gorbachev asked about pushing russia in nato. baker said that was in the realm of fantasy and let's get in the realm of reality. it does come up. it is never taken seriously in the west. baker later says in public that if russia embraces democracy and free markets, we should include it. what comes out in the book on nato expansion is that i concede two of cases for nato expansion but they lead to two different and points. -- two different endpoints. nato helps new democracies. it provides them with security. i find that to be justified. there are calls for people for that to happen. it should have gone further. you could say that nato is a military alliance. in that case, it is expanded. you will take on eastern europe and have new liabilities. the point of an alliance is to create military security for the members. i can see the justification for expanding nato. these have the courage of your convictions and see it all the way through to the end. -- then you should have the courage of your convictions and see at all the way thro

everyone if you take today's russia and say, that's why we have today's russia. it's a vague dispute. finally in the 2:00 i have left, a very interesting case of iraq. here we have a buildup and a short window to develop their argument. the window for scholars to figure out what's happening and come up with codes and arguments. the scholars that oppose this are exactly the same people who exhibihed. they argue that had this was a bad idea. >> to conclude, now going over by a minute. i would say the overall scholarly performance in these three episodes are not amazing. to agree the scholar would have gone a wry, the disconnect between making decisions in these circumstances, i would say that the implication is number one, we scholars frequency criticize policy makers. my paper would add weight on my part. i think we could do better. it will involve a very, very difficult trick in uniting the general with the particular which is the hardest job a scholar has to do. thank you for those cruel by fair comments. thanks to all three panelists and the papers as well, whi

not russia as russia, but on nuclear and missile defense and what was going to happen to the treaty, which she and later the president would make, i think, top foreign policy goal of the period before 9/11. on iraq, i just wanted to say a little more in context about iraq. but on iraq, it was we need to look at this. things aren't going well. the policy of sanctions is in tatters. the smuggling -- smugglers are getting away with blue murder and we need to do something about that. so i suppose the batting order there was nuclear missile defense, russia in that context, not a lot about the middle east. i remember her saying to me, we don't want president bush to become the middle east desk officer, like bill clinton. because clinton was in the final throes of trying to fix the problem, which eventually failed. nor were they intent on doing that into northern ireland either. so we got a heavily missile centric account of foreign policy. two days later -- i think it was two days later, i saw karl rove, and he more or less gave me the same account, but emphasizing that as with most presid

but then in that case they should be offered to the soviet union/russia. it should have gone further. or you say no, nato is and always shall be a military alliance in which case don't expand it. because then you're going to take an obvious areas of eastern europe and the new liabilities without capabilities. and the point of the military alliance is to create military security for the members. so where i come down as i can see the justification for not expanding nato. i can see the justification for expanding nato but to your convictions all the way through to the end. not good. next up admiral prater. >> i've got a question that's in a different land it on the same highway. if one looks at the definition of great nations, one of the criteria along with secure borders and things like that is an environment strong economy. if we look at times that i've changed our nation. september 14, 2007, which had to do with bear stearns and laymen for those of you who are not tracking those states. brought to our attention both a long-term deficit trends that we've ha

he has been an astute observer of the world in general, of russia in particular. his writings are disabled by meticulous work, shrewd political judgment, and an admirable sensitivity to the human expenses of the individuals living in the political systems he has studied. his most recent book is a splendid piece of scholarship, rigorously researched and written. here it is. i have already added it to the list of required reading for students in the russian and eurasian studies program. in short, doctor brown gets a social science or perhaps he would prefer to say social studies, a good name. that is something all of a social scientist can be grateful for. and recognition of his achievement, doctor brown was elected a fellow of the british academy in 1991, and a foreign honorary member of the american academy of arts and sciences in 2003. in 2005, he was awarded the companion of the order of saint michael's in george and the queens birthday on her list for service to u.k. russian relations. for all of these reasons it gives me special pleasure to introduce doctor ar

not russia as russia, but on nuclear and missile defense and what was going to happen to the treaty, which she and later the president would make, i think, top foreign policy goal of the period before 9/11. on iraq, i just wanted to say a little more in context about iraq. but on iraq, it was we need to look at this. things aren't going well. the policy of sanctions is in tatters. the smuggling -- smugglers are getting away with blue murder and we need to do something about that. so i suppose the batting order there was nuclear missile defense, russia in that context, not a lot about the middle east. i remember her saying to me, we don't want president bush to become the middle east desk officer, like bill clinton. because clinton was in the final throes of trying to fix the problem, which eventually failed. nor were they intent on doing that into northern ireland either. so we got a heavily missile centric account of foreign policy. two days later -- i think it was two days later, i saw karl rove, and he more or less gave me the same account, but emphasizing that as with most presid

