 We'll start in just a second We're we're waiting for some liquid lubrication here. Well, Alex will bring it. He'll put it up there when we're Talking, let me begin anyway Thank you all for coming really appreciate you coming in My name is Michael Swain. I'm a senior associate in the Asia program here at the Carnegie Endowment and I Specialized in security related issues involving Asia and China in particular US China national security issues and It's my pleasure today to lead this and moderate this panel. I'll introduce my colleagues in just a minute on the Reports of a project that has just recently been concluded That looks at the long-term future of the Asia Pacific region particularly from the perspective of Potential drivers towards either cooperation or conflict as you can see up there on the on the title That is really a very close to the title of the overall project What you have With you if you picked up a copy, which I think was outside is The one of the products of this project This is a report on This question of long-term future of the Asia Pacific region whether it moves towards cooperation conflict of what would drive it in various directions That we have produced at Carnegie With a group of authors actually including both Carnegie and non Carnegie analysts and specialists to look at this problem Over a 20 to 25 year period the future So it's a pretty long-range project Pretty broad in terms of its scope covering the whole Asia Pacific area But it is only one product in a much larger project That has recently been concluded that involved a wide range of other activities also designed to try to get Arms around this whole issue of the future of the Asia Pacific and its implications For stability in the region for the United States, etc Today We're going to be presenting to you on three different components of this project and I should say this project originated through the US government and the Department of Defense in particular and Specifically through the Pacific Command the office of the Secretary of Defense was involved in this and Some of the main consumers for the work that we've produced here Will be within the United States Defense Department and the Pacific Command in particular What we're going to be presenting today are the bottom line findings from the Carnegie report itself, which is a if you will qualitative not quantitative oriented assessment of the region and Alternative futures for the region But we will also have you'll also be hearing presentations from two of the other components on The overall project work and they will be presented by my two colleagues to the right Immediately to the right of me is Clifford Wickham and he is professor and chair at the Department of Systems Engineering in the Naval Postgraduate School He's a professor there and an analyst and a expert on modeling There is a modeling element to this overall project that relates to the Carnegie study That he is going to be speaking about in a minute it's it's really a model that is what you call a systems model of Dynamic systems that tries to show the interactions of a large range of variables at work Political economic military, etc And how they could interact with each other as a tool for policy makers in the US government in Trying to look at change over time in the Asia Pacific and what would drive Certain change in certain directions particularly in terms of policy actions So it's an effort to try and model the dynamic nature of the region in ways that could be useful for US policy makers On my and Cliff will speak about that after me after my presentation on the Carnegie report And so my far right is Devin Ellis Who is policy and research program director at the University of Maryland icons project and what icon with a John Wilkenfeld? Professor at Maryland and what that unit does is it conducts various types of simulations and This project also has a simulation component to it that involved attempting to take some of the results of the findings of the project in terms of observations about the region recommendations about policy makers and how they would proceed etc and Use those to try and see to what degree knowledge of the findings of the project would have an effect positive or negative in managing certain types of simulation situations and those simulation situations relate to the five different Alternative regional environments which we have in our Carnegie report Which I will bring up in a minute and present to you. This sounds very complicated. I know It's a big project with a lot of moving parts But the ultimate goal of it is to try to make clear for US government and other consumers What are the major dynamics at work in the Asia-Pacific region going forward over a fairly long time frame and at different intervals? what's likely to drive the future in different directions and How should the United States position itself to try to maximize its own interests in dealing with that very dynamic environment? So with that by way of introduction And I should also say we also have members other members of the project team who are here and will be fielding questions if you so desire in the front row is Albert Keitel who is a Former Carnegie call a former Carnegie colleague and is a specialist on economics in Asia, and he was a big contributor to this report on the economics side And Professor Wilkenfeld is also here for my cons So without any further delay Let me go into and I'm going to try and move through this as quickly as possible So that we allow time for both not only Cliff and Devin of course to make remarks about their components But then leave plenty of time for question and answers because I think that's probably going to be the most useful for you to be able to tease out some of the aspects of this What I'm going to cover here is basically the background of what this Report and again keep in mind. This is the Carnegie report part of this The overview in the background the different environments that we came up with that look at the future In Asia the implications recommendations and a final statement about three alternative types of political military approaches that the United States could adopt in In positioning itself in the region in the future particularly in the military slash political realm The different parts of this report have these different Chapters to them the first three as you can see the first four pardon me Identified the key variables that we looked at when we tried to chart the region in the future of the region What's important in the region? What's going to likely be a critical variable either an independent variable intervening variable that will drive change in the future and you can see the four that we worked on each of them has a chapter in this report and It looks at these phenomenon Which are basically functionally defined in terms of the region and in terms of individual countries Particularly the major countries in the region. We look at China. We look at India. We look at Russia. We look at South Korea We look at Indonesia The major countries in the Asia Pacific region and that definition goes from India all the way up through past Japan and To the United States And the second is defense spending military Capabilities the third is national and transnational objectives doctrines approaches the use of force and then finally Relationships particularly enduring relationships such as the US Alliance system and how that could evolve over the over the future Then we have a discussion of what we see as the five security environments That could emerge out of the intro interaction of those sets of four different groups of variables And I will talk in a minute about what the details of those are and then we have implications or recommendations Particularly stated in terms of strategic risks and opportunities in the region going forward because that is a particular interest on the part of DoD they want to have a better understanding about where the risks lie and where the opportunities lie This is not just about Deturing conflict or managing increasing crises. It's about Strengthening the basis for cooperation. That's clearly a priority for pay come We had some general trends that we Looked at in these different areas and this basically just goes into some detail about what we looked at in Specifically within those four areas domestic instability and possible states North Korea first and foremost to a lesser extent China and Russia Different types of military races arms racing that could possibly emerge over time Changes in policy basic foreign policy directions towards more assertiveness ultra-nationalist types of policies of various types And of course impact on the US-led alliance system. Keep in mind what we're looking at here again is security related change This is not an attempt to capture everything in the region. It's an attempt to capture What's most important in terms of the regional balance of power in terms of security relations and that sort of thing We also had identification of Positive trends as I say here. It's not all about competition several different types of Positive trends that we identified here The future security environments the first was what we call status quo redux. That's Some version of what we currently see in Asia today Now what is that environment that environment is essentially a complex environment that combines elements of cooperation and competition There there's a lot of cooperation in the in the Asia-Pacific region sometimes despite what is written about in the media at times The region to a great extent is pretty stable And it is very emphasis and is very focused on growth economic growth Peaceful development is a high priority However, there's a lot of competition in the region too because of the changing capabilities of major states the emergence of a for lack of a better term A more multi-polar environment in Asia Led first and foremost of course by the rise of China, but not just China You have other powers other developing states in the region that are much more capable much more influential economically and otherwise than they have been in the past and that Process is likely to continue The u.s. Led Hubbard spokes alliance system though the u.s. And it's bilateral alliances South Korea Japan Thailand etc. The Philippines that these phenomena will continue Over time, but you will have this mix of national objectives that are both competitive Deterrence oriented to some degree and cooperative reassurance oriented the worst case outcomes Not to be conveyed from one state to another to develop their worst-case fears, etc this kind of a scenario is What we see as probably one that is going to continue for quite some time Not necessarily out to the end of this whole period But is the more likely one certainly in the near to medium term the second one is what we call a Cold War environment This is one where you really do have a much more zero-sum context in the region Policies are much more developed on the basis of competition on the basis of my advancement your your loss What drives this most primarily is the u.s. China relationship and how that evolves over time So we lay out what the different dimensions are of that Cold War environment in this study The third one is one where you have the Movement in a very notable way from the status quo redux to a much more cooperative environment one in which Security competition becomes much less Prevalent in which there are bases for cooperation and for addressing some of the sources of competition in the region peacefully over time That that sort of an environment becomes much more salient and so you have a basis for long-term growth and stability in the region The Asian hot wars environment, which is the fourth one is one in which you actually see episodic conflict primarily driven by Sovereignty issues territorial disputes, but also possibly by domestic unrest that creates Instability on the Korean Peninsula and other