 So, what we have today, I think, is an extremely important topic, which is the influence of Donald Trump, who's a very different kind of American president, to say the least, on world trade, on world politics. And I'm hoping, with this excellent panel, we can also get into something of Mr. Trump's character and how he's changed politics also. The one thing I know, I met Trump more than 30 years ago when he was a businessman, and even then, as he and Ivana, then his wife, were showing me around a yacht he bought and had Trumpified. It was a yacht. Actually, first owned by Jamal Khashoggi's uncle Adnan, who was the great Saudi arms dealer, and he put it up as collateral for a big loan from the Sultan of Brunei, who sold it to Trump, and so he had a Saudi yacht, Trumpified, which is quite extraordinary to see, lots of suede, lots of gold. But even then, when being president was far from everyone's mind, Donald Trump, I remember, and I wrote this at the time, was obsessed with the sense that trade had been unfair to the United States, that the Japanese then and the Germans were taking advantage of the United States, and even then, he was angry at the number of German Japanese cars on American roads. So some things don't change, but let's hear what our great experts have to say. And I thought we would begin with Michael Fuller. You can look into your books and figure out who everybody is. It's too time consuming for me to introduce them all. Michael, up to you. Thanks. Well, good morning, everybody. Thank you, Stephen, for the introduction. Thank you, Thierry, for hosting me. I'm proud to be, I think, one of the two Australians in the audience, flying the flag. We're on the cover of The Economist this week, but we're thin on the ground in Morocco. So what I'd like to do in a very short period of time is make an argument about the foreign policy consequences of President Trump. And I'll touch on four points. First of all, his foreign policy instincts, secondly, his actions in office, thirdly, the limitations on his actions, and fourthly, reasons to be concerned. So first of all, his instincts. And let me start exactly actually where Stephen finished. People often say lazily that Mr. Trump is stupid. His views are incoherent. But in fact, for three decades, he has had extremely coherent views on America's role in the world. And I think he came to office with more coherent views on America than other recent presidents, including President Obama and President Bush. For decades, he has held true to four core beliefs. And I've come to think of them as the four horsemen of the apocalypse. The first instinct that he brought to office is that he was sympathetic to isolationism. Or if isolationism is too strong a word, then certainly a desire for retrenchment. We heard this during the campaign when he spoke of walling America off from its southern neighbor, reducing America's international commitments. Since the 1940s, American presidents have been seized of the advantages of global leadership. Mr. Trump is oblivious to them. Second, he was unimpressed by the alliance network through which America has traditionally projected its influence. And this is odd because China and Russia would dearly love to have an alliance network as powerful and cost effective as that of the United States. Thirdly, as Stephen intimated, he was hostile to free trade agreements, or at least those that had been negotiated by others. Of course, he could negotiate them much better than anyone else. And finally, even before he came to office, we noticed his weird affinity for strongmen, such as Vladimir Putin. By contrast, he was notably lukewarm about democratically elected leaders, including in the European and Asian countries to which the United States has been allied. So those are the four instincts that he brought to office, the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Secondly, I would argue that in office, those instincts have, in many respects, in many important respects, informed America's policies. Now, this was an argument I had with lots of analysts at the time of his election. One of my colleagues said, the American system will wrap its arms around Mr. Trump, and he will end up as a much more orthodox foreign policy president than you might imagine. But as a friend of mine said, never underestimate the impact of Mr. Trump on Trump foreign policy. Let me go through those four horsemen of the apocalypse and point out where his instincts have informed his actions. First of all, the instinct for retrenchment. We saw that in his junking of the Iran deal, pulling out of the Paris Accord, or even in the last week, the INF Treaty. Secondly, his skepticism to alliances we see all the time. He refused to endorse the collective security guarantee of the NATO Treaty for many months. He later threatened the United States could go its own way if delinquent allies did not meet spending demands. He ran down bilateral treaties with countries such as South Korea and Australia. On free trade, he withdrew from the TPP on his first full day in the White House, and he imposed hundreds of billions of dollars of tariffs on China. And finally, on strong men and his preferred interlocutors, he has pursued his fixation with Mr. Putin to a degree that is difficult to understand, refusing to stand up for American democracy, accepting Mr. Putin's word over that of his own intelligence community, blaming all the problems with U.S.-Russia relations on America, on past American behavior, rather than Mr. Putin's behavior or indeed his interference in the U.S. the 2016 election. Mr. Trump enjoys hanging out with a posse of authoritarians, including Mr. Duterte, Mr. Orban, Mr. Salvini and Kim Jong-un, who is running rings around a lovesick president. So that's my second argument, that his instincts have largely informed U.S. foreign policy. However, third, there are important limits on his actions. The president's writ does not run everywhere. And two factors in particular have limited the Trump influence on his own foreign policy. The first is much discussed, and that is opposition within his own administration. The so-called deep state, the adults in the room who have to some extent prevented the president from doing irreparable damage to America's alliances and foreign relationships. They have authored strategic documents such as the national security strategy and the national defense strategy that reflect orthodox rather than Trumpian policies and somehow got Trump to sign off on them. Thank goodness for the deep state, I say. However, most of the adults have now left the room, and there are persistent rumors that the last two standing, John Kelly and Jim Mattis, will soon follow the others out the door, perhaps in a couple of weeks. So that's the first limitation. The secondly, and this is less discussed, the president lacks the patience, discipline, and interest to implement his will. The truth is, President Trump is not really interested in solving policy problems. He is interested in being seen to win. His style is to make a bold and unexpected move, declare victory, and move on. Few believe that not having an Iran nuclear deal is a better way of preventing the Iranians from acquiring nuclear weapons than having one. Few really believe that North Korea will demuclearize, but that is to miss the point about President Trump. He is not interested in having victories, he is interested in being seen to win. So the deep state's resilience and the president's lack of interest have combined to limit the damage that Mr. Trump has done. He has put America's interest in jeopardy, he has damaged international society, he has run down America's prestige, but he has not yet done irreversible harm. However, let me finish on this point. There are two reasons I think we should be a little nervous. First, Mr. Trump has not yet faced an externally generated crisis. Most of his problems have been internally generated. Sooner or later he will face an externally generated crisis. We remember that President Obama came to office right in the teeth of the global financial crisis. Can you imagine if we had a similar crisis now and our last line of defense in the Oval Office was Mr. Trump? Secondly, he could be goaded into making the kind of catastrophic error he hasn't yet made, such as starting an unnecessary war. So those are the reasons to be nervous. Stephen, let me finish on one final point. In 2015, I gave a series of public lectures in Australia and I was concerned then about the fraying of the international order. And so I called the first of these lectures present at the destruction. And this was a play on Dean Atchison's memoir about the establishment of the post-war order present at the creation. And I argued then that the country around which the post-war order was constructed, the United States, was stepping back from the world. Other countries such as Russia and China were stepping in. The pillars supporting the order were weak. The principles that define the order were under challenge. I said the order is not necessarily finished, but it is certainly fraying. And I was criticised at the time, including by the Australian Prime Minister, for being overly gloomy. As is the way with Australian Prime Ministers, he has now left the stage. But ladies and gentlemen, three years later, after Brexit, after the election of many other leaders, including Mr. Duterte and others, and after the election of Mr. Trump, no one is now saying that I was too gloomy. Thank you. Very good. Michael, thank you. But that was a really fine overview. Much appreciated. Thanks a lot. Rolton. So I was just going to pick up on maybe one of the instincts that Michael just mentioned or actually really add to that, because I think it's an interesting framework. And that is, I think the president also has a bit of an instinct for business, business interests, and for ways to stoke and spur economic growth. So let me talk a little bit about that. I would also say the president has a talent maybe for hyperbole, so I would also like to address that. So what I