if you're going to have nato, you should extend it to russia. james baker also said that every solution to a big problem contains within itself the seeds of a future problem. and i found that to be a profoundly wise statement because the solution, the pre-fab solution which worked very well does contain within itself the seeds of problems that we're now seeing today in our relations with russia. thank you. >> thanks very much. bruce cummings. >> i'd like to thank the miller center and especially mel leffler for inviting me to this conference. i commute from charlottesville because my wife works here. so it's nice to have an excuse to be here when i'm supposed to be in chicago on monday, tuesday. my paper i think has a fairly simple point that was also made in different ways by philip that the previous panel which is that the assumptions and premises that policy makers bring to bear, whether on predictable events or ones on a high probability or ones that are utterly surprising attempt to be very important in the way they filter information. i go

russia's national football team is not qualified for the world cup. at the same time, we're planning and submitted our application to 2018 and 2022. is it the only way to get to the world cup for russia's team as a host? are there any more larger scale goals targeted? >> do you play football yourself? >> yes, i do. >> would you like russia to ask the world cup -- >> i would like to ask. at the same time, i'm aware that it's really hard. the infrastructure currently does not correspond to the conditions. >> i fully agree with you. first of all, you said a very important thing. you'd like russia to pass the world cup. infrastructure is not sufficient. actually, infrastructure was inadequate for the winter olympic games as well in 2014. our infrastructure was insufficient for the games in 2012. but we need to develop our infrastructure. we need to do this. our infrastructure isn't sufficient for the apex summit in the far east as far as the olympic games 2014 are concerned. we have almost completed it. there was no normal water supply, no normal services

the first was against russia at port arthur during the administration of president theodore roosevelt. theodore roosevelt book that the japanese sneak attack against the russians, which the russians and much of the world condemned, and theodore roosevelt wrote secretly to his son, i was there early well pleased with the japanese victory because the japs are playing our game. what game? what was roosevelt game here and what was the game that he was saying that japan was playing in cahoots with the america of? i wanted to know. theodore roosevelt was awarded the nobel peace prize for actions that he took in the summer of 1905 during this imperial cruise. he was awarded the peace prize

which is under tundra but rich and strategic minerals, but russia doesn't have the financing and the capitalization ability to underwrite that strategic shift in its economic strategic objectives. china is offering to finance it with uncle sam's and aunt samantha's dollars into the american unit for which the chinese have a trillion accumulated in terms of u.s. treasury debt. instruments as such. and lastly is a commitment it off explore the possibilities of not repeating what they did with a joint command in the northwest part of saudi arabia inside from kuwait. but rather a rapid deployment force of their own with double-headed soldiers and sailors and air personnel in the six armed forces that will include a special operations component. theoretically and strategically to begin to match the special operations component that iran has. i'll answer any questions including the dccc or any of its member countries to the best of my ability. [applause] >> excuse us while we do this for a moment so we can use the microphone. dr. anthony, iran was included in last year's meetings or invite

in addition, nato countries and russia formally restarted the nato-russia council by the first meetings since december of 2007. they also agreed to some restructuring of the nic. and a work program for 2010. secretary had a number of bilateral meetings as she met with uk foreign secretary, polish foreign minister, norwegian foreign minister, georgian foreign minister, russian foreign minister, and she had her first meeting with the new eui rep. in the latter meeting, they talked about afghanistan, like all of the meetings. they also had a chance to talk about the very important meetings next week related to the eu. it'll be the first meeting of foreign ministers for the new eu high rep, lady ashton. and in addition to the european council meeting, which of course was the summit meeting. and as i said, they discussed afghanistan. but they also discussed iran. because we expect that the iranian issue will be addressed in the eu council meeting. and there will be a brood discussion on next steps in that meeting. i also have an announcement regarding travel of undersecretary bill burns. he

this is the shoreline of russia. this is the shoreline of russia. this is russia. this is sweden and finland over here, is iceland, greenland. the north pole is approximately over here. this is where polar bears lippa. now i will identify the goal for you, but i wanted to identify this spot down here. we're going to go there pretty soon. a polar bear populations are the world have been more or less arbitrarily divided into 19 different populations. and as you can see, they all kind of bought up one against another. so it's not altogether sure that one of the population is going to wander into another area and become a polar bear and another population. but the ability to segregate the polar bears, at least technically, gives us some idea of how many there are. in other words, you can count, although polar bears are very difficult to count, you can estimate the number of polar bears in this area. you insert estimate the number of polar bears and the south hudson bay because we'll talk about that in a minute. in greenland, and along the russian coastline, which is th

