about democracy and autocracies it is interesting that hasn't come up at all. to what degree playing out in the rest of the world is an ideological divide a large part of this as opposed to the question -- does anyone want to answer that? >> not hard to say that it is good.

the economic rivalry is clear and we don't have to get into the details of it. i think until relatively recently i don't think there was an ideological rivalry. i think the us and china saw many ways to collaborate. it is true xi jinping as he was coming to power in 2013 issued the internal chinese commonest party document the talked about perils facing the communist party. one of them is social democracy. another one is media freedom. he made clear that for him. i think this was mostly about internal threats. he thought particular ideas he thought were a challenge to the chinese commonest party that had to be fought back against. his rise and his replacing of the previous chinese elite has

created more ideological conflict then there was in the past. i don't think it's hard to say both are important. it depends which day of the weekend which argument we are talking about. >> how africa is positioned as a battleground for us and chinese economic to american interests, what are the applications for the continent itself? >> the beginning of the panel on its own. one of the things that has become clear not just china but russia is there is, there are huge mineral and agricultural resources in africa that can be used as a hedge against global sanctions and global action. and it is i think if you are going to take it cynically in

terms of confirmation that they messed up on the part of america too late to be rectified now. security glitch and a porous border, islamic terrorism which is how it was treated in the west or bradley do vested from the east, sudan and the north. there's been a real retrenchment from the continent by the establishment in the past 20 years and in that time a real expansion on the part of china and russia in countries that have become huge assets particularly to russia at the moment. .. offering economic support and even just sort of physical areas for

russian money to be stored and for russian figures, actual members to have group and to be members of the wagner group to the house, and the chinese visible different explanation but it is essentially has the sameme empowering elements to it which is the place china can make a lot of money and make a lot of money in sectors that are linked to the elite in these countries. china is not unlike mom-and-pop shop in africa. it's huge highway infrastructure, agriculture project, dams that are linked to military and political elites in these countries that make their alliances are more crucial to theirat own fate than it would e for another country. if it did come down to it, whatever that looks like, political elites in african

countries which china has the large investment, large infrastructure alliances, are much more likely to go with the country that literally has built their expressways and to which they are still paying loans, or paying off the loans to, , thata country for whom your closest relationship is the military base down the t road. >> i want to turn some some more questions here. it was an interesting one. how do you think the west, for example, the u.s. should act or should've should have acted with a substantial sum society movement like in iran perhaps asking for support? or is the perception of the west and how can the ally or civil society in these countries? >> so again, my sense is that i would prefer that america did much less. in pakistan, for example, the

cause of democracy has been enormously setback i think by america's engagement with pakistan. my s own since it is i spent the 1970s in california. i went to aar public elementary school. my father is university professor and he was doing his phd. the public elementary school i went to in california was so much better than w the best i've the school that it boggles the mind. i couldn't write, and they were like kids in gibberish. anyway, they figured out very quickly that my handwriting was poor, i spotted was bad, i was inverting letters, put in a separate room, the figured it out. this was the '70s now. like okay, block print, you know. if i had not had that kind of

intervention i probably wouldn't be a novelist today. i thought i can't write. i tell you this story because the good public schools in california today are not better than the best schools in pakistan. my parents, my dad registered, my mom commuted to a job in redwood city with a secondhand dotson. yet we lived quite an opulent life. we went to parks on weekends. we never seem to want for money. my mother's colleagues entry-level person, lowest level job in a tech company that made audiocassettes. that was the high tech of the era. she bought a house, right? now, in the bay area. now, i suppose where i'm going with this is to say that america's interventions are not

for america. my own attachment to the scourges such that i had to think that america desperately needs to focus onne the united states. in fact, these interventions are very often disastrous, sometimes they are complicated. but i think the net result of america's highly foreign policy focus, policy focus has been impoverishment of america. when you say is as though you're an isolationist, it's such an interestingg word. if america were to conduct itself the way that almost every other country on planet earth conduct itself which is primary concern but itself with some interventions abroad, like that's not isolationist. that is how countries are. the only country that isn't like that, a couple of country may become a but the one, large countries that most not like that is the united states. i would say in a lot of these interventions were i come out at this is we don't know if you're going to be good or for ill.

