 Hello, and welcome to this latest Lowy Institute live event. This is part of what we're calling the Long Distance Lowy Institute, in which we communicate our content and analysis online while we're unable to do it in person. Today we have people joining us from all over the world, from Tokyo and Singapore and Manila. We also have several of our board members and corporate members on the call. A warm welcome to you all. My name is Michael Fulilove, and I'm the Executive Director of the Lowy Institute. And joining me this morning from Washington DC are two of the most influential voices in the American debate on the world, Kurt Campbell and Michelle Flournoy. Kurt served as the Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs in the Obama administration, where he was a key architect of Washington's pivot to Asia under President Obama and Secretary Hillary Clinton. He's one of the leading Asia experts in the United States, a former think tanker as the senior VP at CSIS and an entrepreneur as the founding chairman of the Asia Group. From our narrow perspective, he's also a great friend of Australia's, a councillor to successive Australian Prime Ministers and an officer of the Order of Australia. Most importantly of all, of course, in 2013, Kurt served as the Lowy Institute's inaugural distinguished international fellow. Welcome, Kurt. Michelle Flournoy is another remarkable policymaker. Michelle served as the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy in the Obama administration from 2009 to 2012. Her portfolio there included many vexing international challenges, including engineering the drawdown of US troops from Afghanistan. At the time of her appointment, Michelle was the highest ranking woman in Pentagon history. In 2017, when President Donald Trump appointed Jim Mattis to serve as his Defense Secretary, Mattis wanted Michelle to come on board as his deputy. According to reporting, Michelle, well, we know she didn't take up that opportunity and if you don't mind my saying, Michelle, the further we get along, the wiser that decision looks. Michelle is now the co-founder and managing partner of West Exec Advisors. Kurt and Michelle have been collaborators and partners in crime for a long time. In 2007, they co-founded the Center for a New American Security, one of the most energetic and effective think tanks in Washington. Both of them also are known for mentoring many of the best and brightest minds in Washington. I really could not be more delighted to have both of you with me. So welcome. Thanks. Now, before I go to my guests, just some quick housekeeping. On the base of your screens, you'll see a Q&A button where you can submit questions to Kurt and Michelle. We'll put as many of your questions to them both as we can later in the discussion. But first, I have some of my own questions for the panelists, so I'm going to kick off. Let me ask you both and maybe I'll start with you, Kurt. Let me ask you to reflect on what's happening on the streets of America. We've seen in the last couple of weeks the killing of George Floyd, the protests which followed that, and the response of the Trump administration. Let me say for my, in my case, many friends of America are heartsick at what we are seeing, and we extend our thoughts to you. So can I ask you to reflect on what is happening on the streets of America at the moment? Michael, thank you very much. Thank you so much for inviting me and Michelle to be in your group today. It's great to be back at the Lowy Institute at least virtually, and I appreciate the question. It's a hard one for Americans, frankly. I think they're elements of what's taken place over the last couple of weeks and the last couple of months, which are just deeply discouraging. But like in all things that transpire that are tragic in the United States, they're often hopeful notes. And you will note over the last several days a number of elements of grace and hopefulness have played out peaceful demonstrations across the United States. A broad recognition of violence against African Americans, not just in recent days, but historically, a real sense of a community being wronged. A recognition that remedy is necessary. And a broad political recognition that this is something that requires a profound national effort that goes beyond policing. But let's remember, Michael, this takes place not just in the context of the racial situation, the initial sin of the United States slavery, and then the persistence of racial insensitivity and discrimination historically. But we've also lived through, by far and away, the worst elements of the coronavirus challenge and an economic plummet that is reminiscent of the Great Depression. And so if you live in Washington, D.C., and you're not terribly comfortable with the Trump administration and you add these three things in, it can be deeply discouraging. And for me personally, I'm living with a bunch of my daughters and their friends, and they are insisting every day to go out and to represent and to peacefully demonstrate. And you have to let them, you have to support them, but there isn't a day that I'm not nervous because we've got armed groups in the streets, military, we've got helicopters overhead. I never thought I'd see this in my own country, and some days it feels like a bad dream, but ultimately I'm hopeful that we'll pull through and be stronger as a result. That's not a good answer, I recognize Michael, but it's just such a difficult thing for many of us to comprehend and wrap our heads around. Michelle, let me ask you, let me take up where Kurt finished on the role of the military over the past fortnight. We've seen those helicopters flying low, but we've also seen the appearance of police officers and soldiers in the streets without identifying ranks. We saw General Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in combat fatigues in Lafayette Square. We saw, we heard those remarks by the Defense Secretary Mark Esper, which is now withdrawn where he recommended that governors dealing with the protests should seek to dominate the battle space. As someone who has spent a lot of her career in the Pentagon, how does it feel to see those sorts of things, those signs, on America's streets? I think anyone who's taken an oath to the Constitution, which is something you do when you take public office in the United States, was horrified by what we saw last Monday evening. It really was a situation where we had the president talking about deploying active duty troops, not just National Guard on the streets. We had an influx of both National Guard and federal law