in russia, we deplore the murders of journalists. with china, russia, and others, we are engaging on issues of mutual interests. we are also engage feed societal actress in the same countries. -- we're also engaging social networks in the same countries. the assumption that only coercion and isolation are effective tools for advancing diplomatic -- democratic change is also wrong. crossed our diplomacy and development efforts, we keep striving for innovative ways to achieve results. that is why i commissioned the development review to develop a forward-looking shredded g and analysis of our objectives, our tools, and capacities before the hour security objectives. the issues of democracy and government are central to this review. the third element of our approach is that we support change driven by citizens and their communities. the project of making human rights and human reality cannot just be one for governance but it requires operation amongst individuals and organizations within communities and across borders. it means that we

official ministerial meeting of net-russia council in one year? thank you. >> first of all, let me stress that i am not going to comment on internal negotiations and discussions within the nato- russia council. let me just say that it is not fair to single out individual countries in this. we are right now in a negotiation process, and it is quite natural that in the run- up to a foreign ministers' meeting where we are going to make important decisions, there will be some discussions. and we have some tough negotiations. i can confirm that. but i still confident -- but i feel confident that all countries within the nato-russia council are committed to finding constructive solutions to that, so that is what i can say right now. we will have the foreign ministers meeting on friday and i feel pretty sure that we will find the necessary compromises and make important decisions on friday. >> that is all that we have time for. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009] >> secretary of

russia is very interesting. russia transitioned to more of a market, may not too long ago and the oecd has been keeping track of the december, the monthly data rather than back to 94. and so with this picture shows is the russians and the united states, it shows the size of the december spending relative to the month around and look at that the russians over to the u.s. in about 2005. i always think about doctor strange love, a member played by george c. scott worried about the cade gap between the russians and americans. here you have a santa claus gap. not sure if this is good or bad news but we are behind in something. let's move around the world a little bit more. the question is are we alone conjures other countries, the oecd covers brazil, mexico, south africa, all distinctive and large spending months. there are some places where you don't see it or see less of it. so here is a smattering of other countries some of which don't have it. all of these graphs have the u.s. at the and so you can see that for c

given recent strains in the united states-russia relationship. i believe the united states and russia must accept the fact we need each other. kremlin rhetoric will swing from one end of the strategic spectrum to the other, and projects will be on and then off. our frustration level sometimes will be high. but we must not lose patience or miss the possibility of cooperations on cooperative threat reduction. we should recall the nunn-lugar program has created a safeguard u.s. national security interest, and those interests exist regardless of the state of our relationship with russia. it's also vital that we understand the verification utility of the nunn-lugar program which provides for american technicians on the ground in russia, systematically destroying russian weaponry. the cooperative links established by such activity and the confidence-building value inherent in our on-site presence, are assets of incal -- incal hraoubl value. i never considered the nunn-lugar act to be nearly a program or a funding source or a set of agreements. rather i

the casualties in hit for's march to russia were in the millions. it's just a ridiculous exaggeration for john keegan to have compared the two. >> when you are researching a topic frequently at some point it is very easy to get diverted because you found something unexpected and new. what did you find in your research on this particular topic that either supply -- surprised you or me to simply pleased to have discovered? >> i like to put a human face on the war. that is my game writing about the war, and i think i found a much more humane sherman then the stories tell about sherman, the history tells about sherman and i think i also found there are gross exaggerations' about that march from atlanta to savannah. that was actually very orderly and the soldiers called it a grand pyknic because so much of it was not fighting but just stopping at the end of the day and camping and roasting your meat for dinner and getting up at dawn and going out again. until they got to the swamps of savannah they found a ferry pleasant excursions and many of them were

caller: i came to the united states from russia. what i see happening right now is increasing the role of state in the economy of the country. this is turning to social democracy as they have in europe or socialism -- a type of socialism they had in the old soviet union. i find it alarming when they say they want to find people who do not of health insurance. that is an authoritarian type of scenario. i really don't like the way this government is going. all of this does not seem quite right. host: what would you say was your political philosophy before it came to the united states and has it changed? guestcaller: it has moved. when i came here i knew that socialism was wrong. come if i can use such a worker of i became a republican but i was disappointed in the way president bush managed the country. right now, there is a swing to another extreme. and guest: you can certainly argue that we are seeing a potential swing back in terms of the state playing a somewhat larger role than it has in the pass. that is something that has been

paul was the editor and chief of "forbes" the russia edition. he grew up in new york. his gram of cocaine is russian aristocrat. he went back there thinking about he was going to live his life as his uncles and grandfather described as he was growing up. what he found was the chi os so that when putin became president, he cheered. he was a huge fan of putin. he described him that way in his articles. this was very dramatic. how could this guy who was such a fan of putin's be murdered? putin himself in the other murderedders that i describe, putin totally indifferent about these deaths. even in the -- in his interview about the death of another subject who i -- who's murder i describe. he was derisive about her. but with paul, he actually went to new york when he was in new york after his death. he visited with the widow. and he expressed his sympathy. and what does this -- what does this tell me? and what it tells one that the culture of death is bigger than putin. it's even bigger than putin. >> joining us now on book tv is morgan. you are here at the national book aw

