VIDEO AND PODCAST: The 2019-20 Bernard Brodie Lecture on the Conditions of Peace with Joseph Nye

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This year's lecture featured Joseph Nye, Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor and former Dean of the Kennedy School of Government.

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Duration: 01:04:51

Transcript

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good afternoon everyone welcome I'm Kal Raustiala I direct the UCLA Burkle

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Center for international relations and

it's a great pleasure to welcome all of

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you here today to our annual Bernard Brodie lecture on the conditions of peace

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the Brodie lecture was first given almost

40 years ago I think next year is

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actually the 40th anniversary of this

lecture since then we've had the honor

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of welcoming as Brody lecture as many

many interesting and distinguished

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foreign policy luminaries I'll just name

a few for context Secretary of Defense

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bill Perry President Jimmy Carter Prime

Minister of Japan Yasuhiro Nakasone a un

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secretary-general ban ki-moon ambassador

to Russia Mike McFaul and Los Angeles's

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own congressman Adam Schiff the Brody

lecture celebrates the memory of Bernard

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Brody as a famed teacher and scholar of

international relations and strategy and

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I've the great pleasure today of

welcoming to UCLA professor Joe Nye in a

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moment professor and I will get a proper

introduction

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but I'll just say a few words about how

we're going to conduct the lecture and

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then I'll invite Chancellor emeritus

Carnesale to introduce professor and I

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so professor now is gonna speak up here

for about 20 minutes or so then he and I

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are gonna take these two chairs if

you've been to this before you've seen

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this set up we'll talk for a little

while and then we'll open it up time

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permitting for questions from you

so they're a handheld microphones please

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raise your hands wait for me to call on

you and please keep your questions short

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and to the point so as as I mentioned

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Chancellor emeritus Carnesale will

introduce Joe Nye Chancellor Carnesale

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is a I would say a longtime friend of

the Buerkle Center but most importantly

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for today's purposes he's a long-term

friend of Joe Nye they work together

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at the Kennedy School where al was both

Dean and then Provost of Harvard they've

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done many many things together and so I

thought it was appropriate to have him

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do the welcome so please join me in

welcoming Chancellor Aparna South Thank

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You Kal it really is a pleasure to

introduce my friend longtime friend and

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colleague Joan I we were colleagues

well more than a couple of decades and

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friends for twice that long or a little

a little more I also want to welcome

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Molly Joe's wife hi Molly

Joe is a leading political scientist and

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that's understating it he's been named

the most influential scholar in

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international relations not a bad

background Princeton Rhodes Scholar

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Oxford Harvard ph.d Harvard faculty

immediately after the PhD now as you can

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see University Distinguished Service

professor emeritus at Harvard and the

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distinguished really does apply we think

of the university what it said about

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teaching research and service

Joe is distinguished in all three let me

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say a little bit about research and

scholarship the recent count is 14 books

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and well more than hundred 50 articles

remarkable depth and breadth so his

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areas of specialty areas in which I

would consider man most people consider

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them expert moral and political

philosophy political theory history

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international relations national

security politics

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real politics in the US and elsewhere

policy analysis and that combined with

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wisdom and judgment makes him a pretty

good scholar some examples of his work

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to give you an idea of the breadth not

by picking times I forgot to figure one

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book from each decade will give you one

idea pan-africanism an East African

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integration not what you would think of

first but it gives you an idea next

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decade transnational relations in world

politics next decade nuclear ethics so

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he's thought about these morality

questions before in the same decade I

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might mention he published a much more

important book called Hawks doves in

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owls an agenda for avoiding nuclear war

of which Graham Allison hi were

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co-authors

the joke and 90's is bound to lead the

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changing nature of American power in the

2000s the power game the subtitle is a

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Washington novel just to give you an

idea of the breadth it's a novel um

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2010 presidential leadership and the

creation of the American era and now

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this his most recent book just this year

do morals matter presidents and foreign

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policy from FDR to trump teaching a

devoted teacher and mentor undergraduate

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and graduate students his undergraduate

course and international relations was

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the most popular undergraduate course at

Harvard for a good while and to

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audiences beyond academia as well

service academic service many leadership

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roles Dean of the Kennedy School in

government important positions deputy to

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the Undersecretary of State for security

assistance science and technology that

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really meant in the Carter

Administration the guy that worried

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about nuclear proliferation and tried to

do something about it chair of the

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National Intelligence Council that's the

group that produces the National

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Intelligence Estimates the most

important big-picture Intelligence

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Estimates in the US and then assistant

secretary defense for international

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security affairs so he seeks it achieves

excellence in essentially everything he

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does research teaching and service

leadership intellectual and

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organisational awards too numerous to

mention as a colleague and friend as a

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fly fisherman and as a gardener nobody's

better as a matter of fact I must end

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this with one honest thing to let you

all know of the greatest failure in

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Joanie's life was trying to instill in

me the rudimentary skills required for

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fly-fishing now I'm willing to take

responsibility for his failure but it's

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a failure nonetheless so on that note

let me

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introduce and welcome the UCLA my friend

Joseph Nye thank you very much I'll for

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that excessively generous introduction I

should say that when I tried to take out

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fly-fishing and I was showing them how

to cast and it was a very windy day and

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my line kept getting caught on branches

at you know the wind would take it up

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and instead of landing on the water it

caught owl looks at me he says oh I get

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fish live in trees and more to the point

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is that generous introduction is often

countered by the fact that when our sons

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were younger and people would call the

house and say his doctor neither they

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would answer yes but he's not the useful

kind which is particularly relevant now

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with the problems of covent so forth but

it's a real honor for me to be here at

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UCLA and to deliver the Brody lecture

when I as a graduate student I read

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Bernhard Brody's books and we are trying

to make sense at that time what

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difference nuclear weapons were making

to the world we knew they were big we

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knew they made a huge difference but

thinking through what deterrence meant

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how you could have a safe system and so

forth Bernhard Brody was a real pioneer

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on that and his early work really has

stood this test of time

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many people who followed him who did

much more elaborate calculations really

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didn't go beyond some of the original

insights that that Brody had so it's an

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honor for me to be able to to give the

