What was it like to navigate America’s national security apparatus all the while coping with a mercurial commander-in-chief? Hoover senior fellow H.R. McMaster tells all in his new best-seller At War with Ourselves: My Tour of Duty in the White House – with additional insights provided by Hoover senior fellow Niall Ferguson, whose forthcoming biography of Henry Kissinger likewise will touch on national security and White House intrigue. After that: Niall and H.R. dissect the previous night’s presidential debate, assess the impact of Taylor Swift’s endorsement of Kamala Harris (spoiler alert: boy-dad Niall’s not a “Swiftie”), and offer thoughts on the perils of non-historians peddling “anti-history” and where the two fellows were 23 years ago during the 9/11 attacks on America.
Recorded on September 11, 2024.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
>> President Donald Trump (00:00):
In Springfield, they're eating the dogs.
The people that came in,they're eating the cats.
They're eating the pets ofthe people that live there.
And this is what's happening inour country and it's a shame.
[MUSIC]
>> Bill Whalen (00:18):
It's Wednesday, September the 11th, 2024.
And welcome back to GoodFellows, a HooverInstitution broadcast examining social,
economic, political, andgeopolitical concerns.
I'm Bill Whalen,I'm a Hoover Distinguished Policy Fellow.
I'll be your moderator today,joined by two, not three, but
two of our GoodFellows.
John Cochrane is not with us,he is out doing the Lord's business for
Hoover today.
But in his absence, were more thancapably taken care of by the historian
(00:41):
Niall Ferguson, and former presidentialNational Security Advisor and
geostrategist, LieutenantGeneral HR McMaster,
who is in the crosshairs of the showbecause we're gonna talk about his book.
Niall and HR, great to see you.
It's been too long, my friends.
>> H.R. McMaster (00:54):
Hey, great to see both of you.
And thanks again for
the opportunity to talk about the bookwith two people who I admire.
And, Niall, thanks somuch for your advice.
At the outset of it, when I wasframing it, I didn't wanna name you by
name because I didn't want you to beblamed for anything that's in the book.
But thank you so much to both of you foryour support and friendship on this.
>> Bill Whalen (01:14):
Okay, in Nixonian terms,
that makes Niall Ferguson an undetectedco conspirator in this book, I guess.
>> [LAUGH]>> Bill Whalen: But let's get
into the title of the bookis At War with Ourselves.
It is number two, HR, on the bestsellerNew York Times Hardcover Nonfiction list.
Congratulations, that is a coup,my friend.
I'm curious about one thing, HR.
I am a recovering Washingtonian,I spent half my life in that city,
I've spent my life in politics.
So, I've spent way too much time readingmemoirs from people who spent time in
(01:38):
Washington.
There are usually two defining featuresto a tell-all Washington book, HR.
One is that the people who writesthe book, the person writes the book,
they use it to get even.
They wanna exact their vengeance onpeople they think backstabbed them,
threw them under the bus did them wrong.
Secondly, HR,there's the unwritten subhead,
which is that I was the onlysmart person in the room.
Everybody was too stupidnot to take my advice.
(01:59):
Now, as I'm reading At War with Ourselves,I keep waiting for that moment when you
throw somebody under the bus or when yousay, I was the only person who got it,
everybody else was wrong, butit's not there, my friend.
Now, was this a conscious decision on yourpart to write a Washington book that is in
many ways, not a Washington book?
>> H.R. McMaster (02:14):
[LAUGH] Well, thanks for asking that question, Bill.
I really wanted to strike the right tone.
I mean, I really did.
I wasn't writing it to settle any scores.
I wasn't writing it to say, hey,if everybody had just listened to me.
What I wanted to do is bringreaders into the White House,
into the Trump White House.
What was it like?
What is it like to bea national security advisor?
What does an effective national securitydecision-making process look like?
(02:36):
What are the obstacles that oneencounters when trying to put a process
like that into place?
What role do personalities and
relationships play in trying toforge effective policy outcomes?
And, of course,what is president's character?
What is the importance ofpresidential character?
And to consider President Trumpin context of the eight Obama
(02:59):
years that preceded it andthe Biden years that followed it.
So I hope I make good on thatwhile being still grateful for
the opportunity to have been in the job.
And what I really hope isyoung leaders will read it.
Young people who wanna lead,who wanna serve will read it and say, hey,
I can see what the rewards are of service.
>> Niall Ferguson (03:18):
HR, congratulations on the book, it's an important book.
So was the previous book where youset out the strategic landscape,
but this one fills in a lot ofthe detail on what happened during that
whirlwind time when you wereNational Security Advisor.
I wanna talk a bit about how youdescribe the evolution of strategy,
(03:42):
because, in a way, your book isa chance for us to understand how
the national security strategy ofthe United States got fundamentally
overhauled in the first Trumpadministration under your leadership.
That was an enormouslyconsequential change.
I remember reading that document whenit first came out and comparing it with
(04:06):
the document it replaced, which wasthe last national security strategy of
the Obama administration,radical change, especially on China.
Talk a bit about how the bookhelps us understand that process,
given that you were doing it with,let's say,
a somewhat erratic commanderin chief as your boss.
>> H.R. McMaster (04:28):
Well, thanks, Niall.
I mean, what I saw it as my job to do isto help President Trump determine his own
foreign policy,his own national security strategy.
And to do that by fulfilling my duty asa National Security Advisor who is the,
the only person really inthe national security and
foreign policy establishment who hasa president as his or her only client.
By giving the president best analysis,by giving the president best advice.
(04:52):
And, of course,we know Donald Trump is nothing else.
But if he's nothing else, he's disruptive.
And, I wanted to help him disruptwhat needed to be disrupted.
And, Niall, in terms of the process andhow to frame his approach to national
security, which is reflected inthe national security strategy, or
a specific policy andstrategy on China, for example.
(05:15):
What I wanted to do was to helphim by describing the nature of
the challenge we're facing.
And then,
to consider what our objectives ought tobe based on the nature of that challenge.
And the way to do that with Donald Trump,and I think, really with any president,
is to answer the so what question upfront.
Why does America care about thischallenge to our security and prosperity?
(05:37):
Because then you can view that complexchallenge with the lens of those vital
interests and craft an overarchinggoal and more specific objectives.
And in my initial engagementswith President Trump,
I didn't really go much further thanthat because I wanted to make sure, hey,
do you agree with thisdefinition of the challenge?
Do you agree that this iswhy Americans should care?
(05:59):
And do you agree these are our goals andobjectives?
And then we initiated a framing processand then the development of options
that questioned the assumptions onwhich previous policies were based.
This is something thatPresident Trump enjoyed doing, right?
Cuz he would often talk about the stupidpeople who came before me and so forth.
And in some case, I mean,most cases, I think all cases,
(06:20):
he was correct that theseweren't stupid people.
But our assumptions were overly optimisticand were oftentimes implicit and
therefore not challenged.
And so based on some flawedassumptions about the nature of
the post-Cold War period, we hadvacated critical competitive spaces,
critical arenas of competition.
And we were getting our ass kicked, Niall,[LAUGH] by revanchist revisionist powers,
(06:46):
Russia and China and their allies andso forth, or partners.
And so we questioned those assumptions,and that allowed us,
I think, to make the shift you describedbetween the president's disruptive nature,
his willingness to questionthose assumptions.
And the way we crafted our engagementswith him around the framing of the most
(07:06):
significant challenges we were facing.
I think that allowed us to put intoplace this major shift in US policy.
>> Niall Ferguson (07:13):
One thing that strikes me about the book is that it's clear
that it's hard to keep Trump onthat course of a tougher line
towards China because hekeeps going off course.
There's the moment whereyou're kinda telling him,
make sure you don't fall intothe old win-win Chinese terminology,
(07:36):
cuz when they say win-win,they mean two wins for China.
And yet, in fact, his inclinationwas often to ease the pressure,
to look for some kinda dealto be done with Xi Jinping.
Talk a bit about the challenge of keepingTrump on that track that the national
(07:57):
security strategy set out when hisimpulse was often to go right off it.
>> H.R. McMaster (08:01):
Well, he understood fundamentally he was consistent in his
understanding on the challenge from Chinaand especially China's weaponization of
its status mercantilisteconomic model against us.
So he was consistent on that,but President Trump,
everybody knows this, right?
This is not a revelation,has great confidence in his ability
to make big deals, andbig deals get him attention,
(08:23):
big deals he thought were inthe interest of the United States.
And so in the case of China,what China does is wants
the Chinese Communist Party leadershipto string us along complacency,
the American complacency is the ChineseCommunist Party's greatest asset.
So China will string usalong with false promises of
(08:46):
liberalization of their economic model orgovernance or
new areas of cooperation on,on global issues and so forth.
Its all nonsense because what Chinais doing is trying to prevent
us from reentering those arenas ofcompetition that we had vacated.
And so as we prep the president forthese engagements,
(09:08):
we would show him the previous failedpattern of engagement with China,
the working groups that havebeen established for so
many times, and how they wouldnever really bear any fruit.
And of course, President Trump, though,was like, he's reflexively contrarian.
So what I would try to do is let him becontrary to Xi Jinping instead of me, so
(09:28):
in these prep sessions,I would say, hey, Mr.
President, this is whatXi Jinping wants you to say.
And by the way, this is howPresident Obama or President Obama's
national security advisor steppedinto these rhetorical traps and
I think that prepped him well,he didn't fall for those traps.
And then, of course, it wasn't just me,there were other really
(09:50):
very capable people in that administrationwho were giving him the same messages, our
cabinet officials, secretary of state anddefense, but also Bob Lighthizer on trade.
He's fantastic, a fantastically person and
somebody who President Trump hasa great deal of respect for.
So as a team and Matt Pottinger, gosh,that guy is brilliant on China, has so
(10:10):
much deep knowledge, and the presidentlikes to hear kind of stories and
the history and Matt did a great jobin prepping for these engagements.
So I think that we were able to keephim focused on those objectives and
of course, though,what happened is later in his presidency,
he was attracted to the possibilityof a phase two trade deal.
(10:32):
Remember, Bob Lighthizer hadnegotiated phase one, and
the Chinese Communist Party leadership washolding out, dangling out this possibility
of a really big deal that would begreat for the American economy.
That would address President Trump'smain concern, which is really the trade
imbalance in goods is what he reallyfocuses on almost exclusively.
And I know that's problematicfrom an economic perspective, but
(10:56):
that's what prevented him from maybetaking more decisive measures in terms of
countering Chinese economic aggression,such as intellectual property theft under
Article 301 of the trade law, 232 interms of dumping of aluminum and steel.
But then a whole range of otherissues like overcapacity and
subsidies for Chinese products.
(11:18):
So that's good, if Trump is reelected,all that's coming,
I think he learned from that being strungalong and he'll be less patient with
Xi Jinping from a trade andan economic perspective if he's reelected.