would like to do is maybe talk a little bit about noise and signal and talk about that in relation to US economic performance recently and a little bit of foreign economic policy in the United States as well. So on the domestic economic policy front, I think that the Trump administration does deserve some credit for spurring strong growth in the US through a number of steps, policy steps that they have taken. So just this yesterday, we saw the third quarter GDP report from the US. It was at 3.5%. That's a relatively strong number. That came on the back of a 4.2%, second quarter reading. So there's really no question that in the short term, there's been a pretty strong growth spurt in the United States. We could talk about the stimulus that went into that. But I think there's also something to be said for things like the corporate tax reform, which we'll touch on a little bit, deregulation, and a number of things that the administration has done to be pro-business and pro-growth. So on the corporate tax reform, I think it's worth mentioning. It was passed within the first year of the administration, passed and signed in December, lowered the statutory rate from 35%, which is one of the world's highest, to 21%. Repealed that corporate AMT supported business investment through a immediate deduction of business investment, a phase out over five years. These were all things intended to push businesses into reinvesting in the United States because that investment had been quite low for many years. And that's largely succeeded. I don't think it's succeeded as much as the administration likes to claim. But we have seen business investment growth at around 6%. The quarterly average over the last four quarters has been about 6%, which is pretty good, given that it was in the low ones before that. I will say the third quarter number was much, much weaker. So the story is whether any of this is sustainable. The third quarter number didn't look particularly good, so I do suspect that people begin to doubt how much of the business investment is really likely here to stay. Also on deregulation, I think you've probably been following a lot of this, but there are many people who do follow it, but there's been rollbacks to Dodd-Frank, there's been changes to the ACA, the US Health Care Reform, changes to the consumer finance, environmental standards being rolled back, housing rules being rolled back. A lot of these are things that many people debate about the merits of them, but it's pretty clear many businesses really like them. And you can see it in things like business confidence surveys and others. And I think if you think about the whole package, it's not surprising that after-tax corporate profits in the US were at about 9% in the second quarter, after being up at about 37% in the first quarter and 20% in Q4. So it's a really good time to be in American business. And I think the president's taking a lot of credit for that. The World Economic Forum I should mention just recently moved the US to the top spot on its global competitive index. So I say that because I think that it's, you need to give the Trump administration credit or credit is due. It's otherwise, it just looks very partisan. Let me now talk a little bit about places where I think they've not been as successful or I think there's a little bit more smoke and a lot less fire. On the spending cuts and the personal income tax deductions, those have been expansionary policies at a point in the cycle where it was really not necessary to spend that kind of money. Very likely we'll have a significant amount of debt as a consequence and very little growth to show for it. The US just ran a $780 billion deficit in the last fiscal year at a time when we were growing, as I said, at a very, very high rate. So what happens when we hit a recession is a very concerning prospect because in recessions that's just going to get worse. The Trump administration has also taken aim at governance inside the United States, talking about rightsizing government, talking about hiring freezes and pay freezes, attacking whole agencies within budgetary documents that are going up to the Hill. So there's been kind of an attack on governance itself in the United States, which I think is deeply concerning having just come out of the administration. In August it was a very difficult thing to watch, very difficult to work for an administration that had you tagged as deep state and did not really care to hear your expertise. Let me talk a little bit about some failures, just outright failures. They have not passed the infrastructure bill, one of the very, the most bipartisan, probably one of the most pro-growth bills they could have done. They really do not deserve a lot of credit for any of the long-term growth that they've promised. My view is on the supply side, there's no way that this is gonna add up to 3%, and they've tried to balance the budget on 3%. So the best the US is gonna do is probably two to two and a half, and that has to do with productivity growth and labor force growth, both of which are not nearly where they were before. Promising 3% growth was very misleading in my view. And finally, let me just make one last point on the economy. I think the administration so far has failed to deliver on its core promises to its core constituents. So the Trump phenomenon is really built around a struggling white, lower-medal class American voter who have been in a lot of pain over the last two decades. You have not seen their incomes rise. You've seen unbelievable amounts of social distress in their communities, including a report that just came out from CDC, our Center for Disease Control, with 71,000 drug overdose deaths in the United States in the last 12 months. So that's more than we lost in the Vietnam War just in the last 12 months. So some of these communities have been absolutely devastated by the slow growth, the loss of industry, and other things. They're angry, they're blaming everyone else, including foreign trading partners, which the president conveniently can use. But he is not delivering yet on wage earnings, our wage growth for those populations. And the reason this is going to be very hard to do is because we haven't raised productivity yet. So unless these reforms can really spur productivity growth, I don't see how we're going to get the wage growth that we need to really improve the lives of those key voters. So I'll stop there since we have- That's great. Thank you very, very much. No, I was very struck by that. I mean, I think the total in Vietnam was 58,000. So it's almost 10,000 more. Can I just ask you a quick question? We've talked a lot about the cumulative debt in Italy and Greece, but given what's going on with the deficit, I mean, how big a problem will this be down the road with this tax cut? I mean, people suggest American debt to GDP is getting up to that magic 100%. What do you think? I think if you look at the CBS, so it entirely depends on the growth assumptions, which is why I went to that growth story. So the administration is telling a story about 3% growth. If you get those numbers, you can actually see debt to GDP stabilize and come down. Although you have to have a lot of spending cuts to do that too, which I don't think are going to happen because they're so politically unpopular. So without that, without 3% and without spending cuts, right, we are getting closer to 100% GDP. And I think when the president has been critical of the Fed recently in terms of calling the Fed loco and other things, my personal somewhat cynical view on that is that he's trying to get ahead of the fact that there's going to be crowding out in the bond markets as a consequence of the US trying to place a considerable more debt. So what you're seeing is the yields rising, which is raising the cost of borrowing for the government. Yields are now above 3%, 3.14%. And I think that pressure from the fiscal side is actually feeding into that. So to deflect that, let's just blame the Fed for raising rates. Great. Thank you. That's really helpful. Mr. Fujisaki, please. Thank you very much. I'm very glad to be here. I was in the United States only a week ago and that's why I feel rather free because I'm not going back for another several months. I don't think I have to be afraid that I'll be stopped at the border saying that you said that about our country. So I'm going to be very honest today. Now I'll talk about US-China, China, Japan, and US-Japan. US-China, the manner of Trump administration is something a little bit more than a lot of us expected. However, it is true that there are elements that has to be said sometime, like IPR. I thought we had gone through that in the 70s and 80s and Japan was told a lot. And we called it Gaiatsu, the foreign pressure. I thought, why is it not said to Chinese? Is it too big to complain? So I'm not trying to defend everything that Mr. Trump has been saying, but there's some truth in that as well. However, one concern is that there's some similarity between maybe Mr. Xi and Mr. Trump. That is, they want to hear only about what they want to hear from the surroundings. So that's something we have to be concerned. Japan, China, now we are moving. Prime Minister was in Beijing yesterday, greeted very warmly, first time in seven years. It's China that has changed because of the international environment. They have come around to us, I think. And I think it's very good. Now the keyword is from competition to cooperation. However, we will not change partners. One example, Pew Research Center of United States had a research issued on October the 1st, only three weeks ago. In which they asked around in many countries of the world, which would be the leader in the future, China or United States? Only two countries in the world said, people said, more than 80% of people said it should remain as United States. They asked in France, they asked in UK, they asked in Germany, they asked in back Thailand, Korea everywhere, only two countries. That was United States and Japan. So Japan, Japanese people still have a