Brody lecture but and I'll come back to

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that in in a minute or two about when

you talk about nuclear weapons but I

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people ask me why which

at this stage write a book about morals

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and do morals matter and put a question

mark in the title and the answer is to a

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large extent because I don't think we do

a very good job of thinking about morals

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and foreign policy we we talk about it

but but don't do a very good job

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thinking about it and when I was

studying international politics or

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international relations the conventional

wisdom is Montano there was a danger at

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being moralistic you know Woodrow Wilson

was a negative effect in this view Hans

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Morgenthau George Kennan and others

argued that basically the danger for

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Americans was a moralistic tradition and

we were taught to just being realistic

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Ahsan the hard reality of things and not

to get not to get too concerned about

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morals and that was part of the way

people were trained and if you look at

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the literature Huw Google books on

morality and American foreign policy

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it's surprising there's very little work

that's done to actually think hard about

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it there's there ought there are lots of

criticisms there are a few books on it

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but it's as I mentioned the preface of

my new book it's not a career enhancing

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move for a young scholar but fortunately

I'm an old scholar so I can can't get

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away with it but the conventional wisdom

is that basically morality doesn't

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matter that interests bake the cake it's

all national interests that matters in

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fact I remember when I was in the State

Department talking to a French diplomat

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we were at some diplomatic event

relating to nuclear weapons and I said

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you know there's some really hard moral

issues here that we're wrestling with he

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said I don't worry about

morality at all he said the only thing I

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think is matters is the interests of

France and it I don't think it never

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occurred of what a profound moral

judgment he had just made but there is a

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great tendency of this so the

conventional wisdom has been interest

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baked the cake and then politicians come

around and they sprinkle a little moral

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icing on it to make it look pretty but

basically you know the icing is just for

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glorification it's really the interests

that bake the cake trouble with that is

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it seems to me it misses error

misrepresent what's actually happening

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in history so in this book what I've

tried to do is two things one I've tried

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to look at the 14 presidents since 1945

and look carefully at how they made

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certain decisions and ask the question

if you took the cynical view that morals

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don't matter

would you get history wrong and I think

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I've shown that indeed if you have that

cynical view you're gonna get history

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wrong you're not going to understand

what really happened and I'll give you

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example of that in a second the other

purpose of the book is okay if morals do

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matter how should we think about it and

in that part of the book I try to say

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here here's the criteria for a good

moral reasoning about foreign policy as

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opposed to cheap shots or easy ways out

of cop-outs if you want now on on the

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first issue or the first question did

morals matter in history were they

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actually an important ingredient of the

cake I suppose - icing sprinkled on it

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and this brings me back to Bernhard

Brody the best example of this I could I

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have in the book but there I think there

are many others but just the one I find

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most appropriate for a Brody lecture is

Harry Truman

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Harry Truman dropped atomic bombs on

Hiroshima and Nagasaki many people have

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condemned him for that and there was a

philosopher at Oxford who refused to go

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to the honorary degrees ceremony for

Harry Truman in 1948 and she said she

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would never attend the ceremony or

honors being given to a mass murderer

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and that when Truman dropped the atomic

bomb he was a mass murderer and so there

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is a tradition of saying you know Truman

is a villain because of this but it's

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also worth remembering that at that time

we didn't know much about atomic bombs

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we didn't know they're full of facts

they were very new and Truman came into

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this game kind of late all the major

decisions have been made by not only

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Franklin Roosevelt who kept who didn't

inform Truman on much of anything as

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vice president but also buying this vast

machinery of the Manhattan Project which

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was secret properly and making a set of

decisions that led to the preparation of

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the atomic weapon and it was a war in

which there'd been a breach of the

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traditional views that you didn't bomb

cities and kill civilians morality he

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had deteriorated badly in World War two

and so Truman gets into office and the

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question put to him is will we go ahead

with this and his answer is yes and he

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says in his memoirs I didn't lose much

sleep over it you know I think of the

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number of American lives that would be

lost if I didn't go ahead with these

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bombs he said no I you know this this

was not a hard decision and Truman it

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was described by general groves who was

the head of the Atomic Energy Commission

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or discern sorry yet that before the

atomic entry head of the Manhattan

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Project which later evolved and the

Truman who was described by groves as

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being like a boy who was put on the back

of a toboggan which is already heading

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downhill in principle he could have

fallen off or he could have stopped he

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could have tried to stop it legally he

had the authority to stop it but you

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know in reality there wasn't very much

that he could do and this is why he said

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he didn't lose any sleep over it but

let's take the story a few steps further

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the United States had three bombs and a

third bomb had been forward base to

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Tinian to be dropped a week later after

Nagasaki and Truman said no you may not

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drop a third bomb and he said I'm not

going to kill any more women and

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children which is a very interesting

quick moral response to what we learned

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about the evidence of atomic weapons on

civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and

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even more important is to fast forward

five years to 1950 when the Americans

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were losing the Korean War China had

crossed the Yalu River was pushing

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American forces down to the tail or

bottom of the peninsula and it looked

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very much as though we were going to

lose Truman was advised that if we lost

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or stalemated the war it would destroy

his presidency his chances of running

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for election again re-election in 1952

would be destroyed and Truman said no

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I'm not going to do it General MacArthur

came to him who was then the commander

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the Far Eastern theater MacArthur said

if you allow me to drop 25 to 40 atomic

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bombs on Chinese cities Oh

win this war for you and Truman again

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said no I'm not gonna kill that many

women and children that was quite an

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extraordinary moral decision notice

something which Thomas Schelling the

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Nobel laureate who in his Nobel laureate

lecture said the nuclear taboo was one

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of the most important decisions that was

taken in the last 75 years and if Truman

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had decided that differently if he had

treated nuclear weapons as normal war

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fighting weapons as opposed to weapons

which were used for deterrence only the

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world that we live in today would look

very very different and in that sense if

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you treat morality justice icing

sprinkled on the cake you got history

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wrong

Truman's moral views that he was not

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going to save his political skin or

interpret the American national interest

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as involving this destruction of women

and children that was a profound

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importance in terms of the way history