>> Bill Whalen (11:30):
You know HR reading your book was kind of like eating
a Chinese dinner and that I washungry about 15 minutes later, and
I was hungry for Niall Ferguson's nextinstallment of his Kissinger biography.
Because I believe,Niall you pick up in 1969, and
not mistaken that's when Henry Kissingerstarted out as national security advisor.
>> President Richard Nixon (11:46):
Doctor Kissinger is a man who is known to
all people who are interestedin foreign policy as perhaps
one of the major scholars in America andthe world today in this area.
>> Bill Whalen (11:55):
You`ll correct me here, I think Kissinger held the job for six plus
years, which makes him the longest servingNSA but he also holds a distinction of
holding both National Security Council andstate at the same time.
And I think in your book, H.R,you mentioned talking to him and
him joking about it's the onlytime the NSA director and
the secretary of state got along,it was fabulous.
Let's approach this job a little bit froma design, I'm gonna get Niall`s thoughts
(12:18):
here and what Kissinger hastold him about it as well.
But having served in the army, HR,where there is a pecking order and
an understanding of power,there's a general and
officers who take commands and go forward.
I always look at White Housesin design and here,
Trump did something very curious,he had you at NSC.
He obviously had a defense secretary,secretary of state, CIA director, but
then he had this little rump caucus,
(12:38):
this little rump group in the White House,which was Steve Bannon and Jared Kushner.
And I saw that andthat struck me as highly problematic for
someone in your position, because whyBannon's the kind of guy who thinks he's
always the smartest guy in the room andhe's a free agent and kind of a wild card.
Jared's obviously the son in law forTrump, it would seem that there was kind
of a built in system that couldcause chaos within the White House,
am I reading that correctly,or am I wrong here?
>> H.R. McMaster (13:01):
Well, no, I think you're right about that and
President Trump is predisposed.
I read about this, to kind of peopleagainst each other, sort of like a sequel
to the deal to the apprentice the realityTV show that he, that he hosted.
So it was a recipe for a lot of frictionand tension but what I tried to do was
bring people into the NationalSecurity Council decision making,
policy making process.
(13:22):
Mr. Bannon really didn't wanna do that,I mean, he was actually more interested in
manipulating decisions consistentwith his own agenda and
that made him like a less thanoptimal teammate in the West Wing.
And especially when he began to employtactics meant to undercut anybody who
was nothing, who was not helpinghim advance that narrow agenda.
(13:43):
But what I found withJared Kushner is he was a force for
good in the Trump White Housein my perspective.
I mean, Jared Kushner was given some whatpeople thought were impossible portfolios
in the wake of President Trump's, oras President Trump was continuing his
serial insults aimed at Mexico aboutbuilding the wall and everything.
(14:04):
He gave that Mexico portfolio to Jaredon top of the Middle East portfolio and
a number of others.
So I think that heactually over delivered,
I would like to think that we werevery helpful to him, I know we were.
And I said, hey Jared, you can do this onyour own with a small group of people, but
it's not gonna work bringit into our process,
(14:26):
we'll run a process that's transparentwith the departments and agencies.
You can still drive the President's agendaas part of know the NSC process and
you`re gonna have the departments and
agencies who understand what you want toachieve and can be part of achieving it.
And remember, I mean, remember,everybody was saying, gosh,
its a fools errand to try to normalizerelations between Gulf States and
(14:50):
Israel and he did it with a greatguy named Jason Greenblatt.
And with the support of departments andagencies,
those guys drove it but you know what,it was a process that worked.
I used the other example of the move ofthe embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem,
and we used the NSC process forthat, I mean,
(15:10):
our ambassador to Israel wasreluctant about doing that.
Jared was reluctant,I said, hey, listen guys,
this is the only way this is gonnawork effectively and we did it,
I think we demonstrated our role asthe NSC staff, as honest brokers and
we developed a great plan to do it anddid it effectively anyway.
(15:31):
I think that you're right, Bill, I mean,in any White House, this happens, right?
And I write about that in the book andas a historian,
I was kind of familiar with previousadministrations and history can be a great
comfort because you realize you'renot in an unprecedented situation.
>> Bill Whalen (15:48):
Right. >> Niall Ferguson
that's important because I thinkthere were many journalists
who wanted to represent the White Houseof Donald Trump as uniquely chaotic.
And characterized by a factionalinfighting, but, in fact,
it's more of a feature thana bug of White House politics.
(16:10):
The Nixon administration wasvery different in the sense that
the personality of Richard Nixonwas very different,
a president that Donald Trump admires,interestingly.
But they really couldn't be moredifferent because Nixon was cerebral,
introverted, spent a lot of time withHenry Kissinger thinking through
(16:30):
strategy in ways that when youread my second volume, HR,
you'll feel pangs of envy at the waythose guys were able to work together.
But what I try and show in the secondvolume, I'm still slogging away writing,
is that there was all kinds ofskullduggery going on as well.
Machinations, palace intrigue, Henrytrying to make sure that the secretary
(16:56):
of state, William Rogers, was out ofthe loop in all the key decisions.
The kind of politics of secrecy,not to mention wiretapping,
that ultimately led to the destructionof the Nixon presidency,
all began early on inthe Nixon White House in 1969, 1970.
(17:18):
And so I think one of the thingsthat I take away from your book and
from the work I'm doing onthe Nixon administration
is that this is actually howAmerican politics works by design.
Their separation of powers, in fact,
means a kind of struggle betweenthe different bits of the government.
(17:38):
You don't talk an enormousamount about Congress, but
it's another thing that is at odds withthe executive branch most of the time.
And so my sense is that formost readers, it's very valuable
to see how the sausage gets made and torealize that inside every White House or
inside every administration,there are these battles going on.
(18:01):
And this is not something peculiar,
wasn't really a particularfailing of the Trump presidency.
It's actually kind of normal that thathappens and we shouldn't be surprised.
We don't hear quite as muchabout what's been going on in
the Biden-Harris White House becausethere's been much less leaking.
But in the end, we'll find out, andI'm pretty sure we'll find out that there
(18:24):
were all kinds of palace intriguesgoing on, the culmination of which was,
of course, Joe Biden's departure from thetop of the democratic ticket this year.
So I think this is one of the mostexciting things about your book.
We get to see the realities ofpolicymaking, of grand strategy-making
in the sometimes quite toxiccontext of the Trump White House.
(18:47):
But I'm kinda here to reassure you,it's okay.
This kinda happens in mostadministrations, even Ronald Reagan's.
I mean,
that's something that I'm learning fromour Hoover fellow Joseph Ledford's work.
When you look atthe politics of Iran-Contra,
you realize that that was no shiningcity on a hill the Reagan White House.
>> H.R. McMaster (19:08):
No, quite the opposite.
I was talking to Admiral Poindexter.
So one of the aspects ofthe book that I enjoyed writing,
actually all of, it was a mixture of[LAUGH] emotions writing the book.
But I enjoyed writing the part inparticular about my conversations with
former national security advisors.
I talked to every living formernational security advisor in person or
(19:32):
on the phone within weeksafter taking over the job.
And the title of the book I took fromwhat Admiral Poindexter told me,
who served later in Reagan administration.
But he was talking about the firstyears of the Reagan administration.
He said, hey,they were at war with themselves.
And so[LAUGH] that's where the title comes from.
And it is a comfort to knowthat these tensions existed.
(19:54):
And Dr. Kissinger, who is a friend ofours, and I know we both admired him,
and I loved his sense ofhumor about all this too.
He recounted his perspective on it.
And when I started to write the book,I did a Zoom with Dr.
Kissinger just to get his adviceon how should I frame it.
(20:16):
What are the top themes you think wouldbe most useful for readers to read about?
And he said, don't do what Idid with the White House years.
He said,I tried to write about everything.
He said, just focus on several themes,and we discussed them.
And I was reminiscing about our manyconversations when I was national
security advisor.
I said Henry, as I look back on this,
(20:38):
I faced a fundamental choice,to play the power games,
to engage in the intrigue orjust to ignore that and try to do my job.
And I think knowing that I'm a muchless effective Washington bureaucratic
infighter than he was, he said,you made the right choice.
They would have eaten you alive.
(20:58):
[LAUGH]>> Bill Whalen: I was gonna good naturedly
tease you, H.R,because we're at war with ourselves.
That's a line from Kanye West
[MUSIC]
>> Bill Whalen (21:08):
He has a song called Jesus Walks, here's what he raps.
We at war with terrorism, racism, butmost of all, we at war with ourselves.
So I'm gonna call you Yeezy though, or.
>> H.R. McMaster (21:17):
[LAUGH] Well, I think also, hey, let's get over it,
I think, is the theme to those lyrics.
And it's one of the themes ofthe book too, is that being at war
with ourselves is not only bad forour psyche in our society,
but it's actually a severeimpediment to good governance.
(21:39):
I think if you begin everythingwith a vitriolic discourse or
that you're immediately in opposition tosomebody from another political party.
Then actually you forecloseon the opportunity to have
a meaningful discussion about how we canwork together to build a better future.
So one of the themes in the book is,hey, let's get over it.
(22:01):
Let's begin conversations with what weagree on in connection with our most
significant challenges and opportunities,at least from a foreign policy and
a national security perspective.
And we can get a lot done together.
And a lot of the book is about my andour team, our incredible team's efforts,
to transcend this frictionthat we encountered and
(22:22):
difficulties andto actually get some really good outcomes.
As you guys have mentioned already,I mean, the national security strategy
that Dr. Schadlow, our colleaguehere at Hoover, she ran a fantastic
collaborative process while remainingtrue to the president's main priorities.
(22:43):
And I tell the story in the book ofthis meeting with President Trump on
the national security strategy.
And he tells Dr. Schadlow, he goes, I lovethis, I want more of this, this is great.
Well, it's because wepaid attention to him.
And then also, as we had been craftingspeeches for him on foreign policy
across the previous eight months,we had worked in a lot of these ideas so
(23:06):
we could run them by him andget his feedback.
And the speech that he gave inGeneral Assembly, or in Warsaw,
or at APEC, or ASEAN in Vietnam andin the Philippines.
Or this first trip that hetook when he went to Riyadh,
to Tel Aviv, to Rome and to Brussels.
(23:28):
So he was already on record with,I think, some really big ideas,
important ideas that he's actuallyquite consistent on, border sharing,
reciprocity, and trade, right?
I write about his erratic nature, butthere are some things that he's pretty
darn consistent on andhe's not wrong about them.
Now, sometimes, [LAUGH] as Iread the book, he's disruptive,
(23:49):
but sometimes he can be so disruptivethat he disrupts his own agenda, and
sadly, becomes the antagonistin his own story.
>> Bill Whalen (23:57):
My final question, I want both you to grind on here and
the National Security Council,H.R, dates back to 1947.