big confidence in United States because of, I think, the values, freedom of speech, democracy, human rights, which we do in chair 100% with China. Third, Japan, US relations. I think it's pretty good because we've been able to manage problems. By little issues, we have just agreed on trade on goods. And it's pretty that US opted out from TPP, UNESCO, Paris Accord. But I think we are going to do by ourselves with other countries like minded countries and we can wait for United States to change mind and come back. It's not maybe this administration, but next administration and we can wait. So like the movie, 50 years ago, Shane, the movie Shane, I'm always saying. In the end, young boys calling out to Shane, come back in the wild while arming. And I think we always say, America, come back. And I think I'm really thinking we can do that in two, three years. Now, lastly, a lot of people think that America has been so stable a partner and it has moved. I don't take that view. So maybe Americans would like to divide me, challenge me, but look what happened in 1971 to 72. Mr. Nixon suddenly changed dollar gold policy. He changed China policy. All of us were shocked because we were following blindly United States when Brits in France has already moved out and supported Beijing, but we were behind. In 1990s, when North Korea was doing some bad things, Mr. Clinton said, we're gonna give like water reactor to North Korea. What happened? Korea and Japan followed. Mr. Bush came out and said, Bush 43 said, no way. And Mr. Bush started the Iraq war. Britain, I'm sorry, France and Germany said no. US and Japan followed. Mr. Obama came out and said that was wrong. Now Mr. Trump is saying everything that Mr. Obama did was wrong. So when US comes out and say, hey, we are gonna play tango, let's play tango. We're gonna say waltz, let's play waltz. That the disc jockey is always United States and we were dancing. And I think maybe the next leader will change the music and will change the tone. So I think we can wait. And one last thing is that Americans are very smart people. They know that the world institution that is made by United States, the best, most beneficiary is United States. That's why US economy is so good. So they'll wake up sometime. Thank you. That's wonderful, Chiro. Thank you very, very much. It is true. I think the United States is a very difficult partner. Very difficult date, very hard to predict. Has lots of mood swings. That continues. Anyway, thank you very much. Mr. Wang, please. Can you hear me? Yes, excellent. I think Donald Trump is divisive force in United States as well as in world politics. And divisiveness is not, the only adjective I want to add to his description, but I don't want, I refrain from using other words here. He is divisive as world politics is more divided. I think the world has been more divided since the end of the Cold War. And when we look at world politics, we see three different things. First is the combination of rising populism and rising nationalism. And they are reinforcing each other as represented in the United States and elsewhere. The second trend I see is the rise of authoritarianism and great man politics, which are also represented by Trump in the United States and by some others in other countries. The third thing I see is the intensified geopolitical competition. We see that in China-U.S. relations. We see that in the Middle East, between Iran and Saudi Arabia and some other countries. We see that in U.S.-Russian relationship. But the third trend I describe geopolitical competition is that representative of the Trump administration we will have to see. If I move to the U.S.-China relationship, Trump himself has waged trade war with China. What are his goals? What does he want to achieve in trade war with China? There are two different expectations. The first trend, the first interpretation is that Trump wants to address the trade deficit. He wants China to buy more goods from the United States and he wants manufacturers to go back to the United States. But this is Trump, but what are the other objectives? I think one other explanation is the United States wants to change China's industrial policies. IPR is one thing. And especially people are focusing on high-tech competition between the United States and China. There's the fear that China may catch up with the United States in terms not only economic growth, economic output, but also high-tech capabilities. That view is represented by Trump's advisors like Navarro, Lausica, Cutlow, and some others. And the third view about U.S.-China trade war is that the trade war is meant to prevent China from rising up as a global great power. This is related to power politics, geopolitical competition. And this is also related to the Belt and Road Initiative. And I think these people also have their voices in the White House, like John Bolton. And this is mainly power politics. The fourth view or the fourth perspective is that the United States wants to undermine the leadership of the Communist Party in China. If they are not talking about human rights violations in Tibet and Xinjiang and the religious problems and so on and so forth. And they have their voices in Congress. And the thing we don't really know is whether Trump is taking care of human rights. I don't think that is his feature, his thinking. But all the four trends I'm talking about in all the explanations in China-U.S. trade war. What we see in the United States policy toward China, trade deficit, IPR or industrial policies, power politics or great power competition, and China itself. Whether China is moving in the right direction, in the view of the United States or China is violating human rights and so on and so forth. And that is also related to China's world view, China's world behavior. So Trump is actually controversial in China. I don't think it is exaggeration to say that Trump's image in China is probably better than in Europe, in large of the Middle East. I don't know whether China's image is better in Japan or in China. But why is he controversial? I think first, some people like him because he represents some kind of political correctness in the United States. And those people who like Trump do not like multiculturalism. They have their voices expressed by some kind of reservation about immigration to China from Africa, from some Islamic countries. And they are afraid of Islamic extremism that is reflected in China. The second grouping who like Trump maybe they are saying in China's foreign policy communities that Trump is helping China. He is damaging the United States in the world, giving way to China's rights. So we should welcome Trump. He is doing a lot of harm to US images in the world. So China has more strategic opportunities. And the third grouping who admires Trump is that he is a leader who delivers, who fulfills his promises and he gives the United States economic advantage and surging. So some people even say that Trump's pressure on China may help China's economic reform and opening to the outside world. So that is not necessarily bad. China should take this advantage of competing with the United States so and China could improve its IPR records and so on and so forth. So this is my description of Trump in China. That's very good Mr. Wang, thank you. I just wanted to ask you Mr. Michael's theory which he gave us earlier is that Trump acts tough as a negotiator but is very happy to claim a modest success as the greatest success in the world. And if I'm not misreading you Michael. So is that the view in China do you think? Or is Trump more worrisome to the Chinese as a challenger perhaps too early for China's future? I think it depends on who you are talking about in China. I mean government officials are hesitant as to what Trump's role is in U.S. Trump relation. Trump himself claims many times that he sees Xi Jinping as his good friend. And he respects Xi Jinping and actually he wants to establish direct connections with not only Putin but also Iranian leader and Kim Jong-un. So what's wrong with his connection with the Chinese top leadership? That is one thing we can take advantage of. But also people say that he is very unpredictable. For instance if China makes some major concessions in trade with the United States will he be satisfied or will he put more pressure on China? That is quite debatable in China itself. Yes, yes I think it's debatable everywhere. Thank you. Now the larger view but a view from Korea I think. Mr. Bruggenroy please. You have the floor. First of all those baseball fans like me the Dodgers just won in the 18th inning so I'm sorry about being the Red Sox fan but anyway. This is my third year in a row in being on this panel on Donald Trump and I either did a great job or I may be the only one who said anything good about Trump and I suspiciously believe it's the latter. Last year I had to fly back to Korea right after my session at the World Policies Conference as President Moon invited me to a state dinner he was hosting for President Trump. As I was walking down the receiving line I wonder about what should I say to President I got about eight seconds. So I told him Mr. President I like your tweets. Keep tweeting in which he replied believe me I'll be tweeting more and I'm gonna tweet one tomorrow morning and you'll see it. And so yes I take part of the blame but seriously it is a tweets that has made him different from any other presidents in the U.S. or in fact any other leaders in the world and it works in America. The intellects and the press don't like it but if you are a common American who works in a factory like mine in the Midwest they like to hear directly from Trump. They don't want to read New York Times too sophisticated for them. So whether what he says is true or not they rather hear directly from their leader instead of through the press. And every time Trump tweets it becomes national news and headline news. And whatever you said about him whether it's controversial it is entertaining. And American loves entertainment you know you gotta be used with