enforcement of all different stripes. And then we had a very aggressive use of force before the curfew was imposed. So when people were just there peacefully protesting, exercising their First Amendment rights, major use of force to clear out the area using tear gas, pepper spray, rubber bullets, flash bang grenades, the low flying helicopters, to basically clear a path for the president to stroll through Lafayette Park next to the White House and have a photo op in front of an historic church. So people were aghast, they were appalled. I think that for the Defense Department leadership, behind the scenes, the good news is that both Secretary Esper and General Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, were advising Trump against invoking the Insurrection Act, that saying you don't need to do that, the National Guard is adequate, law enforcement is adequate. But as you said, they did make some mistakes talking about dominating the battle spaces if we were in a combat zone overseas in Iraq or Afghanistan. General Milley being caught, you know, in his battle fatigues walking behind the president, you know, in the wake of this use of, inappropriate use of force. But I do think that moment was so horrifying to so many people that several things happened. One is you had a lot of senior military officers who'd held their tongues out of respect for the office of the president, finally step up and speak out. Chairman Mullen, Admiral Mullen, General Mattis, General Dempsey, others. And they were uniform, that, you know, we should not use the military in a way that would violate constitutional rights of Americans, that would politicize the institution, it would break trust in the institution and so forth. And then in the days following, you saw a real pulling back of troops being redeployed home, National Guard troops no longer having any arms, you know, people being pulled back. So we kind of came up to the brink of a really terrifying moment. And it was so terrifying and so many people spoke up. I was part of a letter of 89 former senior defense officials, Kurt too, that said this is wrong and we must not do this. And then we seem to have stepped back from the brink in recent days. All right, Kurt, let me ask you about the last crisis that America has dealt with. You referred to it COVID, because as you say, that's the backdrop against which some of these events in the past fortnight have taken place. How what should we make of America's response to COVID? You have 110,000 dead. We are used to seeing your country as the epicenter of global power, not as the epicenter of global disease. Now, we can point to President Trump's missteps, but it does seem that that perhaps COVID has functioned as a stress test for America and has shown up some other weaknesses in your society. Is that is that fair? How can America take some positives out of the experience in COVID to become a stronger country? Thanks, Michael. It's a good question. I would just simply say a leading nation in a time like this, the leading nation would be expected to do three things and three things relatively effectively. First is to deal with the domestic challenge that COVID provided with a degree of capacity, capability and organization. And you'd want that effort to demonstrate the seriousness of the cause, organize a unified front across the board, combining medical, other national capacities to deal with it. Second, you would want the United States to be able to provide goods, goods and capabilities, PPE to allies and friends globally that are struggling and not just in Asia and Europe, but through the developing world. And third, you would expect the United States to try to take a leadership role to convene international organizations and groups, the G7, the G20, the WHA, to basically make sure that the global community was working together. And there is such a thing as the global community that is working together to address the worst manifestations of the crisis. And I think what's troubling for many of us is that the United States has fallen badly down on all three counts. We've clearly made a hash of it domestically. We've been unable to provide global goods. In fact, if anything, we're out trying to outbid other countries to provide capacity that we bring back home. And we've basically shunned international groupings and organizations. Now, it's clear that China has made a lot of errors and a lot of mistakes, but they've played more of a role recently to try to provide global goods and support in a way that the United States previously had. And I'm not saying China is surging to take over the U.S. role, but basically we have largely been absent on duty from our traditional role. And you see it most clearly at places like meetings at the WHA and efforts in the G7. I would say, look, this crisis would be dramatic for any leadership. And you're seeing it play out in Germany and Great Britain and across Europe. It's posed an enormous challenge to a number of countries. And you've seen some winners. New Zealand, Australia's I think had some success. Japan at times, South Korea, Taiwan. It reveals that countries that have not made profound and deep commitments to social welfare, to public health systems who have not thought about creating capacities for a crisis who don't respect science or medical doctors. I mean, you get what you get. And I am troubled. I think this would have been difficult for anyone, but I am certain that President Trump and his team have made it worse. And we're still not through this. And if you look at our only real guide, Michael, is the flu epidemic of 1917-1918. If you go out in the United States today in Washington in most places, it would feel except for the masks that we've returned to business as usual. But in fact, the virus is spreading in many parts of the United States. And I think people expect that there will be a substantial second wave in the fall or early winter if there is not a vaccine that has been applied to the greater population. So generally speaking, we're in the midst of this. So we're in the midst of an economic crisis, a crisis of racial issues inside the United States. And the coronavirus, we're midstream. We're in the, like, we use baseball analogies. We're like in the second or third inning. We've got lots to play here, and we are behind. And I think, frankly, not taking it nearly seriously as we should. All right, speaking of the fall, let me move on to the election in November because the United States has an opportunity. We've spoken a bit about President Trump's leadership. The United States has an opportunity as a