I think the first NSA comes in about 1953,but the council itself goes back to
1947 and it was the vestigeof the previous Cold War.
The question to you two gentlemen, we'renow in Cold War II, a different cold war,
does America need to revisit itsnational security apparatus?
(24:19):
And if so, how would you two redesign it?
>> H.R. McMaster (24:21):
Niall, why don't you go first?
What are your thoughts on this?
>> Niall Ferguson (24:24):
The most striking difference between today and
the NSC of 50 years ago is how muchlarger the bureaucracy is today.
And I think the question I put to H.R is,did you find it an unwieldy bureaucracy?
It's striking to me that it waspossible in the early 1970s for
(24:44):
Kissinger with a relativelysmall group of talented people,
to execute a very complexstrategic maneuver.
Which was to try to exploit theSino-Soviet split to improve the position
of the United States as it extricateditself from Vietnam to get the Soviets out
of the Middle East.
It was a very complex multi-year strategy,but I think it would have been very hard
(25:09):
to do with the kind of much largerbureaucracy that the NSC is today.
Very keen to get your thoughts on that HR.
You praise the people that you workedwith, and I think quite justly,
because you had lasting achievements,even though you yourself
were ultimately fired by Trump andreplaced by John Bolton.
(25:32):
What you had done not only enduredthrough the Trump presidency,
much of it has enduredthrough the Biden presidency,
cuz they didn't change the Chinapolicy in any meaningful way.
So it lasted, but
did it last because of this much morecomplex bureaucracy or despite it?
>> H.R. McMaster (25:50):
Yeah, well, it's a great question.
I think, first of all, you have tothink about just the size overall.
Smaller is typically betterbecause you're more agile.
But you do need people on the NSC staffwho have deep knowledge of a particular
problem set, say, biomedical security,right, for example.
Niall, the subject that you wrote about inDoom, it's important to have people who
(26:11):
understand pandemics or who understandthe most destructive weapons on earth.
And what effective techniques mightbe to prevent the proliferation of
those weapons, or have the expertiseof Matt Pottinger on China or
Lisa Curtis on Afghanistan and Pakistan.
And so I could just go on, right?
Juan Cruz on the western hemisphere.
(26:32):
So you need people with the rightexpertise, you also need people who
understand the tools that governmenthas to advance American interests.
You need those two critical competencies,and
you want people who are respected andwho know their role.
That it's not their role to make policy,it's their role to coordinate and
integrate efforts acrossthe departments and agencies.
So the number of people is not asimportant as the right people with
(26:54):
the right expertise.
When people talk about numbers, the SusanRice NSC grew to an unmanageable level.
I think, in large measurebecause they were centralizing
decision-making authority about tacticaldecisions rather than being farsighted and
putting into place longer term strategies.
So the size of the organization isimportant, but also the role of the NSC
(27:15):
and how you craft the NationalSecurity Council staff's mission.
And how they go about their businessin terms of are they a strategic or
more of a tactical organization?
But when you hear the numbers bandiedabout, a lot of times you neglect kind of
the growth associated withHomeland Security concerns,
which are relatively new.
The National Economic Council, which hasan international economics division to it,
(27:39):
which is really important.
I think John Bolton got rid of it andit's back now, but
it was super important to integrateeconomic policy and foreign policy and
national security policy,really critical organization.
And then also the Homeland Securityaspects of it, cyberspace, for
example, space is a competitive domain.
So these new demands create new need forexpertise.
(28:03):
But again, it's the right people.
But also, when you hear the numbers of theNSC staff, what happens is the people who
are in the situation room, thecommunications team, the protocol team.
There are various admin peoplewho manage clearances and
do reception for new members of the staff.
All of that gets lumped in a lot of times.
The relevant number are the policypositions on the NSC staff.
(28:25):
And again, what's most important,the fewer is better in general,
if you have the right expertise andthe people who understand their role and
are respected across the departments andagencies.
I mean, when I first came in, I putforward a mission statement for our team,
that our team,it was supposed to focus on, and we did,
on coordinating and integratingefforts across the departments and
(28:48):
agencies to give the president options.
And then to assist with the integrationand sensible implementation of his
policies and decisions, not to do itourselves, but to coordinate that.
And then we had a vision statement forour organization,
that we wanted to be valued and trustedacross the departments and agencies and
be a strategic organization ratherthan get drug into tactics.
(29:11):
But you're right,it can become a behemoth,
especially if you'recentralizing authorities.
One of the first things I did,I tell the story in the book,
is I inventoried all of the authoritiesand decision-making that had been
concentrated in the White Houseunder the Obama administration.
And prepared memoranda for
President Trump's signature todevolve those responsibilities and
(29:32):
decision-making authorities back downto the departments and agencies.
So, hey, China doesn't own the ocean.
So why is the Department of Defenserequesting permission to sail through
the South China Sea?
[LAUGH] Or, hey, why do you have torequest permission from the White House to
have more than three helicopters in Syria?
So these were ridiculous constraints, and
(29:53):
I think we got out of thatbusiness pretty quickly.
>> Bill Whalen (29:57):
Okay, H.R, we're gonna leave it there.
The title of the book, again,At War With Ourselves,
my year in the Trump White House.
It's available where good books are sold.
Congratulations again,H.R, it's a smash hit.
Number two best seller of the NewYork Times Hardcover Nonfiction list.
Niall, he's making it hard for the restof us to write books here at Hoover.
>> Niall Ferguson (30:13):
I raise my hat to you and congratulate you, and
it's a well deserved success.
When you were trying todecide what to do next,
I can remember pitching you the HooverInstitution and saying it was the perfect
place to come andwrite the books that you wanted to write.
And I think I was right about that.
>> H.R. McMaster (30:33):
Well, you're right, and a lot of that's because of you, Niall.
I mean, when you have you andthe other fellows at Hoover to emulate and
to get to know, you have to up your game.
I'll never be as good ofa writer as Niall Ferguson,
but you maybe aspire to at leastbe regarded as a decent writer.
>> Niall Ferguson (30:54):
These are two terrific books, which are both readable and
very illuminating on the problemsthat we face as a nation,
both internal and external.
So congratulations, and
they richly deserve to bethere in the best seller list.
So, well done.
>> H.R. McMaster (31:12):
Well, thanks to both of you for your friendship and
support through the whole process,thank you.
>> Bill Whalen (31:17):
All right, gentlemen, onto the B block.
And all the brotherly love thatyou just saw between Niall and HR,
we're now gonna do 180 degree detour from.
Because we're gonna talk about lastnight's presidential debate in
H.R McMaster's hometown of Philadelphia,Pennsylvania.
I am spoiled here at the HooverInstitution because every four years,
when I need to figure out what's goingon in a presidential election, wait for
Niall Ferguson to tell me.
(31:38):
And here's what Niall hastold me about this election.
It is the Barbenheimer election.
And Niall, the master of pop culture,wrote a brilliant column not too long ago
in which he said, it's the Barbenheimerelection in this regard.
The candidate's the Barbie,she's running on lightness and
kind of good-natured cheer.
The other one's running the Oppenheimercampaign, darkness, gloom.
You can figure out who that is.
(31:58):
Niall, you watched the debate last nightIs it still game on for Barbenheimer, or
are you thinking ina different direction now?
>> Niall Ferguson (32:04):
Well, it pretty much lived up to my expectations
in that Kamala Harrisdid her best to avoid
being pinned down on policy specifics.
And to project likable presidential,
middle class, wholesome cheerleading,
(32:26):
intellectual, political Barbie Persona.
And Donald Trump became more and
more angry as he fell intothe carefully laid traps
that had been prepared bythe Harris team for him.
And the angrier he got,the more he exaggerated.
(32:49):
So that in the course of the evening,we had America destroyed by the worst
inflation in its history,World War III just around the corner,
illegal immigrants devouringthe domestic pets of suburban Ohio.
So, yeah, it pretty much was Barbenheimer,I think, a hugely successful debate.
(33:10):
But Kamala Harris, who avoided wordsalads, stuck to some very well
rehearsed attacking lines, and got Trumpto take the bait on just about all
the issues that his team must havewished he could have steered clear of.
So you have to hand it to the Harriscampaign, they prepped extremely well, and
she delivered the goods.
(33:31):
I was also struck by how verygrating Donald Trump's voice became.
If you remember,eight years ago in the debates,
it was Hillary Clinton'svoice that was grating.
>> Hillary Clinton (33:41):
It's just awfully good that someone with the temperament
of Donald Trump is not in chargeof the law in our country.
>> President Donald Trump (33:49):
Because you'd be in jail.
>> Hillary Clinton (33:50):
Secretary Clinton.
>> Niall Ferguson (33:51):
But last night, I found myself wishing that Donald Trump would
just change his tone, maybe just once,from mad, so mad, mad as can be.
>> President Donald Trump (34:01):
And all over the world,
crime is down all over the world, excepthere, crime here is not through the roof.
>> Niall Ferguson (34:05):
[CROSSTALK] At one point,
I realized that Kamala Harris's voiceis actually somewhat lower than his.
And she is very carefully workingon a mellifluous delivery that
I think will be going over prettywell in those households that
don't want to be in a permanentstate of barely controlled fury.
(34:26):
So that was pretty mucha Barbenheimer evening, and
as such, I think a box office success.
Remember, Barbie did Trounce Oppenheimerat the box office last
year by something like two toone in terms of ticket sales.
On the other hand,as I pointed out in that column,
Barbie only won one Oscar,whereas Oppenheimer swept the Oscars.
(34:50):
And if the Electoral College is kindathe Oscars, I don't rule out that
even after a disastrous debateperformance, Donald Trump can still win
this election narrowly andmaybe because of Pennsylvania.
And this is really one for you HR.
Here's my question, and
I don't know the answer to this cuz Idon't really know the place well enough.
(35:10):
How did this play in those swingcounties where this is gonna be decided,
places like Northampton,Pennsylvania, which went for
Trump in 2016, narrowly, went forBiden in 2020, narrowly?
Seems like the kinda placethat will decide the outcome.
How did it all go over there,that's what I really like to know?
(35:32):
Are people in those swingcounties of Pennsylvania inspired
by barbies, vibes, andjoy and all that good stuff?
Or are they really responding to Trump'smessage that the border was out of
control, illegal immigration is a crisis,and
there was a huge inflation mistake madeby the Biden-Harris administration?
(35:55):
What do you think, you know this partof the world much better than I do?
>> H.R. McMaster (35:59):
Well, I wish I knew it better cuz I moved away when I was 17
to go to West Point, andI've not lived in Pennsylvania since then.
My family's there, my cousins are there.
And I think it just dependson maybe how Americans,
how they regard not only the debate butthe nature of the candidates.