it's almost made for the best of intentions. i think the best intention of what america went to iraq. missing it was bad intentions. the results are often disastrous. i think if we were instead to take those resources and put them into this country, american would be such a powerful force of good in the world because itself would have much more stable democracy, and powered working-class come list of these turmoils. the lasting say about this is when i went to law school, i was in a u.s. citizen so i had to have my loans cosigned by an american. my dad had not seen a decade, so sign -- cosigned $100,000 of high school in the 1990s. he didn't go to vietnam but he volunteered to serve in the vietnam war when it's going on. he later thought the war was a

mistake. he would pick me up the airp, driving down and giving lectures and talk about how it was so strange that they were was happening right now in iraq and it looks like nothing is going wrong. protest, no bo nothing. america's of work but it doesn't affect anybody. now, when you want to conclude with this saying, but it did affect people. it affected the families of the servicemembers who went and fought in a back and living beside the foreigners who lost friends, who suffered unbelievable drama, who came back and asked why typical and fight these wars? and you said, the elite of this country have no concern for interest. they don't care about us. they don't believe in the system. we reject this. we gave rise i think to a political movement that we're seeing now today which manifests itself in like the trump phenomena et cetera. what i can say is if we don't know how successful these

interventions are and we have a choice of putting these resources into the american people, i would say put in the american people. america would be a much more productive force in the world. >> so i'm reading betweene. the lines the questionable but. i thought the questioner was asking a part not a much about military interventions but sort of have united states should rhetorically or otherwise support something like limits booming in iran. it seems like what you are saying is that well, perhaps two things, one, the united states tends to get involved on the wrong set of these things are often does, and perhaps should just not involve any way at all. which is fine, it's perfectly reasonable a answer. but my question sort of which so someone else can maybe take -- >> i want to tell the full anecdote from turkey. of course when america supports those things, it then within domestic context it becomes wow,

there's america behind this. so that's a problematic, problematic situation for the people on thero ground. but then there's the other side of the coin which is actually nice for you guys. in 2013 there was this big uprising in turkey against erdogan. everyone was on the streets. the process band the entire country. it was a massive carnival, a revolutionary moment and so on. and you know what? i remember the moment the scene and started the live airing like live broadcasting, that was like, wow, they saw us. it's not only united states show us but also united states is now amplifying the word to the rest of the world. and i see the beauty behind this question, so that's what i'm inching in this way.

if peoplehi of america want to support the people of the world, they just have to look at them and make them seem, that's it. there is nothing else that they asked for. also, if you want to come and be with the people, that's also okay. >> how do you think a second term presidency might impact our relationship with china going forward? >> it's a surprisingly difficult question to answer because trump clearly admires xi jinping. the admires autocracy. he has said it multiple times. there was a comet relatively recently him saying something about when he says, when he says jump, a main people jump. i can remember the exact quote but something along those lines. then i would like to get my people would do that, too,

something classic like that. i can imagine a world in which he would seek to do personal deals with china in which he would help that business people around them him is supporta special relationship with china, and he's a a transactional pe. he's a transactional president which really none of, no values that bother him, none of the ideology that bothers people is attached to them at all, so we might well seek relationships with china that would be financially and otherwise advantageous to him and his friends. if on the other hand, he saw that it was useful for him politically to be anti-china, if he could create a populist, popular movement in the united states against china, if that language and that rhetoric would some of the politically hopeful to and i can imagine him taking that route as well as he has done in the past. t

so in the case of trump you don't ask, you know, it's not a question or ideology or values or even politics. the question of what any given moment he would proceed as good for him, and that would be, you know, that would be his policy. we know already the chinese, their messaging against him and so on. what they think i can't even imagine, but he doesn't, he doesn't represent i kind of a well-thought-out political view in which, and we can see what would happen down the line. it will depend on what he decides is good for him. >> what is a book recommendation each of you would make for students for future policymakers who are interested in u.s. foreign policy? >> i will each think about that for a couple minutes if you

want, i'll get back to it. i want to ask another question here just looking at these questions, which is that to whichat degree i think in the united states it's up trump's election was seen as this earthquake obviously and obvious is wasom run the world to some extent, too, but to what extent do think in terms of the way the united states is viewed especially the review of kind of offered at the way the united states is viewed in the world is very negatively predatingru tru. you think a change something, this prospect of trump coming back in four years, parties ricocheting back and forth, american policy ricocheting? you think that has fundamental change the way the u.s. is viewed in the global south are not so much? >> i think less trump and more gossip to be honest with you. it feels to me that something quite metro has happened in the past six months, and he think this is what people expected the trump presidency, but actually gaza is what has achieved it.

