 So the next session which we're going to start our afternoon with is how are others preparing for the future and The moderator of this panel is Colonel Liam Collins who's had a very distinguished career and joined special operations command and Instrumental and setting up the West Point's counterterrorism Center and also the modern warfare Institute He's also a fellow at New America. I'm going to hand it over to Liam All right for this panel be joined by Brigadier General US Army retired Brian Davis who's the director of China Research Division at Blue Pat blue path labs and former defense at the ashay to Beijing China Dr. Andrea Kindle Taylor senior fellow and director of transatlantic security program at the Center for New America security and former Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Russia and Eurasia at the National Intelligence Council and Dr. Tricia Bacon associate professor at American University and author of Terror and transition so we had about 30 minutes for this panel So we'll try to work through it and cover these three important topics during that time Which will be a challenge, but I will not I promise that will not monopolize the full 30 minutes So audience be please have some questions in mind. So we'll have some time at the end for that The most recent national security strategy states the most pressing strategic challenge facing our vision is from powers that lay That layer authoritarian governance with a revisionist foreign policy Russia and the People's Republic of China pose different challenges Russia poses an immediate threat to the free and open international system recklessly Flouting the basic laws of the international order today as it's brutal way war of aggression against Ukraine has shown The People's Republic of China by contrast is the only competitor with both the intent to reshape the international order And increasingly the economic diplomatic military and technological power to advance that objective So so it is important to understand the intention and capabilities of these two nations So General Davis, I'll start with you first and ask you how is China preparing for the future? Thanks, Liam, and thanks to New America and Arizona State for the opportunity to participate in this forum So before I address your question, I guess I would ask the question What is China preparing for and I would offer that China is preparing to regain its position as a major global power But not just necessarily a major global power But potentially the major global power by the middle of this century And they do this in several sectors so politically if you look at what Xi Jinping has done since he's Taken over as general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party He strengthened his control of the party and then he strengthened the party's control of both the state and the military He centralized decision-making around himself leading both established Formal committees in charge of all the major key issues that he's interested in but also ad hoc committees and finally he has Driven the system from what was Primarily a consensus-based decision-making system after the chaos of Mao Zedong Back to where he is at the center of that decision-making structure. Why is he do it? Why does he do that? Well, he it appears that he thinks he's the only person that can lead China to its rightful place in the future Which is the rejuvenation of the great Chinese nation economically for example China is finding ways to maintain connectivity across Global economies with major economies of the world but also ensure that several of those economies are reliant on China And they're taking efforts to improve Technologic technology innovation modernization and independence for example this year in the spring in the National People's Congress a Law was passed to both reform and reorganize the Ministry of Science and Technology Which will oversee strategic technologies? policies Investments funding et cetera, and they're also taking efforts to strengthen their Supply chains and domestic production and specifically some of the key areas for domestic production production Or 35 technology what they call choke points that are critical for China's economic development Finally, they're also strengthening their domestic sector of their economy to help better insulate China from foreign Foreign influence but negative foreign influence be it sanctions or just the ups and downs of the global economy economically, I'm sorry diplomatically China's working to reshape the international Institutions that it's a member of but also at the same time establishing parallel institutions It's also according to global south You see that play out in the United Nations, but but elsewhere as well militarily we do tend to I follow that more than the others, but obviously the middle PLA continues to modernize rapidly with the goal as stated by Xi Jinping of achieving basic modernization by 2035 and Become a world-class military by the middle of the century and then finally in the information around China continues to strengthen its influence across global media its propaganda system both Directed at its domestic population and internationally and is strengthening its influence operations across the world led by the party's United Front work department These are just a few examples of how China is preparing for the future So what has China learned if anything from the Russia's invasion of Ukraine in terms of impacting their goals vision strategy? Has anything changed based off of what's how that's played out over the last 20 months? Yeah, that's a great question. I think it's still playing out So they still have the the ultimate lessons lesson or lessons that they take or not necessarily fully established But I think a couple examples or if you look at the run-up to Russia's invasion in February of last year It's how the United States and its allies Leveraged intelligence and got it out into the public sector So how how is China going to prepare for that and