(36:22):
I think that Vice President Harris seemedlike she was going to completely reverse
some of her previous positionson fracking, for example,
which is quite relevant in Pennsylvania,as well as the issues of border security.
I mean, the president reallylet her off scot-free on that,
she didn't really talk about it, right?
She talked about prosecuting membersof transnational organized crime gangs.
(36:44):
So, I just found the whole thing sodisappointing,
I think a lot of my fellow Pennsylvanianswill feel the same way because I just got
a sense of missed opportunity toreally hear what the candidates think.
I mean, there were a couple of issueshere and there that illuminated maybe
a predisposition in a certaindirection on foreign policy,
(37:05):
national security, energy security andenergy policy, economic policy.
I mean, there could have been so much morewe could have heard from both candidates
because as you alluded to Niall,it was performative rather than formative.
And, Bill, you're the politics experthere, how big of an impact do you think?
(37:27):
I think what is clearlya Vice President Harris win, I mean,
I'm not a good judge of this kinda stuff.
>> Bill Whalen (37:33):
Look, you wanna do performative, she performed better by far.
Niall was right, Trump was offensereminder, this is the third time he's done
this, this is not the Trump of eight yearsago, not the Trump you knew in 2017 H.R.
She was far better in performance,she was far better prepared.
Yeah, she got a lot of help from ABC,let's not gloss over that.
It's important to note we're doing thisin the bubble right now, it's less than
(37:54):
24 hours after the debate andwe all get a little overworked about this.
Let's see what the polls move.
I would caution one thing, I'm not beingpartisan here, she had a very good run for
about a month.
And then you might have noticed Niall andH.R, the polls kind of cooled down for
her and the race got back to where itwould have been with the normal Joe Biden
had he not dropped out of the race.
So let's see, in a couple ofweeks from now, if we restore.
But Niall, getting back to theBarbenheimer idea, there's a very famous
(38:16):
Pennsylvanian who jumped in the racelast night, Taylor Swift, Tay Tay.
[MUSIC]
Let's talk a bit about the Taylor effect.
And here, my friend, I want you to chooseyour words carefully because she has 95.2
million followers on X, Niall,and they fight fiercely for her.
So be careful of talking about Tay Tay,but she has now endorsed them.
(38:37):
Is anything like that possiblya game-changer, Niall, or
I'm just reading too much intopop culture and celebrities here?
>> Niall Ferguson (38:42):
Well, I think it's important because this election looks like
being the most gender-polarized electionwe've ever seen in the United States.
The gap between male and female voters,even before last night's debate,
was very striking,something like 11% points.
And of course,an endorsement from Taylor Swift delivers,
(39:02):
I presume,a significant number of young women.
Especially in just the same way thatthe opening exchanges on the issue
of abortion were calculated by the Harriscampaign to resonate with female voters.
So if this election is differentiatedby anything compared with, say, 2020 or
(39:22):
2016, I think it's this.
That there's gonna be a big, big dividebetween the male and female vote,
especially amongst younger voters,where we see a very striking phenomenon.
And not only in the United States,we can see it in the UK, too,
we can see it in Europe,we can see it in South Korea.
Young men are trending right and
(39:43):
young women are trending left in a waythat I don't think we've seen before.
So that's the significanceof Taylor Swift weighing in.
And it was a well-timed endorsementafter Donald Trump had been
the quintessential angry old man.
And Kamala Harris had played verysuccessfully, the empowered, powerful and
(40:06):
confident woman.
So, yeah, I think this isthe big issue in this election.
She has to foreground what theycall reproductive rights, but
I'm gonna call abortion.
Cuz that's an issue that is very difficultfor Republicans, that divides Republicans.
Where Donald Trump is not in sync withquite significant parts of his party,
(40:26):
especially in Bible Belt states.
For Trump, the issues that matterare immigration, inflation, and
the economy more generally.
And I think his signal failure last nightwas to make those issues the focus and
make her as an integral part ofthe Biden administration responsible for
the problems of the last three anda half years.
(40:48):
By failing to do that, I think hecost himself quite significantly.
But you're right, Bill,in the end everything in this day and
age has a news cycle life of what?
Two weeks?
Even a near assassination ofa presidential candidate was a news
story [LAUGH] to me and
(41:08):
astonishingly in a short time we'llhave forgotten about this debate.
Probably by the next GoodFellas episode.
>> Bill Whalen (41:16):
Okay, four things about this debate,
which I wanna quickly point out to you.
And I want your thoughts on whichone of these bothers you the most.
Niall, there was no mentionof the Ferguson law.
The concept that great powers,
when they end up spending more on debtservice and the military, they're screwed.
So no mention of that.
H.R, no pushback whenKamala Harris said the following.
Quote, as of today, there is not onemember of the United States military who
(41:37):
is in active duty in a combat zoneat any war zone around the world.
Niall, no mention about what's goingon in campuses and cancel culture and
anti Semitism.
H.R, no conversation,you can appreciate this,
having briefed a president every day fora year.
No discussion about whatKamala Harris knew or
didn't know aboutJoe Biden's cognitive state.
So, H.R, which of those fourthings concerns you the most?
>> H.R. McMaster (41:57):
Well, I guess, predictably,
I'll say that thereare no US servicemen and
women in harm's way around the world orengaged with enemies around the world.
Well, it's been really notreported very much, but
ISIS has become much,much more active in Syria and in Iraq.
US Central command, where my friendEric Carroll is the commander who's just
(42:18):
a fantastic officer andas good of a rugby player.
He's an absolute animalon the rugby pitch.
This is a guy who was shot inthe leg in an alleyway in Mosul and
chased down the terrorists with a knife.
I mean, he is one hard man,but he's also very competent.
(42:38):
He just reported that there have beentwice as many raids against ISIS and
twice as many ISIS relatedattacks in Iraq and in Syria.
And ISIS is trying to regaincontrol of territory and
become an even greater threat.
And so those soldiers are in harm's way.
Iran, through their proxies, is attackingour forces across the Middle East.
(43:02):
And the Biden administration stilldoesn't wanna act like they didn't
know what the return address is.
So maybe that's why she doesn'tthink we're engaged with enemies.
Because we haven't recognized that Iraq,through their proxies and
now also directly, now are engagingin acts of war against us.
And then think about what'shappening the Bob Ellman Deb,
(43:24):
with the multiple attacks on shipping andon our naval vessels.
Every one of those intercepts of a shortership missile is a diving catch, right?
I mean, I could go on about this,
about how aggressive China isbecoming in the South China Sea,
the seven acts of aggressionagainst the Philippines, a US ally?
And guess what?
(43:44):
We do have troops out there.
So I just think that itwas sort of a Pollyannaish
depiction of the state of the world.
And that was maybe what disappointedme most about her statements.
>> Bill Whalen (43:57):
What about you, Niall?
>> Niall Ferguson (43:59):
Well, whoever wins this election is gonna
be dealing with one hell of a fiscal mess.
I'm sorry, John Cochrane's nothere to agree with me, but
the growth of the debt over the lastdecade really has created a huge problem.
And the problem is becausewith higher rates,
servicing that debt starts to consume anever larger share of the federal budget.
(44:24):
My jokey Ferguson's law is no joke.
Actually the US government is nowspending more on interest payments and
the federal debt thanon national security.
And the Biden-Harris policy impliesa squeeze of the defense budget at
a time when we really need to beinvesting in strengthening our military.
Otherwise we will not have deterrencein the various theaters where
(44:46):
the increasingly aligned authoritarianpowers are threatening us.
So I think to have two presidentialcandidates say virtually nothing
about those fiscal problemswas a really lost opportunity.
And it would have been nice ifthe moderators had asked them about it.
How are you gonna clean up the messof a deficit of 7% of GDP or
(45:10):
whatever it now is at a timeof near full unemployment?
How will you cope when the economy slowsdown and that deficit gets even larger?
But that wasn't the kind ofquestion that the anchors were
interested in asking last night.
>> Bill Whalen (45:23):
Okay, we have about a minute left, a quick question.
It's a mousetrap question, Niall and H.R.How can you design a better debate?
I have one solution for you.
Let the journalists allow the candidatesto ask each other questions
as we get a warped view fromthe moderators themselves.
There was the obligatoryclimate change question.
I wanted to throw a brick through myscreen on the answers cuz I read polls
religiously.
Climate change just does notresonate the same as the economy or
(45:45):
the border foreign policy, but yet theyhave to ask a climate change question.
But Niall and H.R, if you could change onething about the debate process here in
the US if any, what would you change?
>> H.R. McMaster (45:54):
It's a great question, but
we have to try to get to more substance.
Something about when I debated in highschool and you had a resolution and
you had the affirmative and negative team.
Maybe even provide some ofthe questions in advance,
knowing that the candidates will takean affirmative or negative position.
And make it an argument for oragainst that proposition and
(46:15):
then afford a short rebuttal time forboth of them.
More in lines of the rulesof collegiate debates.
I just think we've gotta do something to
try to force the candidatesto answer the questions.
What would their policies be?
What would they really do?
>> Niall Ferguson (46:35):
My view is that these aren't debates.
And the reason that they're so
frustrating is that we don't really have aculture of debate in this country anymore.
Even student debating has beenseverely damaged by workism.
So that it's impossible, in fact,to have the kind of debates that you and
I had when we were young.
(46:56):
So we need to revivedebating as an activity.
Perhaps it's part of the educationalrenewal that I'm so concerned with,
if we want to see presidentialcandidates engaging in real debate.
My one reform, let's have an audience.
Having these dead,empty studios is not the right way for
(47:17):
a political argument to be made.
Democracy is about the people.
And having the people sat watching thison their TVs instead of at least being
represented in the auditorium,seems to me in itself to be a mistake.
So I'd like to bring the audience back.
>> Bill Whalen (47:34):
Not exactly Lincoln Douglas, is it, Niall?
>> Niall Ferguson (47:38):
No, that would be my reform.
Bring back the audience.
>> Bill Whalen (47:43):
Yeah, I would add one more thing.
We need at least one more debate herebecause you just can't cram everything
into 90 minutes.
I'm the only single guy in the show, It'slike watching two people speed date for
90 minutes.
It was just very shallow conversations and
nothing substantive but Andnow onto the lightning round.
Okay, gentlemen,let's begin quick question here.
(48:04):
We're recording the show on the 23rdanniversary of the 911 attacks on America,
very quickly, where were you to that day?
>> H.R. McMaster (48:11):
I was in Germany, command of a cavalry squadron.
We had a short respite in betweena force on force maneuver exercise, and
a continuation of that exercise.
And, I resolved at that moment, obviously,
to continue to train our unit andget us ready to fight.
I did not command that squadronwhen it did go into combat, but
it did go into combat several years later.
(48:34):
And, of course, it was a huge change for
our armed forces as we pursued the enemiesof all civilization in Afghanistan,
and then had the subsequentwar in Iraq as well.