, and i realized this would derail his campaign, why russia is really a democracy, had come out. so i was hit with the moral dilemma die tell this nice, wonderful, sweet old professor, yes, give out that paper to any reporter. so finally i said, well, dr., i don't know what you should do, however, if it were my paper i would prefer that you ask me first. and so fortunately he says, yes, you're right, i'll ask clinton before i give it out. then i had another dilemma, which is i still thought i might have a copy of this paper and i was at time magazine and it would be a great scoop. so i call home to new orleans, get my dad on the phone, and i said, dad, can you go to the basement by the work chicago behind the table saw, there's a white chest of drawers, all my papers. go in there and see if you can find a paper by bill clinton. and dad says, sure, and i will call you back. and i said, no, no i'm going to hold on. he comes back quite upset, because even before katrina, -- he said the basement has flooded a few times and your mother threw out those papers. i was actually secretly r

when i was in russia, i visited an independent radio station to express through word in feed our support for independent media. i made a point in meeting with women activists. in 1998, and it did a small group of lawyers in a crowded apartment on a fifth floor of a walkup building they described their efforts to win rights for women. when i visited china and again, i met some of these same women. they had grown and expanded the scope. now women were working not just for legal rights, but for economic rights as well. many regimes have tried to limit the effectiveness by restricting their activities, including more than 25 governments that have recently adopted new restrictions our funding can get a foothold to local organizations, training programs, and independent medians. it fosters broadbased economic development. to build success, our assistance needs to be as effective as possible. it paves the way for broadbased growth and long term self- reliance. economic empowerment to give them a stake in the futures. our development activities act in concert with our efforts to support democrat

the first was against russia at port arthur during the administration of president theodore roosevelt. theodore roosevelt book that the japanese sneak attack against the russians, which the russians and much of the world condemned, and theodore roosevelt wrote secretly to his son, i was there early well pleased with the japanese victory because the japs are playing our game. what game? what was roosevelt game here and what was the game that he was saying that japan was playing in cahoots with the america of? i wanted to know. theodore roosevelt was awarded the nobel peace prize for actions that he took in the summer of 1905 during this imperial cruise. he was awarded the peace prize for brokering the peace between japan and russia, but unknown to the russians at this point, theodore roosevelt was acting secretly as an agent of japan at the behest of japan, and he wrote about this the, that he was, that he was so excited about acting secretly on japan's behalf without the russians knowing. unknown to the nobel peace prize committee, and the known to congress, in july of 1905 on this im

we have a program developing russia to 2012. here we're speaking about modernization of the economy, innovation course of developing the country. development of different branches of the economy, agriculture, restructuring the economy as a whole. we'll speak about social development, about education and so then, reform of the pension system and so then. all this is written down. this, of course, requires additional corrections about the present day realities but we are not turning our backs on this and now this following report is right in line with what i've been saying. x and together with our people, we'll cope with everything. >> translator: we have many relationships with it. it's one of the most important partners, and the world economy is connected with invisible threads with the economy of the united states, and to wish someone certain problems -- to any country, in fact -- we'd be better if we were in a favorable world than in a world of catastrophes. >> translator: i'm 35 years. dear tatiana and nikolai, i congratulate

starting from scratch, if you can find a stashed in russia because they did not counted very well as you got some guys to steal it or other places then the time is very short. the challenge of want to leave with you is what will we do about this how we think it through because the threat of the nuclear event is sustained and what is our declaratory policy and what will we do? >> thank you for having me. [applause] >> every month of press club coast and author night we have the author of defenders of eighth. -- defenders of eighth. let's start with the basic question. who was charles v? >> guest: charles v was the holy roman emperor and misaligned the neck of a cent was the tenth of the ottoman empire. and they too came to clash in vienna in 1532 and it was a clash of vampires and a clash of civilizations and religion broker so we think we seeing we are the only ones that have the experience of jihad verses crusade but this is what i have been doing for the last four books is reminding people of people of episodes and history when islam and christianity came into conflict. the result