places and that this kind of episodic conflict Becomes extremely destabilizing for the region as a whole it Diverts resources to an even greater extent than the Cold War away from Peaceful pursuits to protection of one's interests more zero some orientation, but it doesn't posit a prolonged region-wide Conflagration And the last is what we call a challenge region, which is a region that is Actually focusing more on the challenges posed by transnational security non-traditional security threats pandemics Climate change other issues that become in the far end of this time zone timeline that we're looking at become really Significant and major issues for the region and drive the region to Need to cooperate in some degree in dealing with them over time now What do we identify here as some of the primary risks in the environment that we look at and looking at these Asia-Pacific today and these five environments The primary risks of course are a shift in national resources toward greater security competition That is to say the major countries of Asia begin to devote more and more of their resources to Strengthening their defensive position their military position Enhancing their ability to compete on the security level with much more of an attention towards the sort of zero-sum outcomes in a range of different areas You have the emergence of greater competitive centers that leads to Increasing likelihood to try to test one's resolve one's position either as a dominant or less dominant force There is less clarity as to what the distribution of power is in the system There is more of a tendency as a result of that to test the different relative capabilities of different states in the system The possibility that the United States could become more embroiled in third-party disputes particularly by allies Particularly over these issues of security competition and the way they're triggered by sovereignty Territorial disputes as we've seen East China Sea South China Sea could be Korea and Taiwan Over time and the US could become more drawn into these disputes in a way that is not necessarily Stability inducing for the region as a whole and you could see greater challenges to the US Let alliance system over time as a risk in the sense that allies do not have Unified views on how to deal with a more dynamic environment in the region particularly with the emergence of China and the probably the most foremost example of this is the potential for a lack of Unanimity between Japan and South Korea in Addressing China's emergence as a major power in the region over time and what that would mean for overall alliance management for the United States Secondary risks we look at our exclusionary different types of political and economic arrangements Domestic instability etc. You can see there We posit the domestic instability is being most significant in the North Korean case less so for the Chinese case This study does not predict that the Chinese government is going to collapse It does not predict that the Chinese government is going to go into a prolonged free fall with increasing levels of domestic instability On balance we judge that the Chinese situation is going to remain stable The growth levels will remain adequate to maintain adequate levels of social order and stability now This is something that's controversial in some areas, but we Very free to discuss this in the Q&A if you'd like We don't exclude absolutely the possibility that China could face some major major domestic problems But that's certainly not what we regard as a very probable situation we also cite the issue of Possibly us overreaction in certain cases to its changing position in the region Now aside from all of these negative factors We identify some factors which I alluded to before which are really positive in the region over time the emphasis on continued growth the absence of what you would call deeply existential disputes about the Very survival of a particular government in the region because it's being threatened by another government for its survival It's not the zero-sum kind of existential Type of competition that you saw during the Cold War at the height of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union that's not the US-China relationship and it is unlikely to be so even over the long term Continuing American strength. Yes, the United States is likely to decline in relative terms Given the emergence and greater power and influence of other states in the system particularly China but the United States is still going to be a major Strong player in the region. We're not we don't think withdrawal and Drastic reduction of the US presence is at all likely over the long term even The possibility of a more flexible China a stronger China does not necessarily Translate into a more aggressive China a China that is more confident Domestically and is more confident in some of his capabilities overseas could become in some ways a more flexible China We don't predict that that's the outcome and I should say this whole exercise is not about prediction It's about identifying alternative types of futures and the forces that could drive them in different directions But on that particular point we cite that as a definite possibility also on cooperating with North Korea that could improve and also cooperation over growing transnational threats now some of the recommendations that we presented this study and I'll try and Wrap up as quickly as possible now so that I can give my colleagues a chance to present as well We basically conclude that the United States needs to become more systematic about defining its long-term interests in Asia and Recognizing as it does. I think that it it plays a major role as a key Agency of influence in the region. This is not about the United States sitting back and reacting to the region It's about the dynamic relationship that exists between us actions and the actions of others in the region and For the United States it needs to gain a clear understanding going forward as to what its primary and secondary interests are in a variety of security related areas and What its likely capabilities are going to be to carry out and defend those interests? We believe in general that there is not enough of that long-range strategic thinking matching capabilities that Exists in the US government at this time these kinds of long-range studies are pretty rare in the US government And so we're asking for greater clarity on that that we hope would lead into a Discussion with the Chinese ultimately as well as with US allies of course along the way in fact preceding that of a dialogue with China But a dialogue with China that talks and thinks again about the longer term again in a way that is more strategic talking about changes in relative capabilities over time We have other different recommendations that relate to specific types of initiatives for reducing security competition increasing cooperation in a variety of different ways Including establishing a forum for energy security including developing joint slot defense. That's strategic lines of communication In the Asia Pacific area We see this and and this was actually a recommendation that came out of the primary energy specialist with the group Michael Herberg He sees that the energy factor in Asia is increasingly driving towards a need for greater cooperation not Competition among countries in the region and beyond and he sees a basis for greater the need for greater Coordination as China's military increases in carrying out some vital defenses of energy related slots for example So the last thing that we talked about were three different alternative Postures for the United States in going forward in trying to maximize its security position in this very dynamic environment We don't indicate a preference on this But these are the same if some of you have read the earlier net assessment study that we did on the role of the Chinese military its impact on the US-Japan alliance These are the same three General approaches because they apply in both cases region-wide and Northeast Asia as well And I should add that the reason one reason why Carnegie Did this study is because of that previous study on the strategic what we call the strategic net assessment in Northeast Asia Which got the attention of the US government and they wanted us to do something on a broader scale, which is this study having too much probably These three are basically the first one is a is a policy is a pardon me is a forced posture and a position That is essentially some version of a continuation of what had been the past the United States retains overall predominance in the Western Pacific through forward deployed forces and An ability to negate any kind of challenge to those forces by negate I mean overcome them and be able to prevail and have freedom of action across the Western Pacific Right up to a country's 12 mile nautical mile limit That has been the capability of the United States historically since the end of the Second World War in the Maritime Theater in the Western Pacific A continuation of that strategy is one alternative a Second one is one that is less oriented towards the more let's say Robust or offensive oriented way of asserting us or maintaining us predominance as in the first the second is a more defensive version of that same Desire for primacy the details of this are laid out in the report. The third is one that is more genuinely balanced There is a genuine balance in the region primarily between the United States and China that Involves what we call mutual denial of capability of the ability to threaten certain types of vital interests Through a posture a force posture and a policy set that is much changed from what it is today Particularly on the US side. We can talk more about this in the Q&A These are just details on those three different approaches, which I will not go through now in the interest of time I will now turn that that is basically the car the Carnegie report. We lay out these alternative futures We identify these risks and opportunities and we Make some general observations on implications and recommendations and now I want to turn to Cliff to present his part of this Okay, thanks Michael. Thanks everyone and Yeah, I'm Cliff Whitcombe a professor and chairman of the systems engineering department at the Naval postgraduate school again I'm an engineer I'm not somebody who deals with policy or an expert in any of these areas But what what we did bring to this project was an ability to look at developing some systems models that would provide a Systems context into looking at this kind of situation So we didn't have any particular study that we're doing to set policy or to analyze a situation But create a model that would allow those kind of things to be done by an analyst who wanted to look at it in this particular Perspective, so I'll cover that in just a minute. I'd like to recognize some of the research team I've got several research associates that work with me and because we educate students from all the services out there I was lucky to have a Navy commander Michael Shizhevinsky on the team To develop part of the model and an army major a cheek a Robertson So I thought I was Very significant that I have some of these other officers that are still going to be going from the Naval postgraduate school and working and potentially at these combat Commanders to start to understand these kind of problems and how to how to deal with them So again a brief overview of the My part of the project and the contribution to this a little bit about systems planning because this about planners making Decisions looking at how you can set policy And so this is a different perspective Maybe then the general perspective of planners to take a systems view and then specifically we use the concept systems dynamics developed originally by Forrester at MIT and Still going strong today as a method of looking at systems and modeling and then