So, yeah, I was in Germany andin Schweinfurt, Germany.
>> Bill Whalen (48:48):
Niall.
>> Niall Ferguson (48:50):
I was in Oxford, and I watched on a rather
dodgy dial up Internet connection,
the twin towers of the World Tradecenter crash down.
And I realized that moment that I had tocome to the United States, and I very.
In Springfield, they're eating the dogs.
The people that came in,they're eating the cats.
They're eating the pets ofthe people that live there.
And this is what's happening inour country and it's a shame.
[MUSIC]
>> Bill Whalen (00:18):
It's Wednesday, September the 11th, 2024.
And welcome back to GoodFellows, a HooverInstitution broadcast examining social,
economic, political, andgeopolitical concerns.
I'm Bill Whalen,I'm a Hoover Distinguished Policy Fellow.
I'll be your moderator today,joined by two, not three, but
two of our GoodFellows.
John Cochrane is not with us,he is out doing the Lord's business for
Hoover today.
But in his absence, were more thancapably taken care of by the historian
(00:41):
Niall Ferguson, and former presidentialNational Security Advisor and
geostrategist, LieutenantGeneral HR McMaster,
who is in the crosshairs of the showbecause we're gonna talk about his book.
Niall and HR, great to see you.
It's been too long, my friends.
>> H.R. McMaster (00:54):
Hey, great to see both of you.
And thanks again for
the opportunity to talk about the bookwith two people who I admire.
And, Niall, thanks somuch for your advice.
At the outset of it, when I wasframing it, I didn't wanna name you by
name because I didn't want you to beblamed for anything that's in the book.
But thank you so much to both of you foryour support and friendship on this.
>> Bill Whalen (01:14):
Okay, in Nixonian terms,
that makes Niall Ferguson an undetectedco conspirator in this book, I guess.
>> [LAUGH]>> Bill Whalen: But let's get
into the title of the bookis At War with Ourselves.
It is number two, HR, on the bestsellerNew York Times Hardcover Nonfiction list.
Congratulations, that is a coup,my friend.
I'm curious about one thing, HR.
I am a recovering Washingtonian,I spent half my life in that city,
I've spent my life in politics.
So, I've spent way too much time readingmemoirs from people who spent time in
(01:38):
Washington.
There are usually two defining featuresto a tell-all Washington book, HR.
One is that the people who writesthe book, the person writes the book,
they use it to get even.
They wanna exact their vengeance onpeople they think backstabbed them,
threw them under the bus did them wrong.
Secondly, HR,there's the unwritten subhead,
which is that I was the onlysmart person in the room.
Everybody was too stupidnot to take my advice.
(01:59):
Now, as I'm reading At War with Ourselves,I keep waiting for that moment when you
throw somebody under the bus or when yousay, I was the only person who got it,
everybody else was wrong, butit's not there, my friend.
Now, was this a conscious decision on yourpart to write a Washington book that is in
many ways, not a Washington book?
>> H.R. McMaster (02:14):
[LAUGH] Well, thanks for asking that question, Bill.
I really wanted to strike the right tone.
I mean, I really did.
I wasn't writing it to settle any scores.
I wasn't writing it to say, hey,if everybody had just listened to me.
What I wanted to do is bringreaders into the White House,
into the Trump White House.
What was it like?
What is it like to bea national security advisor?
What does an effective national securitydecision-making process look like?
(02:36):
What are the obstacles that oneencounters when trying to put a process
like that into place?
What role do personalities and
relationships play in trying toforge effective policy outcomes?
And, of course,what is president's character?
What is the importance ofpresidential character?
And to consider President Trumpin context of the eight Obama
(02:59):
years that preceded it andthe Biden years that followed it.
So I hope I make good on thatwhile being still grateful for
the opportunity to have been in the job.
And what I really hope isyoung leaders will read it.
Young people who wanna lead,who wanna serve will read it and say, hey,
I can see what the rewards are of service.
>> Niall Ferguson (03:18):
HR, congratulations on the book, it's an important book.
So was the previous book where youset out the strategic landscape,
but this one fills in a lot ofthe detail on what happened during that
whirlwind time when you wereNational Security Advisor.
I wanna talk a bit about how youdescribe the evolution of strategy,
(03:42):
because, in a way, your book isa chance for us to understand how
the national security strategy ofthe United States got fundamentally
overhauled in the first Trumpadministration under your leadership.
That was an enormouslyconsequential change.
I remember reading that document whenit first came out and comparing it with
(04:06):
the document it replaced, which wasthe last national security strategy of
the Obama administration,radical change, especially on China.
Talk a bit about how the bookhelps us understand that process,
given that you were doing it with,let's say,
a somewhat erratic commanderin chief as your boss.
>> H.R. McMaster (04:28):
Well, thanks, Niall.
I mean, what I saw it as my job to do isto help President Trump determine his own
foreign policy,his own national security strategy.
And to do that by fulfilling my duty asa National Security Advisor who is the,
the only person really inthe national security and
foreign policy establishment who hasa president as his or her only client.
By giving the president best analysis,by giving the president best advice.
(04:52):
And, of course,we know Donald Trump is nothing else.
But if he's nothing else, he's disruptive.
And, I wanted to help him disruptwhat needed to be disrupted.
And, Niall, in terms of the process andhow to frame his approach to national
security, which is reflected inthe national security strategy, or
a specific policy andstrategy on China, for example.
(05:15):
What I wanted to do was to helphim by describing the nature of
the challenge we're facing.
And then,
to consider what our objectives ought tobe based on the nature of that challenge.
And the way to do that with Donald Trump,and I think, really with any president,
is to answer the so what question upfront.
Why does America care about thischallenge to our security and prosperity?
(05:37):
Because then you can view that complexchallenge with the lens of those vital
interests and craft an overarchinggoal and more specific objectives.
And in my initial engagementswith President Trump,
I didn't really go much further thanthat because I wanted to make sure, hey,
do you agree with thisdefinition of the challenge?
Do you agree that this iswhy Americans should care?
(05:59):
And do you agree these are our goals andobjectives?
And then we initiated a framing processand then the development of options
that questioned the assumptions onwhich previous policies were based.
This is something thatPresident Trump enjoyed doing, right?
Cuz he would often talk about the stupidpeople who came before me and so forth.
And in some case, I mean,most cases, I think all cases,
(06:20):
he was correct that theseweren't stupid people.
But our assumptions were overly optimisticand were oftentimes implicit and
therefore not challenged.
And so based on some flawedassumptions about the nature of
the post-Cold War period, we hadvacated critical competitive spaces,
critical arenas of competition.
And we were getting our ass kicked, Niall,[LAUGH] by revanchist revisionist powers,
(06:46):
Russia and China and their allies andso forth, or partners.
And so we questioned those assumptions,and that allowed us,
I think, to make the shift you describedbetween the president's disruptive nature,
his willingness to questionthose assumptions.
And the way we crafted our engagementswith him around the framing of the most
(07:06):
significant challenges we were facing.
I think that allowed us to put intoplace this major shift in US policy.
>> Niall Ferguson (07:13):
One thing that strikes me about the book is that it's clear
that it's hard to keep Trump onthat course of a tougher line
towards China because hekeeps going off course.
There's the moment whereyou're kinda telling him,
make sure you don't fall intothe old win-win Chinese terminology,
(07:36):
cuz when they say win-win,they mean two wins for China.
And yet, in fact, his inclinationwas often to ease the pressure,
to look for some kinda dealto be done with Xi Jinping.
Talk a bit about the challenge of keepingTrump on that track that the national
(07:57):
security strategy set out when hisimpulse was often to go right off it.
>> H.R. McMaster (08:01):
Well, he understood fundamentally he was consistent in his
understanding on the challenge from Chinaand especially China's weaponization of
its status mercantilisteconomic model against us.
So he was consistent on that,but President Trump,
everybody knows this, right?
This is not a revelation,has great confidence in his ability
to make big deals, andbig deals get him attention,
(08:23):
big deals he thought were inthe interest of the United States.
And so in the case of China,what China does is wants
the Chinese Communist Party leadershipto string us along complacency,
the American complacency is the ChineseCommunist Party's greatest asset.
So China will string usalong with false promises of
(08:46):
liberalization of their economic model orgovernance or
new areas of cooperation on,on global issues and so forth.
Its all nonsense because what Chinais doing is trying to prevent
us from reentering those arenas ofcompetition that we had vacated.
And so as we prep the president forthese engagements,
(09:08):
we would show him the previous failedpattern of engagement with China,
the working groups that havebeen established for so
many times, and how they wouldnever really bear any fruit.
And of course, President Trump, though,was like, he's reflexively contrarian.
So what I would try to do is let him becontrary to Xi Jinping instead of me, so
(09:28):
in these prep sessions,I would say, hey, Mr.
President, this is whatXi Jinping wants you to say.
And by the way, this is howPresident Obama or President Obama's
national security advisor steppedinto these rhetorical traps and
I think that prepped him well,he didn't fall for those traps.
And then, of course, it wasn't just me,there were other really
(09:50):
very capable people in that administrationwho were giving him the same messages, our
cabinet officials, secretary of state anddefense, but also Bob Lighthizer on trade.
He's fantastic, a fantastically person and
somebody who President Trump hasa great deal of respect for.
So as a team and Matt Pottinger, gosh,that guy is brilliant on China, has so
(10:10):
much deep knowledge, and the presidentlikes to hear kind of stories and
the history and Matt did a great jobin prepping for these engagements.
So I think that we were able to keephim focused on those objectives and
of course, though,what happened is later in his presidency,
he was attracted to the possibilityof a phase two trade deal.
(10:32):
Remember, Bob Lighthizer hadnegotiated phase one, and
the Chinese Communist Party leadership washolding out, dangling out this possibility
of a really big deal that would begreat for the American economy.
That would address President Trump'smain concern, which is really the trade
imbalance in goods is what he reallyfocuses on almost exclusively.
And I know that's problematicfrom an economic perspective, but
(10:56):
that's what prevented him from maybetaking more decisive measures in terms of
countering Chinese economic aggression,such as intellectual property theft under
Article 301 of the trade law, 232 interms of dumping of aluminum and steel.
But then a whole range of otherissues like overcapacity and
subsidies for Chinese products.
(11:18):
So that's good, if Trump is reelected,all that's coming,
I think he learned from that being strungalong and he'll be less patient with
Xi Jinping from a trade andan economic perspective if he's reelected.
>> Bill Whalen (11:30):
You know HR reading your book was kind of like eating
a Chinese dinner and that I washungry about 15 minutes later, and
I was hungry for Niall Ferguson's nextinstallment of his Kissinger biography.
Because I believe,Niall you pick up in 1969, and
not mistaken that's when Henry Kissingerstarted out as national security advisor.