and i realized this would derail his campaign if why russia is really a democracy his paper had come out. so i was that without moral dilemma of do i tell this nice, wonderful, sweet old professor gas, give out that paper. so finally i said, while dr. kochanski i don't know what he should do. however if it was my paper i would prefer that you ask me first. and so, fortunately he says yes you are right, i'll ask them. i will ask the clintons before i give it out. that result when dilemma but then i had another dilemma, which is i still thought i might have a copy of this paper and i was at "time" magazine and it would be a great scoop. [laughter] so i call home to new orleans to get my data on the phone and i say dad, can you go to the basement by the workshop behind the table saw there is a white chest of drawers were all my papers are. go in there and see if you can find a paper from bill clinton, by bill clinton. and dad says, sure i'll do it and call you back. i says no, no i'll hold on. he comes back quite upset because even before katrina we used to flood all the time and he sai

if you want to follow her logic, couldn't she be a citizen of russia for all we know? >> you know, that is a very interesting point of view. i hadn't considered the similarities between putin and palin, now that you mention it. when she said she was keeping an eye on russia, she may have just been keeping an eye on herself. >> finally, richard, how much damage does this do to those who still see sarah palin as their savior in 2012? >> the more she gets out and has to face these kinds of problems of her own making, the more she's going to be exposed to the kinds of questions about can she be a credible candidate, should she -- is she fg to represent the party in the way it wants to be represented. and i think there's a reason why the handlers in the mccain campaign were so terrified about putting her out there unvarnished. this is her moment. let's see what she's made of. i suspect that at this rate she's not going to make 2010, never mind 2012. >> richard wolffe of msnbc, author of "renegade." also with public strategies. thanks as always. we appreciate it. >>> governo

caller: i came to the united states from russia. what i see happening right now is increasing the role of state in the economy of the country. this is turning to social democracy as they have in europe or socialism -- a type of socialism they had in the old soviet union. i find it alarming when they say they want to find people who do not of health insurance. that is an authoritarian type of scenario. i really don't like the way this government is going. all of this does not seem quite right. host: what would you say was your political philosophy before it came to the united states and has it changed? guestcaller: it has moved. when i came here i knew that socialism was wrong. come if i can use such a worker of i became a republican but i was disappointed in the way president bush managed the country. right now, there is a swing to another extreme. and guest: you can certainly argue that we are seeing a potential swing back in terms of the state playing a somewhat larger role than it has in the pass. that is something that has been

pakistan, china and russia. it also means iran. can the prime minister tell us how we will find a way to take a tough stance with iran while seeking to keep them engaged in securing peace in afghanistan? @@@@@@@ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ what happens presidentskarzai does not achieve his goal? what about developing a plan b? what about dealing instead with local and regional government? i am sure he agrees with me that given the corruption, we should not hold our breath for him to change but work on finding ways to succeed without him if he does not succeed. talking about improved equipment for our troops and the welcome delivery of new masthead vehicles, can he confirm that this means the protected land rovers are no longer being used by any of our troops? let me address the issue of troop deployments. it was the prime minister himself is said the deployment of any extra british troops would be conditional on other she refuses to tell us today exactly what other countries are sharing the burden. condition, will he now be clear and d

it was a long discussion of russia. at the time, i think tony blair was the european leader who think had the most face time with putin. bush was very keen to download his assessment of putin. we spent a long time on that. iraq came up at the beginning, really, almost to be dismissed. the final problem was that colin powell was at camp david and had to go, and as soon as the prime minister and the president sat down for lunch and had it five minutes between them, the president immediately asked tony his assessment, where things were in the region, and what we needed to do about iraq. the rest of the agenda did not come back at that particular summit. >> you mentioned bonding, and that is an important question. how would you characterize the impression made at that camp david summit by each of the leaders on each other? then, looking forward with your experience, meeting with the general, how did they relate to each other? particularly with regard to iraq and the middle east policy? >> the massive anxiety that i had was

he grew up 50 miles an international date line that separates russia. and i would invite any readers out there at palin, going rogue, to look into this book. 50 miles from tomorrow by william hensley. thank you. 2009 march the 20th anniversary of the fall of the berlin wall. here's a book i've were mashed rottenness sired and it's called tear down this wall. the city, a president, and the speech that ended the cold war. good morning to gail on a republican line. >> caller: it wasn't written the theater. it was reissued in a paperback. >> host: that's okay. we'll take that. then the rules a little bit. that's fine. >> caller: it's a professor in the madman, a tale of murder and vanity and the making of the oxford english dictionary. by simon winchester. and it's a wonderful book. i think the thing i got from the most was the tremendous amount of work, the tremendous amount of work and time and people that put together all of those words and they have to keep doing it all the time. >> host: and we did cover that. thank you for your call. we covered that o