into a brief summary So again, we'll look a little bit about the perspective from planners and then a little bit about the model itself And so the overall objective here was to provide planners in support of other decision makers A tool to make better sense of those nonlinear dynamics and feedback Mechanisms that come into play in all the various dimensions of these kind of problems when you're trying to study a situation such as us China relations and what we're Trying to create here is a tool to look at a study of futures things that could happen It's not a predictive tool, but it gives you some context to be able to say if your projections of economic growth play out in a certain way from a Particular document, maybe you could say well what if in five years it dropped by a significant amount or maybe if GDP and In a certain balance started to go in another direction. What would that mean to the context of how we might set policy? So this was a tool set up for looking at those kind of futures running them in many Iterations and then trying to figure out some of the context that may happen in the future if something were to change in the system What we're trying to do here is broaden that horizon of strategic thinking in forming planning with a different methodology in a different way To take a look at the problem again using a systems approach So what we did from the project and all the collaborators Carnegie included we also had several other key players from University of Merrill Maryland We had CSIS NSI and a number of other organizations Texas A&M and University of British Columbia, etc They identified the key influencing variables here And then we took those into consideration and creating this model because we're not trying to create a generic model that handles everything That could happen in the context of the US China focused on what the subject matter experts said were the key variables and influencers And how they might influence each other But we also wanted to create something that wasn't just going to be a tool We developed that we would have to maintain we wanted something that analysts anywhere who wanted to try this kind of methodology Use these methods could could take advantage of it. So we used a commercial tool It was a company was IC systems and it's a tool called I think they also make the Stella series of system dynamics modeling tools So we wanted to make that interface on it something that would be useful for the user to be able to manipulate variables But the tool also allows you to get right down to the equations if you are somebody who's an analyst and wants to change things You could change the data could change the equations could change the linkages But it's not not really recommended unless you understand the actual situation that's going on So we wanted to have sort of a basic interface design so that this could be a tool that will be useful to analysts in in general here So that systems thinking just to go over this I'm sure a lot of you have already heard of this and as a methodology, but it really considers a worldview means to Really take a broad view of everything that could come into play in a situation and not just focusing on Analysis where you kind of brush away everything you don't want to know about and focus on that little piece of it And we think it's important because thinking in general determines what you do about what you see So if you see things in a system context, you can start to behave in a systems manner Systems thinking is a mindset. So it isn't something you apply. It's not a processor method It's a way of thinking about problems again in the in the past several decades. I think generally Von Bertalan fee is credited with having started a lot of this General systems theory in 1937 so post World War two and World War two and post World War two is when systems thinking started to Really take hold in a more Rigorous sense and then into the 50s and 60s when forester developed systems dynamics and the various computer tools this really allowed people to take into consideration the the way to look at a system on a holistic basis on a Basis that looks at more of a instead of analysis but synthesis and trying to understand a system by looking at why it does things as it does and to study the system and not Just the problem at hand So what we're facing though is a situation where a lot of planners today when they work on situations are You know with the state of the planning that they do and the way they do it They're pretty comfortable. So I'd say that this is from Akhoff in 1981 classified planners from a system view that people that are satisfied with the way things are generally You know seek to avoid errors within the current system and want to just keep things on the way They do things the same because they're afraid of maybe making errors But we're trying to create people who would be more a little bit pre-activist. I think in their analysis Maybe unsatisfied with the way analysis is done today and want to look at a different way of doing this because they may seek To understand all aspects of the future that may play into the success of this Even if you're studying one aspect of it you want to know how would the rest of the pieces influence that in the way you're thinking about this So again, we created a system dynamics model tool and Kind of the context was to look at, you know, how would tensions be? Manifested between us China here tension meaning anytime There's a either a perception or an actual difference of something that says, you know, you might take a different position on it You might create some tension there But we have lots of other specific variables. You can look at and and map and and model again we use the I think software by IC systems and Based our model into five basic sub models the tension is sort of the thing that shows you what might be going on between the Perceptions of two powers the United States and China who are trying to influence the area And then if they're in they feel like their influence is coming out of balance it might create a tension from one side or the other And then we had aspects related to military actions. Most of our stuff was quasi military actions We were not looking at modeling military conflict in itself And then things about demographics and stability Economics model and energy and resources. So if I could just say very briefly you could say from here We're from a cliff saying that his section of doing the modeling was focused much more on the US China Diad right it was more focused on the Larger systemic dynamics of that relationship than it was on trying to model the entire region Yeah, that we figured we better focus on this dyad because trying to consider everyone else in the region Although they are major players in the region We really took it as China would like to have an influence in in the Asian theater That maybe would at least match and maybe exceed the US ability to have an influence there So these kind of things relate to the tension that might happen So of course events that happen in these areas like you know, North Korea to Taiwan Japan Any of these areas may come to play in this and cause those kind of situations to change So we do have this ability to inject those kind of changes and then see what happens But try to show just in a big picture here Not the details of the model on the top you see that we used energy and resources in a sub-model basically using data From the International Energy Agency and looking at What is the historical energy usage in the US and China particularly in China and then how do they project it into the future an Economic sub-model where we mostly took the United Nations data in that case to look at the US and China very high level, you know gross domestic product gross national product type issues and macro economic aspects The tension sub-model there in blue in the middle kind of shows that the relationship of the US and China and their perceptions of influence in the region On the right is the Democrat Demographics and stability model looking at population aging demographic shifts and how perceptions might shift in there if people are Disatisfied or not with the way some sort of policy is going on inside China and then finally that military action sub-model where again, this is where if they were Situations where you had quasi military interactions or you had That that may cause tension, but you could also do things like cooperative efforts in Exercises that may reduce tension So these kind of things all come into play and the way this this works is that because we've modeled them with specific data And characteristics of each one we can now connect them across so For example if in aspects of energy China will be using a lot of coal Probably will continue to have to use 60 70% of their energy resources going to be in coal They can supplement with oil But still it's it's going to be heavily dependent on that it's going to have an impact on the environment That may actually cause the population as they become more aware of the importance of the environment that they get a Disfatted satisfaction in the population it also may work back into economics if the government is forced to do something about the pollution and Have different controls which would maybe reduce their economic output So all these are tied together so if you have a specific question about in a context of a quasi military action If things were stable and the same as they were projected to be it may have one outcome But what if in the future some aspect of you know the Internal satisfaction wasn't there with something caused the Chinese to have a little bit more tension going on that Quasi military action may actually increase tensions from where it was higher up to a higher level So this is the kind of thing you can look at in the way this model is interconnected Just very quickly what the tool looks like kind of like a spreadsheet with the interfaces on it that you know that we have here that Is fairly straightforward to use It looks like a home page when you're running the software on your laptop or whatever This is a quick look at what the energy page looks like lots of Materials for explanation you could go right to the equation layer in this as I said and change the equations update the data and Rerun the model and it's just as easy as changing a spreadsheet It also shows you an image of the model so you can see all the interconnections not that you could see it here But and then the simulation dashboard they call it a flight simulator You know has various graphs. You can populate the graphs you want you can Put simulation controls on there You can put sliders to change the variable levels and then you execute the simulation you can reset it You can run it multiple times you can set the events to happen now We're in the future and then just run various scenarios on Setting things whether you have some kind of event in the region you can also say that well We expect that GDP in in five years may drop what would happen So you can vary these different variables and run simulation so you can get an idea of what the impacts might be So in summary again We created a system dynamics modeling tool to allow planners to look at these various futures in a systems way We weren't there to run any particular cases or to come to any conclusions based on running any simulations It was to provide this tool so that planners could start to use this kind of methodology To gain insight from a systems perspective in the way they look at that and to understand the situation and perhaps look at maybe even setting Policy or dynamic aspects related to policy Thanks, so I'll go ahead and turn it back to No, I was gonna say thank you. Thank you. I hope we've sufficiently blinded you with science now The whole purpose behind these kinds of activities cliffs Devon's as you'll see in a second is to is to look at this issue future of the region from