>> President Richard Nixon (11:46):
Doctor Kissinger is a man who is known to
all people who are interestedin foreign policy as perhaps
one of the major scholars in America andthe world today in this area.
>> Bill Whalen (11:55):
You`ll correct me here, I think Kissinger held the job for six plus
years, which makes him the longest servingNSA but he also holds a distinction of
holding both National Security Council andstate at the same time.
And I think in your book, H.R,you mentioned talking to him and
him joking about it's the onlytime the NSA director and
the secretary of state got along,it was fabulous.
Let's approach this job a little bit froma design, I'm gonna get Niall`s thoughts
(12:18):
here and what Kissinger hastold him about it as well.
But having served in the army, HR,where there is a pecking order and
an understanding of power,there's a general and
officers who take commands and go forward.
I always look at White Housesin design and here,
Trump did something very curious,he had you at NSC.
He obviously had a defense secretary,secretary of state, CIA director, but
then he had this little rump caucus,
(12:38):
this little rump group in the White House,which was Steve Bannon and Jared Kushner.
And I saw that andthat struck me as highly problematic for
someone in your position, because whyBannon's the kind of guy who thinks he's
always the smartest guy in the room andhe's a free agent and kind of a wild card.
Jared's obviously the son in law forTrump, it would seem that there was kind
of a built in system that couldcause chaos within the White House,
am I reading that correctly,or am I wrong here?
>> H.R. McMaster (13:01):
Well, no, I think you're right about that and
President Trump is predisposed.
I read about this, to kind of peopleagainst each other, sort of like a sequel
to the deal to the apprentice the realityTV show that he, that he hosted.
So it was a recipe for a lot of frictionand tension but what I tried to do was
bring people into the NationalSecurity Council decision making,
policy making process.
(13:22):
Mr. Bannon really didn't wanna do that,I mean, he was actually more interested in
manipulating decisions consistentwith his own agenda and
that made him like a less thanoptimal teammate in the West Wing.
And especially when he began to employtactics meant to undercut anybody who
was nothing, who was not helpinghim advance that narrow agenda.
(13:43):
But what I found withJared Kushner is he was a force for
good in the Trump White Housein my perspective.
I mean, Jared Kushner was given some whatpeople thought were impossible portfolios
in the wake of President Trump's, oras President Trump was continuing his
serial insults aimed at Mexico aboutbuilding the wall and everything.
(14:04):
He gave that Mexico portfolio to Jaredon top of the Middle East portfolio and
a number of others.
So I think that heactually over delivered,
I would like to think that we werevery helpful to him, I know we were.
And I said, hey Jared, you can do this onyour own with a small group of people, but
it's not gonna work bringit into our process,
(14:26):
we'll run a process that's transparentwith the departments and agencies.
You can still drive the President's agendaas part of know the NSC process and
you`re gonna have the departments and
agencies who understand what you want toachieve and can be part of achieving it.
And remember, I mean, remember,everybody was saying, gosh,
its a fools errand to try to normalizerelations between Gulf States and
(14:50):
Israel and he did it with a greatguy named Jason Greenblatt.
And with the support of departments andagencies,
those guys drove it but you know what,it was a process that worked.
I used the other example of the move ofthe embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem,
and we used the NSC process forthat, I mean,
(15:10):
our ambassador to Israel wasreluctant about doing that.
Jared was reluctant,I said, hey, listen guys,
this is the only way this is gonnawork effectively and we did it,
I think we demonstrated our role asthe NSC staff, as honest brokers and
we developed a great plan to do it anddid it effectively anyway.
(15:31):
I think that you're right, Bill, I mean,in any White House, this happens, right?
And I write about that in the book andas a historian,
I was kind of familiar with previousadministrations and history can be a great
comfort because you realize you'renot in an unprecedented situation.
>> Bill Whalen (15:48):
Right. >> Niall Ferguson
that's important because I thinkthere were many journalists
who wanted to represent the White Houseof Donald Trump as uniquely chaotic.
And characterized by a factionalinfighting, but, in fact,
it's more of a feature thana bug of White House politics.
(16:10):
The Nixon administration wasvery different in the sense that
the personality of Richard Nixonwas very different,
a president that Donald Trump admires,interestingly.
But they really couldn't be moredifferent because Nixon was cerebral,
introverted, spent a lot of time withHenry Kissinger thinking through
(16:30):
strategy in ways that when youread my second volume, HR,
you'll feel pangs of envy at the waythose guys were able to work together.
But what I try and show in the secondvolume, I'm still slogging away writing,
is that there was all kinds ofskullduggery going on as well.
Machinations, palace intrigue, Henrytrying to make sure that the secretary
(16:56):
of state, William Rogers, was out ofthe loop in all the key decisions.
The kind of politics of secrecy,not to mention wiretapping,
that ultimately led to the destructionof the Nixon presidency,
all began early on inthe Nixon White House in 1969, 1970.
(17:18):
And so I think one of the thingsthat I take away from your book and
from the work I'm doing onthe Nixon administration
is that this is actually howAmerican politics works by design.
Their separation of powers, in fact,
means a kind of struggle betweenthe different bits of the government.
(17:38):
You don't talk an enormousamount about Congress, but
it's another thing that is at odds withthe executive branch most of the time.
And so my sense is that formost readers, it's very valuable
to see how the sausage gets made and torealize that inside every White House or
inside every administration,there are these battles going on.
(18:01):
And this is not something peculiar,
wasn't really a particularfailing of the Trump presidency.
It's actually kind of normal that thathappens and we shouldn't be surprised.
We don't hear quite as muchabout what's been going on in
the Biden-Harris White House becausethere's been much less leaking.
But in the end, we'll find out, andI'm pretty sure we'll find out that there
(18:24):
were all kinds of palace intriguesgoing on, the culmination of which was,
of course, Joe Biden's departure from thetop of the democratic ticket this year.
So I think this is one of the mostexciting things about your book.
We get to see the realities ofpolicymaking, of grand strategy-making
in the sometimes quite toxiccontext of the Trump White House.
(18:47):
But I'm kinda here to reassure you,it's okay.
This kinda happens in mostadministrations, even Ronald Reagan's.
I mean,
that's something that I'm learning fromour Hoover fellow Joseph Ledford's work.
When you look atthe politics of Iran-Contra,
you realize that that was no shiningcity on a hill the Reagan White House.
>> H.R. McMaster (19:08):
No, quite the opposite.
I was talking to Admiral Poindexter.
So one of the aspects ofthe book that I enjoyed writing,
actually all of, it was a mixture of[LAUGH] emotions writing the book.
But I enjoyed writing the part inparticular about my conversations with
former national security advisors.
I talked to every living formernational security advisor in person or
(19:32):
on the phone within weeksafter taking over the job.
And the title of the book I took fromwhat Admiral Poindexter told me,
who served later in Reagan administration.
But he was talking about the firstyears of the Reagan administration.
He said, hey,they were at war with themselves.
And so[LAUGH] that's where the title comes from.
And it is a comfort to knowthat these tensions existed.
(19:54):
And Dr. Kissinger, who is a friend ofours, and I know we both admired him,
and I loved his sense ofhumor about all this too.
He recounted his perspective on it.
And when I started to write the book,I did a Zoom with Dr.
Kissinger just to get his adviceon how should I frame it.
(20:16):
What are the top themes you think wouldbe most useful for readers to read about?
And he said, don't do what Idid with the White House years.
He said,I tried to write about everything.
He said, just focus on several themes,and we discussed them.
And I was reminiscing about our manyconversations when I was national
security advisor.
I said Henry, as I look back on this,
(20:38):
I faced a fundamental choice,to play the power games,
to engage in the intrigue orjust to ignore that and try to do my job.
And I think knowing that I'm a muchless effective Washington bureaucratic
infighter than he was, he said,you made the right choice.
They would have eaten you alive.
(20:58):
[LAUGH]>> Bill Whalen: I was gonna good naturedly
tease you, H.R,because we're at war with ourselves.
That's a line from Kanye West
[MUSIC]
>> Bill Whalen (21:08):
He has a song called Jesus Walks, here's what he raps.
We at war with terrorism, racism, butmost of all, we at war with ourselves.
So I'm gonna call you Yeezy though, or.
>> H.R. McMaster (21:17):
[LAUGH] Well, I think also, hey, let's get over it,
I think, is the theme to those lyrics.
And it's one of the themes ofthe book too, is that being at war
with ourselves is not only bad forour psyche in our society,
but it's actually a severeimpediment to good governance.
(21:39):
I think if you begin everythingwith a vitriolic discourse or
that you're immediately in opposition tosomebody from another political party.
Then actually you forecloseon the opportunity to have
a meaningful discussion about how we canwork together to build a better future.
So one of the themes in the book is,hey, let's get over it.
(22:01):
Let's begin conversations with what weagree on in connection with our most
significant challenges and opportunities,at least from a foreign policy and
a national security perspective.
And we can get a lot done together.
And a lot of the book is about my andour team, our incredible team's efforts,
to transcend this frictionthat we encountered and
(22:22):
difficulties andto actually get some really good outcomes.
As you guys have mentioned already,I mean, the national security strategy
that Dr. Schadlow, our colleaguehere at Hoover, she ran a fantastic
collaborative process while remainingtrue to the president's main priorities.
(22:43):
And I tell the story in the book ofthis meeting with President Trump on
the national security strategy.
And he tells Dr. Schadlow, he goes, I lovethis, I want more of this, this is great.
Well, it's because wepaid attention to him.
And then also, as we had been craftingspeeches for him on foreign policy
across the previous eight months,we had worked in a lot of these ideas so
(23:06):
we could run them by him andget his feedback.
And the speech that he gave inGeneral Assembly, or in Warsaw,
or at APEC, or ASEAN in Vietnam andin the Philippines.
Or this first trip that hetook when he went to Riyadh,
to Tel Aviv, to Rome and to Brussels.
(23:28):
So he was already on record with,I think, some really big ideas,
important ideas that he's actuallyquite consistent on, border sharing,
reciprocity, and trade, right?
I write about his erratic nature, butthere are some things that he's pretty
darn consistent on andhe's not wrong about them.
Now, sometimes, [LAUGH] as Iread the book, he's disruptive,
(23:49):
but sometimes he can be so disruptivethat he disrupts his own agenda, and
sadly, becomes the antagonistin his own story.
>> Bill Whalen (23:57):
My final question, I want both you to grind on here and
the National Security Council,H.R, dates back to 1947.
I think the first NSA comes in about 1953,but the council itself goes back to
1947 and it was the vestigeof the previous Cold War.
The question to you two gentlemen, we'renow in Cold War II, a different cold war,
does America need to revisit itsnational security apparatus?
(24:19):
And if so, how would you two redesign it?
>> H.R. McMaster (24:21):
Niall, why don't you go first?