evolved it wasn't just icing it won as

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the was one of the key ingredients in

the cake and I think it's appropriate to

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recall that in a Bernhard Brody lecture

because this was what Brody wrestled

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with so I would submit that in the title

of my book do morals matter with a

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question mark perhaps it's not

surprising that I conclude the answer is

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yes morals do matter but the more

important question is okay the matter

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how you think about them and as you try

to deal with this you realize that very

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often we talk in about moral issues in

foreign policy but we do in a very

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shallow way for example there is the

tradition of American accept

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we Americans think ourselves as a moral

people therefore we do it it's good well

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you know that's quite a non sequitur or

we'll say if it turned out all right

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it's good that's also a non sequitur or

people will say if our intentions are

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good then it's good which is also a non

sequitur let me give you a concrete

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example of that and the invasion of Iraq

in 2003 if you look at George W Bush

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Bush 43 as he sometimes called people

ask you know where his intentions good

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some people doubt it they say Bush lied

and boys died I don't that's true the

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general consensus in intelligence

communities not just in the US but

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around the world was that Saddam Hussein

had weapons of mass destruction

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I think Bush believed that and I also

believe that if you could convert Iraq

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into a democracy you could maybe get at

the roots of terrorism so in that sense

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some of his defenders have said he was

moral innovating Iraq ari fleischer his

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press secretary said you have to admire

Bush's moral clarity he had a freedom

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agenda and whether it worked or not

doesn't matter

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he had this freedom agenda and it

therefore he was moral and what he did

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I find that extraordinarily shallow

moral thinking to just judge by

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attentions and I've argued that you

really need to think in three dimensions

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to have good moral appraisal or moral

reasoning you have to think of

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intentions and motives you have to think

of the beans and you have to think of

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the consequences so I call that 3d

and something like Fleischer's Comet

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that it was good intentions is just not

that's one third of the 3d if you want

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it's not adequate moral reasoning I

sometimes use is homely example which is

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in the book which is imagine that your

child is out at a high school dance but

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she has SATs tomorrow morning and

Frances I'll bring her home but get her

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home early

don't worry and picks her up the dance

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doesn't notice that it's rain the road

is slick and wet drives 80 miles an hour

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skids off the road hits a tree and your

child is killed would you say oh that's

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okay you had good intentions of course

not you would have said inappropriate

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means and failure to think through

unintended consequences which could be

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highly immoral and that I think is

pretty much what happened in Iraq even

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if you grant Bush the benefit of the

doubt on his intentions in terms of the

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means he did not have the means to

accomplish them there were many studies

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done in the State Department and in the

intelligence agencies that showed that

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you couldn't really we didn't have the

means to reconstruct Iraq properly we

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couldn't bring democracy to Iraq and

what Bush and the White House did was

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shut that all aside it didn't pay any

attention to it it went ahead anyway and

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then if you ask about the consequences

the consequences of Bush's actions were

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that you stimulated a civil war between

Sunni and Shia in Iraq and you laid the

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basis for a strengthening of al Qaeda in

Iraq which later became Isis the Islamic

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state was who had horrible Khan

sequences so you could argue that

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there's quite similarity between my

little road accident and this complex

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international relations but in analyzing

each of them we want to think in three

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dimensions we one don't want to settle

just for good intentions therefore

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that's a moral act so I think the the

key in terms of thinking about morality

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and foreign policy is to make sure that

we don't take the easy way out we don't

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do just one dimension but think of all

three and I'm not the first to think

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about this this actually has a long

tradition which goes back to just war

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theory remember st. Augustine in the

fourth century it was wrestling with the

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dilemma that as the Roman Empire decayed

and there was increasing disorder and

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increasing violence what should he do

about thou shalt not kill and his

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dilemma was if the good didn't kill in

self-defense then evil would prevail and

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the good would vanish from the earth so

he developed the view that killing in

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self-defense was morally acceptable but

if the self-defense wasn't there then

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there was no justification so that if

somebody was about to attack you you

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could use your force to kill them but if

they drop their sword or their gun or

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whatever and stop threatening your life

and put their hands up

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you no longer could kill them there was

no longer imminent self-defense and that

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developed over the centuries to be a

doctrine which is enshrined in

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international humanitarian law the

Geneva Conventions and in the US Code

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Uniform Code of Military Justice

so it's been secularized and adopted and

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in the basic premises of Just War theory

you have you have to have all three

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dimensions as I mentioned you have to

have just cause you have to have means

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which make distinctions between

combatants and non-combatants you have

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to have proportionality in the means you

can't just kill wanton way for it self

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defense and you also in terms of

consequences you have to have a

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reasonable prospect of success those

three dimensions which really come down

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to us over the centuries are pretty good

initial framework for how we should be

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thinking about morality in international

politics now life is always more complex

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than in any formula but I would argue

that it's a good framework to start with

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now it becomes more complex for example

when we talk about good intentions you

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have to realize that the stated

intention is that most political leaders

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are going to tell you are going to be

good that's how they get elected they're

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not going to say I'm about to go and do

evil the interesting question is do they

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have the emotional stability emotional

IQ to prevent their emotional needs from

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distorting their attentions so that

their motives are in line with the

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intent stated intentions an example of

this would be in Vietnam both Jack

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Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson their stated

intention was to save South Vietnamese

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from totalitarian communism imposed by

the north but their motives turned out

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to be slightly different because of

their different emotional needs McGeorge

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Bundy who was a hawk on Vietnam and who

advised both

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Kennedy and Johnson said later in life

after he'd retired he's asked what would

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Kennedy have done if he had not been

assassinated Bundy said Kennedy probably

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would have been reelected and would have

got out and he said the reason is that

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Kennedy wanted to be seen as smart