a whole lot of different types of perspectives and to give policy makers more options to think about the future ahead and How their behavior could affect it and and that's you know, that's what you want to do You don't want to tell people hey, you know, this is gonna happen. You need to do that You want to give them enough? Information that hopefully is going to be usable enough for them that they can make evaluations on their own about where they think Policy needs to go over time because of the way the region could develop now. I'll turn over to Devin Thank You Michael as Michael indicated. I'm Devin Ellis. I'm at the University of Maryland with the icons project and our role in the overall effort was to try and take a look at some of the utility and possible implications of planners getting to use the kind of strategic level products and in-depth analytic products that were produced over the whole effort and This has is what my colleagues have kindly called my incomprehensible slide But it just attempts to describe very briefly the design of the simulation that we ran in order to look at those utilities The in in brief We had a treatment group in a control group the treatment group received access to all the analytic product including Cliff's tool Michael's report and the other parts of the effort and the treatment group did not and we ran them through the same set of Scenarios six storylines focused on a major bilateral and multilateral events and actors in the Asia Pacific region over the course of two rounds one from now out through 2020 and the other from 2020 to 2025 and our Scenarios encompassed Movement towards they weren't the end states were not predefined I should say they allowed you to move towards an end state that closely resembled Michael's future security environment The status quo Redox or one that more closely resembled the future security environment of an Asia Pacific Cold War The reason we focused on these two security environments was because we felt that in the interest in sanity We had to hold one major variable steady And so we chose that to be economic and these were the two that are most easily postulated with a relatively steady state economic horizon over the next 15 years very Quickly an overview of the participant groups that we incorporated these were people who are either in or former Planning folks with the US government mostly DoD, but some other USG particularly state and everyone in both groups had Relatively significant amount of planning experience and also a relatively significant amount of regional experience in the Asia Pacific When we looked at the inputs that they were offered the opportunity to adjust over the course of those two five-year rounds to major bilateral and multilateral alliance and relationship maintenance and emphasis and to force posture and asset allocation Particularly with regard to the Defense Department, but writ somewhat more broadly for national security over the region This is what we found There was indeed a divergence in priorities between the two groups in the second round Which again was the time horizon out through 2025 in the first round Both groups were very similar in their preferences and inputs But in the second round what you saw was that those who had access to the analytic product from the effort began to shift Their emphasis on what they would change going into the future Mostly into the bilateral and multilateral relationship management arena and tended to leave Force posture considerations pretty steady state this the reverse was true in the control group where the emphasis Out to the 2025 window was largely on force posture concerns and much less on bilateral relationship management And I should caveat that by saying that bilateral and multilateral Relationships weren't ignored in the control group. They just didn't focus on adjusting them Beyond what you would consider to be sort of status quo for today. I can say just keep in mind what what? Devin's group did is they looked out only at a 10-year time period Right the larger project in this report looked out further, but for a variety of reasons Particularly, I think reflecting the desire of the sponsor. Yeah, they wanted to have a focus on the next decade And what we saw further was that those Members of the treatment group who had access to the tools who used to them most We're also the most likely to fall into the category of people who Focus their changes over that time horizon on the relationship management issue as opposed to the force posture issue And this just sort of breaks down the in very broad strokes for you the relationship between significant use of these analytic products and the inputs that were put out The other variable that I'd like to focus on that we noticed was of course the salience of the PRC I should pick up on the point that Michael made with regard to the tool that cliffs folks developed and say that That the scenario was not developed to be specifically u.s. China bilateral It was developed to try and take a Theater-wide perspective that didn't over emphasize the importance of that bilateral relationship And as it turns out we didn't have to the participants emphasize the importance of that bilateral anyway 85% of all the inputs across both the groups in both rounds Reference the PRC even if the input did not relate directly to the bilateral relationship or to a multilateral relationship that clearly involved PRC influence and the the final thing that I'll say about that is that I think the implications of some of the policy recommendations in the Carnegie report here are Toward aimed towards Allowing Folks who get to make plans and policy in the u.s. Government the opportunity to think about some ways that they can shift towards the the less confrontational side of this spectrum of possible future security environments and What we saw in our Study was that even given access to these Findings and recommendations that was hard to do the vast majority of participants concluded at the end of the exercise that the u.s. And China were likely to be at least as confrontational if not more confrontational in 2025 than they are today some Also suggested that there might be some endogeneity to my scenario design and pushing them in that direction I would I would probably Say that I would dispute that because of the fact that we paid pretty close attention to following Multiple pathways that were laid out in the Carnegie effort and in others that could get you towards the less Confrontational end of the spectrum as well and with that I think that I'm sure folks have questions And I will wrap it up Thank you very much Devin Well, we tried to give you this is a lot and different Definitely different dimensions different aspects of looking at this overall problem Some of the other activities that have been conducted as part of this project will emerge in the future In published publications some of them will not But what we've given you here as I think a good taste of some of the major elements of what this is and This Carnegie report really I think is the thus far the major written product from this project and as I said before one that is comprehensive in its effort to try and bring in the region as a whole and is Decidedly very qualitative although not without some quantitative elements, but qualitative in much of its analysis As you go out further a field in trying to look at a region as dynamic as the Asia Pacific the ability to Assess and analyze trends and how they might operate becomes increasingly difficult There is almost no such thing Barring some very extreme exceptions as a clear-cut negative or positive trend Trends can produce very different outcomes over long-term periods Depending upon how they interact with other factors And you have to try and bring that into consideration every time you engage in this kind of informed if you will speculation about the future But we're convinced and we think the sponsor is convinced That this type of analysis is necessary and it is indeed useful So with that I will open this up to questions and we can go as long as the questions last do we don't have to go until Three four four o'clock by any means. Yes, sir. Could you please identify yourself and wait for the microphone? There's a mic here Well first Thanks so much for such comprehensive multivariate analysis is reassuring that you're doing something so comprehensive I'm Andre so for Joe and I work for a interstate traffic company in in Michigan for the Vietnam Southeast Asia But I'm also veterans for peace U.S. Army retired and so I'm my question is this on on multivariate analysis Spurs by mr. Whitman which would come I thought yeah would come you you said in your treatment of Your topic that When you mentioned the military Part of the equation you said specifically that it does not treat Actual raw military battles right right and my question is this then why not tweak that aspect to have to include an Absolute assurance that we can defeat China if they're if all these multivariate analyses Don't ensure don't result in peace in other words wouldn't it be reassuring to know that We can beat them and that China would know that might spur them to Choose peaceful coexistence since they're the only country using violence against others at this stage Well, I'd say that from that perspective Yeah, we there's plenty of other military conflict models out there that are used in all kinds of analyses and for You know conflict Models that are in all kinds of states of classification going on And so we we scoped it out to look at things that would impact the conflict and cooperation And so you know I suppose a variable you could put in there that say that you know in an absolute sense The influence is going to flip all the other way and then what would happen But then I think that might obviate all the a lot of the outcomes of the model that maybe everything you would do it would say that This might result in a particular outcome, but I'm not Saying one way or another whether you know that would make sense to do or not but but I still think that putting something in there that says that We're looking at the military conflict We kind of left that up to the planners that are looking at what would happen in a military context rather than the influence of what would happen As a context around all the other aspects that they're looking at and planning for policy because they have different policies for the War outcomes. Yeah, this this project was definitely not about wargaming It wasn't about how to how to defeat any kind of adversary That's sort of stuff the Pentagon does an awful lot So this this was much more about trying to understand the the complex interaction of a wide variety of elements in in a competitive cooperative environment and and how they could interact in ways that could go very Lead in very negative directions where you could actually end up in some kind of conflict ultimately But what's most important is understanding that path Not in my view not necessarily understanding what you do when you get to the end point Yeah, as Burt just mentioned of the three different types of Postures that we had at the end of my presentation the first one was one that was predicated on the need to have a predominant position that would be able to In effect defeat any adversary in the Western Pacific that would challenge the United States So that's one alternate. That's one alternative in in going forward. So let me yes, sir in the back there Couple of questions. My name is Amitabh. I'm a professor at American University You said to your five Environments Informed speculation I'd like to know if you think any of this scenario is more likely than others and which is most likely You don't have to predict But I think this is something people will ask you No, I well, I should have said something in the and Okay, let me just finish one more question related to this likely that more than one of the scenarios