What are your thoughts on this?
>> Niall Ferguson (24:24):
The most striking difference between today and
the NSC of 50 years ago is how muchlarger the bureaucracy is today.
And I think the question I put to H.R is,did you find it an unwieldy bureaucracy?
It's striking to me that it waspossible in the early 1970s for
(24:44):
Kissinger with a relativelysmall group of talented people,
to execute a very complexstrategic maneuver.
Which was to try to exploit theSino-Soviet split to improve the position
of the United States as it extricateditself from Vietnam to get the Soviets out
of the Middle East.
It was a very complex multi-year strategy,but I think it would have been very hard
(25:09):
to do with the kind of much largerbureaucracy that the NSC is today.
Very keen to get your thoughts on that HR.
You praise the people that you workedwith, and I think quite justly,
because you had lasting achievements,even though you yourself
were ultimately fired by Trump andreplaced by John Bolton.
(25:32):
What you had done not only enduredthrough the Trump presidency,
much of it has enduredthrough the Biden presidency,
cuz they didn't change the Chinapolicy in any meaningful way.
So it lasted, but
did it last because of this much morecomplex bureaucracy or despite it?
>> H.R. McMaster (25:50):
Yeah, well, it's a great question.
I think, first of all, you have tothink about just the size overall.
Smaller is typically betterbecause you're more agile.
But you do need people on the NSC staffwho have deep knowledge of a particular
problem set, say, biomedical security,right, for example.
Niall, the subject that you wrote about inDoom, it's important to have people who
(26:11):
understand pandemics or who understandthe most destructive weapons on earth.
And what effective techniques mightbe to prevent the proliferation of
those weapons, or have the expertiseof Matt Pottinger on China or
Lisa Curtis on Afghanistan and Pakistan.
And so I could just go on, right?
Juan Cruz on the western hemisphere.
(26:32):
So you need people with the rightexpertise, you also need people who
understand the tools that governmenthas to advance American interests.
You need those two critical competencies,and
you want people who are respected andwho know their role.
That it's not their role to make policy,it's their role to coordinate and
integrate efforts acrossthe departments and agencies.
So the number of people is not asimportant as the right people with
(26:54):
the right expertise.
When people talk about numbers, the SusanRice NSC grew to an unmanageable level.
I think, in large measurebecause they were centralizing
decision-making authority about tacticaldecisions rather than being farsighted and
putting into place longer term strategies.
So the size of the organization isimportant, but also the role of the NSC
(27:15):
and how you craft the NationalSecurity Council staff's mission.
And how they go about their businessin terms of are they a strategic or
more of a tactical organization?
But when you hear the numbers bandiedabout, a lot of times you neglect kind of
the growth associated withHomeland Security concerns,
which are relatively new.
The National Economic Council, which hasan international economics division to it,
(27:39):
which is really important.
I think John Bolton got rid of it andit's back now, but
it was super important to integrateeconomic policy and foreign policy and
national security policy,really critical organization.
And then also the Homeland Securityaspects of it, cyberspace, for
example, space is a competitive domain.
So these new demands create new need forexpertise.
(28:03):
But again, it's the right people.
But also, when you hear the numbers of theNSC staff, what happens is the people who
are in the situation room, thecommunications team, the protocol team.
There are various admin peoplewho manage clearances and
do reception for new members of the staff.
All of that gets lumped in a lot of times.
The relevant number are the policypositions on the NSC staff.
(28:25):
And again, what's most important,the fewer is better in general,
if you have the right expertise andthe people who understand their role and
are respected across the departments andagencies.
I mean, when I first came in, I putforward a mission statement for our team,
that our team,it was supposed to focus on, and we did,
on coordinating and integratingefforts across the departments and
(28:48):
agencies to give the president options.
And then to assist with the integrationand sensible implementation of his
policies and decisions, not to do itourselves, but to coordinate that.
And then we had a vision statement forour organization,
that we wanted to be valued and trustedacross the departments and agencies and
be a strategic organization ratherthan get drug into tactics.
(29:11):
But you're right,it can become a behemoth,
especially if you'recentralizing authorities.
One of the first things I did,I tell the story in the book,
is I inventoried all of the authoritiesand decision-making that had been
concentrated in the White Houseunder the Obama administration.
And prepared memoranda for
President Trump's signature todevolve those responsibilities and
(29:32):
decision-making authorities back downto the departments and agencies.
So, hey, China doesn't own the ocean.
So why is the Department of Defenserequesting permission to sail through
the South China Sea?
[LAUGH] Or, hey, why do you have torequest permission from the White House to
have more than three helicopters in Syria?
So these were ridiculous constraints, and
(29:53):
I think we got out of thatbusiness pretty quickly.
>> Bill Whalen (29:57):
Okay, H.R, we're gonna leave it there.
The title of the book, again,At War With Ourselves,
my year in the Trump White House.
It's available where good books are sold.
Congratulations again,H.R, it's a smash hit.
Number two best seller of the NewYork Times Hardcover Nonfiction list.
Niall, he's making it hard for the restof us to write books here at Hoover.
>> Niall Ferguson (30:13):
I raise my hat to you and congratulate you, and
it's a well deserved success.
When you were trying todecide what to do next,
I can remember pitching you the HooverInstitution and saying it was the perfect
place to come andwrite the books that you wanted to write.
And I think I was right about that.
>> H.R. McMaster (30:33):
Well, you're right, and a lot of that's because of you, Niall.
I mean, when you have you andthe other fellows at Hoover to emulate and
to get to know, you have to up your game.
I'll never be as good ofa writer as Niall Ferguson,
but you maybe aspire to at leastbe regarded as a decent writer.
>> Niall Ferguson (30:54):
These are two terrific books, which are both readable and
very illuminating on the problemsthat we face as a nation,
both internal and external.
So congratulations, and
they richly deserve to bethere in the best seller list.
So, well done.
>> H.R. McMaster (31:12):
Well, thanks to both of you for your friendship and
support through the whole process,thank you.
>> Bill Whalen (31:17):
All right, gentlemen, onto the B block.
And all the brotherly love thatyou just saw between Niall and HR,
we're now gonna do 180 degree detour from.
Because we're gonna talk about lastnight's presidential debate in
H.R McMaster's hometown of Philadelphia,Pennsylvania.
I am spoiled here at the HooverInstitution because every four years,
when I need to figure out what's goingon in a presidential election, wait for
Niall Ferguson to tell me.
(31:38):
And here's what Niall hastold me about this election.
It is the Barbenheimer election.
And Niall, the master of pop culture,wrote a brilliant column not too long ago
in which he said, it's the Barbenheimerelection in this regard.
The candidate's the Barbie,she's running on lightness and
kind of good-natured cheer.
The other one's running the Oppenheimercampaign, darkness, gloom.
You can figure out who that is.
(31:58):
Niall, you watched the debate last nightIs it still game on for Barbenheimer, or
are you thinking ina different direction now?
>> Niall Ferguson (32:04):
Well, it pretty much lived up to my expectations
in that Kamala Harrisdid her best to avoid
being pinned down on policy specifics.
And to project likable presidential,
middle class, wholesome cheerleading,
(32:26):
intellectual, political Barbie Persona.
And Donald Trump became more and
more angry as he fell intothe carefully laid traps
that had been prepared bythe Harris team for him.
And the angrier he got,the more he exaggerated.
(32:49):
So that in the course of the evening,we had America destroyed by the worst
inflation in its history,World War III just around the corner,
illegal immigrants devouringthe domestic pets of suburban Ohio.
So, yeah, it pretty much was Barbenheimer,I think, a hugely successful debate.
(33:10):
But Kamala Harris, who avoided wordsalads, stuck to some very well
rehearsed attacking lines, and got Trumpto take the bait on just about all
the issues that his team must havewished he could have steered clear of.
So you have to hand it to the Harriscampaign, they prepped extremely well, and
she delivered the goods.
(33:31):
I was also struck by how verygrating Donald Trump's voice became.
If you remember,eight years ago in the debates,
it was Hillary Clinton'svoice that was grating.
>> Hillary Clinton (33:41):
It's just awfully good that someone with the temperament
of Donald Trump is not in chargeof the law in our country.
>> President Donald Trump (33:49):
Because you'd be in jail.
>> Hillary Clinton (33:50):
Secretary Clinton.
>> Niall Ferguson (33:51):
But last night, I found myself wishing that Donald Trump would
just change his tone, maybe just once,from mad, so mad, mad as can be.
>> President Donald Trump (34:01):
And all over the world,
crime is down all over the world, excepthere, crime here is not through the roof.
>> Niall Ferguson (34:05):
[CROSSTALK] At one point,
I realized that Kamala Harris's voiceis actually somewhat lower than his.
And she is very carefully workingon a mellifluous delivery that
I think will be going over prettywell in those households that
don't want to be in a permanentstate of barely controlled fury.
(34:26):
So that was pretty mucha Barbenheimer evening, and
as such, I think a box office success.
Remember, Barbie did Trounce Oppenheimerat the box office last
year by something like two toone in terms of ticket sales.
On the other hand,as I pointed out in that column,
Barbie only won one Oscar,whereas Oppenheimer swept the Oscars.
(34:50):
And if the Electoral College is kindathe Oscars, I don't rule out that
even after a disastrous debateperformance, Donald Trump can still win
this election narrowly andmaybe because of Pennsylvania.
And this is really one for you HR.
Here's my question, and
I don't know the answer to this cuz Idon't really know the place well enough.
(35:10):
How did this play in those swingcounties where this is gonna be decided,
places like Northampton,Pennsylvania, which went for
Trump in 2016, narrowly, went forBiden in 2020, narrowly?
Seems like the kinda placethat will decide the outcome.
How did it all go over there,that's what I really like to know?
(35:32):
Are people in those swingcounties of Pennsylvania inspired
by barbies, vibes, andjoy and all that good stuff?
Or are they really responding to Trump'smessage that the border was out of
control, illegal immigration is a crisis,and
there was a huge inflation mistake madeby the Biden-Harris administration?
(35:55):
What do you think, you know this partof the world much better than I do?
>> H.R. McMaster (35:59):
Well, I wish I knew it better cuz I moved away when I was 17
to go to West Point, andI've not lived in Pennsylvania since then.
My family's there, my cousins are there.
And I think it just dependson maybe how Americans,
how they regard not only the debate butthe nature of the candidates.
(36:22):
I think that Vice President Harris seemedlike she was going to completely reverse
some of her previous positionson fracking, for example,
which is quite relevant in Pennsylvania,as well as the issues of border security.
I mean, the president reallylet her off scot-free on that,
she didn't really talk about it, right?
She talked about prosecuting membersof transnational organized crime gangs.
(36:44):
So, I just found the whole thing sodisappointing,
I think a lot of my fellow Pennsylvanianswill feel the same way because I just got
a sense of missed opportunity toreally hear what the candidates think.
