 Well good afternoon everybody welcome we're delighted to have you here this is I've been looking forward to this for a very long time Dr. Kissinger this is his only book event in Washington to discuss his newest book World Order and it is something I must say I finished it at 2 o'clock in the morning Henry so I will be a little foggy but I hope I can bring out some of the deep rich texture of this book and I'm only going to get it started for all of us and then we're going to collectively engage in a conversation with Dr. Kissinger on this on this remarkable piece he asked me he said I don't have to give a speech do I and I said no but we are all going to help him bring out the texture of this book so let me just begin Henry with a very simple question why did you write it and who did you write it for before I do that can I make a comment about the question with which you began yes sir which is can you hear me by definition those who can't hear you can't answer it well that's true why did I write this book I can answer that precisely I was having dinner with a friend and at that time I was thinking of writing a book about like the church you've put on great contemporaries about significant individuals and their impact and why and then my counterpart suggested why not write what don't write a book about the past write a book about the most important current problem that you see and so we discussed that issue and we came to the conclusion that the collapse of world order the in a way absence of world order was one of the dumb was steep maybe the dominant problem of our period and so I started writing a book about it took about nearly three years so this was not a book that was geared to the contemporary situation this was a book that evolved in a situation in which the problem was apparent but its manifestations had fully occurred here just so this is a teaser I hope everybody's bought one by now but just as a teaser Dr. Kissinger goes through a very interesting exposition of the Westphalian system characterizing it as only one of the of the ordered structures by which you could create a world order looked at how the Islamic world looks at the at state craft the role of diplomacy the role of states looks at the Chinese point of view which is a beautiful little condensation of his book on China looks at the India looks at Iran a few other countries and then says what's going to be the ordering principle for the international system going forward before I turn to ask you about the punchline but I'd like to just dig in on a few things there's one one piece here which I thought was fascinating he was talking about the Westphalian system he said diplomats at Vienna were weeks away from their capitals it took four days for a message from Vienna to reach Berlin three weeks for a message to read Paris London took a bit longer instructions therefore had to be drafted in language general enough to cover changes in situations so the diplomats were instructed primarily on general concepts and long-term interests with respect to day-to-day tactics and they were largely on their own we live in quite a different world we live in a world of instant communications is it possible to create an international system that doesn't have detachment for diplomats let me make one observation about your previous point the basic argument I make with respect to the Westphalian system is it's twofold that in the past order in the world was imperial in nature it was primarily and I would from my limited knowledge exclusively in the West the notion of order based on a balance of sovereign states evolved and that in China in the Islamic world it was conceived as a unified system and not as a system that was divided up because this is in China after the period of the warring state so that that was my it's my basic argument now the Westphalian system spread across the world as a result of colonialism largely the result of colonialism so many new countries adopted some of the language of the Westphalian system without internalizing it and one of the problems of our period is that what we consider order and international law is really a Western invention that is accepted only in part and sometimes not at all in in other parts of Europe now to get to your point on diplomacy those of us who have practiced diplomacy in the current world know that it is quite feasible and quite frequently done that ambassadors are instructed verbatim as to what they should say at important meetings and that in any event even if they're not instructed in so much detail they're instructed with great precision if it's an important subject and not necessarily and I would say very rarely given a conceptual background of what the overall strategy of the leadership is in the period about with in the period in the 18th 19th century when distances were so great the instructions had to be conceptual and if you wanted to change the policy of your government there was no point arguing about a specific instruction but you had to make a conceptual argument of why the government would change the major directions of its policy so as a result inevitably in the modern system the diplomatic the internal diplomatic dialogue is very pragmatic and very short to him while in that period when say Castle Ray communicated with London he had to explain his philosophy and it was true of the others that was not true of Medinick who was in his capital but even depressions were more than a week away so it's a general proposition and about a later period that I wrote not in this book in a great detail when Bismarck Bismarck started his diplomatic career as ambassador of pressure to the German Confederation and he violently disagreed with the traditional thinking of present foreign policy which was close cooperation with Austria and based on and then European legitimacy he challenged all of this on the basis of national interest and he wrote long hundred I mean he collected there was many volumes of dispatches in which he explained the theory on which he thought foreign policy should be conducted you wouldn't this wouldn't be possible today I wouldn't know outside of Kennan but he was really