environments can happen simultaneously like for example the challenge region and the Asia Pacific Cold War Asia Pacific would be very stable in terms of interstate relationship But maybe not very stable in terms of transnational challenges So, so how do you see the link between these two and one last clarification? You said mutual denial is like probably one of the I Don't know that you say it is it is good or bad, but I'd like to know does mutual denial include accepting Chinese area denial capability and posture Which may not be acceptable to the Pentagon Thank you. Nice easy questions Well the general probability We do make reference to this in the report and I was remissed to not make a reference to this in the presentation In general terms we laid out what we think our probabilities in the order of the environments that I listed Which means that some can some variation continuation of this mixed dynamic environment that we have today But likely with greater competition in a variety of areas particularly between US and China is more likely than not to continue And we say this for a variety of reasons that have to do with the balance of risks and opportunities The need for all countries in the region to try to avoid getting into de-escalator or escalatory, you know spirals downward spirals A variety of factors that we mentioned there the It's hard to say what is the the absolute least likely. I mean you could have a you know global pandemic That changes everything That you really have to then reassess You know what what the future will bring The Cold War environment is one that Devon said you know he sort of they juxtapose the status quo redux in the Cold War environment and looking at their simulations to try and understand how you might move from a status quo redux to a real genuine Cold War environment and I guess if I had to Be pushed to make a statement. I would say that the second most likely Environment for the future is indeed probably a Cold War environment that would emerge or evolve out of the status quo redux environment in a much more competitive way That would be very unfortunate for all the states concerned But I think that the Pacific Asia Pacific the episodic hot wars in the challenge region are all much less likely Now I take your point about they're not mutually exclusive I think that is I mean there are aspects of Cold War environment that are inherent to some degree in the status quo redux. I Wouldn't you know, we're talking about sort of heuristic device here by you know it Laying out in fairly clear terms alternatives But there are combinations there that you certainly could see over time and Exactly how they'd combine and you know how they would might evolve over time is is open to all kinds of discussions We didn't really get into that, but we did talk about in the report if you read the report the complexity of overlapping Environments in various ways and your third question about mutual denial. I have to be careful because it's my my own opinion versus The group took no opinion about these three different alternative postures there were differences within the Co the authors in this group about Which of these different approaches would be more advisable to pursue for the United States over time? My own view is that the United States is probably going to have to Seriously consider I Don't want to say will inevitably be in but it needs to seriously consider Some version of a mutual denials that stands over the long term in the Western Pacific Particularly within what is called the first island chain, which is 1500 or so nautical miles from China's coast that area in my view Will be increasingly contested in fact by the Chinese capabilities and The ability of the United States to retain the level of freedom of action and predominance in that area I believe will decline and The question is how do you deal with that situation? I think it's going to happen Some people don't some people are not very concerned But I you know I I believe that that kind of earlier world that we lived in that was very much based upon a Clearly predominant American presence in the Western Pacific That would really basically broke no challenge in the maritime theater maritime, okay? I'm talking not land not continental Asia That will not be sustainable in my view. And so you have to discuss How you deal with that? Do you double down and say no, it's not going to happen. We're going to make it Sustainable we're going to sustain that and then look at the resources look at the costs look at the benefits of doing that versus alternatives and My argument has been the US has to think much more seriously about alternatives Preparing to get to a situation where it can extract the maximum benefits From a situation that is less optimal than it that has been in the past Anyway, I've got a piece coming out in foreign affairs. You can read more about it I'm going to put something on Carnegie a website. You can read more about it there I've written a lot about that Michael. Can I piggyback on that comment though for one sure one moment? I I think that There's a there's a bottom line that's important to what Michael is saying here, which is I You know just based on my very small study and of course many other people's opinions I don't think you're gonna see an Organic change to accepting that sort of Future with regard to mutual denial and so the reason to Do this kind of study is to be thinking about the fact that it could happen anyway To be ready for that as opposed to waking up one day and finding yourself there Bradley then I'll go to you Hi, Bradley. Hi Bradley Womack University of Virginia and I would like to ask something about long-term Cooperation in Asia Pacific and the advantages for the United States, but that's not exciting enough. No No, I was hoping you do that and we could talk about cooperation, right? Right. Well, there are the questions of the transformative effects of AII be in Two silk roads and those types of things and those certainly deserve as much attention as More scary scenarios, but the thing that I'd like to bring up is it seems to be that Even in the mutual area denial alternative there needs to be an added factor of Mutual regional restraint both in in specific areas and in modalities because One of the good things about this report is this Asia Pacific is not US China and The US China relationship will be an Asia Pacific relationship and if we don't reassure You know if that relationship doesn't reassure Vietnam Thailand allies and non-allies in the region Then we're more likely to have a conflict breaking out in some third country that's driven to either False ambitions or desperation than we are to have some Problem in directly in the pure bilateral relationship. So some element now that element could be added to all three scenarios But some way of Making sure that an improvement in US China relationship in the big country relationship doesn't Scare doesn't add to the concerns of the smaller countries Not that they would ever want big country conflict. That's that's the worst thing for them, too But big country harmony doesn't necessarily solve their problems and their asymmetric relationships Good point Yes, sir. Thank you very much. Don't we with China reveal news agency of Hong Kong? I have two questions regarding Taiwan and doctors when In your speech one of the primary risks you mentioned is that the US may be more possible to get into the third-party disputes including the Possible scenario in Taiwan Street. Could you please elaborate that? What kind of risk do you see in the next several years? that may threaten the peace and stability of the Taiwan Street particularly Considering the coming Taiwan election and the DPP may come back to the office and I have a second question is Yesterday to US Marine Jax land had an emergency emergency land landing on Taiwan and some people here said The Pentagon is trying to send a political message to Beijing To show the US resolve after the PLA had a bomber drill near Taiwan. What do you think about the? Political and security implication of this incident. Thank you very much. I guess that's me Well, I'll take your second question first. That's a classic example. I think of of What goes on when you have an incident like this happen and You get all kinds of theorizing about the deliberate Machiavellian strategic conspiratorial More than a likely Lin not these jets had trouble. He had to land. I mean, I can't I can't I can't give you a Assessment on that one way or the other I don't know anything about the the details of it, but I think it's highly unlikely I mean if we were listing probabilities I would have it down there as Denny Blair said the other day somewhere between zero and nil That the Pentagon would make a decision to land Marine aircraft on Taiwan deliberately to send a signal to China I Mean there are two elements of that. They're very unbelievable. One is that the Pentagon would do this on its own and The two the whole desire would be to send a signal to China that would be in some way stability inducing so That's how I look at that kind of issue In the in the in the case of the Taiwan Strait what kind of scenario as well There there are a variety of different types of scenarios and we didn't go into them in any in any detail if at all in this report Near term, of course the most obvious one that people point to is if you have a DPP victory in the upcoming Taiwan presidential election You have greater domestic support on Taiwan for a DPP platform of some kind The Taiwan certainly not going to declare independence any DPP president is not going to repeat the policies of Chun Shui-bian But you could get efforts to try to put the brake on Contacts across the Strait in various degrees that limit contact across the Strait that Make people think that Taiwan can transition away from the mainland that in turn makes the mainland think The gains that it has made in the past in strengthening cross-strait relations are being eroded in a significant way and That Taiwan and that the mainland needs to do something something about that and that that creates in itself some kind of tension I mean, that's you know all lots of vague words there, but it's it's that kind of general I think dynamic that's worst case near to medium term Longer term, I mean I've presented before the dangers that could emerge from a situation in which China has much more influence over Taiwan than it has today economically much more Political and social interaction across the Strait and a much stronger and more capable China in that near near close-in area Which is Taiwan and China begins to become more? It it it becomes less accepting of US arms sales to Taiwan. I mean, it's never been accepting of them, but it becomes Committed to the idea that it can deter those sorts of things and it and it tries to act to do that That I think could create a crisis in US China relations If a Chinese government came to that kind of conclusion that it for domestic reasons and other reasons It had to take that kind of position and the United States was not going to sell anything else Significant to Taiwan because that is obstructing the final phase of a movement towards a political settlement And and that kind of dynamic I think could be very very worrisome Thank you. Anybody else? Yes, ma'am. Yes, my name is Justina Zions. I am visiting scholar at GW Italian school But I work as a professor at the University of Warsaw and I would like to ask two questions The first one is about Russia. How do you perceive the Russians policy on the Russian role in in in the region Asia Pacific region taking into consideration especially, you know conflict in Ukraine and also the deterioration of relations between Russia and the West and and the second question is Did you take into consideration also the relations between US and China in different part of the world and its influence on the on the cooperation conflict in in in the region, I mean for