it. So I have my own formula. I call it the 30, 30, 40 formula. Believe 30% of what he says. Verify 30% of what he says. And let me now talk about how Trump negotiates. He always starts with threats. Look how he first threatened about leaving NATO and how he ended up getting the NATO countries to pay more for the defense. Look at how he threatened about getting out of NAFTA. Now he has a new deal with Canada and Mexico. He threatened Korea about getting rid of US-Korea free trade agreement. Now we have a new one which is not that much different from the original one. He just wants to win and gives his point. Look at how he threatened North Korean Kim Jong-un about striking first and how his button was bigger than his. And now he had a meeting with Kim Jong-un and now they are in a love affair at least for the time being according to Trump. So I'm not that worried about the trade issues the US has with China. I think in the end the Chinese will blink and I think there will be some kind of an agreement. I'm also kind of a cautiously optimist that he may come back to the TTP. At least he wants to listen and talk. So those are some of the things that I think you have to. So don't believe everything he's tweets but look at what he does in the process and what kind of action he takes. It's really going to be a do or die election for Donald Trump. If the Republicans wins both the House and the Senate he will have a very good chance of becoming a two-term president. If the Republican loses the House and wins the Senate as most people are predicting he will be handicapped with this budget. The Democrats will be controlling the budgets. One thing for sure he won't be able to build that big wall in the border of the US and Mexico if the Democrats win. If he loses both the House and the Senate he will be in real trouble and could possibly face impeachment depending on the outcome of the mirror investigations. Like Trump or not, I still believe America is the greatest country in the world and yes, America and the world will survive Donald Trump whether it's two more years or four more years. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you for that note of optimism. It is worth pointing out, I think you're quite right that even Barack Obama got probably more done in his first two years when he controlled both houses of Congress than he did in the next six and partly because he didn't control certainly the Senate. That's why the JCPOA and the Paris Agreement, none of them were put forward to the Senate. They just stayed as agreements which is why Mr. Trump felt he could abrogate them. It's very helpful, thank you. I just wondered very quickly if you think this tactic is going to actually work with Kim Jong-un or is this still very unclear? I can't imagine North Korea is gonna denuclearize, that seems mad for them. If you ask the same question about his father, Kim Jong-un, I would say no chance that he's gonna negotiate. But with his son, I feel a little different. I think this guy has a little bit of a heart and he actually cares about his people. So if Trump's because of two-term president and if he keeps threatening and doing that thing, I think there is an answer to this. Those few, they said I was crazy, but I am a believer that depending on how they negotiate, there could be a solution. Yes, good. And it would help if China, again, turned the screw a little bit more rather than turning it back half a notch, but. But to add to that, I think Kim Jong-un is also unhappy or not, can't trust the Chinese completely. That's why he's also moving with the U.S. and Korea, because he doesn't. And Kim Jong-un, his father never trusted the Chinese and that was one thing he advised Kim Jong-un said, don't ever trust the Chinese. So those are some, I'm sorry, I have to mention that to you, but it was just in our record, but that's what they said. So I'm just coding. That's one of the reasons I think he will keep nuclear weapons. It's about China. And I have to go to China next week, so I need to visa, so I'm not, don't please take it seriously. Well, don't have lunch with Xi Jinping. I don't think I'll get invited, thank you. Igor, over to you, please. Thank you very much. Steven, special thanks to Teri de Montbriand, because this is an excellent opportunity for the Russians to pronounce what they think about the global governance, which is an enigmatic thing for most of us. Looking at Trump from this Soviet-Russian retrospective, I would say that there could be two options. First, this is a cyclical Trump. By this I mean that for the Soviets, the change from Carter to Nixon was the similar thing, even worse. Or for example, from Kennedy to Nixon. So for us, it's sort of a cyclical thing when this great nation changes course because social justice versus economic efficiency wins or loses. And he symbolizes at the moment, as our American colleague said, this boost for the economic efficiency of the ruling class. So as Paul Kennedy said once in his famous book, The Rise and the Fall of the Superpowers, that could be the rise of the United States or that could be a fall of the United States easily because the United States can overextend itself and it looks like protectionism, demagoguery and populism could overextend the United States. This, we were talking about trade wars. We all know that protectionism has its limits. It will backfire on demand and supply chain sooner or later. This war with China has its limits and so on and so forth. From this point of view, I think that I'm on the side of those who think that American people will give its answers to all these questions by their own history, institutions, tradition, and they will temper the president. This obsession can be, Trump obsession can be cured by American history and institutions. For the Russians, Trump is a great catalyzer of the creation of the bipolar world or the return to the bipolar world, authoritarianism versus liberalism. If at the beginning of this century we had naive ideas and hopes that Russia will join European family as one of the members, now it's over. We are pushed into the natural, unnatural alliance, dash marriage with our great partner, China, and with other authoritarian regimes like Turkey, like South America, like Vietnam and so on and so forth. So from this point of view, he catalyzed the creation of bipolar world, but in a way it's more balanced international system, which we know how to handle. We do remember this bipolar world, which managed to create Helsinki agreements, which managed to do many other things because we are, by definition, cannot be all liberals. By definition, certain nations cannot be the nations of the rule of law, democracy, liberal democracy, open market and so on and so forth. By definition, through historical stage, at the moment we are much closer to China than to Europe, and he catalyzed by his behavior this thing. Good question on which side of the equation he is, and this question was raised many times here. And from this point of view, he will of course bring some kind of a disbalance. I don't want to deal with the personal questions because so many things were said or rather not said by Mr. Mahler and the whole of the group which explores the possibilities or investigates how Mr. Putin manipulates Mr. Trump. We'll see it soon. They will meet in Paris and then they will meet next year in Washington and if Trump is manipulated by Putin, American people will see that. I have my doubts that we are so powerful, never were. But from the point of view of people gathered here at this room, I think we can go back to the global governance as the question what to do in this situation of bipolarity, big question marks, a lot of uncertainties and so on and so forth. So for me, from me to long term, we have different questions and different challenges. We know that 4 billion people very soon will have problems having fresh water. We know that about 11 big cities, megapolises of this world in 10 years time will run out of this fresh water. We know that around $3 trillion is, 30, 30, excuse me, $3 trillion is hidden in the offshore jurisprudences and is not used for the betterment of where we live, for the commodities and services we need. So we have to talk about very good global governance and while big people fight at this lunches, Xi Jinping, Putin, poisoning, Trump and verse of verse, we have to think about what do we do, middle-sized countries, good integrations like European Union, other integrations. What do we do with this global governance? Where do we go forward from here? Because we're extinguishing the civilization we're living in. So from this point of view, I think that new enlightenment, new convergence of religion and science, new recipes for the convergence of this economic efficiency and social justice of communism and socialism, if you want, and capitalism. Those are the questions which the gathering like this has to be much more occupied with than this particular very difficult stage of the existence of Trump as the leader of the free world. I would stop here, thank you. Thank you, spasible shine. I hope we will go to the audience after Mr. Bedrin. So please have some questions, think of things that you want to ask particular panelists. So we don't end up having lots of empty responses to particular questions. So, Mr. Bedrin, au revoir. Alors notre sujet de ce matin, c'est les conséquences de Trump. Je dirais tout de suite que pour moi, elles sont considérables, presque toutes négatives, même s'il peut obtenir un certain nombre de succès économique à long terme, en tout cas, du point de vue de son électorat. Mais il faut ajouter aussi donc les conséquences à dépendre la durée. C'est pas la même chose selon que ça dure jusqu'à la fin de ce mandat, ou s'il y a un autre mandat après. Et on peut pas dire aujourd'hui si Mr. Trump finira en prison ou réélu. Donc ça change tout sur la durée, sur l'appréciation. Je dirais par ailleurs que, moi je ne le considère pas comme isolationiste. Je sais bien que pour les libéraux et les néo-conservateurs interventionnistes, ils