Davos 2013 - The State of the World: A Strategic Assessment

good morning excellencies ladies gentlemen this is a session I was particularly looking forward to because dr. Kissinger it's such a special pleasure to welcome you back here to Davos and of course for me it's a special pleasure because I had C honor to meet you in the 60s when I was a student at Harvard University secession which we have today should become a kind of framework for our geopolitical discussions which we have here in Davos and it's entitled the state of the world a strategic assessment and I couldn't think of anybody better to provide us with the insights to understand what's really going on in the world I don't want to list only all your achievements as national security advisors a secretary of state as a professor what's much more important I think it's the influence which you have had on international politics over so many decades Henry your first trip to Davos States back to more than 30 years in 1980 you delivered actually the opening address of this annual meeting and it's very interesting I read again your your speech and you spoke at the time about the constantly changing world and I quote and CH of global interdependence you want of a delusion of confidence in classic economic models a challenge to the capitalist system but you also noted and I quote again a demobilization of socialist systems which no world have produces the satisfaction of human personality after we will have many discussions so next days on the geopolitical and geo-economic affairs your insights share search this morning will certainly be of a kind to enlighten us all so please welcome dr. Henry Kissinger dr. Kissinger we will learn this session as a dialogue and my first question to you we will look at all the different regions in the world but my first question starts with C region which is probably of utmost concern at this moment it's a Middle East submit least essential for global security essential for global energy supply we were all of great hope two years ago we see Arab Spring but now we see the whole region moving more to extremism you have three different kinds of Islam competing each reason azure sea saudi arabian sea iranian zip muslim brotherhood what what is your assessment and how worried do you feel about this development which we see in the aftermath of the Arab Spring but first let me thank you for your very friendly introduction and when I think back to the first my first visit to tabo's which was just a CEO meeting of maybe the two front roads and when I see it today it is a triumph of vision because there many CEO meetings but there's only one Davos and that's a tribute to Klaus the second point I want to make since you asked me probably about different regions of the world not realizing that I probably will take all the time with the first question I want to say a few sentences about how I look at the world because in the American public discussion there's often the argument should one look at the world from a realistic point of view or from an idealistic point of view I think that is a false dichotomy one has to begin with an assessment of the situation as it is if one cannot do that one cannot make any predictions about the future but one cannot rest on the situation as it is because what happens especially in times of turmoil it's the challenge of moving the world from where it is to where it has not yet been and that requires vision and idealism and my answer to all these questions will be characterized by that attitude now of course we really we could spend a whole hour on the Middle East and I'll confine myself to an analysis of the situation as it now appears the the middle eaves for one thing it's a system in which the states many of the states were artificially created at the end of the First World War so the borders of these countries were not chosen by historical evolution and by a shared national experience they were drawn by the victors of the first world war none of whom were middle-east countries for these strategic convenience of the countries concerned so therefore the nation as it exists in Europe and Asia has a different significance in the Middle East their acceptance in Iran and to a large extent in Egypt but the other borders are permeable secondly the Slovak religion that is professed by all these regions has in its history the notion of the unity of all religious believers and so therefore it makes the national borders it leads to those who believe in this principle much more transitory so it has emerged in that region the most current issue and the most urgent issue of nuclear proliferation in the case of Iran and a key element in this is that for 15 years remembers the permanent members of the Security Council have declared that a nuclear Iran is unacceptable but it has been approaching and so within a foreseeable future people having advanced that view will have to come to a determination of how to react or about the consequences of non-reaction or abandoning in substance this policy and I believe this point will be reached within a very foreseeable future force there is the competition that to which clouds referred of the various Islamic radicalism with each other sits there's the evolution of the Arab Spring which was greeted with enthusiasm by the outside world and was interpreted as the emergence of pluralistic democracy but has in fact reduced as the dominant party in every country political organizations that difficult to reconcile with pluralism and they have in their history affirmed a very Universalist position 613 the experience of Libya which the Western countries dealt with as an affirmation of high moral principle and those principles were accurate but they are now in the process of learning that every action had strategic consequences and that one Hemet just rules a part of the action and then abdicate