democracy to course correct in November. Both of you have endorsed Vice President Joe Biden for President of the United States. Perhaps I can start with you, Michelle. How would President, what would it mean for U.S. foreign policy if Vice President Biden is elected President? How would his foreign policy differ from President Trump's? And secondly, what would it mean for America and the world if President Trump is re-elected? If Americans look at the last four years and effectively say more, please. Well, I do think that if Vice President Biden is elected, you will see a more recognizable America. You know, this is someone who's spent his career in foreign policy. He understands the importance of U.S. engagement in the world. He understands the strategic value and advantage of our deep network of alliances around the world. And he understands that had the importance of the U.S. being a model to emulate the sort of the power of our soft power to be an example, and he's talked about this a lot. So, you know, I'm not saying you would, I don't think you'd see a turning back of the clock because the world has changed. We're in a much more multipolar world, a much more competitive world, the world of these, you know, simultaneous crises, a world of technology disruption, a world of advancing climate change. So it's not turning back the clock, but I do think you would see someone who would try to restore a modicum of U.S. leadership starting by reinvesting in and reinvigorating and adapting our alliances and our partnerships around the world. You know, I personally think it's hard for me to let myself imagine what it will mean if Trump is reelected because four years of this has done some real damage and it's going to take many, many more years than that to recover from it, and some of it will never fully recover from. If you were to extend that to eight years of the kind of treatment of our allies, the cozying up to authoritarian regimes, the lack of leadership here at home to heal the kind of societal divisions that need to be healed to invest in the drivers of American competitiveness for the future, to really have a strategic approach to our foreign policy. You know, if that becomes eight years, then I think we lose our position. We lose our economic much as a good portion of our economic competitiveness and many other things. It's hard for me to imagine the extent of the damage if this became a two-term administration. I also have the question of who would actually populate it. I mean, in the sense that there's so many open seats now. There's so many people, jobs that are unfilled and I'm not sure where the bench is for four more years of this. Let me give you an opportunity to answer the same questions. What would it, what are the stakes in this election? What would it mean if President Trump is reelected and then, I guess, to finish on a positive, if Vice President Biden is elected, what are the possibilities for an American snapback? Yeah, thanks, Michael. Let me just begin by saying I really admire and agree with what Michelle has said and I agree with it wholeheartedly. My sense is that many people globally believe that in some respects the election of President Trump was a kind of accident that, you know, we didn't have a strong competing candidate that the elite had not listened carefully, that there was a sense of outrage in parts of the country and that this was a reaction to, you know, a ways of doing business over decades. I don't actually agree with that storyline, but it is one that is broadly accepted in many parts of the United States and the world. I think if he is reelected, I think then it goes from, well, this was some sort of historic accident, Americans have learned from it, to a view that both President Trump and importantly the Republican Party has accepted so many things that we would have thought impossible, you know, authoritarian impulses, just, you know, when Michelle was talking about the military, think about, you know, there are the power ministries in our country, the FBI, the Justice Department and the military. The first two of those are showing real signs of weakness under enormous pressure from the President and some of the people under him and I will say this idea that you cannot find people, I disagree with that, you always can find people who are prepared to serve, you know, when power comes with the opportunity. It's just the character of those people you really start to have questions and concerns about. And so I'm like Michelle, I think what it will say about the United States and about the world is enormous and concerning. Like, look at all the things that we've been talking about, what has gotten barely a mention, Michael, in the last week, President Trump has announced we're gonna pull out a third of our troops from Germany, right? And there's lots of strategic discussion about why, but we know why. It's because Merkel decided not to come to the G7 for health reasons in the United States and that bothered the President. And so this is really the kind of decision that he might take. I could easily see him taking decisions in Asia that are deeply concerning, bizarre overtures to North Korea, pulling our troops out of South Korea, a very different set of interactions with a number of countries that could verge on creating a conflict. I worry about all of those things. I think what President Biden, what Vice President Biden holds open as a possibility is although the world has changed very much, I agree that it will be more recognizable. There will be restorative elements associated with this, but at the same time, we cannot, we can't, Michelle and I cannot underscore enough how difficult the circumstances will be. The national coffers will be emptied. We will be largely exhausted from both Trump and the coronavirus. We will be digging out of unemployment difficulties for years. But at the same time, I will say this, Michael, the one recurring theme over decades of commentary in Asia has been the belief about American decline during the Korean War, Vietnam War. At the end of the Cold War, the sense that Japan had won the Asian financial crisis more recently in the global economic crisis, each time when the United States was counted out, we came surging back because of our residual capacities, our capabilities, our ability to reinvent ourselves. And so I do believe the United States has those capacities. I will say what has to be part of the equation going forward is a degree of American humility. Vice President Biden is elected president. I would expect he and his colleagues, people around him to listen and to be deeply humble about what's just gone on and to work clearly and constructively, particularly with our allies. I can imagine a situation where that the number one agenda of the United States is to work closely with our allies and as part of that effort to again elevate our virtues of our beliefs, our support for democracy and human rights, all of those issues have been largely overlooked or forgotten in recent years. I think the Vice President feels those deeply and I believe those will be part of any approach if Vice President Biden is elected in November. All right, thank you. Let me stay with you, Kurt, for the next question too and ask you about U.S.