le considèrent comme isolationiste. Je pense que c'est un contre-sense qui a eu d'autres isolationistes dans l'histoire américaine, il y a longtemps, mais tout simplement, c'est quelqu'un qui veut avoir les mains libres. Donc c'est plutôt une sorte d'egoïsme brutale, à court terme, qu'une sorte d'isolationisme théorique et ceux qui le prennent pour un isolationiste risquent d'avoir des surprises. Bah, la suite. Après, je suis d'accord avec la première intervention qui rappelait qu'il y a une cohérence très simpliste, qui est frustre, mais une cohérence dans tout ce que dit Trump dans sa vision des rapports de force du monde depuis le début. Et après, je ferai quatre remarques. Consequences sur les États-Unis eux-mêmes. Trump n'est pas à l'origine de toute la violence américaine, mais il l'aggrave sur tous les plans. Sa façon d'être, son comportement, ses mots, sa façon d'être président, aggrave, de façon tragique, le climat d'affrontement dans ce pays qui, je crois, n'a jamais été aussi divisé depuis la guerre de ses sessions. Il y a une sorte d'éléments de haine, même presque, aux États-Unis. Et pour le Parti démocrate, il me semble que ça reste un challenge très, très compliqué que de réussir à garder le soutien des multiples minorités, tout en réussissant à parler à l'électorat classe moyenne blanche dont on a parlé. Apparemment, le Parti démocrate n'a pas trouvé le populiste démocrate modéré qui pourrait surmonter cette contradiction. On verra s'ils y arrivent. Ça, c'est le conséquence sur les États-Unis. Images des États-Unis dans le monde, elle n'est pas mauvaise partout parce que Trump est très, très aimé en Israël, en Pologne, dans différents pays. Mais elle est globalement mauvaise, mais impressionnante. Donc, même ceux qui trouvent ça épouvantable ont peur de quelque chose. C'est un élément de force dans le monde brutal dans lequel nous sommes. Deuxième remarque, jusqu'où quels sont les conséquences de Trump par rapport aux pays avec lesquels il y a un bras de fer évident. Avec la Chine, ça va aller jusqu'où. Moi, je pense que ça peut aller assez loin, à la fois sur le plan commercial et économique. Je n'exclu pas qu'un jour, il y ait un affrontement vrai, notamment en ce qui concerne la libre circulation, la question des maires de Chine, libre circulation. Il y a quand même un antagonisme de projet qui est assez clair. J'imagine qu'il sera géré le moment venu, mais on n'est pas sûrs, par rapport à ça. Mais ça, c'est pas que Trump. Ça a commencé avant Trump, ça se poursuivra après Trump. Mais la première question est chinoise. États-Unis, Chine. Sur la Russie, ça a été évoqué. La question, on n'a pas la réponse. Est-ce que Trump réussira à imposer, par rapport à la Russie, une relation, disons, réaliste, réaliste brutale et délile? Ou est-ce qu'il sera empêché de faire ça par l'État profond américain qui est totalement contre cette politique? On verra, on n'en sait rien. Au Moyen-Orient, là aussi, je pense qu'il est un facteur d'aggravation, la politique avant l'affaire Khashoggi, c'est une alliance entre Trump, l'Arabie de Mohamed Ben Salman et l'Israël de Netanyahu pour imposer un blocus à l'Iran, il faut employer les termes, sur la base d'une conception absolument scandaleuse du droit international mais qui a été acceptée par tout le monde depuis très, très longtemps, qui sont les sanctions unilatérales. C'est pas Trump qui les a inventées, il les a graves, il les utilise de façon violente, mais ce n'est pas lui qui les a inventées. Et dans l'état actuel des choses, un président comme ça peut prendre en otage toute l'économie mondiale dollarisée, numérisée, qui passe par Swift, etc. Bon, alors est-ce qu'il va réussir à renverser le régime iranien comme c'est le but, créer une guerre civile, n'en sortirait dans cette théorie un régime meilleur pour l'Occident ou ça est très faux l'amour. On n'en sait rien, mais c'est la question principale. Est-ce que l'affaire Khashoggi fait que se réveil aux États-Unis un lobby anti-Saudien, qui était très puissant depuis le 11 septembre mais qui avait été mis au second plan parce que l'objectif de se venger du régime iranien était plus fort que l'autre. On ne sait pas très bien mais sur ce sujet comme sur les autres que j'ai cité, sauf sur potentiellement la Russie, Trump n'est qu'un facteur d'aggravation. Après on ne sait pas jusqu'où. Troisième remarque, Trump a un effet de démoralisation sur les alliés. L'ensemble des pays alliés protégés par les États-Unis, évidemment en Europe mais aussi en Asie. Donc ils sont déboussolés, désemparés. La question par rapport à ça, c'est qu'est-ce que ça va entraîner? Est-ce que ça crée de nouvelles alliances? On en voit peut-être les prévices en Asie. C'est fragile. Est-ce que ça va déclencher quelque chose de sérieux en Europe? La déclaration la plus importante en Europe depuis que M. Trump est président, c'est celle de Mme Merkel qui a dit l'an dernier qu'il a répété on ne peut plus vraiment compter sur eux donc on doit s'organiser plus entre nous. Mais ça n'a pas eu de suite pratique pour le moment. Est-ce que c'est un déclenchement? Est-ce que dans la tête des Européens, ça va ouvrir une nouvelle phase marquée par la volonté systématique d'être moins dépendant des États-Unis tout en restant alliés? Même si c'est le cas, c'est caché. Mais ça peut être une sorte d'obsession mentale dont les répercussions se verront dans 5 ans, dans 10 ans, peut-être. Donc par rapport au salier, là aussi c'est la question des conséquences. Je dirais que la conséquence globale principale si je synthétise et la plus grave, c'est que le comportement de Trump fait sauter les inhibitions, fait sauter toute une série de verrous. Pas simplement ce de la descense et de la bonne éducation, c'est beaucoup plus grave. Il y a une sorte de déginhibition. Notamment dans le domaine dont Laurent Fabius a parlé très bien hier soir au dîner sur la question écologique qui concerne pas que le climat, mais la biodiversité, les océans, les forêts, etc. L'attitude de Trump, consistant à dire tout ça n'existe pas, c'est négligeable, libère l'attitude des autres qui par exemple, c'est l'exemple que prenait Laurent Fabius dans l'affaire de la COP21 n'avait accepté le mouvement que parce qu'il y avait l'engagement d'Obama, le changement des titules de la Chine, l'orchestration Hollande Fabius à la Française, etc. Ça crée un mouvement qui s'imposait en quelque sorte. Dès lors que les États-Unis sortent, même si à la Californie, même si à beaucoup d'entreprises, même si à beaucoup de chercheurs, ça libère les comportements des autres et c'est donc absolument grave ici sur l'écologie, mais aussi sur le reste. Parce que le comportement de Trump, je ne disais pas isolationiste. Si tout le monde devenait isolationiste, replié dans son coin, c'est une regression lamentable, mais ce n'est pas automatiquement dangereux. Alors que son comportement qui n'est pas isolationiste, qui est égoïste, brutal, potentiellement interventioniste, à sa façon, cautionne d'avoir ceux qui étaient déjà comme ça avant, du genre Poutine ou Netanyahu, mais d'état d'autre en fait. Donc je pense qu'il peut y avoir un effet d'entraînement, de généralisation de ce type d'attitude, de violence pas que verbale. Qu'est-ce que ça nous donne comme monde après Trump ? Alors je le redis, ça dépend quand c'est le monde après Trump. Quel est l'état du monde occidental, à mon avis, plus mauvais ? Pour le monde occidental, c'est déjà très compliqué d'avoir à admettre que l'Occident n'a plus le monopole de la puissance. Au moment de la fin de l'Union soviétique, le monde occidental est déliré totalement. Sur la fin de l'histoire, on a gagné, on va imposer nos conceptions partout. C'est exactement l'inverse qui s'est produit. L'histoire s'est remise en marche, mais nous n'avons plus le monopole. Je ne vais pas aussi loin que Kishore Mabubani, le penseur de Singapour, qui considère que c'est la fin de la parenthèse occidental. Je ne dis pas ça, je ne dis pas la fin de la parenthèse, le fin du monopole. Mais ça, les États-Unis ont du mal à s'adapter à ça. On voit d'ailleurs dans les élections présidentielles américaines que les électeurs choisissent d'un d'extrême à l'autre à la fin de chaque président. Quant aux Européens, ils sont toujours dans une sorte de bulle sur ces questions. Donc, un monde occidental encore moins bien placé après Trump qu'avant pour admettre de façon réaliste les nouvelles donnes dans le monde et défendre ses intérêts vitaux et ses valeurs. Donc, ça dépendra en réalité des autres. Et dans les conséquences de Trump, il faut dépasser tout ça. Et c'est-à-dire, qu'est-ce que les autres vont faire ? Est-ce qu'il y a une réaction un peu coordonnée ou en tout cas convergente ? Il suffit pas de faire des sermons sur le multilatéralisme. Il faut que le faire fonctionner la coopération internationale. J'ai convaincu que les États-Unis reviendront, non pas à la théorie du multilatéralisme, à la pratique de la coopération internationale qu'ils auront vu l'échec relatif pendant Trump de ça. Et à cause de la question chinoise et d'autres questions, ils y reviendront à leur façon en essayant de l'orienter. Mais c'est pas tout de suite, c'est dans longtemps. Donc, pour moi, la question principale, c'est qu'est-ce que l'ensemble de ceux qui sont inquiets, choqués, désemparés, etc., comment est-ce qu'ils vont s'organiser dans la période qui nous sépare du moment où les États-Unis redeviendront un partenaire de la coopération internationale ? Merci bien, monsieur. Je vous demanderai une question, si c'est possible. But, in English, there's a debate in Europe about how symptomatic Trump is of an altered American role in the world, or whether he's something temporary, a kind of interlude. And my impression wandering around Europe is it's still tetanisé by Trump, it's still kind of paralyzed by Trump. It really doesn't know how to respond. It's certainly not responding in any coordinated fashion. So that's what I wanted to ask you. I mean, is it your sense this is changing, are people beginning to coordinate their responses? And in this debate about whether Trump