Johnson of course did something very

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different

he sent five hundred sixty-five thousand

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American combat troops into Vietnam

which ultimately led to 58,000 American

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deaths even though he knew that the war

was not going well and as he put it it

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was interfering with what he really

loved which was the Great Society and

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his one point he says that bitch of a

war is interfering with the woman I

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loved the Great Society and yet he went

ahead anyway and the reason according to

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Bundy in tarns and others who study this

is Johnson emotionally having grown up

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in Texas and being worried about being

seen as botch oh and his father's image

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Johnson was most afraid of being seen as

a coward and he felt that if he was the

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man who lost Vietnam he would be seen as

a coward so even though the stated

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intentions of Kennedy and Johnson were

the same they're different emotional

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needs twisted their motives into

something which was quite different in

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terms of its consequences so we have a

we have to realize that there are many

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nuances as we think about votives means

and consequences on consequences there's

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also some very important differences

which you get into in terms of the the

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context of the decision and how much you

can know with any complex social

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phenomena and particularly foreign

policy which deals with the events

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international nature there are many all

sorts of unintended consequences and so

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how should we judge somebody if there

are unintended consequences should we

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say well nice try but you didn't get it

but that's okay you get a bye on this

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round

probably not I think what we would say

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is how good was your contextual IQ how

good was your ability to think through

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and make major efforts to assess on

possibility of unintended consequences

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to assess risk so and that is where the

hardest kinds of calls are made for

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example if you look at unintended

consequences I and go back to my example

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of Bush 43 in Iraq the fault I think for

Bush was he didn't understand much about

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International Affairs unlike his father

who I great very highly in my book

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because he had extraordinary knowledge

of internationally or as the younger

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Bush didn't understand a lot about

international affairs and he didn't make

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the effort that he needed to learn well

or see he didn't you should not have

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discarded all those State Department

studies which was done partly out of

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bureaucratic politics his intentions

let's assume they were moral the moral

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intentions led him to inappropriate

means and a failure to think carefully

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and clearly about the prospect of

unintended consequences which could be

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highly immoral and when we look at that

we can say yes everybody is likely to

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suffer unintended consequences at some

point but did they make a major good

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faith effort to anticipate that and to

assess the risks of it and in law we

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call that due diligence

others if you have done due diligence

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you get a bye for having at least made

that every day and if you haven't done

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due diligence then we call that in law

culpable negligence and I think the same

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goes for the issues of moral judgments

about consequences which is did the

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decision-maker do due diligence and if

not was it culpable negligence now there

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are some cases that always turn out more

difficult than that Henry Kissinger once

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said that the interesting thing is that

most issues of international morality

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wind up in the sort of the range between

51 and 49 percent when you balance and

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wait the motives means and consequences

you have to make adjustments and you

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often get a lot of things that come out

to narrow margins but at least if you

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have a framework you're not going to

have the sort of cheap and easy cop-out

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because we did it it's good or because

it turned out right it's okay or because

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we had good stated intentions everything

is moral and what I've tried to do in

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the book is demonstrate not only that

morals matter and if you deny that

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you're gonna get history wrong but if

they matter we've got to do a better job

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of thinking of them in all three

dimensions and realizing that these easy

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cop-outs are not sufficient one final

word I'll say before ending and having

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our conversation cow is when you assess

consequences you don't just take the

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consequences of the particular action

you have to think of the consequences

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for the system as a whole and future

actions philosophers sometimes call is

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the difference between act utilitarian

and rule utilitarian if I'm an act

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utilitarian I look at

particular action and I say was this the

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greatest good for the greatest number in

this act and you know that's one way to

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do it but suppose if I do a decision

this way in this particular act I break

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a set of rules or institutions that will

affect all future actions don't I have

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to calculate the consequences of that as

I make my decision that's a rule

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utilitarian as opposed to an act

utilitarian a lot of what we're seeing

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today is to discount the effect of

breaking rules and destroying

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institutions a lot of what we're seeing

is essentially very short run Act

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utilitarian transactional approaches and

I think that's a mistake I think there

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is a conventional wisdom that

international politics because there's

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no higher law or higher government to

enforce the law is like the game of

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prisoner's dilemma which there's a great

incentive for prisoners who are caught

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by the police to squeal on each other

essentially to cheat on each other to

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defect and that's often the model is in

Chapter one of the textbooks but there's

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a political scientist at University of

Michigan Robert Axelrod who did a

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computer tournament and he said to a

group all right we're gonna play this

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game not once but many many times

together and whereas if you play this

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game once there's a strong incentive to

cheat but if you play it again and again

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and again you find that the optimal

strategy is to have reciprocity what he

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called tit-for-tat you cheat on round

one I'll cheat on you round two you can

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cooperate I'll cooperate and so forth

and what Axelrod found was that this

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expectation that the game was going to

go on created what he called a long

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shadow

of the future and institutions and rules

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and norms create a long shadow of the

future and that's what bothers me about

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some of the ways in which we're

approaching foreign policy today we're

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discounting institutions and discounting

that long shadow of the future and the

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net result of that is I think we're

selling our own future short the I think

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the better better for for how to think

about morality and foreign policy is

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that used by George Shultz who was

Reagan's Secretary of State

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we should had better to think of foreign

policy is like gardening you cultivate

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you trim you we you you proceed but

you're playing this for a long range and

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that's very different from a

transactional approach which says each

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of these operations like a real estate

deal I win you lose this zero-sum and

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then we go on to the next deal in the

next deal the next deal I think that

377

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this whole question of thinking of

morals has to think not just of act

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utilitarian each transaction but a rule

utilitarian which includes the long

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shadow of future and these international

institutions do create that long shadow

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of the future and that essentially

allows for greater range for morality in

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foreign policy so I would submit that

yes morals matter in foreign policy if

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you don't believe that you're going to

get history wrong and that if you accept

383

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it you have to accept it in terms of

thinking of all three dimensions of

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morality motives means and consequences

and include in the consequences

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institutions and oral frameworks as well

as the particular actions so let me end

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there and turn to our conversation all

right well thank you so much for for

387

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coming out and for that lecture

so I thought what we could start with a

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couple of questions were based on your

your book and your your remarks tonight

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and then maybe open it up a little bit

MMN to the audience so so maybe first

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thing on the case for morals mattering I

had understood Morgenthau and others as

391

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making a normative critique that