distance away and both conceptually it's very rare that diplomatic even internal diplomatic exchanges reached that level Henry when you when you discuss the Westphalian system you talk about the radical shock that the French Revolution had on it that all of a sudden it introduced rather universalistic popular sentiments that made it harder to do diplomacy do you want to just recount that for for the audience here today I have a follow-up question Sean has read the book more recently than I have if you need any help let me know the of course the Westphalian peace emerged at the end of the 30 years which had fun at two pages one was a religious basis and the other one was the attempt by France to bend the religious war into a geopolitical enterprise and in that they fundamentally succeeded because they it produced an outcome which kept central Europe divided France strong France a Catholic country whose ruler had the title of the most Catholic majesty France allied with Protestant Sweden in a war against Catholic Austria so that the war then ended however with a decision that the religious conviction of of populations should be left to the decision of their rulers and that therefore they had no right no outside country had a right to intervene in that decision so that wars in that concept were fought for two political reasons and for the for the balance of power and so I said if the two major elements of the Westphalian system were non-intervention and a balance of power non-intervention domestic affairs and an equilibrium of powers this however presupposes that no country uses its domestic institutions to subvert the domestic institutions of another country because if you make the prevalence of your domestic institutions the key to international peace then you are also obliged to undertake a crusade to achieve it and the French Revolution with many good many aspects but they were an example of this tendency of making conversion the element of foreign policy was a declaration signed by the National Assembly which any country could fill in saying that France would support the revolutionary elements of the Republican elements in in any of the society and putting French power at the disposal so then this meant a breakdown of the basic concepts of the Westphalian system another aspect of the Westphalian system was what was new at that time it was the emergence of the concept of the state as a legal entity that in that government no longer was the expression of royal power but royal power symbolized the existence of a state which conducted essentially to your political policy and the founder of this was Cardinal Richelieu Cardinal who was who was whatever his title was he was in charge of foreign policy of France but he said the individualist model he will be fulfilled in the year after but the state will be judged by its current by its current actions so that therefore there were no universal principles above the geopolitical necessities of the state and this is what gradually became the dominant principle after the Treaty of Westphalia of European diplomacy and I think of many respect global diplomacy but it means that if the convictions of a group of a governing group go beyond the borders of the state then either the state breaks down which is what we're seeing in the Middle East or the state holding such views will be engaged in a de facto crusade you you you talk about how the French Revolution and then the Bolshevik Revolution up ended the Westphalian system in the sense that it brought popular energy connected with rather universalistic objectives and in a sense that seems to be a problem we have in the United States with a sustained foreign policy partly running through your narrative is a critique of America's missionary impulse well the American missionary impulse as long as we were separated from the rest of the world had a profound historic foundation that this was a country that was populated by people who had turned their back on the societies in which they lived and they were convinced and rightly so that in the new country they would find and possibility to express views that had been prescribed at home and and so the idea of America as an example to the world what sort of a natural expression of not the 19th century experience because we fundamentally as nothing of the rest of the world except not to intervene in our affairs it became a challenge to American foreign policy when we attempted to imply apply these these principles not just as values but as implementing principles of a balance of power and of a geopolitical system and in that sense much of American foreign policy but some of American foreign policy can be described as an oscillation between periods of withdrawal or periods of maybe over commitment and where the I aware the pragmatic nature of America the American experience in which every problem that had been recognized as a problem had proved soluble in some manner when applied to diplomacy it means that for every problem we have a temptation to offer a solution and that that solution is conceived as being implementable in a limited period of time and this gives a on the one hand an impetus but also a universalism to American foreign policy which is not always reconcilable a with a slower pace of history or sometimes with the necessities of the situation you say you wrote it over a three-year period but you talk about basis in the book and in one sense I'm to pick up on this question you're about oscillations between engagement and withdrawal it seems to me we're kind of caught here at these two in a phase shift are we you know the the president clearly doesn't want to get involved and yet the international system seems to require that somebody lead to be involved to solve it do you have an insight actually I I have to confess the few sentences were stuck in in going through the proofs and it was probably a mistake because I had made the same point as a general forecast of what was going to happen with less precision because I consider eyes it's sort of an almost inevitable outcome of the of the evolution of an upheaval that has a whole set of different components it