is an interlude or symptomatic of a structural change in American life, what do you think? If Europeans consider Trump is a parenthesis, there will be no reaction. It will be the politics of the other side. But we'll wait. It's a nightmare, it will stop. If they're convinced it will last longer, it can cause something. But so far, Europeans have been amazed by the idea of leaving the situation that was set up after the Second World War, that is to say, with permanent protests between the United States and the country, the Europeans who are not happy with the modality of protection, and who in doubt, since the old theory of the flexible response, which introduced in doubt, but it continued. So it could evolve in a more constructive way. If we think that Trump is a long phenomenon and that even Trump represents something deep in America that will last after him, we have to organize ourselves. That's why I mentioned Madame Merkel, because precisely, Germany is central in relation to that. And so the ideal response, it would be a combination of Madame Merkel, we have to organize ourselves better between us and an old classic formula of French foreign policy. We are the American friends, we are allies to the United States, but we are not aligned. The United States do not have that, because they consider that the allies must be aligned, but if there was an evolution, it would be in that sense. Are there signs in Europe of that? Frankly, very few. There are a few small signs. It can be transformed, maybe. Merci. Just out of gas with anyone else on the panel, like to talk to that question, which I think we haven't quite discussed, which is how emblematic is Trump of a structural change in the United States? Or is he this kind of shocking interlude that was an accident and then we'll go back to something different, but not so different? Did that send in wrongs? Do you want to? Probably frame it not as he being the structural change, but as many structural changes happening in the United States and he becoming kind of a symptom of them. So as I mentioned earlier, right, so very stagnant economic and wage growth in many parts of the country, a deindustrialization across many parts of the country a lot of internal migration into the country and then out migration from many communities. So I use a personal example. I have 16 first cousins on both sides of the family and from the Midwest, all from Ohio and Wisconsin and all born in the Midwest. Only four of them still live in the Midwest. And that happened in one generation and that kind of hollowing out of the Midwest, the heartland, the hollowing out of the middle class has been going on for 20 years in the United States. It just didn't seem to ever percolate up and I think the U.S. leadership and this is both Democrats and Republicans have really not explained well the benefits of integration of openness. So I guess I could disagree a little bit with some of the people on the pattern to think American voters gonna be very smart and understand why we should be engaged internationally. I actually am not quite sure about that. I don't think we've done a great job of explaining the benefits to the average American voter. And as a consequence, I think there's a lot of doubts about what the benefits for American leadership are and if you're in like Canton or Toledo, Ohio. So I do wonder. Thank you. Michael, did you wanna say something? I think both points are correct. I think clearly something was happening before Trump. That's a point I was trying to make. A lot of people observed that President Obama was more interested in building the nation at home than building the order abroad. But what is different about President Trump is that he's not, he doesn't, whereas Mr. Obama had a sort of a cool analytical view that the U.S. role in the world was changing, President Trump is actually actively hostile to that role. It's not that he doesn't feel they can sustain it anymore. He feels that America has been a schmuck. That the current leader of the free world doesn't believe in the free world and he doesn't wanna lead it. He doesn't think that it's in America's interests to lead in a way. He believes much more in the brutal application of superior negotiating power in a dog eat dog, zero sum sort of way. So I think that's an important change. The second point to make is that can the system, can America go back to what it was after four years of Trump or after eight years of Trump? And I think the jury is out on that because we already see in public opinion polls that Mr. Trump is changing the views of Republicans, for example, about alliances, about trade and about other issues like that. About Russia. About Russia. And I don't think those views are gonna snap back easily. The third point I'd make, and I say this to someone from the Asia Pacific, is that I think there are real questions about the future of both the United States and China and this is why it's such a discombobulating moment. We're talking about Mr. Trump, but equally on the China side, we don't know how China, there is a bipolarity to Chinese behavior, sometimes very skillful, sometimes very hard and forward leaning. And we don't know how the contours of this relationship will work, whether the current uneasy competition will slide into actual confrontation which will be deeply uncomfortable for all of us. So a country like Australia worries both about a feckless America, which is what we're talking about, but also about a potentially reckless China in the future. So I think you have to be aware of uncertainty in both those polls. I mean, some people even suggest that Trump understands the structural change and is taking one of the last moments of real American hegemony to push outside the multilateral system to get better deals from inside it because America's power is slowly declining inevitably compared to China and Asia. Itzhiro, please. Thank you very much. I am a believer of United States coming back like Minister Vettrin said, il revient en un jour. But how soon it is? I don't know, of course, but I think it can be a temporary phenomena. If I sound cynical, I'm sorry, but the weakness of intelligent analysts is that you take what it is as something that should have happened. Three years ago, no one was saying that the Trump and Americans will change like this. Now, a lot of people are saying Trump is a phenomenon. This had to happen, and I don't really believe in that kind of logic. Sorry to be very straight forward. And I think maybe Mr. Trump denies values of your founding fathers, democracy, freedom of speech, freedom and everything. But I think still a lot of Americans believe that, and that's why Mr. President doesn't have more than 40% support. And so I still believe in that. Maybe I'm too optimistic, but I feel that way. No, but it is true. It's always easier to reinterpret the past. Let's get some questions from the audience. What I love, I'm sure we have microphones around, I see some hands, but I can't really see faces. So there's a gentleman with his hand up in the second row. Is there a microphone? Keep going, the second row, the second one, la. And then there's someone in, like, looks like a yellow sweater. Okay, okay, please. Thank you very much, Mr. Laichubi. I've already come in. I wanted to ask you a question that seems essential to me. This has been discussed, but shouldn't we be concerned about the fact that Trump is also the product of the failure of previous approaches? And so when he plays this role of rupture, from there, should analysis on his failures and his approaches not be deeper? First question. I'd like my panelists to come back. And beyond Trump, what would be the evolutions? Because it's a failure compared to the previous approaches. The previous approaches have been denounced, are ineffective. I'd like an eye, I'd like an analysis on this question. And how do you imagine the new evolutions to the light of this contradiction? Thank you. Okay, thank you, thank you, Mr. Laichubi. Oui, Hervé Mariton. D'abord, en tant qu'Algerois, pour approuver la question de notre ami algérien, qui est sur le premier point, paraît très importante, les échecs qui ont conduit à Trump. But I would put two quick points. First, how is it that Trump still has a very large popular support? Are there that many idiots in this case? Or is it that Trump bashing, as we've heard from part of the panel this morning, as exactly the reverse effect? Second point, Trump has probably the useful policy, and that was part of the final analysis from our moderator to exert and try and exert some influence towards, and in a way against, Chinese expansionism today, from its near vicinity, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and extended to Africa, indeed here in Morocco and many countries on the planet. So if Trump does not do that, who else? And in a way, a question maybe to Mr. Vidrin and others on the panel, would it be immanageable that other parties on the planet, if not Trump, somebody else, some other country, takes that sort of responsibility, or is the world totally to the idea that there's one type of expansionism that has no answer, no reaction, and maybe a final conclusion, we may express many criticisms towards Trump. It's not my cup of tea, but on freedom of speech, human rights, I'd still rather live in the States than in China. Okay, very good. Could you pass the microphone behind you to your right? And then, are there any questions over on this side? I can't see, okay, anyway, please. And if I could just ask you, I should have done before, just please identify yourself. Would you mind terribly? Everything. I'm not a tabernacle, Libo. My question is that unilateralism, American, and the commercial war, money, not building up the dollar as exchange money in international trade, thank you. Okay, now see, let's take a couple more, there's right down in front, Madame Voila, and then there's a gentleman on the aisle there, thank you. Can I go ahead, please? Okay, I'm Jean-Pierre Cavesson from Hong Kong Baptist University. All right, yes, general