Americans traditionally focused too much

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on morals or at least at that time did

in our foreign policy and that that led

393

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to mistakes and I think you made a

pretty convincing case that it also

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leads to a miss read of history but it

doesn't necessarily answer the question

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of whether we ought to be focusing on

morals so can you speak to that a little

396

00:40:27,320 --> 00:40:33,830

bit is that something that we should be

doing why I think the the conventional

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00:40:33,830 --> 00:40:41,870

wisdom in the period after World War two

that Morgenthau ave georgetown and made

398

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the same points was that we had gone

through a very moralistic period under

399

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Woodrow Wilson Wilson wanted to create a

League of Nations didn't have the

400

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capacity or the means to do it

and in the process of trying had

401

00:40:55,940 --> 00:41:01,490

terrible consequences because it failed

and they led to an isolationist reaction

402

00:41:01,490 --> 00:41:04,130

against it

so I think with what Morgenthau and

403

00:41:04,130 --> 00:41:10,820

Kenan and their generation of post-war

intellectuals were trying to do was

404

00:41:10,820 --> 00:41:16,250

protect us against the mistakes of World

War one and it's aftermath and

405

00:41:16,250 --> 00:41:20,960

particularly the isolationism of the 30s

and I think I grew that I think they're

406

00:41:20,960 --> 00:41:26,210

right I mean they if you are too

moralistic and don't have the means to

407

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carry it out you can have terrible

consequences which is my little example

408

00:41:30,650 --> 00:41:38,930

the road accidental Iraq but it is

interesting to me that and essentially

409

00:41:38,930 --> 00:41:46,190

they overdid it George Kennan who wrote

a classic work called American diplomacy

410

00:41:46,190 --> 00:41:53,450

in 1950 which was highly critical

Woodrow Wilson by the late 1980s Kenan

411

00:41:53,450 --> 00:42:00,710

said you know I've revised my opinion of

Wilson maybe he wasn't quite so bad

412

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for all so I I think I agree with their

premise but I think they overdid it so

413

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let me ask you about those specifics of

the president so you talk about 14

414

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presidents in the book maybe give us a

sense of one or two surprises that you

415

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found things you didn't expect you sort

of alluded to one which is the Bush 41

416

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that you've you've evaluate him quite

highly in the book and you didn't

417

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necessarily expect that but are there

others that you want to point out well

418

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it's interesting that Bush 41 I had

spent a good part of 1988 trying to

419

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prevent it being president obviously not

very effectively and I had to in as a

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00:42:45,710 --> 00:42:55,359