insulate that that's probably a major lesson that they took prior to And right after the invasion think another area that they would see is you know information Aspect in general controlling the narrative shaping that narrative for multiple audiences Russia has not necessarily done that as well as What China will be prepared to do looking at the will of the Ukrainian people to fight against? Russia I mean think most of us were surprised at what they've been able to do that obviously is a key factor for what could play out if there were to be some sort of a Taiwan military scenario whether it's the will to fight or at least the will as a as a as a Population to hold out until potential help could come from the United States And one thing that we're learning I mean you shouldn't say we're learning some of us are learning some of us already know it But you know technology matters, but the people are probably more important than technologies We're learning in the war once again And I wonder if you can build a professional non-commissioned officer core or or empower junior leaders In an authoritarian state where that is a kind of a risk to the nation You know is that something what is China doing to ensure that they have or do they have? You know junior officers that are able of taking initiative on the battlefield with the speed of warfare on the 20th 21st century So yeah, the Chinese military. It's a it's a different system Than what we think of when we think of Western militaries Part of it is the Leninist control over the army and so it's different There's the influence of Chinese culture on the army There's a chip influence of the Chinese Communist Party's influence and culture, but in general It is a much more centralized decision-making system. They have party and this PLA senior leadership values that They do understand that they need more junior officers and NCOs to be able to take initiative, but it's more constrained what you might think of from your military background or my military background and and NCOs tend to be more Not necessarily technicians, but more able to execute tasks than be that key Small unit leader that develops that has grown in our military that that's the strength of what our military is But it continues to involve they continue to change their Personnel policies and their training to make their NCO core better But I wouldn't say it's going to be an NCO core that is a mirror image of a Western NCO Thanks, Brian. I'll now turn to you. Dr. Kendall Taylor and ask you a similar question What's Russia doing to prepare for the future? Yeah, I'll start with your point about the national security strategy talking about Russia as immediate threat And I think that's right, but we have to also understand that it's a persistent threat And so what do I mean by that? I think we all understand that Russia will emerge from its war in Ukraine weaker in all ways economically geopolitically and certainly militarily And there will therefore be a really significant temptation I think especially here in Washington to downgrade Russia as a threat But I would argue that that would be a significant mistake Because what we see is that Russia is looking to adapt and it is evolving its tactics in response to the Challenges that it faces in Ukraine and just like you talked about well What is China preparing for well read it? What is Russia preparing for and I think we have to be clear that even though the United States isn't fighting Russia in Ukraine? Russia very much perceives or understands itself to be at war with us And it has framed this as an existential challenge and even as a civilizational challenge And so it will very much retain the intent To challenge the United States for the foreseeable future and certainly past even Putin's time in office So then what are they preparing to you know to do as a part of that civilizational challenge? Well first and foremost most immediately they're looking to evolve And they're looking to bypass and circumvent the unprecedented Western pressure that we've put on They are looking and actively Circumventing sanctions and export controls that the United States and its allies have applied There was a really great story just today in the New York Times that talked about how Russia is Circumventing sanctions and export controls and that they've actually Expanded its missile production to pre-war level to pre-war levels So this threat is not going away They're also actively deepening partnerships with external partners obviously in the news today is North Korea and that meeting that deepening of that bilateral relationship, but it's also Iran and China So Russia is actively looking to build a coalition of countries that share It's hostility to the United States and our influence and our power And I think that the thing that I worry most about is the more desperate Russia becomes in the war the more They're going to be willing to give away in those relationships So giving away technology to the North Koreans to the Iranians and so they are actually Amplifying making worse America's challenges in other parts of the globe In addition to the kind of circumventing and mitigating Western pressure They're also adapting tactics and I think that's happening on the battlefield in Ukraine But also in a very broad sense We can see that the more degraded the Russian military is in terms of it's the conventional military The more they're relying on its non-conventional tools and tactics So at the low end in the hybrid realm that means they're relying more heavily on things like cyber We should expect more attacks on things like critical infrastructure. It's sabotage. It's information operations That will become much more important in Russia's arsenal the more degraded they are conventionally But then it's also a risk at the high end in the nuclear domain So we should expect that the nuclear weapons become a much more important part Russia's military strategy It's going to be a low-cost and very effective way to offset the