-China relations and how you think they would change under a Vice President Biden. I mean, my sense is that for the first couple of years, first two or three years, President Trump wasn't tough on China per se. He was tough on trade and he was tough on China trade. Now he is zeroing in on China as he gets desperate about reelection and perhaps he feels it has some domestic leverage. We've seen him criticize Vice President Biden for being soft on China and we've seen Vice President Biden return fire and put out an ad saying, actually you're the poodle, actually you're the one who's soft on China. What does all this add up to? What would a U.S. strategy towards China look like under Vice President Biden? How would it be different from Obama's strategy on China? How would it be different from Trump's? So look, I think we have to acknowledge that the world has changed. We have a different leadership in Beijing, a leadership that's more assertive, that's more risk-acceptant, that is more aggressive in a number of circumstances with friends, with allies on issues of deep national purpose and concern of the United States. And so I believe Vice President Biden has no illusions about China, understands the nature of the challenge that they pose and I believe that the watchword for relations between Beijing and Washington will be competition. We're going to compete and the hope will be that that competition will be peaceful. We're going to try to align a number of countries to make clear what we expect from Beijing in terms of international performance and standards across the board on trade, on human rights. I believe a natural arena for closer coordination with Europe, with Australia, with Japan, with India, Vietnam and other countries really is to coordinate more effectively on China. At the same time that I think relations will be difficult and challenging, I believe Vice President Biden and his team understand that there are some issues that require a degree of alignment, if not cooperation between the United States and China. The expectation has always been that for instance during the Cold War when the United States and the Soviet Union had to work on smallpox together, they did. The hope would be that as we face the tail end of this coronavirus challenge that the United States and China would find arenas where we'd be able to work together, I think that's necessary and it's in our national interest. I believe that to prevent the further proliferation of nuclear materials and weapons, a degree of cooperation is necessary. A certain degree of macroeconomic coordination or alignment is useful for both nations and in the interest of the United States. And again, as has been mentioned, if we cannot work or at least again align with Beijing and with India and other leading powers on climate change, it will be difficult to deal with this most difficult 21st century problem. And so I just don't think it's viable to think about moving into a situation in which you're an all out confrontation with China. It's not in our interests. Although I will say it is not completely up to us. We have to be clear. We've got to give the Chinese an opportunity to work with us, but we have to be vigilant about the things that we believe in and that we want to defend. I do believe if we're able to align our allies and work closely, we can present a kind of ultimatum to China about what we expect in terms of their performance and their activity on the global stage. Michelle, let me give you an opportunity to chime in on China. China is, as you know, is a matter of abiding interest here in Australia. So we'd be interested to hear about your view on Biden's policy towards China, but also on climate change if you wouldn't mind. President Trump took your country out of the Paris Accord. Vice President Biden has said that he would rejoin Paris on day one. What else would a Biden administration do to return the United States to a position of climate leadership? Well, first on China, I think, you know, you've heard Vice President Biden has talked a lot about step number one is reinvesting in the drivers of our own competitiveness here at home, whether that's science and technology, research and development, 21st century infrastructure, access to higher education, a smart immigration policy that actually attracts the best and brightest from around the world and then tries to keep them here to grow their businesses here. So there's, I mean, and that actually coincides very nicely with some of the economic recovery agenda that we need to go after in this, in the wake of this crisis as well. So I think the first part is, you know, investing here at home to regain our resilience and our strength. I also think that there's, there would be a fair amount of focus on refining the importance of deterrence. The whole point of this is, you know, on the military and security dimension is to prevent conflict, prevent any kind of miscalculation that would get to nuclear powers into conflict. And I think there are some very specific steps that could be taken to sharpen our edge, to clarify our interests and communicate both our resolve and our capabilities more clearly to Beijing. But I believe that all of this would be done in the context of a strategy and a strategic dialogue. And one of the challenges with the Trump administration is they may have diagnosed some of the problems with China on China trade correctly, but they've really only consistently looked to use two instruments, tariffs and threats. And, you know, coercive instruments. As Kurt said, this is going to be a much more complex and comprehensive agenda where we're going to be pushing back where we need to, but also engaging China to try to communicate where our interests and values lie, where we have differences that they need to be mindful of, where we have areas where we need to work together. So on climate change, I do think, I do hope that we would immediately