crip to go rafers, mathematicians, not a lot of work there for a while in russia. so lot of them went into hacking and the main reason you find them in the former soviet union is because it's a sanctuary. they're not going to be arrested. so it's a beautiful crime. lots of money. no risk. >> brown: no risk because there's nobody trying to stop shut it down. >> every once in a while one of them gets caught. the main rule you have to know if you're a hacker in russia is don't take vacations in the west. >> brown: in this case, in the report, supposedly it took place over the summer or before. how do these things get found? how do they get stopped in. >> you know, if they come from overseas, some u.s. government agency, whether it's the f.b.i. or nsa, will see them coming in. one of the problems we have is that n.s.a. is the best at monitoring traffic from outside from foreign sources. but they prevent our laws prevent them from intervening. in this case it was discovered while it was in progress but too late to stop. >> brown: to stop it, was it easy or hard? >> we d

council and that we'll agree away forwards on reforming the work in the nato russia council. and then, third and finally, we will meet with both jordan and ukraine. the commitment made in both countries still stands. they will become nato members when they meet the standards and if they so desire. we will be discussing progress in reform which nato will continue to support. we'll also thank both countries for whpá they are contributing to our operations and missions and i would like to recognize in particular, georgia for t$e substantial contingent it's send "ttogether afghanistan. so overall, a very busy foreign minister's meeting in a very important week. >> united arab imrates. what was the meeting and why you don't inviteicvi ministers to attend the meetings. thank you. >> well, first of all we had a very successful seminary conference in the united emirates a few weeks ago, and i had a very productive bilateral meetings with political meetings in the country. as you know, i have made rá a priority to further develop and strengthen our partnerships within the istanbul c

russia, venezuela, our european allies, all come into play in ways. number five, it undermines our diplomacy, it isolates us from our allies, it isolates us from our trading partners. number six, it undercuts international energy companies who work in a back channel road to try to help us with our diplomacy. number seven, it undermines democracy in iran. all of us have seen those pictures, they've been all over the tv and the internet in the last few months, about a growing democratic movement in iran. this sanction will force all people to close iran's leadership, it will strengthen the hardliners who undermine democracy. next, it will make the u.s. presence in iraq, afghanistan, pakistan, even more dangerous for our troops. number nine, it's a path to military escalation. i will be discussing that later. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from ohio reserves his time. the gentleman from california is recognized. mr. berman: mr. speaker, can we get a little summary of the time remaining on this complicated -- the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman

minister confirm at the london conference he just referred to whether the powers around afghanistan, russia, china and, yes, even iran might be involved? without regional backing it will be difficult to create stability within afghanistan. president obama was critical in his speech last night. will the prime minister tell us whether this is being taken forward and perhaps give us a feel for what steps have been taken to involve those other countries in the region. >> as he recognizes the military surge has got to be matched by a political and diplomatic surge and it will be no use for the future of afghanistan if there is no security around afghanistan with the neighbors of hassling that's why they have an important role in afghanistan's affairs and building up the links that are necessary for afghan trade and industry and afghan's commerce to flourish and stop the weapons into afghanistan. we will invite international powers. >> will the prime minister join with me in marking 60 years since the british surgeon commissioned my company to produce the first inter-occular lens and on friday re

russia, venezuela, our european allies, all come into play in ways. number five, it undermines our diplomacy, it isolates us from our allies, it isolates us from our trading partners. number six, it undercuts international energy companies who work in a back channel road to try to help us with our diplomacy. number seven, it undermines democracy in iran. all of us have seen those pictures, they've been all over the tv and the internet in the last few months, about a growing democratic movement in iran. this sanction will force all people to close iran's leadership, it will strengthen the hardliners who undermine democracy. next, it will make the u.s. presence in iraq, afghanistan, pakistan, even more dangerous for our troops. number nine, it's a path to military escalation. i will be discussing that later. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from ohio reserves his time. the gentleman from california is recognized. mr. berman: mr. speaker, can we get a little summary of the time remaining on this complicated -- the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman

if you're going to have nato, you should extend it to russia. james baker also said that every solution to a big problem contains within itself the seeds of a future problem. and i found that to be a profoundly wise statement because the solution, the pre-fab solution which worked very well does contain within itself the seeds of problems that we're now seeing today in our relations with russia. thank you. >> thanks very much. bruce cummings. >> i'd like to thank the miller center and especially mel leffler for inviting me to this conference. i commute from charlottesville because my wife works here. so it's nice to have an excuse to be here when i'm supposed to be in chicago on monday, tuesday. my paper i think has a fairly simple point that was also made in different ways by philip that the previous panel which is that the assumptions and premises that policy makers bring to bear, whether on predictable events or ones on a high probability or ones that are utterly surprising attempt to be very important in the way they filter information. i go