example, you know the US and then and China in Latin America in Central Asia how it influence on the on the relation in Asia Pacific region Sure. Thank you Gosh, I guess that's me again Unless you want to answer Devin Well, you don't have to I'll let Michael say what consideration went into the Russia question in the report but I'll say that our our subjects Definitely kept Russia in mind in its broader role in the region and in particularly with regard to economic connections between Russia and China and energy security connections between Russia and China I Don't know about other broader regional trends bilaterally in other parts of the world But obviously central Asia is one of the most interesting ones and with the Shanghai cooperation Organization Central Asia was really one of the first areas where China began exploring new and different multilateral engagement in the 90s I mean one of the things though with the model the energy model we had for China's we did have to add that Russia China, you know gas Deal as part of the model because it had the potential to really you know shift aspects of energy resources and availability But that was something that we had to have after we built our model that We didn't look for any particular impacts on it But we thought it was a major enough impact on energy resources and availability that it was worth including I mean we have sections different sections in the report that cover different major states and Russia is in there In those four different chapters How domestic instability might in Russia might affect the Asia Pacific, you know tranny various types of national objectives, etc if We if I mean it again my own view if I try to step back from all that and say okay What was the sort of net net on that in in Russia's role? I would say we found it largely in the context of what cliff just alluded to which was the Dynamics and consequences of the growing economic relationship that has emerged between China and Russia and the The possibility that that could have an effect on the strategic calculations of the United States and other powers in the region But not so much the idea of Russia as a independent strategic actor in the Asia Pacific Even over the longer term We don't we don't Really emphasize the emergence or reemergence of Russia as a sort of classic security actor in the Far East In the Asia Pacific My own view is I think that's very unlikely But you know it wasn't a central part of the analysis I think in part because there was a general sense that Russia is not going to play that kind of that kind of role For reasons that have to do with limits on Russia's internal situation. It's demographics The basis for continued economic growth beyond the reliance on oil I mean all of those different factors that put major constraints on the Real influence of a Russian state far from home other than I mean the Russian Far East of course is in Asia But that's not what I would regard as a major source of Russian activity in Asia per se and it's I don't think likely to become one For a variety of reasons again having to do with development of the Far East area Population movements and all of that which we we do deal with in the report So if people are looking for like a big kind of like Russia is going to be looming on the horizon to really be a Decisive variable and influencing the region this report isn't going to help Any other questions yes, sir in the back. I'm mark wall. I'm Well, most recently at the with the University of Wyoming, but previously an advisor at the US Pacific Command You've already touched on this to some extent, but I'd like to hear you elaborate a bit more In the light of your analysis Of your report. How do you assess the arguments of of those who? Who maintain that the United States and China are basically on a on a collision course that we're headed toward a much more adversarial? relationship Relationship based on a strategic rivalry that that the logic of the system just makes that kind of outcome not only More likely, but maybe even inevitable. Do you have any thoughts on that? Oh, I got plenty of thoughts on The question is not belaboring with you with them all and not skewing the reports Observations The report certainly doesn't accept the idea that the US and China are fated to become strategic adversaries and I think it You know and and and there are some members of the of the group that are by no means you know kind of Liberal internationalist if you will one worlders About about politics international politics. I mean they're pretty hard-nosed realists and I think the the primary concern between the United States and China on the strategic level has to do with the Western Pacific and that area that I've already mentioned that 1500 nautical mile maybe two thousand off the Chinese coast and What what the relationship between the United States and China will be in that area how its Militaries will interact its paramilitaries which could be equally if not more important when you talk about territorial disputes Coastguards and other types of related agencies that interact and the impact of economic incentives to Avoid getting into very costly and debilitating competitions, I mean you have a mixed set of incentives there and Ultimately as we say in this report, it's not all negative. I mean they really do there are elements that Greatly greatly militate towards restraint In on the part of both the United States and China in dealing with a situation of arguably greater competition competition doesn't mean conflict and I think most people myself included believe that this competition is likely to get more intense over time But it doesn't by any means have to become zero-sum and deadly When you think about it, there are very few reasons why the United States and China Would have a logical reason to go to war. I Mean They're very very few Once you get past Taiwan You're you're into You know again the Denny Blair set between zero and no almost It's pretty low it has a lot to do with perceptions and how The different countries in the region and I think that's very important how other countries in the region look at the United States and China and their relationship and The more that can be done to avoid giving the impression that either or both sides are Increasingly competitive in a zero-sum way and particularly on the military side and are pressuring one another to take sides the better That's gonna requires a lot of deaf diplomacy. My own view is Again, this is my own view is that I think that absent a More clear-headed understanding about how the balance of power in Asia is changing And I mean clear-headed on both the part of the US and China I think we are going to see more tension than we've seen before. I Think we'll likely see more competition more uncertainty and Anticipating that and managing that so as to minimize it getting and reduce the chances of getting much worse I think it's going to be the primary challenge For both the United States and China and in some respects, they're not terribly well disposed To manage that effectively doesn't translate into war But there's a whole host of reasons why the US and China are not terribly well Disposed to manage that kind of intensifying competition. This sounds very very mealy mouth, doesn't it? But it's it's I don't I don't accept the idea that that these two great countries are fated to have to have an escalating Spiral of strategic competition that will enter into the military realm. I just the dynamics behind that I think are just so Negative they're so detrimental to the interests of both states that I think it is Unlikely but I do think they have to manage the change in the trend in the balance of power more effectively to avoid some of the Possible flash points like maritime issues like Taiwan like Korea becoming more serious over time Bert yes, you haven't said anything because I basically didn't allow you to say anything Now you can you can say something I think implicit in the report to answer your question is Is this issue about how China's economic development is likely to proceed and we are pretty? Convinced at least those of us that worked on it and then cleared it that China will grow in the high single digits into the 20s And then middle single digits into you know 2040 So that's a dramatic change in the standard of living of China a reduction in the kind of tensions that we're seeing From the combination of migration and preservation of subsidies in the cities That are partly responsible for a lot of what we're calling repression in the system itself So there's a this view that we have to be long-term Confrontational agents because we don't share the same values That underpinning of a prediction of long-term conflict could fade as China's economy changes in the tension sort of resolve and I think that's a very important issue the idea that we don't share the same values They don't share our Greek ideas of freedom And we see them as sort of an imperial Totalitarian entity. I think that will Soften a great deal over the next decades because of the economics that this report says are likely Bert's an optimist He's a realist. He's a he's an optimistic realist That's right. We're in the back. Hi. Thank you. My name is Arthur Lorde. I'm with DOD in the strategy office in OSD policy I wanted to thank you very much for this effort and presentation It seems like there's a lot of thoughtful analysis that went into the methodology as opposed to just opinions Which is what we often get I am really interested, you know and describing this as a net assessment a big component of net assessments is Understanding how other capitals view these factors not just internally Have you got any feedback even informally from Beijing Tokyo soul Southeast Asia and Oceania partners allies? And if so, what are their thoughts on your framework? findings and recommendations That's a very good question. I should have mentioned that part of the process of Research that went into this report the Carnegie report involved a trip to Beijing and a roundtable discussion at our Beijing Qinghua Center the Carnegie Center with a group of Chinese scholars military and civilian about the future and about different aspects of the future and I certainly don't want to speak on behalf of them and and their comments were not for public distribution But I guess I could say first of all we didn't have we hadn't completed the study So we were just exploring Different ways of thinking about the region long-term and these were some people who were more I think intellectually curious about those kinds of issues and I certainly didn't get a lot of pushback on The alternative types of futures that we that we laid out in the report in some detail So it it wasn't the case of you know, oh my gosh You're way off base and you need to do this or you need to do that. It was really talking about on the margins variations and emphasis on this or that that was not that real Significance now how much does that reflect actual thinking in the Chinese government? I mean that's really a very very hard thing to say This is all too new to get any response to the product This is just come out. I mean, I think was in bargain till last night so nobody has read any of this yet and Hopefully we will get some reactions. I can say that the earlier study that we did Northeast Asia US Japan Alliance and and China's rise Did get a lot of response From governments, not just US government, but also foreign governments They read it carefully They had questions There wasn't any kind of you know, oh, that's ridiculous sort of response, but then again Government's interlocutors in most cases will keep their cards rather close to their vests in Talking about things like long-term strategy and how the United States may or may not position itself So I think a lot of people who find these studies valuable are people within the governments who are doing the analytical work Perhaps people like yourself and