come back into the Paris Accord. But that's not going to be enough because time has been ticking, the clock is ticking. And we're going to need to adopt a more rigorous set of goals. I do believe that a Biden administration would use federal incentives to try to stimulate more sustainable sources of energy, adoption of electrification in terms of transportation, a whole set of practices that would accelerate the movement of the U.S. economy down the road towards a lower carbon footprint. One of the things that I've found heartening is you see a lot of corporations that are making their own commitments to go to zero or negative carbon footprint. That's happening anyway. Governors are still leading, big city mayors are still leading, CEOs are still leading. So all that energy is there to be brought together under a new administration. And lastly, I just note, I think the Pentagon is a huge demonstration platform. The military as the military understands this threat. They understand what climate change will mean for them. For goodness' sake, if you look at most of our coastal bases, they will be under water at some point. So there's a lot of interest in the Pentagon if they were allowed to lean forward on this issue. So I think you'd see a very active agenda in this area. All right. I'm going to go to questions from the audience here. We've got very enthusiastic audience members for this particular event. I'm going to try to get through as many questions as I can. And I'll read the questions out to Kurt and Michelle as I see them. I'm going to start with really for either of you. This is a question from Steve Rowan Jones, who's the director of O2C. Steve says, we hear and see a lot of the negatives of the Trump administration. What are three positive outcomes generated by Trump? I'll jump in. Michelle probably has her list as well. But I'll give you a few things. It is generally the case of almost every administration that comes in the power. They tend to look back and discard, at least initially certain elements of the previous administration. And that's something you have to be very careful about. So I would say. Number one, Michael, I admire that with some of our. Relationships between President Trump and his counterparts, he has forged deeply personal relationships that transcend just the, you know, exchange of diplomatic niceties. And so he's, he has found the time to golf and to have supper with Prime Minister Abe with a succession of Australian leaders. He takes personal diplomacy seriously. And it turns out that in today's day and age, that matters. And I admired and enjoyed very much working for President Obama. I was in a lot of meetings with him. He was, we have a saying, he was cooler than the other than the other side of the pillow. And occasionally a little aloof. And I could sense that some of the, his counterparts wanted more, wanted to have a little bit more of a relationship. And I think Vice President Biden is a deeply engaging person. And that is one of his strengths. So I'm hopeful that some of that, particularly in Asia will be replicated. That would be number one. Number two, I like the way Michelle put it. I don't agree with the way that President Trump has gone about it, but he has tried to link. Domestic politics and the domestic pursuits. Of Americans with our international purpose more directly. And I think he's argued that in some ways international relations or international diplomacy is somehow. Disconnected from how Americans live and. Are various walks of life. And I think that's something is a reminder to all of us. You can have a foreign policy that in some ways doesn't address the needs of the American middle class and. American. People by and large. And I think he has at least. In his crude way attempted to address that issue. And the third thing is that in some instances he has been audacious. He decided that he was going to. Sit down with Kim Jong-un and try to see what's possible going forward. Now the truth is I think an American Democratic leader would have tried that before. Except for what would have been a cascading howls of disapproval. From the Republican Party and of course under President Trump. You're not going to hear anything. But I do think that there are some things that he has asked the question. I think that he's challenged some of those beliefs. I think it's healthy. So you could take that back. Those are three things. That I think we should watch and consider carefully. Thank you, Michael. All right, Michelle. Do you want to add something on that question? I'm not sure I can get to all the way to three, but let me add a couple. Yeah. One is you recall after the financial crisis, the Congress imposed something called the budget control act, which severely reduced and constrained military spending. As a result of that, we really need to make sure that we have the budget control act. We need to make sure that we have the budget control act. We need to make sure that we have the budget control act. We need to make sure that we have the budget control act. And as a result of that, we really had a self-imposed or self-created readiness crisis across the services. And I do think that the Trump administration's increase of defense spending, although I don't think in general, it's been as wisely applied as it might have been. It had, they have presided with the Congress and the end of sequestration over a recovery of readiness that needed to occur. And I think we're, I think that that's the way they're going to be. And I think that the Congress will give them partial credit for, you know, having that happen on their watch. And then the second thing is, is. I do think there are a number of areas as much as. Trump has been challenging for some of our close allies in Europe. And in Asia. and cooperation have been allowed to proceed relatively untouched. So in Europe you still have a tremendous initiative called the deterrence and reassurance initiative that's really enhanced deterrence of Russia in the Baltic region and the frontline states in northern Europe. You know in Asia you see a much more routine use of freedom of navigation operations and a sort of effort to enforce the rules of the road with China alongside our allies like Australia and other. So I guess I'm trying to give them credit for not disturbing some of the things that have been working below the level of attention that the White House has you know typically below what they've focused on. They haven't heard of those things. That's the positions rule first June on arm. The next question I think is for probably best directed to