vulnerabilities that it faces And so what does that mean? Well, we should expect force posture changes and changes to the structure of its nuclear forces much more elaborate warning exercises And I think you know you're thinking about the arms control realm They're actively undermining the you know with with suspending its participation in new start This is also the way that they're preparing is they're intentionally introducing risk into the relationship They understand the United States in Europe to be more risk averse than Russia And so they're introducing that risk as a way to get us to self-restrain So I think and it'll be interesting to think about what you know the proliferation of semi-state organizations All of these types of things. I think Russia is working on to try to immediately Address vulnerabilities that it sees and then in the longer term We should all expect that Russia will certainly look to reconstitute its military and that includes in areas like AI Where they're actively trying to integrate AI into the battlefield in Ukraine So I think my kind of bumper sticker is that Russia is is down But it's not out and it will remain a good enough power with both the capabilities and the intent to challenge the United States for the foreseeable future All right, I'm gonna ask a question probably everybody in the audience wants to know about how long this war will go on I'll set it up a little bit. So I'll ask it You know former Intel officer will never give you a straight answer though on November 11th I think it was November 11th 2001 I asked my intelligence analyst how long is it, you know We'll take Kabul the fall to the Taliban and he said oh, it's gonna probably take years They lasted a long time against the Soviets and the Russian Soviet's a time and the next day they fell And I said well that was your worthless to me as an Intel analyst So I'm gonna ask you the question is right if we assume Ukraine has it has the will right? They've demonstrated that in 2014 2015 and throughout this war right that that's not gonna waver As long as they get supplied right get the capabilities that it necessary to fight a war and if those go away They'll probably just go to a counter-insurgency How long can Russia maintain the will for probably more will than capability to to For the war to go on if it's you know from that perspective is one potential ending recognizing right the war in Afghanistan lasted a decade and But their interest in Ukraine are Right exponentially more than anything else that they've been involved in so How long can Russia I think I think it's in he sees it as in his interest to fight a long war And so I mean first and foremost He obviously believes that he can outlast the United States in Europe and he'll look at Political changes potentially here in Washington, but also other European capitals and expect that they could bring changes in leadership and a resulting Reduction in Western military support for Ukraine, but even more than that I think you know it's in you I've done a lot of work on looking at kind of the duration of wars and tied to leaders interests and Putin he faces more challenges at home as a result of the war in Ukraine So the Progosian incident is certainly a very poignant reminder of that But I actually think it's in his interest because being at war makes him more secure at home There's very few Authoritarian leaders who are unseated while a war that they are involved in is ongoing And so for me, I think it helps insulate him in power as soon as the war ends There's going to be a political reckoning There's going to be a lot of questions asked and certainly if Russians perceive it as a military defeat Then the risk of him losing his job which he would equate with probably his life because we know that these Personalist dictators once they're ousted from office are jailed killed in prison So it's he's talking about his own personal survival And so I see I believe that it he perceives it in his interest to keep this going Because it actually makes him more secure in office And so he would like to see that this and I and I do think that they have the kind of capacity at home in order to sustain the fighting for quite a long time Let's get one more question before transitioning to terrorism. So I mean Why do we how did we get their performance? How do we predict it so wrong? Is it I mean, I knew Ukraine's capability So I they performed how I thought they would but even I was surprised by Russia's underperformance I mean, obviously, you know, somewhat like a meteorologist weren't incentivized to overestimate because the cost of underestimating can be severe But what explains kind of this and it's repeated But you know this inability to kind of really anticipate their capability. Is it an intelligence failure? A military industrial complex trying to justify an 800 billion dollar budget. Is it something else? I mean, why do we consistently get this so wrong? Well, I go back to your afghanistan and part of me wonders quite a lot I obviously wasn't in the intelligence community at the time But they were obviously wrong on their afghanistan call thinking that Kabul could last a long time And I sometimes wonder if they had then the knee-jerk reaction to try to warn About in in the opposite direction. So I think that there was some linkage there, but I think generally speaking we have Institutionally a predisposition to overestimating Russia's capabilities and during my time in the intelligence community I feel like I saw this time and time again in Syria and other places where there's this expectation of what Russia wants Russia gets without really having spent the time and investing and understanding the capabilities in the intent on the receiving end and so For that reason, I think, you know, that was a large part of it A large part of it is just the way that the war played out, right that this isn't the With the training exercises and other things This is not the war that Russia was planning to fight its plans because of