has an upheaval against constituted authority it's a upheaval caused by the split between the Shia and Sunni religions or sects or aspects of the Muslim religion going on for a thousand years and it's a revolution against an artificial state system that was imposed in the Middle East at the end of the 19 around 1920 and right after the Second World First World War and it was really a reflection of a line of demarcation between French and British imperial interests the there was no such thing as an Iraq before 1920 there was no such thing as a Syria in its present dimension so that the civil war that it's therefore very difficult to speak of a national feeling in the sense that we know it that we know it in the West and this set of upheavals has in in ISIS but Al Qaeda existed before that and what ISIS represents it's the combination of the terrorist trend with geographic control of territory but let me just I'm pressing I will probably ask an awkward question but given our system in America's role in is it possible for an international system to work when the leading country wants to lead from behind not awkward for me it's you know much of it of discussions in circles like I represent here seems to stated as a requirement that America must lead and that is then defined that America must come up with a solution that everybody must follow I I don't think that is so much the essential requirement essential requirement is that the United States properly understands the nature of of the evolution through which it is going that it then for its own thinking as I point out it needs to understand how it is affected and how it can influence these events and distinguish between matters that America must do alone if necessary matters which it should do only with allies and matters it shouldn't do it all and if it thinks clearly enough about these three issues then the United States by its weight and by its convictions will have a significant influence I thought the excursion or whatever you call it in the Libya was based on an inadequate analysis and if we are involved militarily we should learn one lesson one absolutely key lesson simply because I've lived through it me it means particularly much but I see others here like Dennis Gokrov to have also lived through it which is says since World War two we have fought five wars we brought only one of them to the conclusion that we stated as its objective at the beginning the other one would sort of a draw and three others we withdrew from in one form or another that cannot be a continued pattern of American foreign policy because it immoralizes the public and it makes it impossible then to have a unified policy so that is the overwhelming concern yes we should do what our best role is in bringing about objective within the framework that I have described but whether we have the abstract leadership idea is not one that I spent sleepless nights over use when you started off your response you said something which I think was very telling no I'm gonna let the audience no no I'm fine but just to you said if it thinks clearly but how does a democracy think clearly especially one that's so fractured with our domestic politics the way it is now I don't have an answer to this question because when democracy evolved it was an essentially middle-class societies and the debates were dominated the issues were relatively few and had an essentially philosophical basis there were big issues and the while the public had an opportunity to express itself in periodic intervals the leaders were not driven by the need to justify themselves day after day in the face of a constant exhibition of every pressure group that might have a bearing on the discussion so therefore in almost every country in that period you developed some leaders and over an extended period of time that had its conceptual quality if you look at Britain that in one century produced catarate parmesan disraeli cladston and so very and all of them men with with vision and not just a tactical people so if you but in in our present period when you would think of the presidential campaigns that are now starting the candidates by necessity have to be preoccupied with how they can present themselves in state after state and to present themselves in terms of the various pressure groups that can be originated so you can take it for granted that it is three four years before they become president they have not been able to think consistently about geopolitical problems that is no fault of theirs so then you get into office with some of the mindset that developed during the campaign and it becomes very hard to establish a queering second the composition of our Congress has changed in a in a fundamental way when when I was in office here I thought life was tough and I did not find relations with the Congress necessarily enjoyable so I don't want to give you the wrong impression but there were people who by the nature of the system had been in office for a very long period of time and to whom you could appeal on the basis of the national interest and he would not answer you with their local problems and who were not running for president either so they didn't have to so that established a certain floor under the nature of the of the debate and now with in in the house of representatives I don't know how many they're very few how many seats are contested less than 100 oh yes probably probably 30 yeah so so the candidates that are running not worried about the general issues they're worried about the extremes in their party that might challenge them in a primary so this is inherent and the I think the fundamental problem of democracy at the moment is how you can develop a general concept when the new cycle is 24 24 hours and when the fear of offending somebody become such a dominant element that less and less our democratic leaders I would say that's even more true in Europe than here prepared to ask sacrifices of their people but it's very hard to be a great country if you're not willing to give up some of the present for the future what one last question that I'm going to open up do we have microphones ready to move around I just