from the remainder then there is the problem of Syria which it first was interpreted as a fight of democracy against the dictatorship but which has transformed itself into a conflict between various ethnic groups and in which the outside world finds itself in the position that if it intervened militarily it will be in the middle of a vast ethnic conflict and if it doesn't intervene militarily as I have searched it not to do it will be caught in a human humanitarian tragedy and so the outcomes that are conceivable there and I'm doing it purely analytically would be an asset staying in office a total Sunni victory over an emergence of a loose Federation of various ethnic groups each of which each of it has its own consequences as for the outside world to the degree that it competes with each other it makes the situation worse and so I have always advocated a russian-american understanding which would then probably be backed by all the other permanent members of the Security Council as it would step towards defining what the objectives then Derek see / now historic Palestinian problem and on the issue of the survival of Israel it is a strange situation in this sense that a consensus has developed in the world of a outcome but nobody has yet been able to determine how to get there and the element of uncertainty with respect to this is that it's a is how to get a negotiation started but also how to define it very much parameters and I would like to state a person of you in that connection the there's no doubt that any settlement will require significant sacrifices on the Israeli side from the position they now hold whatever the details of desert but I would like to appeal to thee Adam people present here that there has to be some reciprocity on the Arab side other than just declaring the word peace without defining it there has to be something that changes in their conduct other than uttering the word peace certain Creed arrangements so that Israel which now finds itself in the position of surrounded by absolutist Islamic states can justified to its own people that a peace that is emerging as some complete content and the final point is this of course it's an issue that has essentially organically internal dynamism but the relation of the outside powers to each other it's crucial in determining the volatility of the system and in that respect the changing energy patterns will produce a necessity of re-evaluating the strategic role of various countries in the region not as a question of choice but as a question of the inherent changing of various weights that emerge dr. kissinger if you look you you provided us with a comprehensive analysis now susan president / Obama has been reelected what our support see options he has I think everybody expects the United States to take a more active role in selection but wha what are actually supports the options which are open the President Obama for first of all I mean the audience knows that President Obama was not my first choice in in the last election but it should also know that I believe that foreign policy has to be nonpartisan and that I will do my best to support the policies unless a huge ideological objection will arise which I don't now the challenge we face is twofold first the United States has to draw some lessons from its recent experiences and from that point of view some of the previous involvement in the region in the military field will diminish and the capacity the willingness to intervene in local issues of balance will be altered the second is that when America learns the lesson that it is still probably the most powerful country in the world and certainly an indispensable country in preserving order it will redefine those things it can do but it will also learn to do better the things that remain for it to be done so I would expect that the administration will deal in its early period with achieving some clarity about its objectives of relating non-proliferation to delete so I would expect Iran to be I on the agenda the president has also repeatedly stated that he favors and resolution of the israeli-palestinian problem in the form of a two-state solution so I would again expect some activism in in that respect I have also already indicated that the Syrian problem would best be dealt with internationally by Russia and America not making it a contest of national interest now when I say I expect this is not it that rectified that it's my analytical expectation and I would hope that the undertaking of the United States and foreign policy will not be characterized by the divisions that have we have seen on domestic policy only I would like to come back to one issue because it's such a dangerous element in in global affairs I refer to the so-called red line which to which Prime Minister Netanyahu referred in his speech to the United Nations and what you said before we are get closer to the red line what kinds of world community do to a white said we slip into a kind of an wanted Pacioretty it one has to decide to say what one means by an Iranian nuclear capability at what level does one assess it to be so close to military option that it has to be dealt with as a military option and the second term is who should deal with it I believe unilateral action by Israel would be a desperation last resort so one should keep these negotiations a real chance and contact them flexibly but the Iranians have to understand that if they keep using the negotiations simply as a means to gain time to complete a nuclear program that the situation will become extremely dangerous because the consequences of an Iranian nuclear program will be that other countries in the region will be feel impelled to come to adopt similar programs that the credibility of the countries who have talked about unacceptability will be severely damaged and that if nuclear weapons keep spreading into regions