story in there analysts say you know I

was wrong and so I think Bush 41 was

421

00:42:55,359 --> 00:43:01,550

extraordinary in the sense that he had a

great emotional intelligence remember

422

00:43:01,550 --> 00:43:06,980

when people said to him celebrate these

fall of the wall he said I'm not going

423

00:43:06,980 --> 00:43:12,380

to dance on the wall I've got to deal

with Gorbachev so he resisted the the

424

00:43:12,380 --> 00:43:19,400

braggadocio temptation and he also had

great contextual intelligence the

425

00:43:19,400 --> 00:43:25,640

questions of how do you end a cold war

with Germany inside NATO and not a shot

426

00:43:25,640 --> 00:43:32,720

being far fired required extraordinary

understanding of the nuances of

427

00:43:32,720 --> 00:43:38,690

international politics so that's that's

why I revised my opinion on but there

428

00:43:38,690 --> 00:43:45,440

there are others that I also revised my

opinion on I was much more critical

429

00:43:45,440 --> 00:43:51,520

Truman frankly before I started doing

the more detailed research on his

430

00:43:51,520 --> 00:43:58,490

positions on nuclear weapons and the

other problems when you look more

carefully at Nixon's foreign policy he

462

00:47:07,120 --> 00:47:14,920

did a lousy job on foreign economic

policy he basically didn't care about it

463

00:47:14,920 --> 00:47:24,120

and what it led to was an unleashing of

a rampant inflation which led to major

464

00:47:24,120 --> 00:47:29,980

problems in the international system as

well as the American economy in addition

465

00:47:29,980 --> 00:47:38,440

to that there's a whole question of how

he left Vietnam in when Nixon came into

466

00:47:38,440 --> 00:47:47,560

office in 69 he and Kissinger did an

assessment of what were the prospects

467

00:47:47,560 --> 00:47:54,640

for winning the Vietnam War and decided

it was unwinnable and the question is

468

00:47:54,640 --> 00:47:59,470

what do you do there were people like

Senator Aiken of Vermont who were saying

469

00:47:59,470 --> 00:48:06,630

declare victory and get out and centered

Russell of Georgia that a similar view

470

00:48:06,630 --> 00:48:12,970

Nixon and Kissinger said no we have to

have a decent interval between when we

471

00:48:12,970 --> 00:48:22,060

leave and when the North takes over and

that term decent interval led us to

472

00:48:22,060 --> 00:48:29,410

continue fighting and it cost twenty two

thousand American lives and in the end

473

00:48:29,410 --> 00:48:36,640

the time between when we signed a peace

accord with the North Vietnamese and

474

00:48:36,640 --> 00:48:43,060

when the north of these took over Saigon

turned out to be two two years and that

475

00:48:43,060 --> 00:48:50,110

is about 10,000 American lives a year is

that the right trade-off I mean he did

476

00:48:50,110 --> 00:48:55,660

it for credibility in our overall

foreign policy it's not clear that that

477

00:48:55,660 --> 00:49:01,720

was necessary I mean there may have been

alternatives so I the idea that Nixon

478

00:49:01,720 --> 00:49:07,060

was a foreign policy genius I give him

full credit for the opening to China but

479

00:49:07,060 --> 00:49:11,890

as the more I looked at this a more I

said that the foreign economic policy

480

00:49:11,890 --> 00:49:21,130

was a mess and that the policy on

Vietnam was marginal the framework that

481

00:49:21,130 --> 00:49:25,540

you laid out in your remarks would you

apply that generally to questions of

482

00:49:25,540 --> 00:49:28,510

morality I guess another way to put the

question is what's distinctive about

483

00:49:28,510 --> 00:49:32,470

foreign policy when we're thinking in

Walter well I think you can I mean this

484

00:49:32,470 --> 00:49:37,870

is why I use this simplistic example of

the road accident you you can apply to

485

00:49:37,870 --> 00:49:42,880

anything and morality I think what's

different in foreign policy is the

486

00:49:42,880 --> 00:49:50,110

complexity of the situation if you if

you think about foreign policy the it

487

00:49:50,110 --> 00:49:53,410

with so many different countries

different cultures different power

488

00:49:53,410 --> 00:49:59,590

structures changing context the prospect

of unintended consequences going to be

489

00:49:59,590 --> 00:50:07,360

much higher and it's harder than to

think through the risks so the due

490

00:50:07,360 --> 00:50:16,650

diligence is a tougher job and I think

in that sense a foreign policy is the

491

00:50:16,650 --> 00:50:20,830

framework can be applied to anything but

I think it's tougher in foreign policy

492

00:50:20,830 --> 00:50:26,410

because of the difficulty of doing the

due diligence about unintended

493

00:50:26,410 --> 00:50:31,600

consequences does that suggest greater

caution because we have adversaries in

494

00:50:31,600 --> 00:50:35,670

the foreign policy and texts and those

adversaries are going to react maybe

495

00:50:35,670 --> 00:50:40,680

well it does

does suggest that caution and prudence

496

00:50:40,680 --> 00:50:47,670

are more than instrumental virtue in

foreign policy it means that the

497

00:50:47,670 --> 00:50:53,550

prudence is you know it's there's

something like a Hippocratic oath and

498

00:50:53,550 --> 00:51:00,060

foreign policy first do no harm

doesn't mean do nothing but it does mean

499

00:51:00,060 --> 00:51:09,540

that err on the side of being awfully

cautious you know be careful before you

500

00:51:09,540 --> 00:51:16,980

unleash the dogs of war and so it does

lead to a greater emphasis on prudence

501

00:51:16,980 --> 00:51:22,080

and now you could argue that our time

when prudence is inappropriate

502

00:51:22,080 --> 00:51:31,140

you know Chamberlain and after Munich

should vote her not as prudent so if

503

00:51:31,140 --> 00:51:35,430

you're faced with a Hitler and you know

it's a Hitler and you can you can

504

00:51:35,430 --> 00:51:39,720

understand some of the likely

consequences of not standing up to

505

00:51:39,720 --> 00:51:44,730

Hitler then prudence is not a virtue but

on the other hand if you're dealing with

506

00:51:44,730 --> 00:51:53,640

a very complex situation such as Libya

in 2011 maybe you ought to be more

507

00:51:53,640 --> 00:51:58,770

prudent than we were I mean what we did

was use military force to prevent

508

00:51:58,770 --> 00:52:05,970

Qadhafi from destroying or killing

civilians in Benghazi but we hadn't

509

00:52:05,970 --> 00:52:09,660

thought through the fact whether the

Europeans were up to their part of it

510

00:52:09,660 --> 00:52:16,890

what did you do if after you've

protected the civilians in Benghazi what

511

00:52:16,890 --> 00:52:22,980

did you do about Qaddafi and if you

allow the mission to morph into regime

512

00:52:22,980 --> 00:52:29,910

change and you left chaos did you have a

plan for let's say a massive UN

513

00:52:29,910 --> 00:52:34,230

peacekeeping operation or something to

stabilize situation none of that

514

00:52:34,230 --> 00:52:41,040

occurred and the net effect of that was

in an unintended consequences was that

515

00:52:41,040 --> 00:52:47,040

when we tried to do something about

Syria the Russians and the Chinese would

516

00:52:47,040 --> 00:52:52,190

veto every UN resolution we

tried to pass to get some action on

517

00:52:52,190 --> 00:52:59,150

Syria and they said it's because look at

what you the mess you made in Libya so

518

00:52:59,150 --> 00:53:08,750

in addition to the mess that's in Libya

today there's the contribution to the

519