so the difficulty of getting russia and china on board is something that is essentially going to make it next to impossible to get those type of comp hence yiffer sanctions. host: do you envision somehow the united states and other countries cutting off the ability to export those supplies? guest: i think what we may move towards, what i think may be unhelpful is to go for a coalition of the willing, that type of approach. which then increasingly would make obama's strategy on iran somewhat similar to the bush strategy, in which we would target some of our allies with sanctions, not work with them but rather try to put pressure on them rather than putting pressure on the iranians. and the midst of all of this, the suffering of the iranian people seems to have been forgotten. host: our first call from california. ruby on our democrat's line. you're on with our guest. go ahead. caller: thank you. and good morning, gentlemen. going back to your dear leader killed, i just feel so sad about that still. and being he was man of the year in time magazine. that's just such a shame that had to

shows it is possible to hel the most desperate of poor people in places like haiti, peru, cuba and russia. i won't tell you much about his new book, "strength in what remains," but the "new york times" wrote of it that mr.. has a casual mastery of complex topics in this book is perhaps as finest an examination of the nature human charity and good will. as the "baltimore sun" said, tracy kidder is a master of nonfiction narrative. please welcome tracy kidder. [applause] >> thank you. it is nice to be here. i am going to talk a while and readed little and then i'm going to show you some pictures. i am afraid that this story has already been told but i'm going to tell it again. a young medical student named deogratis merely survives the onset of civil war in his native country, this mali's central african nation of burgundy. he survived because he left the door to his room open and the men who would have killed him assumed he had already fled. he made a six month long escape from burundi, and then from the genocide in rwanda and back to burundi and by accident he got transported to new york

caller: he dropped 50 miles from the international dateline the separates alaska and russia. by any readers of sarah palin "going rogue," i invite him to read this book. host: thank you. 2009 was the 20th anniversary of the fall of the berlin wall. here is a book that is called " tear down this wall." clorox. was a report of the year? -- little rock. caller: the book was reissued in paperback. host: that is ok. caller: "professor and the madman" by simon winchester. the thing i got from it was a tremendous amount of work and time, people who put together all these words and a half to keep doing it all the time. host: and we did cover that. you could go to our web site and take a search for that. good morning to david in tulsa, oklahoma. caller: "a fiery pieeace i an a cold war." i found it in lightning. it brought many things about the cold war that i was not aware of. it updated the cold war. i just learned a great deal from the book. neil sheehan brought us book notes. the program has affected us in terms of my reading. anything he puts out i'm going to reprieve host:ad. ca

which is under tundra but rich and strategic minerals but russia does not have the financing and the capitalization of ability to underwrite projects. china is offering to finance it to with uncle sam's dollars. [unintelligible] lastly, it is a commitment to explore the possibilities of not repeating what they did with the joint command in the northwest part of saudi arabia but rather a rapid deployment force of their round with double headed soldiers and sailors and their personnel in the six armed forces that will include a special operations component. theoretically and strategically to begin to match the special operations component that iran has. i will answer any questions an including the gcc countries to the best of my ability. [applause] >> dr. anthony, iran was included in last year's meetings or invited but not this year. why? >> it was not included at last year's. it was included the year before last. the only two times iran has been included is when qatar was the host. they have an image of pushing the envelope and being innovative. it was qatar that extended the invitat

foreign minister of russia stayed here. winston churchill was there. harry truman and his family. their signatures are there for when they stayed. but was in 1945 at fdr's funeral. blair house is an important asset in foreign affairs. we want to put our best foot forward. we want to make people feel welcome to. with a house like that, police, it really has a psychological effect -- believe me, it really has a psychological effect. >> sometimes endure as many as 25, 26, 30 visits a year. some of them: for three or four days. it is quite a task. making sure every single needed they have is meant. diplomacy does not happen until two people engaged. our staff is involved in diplomacy. just by nature of what to do, caring about someone who is arriving. it is not even on a political level. it is what we hope it's a our gracious hospitality to a world leader. it is very personal and meaningful to them. the honor is steeped and intense, especially in times when we are hosting the president-elect before inauguration or whether we are hosting the window and the family of a deceased presiden