Kurt and it's from Gordon Flake from the US Asia Center in Perth. Kurt says can you discuss the implications for Australia of the very difficult and very public debate over cost sharing between the US and its treaty ally the Republic of Korea? Yeah thank you. I think this got I raised it a little bit and it's great to hear from my friend in Perth. I you know what the president has done is put down a marker of just dramatic increases of hostation support in both South Korea and Japan and I will tell you that one of the most difficult things a country can do is to host or send its forces to be deployed on the soil of another democratic nation. It's incredibly difficult very complex politics and I think it has created a near crisis in relations with both Seoul and it's not as apparent but also in Tokyo as well. Now what's not clear is is the president trying to really up that price like to get more money to see us as you know being paid for by these other countries or is his ultimate intent to pull American forces out of Asia? I think there's some element of the latter. I think we now know from a variety of biographies that who you know written about this period that he on several occasions has tried to pull forces out of South Korea. Secretary Mattis blocked it at one point others have you know misplaced paperwork and or just not followed through but it's most concerning and what is most concerning about this remember what President Trump does does not happen in a vacuum. What is remarkable is how he has completely captured the heart and spirit of the Republican Party. You would think that there would be some Republicans that would raise concerns or questions about pulling U.S. forces out of Germany. I worry again to the question that was posed earlier if President Trump is reelected and he decides to pull forces out will there be any countergroup to say no that that will hurt American purpose it will it will deter you know for the kinds of allied responses we'd like to see. So I would say what we're seeing playing out between the United States and South Korea is a deep profound concern and I think most countries in Asia are trying to defer in delay a variety of deliberations until after November with the hope that there will be a more predictable set of circumstances subsequently. All right I think the next question I'll put to Michelle and it's from Douglas Powell who I'm sure is the Doug Powell we know from the Carnegie Endowment and Douglas asks this he says flirtation with the insurrection act reminds that there might be a troubled set of circumstances around our November election should the House and especially the Senate the Senate summon America's military leaders to receive assurances in advance that they will protect the constitutional election processes. Michelle. You know I I do worry given all the times that the president has talked about the potential for fraud rigged elections the fact that he's been asked point blank on national television whether if he loses the election will he give up the office I you know I don't think it's likely that he will this scenario will play out but it's not it's for the first time in our history I think not impossible to imagine a situation where Trump would contest the results it would create a real crisis that would call into question you know if he doesn't what happens if he refuses to leave my own view is you don't have to ask the US military what they would do because they're going what they will do is recite you know chapter and verse of the constitution and they will follow the ruling of the Supreme Court I mean this will be if this happens it'll be some combination of the chaos of the Iowa caucuses that we had during the primaries and the chaos of the Gore Bush elections and in that case the the the issues will be brought Supreme Court the Supreme Court will have to rule I think the real question is what federal law enforcement agency would enforce that long before you ever get to a question of the military what law enforcement agency would actually be and enforce that if you had to get there but I think you know I had a I had an interesting conversation the last week after the use of force on Lafayette Square with a young you know relatively young battalion commander who said you know the military as an institution is apolitical and we take that very very seriously it's part of the reason why you haven't seen more office active duty officers speak up and even retired officers speak up there may be a lot of cultural republicans or more conservative folks in the military but when it comes to questions of the the core survival of our democracy and questions core to the implementation of our constitutional there is no question they are trained and schooled again and again doing you will not execute an order that you believe to be legal and if you believe it's immoral you have the right to resign and refuse so this is inculcated and it is very universal very strongly held so perhaps someone would like to invite them to confirm that in a hearing I don't think it's even necessary I think it's very very clear where the officer core would stand all right Kurt the next question is for you and it's from James Curran who's a history professor well-known history professor at the University of Sydney and he's challenging some comments you made earlier in the discussion and he says this Kurt isn't that a contradiction you've just said that the US is exhausted and staring down into empty coffers but if that's okay in if that's the case does it have the capacity does it have the will can it afford it how will it galvanize the public to do so is the American public up for the challenge especially for the challenge of a long twilight struggle with China so I guess the question is given the constraints you've mentioned will that not constrain the United States in in bouncing back this time yeah look I I think many of the issues that are constraining us right now many of the issues that are bedeviling us can be effectively addressed with the kinds of national policies that we discussed earlier in the discussion that Michelle laid out I I also believe that if you look at a number of times again just in the last few decades most of Asia believed at the end of the Vietnam War that the United States was utterly defeated divided domestically exhausted unable to compete and we saw some of the strongest performance in American history in the 1980s and 1990s my deepest belief is that the United States does have the ability to reinvent itself to surge forward I still think that the coronavirus tragedy could have