i'm speaking very broadly here obviously when i think about the middle east and north africa in particular. the view was american foreign policy itself interested at best evil at worst. but always coherent, right? always coherent, always coordinated, always intelligent. when things went wrong like in iraqhe it was kind of unintended consequence and the blunder of this mighty force that miscalculated. after gaza, and it hasn't helped having a president such as joe biden at the helm, just because it is sort of lack of articulately and inability to really come to grips with the crisis. after gaza the. perception is america doesn't know what it's doing, which is altogether far more dangerous i think because you can respect and interlocutor that you think that you disagree with that yout think has a huge

amount of intelligence, whatever that intelligence is. but after gaza aid is seen as an inherently contradictory, unable to pursue the main thing that american foreign policy touts as did for aging asset which is desired to grid stability, security and peace. it not been able to deliver peace. it's not been able to deliver security at a stop and able to marshal its ally, israel, to a peaceful resolution. that is very undermining of america's power, and it has not been able even to articulate a coherent moral framing for what is happening. so the perception has changed to one of sort of grudging, not respect, but understand, powerful, country and each see what it do to maintain its power

and its interest to. you're so much power that the something crumbling about it, something slightly last days of empire about it all because the logic of this power seems not to hold in this particular instance. so there's this source of disrespect, , mockery and the kd of emperor's new clothes type perception that i'm sensing in the middle east. puppet. this is the general perception. oh, the united states. they don't know what they are doing. this is a perception for sure in turkey. several other countries. >> it's incredible. i would agree with what you said. nothing has been quite like this. i mean, the idea that some country that is recipient of so much u.s. aid seems to have power vis-a-vis the united states that, in fact, the

president or prime minister of other country, foreign country can be invited to address the u.s. congress in opposition to the president of the united states of america is an utterly baffling site. >> this is during obama administration. >> i think that -- i think that the u.s.-israel relationship particularly on the issue of gaza, it seems that it is detrimental to the u.s. and yet the u.s. is so helpless. biden is unable to do anything, to figure out what is the american interest, what might america do. those that are old enough we remember, i think it was 1982 when reagan threaten to do cut off the supply and reagan was no peace maker but biden is secretly getting 2,000-pound bombs to israel and people are

resigning in the state department, aggregate all of our own things and it conveys the impression of a state of profound corruption, moral corruption, societal corruption. and you can say america should be doing this, but, you know, without taking sides on where you think the israel-palestine conflict should end up, but on the massacre that we have been seeing for the last several months, i think this has really turned people off, you know, off the united states, not just in terms of it being the right policy but in the idea that the u.s. government perhaps doesn't really represent the will of the people or even have the capacity to act in u.s. self-interest. .. ..

its allies in the global political system. broadly it is a stabilizing factor. the fact it has been unable to bring that and security. while also allowing, this is so damaging. while allowing the israeli authorities to speak to america and to the icj into the global human rights community. in such a manner the lesson heard that kind of language spoken you're going to let them talk to you like that? that has been not just detrimental to how america is perceived as a coherent stabilizing force but they are immoral or a moral. but to a global justice system and language of international

values and principles that as i think far more dangerous than what's happening to america at the moment. there's always agitating forces that we start this conversation with on russia and china. this is their currency for this is what they do. this is the threat, the biggest threat they seem to pose as they undermine the very fragile post-world war ii of checks and balances. you have a central ally at the u.s. doing so. i only receiving no censure lots of support. as a threat of a cold war or extending group that are in the ascendance. it is because there are inherent contradictions in how america treats its allies.

more ability, more ground, or me traction because of america's inconsistencies. >> can i ask you a question about sandwiches junior first answer talked about the two groupings of countries. >> that's exactly it is not saying pink work's not about china you talked about photography joining together. >> the network extends into other places as well. rex and many of that group i guess maybe group is the wrong word. may be of those countries you've mentioned have taken the opposite position they've taken on ukraine and rhetorically have tried to use that against the u.s. and its allies to say essentially we are setting up for human rights at the un security council and so on and so forth while the u.s. and allies is not. curious what you made of that? that comp locates a picture in some way or there's a base level of these how do you view it?

>> baselevel cynicism. [laughter] there is clearly criticism there. grix i just had a conversation china expert writes a lot about china he just written a book partly about chinese media and africa. the attitudes that middle east was hands off. we don't really get involved here. we don't take sides. there is an instance 180 degrees turn. that's expression used we can use this. we can make use of it. >> only phrase at this within. taken as a given xi jinping and viner putin didn't care about human rights.