the personalization of the political system were also close held a lot of Military officers who should have been involved in planning were not they were excluded from that And so it was also a poorly planned So part it's hard to know if we grossly over To what extent we grossly overestimated the russian army and to what extent some of it was a bit contingent on the plan That was in place, which of course was a result of the personalization and the rot within within the russian system Thanks, andrea All right, dr. Bacon. We'll we'll turn now to a discussion of terrorist groups I mean over the past decades, right? We've seen consistently evolutions in terms of tactics organizations ideology goals Capability pretty much everything across the spectrum. So How are terrorist groups evolving and what might we expect to see in the future? Sure, it's probably fitting that i'm last in this discussion because if you last but not least perhaps also least but When you go through the national security strategy, you just keep flipping and flipping and flipping before you get to Counterterrorism and there's clearly good reasons for it that we already heard about So I I don't necessarily disagree with the downgrading of terrorism But it does come with its own problems because just because we're done with counterterrorism does not mean they are done with us essentially And I would say there's two things that have really characterized the jihadist movement over the last You know 20 Probably probably more accurately 30 or so years and that probably will going forward and the first is their resilience These are organizations that despite the massive amount of counterterrorism pressure over the last 20 years We have really struggled to actually defeat There have been plenty of decorations of defeat the taliban in 2001 the islamic state in iraq in 2010 All shabab in 2013 the pakistani taliban in 2014 And all of these organizations have been able to rebuild and research to be stronger than they were before So I would expect that they will continue to be resilient And I say that also as a caution because there was a lot of talk at this most recent september 11th anniversary Which in my professional career was the one with sort of the least discussion or fanfare or events or debates of any Since 2001 and there's a lot of discussion about al-qaeda being as its nader and the islamic state is being so and what I would say is These organizations have consistently been declared as defeated as dead And they almost never have been these are just incredibly resilient organizations And I think the second thing that they're effective at which it gets to the resilience is they're very effective at exploiting Fertile conditions and so what we see today is not necessarily a jihadist movement. That's weaker It's one that has morphed it has an epicenter for example in sub-taharan africa now Where a place where the united states has has consistently struggled to recognize the national security importance of that region And what we see there is jihadist expansion on ways that were unimaginable 20 years ago the number of organizations You have both islamic state and al-qaeda affiliates the number of countries affected the number of attacks the number of fatalities All of the indicators are very very alarming in sub-taharan africa And there's really no systems in place at this point to do anything to mitigate that downward slide If anything the great power near peer strategic competition, whatever we're calling it is exacerbating it as we see russia come into this hell for example, and essentially make conditions worse and Creating conditions that the jihadist groups are even more effective at exploiting We even see in afghanistan where okay, we haven't seen a resurgence of al-qaeda yet But we have seen the taliban provide Permissive conditions for the pakistani's halban and a significant deterioration in pakistan So overall these are groups that are going to exploit the space that they get from the lack of counterterrorism pressure They're going to seek ways to disrupt and that's essentially what they are at this point They're a disruptive threat to the united states They have the ability to distract from the very important challenges We face from peers or near peers or however we'd like to characterize them They're still very capable of those kinds of actions Even if they are not the primary threat anymore and they're still very effective at exploiting conditions when they are available To expand in terms of their recruitment their attacks Their safe havens and even their ability to potentially take over entire states in some places in sub-taharan africa So we're not necessarily in a less dangerous environment I don't see another september 11th attack coming But we do have a movement overall that has grown and expanded in really important ways and is still exploiting the conditions that exist today Trisha i've done a terrible job of managing the time So i'll ask you one question and then turn it over to the audience for maybe one or two questions. So What can we do better from a policy perspective in terms of counterterrorism policy? Yeah, no, that's a very reasonable question to ask at this point and what I would say is Much of the whatever you want to call the years after september 11th global war on terrorism, etc We were incredibly good tactically. We're very good at tactical successes in terms of um leadership decapitation or Offensives that weaken these organizations But these different tactics never really came together as effective strategies to Execute the cold the full defeat of some of these organizations some of whom really could have been defeated So I think that that's one of the things that going forward We're going to have less of those tactics less of those resources and it's going to force us to come up with a more comprehensive strategy that isn't so military centric Thank you. Trisha. I we probably have time for one or two questions depending on the length of our answers. Yeah