where the technical sophistication with which they were handled during the Cold War period it's very difficult to implement a at broad range and where the political passions so great that we could then be approaching a point where nuclear weapons become almost conventional and totally some sort of nuclear conflict might arise that I believe would be a turning point in human history and so the if you should be a subject of intense negotiation over the next months under taken seriously by both sides and the possibilities of finding a solution one to the definition of what a nuclear capability is and secondly what its consequences are should then be explore seriously Florin that Iran should ask itself this question for the United States and I think for all Western countries there is no challenge to Iranian national identity or eyelid and any development if Iran acts as a nation and not as a revolutionary cause there is no reason for America or any other permanent member of the Security Council to be in conflict with it nor should there be for any regional country and on that basis I would hope that a negotiated solution will be found in a measurable now hangry when we talk about nuclear powers you have actually insulation you have Pakistan and the political situation in Pakistan is not the most stable one to to express it let's say diplomatically how much are you worried about about Pakistan in the long term in deep trouble when I leave it I have great respect for Pakistan in 1971 was accused of being too sympathetic I'm worried about Pakistan because the trends that I have described of Islamic fundamentalism are gaining ground and the difficulty of of establishing a civilian government has not been overcome partly because of the differences between the regions Pakistan has demonstrated enormous sophistication in developing nuclear weapons unexpectedly and could become a sort of religion in the region and the and when that happens then the issues with India and of Afghanistan but one should hope to achieve is if this first Pakistan Afghanistan is now being left under conditions which will produce a political vacuum and I believe it is imperative for the surrounding countries which of supports stuff is an enormous ly important part and Russia and China and India and Iran and India because it is so affected by to come up with some notion of how to prevent Afghanistan from becoming a center of disturbance in the region and in that context with Pakistan being given the respected plates in it and it being made clear to Pakistan that it's consider any concerns or understood it may turn out that that some progress can be made but I right now one has to say the challenge for Pakistan stability is of course in the first instance the Pakistan problem but also a will trouble and so risk fall from Afghanistan will it have a positive or negative effect the withdrawal from Afghanistan became a necessity in terms of the American situation and one of the lessons we have to learn it said our capacity to change domestic structures deep in other continents in far from the United States the may is not sustainable by American public opinion so I have understanding for the presidential decision to withdraw but one cannot act as if ten years of history leaves no requirements for a legacy and so I believe that it is necessary to create a political framework which we should encourage in which the surrounding countries addressed from challenge of how to prevent another terrorist center from being directed at surrounding countries which given the history could really be any of the surrounding countries I often use the example which is much simple defied in 1830 when Belgium became independent from the Netherlands the question was out what to do with what had been the battlefield for over a century between the European great powers and the idea was then developed of Belgian neutrality guaranteed by surrounding countries neutrality is not the word we are looking for here and it would be much more complex because we are not concerned with armies marching in and out but some concept like this ought to be elaborated by surrounding countries some of which had conflict with each other but which might unite on this and if that were established then Afghanistan could develop internally by its own rights own Maxim's and in this sense I the American military withdrawal which it's inevitable should be coupled with a political arrangement to prevent a same situation from realizing if return and this week of course has seen the 57th inaugural ceremony of US president and see us the United States was always known as as a country which was integrating people from all over the world and now says a bit concerned about polarization in the u.s. not only politics but also society do you feel a hand races is just a political phenomenon which will go away or do we have here deep fundamental societal change as far as the American population is concerned of course I'm an American who was integrated and I came to America not speaking English and it was from that point of view a very coherent society now I would say that polarization has a number of causes one it's the complexity of the issues that are involved I was on the board of a company that fell under some regulations and even if lawyers couldn't figure out what these regulations meant and they went to Washington and there any congressman who had voted had to refer to their stats so when the public finds when when documents are twenty five hundred pages long and out of such enormous consequence and the public has no possibility of understanding the issues about which the fight goes on this leads to a certain frustration with democracy on one side secondly debate political debates are now conducted in all countries but especially in the United it's moving democracy from an effort of persuasion to an effort of