remark, it looks like Europeans believe more in Trump's worlds and less in his actions than the Asians. It looks like the Asians are more cautious and more concentrated in the actions of the Trump administration beyond the words it has uttered. So that's general remark. Now, I have a specific question to Wang Tisiu, anyone who is based in the Asia Pacific region is regarding the US and China confrontation. Now, in China in the last few years, there were a lot of debates about the US decline. It looks like today, these debate has been forgotten because maybe the US has come back to Asia and the Trump administration in many ways has developed some kind of super-rebalancing policy towards China. And I'm happy that Yubi Yavelin mentioned the South China Sea because I would like to have Wang Tisiu, another Asian representative on the panel, on the risks of crisis in the South China Sea or in the Taiwan Strait. I think Taiwan was just mentioned very briefly, but that's another hotspot we should look at. Now, the question is whether there is a chance for such a crisis. And the other issue is whether the core war, the trade war between China and the US as you sort of alluded to, on this is going to put enough pressure on the Chinese leadership to reform. And I would like to have your own view on that. It seems to me that it's unlikely, but maybe have another view. Thank you very, very much. And I'll do it here. I am President of the Moroccan Institute of International Relations. And I have two questions for Mr. Védrine. I noticed that we talked a lot about Asia, we talked a lot about Europe, but we absolutely didn't talk about Africa. So my question to Mr. Védrine, is that Trump has an African policy or does it interest him? Absolutely not. That's my first question. The second is about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Trump went beyond all the previous presidents by recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, by ignoring all the help that was given by the United States to the Palestinians, and even by ignoring the Palestinian representation in Washington. We are talking about a Trump plan for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And my question to Mr. Védrine, is this plan really existing? And what would be its contours? Thank you. Thank you, Mr. OK, let's come back here. Let's try to first answer the questions about Asia, Pacific, and worries about the South China Sea. Mr. Wang, would you like to start? Yes. First, I'm very much in agreement with Michael's point that the United States is changing, but not changing totally. I think some people say Trump is some kind of abrogation in world politics and US politics. I don't totally agree, but I think he represents, as I said earlier, the divisiveness in world politics. And the divisiveness is caused by increased economic equality among many countries, and also the identity politics that are exacerbated by economic inequality. So if we come to US-China relations, I think the relationship is influenced by their domestic politics. In the United States, the criticisms of China are rising up, not only in the Trump administration, but in the political community as a whole. So I don't think this is a short-term phenomenon, because Trump is surrounded by people who have hostile or strong reservations about China. With regard to the South China Sea and the Taiwan question, the two sides do not want to fight a war over these islands or over Taiwan. But the tensions are rising up, because people in China hold nationalistic feelings and sentiments about the United States, and people in the United States are saying China is trying to replace the United States domination in East Asia. But I think in the practical terms, the two sides are very cautious not to be engaged in an actual military conflict. The two militaries are talking to each other, and I think there will be somewhat reserved in making some skirmishes. So I am moderately optimistic about the South China Sea and Taiwan. Regardless of the rhetoric. Can I ask you, there may be a slightly difficult question. I mean, China has joined much of the world order and has asked everyone to obey the rules. And yet, the decision of the court about these islands has been totally ignored by China. And I wonder how that fits with the Chinese view that everyone should obey the rules except themselves. I think China says that it abides by international law and it is a contributor to current world order. Of course, their behavior has generated some concerns over the South China Sea and elsewhere. But I think the preoccupation of China today is still domestic economy. So I don't think China will be engaging in adventurous things abroad. Going back to the question about China's reform, I think it is expected that the Communist Party will hold another plenum after the party congress. And I hope these people have some expectations of economic reform. But I think economic reform may be restored. But I think the political situation may remain unchanged. There's still a great deal of effort to consolidate the power base of the Communist Party. Yes, yes, that's precisely it. Mr. Furusaki and then Mike. Very shortly, our relations with China are improving. So I have to be rather cautious. But my personal view, I have two concerns. One about the South China Sea and other issues. Feta Complee, or you do things first and then extending smiling hands afterwards. I think that's a little consent to us. Second is an idea like AIIB or OBOR on Belt and Road, which we will discuss later. Great ideas, maybe. But it doesn't come this way that, hey, I have a good idea. Let's discuss to make it. It comes like, I have a good idea. Those who want to join, come on the board. I think these are the two small concerns I have on China's diplomacy. OK, Mike, this is not aimed at you. But let's try to keep our responses short. So we have time to go to the audience one more time, please. I'm going to respond to the gentleman in the yellow sweater who made the argument that Mr. Trump is confronting an expansionist China. I don't really see it that way. I don't recognize that in Mr. Trump's policies. The truth is he's been very inconsistent on China. During the campaign, he was very tough. During the first 18 months in office, he coddled China. He didn't confront China. You remember the Mar-a-Lago summit, all the early love affair with Xi Jinping. Now US policy on China has toughened up, for sure. The Pence speech, very tough, reminiscent of a sort of Cold War rollback approach to China. Why has that changed? I think trade is Mr. Trump's red line. And I think he's angry about that. Secondly, he's pushing on an open door. The truth is that everybody in Washington has toughened on China. Democrats and Republicans are getting sick of Chinese foreign policy. And it's very easy for Mr. Trump to make this argument. And also, I think there's a distraction element. While he's being attacked on Russia, he can give a big speech on China and say, look over there. There's nothing happening here. Look over at China. I think Mr. Trump will be tough, will continue to be tough on China's economic approach. But it's not clear to me to come to the South China Sea issue that he's going to take risks on really hard security issues because he hasn't done that to date. And he doesn't care really about alliance guarantees. The idea that Donald Trump is going to take big risks on the grounds of half-submerged water features in a waterway on the other side of the world seems very unlikely to me. The second point, just very quickly, Steven, you also made the point, sir, about Trump bashing. And I think that's a fair point. I think Mr. Trump has had successes in his foreign policy. The two points I would make is, first of all, the scale of the successes are not what he says they are. And he doesn't care too much about the scale of the successes. So we have to be very careful in interrogating what those successes are. The second question I'd put to you, at what price do these successes come? Yes, the stronger party in a negotiation can always wring concessions out of the weaker party, but in the long term, that will tend to undercut your reliability, your reputation, and your prestige. And the genius of the US-led order after the Second World War was what the great American historian John Lewis Gattis described as hegemony by consent. America achieved hegemony over much of the world by consent. The world consented in America's hegemony. But if you misuse your power, if you're too strong, if you take every advantage you have, then that consent will go away. Thank you very, very much. That's great. Mr. Roy, did you want to speak? I just want to say that. And then we'll go to Mr. Moon. When Kim Jong-un was shooting those missiles, China, instead of trying to calm down the North Koreans, they punished South Korea when we put that anti-missile system. So how can you, and it's for our own protection. It's a defense mechanism. So for China to punish penalized South Korea, we're putting this system to defend ourselves. And Korea, we've been bullied by the Chinese for 5,000 years. So it's in the DNA of the Chinese to bully you, threaten you. So I rather have some kind of a US presence for you to prevent some kind of an inveturism from China. It's my personal opinion. Thank you. Mr. Vitrine, there are a number of questions addressed to you. So Steve, we'll play. It wasn't the case for the moment. And it wasn't major in the exchange that we had. Secondly, the plan on Israel-Palestine is a plan in all times. He says that the cost of winning is basically that the Arab countries in the region have other suicides, that no one else supports the policy of two states, except the Europeans, and especially France, with a certain verbal courage. But there you go. So they're going to abuse this situation to say it's to take or to leave. In my opinion. On global terms, what I wanted to say is that the Western countries will not find the global control of the global system. There is no global system. There is what Guterres calls chaos. The