Thank you very much. We saw kim jong un You know have a visit with vladimir putin first time in several years Clearly a kind of role change almost where we have putin as the supplicant and Kim jong un as the as the superior in a very strange twist But has implications for the PLA and for china as well I wonder if you just comment a little bit about what you think about that role change How it might evolve over the future and where china sits in this relationship with russia right now That's a great question. I think part of the relationship is just by nature of They're both feel constrained by the united states that us policies are directed at From a chinese perspective, I won't offer the russian perspective, but from the chinese perspective There's a feeling that the us is in decline and that the us is attempting to Thork china's rightful reemergence as a global power and so russia in some ways is a partner of convenience I think part of that from the chinese perspective is also even though there's a lot of areas where china and russia are not aligned There is a personal relationship between shijin ping and bladmir putin That is important that could be taking them a little further than if the mechanisms of the The two states were left to determine that way ahead What will happen after one or both of them eventually go away remains to be seen But it certainly is a a factor and then at the end of the day is you know with china's growth and modernization and that shift of Who's the big brother? Who's the little brother in the relationship? If china's economy does slow down Where they're not modernizing at a rapid pace where they the the reliance or the Appetite for some of the strategic resources that russia is able to provide such as minerals and oil Where that appetite decreases how will that affect that relationship? I don't know the answer, but it'll be You know professionally looking at it. It will be fascinating to see how that plays out And I think when they're even though they have disagreements in their interest diverge Working together it amplifies the the net effect of all of them So they and they they understand that so that they're less isolated when they're cooperating They're able to distract attention. So that's very useful from china's perspective I'm sure putin didn't doesn't mind if North korea acts a bit more belligerently on the international stage because that's a distraction So I think of it as like a synergy and that together they're they're more threatening than they would be individually Who's anybody else? I'd say we're out of time, but I believe Peter's got a question one question for So if I talk to aching, you know, you alluded to this on september 11th the national counterterrorism center said Essentially, we've won against al-qaeda and in june the u.m. Released a report that basically said completely the opposite You know the Hikani who's the minister of the interior is part of the leadership council of al-qaeda. They have a very different narrative. So I just I wonder how you adjudicate these seemingly two very different conclusions and for general davis You know the chinese face a demographic cliff that they're about to fall off their economy You mentioned I mean their real estate is going to crash They have a terrible command economy, which is the zero kovat policy Obviously had a lot of impact if you look at puke polling. They're very unpopular Belt and road hasn't gone quite the way they wanted and And you know, they have a sea of problems. Does that make them more inclined to invade taiwan in 2027 as She has told pli to be prepared for or less on the question of adjudicating the different assessments of al-qaeda They are very hard. It's very hard to reconcile those two reports To be sure I think one of the things that we're going to face though is an environment of decreasing amounts and quality of information And it means that people will weigh certain pieces of information more heavily than others And I think that and there will be sort of baseline assumptions about the organization that will take people and increasingly sort of Divergent assessments and So I think I also think that there there is A narrowing of how the us views the threat It's much more about is this a threat to the homeland Is this a threat to the us interest and the un has sort of a broader aperture and that that explains part of it But I often I think a lot of it is just the sort of dearth of really quality information to use as a basis for an assessment And then on your china question China's economic policy is in the past has been focused on Modernizing before your demographics Cliff catches up with you and with the slowdown that does complicate The party's domestic agenda I would say just from watching them for 25 years now never underestimate the ability of the chinese communist party and the chinese state to muddle through a problem You know when we think they can't And so you know stay tuned to see what happens But it's clear the economy is slowing down. There are a lot of problems And this predates the party, but you know it has happened in the past where china's being able to use foreign Foreign actors or foreign problems to refocus domestic Frustration and that could Play out in a taiwan scenario. I think it comes down to to shijin ping In the past the previous previous leaders of the party were content to make progress in unification with taiwan She's given himself more time with the removal of term limits for for president Now there was no term limit for general secretary at the party or chairman of the central military commission the other two positions he holds But does he feel it has to happen on his watch? Given his age At what point does that perhaps become a tipping point in his mind? I don't know obviously and I don't think anybody knows But that's a factor as well Well peter you set this up like a good party right always leave everybody wanting more instead of realizing they stuck around too long So thank the panel panelists