>> is that concern you our policy is allowing them to use this to the advantage? >> yes of course. >> it is a disaster. [inaudible] >> we are not allowed to do that. you can write one down. [inaudible] [inaudible] i am curious your point of view on that.

and it's always. [inaudible] [inaudible] executed 20 million variety. [inaudible] i am curious to hear your point of view what you don't believe perhaps the united states should try to salvage relations. [inaudible] if you can explain that, thank you. quick sure, go for it.

if it is like take this or you die, that is bad. my country has been through two coos. i was born after one ministry who and then when i was eight there is another. both of them were supported by u.s. parenthesis documented. this is not my opinion. so many people die before being my mother she was imprisoned. she was an licit and my father rescued her and they married and so on. so i come from that kind of background. and then it's not only turkey. the united states unfortunately not as its people but it's

government applied this policy. so they made more. they wanted less socialists they wanted more dictatorship. it may be too far away but happened in america as well. many, many, many people died. it was a painful history for us. it's just you don't know as much as we do for that is a painful part of the divide of our story. i wish we could have told more. i wish you could have listened more. this is the story behind my reaction or my assessment. >> are going to have to end there. a couple of minutes tom they're going to stick around for a couple reflections of the

festival itself. but before we go did anyone come up with an answer to that question about a book for young students to read? >> i have one. >> 13 days in september by lawrence wright. it was very useful to me in humanizing all sides. the u.s. intention, the israeli intention and the palestinian intention. i don't think everything happened today but it's a good reminder that it is possible. and it might be possible again one day. >> i do not remember the name of the writer but it's a broken promises. in google it broken promises cold war. you'll see the book it's an amazing book. it was a broken promise. >> i would suggest beloved.

it's foreign policy text. what is incredible about that book is that looks at this horrific history of slavery. it took place in the democracy that was the united states. and reveals the absolute inspiring capacity that can exist in your society to confront mistakes. to be self-critical. and to produce truly transformative insights from that process. that radical self-criticism and inspiration is what i like to see. >> i wrote a book about this. i'm not 1988 ministry the time it was published in the united states. so i recommend that as well. [laughter] >> tempted as i am to recommend my own book which is being published in july. [laughter] it's called hypocrisy is

describes the frame i was trying to -- and i'm probably trying to weakly explain. in addition to that it's a great book if you want to understand how russia sees the world. help other dictatorships do. everything's true impossible by peter. >> thank you guys so much. so glad we did this. thank you everyone for coming to the festival. [applause] thank you, everyone for coming to the festival. >> thank you, everyone. [applause] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> today on cpa the house returns at 10 p.m. eastern for generalpehes followed by legislative business at noon. membsre considering a bill to remedy the energy departmen from issuing, implement or

enforcing efficiency standards of right of home appliances that are not technically feasible or economiclyustified. members may also ted over at president biden's veto of legislation tha bcks a collective-bargaining role b the national labor relations board. at 11 a.m. on c-span2, president biden will speak at holau remembrance ceremony at the u.s. capitol. athr the senate returns to vote on the confirmation of the u.s. ambassador to southeastern asian country. seto will also continueor on a five-year reauthorization bill for federal aviio administration programs. current faa authority expires this friday at mnit. on c-span3 115.m. education secretary cardona tessera storehouse lawmakers about his department'solies, priorities and budget. you can also watch o live coverage on the c-span now video app or online at c-span.org.

>> the c-span bookshelf podcast feed makes it easy for you to listen to all c-span's podcast that feature nonfiction books in one place. you can discover new authors and ideas. each week we are making a convenient for you to listen to multiple episodes with critically acclaimed authors discussing history, biography, truck events and culture. from her signature program about books, after words, booknotes+ and q&a. listen to c-span's bookshelf podcast feed today. you can find the feed of our podcast on the free c-span now mobile video-out aware of you get your podcast, and on our website c-span.org/podcast. >> c-span is your unfiltered view of government. we are funded by these television companies and more including mediacom.

>> at media, , we believe whethr you live here, or right here, or we are in the middle of anywhere, you should have access to fast reliable internet. that's what we are leading the way to take you to 10g. >> tranone supports c-span is a public service along with these other television providers giving you a front row seat to democracy. >> five of the six republican candidates running in indiana is 2024 governor's race took part in the final primary debate. they were asked about fincens for entrepreneurs, the limited the states income tax, and indiana's abortion ban. senator mike braun who's also a candidate was unable to attend because he was needed in washington, d.c. for a vote on a ukraine a package. he ended up voting against the bill which ultimately passed. this debate is hosted indianapolis by the indianaba debate commission.