a silver lining in the sense that some of the most inventive parts of American society are devoted to biomedicine and to innovative medical capabilities and I do believe we have what it takes to provide the kind of cures and vaccines that can make a difference on the global stage and I also believe that the United States has much to be able to share with respect to trying to convene a coalition of countries that will deal with and in many circumstances confront China I I think the challenge here is that if Vice President Biden is reelected is elected I do not believe that there will be cheering in on the global stage that somehow America is back in fact I think that the early stages of the diplomacy will be very difficult but if the United States is persistent is patient invests in the kinds of things that Michelle and we've discussed throughout this discussion in a very short period of time the United States can rebound as we have on numerous occasions in our past the tendency has always been to overestimate our contenders and under underestimate the reservoirs of American capacity ingenuity and our ability to research all right the next question I'll start I might put it to you in the first instance anyway Michelle it's from Lucy Ryan who's an assistant director at the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and she asks what is the outlook for the US-China trade deal and what will the United States do next on Hong Kong good questions um you know I I do think that despite the difficulty both sides have had implementing even phase one of the trade deal that right before an election I don't think Trump really wants to see it fail so I think there will be some efforts continue to be made on both sides to salvage some elements of that and and move it forward although obviously I think that it's harder for China to meet its commitments and you know it won't be fully implemented I think the phase two deal is completely off the table one of the things that this crisis has done and particularly Trump's handling of the crisis and blaming of China it has really accelerated the alienation um and the and the the decline of the relationship so I don't have a lot of hope for any uh you know more structurally focused or fundamental trade deal uh following following this one um in terms of Hong Kong you know you've seen Secretary Pompeo basically say he can't you know the president can't certify um that uh the the autonomous situation in in Hong Kong at this point but what the administration has yet to do is to really then explain what that that means and they could take this in a lot of different directions um some of which would be primarily symbolic and others that could have very deep but I know economic consequences and ultimately um uh you know very punishing consequences for both China but particularly the people of Hong Kong um so I you know I'm not an expert on these issues but I think that um we need to try to navigate this in a way that supports our democratic values and our desire to see the freedoms of the Hong Kong people protected but doesn't make them the worst victim of whatever you know sanctions or or constraints are imposed. All right um Kurt the next question is for you and uh this is a question from James Crabtree at the Lee Korn U School in Singapore and James was formally with the Financial Times and he's quoting an article of yours so that's a nice compliment to you James says this in his foreign affairs essay last year Kurt wrote although much of the discussion on US-China competition focuses on its bilateral dimension the US will ultimately need to embed its China strategy in a dense network of relationships and institutions in Asia. What should President Biden's early priorities be in this regard? Yeah thank you it's a good question so so look the truth is we have always treated China policy as a kind of almost romantic mystical bilateral secret diplomacy sitting in big chairs and deciding issues in sort of a bipolar cohort that that period is over and real effective China policy is now a more effective Asia policy and so what's required is not only robust bilateral diplomacy of the kind that Michelle has outlined but also working much more closely with allies and so I can I can imagine a number of steps that we could take I think convening a group of like-minded states carefully to talk about common pursuits and common purpose you could imagine the Quad, India, Australia, Japan and the United States but other countries are also expressing a desire for this kind of dialogue about shared purpose I can imagine certain discussions taking place with Singapore with Vietnam other countries that desire a a fuller landscape of engagement more generally some of this will be informal Michael some of it will be perhaps formalized in other settings I'd like to see the G-22 have a more robust agenda I think in the past a number of states have worked to undermine common purpose and a number of institutions I'd like most of those institutions to reflect Asian realities I think if you look at some of our legacy institutions Europe is overrepresented we need to recognize that there have to be institutions in which Asia plays a dominant role I'd like to see the United States play a robust role in the ASEAN regional forum in the East Asia summit these are all challenging things that requires people getting on planes and flying for long distances but this is what's going to be at stake here is a deep fundamental American commitment and so what we are likely to see Michael if we're going to take this seriously Asia has always been a secondary theater for the United States it was a secondary theater during the Second World War during Vietnam we were primarily focused on the primary theater in Europe with the Soviet Union for the first time really in our history both for economic issues for security issues across the board for climate the central convening regional and strategic orientation is going to be in Asia and that's going to mean building more capacity spending more time focusing intently and intensely on not just the bilateral diplomacy with China as we describe but also with these surrounding countries most of whom and again this is perhaps another area that we can compliment President Trump most of these countries Australia India Japan even South Korea are now more prepared to speak out and to step up and to engage in a collaborative process to talk about how we want to work constructively with China than in the past and the United States can and should take advantage of that all right I'm going to ask the final two questions