manipulation the great debates in England were addressed to individual voters at mass meetings where candidates debated the same in the United States in the debates prior to the Civil War and right after the new a New Deal now technicians are running 10 things files are kept of 40 million people in which it may be impossible that the headquarters of these campaigns know more about the total habits of the people that certainly their neighbors and maybe the families that introduces an element of rigidity into the system because it results in a statement that are geared to producing emotion the suet V even I the longest period I served was in the Nixon 4th period and we thought we had it pretty enough but at that time they were still a kind of Understanding between the Congress and the executive branch that on some key issues one could act on most of them in a United Way this is now much more precarious is it inevitable that this continues I'm worried about the way the debate is now evolving and of course there has been a democratic change in the United States and so that many of the new immigrants do not have the ties to Europe that there at the previous ancestors head so Peter all wanted some phenomena on the other hand at least the America that I see which may not be have all aspects it's still a country that believed in itself it is still a country where the government in the end will be able to have sacrifices of its people and the conditions that I have described are a challenge to our leaders they are not an organic necessity that needs to continue indefinitely but couldn't you coming back to your basic philosophy couldn't you say the u.s. becomes more and more a pragmatic realistic legalistic society missing see the normative value based the idealistic dimension and I think this dimension was so important to provide the us with credibility in international leadership now I think the idealistic element of America is inseparable from the American role in the world and you cannot justify foreign policy in America and long term simply by a balance of power approach or a purely mechanistic approach and indeed I would say that the that that is very significant element in the United States is distorting things for an excessively I wouldn't say idealistic approach but an excessively a more realistic approach I think the neoconservative element I would totally be that and then there are many people with whom I sympathize from my own experience who believed that America has a moral duty to intervene militarily wherever human rights are seriously violated that is a very significant element in the American debate the present debates are about finances and they of course have a major legalistic element but they will come down to unclutch in the name of what can America as sacrifices of its people it will have to ask sacrifices and I said it will act it works through the present process and so that it's really an idealistic made another vehicle is a debate but Henry if you were to last see the American people and you would ask for sacrifices to reduce at that load to brings the house in although what would you tell the American people in I do addressing that says immorality idealistic dimension of it you see the problem is that the mechanics of the mechanics of the presidential selection now means that candidates have to debate in ever in 50 states on the basis of local state issues and that the people who come out to vote in these primaries are the activists so the president's election system and this is I would apply that across the board I just the debate does not break before the American people a an appeal on general principles on the other hand I think that if the present debate continues in depth of its level some rebellion will arise I don't know what form it will take I'm no expert on domestic issues anyway I'm said saying that as a as an observer but I would predict that when it is resolved it will be resolved by separate merging to appeal to something higher that Eve purely financial issues that are not being good for only one of C most impressive books I have read and I have been probably 70 70 times in India in China over the last 35 years 34 years you see a book on China and see people speak now about the so called Chi 2 is really what metals in the world how do you see the evolution of us-chinese relations particularly now where you have a transformation of leadership in China and I should include into my question also see more assertive role which apparently Japan will play in this context the us-china relations plates now have will be in my view at least acquiring that wooden symbolic character for this reason they are the two countries that will be developing the most active economic relations around the world they will interact with each other everywhere they provide the classic example of an emerging country and the status quo country working out their coexistence and what history would teach one about this is that these countries will conduct them an increasing rivalry and that this will lead to constellations and to some kind of at least diplomatic conflict but I think also that we are living now in a world with this traditional pattern of which I've written a lot and which I understand very well where this traditional pattern has to be superseded there are issues like energy proliferate environment that can only be dealt with on a global basis if the United States and China fall into a Cold War pattern every country in the world will be asked two truths in some fashion will therefore be split in some fashion and at the end of this process one doesn't learn from history any achievement other than when countries like this had played out their roles like Germany and Italy the rest of Europe they face exactly the same problem with which they entered it so in that sense I believe it's a sign of American cooperation