00:53:08,750 --> 00:53:17,990

mess in in Syria so I think in that

sense you know the prudence it's hard I

520

00:53:17,990 --> 00:53:27,470

mean Obama in in his various interviews

and retrospective has said that said I

521

00:53:27,470 --> 00:53:31,280

intervened in Libya

I didn't intervene in Syria and I'm

522

00:53:31,280 --> 00:53:36,410

criticized for both but there may be

more of a connection between the two it

523

00:53:36,410 --> 00:53:41,300

does seem like the the last 20 years

it's hard to assess the mood of a nation

524

00:53:41,300 --> 00:53:47,150

like ours but the last 20 years have led

to a time in which is increasing concern

525

00:53:47,150 --> 00:53:50,780

about the day after problem and a lot of

questioning of things that I think were

526

00:53:50,780 --> 00:53:57,530

viewed as at the time maybe reasonable

choices now seem imprudent because we

527

00:53:57,530 --> 00:54:03,620

couldn't deal with the aftermath of

racism but well it's a good example this

528

00:54:03,620 --> 00:54:13,580

is the current situation in Afghanistan

after the Taliban hosted al Qaeda and al

529

00:54:13,580 --> 00:54:21,730

Qaeda then planned and bounded attacks

on us from their bases in Afghanistan

530

00:54:22,030 --> 00:54:33,310

the question of should we have gone in

as we did had defeated al Qaeda and

531

00:54:33,310 --> 00:54:38,750

basically driven them out of or some

people would say not driven out loud

532

00:54:38,750 --> 00:54:46,070

that escape from Afghanistan but

essentially in early 2002

533

00:54:46,070 --> 00:54:51,500

should we have said you've done what you

needed to do is a basic minimum now

534

00:54:51,500 --> 00:54:58,160

withdraw or should we have stayed and

tried to construct an effective Afghan

535

00:54:58,160 --> 00:55:06,630

state and we have not done that

effectively and it's lasted there what

536

00:55:06,630 --> 00:55:10,620

is the saying that there young men

fighting in Afghanistan today who

537

00:55:10,620 --> 00:55:15,630

weren't even born when we started this

and there's an interesting article in

538

00:55:15,630 --> 00:55:20,940

the LA Times day by Andy bass of itch

saying that this was not a success so

539

00:55:20,940 --> 00:55:27,390

the question is are there some

situations in which you know you're

540

00:55:27,390 --> 00:55:34,470

better off making a statement going in

and getting out than trying to cure the

541

00:55:34,470 --> 00:55:39,080

whole situation because you're not

capable of hearing the whole situation

542

00:55:39,080 --> 00:55:44,850

it's ok let's pivot to a couple of

broader bright issues as al said you've

543

00:55:44,850 --> 00:55:48,030

covered so many different things and so

I just want to ask you a few I guess a

544

00:55:48,030 --> 00:55:52,770

few questions about fly-fishing so I

didn't notice your tie how's that that's

545

00:55:52,770 --> 00:55:59,310

right I wore that for Al so maybe we

could start with coronavirus so you've

546

00:55:59,310 --> 00:56:02,640

thought about the effect of

globalization and transnational

547

00:56:02,640 --> 00:56:08,460

relations for decades and now we're

facing potentially a major pandemic it's

548

00:56:08,460 --> 00:56:12,270

hard to say at this point but it's

expanding still what do you see is the

549

00:56:12,270 --> 00:56:16,260

kind of geopolitical implications of

that what is that well it's interesting

550

00:56:16,260 --> 00:56:20,870

because if you look at our national

security strategy which was issued in

551

00:56:20,870 --> 00:56:30,660

December of 2017 it said we were

reorienting our budgets in our strategy

552

00:56:30,660 --> 00:56:40,320

toward great power competition China and

Russia and some of that's okay but it

553

00:56:40,320 --> 00:56:48,210

doesn't deal with coronavirus doesn't

deal with climate change so we're we're

554

00:56:48,210 --> 00:56:53,510

spending what seven hundred billion

dollars plus on the defense budget and

555

00:56:53,510 --> 00:56:59,420

yet we're facing a threat today which is

not addressed by any of that seminar

556

00:56:59,420 --> 00:57:04,860

virtually any of that seven or $50 would

mean you'd wanted to be unlike what the

557

00:57:04,860 --> 00:57:12,510

administration did which was to cut

resources for the CDC and to abolish the

558

00:57:12,510 --> 00:57:16,380

part of the National Security Council

which which was

559

00:57:16,380 --> 00:57:22,140

oriented toward dealing with pandemics

you would say no we're you know we're

560

00:57:22,140 --> 00:57:27,779

looking at the wrong things we have to

deal with other dimensions as well so it

561

00:57:27,779 --> 00:57:32,880

doesn't mean you say I'm not gonna worry

about Chinese encroachments in the South

562

00:57:32,880 --> 00:57:37,079

China Sea but it means you don't spend

all your time and attention on that

563

00:57:37,079 --> 00:57:44,309

there are other things to think about as

well so I think the covin 19 may prove

564

00:57:44,309 --> 00:57:49,019

something of a wake up call on this you

would have thought the way it got called

565

00:57:49,019 --> 00:57:54,150

already occurred with Ebola

remember Obama's first reaction of Ebola

566

00:57:54,150 --> 00:57:59,479

is what's the last thing I want to get

involved in this is this is a no-win for

567

00:57:59,479 --> 00:58:04,739

me back here in the US and then he cited

you know I'm not going to be able to

568

00:58:04,739 --> 00:58:09,839

isolate us from this I'm not being able

to keep away from this and it's also a

569

00:58:09,839 --> 00:58:17,640

humanitarian issue and so we used our

the American military to build emergency

570

00:58:17,640 --> 00:58:24,329

hospitals in Liberia and other places

and we were able to stamp out a major

571

00:58:24,329 --> 00:58:33,660

part of that virus before it became a

pandemic and then in this administration

572

00:58:33,660 --> 00:58:40,819

we've cut back on that that to me is

there's a lesson there do you think if

573

00:58:40,819 --> 00:58:45,869

we'll hope this doesn't happen but if it

became something worse something that

574

00:58:45,869 --> 00:58:50,969

really was truly global would there be

implications for for example the

575

00:58:50,969 --> 00:58:53,219

importance of you mentioned

international institutions in your

576

00:58:53,219 --> 00:58:57,779

discussion so that we would look more

towards the World Health Organization

577

00:58:57,779 --> 00:59:01,890

other organs that would it strengthen

multilateralism because we would see the

578

00:59:01,890 --> 00:59:05,069

need or would it in fact have the

opposite effect where countries would

579

00:59:05,069 --> 00:59:09,420

want a wall themselves off more and in

fact disengage politically and

580

00:59:09,420 --> 00:59:15,660

economically well the initial reactions

that we've seen have been stop

581

00:59:15,660 --> 00:59:20,910

international travel no travel from

certain countries so forth that may be a

582

00:59:20,910 --> 00:59:27,810

temporary measure of that is useful it

doesn't deal with the basic problem

583

00:59:27,810 --> 00:59:36,120

and for example the virus apparently was

more widespread and realized earlier and

584

00:59:36,120 --> 00:59:43,050

many people had already traveled from

China or elsewhere well before we closed

585

00:59:43,050 --> 00:59:51,150

the border so you know closing the

border is not the sufficient answer if

586

00:59:51,150 --> 00:59:56,700

on the other hand we had strengthened

the World Health Organization and more

587

00:59:56,700 --> 01:00:03,660