others who are who are trying to get their arms around the dynamics of the region and They find this kind of way of sort of thinking more systematically through this longer term as being very useful to them because it makes the system more aware of certain Concepts and as I think Cliff said in his set up it in some cases it challenges group think challenges, you know habitual thinking and and that is really I think increasingly necessary In all the major capitals is to avoid getting into this group think about you know Well, we have a conventional wisdom or so far so good, you know If it ain't broken don't fix it that kind of attitude, which I think can be very dangerous over time And so if our reports help in opening people's minds in that regard And getting them to challenge their own assumptions, then then we'll have performed a major major function positive function. I think Let me add that in terms of the evaluation piece there was another element of the overall project that looked at narratives of You know regional conflict and cooperation across a broader spectrum of I guess what you would call Talking heads like us from around the Asia-Pacific region including a lot of Southeast Asia and Northeast Asia as well And in the development of our evaluation scenarios We did consider some of that feedback so to the degree that you think those folks are Suitable proxies for what their capitals are really thinking there was some of that involved in the evaluation component Yes, ma'am brief. Thank you. My name is Jeanine Wynn with voice of Vietnamese Americans I thank you for a very comprehensive study so would you discuss the conflict and cooperation of the Asia-Pacific U.S. and China in the Southeast Asia in Maritime disputes in economy and in the rule of law for the future Given the timeframe that you put forward five years ten years twenty five years thirty years now given that When you put out the model that you also put in the public opinions given the escalations of speedy of information transmit throughout the world and also the cyber space and the interfacing between You know China and many other countries U.S. in cyberspace domain and Outer space domain as well. Thank you Actually We we did take into consideration some of these new dynamics in the particularly in the chapter on domestic Stability and I can't make the exact title of that chapter We tried to look at the impact of information technologies social media the rise of a more self-aware and Worldly aware national publics in key nations in Asia as a force that is Driving some elements of nationalism public pride in some cases putting pressure on governments We dealt with that And we tried to assess how that might play out in a variety of different ways. I mean one one really critical aspect to Variable I guess aside from this what you call the structural variables like economic growth Per capita GNP defense spending levels resource Attributes and and acquisition that kind of thing demographics which are pretty, you know structural oriented types of factors We tried to look at things like the emergence of ultra nationalist leaderships. I mean We don't have in in in Asia today in many places what I would regard as really aggressive ultra nationalist leaderships There's there are some Some people of course say that China is very assertive today and Xi Jinping is much more assertive than his predecessors and in some ways I think that's true But China I would not regard as a kind of ultra nationalist government the way in which we define it in this report and We tried to assess how that type of government might emerge In various capitals and by the way it would not be necessarily limited to just China You could get governments like that in Japan. You could get governments like that. We wouldn't call it ultra nationalist But in the United States And you you know We tried to bring in what that might mean in in general ways, but again Not in any sort of predictive sense trying to understand how economics interacts with nationalism is one big element of that We tried to deal with the question of whether a a domestic society that is in greater unrest Domestic instability is going to be more or less assertive in foreign policy This is a big theme and looking at China there tends to be an assumption that a Domestically unstable China will be a more aggressive China externally and that is by no means a Set assumption that one should accept in my view. It's certainly not as grounded necessarily in history Yes, you've had assertive Chinese periods and yes They have coincided at times with domestic unrest, but it's a much more complex interaction than most people would think so that's kind of a long answer, but We did try and address those issues Yeah, and some as I say in the in in our model We did try to look at it although not in the details of any dimension of cyber security or social media that but we We said for internally for the for the population in that in that sense internally that being dissatisfied and sort of You know being dissatisfied was not enough It had to be that they that any of the parts of the population would have to express that dissatisfaction or act on it that would be a trigger that would cause something as a reaction that might Indicate something with tension so it just because they were communicating and saying that they were dissatisfied maybe as a parts of the Culture they had this sort of take action as a trigger for the model to respond to that so that you know We tried to consider it in some way And then another thing we tried to consider although we didn't know really how to do that was you know the sort of the cyber Activities that can get whether it's you know commercial cyber or military cyber because that's it's really hard to Judge the impacts and know where that's coming from because it can be such a global issue that we decided that that was something that was just going to be too hard to try to model in the sense of a You know some kind of a model to include in the system Although I do think it could be a very important and is an important aspect Anything to add Devin? We did look at some of those dynamics certainly the issue of cyber writ large and the sort of attendant issue of maintaining a Technological superiority on the part of the United States were things that our our subjects were interested in in their inputs And we did look at some of the dynamics that Michael just referred to with regard to increasing nationalism particularly in our scenario We looked at possible incumbent effects from increasing nationalism in but I The the specific details that we looked at are for official use only so My question has the first two part it has to do with the Southeast Asia economy given that the AI AIB bank is being established with a lot of potential connectivity in between Asia Pacific, but We learned that China's debt over GDP ratio is three hundred percent and that's a scary fact if the AII be bank is able to Potentially promising lending with our clear values clear set of transparent values Our governance to all these Southeast Asia countries and all the exploitation they could be how would that affect these Nations in the Southeast Asia only just so that we can see and also that has to do with the Maritime disputes as well as coercion applied to all that sovereignty of these nations and So there's a lot to talk about especially what China is doing with the building of Man-made islands in that area So how would that affect the rule of law the global rule of laws and China obviously is trying to establish its own rule of law So from what Dr. Swain said the maritime Landscape would be significantly changed in the next 10 years 20 years 30 years So given all that and with your well thought-out strategy May I ask for your personal view on on the questions I raised? How would that affect the Southeast Asian countries? economically Met sovereignty and most importantly they're available ability to develop a sustainable growth based on the rule of law Thank you. Well Bert Fortunately our economists just stepped into the room back into the room. There was there was a question from this lady Bert about the AIIB and the debt level within the Chinese government and Whether or not that would adversely affect the ability of that bank to function With the assumption being I guess that China would be providing the majority of the resources at the AIIB and Doesn't that present exposure for the countries that are would be receiving receiving Financing from the AIIB. I think that's what you meant. It was right in front of you there Bert. I'm sure it is now. No, okay well the Asian infrastructure Bank is Obviously going to be mostly funded by China. I Think the issue of deadness in China Is not a serious one If you look at the structure of the debt, it's mostly banks which are Pretty well funded. Even if you take the extreme non performing loan statistics very hard for them, even if they have to allow for those to find themselves in a loss because of Reserves they have to take for non-forming loans. You look at the non bank financial institutions They're about 15% of the deadness of the Chinese financial system so I think the idea that this bank will have trouble funding itself and is Given the structure of the Chinese financial system. It's government ownership The strong international financial position with China's reserve position and also the structure of their trade which continues to produce Surpluses not because of the exchange rate, but because of the assembly trade which is guaranteed to give you a surplus That the banking system and the financial system and writ large is in a very good position to support that kind of back And and the idea that then this would if it if that weren't the case that you would have problems for borrowers This is is a little Hard to turn around because once you've borrowed the money the problem is China's are they going to get repaid? So it's hardly An issue of concern if Vietnam or other Southeast Asian countries can get significant infrastructure Lending that the Chinese don't have the money to make more loans It's a question of then will Vietnam or Indonesia or Thailand repay those loans or in Central Asia, so I think it's It's a pool of foreign exchange That the Chinese are saying we And actually the Chinese use of a development bank themselves has been quite Counter-cyclical it's helped maintain demand in the Chinese economy, which is really the Crucible of technical change in my analysis. You have sustained high effective demand. You get a lot of technical change as well, so I think the picture of the Chinese if you look at the non-government Vehicles at the local level They're actually in pretty good shape even and they're not a huge part of the Chinese financial picture anyway So I would reassure you I think that the Chinese financial system is is quite robust at this point for supporting the infrastructure bank That they've launched on the on the rule of law issue in the South China Sea I mean that's a huge topic and we I don't know if we if I want to get into all that at this point in the report we dealt with these issues these maritime disputes in Part by connecting them into the forces driving nationalism as well as in some cases resource scarcity and we tried to analyze how they would drive these kinds of disputes over time and Then we also linked them in as potential triggers for the You know worsening security environment if they're mishandled that would move towards a more Cold War type situation And in our implications and recommendations in the report we listed a series of different types of Approaches particularly by the US government that we think would be advisable in dealing with these and we borrowed To some degree on a very excellent study That analyzes problem that was penned it actually next door at Brookings by Jeff Bader And also others not at Brookings Mike McDivitt former rear admiral Talking about the