want to make sure that we're ready for that but let me just ask one question Henry that you you toward the end of the book you you talk about the problem of reconciling global economics and global politics and in essence I mean this is my simple-minded characterization but global economics is horizontal and governments are vertical you know we we don't have this transcending capacity to deal with arch over arching problems what would you suggest we do but I smile because there are people in this room who work technically under me as economists and who expressed their view their view was once expressed by secretary Simon who said he thought my knowledge of economics was an argument against universal suffrage so but I understand the particular problem I'm talking about I was talking about in the book my basic argument is economics is the dominant economic theory is globalization which in effect the search that the divisions between states are superseded by the inherent dynamics of the economic system and that a expanding economic system and a productive economic system would not treat countries on the basis of their political conviction but on the necessities of the economic system and on the how the mechanism of that works on the other hand the states are operating on the basis of the economic system of political systems to which you alluded in your previous questions since crises are inseparable from the unequal development that will always take place to some extent in the economic world the solution of these crises will be done on a political basis and secondly we have seen in our time that the use of sanctions that is a deliberate interruption of the global system becomes a weapon of diplomacy to the extent that that occurs countries that might be threatened by similar measures have an in ever have a temptation and an incentive to immunize themselves against such danger so that on the one hand the actions of the political system have a tendency towards mechanization and the necessities of the economic system have a tendency towards globalization and that's one of the issues we have not resolved I did not write this book to pretend as I do in private conversation that I have a solution to every problem I wanted to say here is a set of problems which we don't deal with conceptually and practically and they may be the deepest problems we have that puts the basic purpose of the book sometimes I have I think I have a direction in which to go but that's not the key reason for writing this but I thought it may have suggested a slightly different direction for your book which is given that there is this compelling international economic imperative to find solutions that that might be a better starting point for a global order than a political system given that we're all the people I agree with that the problem is how do you apply it to the rights of nations to the decline of nations and to the eruption of upheavals and I think we should preserve the global economic system anyway you need to devote CSIS to the question question we'll think about that we're going to open up for some questions Rebecca I'm a first pick on Tom Pritzker's right down here in the front to get things started and look forward to people asking questions so you spoke to this a little bit could you just look at our system and the Chinese system the world's changed dramatically since the founding of both of those systems are there fundamental faulty major premises in either or both of the systems or what do you worry about that is sort of a faulty major premise that each system is going to have to navigate around I didn't quite get the question he was suggesting that both we and the Chinese have faulty underlying conditions which are affecting our capacity to do diplomacy with each other how should we think about I think that parsley I think that parsley true I the historic Chinese conception of the universe and until the fairly recent past was different from quite different from from the best failing system but the immediate problem in Sino-American relations it's the one that has often been discussed that when a successful country that appreciates the status quo it's facing a rising country and how to integrate the rising country into an international system without country without war I think that it's a dominant Sino-American problem of our period and so I mean some expressions of it that we have great belief in arbitration the Chinese consider that agreement to arbitration before you have an agreement on principle it's an application of their position to be inverse so but be there as it may I I think the fundamental period problem of a period it says and they are the lessons of World War one seemed to me to be overwhelming if you look at the issues that produced World War one they went through a decade at least a decade of constant mutual irritation on essentially peripheral problems peripheral to the central survival of their their society and most of those issues had been were solved and suddenly one issue came along that wasn't solved even though as an issue it was perhaps less significant than some of those they had after the Balkan wars and in the Moroccan crisis and at the end of that process they sort of slid in the war they didn't know how to end it and at the end of it the structure of European order was irretrievably destroyed now any of us can list a catalogue of this agreement that exists between us and China and we have on the whole managed to deal with them on both sides and both of the leaders have asserted that they want to create a relationship that transcends that of traditional adversaries in my view the apologies to the distinguished ambassador from China we have not on either side fully lived up to to this objective we have been skillful in solving short-term problems we have not yet come up with something that shows to the world that we are trying to move into a new pattern and it is so easy to find it but there's so many crisis going on in which I hope we will in the next few years we are starting with the president's trip to China find a way to lift the issues to that level thank you I'm Akbar Faja former