cooperation with China on pandemics and

had a better early warning system of

588

01:00:03,660 --> 01:00:08,970

what was going on we might have had a

better capacity to limit it so I think

589

01:00:08,970 --> 01:00:18,990

the the dangers we think that that were

safe behind borders unfortunately we're

590

01:00:18,990 --> 01:00:24,570

not and if you go from Co food to

climate change of the idea that you're

591

01:00:24,570 --> 01:00:33,420

safe beyond borders is nonsense we in

China 40% of the the greenhouse gases

592

01:00:33,420 --> 01:00:40,710

that are produced in the world the idea

that we can solve this without China is

593

01:00:40,710 --> 01:00:46,320

a mistake the idea that China can solve

it without us mistake and these are

594

01:00:46,320 --> 01:00:51,290

challenges which don't respect borders

the only way you can deal with them is

595

01:00:51,290 --> 01:00:57,990

essentially by working with others so

what I argue in the last chapter of the

596

01:00:57,990 --> 01:01:01,950

book where I try to look ahead of what

are the moral challenges for the future

597

01:01:01,950 --> 01:01:08,010

is we've got to get away from focusing

just on power over others we've got to

598

01:01:08,010 --> 01:01:13,470

think also of power with others certain

things you can do with power over others

599

01:01:13,470 --> 01:01:17,730

there are other things and climate

changes is a good example you can only

600

01:01:17,730 --> 01:01:23,040

do with power with others final question

then we'll open it up so this is the

601

01:01:23,040 --> 01:01:28,950

lecture on the conditions of peace what

do you see as the primary threat today

602

01:01:28,950 --> 01:01:33,130

to peace the leading threat it's most

urgent threat

603

01:01:33,130 --> 01:01:43,480

well the short-run media threats are in

my mind of miscalculation which would

604

01:01:43,480 --> 01:01:49,720

destabilize the nuclear deterrent

relationship I don't think there's a

605

01:01:49,720 --> 01:01:58,060

high probability of that but that would

be a truly catastrophic event it's worth

606

01:01:58,060 --> 01:02:06,670

remembering that in 1914 August 1914

nobody expected World War 1 they

607

01:02:06,670 --> 01:02:12,910

expected the third Balkan war in which

Serbia would be taught a lesson and the

608

01:02:12,910 --> 01:02:18,070

troops would be home by Christmas what

they wound up with was four years of

609

01:02:18,070 --> 01:02:26,470

horror which Europe tour itself apart

he destroyed three empires and Europe

610

01:02:26,470 --> 01:02:33,820

ceased to be centered the world in terms

of the global palace of power so today

611

01:02:33,820 --> 01:02:38,950

when we look at the rivalry with China

for example many people say this is the

612

01:02:38,950 --> 01:02:48,250

greatest threat an even greater threat

is not to underestimate China its

613

01:02:48,250 --> 01:02:54,610

overestimate China but it's getting the

right balance to realize that if we

614

01:02:54,610 --> 01:02:58,480

played chicken with China and somebody

miscalculates

615

01:02:58,480 --> 01:03:05,350

and it does escalate that could be truly

catastrophic so if you say what is my

616

01:03:05,350 --> 01:03:12,300

what worries me most it's Americans

working himself up into a fervor of

617

01:03:12,300 --> 01:03:19,930

anti-chinese sentiment so that we create

the fear that can be devastating one of

618

01:03:19,930 --> 01:03:26,580

my colleagues at Harvard talks about a

Thucydides trap and with China in which

619

01:03:26,580 --> 01:03:32,170

through cities famously attributed the

Peloponnesian War to the rise of the

620

01:03:32,170 --> 01:03:37,270

power of Athens that fear created in

Sparta and everybody focuses on the

621

01:03:37,270 --> 01:03:41,500

first half of that equation the rise of

the power of China they don't pay enough

622

01:03:41,500 --> 01:03:44,770

attention to the fear it creates in

Washington

623

01:03:44,770 --> 01:03:49,780

and to overstimulate that fear is a

great danger this doesn't mean we

624

01:03:49,780 --> 01:03:53,350

shouldn't stand up to China I'm all in

favor of freedom of navigation

625

01:03:53,350 --> 01:04:00,340

operations in the South China Sea and so

forth but to overstimulate fear and to

626

01:04:00,340 --> 01:04:05,560

create a climate in which there's a

miscalculation I think is something that

627

01:04:05,560 --> 01:04:11,920

worries me that's my that's my short-run

fee with fear of the threat to peace my

628

01:04:11,920 --> 01:04:21,010

long-run fear is failure to master new

technologies and their application

629

01:04:21,010 --> 01:04:25,540

particularly cyber and artificial

intelligence and what that means for the

630

01:04:25,540 --> 01:04:32,890

ability to continue to maintain control

not over not only over nuclear systems

631

01:04:32,890 --> 01:04:42,300

that Bernhard Brody was so prescient

about but over many more systems and

632

01:04:42,300 --> 01:04:48,310

that is not is imminent but it's

something that we should be worrying

633

01:04:48,310 --> 01:04:51,870

very much about the longer term

ABOUT THE SPEAKER:

Joseph S. Nye, Jr., one of the world's leading scholars of international relations, is University Distinguished Service Professor and former Dean of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. He received his bachelor's degree summa cum laude from Princeton University, studied at Oxford University on a Rhodes Scholarship, and earned a Ph.D. in political science from Harvard where he joined the faculty in 1964. In 2008, a poll of 2700 international relations scholars listed him as the most influential scholar on American foreign policy, and in 2011 "Foreign Policy" listed him among the 100 leading global thinkers.

From 1977-79, Nye was a deputy Undersecretary of State and chaired the National Security Council Group on Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons. In 1993-94 he chaired the National Intelligence Council which prepares intelligence estimates for the president, and in 1994-95 served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs. He won Distinguished Service medals from all three agencies.

Nye has published fourteen academic books, a novel, and more than 150 articles in professional and policy journals. Recent books include the highly influential Soft Power, The Powers to Lead, The Future of Power, and Is the American Century Over? Nye's newest book Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy from FDR to Trump was published in January 2020.

He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the British Academy, the American Academy of Diplomacy, and an honorary fellow of Exeter College, Oxford. He is the recipient of Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson Award, the Charles Merriam Award from the American Political Science Association, France’s Palmes Academiques, and various honorary degrees.

ABOUT THE LECTURE SERIES:

In sponsoring the Bernard Brodie Distinguished Lecture on the Conditions of Peace, the Burkle Center for International Relations celebrates the memory of Brodie as an eminent scholar and teacher. The lectures provide a special forum for outstanding students of politics, strategy, and warfare to present their thoughts and research within the scholarly and humanist tradition exemplified by Bernard Brodie.

Established in 1980, the lecture series provides a special forum for dignitaries and scholars of politics, strategy, warfare, and peace to present their views to the UCLA community and the public.

Published: Tuesday, March 10, 2020