is extremely important and in a certain kind of and it close cooperation should be attempted but I don't think they should be a tree tool in which China and the US tried to run the world this has to be in the context of a broadening of the base of international cooperation away from the in which emerging in which countries like India Brazil the prett concept will play an increasing role the relationship between China and the United States will be inhibited to some extent but differences in culture China sinks most strategically America things smoke programmatically China has lived with a sense of constant danger from its neighbors America has never had neighbors that were an immediate threat to it both countries are now undergoing transformations domestically but that is the fundamental challenge of the relationship when you have said this you go into then you get to read to details the intention I would urge on both sides is of course being great powers they have to work on settling their disputes but they have to find something they can do jointly so that there is some experience of of both sides of Japan in this will play a key role being a major country in the reach Japan is undergoing a transition now from being primarily an economic country which was a natural result of the world war 2 to becoming more active in international affairs and sorting out in the Japanese way the various options in ads and one can see in Japan elements that want to continue the association with the United States which would have to be modified however by the qualifications I put on the American role in the earlier part of our discussion by others who are arguing even in the face of many storms for a closer association of japan which northeast asia blocked and a third group which would pursue a more national policy this japanese be paid is carried out in a manner that is more elusive and less problematic than debates are carried on in the United States and in other Western countries but it it has to be understood and when as also to understand the decision China met Japan makes in its absence will affect it be affected importantly by what kind of sign of American relationship will develop and by the attachment in Japan of how the various parts of the world really evolved anyway we are in a week were based also on the speech of Prime Minister Cameron who will join us any moment and the future of Europe is very much I would say debate it I don't say in question now how you are such a European specialist you you followed in depth see European history how would you define see ideal Europe in five to ten years from now one underlying problem it's the one I described also for the United States which is what sacrifices can be asked of the public's and the reason it's an underlying question it's because every country and this is also the American problem has to address its public expenditures in relation to its capabilities and it will also affect the evolution of Europe because the cohesion of Europe ended solution of its existing problems depends on the willingness to make sacrifices of the part first of the people immediately concerned but on the part of the other Europeans I would think as an observer the issued said it need to be solved it's the relationship between austerity and growth and to what extent necessary sacrifices may however do be hard to translate into growth because they go beyond the sustainability of the political systems and if there is no growth then the economic cohesion of Europe will suffer the second question is to what extent those countries that have the capacity to do so can't be asked indefinitely to pay their the burdens of helping the countries that have slipped into these difficulties and its answers to these two questions emerge to be negative which I'm not predicting that the question will be what happens to Europe and there I would say whatever happens the idea of European unity needs to be preserved and it may be that for a while and maybe for the next phase one has to shift from the great idea of the fifties and sixties which was to approach unity by economic instruction to approach in unity by political construction and I would not accept the proposition that if these other questions cannot be answered creatively that that has to be the end of Europe the Europe should be maintained as an idea even if the ideal solution does not emerge so if I if I understand you we have at the moment in the political discussions the conflict between euro per se economic unity or as a political unity so you would argue Europe has to bring his own its house in although but the endgame has to be superlative reunion such based on the historical process and such the only way how you are can enter by fair has the ingenuity that brought European economic unity to this point should now be transferred to the political field that may be it may be that for a while the political field has to be given a high priority and when we speak about Europe you would speak not only about the continent but you would I I would include I would include the UK of course such chef I seek such a great incision to the next session where our prime minister come on will will address us but I would like you always have been my mentor Henry and I think today you shared your insights with us let me just say we are very grateful for your presence because I know it was not easy for you to come to the States and to be back so I hope that you come we know all of your age but we wish you that we still and we wish us that we still have other opportunities to see you back in Davos thank you so much

Channel: World Economic Forum

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Keywords: world, economic, forum, WEF, Davos 2013, World Economic Forum

Id: KZh5cfJxHz4

Length: 56min 15sec (3375 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 12 2013