and I'll start with you Michelle let me pick up exactly where Kurt finished as you may have seen in the press the Australia the Australian relationship with China has really hardened and cooled in recent months it's happened over probably over the course of a number of years but especially in the last couple of months in response to Australia's call for an independent investigation into the coronavirus pandemic the Chinese were very angry with us and they have imposed some tariffs for example on our barley exports and there's been various talk of coercion and consumer boycotts what what advice would you give the Australian government Michelle on dealing with a country like China well again I think Kurt's formulas is key is that if we each try to deal with China bilaterally we will be much weaker in our dealings than if we approach China as states that share common interests and common values and so I think building out a coalition of free market democracies of like-minded states who can approach China together when we have common concerns I think that's the stronger way to go but I think you know China is always testing the limits and when we've succeeded in sort of making them take a step back from a more assertive or aggressive posture it has been when we've approached them with some unified coalition of states that say no this is this is not on of course we are going to have a clear-eyed fact-based analysis of this pandemic and how it started we're going to do it in the united states or we should we should do it with regard to China's role everybody's well we need to learn lessons from this so that when it happens again we're going to be better prepared to limit the consequences so that that's where I would start but I think we shouldn't ask countries to choose between the US and China we need to really fortify this coalition that Kurt started to describe of like-minded states to find out where is it in our interests to work together to engage China and also to push back when necessary all right Kurt final question to you what would a Biden administration mean for Australia now the Australian public as you know doesn't much like Donald Trump but Australian governments have done a reasonable job of getting on with him and as you alluded to Scott Morrison has developed a good relationship with President Trump what would you what would you how would you assess the way the Australian government has uh has dealt with the Trump administration and if president vice president Biden were elected how would what would be your advice about remaining relevant and remaining central to to his councils thanks Michael so look the one of the in my view very positive elements of this period which is filled with up he and difficulty and what makes this period different than the Cold War is that the maneuver room and influence of middle powers is greater than it's ever been so countries like Australia Great Britain Germany India Japan have an enormous influence convening influence maneuver room defining purpose in the global community and that that should not be underestimated and so Australia's role globally has never been more important and frankly more recognized so that's the first point I'd make the second is the most important thing about the U.S. Australian relationship is how bipartisan it has been the one thing that will cause made ship between Democrats and Republicans and you've seen it in succession successive engagement between Americans and Australians is their deep love and respect for Australia and so there's very little that divides Democrats and Republicans when it comes to an agenda for Australia so I think in that respect Australians can be comforted and can be relieved that that Biden administration will be a strong supporter of Australia but the last thing I think that that you will see I mean I don't know how we got in a situation where we have a chief executive who who who absolutely will under no circumstances apologize or take anything back and continues to take positions on a number of issues that are just antithetical to reality to good sense to you know just across the board and I think America will be more recognizable I think it will be more multicultural I think you're likely to engage diplomats and others that will look more like America and you will find a number of issues that frankly um both the United States and Australia share in terms of what we want for our children and the and the way ahead so I'm deeply optimistic about us Australian relations I also think that both of us have come to some of the same res uh uh realizations about the challenges that China pose and I think both of us realize that having a strong workable relationship with China is in our best interests but the only way to get that as Michelle indicated is to get it together and not just roll over and allow us to be divided so I think the agenda is there for us I think strands will be pleased if Vice President Biden is elected and I can assure you that the people around him have deep experience knowledge uh and commitment to this relationship that has served us so well for decades thank you Kurt for ending on an optimistic note I don't know if the audience could hear but it seems like there's a thunderstorm in uh Washington it's just rolled through uh helicopters overhead helicopter now I'm I'm I'm interpreting this thunderstorms and we know that after the thunderstorms there are clear skies so uh thank you for ending on a note of optimism and I want to thank very warmly Michelle Flournoy and Kurt Campbell two terrific friends of the Institute and of Australia for being here this evening thank you very much uh let me also thank everybody in the audience for joining us for this latest Lowey Institute live event for the time being we're live streaming all of our events so please keep an eye on our website for future events also keep an eye out for our podcasts COVID cast and my own podcast the director's chair which is available on SoundCloud Spotify and Apple podcasts today we released the new episode of the director's chair in which I speak with legendary Australian official no doubt friend of Kurt's and Michelle's Dennis Richardson who has lots of interesting yarns of including about the time that Bob Hawke um insisted on uh on um testing who was taller between Dennis Richardson and Bob Hawke so if you want a light touch then please tune into that again thank you ladies and gentlemen and in particular thank you very much Kurt Campbell and Michelle Flournoy thank you and good evening good morning all the best down under thank you very much all right