World Bank officials with a note of thanks to CSIS and also to Mr. Cassinger my question is focused on talk a little louder please okay thank you I'm Akbar Faja former World Bank official my question is focused on if you could kindly comment on President Obama's policies towards South Asia particularly to Pakistan and India and if you could add a comment on civil nuclear technology assistance to India but not to Pakistan thank you he wants you to offer your insights into India and Pakistan from an American point of view and then if you have thoughts care to share them about the civil military cooperation specifically things we will do with India we will not do with Pakistan I'm not going into the second part of the question because I don't know exactly what we're doing the India Pakistan crisis up with the result of the period of decolonization in which the British divided the region into the predominantly Hindu region and those who did not want to live in an Hindu dominated region which were mostly Muslims but it was very difficult to draw this dividing line in such a way that the objective was achieved and then the populations have increased so much that the Muslim population which in India was a small relatively smaller minority has in it largely and considerably on the Pakistan side its existence depended on it it's different from India and from the latent fear that India might want to reverse that experience and there was the additional problem of Kashmir and so for the whole period there have been I don't know four at least four wars between India and Pakistan theoretically at least from the American point of view we have no interest in the conflict between India and Pakistan as we it may in it is not to us a balance of power problem and all American policymakers that I've ever known would welcome a solution to this to this conflict in some manner through negotiation but now both countries have nuclear weapons and a conflict with them between them could have the profoundest global consequences of the United States in recent years has been substantially cooperative with with India and it's another one of those issues is often described as a strategic problem I think the defense of India it's largely an Indian responsibility but placing India into a South Asian context in which we can cooperate that is a very important task and now the difference between civilian military relationship I don't know what you're referring to particularly it outside really of the conversation right here so let me move I just I've got two questions right here and let's move the microphone Chelsea right it but let me just say if you got a cell phone you please turn it to style a silent stun you know you'll feel better we'll feel better okay yeah right either one of those two gents right there then we'll you'll get it next you'll get it next my name is Amitabh Acharya I'm a professor at America University my question is about China do you think China is a revisionist power does China want to live within the current internal order which is substantially still the American-led liberal order what does China want to create its own world order where it wants America to have an order to live in so the question is is China willing to live within a Westphalian system a system it didn't design but is having to operate today or does it want to create its own international system Chinese ambassadors he is in a better position to answer that then I will give him the microphone later I would say this the Westphalian system does not come naturally to the Chinese mind because the historic position of China has been to regard itself as the middle kingdom and the other countries had some degree of tributary relationship to China so that the notion of sovereign equality operating by the largely legal principles is not an original Chinese idea and therefore some aspects of the Westphalian system will be instinctively treated by by Chinese as interference or condescension of some kind on the other hand the basic aspect of the Westphalian system is to recognize the state as a basic unit of international politics and of sovereign of of non-intervention in the domestic affairs of other states is compatible with the practice of China and in its present in Ghana right next to Chelsea thank you my name is Paolo von Sheerach Sheerach report in keeping with the differentiation that you made a moment ago dr. Kissinger regarding the fluctuation in America between over commitment and withdrawal there is a relatively recent development now and that is lack of means in other words it seems to me that right now whatever the inclination may be of the nation or policymakers we are a country with 17 trillion dollar debt with an economy that is growing at a trend of 2% a year as opposed to the historic 3% of the post-war period our main allies in Europe are about zero growth with the defense of budgets ranging from 1 to 2% 4 or 5 of them at the most reached the NATO goal of 2% Japan is in what I would call a sort of a terminal demographic decline therefore ourselves and our allies seems to be plagued whatever other issues there are in terms of orientation and agreement on basic policy we have a fundamental economic problem without means there is very little or at least a lot less that can be done by the United States whether it leads or it's not leading you know do you see this as a as an issue or is this transient or is this going to be remedied thank you the I'll just rephrase it he's he's suggesting that you know nations capacities internationally reflect their underlying strength and that America's strength is diminished by its large deficits its slow growth our primary partner is Europe Europe is very static economies are these because of that are we in a position to sustain a system that we created I agree that the underlying strength of the nation will affect the influence of its diplomacy by strength I don't mean just the military strength of a nation it but its capacity to deal with the rapidly changing situation and its values as well as as it felt that is certainly true and one has to expect that if a huge gap develops in the internal capacities