but he's pouring gasoline all over the world, in russia, iran, iraq, afghanistan, in china. and whether the match will be lit, we don't know where it's going to be. but you can count on obama to do the wrong thing. every president is living off the foreign policy of the predecessor for the first year. we're about to move into the obama foreign policy. i think there's going to be disaster. i don't know where or how or what it'll be. but i know obama is going to do the wrong thing. >> congress? >> well, congress. is there something below an f. the only good thing is they are not really getting things done and passed. they passed the crazy cap-and-trade bill. which really, i mean it went over to the senate. this isn't just senate the speaking. they looked and said this is insane. and it's just been sitting there. so that may not get passed. i like it not being passed. but in the middle of the recession and the housing bubble, they have the massive energy taxes on homeowners, manufacturers, you'd have to have an epa inspector to come to your house to make sure it's green before

russia and china will not help us with that. let's do something. the american people are tired of hearing this bs. the american people are tired. they really are. let's do something about this. thank you. guest: to support president obama, he is trying to do something. he is also trying to do the right thing and a smart thing. . >> it would be a major risk for the united states. iran is a lot more powerful than iraq ever was. and certainly more powerful than the afghan -- and those that we were fighting in the afghan situation. you have to think, before you start a fight, is it in our interest? will we win it? what is the cost in lives and money for the country. our president has been admirably restrained. it does not mean he is weak. he is adopting a different strategy, longer-term, meant to weaken the iranians themselves. >> how long to play out diplomacy? as far as our attitude towards iran and his frustration of the way that we help diplomatic measures -- overall, when you factor in how long you play the diplomatic situation or how long you mov

. >> joe: starting withstarting with the potential washington invitees beginning with team russia, loaded. >> craig: it is loaded, especially offensively. alex ovechkin the marquee player. alexander semin, his running mate, guaranteeing the lot to play there. dazzling and razzeling. >> and we think when you talk about mike green in canada, that's a hot topic. >> craig: he is on the bubble. we just saw lowe walk by. we hope he gets a chance. >> joe: i think fleischmann is a sure for the czech republic. they may use him at center. >> craig: the way he plays and scored this season after missing training camp, missing 11 games he's been a real positive. >> joe: the defending champs at the olympics in '06, nicklas backstrom, back in '010. >> craig: you put him with the ringer, he will always rack up the points. nick backstrom, another young guy they will be able to utilize. >> joe: i know discussing rosters for team usa and canada could start a barroom brawl, but who do you think will be there? >> craig: apoto from the islanders and then eric johnson, other -- ore, and martin and then the numb

/russia commission and there was the speaker. i said i am going to give you -- i took your statement to mr. riley. i opened the page and said there is an unfilled position here. the staff member said we have a list. you received a list of all the statutory authorized deployments. this is not on that list. he is going to look into it. it could be an oversight. and you think about elected officials love to appoint people. there is no reason to do that. these kinds of things mean something. one of her staff members needs written statements to enter in his hand. so when we get back from spring recess we can follow up on that. i have seen -- i have the list of appointments and it is not on that list. >> quick action. >> everyone is booked. i want to give an open ended question. i would like for each of you to tell us how you got involved in these issues and what do you tell people about why this is so important? we think it is important but i suspect -- your friends back home who say that was a long time ago. why is it so important? i

, which is under tantra but rich and strategic minerals, but russia does not have the financing and the capitalization ability to underwrite that strategic ship in its economic strategic objectives. china is offering to finance it with all sam and and samantha's >dollars -- with local sam -- uncle sam's adnd aunt cement the's dollars. that will include a special operations component. the radically and strategically, it would match the special operations component that iran has. i will answer any questions, including the gcc to the best of my ability. [applause] [inaudible] >> dr. anthony, iran is -- was including in last year's meetings but not this year. why? >> it was not included in last year's. it was in the year before last. the only two * that iran has been included has been when qatar has been the host. they've been pushing the envelope. on the two locations, it was catarrh that extended the invitation. -- it was qatar that extended the invitation. >> how are they using their economic and political capital to pressure the united states to be an honest broker in the arab- israeli

at one end of the speck truck and russia at the other. it became almost a normal security council negotiations. thinking back to the post 1441 resolution. it went to the french when it comes to 1483. the security council were more constructive than i was expecting at this stage. i think for one, perhaps two overwhelming reasons. one was they wanted the united nations to come back into the picture. they wanted the unilateralism of what they saw having happened in the invasion to be corrected back to an internationally approved and organized situation for iraq with u.n. playing its proper part in it. and secondly, they wanted to minimize the overall political geo-political damage that had been done by the invasion of iraq and that in my mind was a more constructive approach than might have happened but i had something to play with in the rest of the security council because of those attitudes. those two sets of responses very much echoing the united kingdom policy at that moment. >> with a country like france, a fellow permanent member with