I mean, there were a couple of issueshere and there that illuminated maybe
a predisposition in a certaindirection on foreign policy,
(37:05):
national security, energy security andenergy policy, economic policy.
I mean, there could have been so much morewe could have heard from both candidates
because as you alluded to Niall,it was performative rather than formative.
And, Bill, you're the politics experthere, how big of an impact do you think?
(37:27):
I think what is clearlya Vice President Harris win, I mean,
I'm not a good judge of this kinda stuff.
>> Bill Whalen (37:33):
Look, you wanna do performative, she performed better by far.
Niall was right, Trump was offensereminder, this is the third time he's done
this, this is not the Trump of eight yearsago, not the Trump you knew in 2017 H.R.
She was far better in performance,she was far better prepared.
Yeah, she got a lot of help from ABC,let's not gloss over that.
It's important to note we're doing thisin the bubble right now, it's less than
(37:54):
24 hours after the debate andwe all get a little overworked about this.
Let's see what the polls move.
I would caution one thing, I'm not beingpartisan here, she had a very good run for
about a month.
And then you might have noticed Niall andH.R, the polls kind of cooled down for
her and the race got back to where itwould have been with the normal Joe Biden
had he not dropped out of the race.
So let's see, in a couple ofweeks from now, if we restore.
But Niall, getting back to theBarbenheimer idea, there's a very famous
(38:16):
Pennsylvanian who jumped in the racelast night, Taylor Swift, Tay Tay.
[MUSIC]
Let's talk a bit about the Taylor effect.
And here, my friend, I want you to chooseyour words carefully because she has 95.2
million followers on X, Niall,and they fight fiercely for her.
So be careful of talking about Tay Tay,but she has now endorsed them.
(38:37):
Is anything like that possiblya game-changer, Niall, or
I'm just reading too much intopop culture and celebrities here?
>> Niall Ferguson (38:42):
Well, I think it's important because this election looks like
being the most gender-polarized electionwe've ever seen in the United States.
The gap between male and female voters,even before last night's debate,
was very striking,something like 11% points.
And of course,an endorsement from Taylor Swift delivers,
(39:02):
I presume,a significant number of young women.
Especially in just the same way thatthe opening exchanges on the issue
of abortion were calculated by the Harriscampaign to resonate with female voters.
So if this election is differentiatedby anything compared with, say, 2020 or
(39:22):
2016, I think it's this.
That there's gonna be a big, big dividebetween the male and female vote,
especially amongst younger voters,where we see a very striking phenomenon.
And not only in the United States,we can see it in the UK, too,
we can see it in Europe,we can see it in South Korea.
Young men are trending right and
(39:43):
young women are trending left in a waythat I don't think we've seen before.
So that's the significanceof Taylor Swift weighing in.
And it was a well-timed endorsementafter Donald Trump had been
the quintessential angry old man.
And Kamala Harris had played verysuccessfully, the empowered, powerful and
(40:06):
confident woman.
So, yeah, I think this isthe big issue in this election.
She has to foreground what theycall reproductive rights, but
I'm gonna call abortion.
Cuz that's an issue that is very difficultfor Republicans, that divides Republicans.
Where Donald Trump is not in sync withquite significant parts of his party,
(40:26):
especially in Bible Belt states.
For Trump, the issues that matterare immigration, inflation, and
the economy more generally.
And I think his signal failure last nightwas to make those issues the focus and
make her as an integral part ofthe Biden administration responsible for
the problems of the last three anda half years.
(40:48):
By failing to do that, I think hecost himself quite significantly.
But you're right, Bill,in the end everything in this day and
age has a news cycle life of what?
Two weeks?
Even a near assassination ofa presidential candidate was a news
story [LAUGH] to me and
(41:08):
astonishingly in a short time we'llhave forgotten about this debate.
Probably by the next GoodFellas episode.
>> Bill Whalen (41:16):
Okay, four things about this debate,
which I wanna quickly point out to you.
And I want your thoughts on whichone of these bothers you the most.
Niall, there was no mentionof the Ferguson law.
The concept that great powers,
when they end up spending more on debtservice and the military, they're screwed.
So no mention of that.
H.R, no pushback whenKamala Harris said the following.
Quote, as of today, there is not onemember of the United States military who
(41:37):
is in active duty in a combat zoneat any war zone around the world.
Niall, no mention about what's goingon in campuses and cancel culture and
anti Semitism.
H.R, no conversation,you can appreciate this,
having briefed a president every day fora year.
No discussion about whatKamala Harris knew or
didn't know aboutJoe Biden's cognitive state.
So, H.R, which of those fourthings concerns you the most?
>> H.R. McMaster (41:57):
Well, I guess, predictably,
I'll say that thereare no US servicemen and
women in harm's way around the world orengaged with enemies around the world.
Well, it's been really notreported very much, but
ISIS has become much,much more active in Syria and in Iraq.
US Central command, where my friendEric Carroll is the commander who's just
(42:18):
a fantastic officer andas good of a rugby player.
He's an absolute animalon the rugby pitch.
This is a guy who was shot inthe leg in an alleyway in Mosul and
chased down the terrorists with a knife.
I mean, he is one hard man,but he's also very competent.
(42:38):
He just reported that there have beentwice as many raids against ISIS and
twice as many ISIS relatedattacks in Iraq and in Syria.
And ISIS is trying to regaincontrol of territory and
become an even greater threat.
And so those soldiers are in harm's way.
Iran, through their proxies, is attackingour forces across the Middle East.
(43:02):
And the Biden administration stilldoesn't wanna act like they didn't
know what the return address is.
So maybe that's why she doesn'tthink we're engaged with enemies.
Because we haven't recognized that Iraq,through their proxies and
now also directly, now are engagingin acts of war against us.
And then think about what'shappening the Bob Ellman Deb,
(43:24):
with the multiple attacks on shipping andon our naval vessels.
Every one of those intercepts of a shortership missile is a diving catch, right?
I mean, I could go on about this,
about how aggressive China isbecoming in the South China Sea,
the seven acts of aggressionagainst the Philippines, a US ally?
And guess what?
(43:44):
We do have troops out there.
So I just think that itwas sort of a Pollyannaish
depiction of the state of the world.
And that was maybe what disappointedme most about her statements.
>> Bill Whalen (43:57):
What about you, Niall?
>> Niall Ferguson (43:59):
Well, whoever wins this election is gonna
be dealing with one hell of a fiscal mess.
I'm sorry, John Cochrane's nothere to agree with me, but
the growth of the debt over the lastdecade really has created a huge problem.
And the problem is becausewith higher rates,
servicing that debt starts to consume anever larger share of the federal budget.
(44:24):
My jokey Ferguson's law is no joke.
Actually the US government is nowspending more on interest payments and
the federal debt thanon national security.
And the Biden-Harris policy impliesa squeeze of the defense budget at
a time when we really need to beinvesting in strengthening our military.
Otherwise we will not have deterrencein the various theaters where
(44:46):
the increasingly aligned authoritarianpowers are threatening us.
So I think to have two presidentialcandidates say virtually nothing
about those fiscal problemswas a really lost opportunity.
And it would have been nice ifthe moderators had asked them about it.
How are you gonna clean up the messof a deficit of 7% of GDP or
(45:10):
whatever it now is at a timeof near full unemployment?
How will you cope when the economy slowsdown and that deficit gets even larger?
But that wasn't the kind ofquestion that the anchors were
interested in asking last night.
>> Bill Whalen (45:23):
Okay, we have about a minute left, a quick question.
It's a mousetrap question, Niall and H.R.How can you design a better debate?
I have one solution for you.
Let the journalists allow the candidatesto ask each other questions
as we get a warped view fromthe moderators themselves.
There was the obligatoryclimate change question.
I wanted to throw a brick through myscreen on the answers cuz I read polls
religiously.
Climate change just does notresonate the same as the economy or
(45:45):
the border foreign policy, but yet theyhave to ask a climate change question.
But Niall and H.R, if you could change onething about the debate process here in
the US if any, what would you change?
>> H.R. McMaster (45:54):
It's a great question, but
we have to try to get to more substance.
Something about when I debated in highschool and you had a resolution and
you had the affirmative and negative team.
Maybe even provide some ofthe questions in advance,
knowing that the candidates will takean affirmative or negative position.
And make it an argument for oragainst that proposition and
(46:15):
then afford a short rebuttal time forboth of them.
More in lines of the rulesof collegiate debates.
I just think we've gotta do something to
try to force the candidatesto answer the questions.
What would their policies be?
What would they really do?
>> Niall Ferguson (46:35):
My view is that these aren't debates.
And the reason that they're so
frustrating is that we don't really have aculture of debate in this country anymore.
Even student debating has beenseverely damaged by workism.
So that it's impossible, in fact,to have the kind of debates that you and
I had when we were young.
(46:56):
So we need to revivedebating as an activity.
Perhaps it's part of the educationalrenewal that I'm so concerned with,
if we want to see presidentialcandidates engaging in real debate.
My one reform, let's have an audience.
Having these dead,empty studios is not the right way for
(47:17):
a political argument to be made.
Democracy is about the people.
And having the people sat watching thison their TVs instead of at least being
represented in the auditorium,seems to me in itself to be a mistake.
So I'd like to bring the audience back.
>> Bill Whalen (47:34):
Not exactly Lincoln Douglas, is it, Niall?
>> Niall Ferguson (47:38):
No, that would be my reform.
Bring back the audience.
>> Bill Whalen (47:43):
Yeah, I would add one more thing.
We need at least one more debate herebecause you just can't cram everything
into 90 minutes.
I'm the only single guy in the show, It'slike watching two people speed date for
90 minutes.
It was just very shallow conversations and
nothing substantive but Andnow onto the lightning round.
Okay, gentlemen,let's begin quick question here.
(48:04):
We're recording the show on the 23rdanniversary of the 911 attacks on America,
very quickly, where were you to that day?
>> H.R. McMaster (48:11):
I was in Germany, command of a cavalry squadron.
We had a short respite in betweena force on force maneuver exercise, and
a continuation of that exercise.
And, I resolved at that moment, obviously,
to continue to train our unit andget us ready to fight.
I did not command that squadronwhen it did go into combat, but
it did go into combat several years later.
(48:34):
And, of course, it was a huge change for
our armed forces as we pursued the enemiesof all civilization in Afghanistan,
and then had the subsequentwar in Iraq as well.
So, yeah, I was in Germany andin Schweinfurt, Germany.
>> Bill Whalen (48:48):
Niall.
>> Niall Ferguson (48:50):
I was in Oxford, and I watched on a rather
dodgy dial up Internet connection,
the twin towers of the World Tradecenter crash down.
And I realized that moment that I had tocome to the United States, and I very.
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