Western countries will not arrive. The United States will not arrive even with Trump's brutality. The Western countries, in addition, do not agree with them on these questions. I think that China will not arrive either. I don't think it's the Chinese project. And even if it was its new project, it would not arrive, because there will still be systems of Dan Digmont in relation to China. Confused, but still. Emergencies, in general, do not have unity between them. Look, one of China, for example. So we are in a rather difficult chaotic system. Chaotic, that does not mean war, but unstable, sustainable chaotic. What makes, in my opinion, there is a meeting in front of us between the powers installed for two or three centuries, which are still relatively self-defense, and the power that is mounted in disorder. There is a meeting. Either it will take place through dozens of dangerous and painful battles on all political, monetary, military, etc. Either, at some point, will organize a sort of general discussion that did not take place after the end of the Soviet Union, which had taken place after the end of the First World War, not very well, after the end of the Second World War, rather well, and which did not take place. So my only simple idea is that this meeting is not behind us. It is not just about making sure that the worst and that the citron, the contestant, the holy land, the system that has already been organized, which is beautiful, I think that the meeting is in front of us. And it poses very, very, very complicated questions to the powers that were the dominant powers in advance. It is more complicated than for the others. So, for the Europeans. You'll see. Igor, I don't want to put you on the spot, but one of the things Mr. Vadrin just said, which is always intriguing me, is we have traditional powers, we have rising powers. There's clearly a change. There's a, where does Russia see itself in this? I mean, does it see itself part of the future or hanging on to the past? By the course of events, our politics were reactive because we do not represent the power and potential economic and military one of the Soviet Union, but we still thought of ourselves as the adversary of the United States and in this bipolar competition. Ukrainian crisis, Syrian crisis were the reaction to this. At the moment, it's obvious that we cannot take this burden upon ourselves alone, but through dual containment of the United States, of China and of Russia, we are organizing counter-dual containment of the United States. So we can be allies of China at the moment. Hypothetically, if something goes very well beyond Putin, then we can go back to the Western world, but at the moment until 2024 at least, I don't think it will happen. You know, I mean, in a way, some people, maybe it's a joke, but they suggest that Putin is doing to the United States what Nixon did to the Soviet Union by moving toward China. Something like that, and he's a very good player in this. And tactically, I think that we made a lot of successes. We're back in the Middle East and we can bargain our Palestinian-Arab-Turkish-Iranian connections and we can be a player and we can't pretend to go back on the top table, but the weakness is economy, demography, and other things and in the long run, we cannot play this role anymore. Okay, thanks. We have eight minutes, so I'd like to take a couple more questions. I don't know if Jim Loewenstein's out there. We had talked about a question, so if Jim, you're out there somewhere, stand up. Where? Okay. Okay, could you give him a microphone please? Thank you, Jeff. Jim, thank you. Thank you, I'm a retired American diplomat, so of course what I worry about is the image of the United States. To what degree do you think Europeans and Asians separate their reaction to President Trump from their opinion on the United States? Thank you. A couple more. I mean, in the, is it Carrie? I can't see. There's a woman in the front row, please. As someone who has a foot on either side of the Atlantic, I wonder if we might not also look at Trump as someone who puts his finger on the divisions as Rosalind was referring to, of the losers in the transition to a knowledge economy. The people in the north of England who voted for Brexit, the people perhaps in the French countryside, that he's putting, that he's not simply an American phenomenon, perhaps in an internal or a domestic policy way. Okay, thanks. And could you just hand the microphone to the desk? Go ahead, I'll see. I have also two fits on each side of the Atlantic. I have two comments remark question. One, I think beyond the trade war or so-called trade difficulties between China and the United States, it seems to me that the real issue is more market access. I would say reciprocal market access. What we've seen lately is attempts in the US to block some investments by Chinese companies, particularly in certain sensitive sectors. And we have a process called Cyprus that some of you, I'm sure, are familiar with. We've seen it's harder for Chinese company to invest abroad at the same time. Probably the Chinese authority don't want to spend that much money outside of the country because as one of the panelists said, the issues are more on the domestic side. So this is one aspect. The other thing that I would like, there's been, everything I told was pointing out, some I would say Trump bashing and a lot of people don't like Trump for a vital reason, which I perfectly understand. I'd like to make two remarks. One, he's been elected, he's been elected. I mean, some people said he didn't get more. He's been elected. But he's been elected, he's the president. And the second thing is elected by the Americans. Everybody has a view on who should be the president of the United States, but be aware of something, only the American votes. Thank you very much. So let's have one more question, but let's try to have a question about Trump. We've wandered around, I think, in a very interesting way, but let's get one last question about Mr. Trump. I see gentlemen with his hand up there, please. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. That's almost from Japan. I have a question to former minister, Mr. Moshu Verlin. If you put in your shoes of historian, for example, in 1980, more than 50% of the world GDP was produced by two countries, China and India. And if history may repeat itself, and if many people predict by 2050, China is by far the largest country in the world in terms of military, economic, political power, do you think this course of history could be interpreted by something happening between China and the United States now? Thank you. Great. Thanks very much. We don't have tons of time, so let's first try to have quick responses to the question about America's image abroad and Mr. Trump. Michael, go ahead. But let's just be brief if we can. Polling data gives us the answer to that. Most Western countries at the moment are distinguishing between their view of the United States and their view of Mr. Trump. And in the Australian case, for example, still seven or eight out of 10 Australians believe that the alliance is important to our security, but only 30% of Australians respect Mr. Trump. I worry, though, in the long term, if you think of the murder of Mr. Khashoggi, the disappearance of the Chinese, Interpol chief, for example, these are the kinds of questions that in the past we would have relied on, expected the United States, the president of the United States to take a lead on. Now that doesn't happen. What does it mean that someone like Erdogan of Turkey is a greater advocate of press freedom and of getting to the truth of Mr. Khashoggi's murder than the president of the United States? And the final thing I'd say is, what if Mr. Trump is re-elected? It's one thing for us to suspend disbelief when America elects him once, but what if he's re-elected? Brons, do you have a thought on this, or am I putting you in a spot? On the image abroad. I'm not sure I'm in a great position to describe that. I can talk a little bit about his image in the U.S. Which we'll hear a lot about mid-November, I think. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Would anyone else like to... Igor, what does Trump look like? We have this video already. We have an inferiority complex vis-à-vis Americans, but we have a superiority complex either. So this is a dissonance cognitive, total. So the rich people in Russia would run to the United States buy properties and enjoy life, but coming back, they would bash Trump, Americans and all of that stuff. So it's very situational. And then for example, on the 11th of November in Paris, by some miracle, Putin strikes a deal with Trump, then six days later, the public opinion of Russia, being brainwashed by television, would say that 60% of the Russian population is strongly for Trump. Yeah, yeah. I'm afraid both our populations are a little bit the same way. Mr. Wang. I think Trump is difficult to separate Trump from the United States. In the sense, in China, for instance, Trump is trying, his administration is trying to drive some Chinese presence from the United States. Chinese students, Chinese businesses. So that hurts the United States immediately in China. Basically, the United States still enjoys a lot of popularity, especially among the Chinese younger intellectuals and students. But if they are denied access to U.S. universities, they will have to go somewhere else, Australia, Great Britain and other countries. So it depends on whether that kind of policy will continue. Yes, thank you. I think you're probably gonna have the last word. So go ahead. Just one word. Because Japan's relations with the United States has been so close and so strong, up till now, we were able to distinguish the two, Trump and United States. I hope this will last long. Thank you very much. Okay, well listen, we are out of time. I apologize to those who wanted to ask questions and I failed to let you do that. So my apologies, but my thanks to this panel for a really interesting discussion. All the best. Thank you.