of various nations that their relative influence will decline but the solution to that problem is to enhance the elements of of national capacity and but one cannot simply passively wait and expect that an international system in the abstract will defend one one has to participate in the international process as a relevant country and laws of relevance is unforgivable Rebecca right down here in the front this way then I'll come to you I'm Kumi Yokoe from Hitachi the high tension is rising between Japan and China do you have any advice leader Japanese leader and Chinese leader I'm not sure I understood but you're talking about the tension inside China between China and Japan between China and Japan there's a tension between China and Japan and I guess how do you assess it and how do you forecast where it may go of course there's a historic basis for it and of course the aftermath of the war has created legacies which can fuel this but ultimately I believe these tension the outcome of these tensions will depend on the evolution of Northeast Asian relationships and of the future of Northeast Asia but they are their problems like Korea that will fundamentally affect the relationship between Japan and China and and also the continued role of the United States in that region I of course consider the immediate tensions important but the deeper issue will be how one visualizes how the major countries of Northeast Asia will and should interact with each other over an extended period of time and not merely over the next few months right back with your hands up right right there yep and then Diana and then I'm gonna have to wrap it up with questions we need a sign box Joe Bosco formerly with the Defense Department and a student of the Dr. Kissinger it's good to see you again following up on the China questions do you believe that China has engaged in an active policy of undermining and distracting the United States from its global position such as by enabling the North Korean nuclear and missile program proliferating weapons of mass destruction and supporting some of the world's most odious regimes did he suggesting that China the provocative question that China is undermining America by supporting North Korea by supporting obnoxious regimes around the world do you have a view on this it's a basic principle I think that China conducts a policy of equilibrium around the world and therefore they do not consider it their duty to solve all our embarrassments in specific regions but it's a particular issue that you mentioned I have a different perception of the North Korean issue and I expressed it in fact in this book I think China feels itself substantially threatened by events in in North Korea and does not particularly seek on the country would prefer not to have a nuclear country and would be open to a discussion of the evolution of of Northeast Asia and whatever you think of Chinese actions in other parts of the world in the issue of North Korea I'm absolutely convinced and I have I'm absolutely convinced that the analysis I made it's a correct assessment now in other parts of the world it is quite possible in fact likely that our preferred solution is not necessarily accepted by the Chinese but that doesn't mean that they do it in order to particularly undermine under miners I think the evolution of our capacity to deal with China depends on us and not on I do not think that we are now in a global conflict with China but it might develop and that would be a great tragedy Diana Diana and I'm going to have to probably make this the last go ahead thank you Diana Lady Dugan former government official and CSIS senior advisor since I am the last dog to be hung I took the liberty of reading the last paragraph of your book and many of us have bought it but not had the pleasure to read it and I was I was struck by the fact that your last line is that the greatest most consequential issues of the human condition have been must be faced and that decisions to meet these challenges must be taken by statesmen before it's possible to know what the outcome may be and since you clearly demonstrate your 21st century as well as 20th century statesmen the question becomes in this era and every there's this there's a lot of deja vu in every century but when we do have frequent flyer diplomacy sound bite decisions and not just identifying winners and losers and but not just rewarding winners and losers but creating winners and losers how do you one remain optimistic about the the creation of statesmen like you and others in this room and how do you think that they can be will be different in the 21st century well the last paragraph of the book it's sort of a personal reflection of the difference between my view of history as an undergraduate and after some 70 years of observing the world and I'm trying to make the point that the it's the upheaval in the world right now it's unprecedented and statesmen are obliged to deal with it and they cannot step into the same river twice and above all that they have to act on the basis of assessments they cannot prove true when they make it so it depends importantly on the moral strengths and the courage of leaders because all the questions you asked and many modes one could many more we could elicit really are on the issue what do we think it's likely to happen or how can we deal with it and this is where statesmen have to make a choice and where they have to develop a concept and I confess I think they could temporary leadership in most parts of the world is not meeting that challenge at any rate not fully and it's the big unsolved problem of a period that's really all I meant to say in that last paragraph which is there's a set of consequential issues of our time and the statesmen do not know how they will turn out when they undertake them but they have no choice but to undertake that's a fitting benediction for a remarkable afternoon would you please join me with your applause and saying thank you folks will he'll be signing books outside if you have one a needed sign please let the good doctor get up there where he can get right we have you'll have to line up to get it so thank you