management of South China Sea Even though this was not you know an internal set of recommendations I thought it was important to mention that there were some valuable Comments made by others about this So, I mean, that's basically how we dealt with that issue As an example of a driver in the region that could become much worse Over time and that didn't assume necessarily that China had X objective that it was going to therefore try to Succeed in and produce a conflict or that of others it had more to do with the problems that we merge out of a Changing power distribution overall great greater levels of nationalism and social media awareness and Mismanagement if you don't have the right kind of CBMs and other things to manage this problem over time Which which I think could very well get More difficult to manage boy people are getting the second burst of energy here. I mean Okay, yeah, we're not the end of our time so we can keep going Yes, sir. My name is Vupanchu and I'm from American University And I understand you could not have possibly included all the countries in the Asia Pacific But my question is why these countries that you have included and I see from Southeast Asia There are only four countries included and you haven't included like Myanmar or Singapore or What are particular considerations in including some countries and excluding those what are those cut-off lines if you could explain? Thank you with a larger regional cut-off line was basically to be congruent with the pay-com what's called AOR Which is the area of responsibility? for the Pacific Command and That extends out to South Asia. It includes India, but not Pakistan. Don't ask and and And it extends all the way over to Conas to the continental United States So that was kind of like the larger aggregate nature of the region that we identified We didn't treat if you will smaller countries in the region in as much detail as we did the bigger countries On us because in a in a security oriented type of analysis that's trying to identify drivers of change over time those smaller countries other than allies and Tend to have second-order effects in my view They can be important and we brought them in in certain respects as for example ASEAN and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations as a whole as an entity which we looked at and we brought them in as possible participants in various sub regional economic interactions That are involved the Chinese the so-called Silk Road concepts Maritime and land-based Silk Road concepts economic corridors. We dealt with those But we did not view these Countries as themselves kind of independent actors as sort of security actors in the region and That in some ways, I think might give them short shrift in Respects, but I I think on balance. We got it just about right. It wasn't overly emphasizing or de-emphasizing any other Yes, ma'am right there in the orange jacket Thank you so much. Jennifer Chen correspondent with SCMG Question about a new clean program. We know agreement has just been reached on framework For the final deal on Iran your clear program today So what's the significance of it and how did you predict the US-China relations of it? Thanks We didn't on the on the Iran on the Iran question We somebody asked about this before about the impact of extra regional actions on This dynamic In terms of the Carnegie report, I don't know you guys can comment on if you if you did did things and brought in stuff from outside The region in the Carnegie report there wasn't a whole lot of that only in the sense of Talking about the possibility that certain types of very negative Occurrences in the Middle East could blow back on relations in in Asia because of a political fallout Diversion of attention the United States resources and attention to the Middle East even more than has been the case I mean it was that kind of thing more than it was anything else We didn't really talk about the nuclear proliferation issue beyond the Korean Peninsula as Outside of the region as being a critical driver within the region of the Asian security environment, I suppose we could do more Thinking about that on the Iran case Like frankly, I can't recall if we had any more detailed Analysis in there than that you guys have anything to comment on yeah We did not include Iran specifically in our scenarios at all But there's as Michael said there's some very simple fundamentals here with regard to stability in the Middle East It's good for energy security. It's good for the Silk Road Proposals, I think there's there's obviously a degree to which over the next 25 years China is going to be engaged in a much greater fashion In that part of the world if they want to continue pursuing some of their strategic objectives and Yeah, well Burt's just saying a Iranian oil sales to China so that that's certainly as I said the energy security thing is important so To the degree that a deal creates stability, I guess it will have an impact or instability conversely But I think you know probably too Far out from what the impact of the deal will be to say anything more than Cliff do you know from our perspective would look at it from again energy security energy resources And if they were driven to need to import more oil because of any internal activity then that may challenge them to say we need to get more protection of our sea lines of communication to Protect that oil so it just was something that might cause Some sort of tension or consideration, but it wasn't a direct effect It was and it could have been anywhere that we had said something like that would happen So but that kind of a variable was something that was considered. I mean just just parenthetically the oil factor was really a dynamic one in Trying to build it into our report because when we first started to do Analysis on this there wasn't such an assumption about cheap oil I mean Michael Herberg was doing estimates that we were relating in part to a hundred and sixty five dollars a barrel For oil. I mean we may we may see that world again But you know over the long stretch of this of this report But he had to quickly then reassess based upon much lower levels of oil Which you know implications for Russia for producers and consumers? It's a much more dynamic environment Then we went in on and thinking of it as being when we went in thank you My my name's Ken Lee from Chinese Embassy you are reported the title of report is Conflict and cooperation in Asia Pacific region that means in the future scenario there is possibility of both conflict and cooperation so in your analysis for and in order to push or in a direction of cooperation in your In your suggestion what US can do should do and what China should do thank you to To stimulate cooperation Well, I think we touched on it in some of the points that I made in my presentation the need to think hard about the long-term future and the required resources for sustaining interests defending interests how that relates to a dialogue the use of certain types of reassuring mechanisms CBMs and Others that both sides in the past have been very Restrained in using or they've been used very episodically These are all elements in how to strengthen cooperation Some of these things are being undertaken deepening of mill mill relations But to my mind the most important thing has to do with Developing a stable consistent set of interactions over time that emphasize the need for cooperation in certain areas and build in Incentives build in habits of cooperation that are hard to just throw out Because they they really are essential for for success in addressing a growing number of transnational issues in in between the United States and China and as you know in order to avoid the security competition from Going sort of becoming an overly Negative dynamic in the region. I think there does need to be some attention to how these hot spots Taiwan Korea the maritime disputes can be Diffused or their potential for creating confrontation can be reduced and we provide some recommendations about that in the report and I've written about this out in other places as well So there's not a clear-cut simple answer to this as I think you know But I think it has to be addressed on a multitude of fronts Bert you have a comment on this Just one example if you go to the top of page 87 in the report There's a quick mention of one possible development with North Korea that would be collaborative that could involve relaxation of commercial sanctions along with reforms That allowed North Korea to change more rapidly than otherwise would in a still divided peninsula scenario as a strong Possibility for quite not a strong possibility, but as one some people think a very weak possibility of for cooperation, but it is it's an idea It's in the report. Thank you. I mean I've just Devin go really quickly add to I think there's a There are I Completely concur with what Michael said and I'm now straying into entirely my own opinion here There are there are some Issues of institutional willpower that have to be addressed if you want to You know take the kind of steps that Michaels brought up I'll just talk about the US side of the bilateral relationship We've we have marched down a road since in the post Tiananmen era of creating legal structural rules frameworks particularly with regard to defense relationships that That mean that the kinds of decisions policy decisions about changing the framework of engagement or ensuring that You don't simply walk down a road of increasing Competitive military tension I have to come from the top. They really do meaning the President and The Congress and the Congress and the Congress. Yeah, I thought the Congress is in there. Yeah. Yeah, there are those other gentlemen and ladies Yeah, I mean it's interesting some of you may have been at a recent event that the Carnegie nonproliferation program put on where I was a moderator with Kevin Rudd former Australian Prime Minister Denny Blair former Commander of Pays of Command and Stabled in Roy former US ambassador to China and we're talking about US China strategic issues and at the end of the day It came a lot of it came back to the United States and The policies of the United States domestic with the political environment in the United States and the executive congressional relations and all of those factors that are acting in a variety of ways to In the best case make us policy less efficient and in the worst case create enormous problems And you know how did how to deal with that calls for you know greater greater efforts is you know I mean heard a lot in Washington, but apparently rarely does anything actually have us Yes, yeah, but it was just emphasizing. I mean the the agency factor of the United States is very important here There's there's little question about that the United States Is not a passive recipient of what goes on in Asia. Obviously it's shaping the environment in a very important ways I mean China will increasingly perform that role as well and Recognizing that it needs to do that in in a in a way that is conducive to stability is is I think an important element of All of this as well In the Chinese case my own view is that too often you have many Chinese who believe that because China's still a quote-unquote developing country that it is Not well positioned and should not undertake certain actions that could in fact be very stabilizing In the region and that sort of mindset. I think in China is changing Changing under Xi Jinping, but I think it has to happen even more so I mean an assertive China is not by definition a bad China depends a lot on What it's assertive about And how it's assertive and how it interacts with other countries in the region, but you all know this Thank you all. Thank you for coming. Thanks guys Listen So I have been working on the project with actually Support for the Chinese Foreign Ministry on the rise of China in Asian security. We have about three rounds of meetings and