Hosted by Christina Ruffini and Sir Richard Dearlove
Guest
Episode Summary
In this bonus episode before the NATO Summit Julia Macfarlane & Sir Richard Dearlove consider Bob Gates’s opinion that America is the biggest national security threat to itself.
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Transcript
INTRODUCTION
Mcfarlane: Hello, and welcome to One Decision. I'm Julia McFarlane. This week, One Decision is headed to NATO, and we have an exciting week of programming for you. On Tuesday, June 28, we'll be broadcasting a NATO preview live on YouTube as we look at the big decisions coming out of the summit. I'll be joined by a former secretary general of NATO, the director of Chatham House, and the defense editor for The Times. To register, go to 1decisionpodcast.com, and you'll receive the link shortly before the program begins. On Wednesday and Thursday, we'll be covering the summit, and we'll have a wrap up podcast for our listeners on Friday with my cohost, Sir Richard Dearlove. And speaking of Sir Richard, after we caught up with his old colleague, Bob Gates, we had a little chat about Gates' top predictions. I guess I wanna start firstly with his first response to that conversation when he said that he believed the greatest security threat to The United States. It wasn't China, it wasn't Russia, it wasn't North Korea and Iran or any of the things in the National Defense Review that came out. He said the greatest threat to The US right now is found within the two square miles that encompass the White House and the Capitol. If we can't get past our paralysis and polarization, there's no threat from abroad that holds as great a danger. And at the time we are recording this, America is extremely divided and polarized. And one aspect of this is the overturning of Roe v Wade, which has sharply divided opinion in The US.
ANALYSIS WITH SIR RICHARD DEARLOVE
Dearlove: Well, I thought that was a very, very striking comment. And of course, he made it first and in a way it did sort of overshadow the subsequent analysis and, you know, I guess he's in a good position to make that statement, to make that judgment. I think there is always a tendency though for people who are, you know, immediately standing beside the problem to focus and that very much is, you know, the sort of stasis in the American political system, the depth of the divide. But I think if you're, you know, if you're not part of it and you're looking in from the outside, I mean, think what I'm saying is I wonder whether it's gonna be as dominant as he says. I'm not disagreeing with him. But for example, you know, you've got a crisis in Ukraine, which in a way has brought elements of the Democratic and Republican parties together. So an outside crisis, as it were, a unitive view, okay, on an issue which isn't domestic, but it's interesting to see how Biden has operated on Ukraine with a significant amount of Republican support. So, you know, there are issues which you do not have to see through the domestic optic. I think part of the problem at the moment is you've got two issues. You've got this inquiry which is Democrat, which looks partisan, but is going after Trump because of what happened on Capitol Hill. And then at the same time, you've got Roe versus Wade and the whole question being raised in the Supreme Court. And that they are serious social. And then, of course, you've got the gun issue as well which is topical but that is permanent and it comes and goes. I mean okay, I'm just sort of speculating and saying I think if you're not American you might take a slightly different view and there's at the moment I think there's a strong inclination in the West to look at one's own country and to be declineist. I mean, to look at, you know, you're thinking everything's wrong with my own country. I mean, suffer from it in The UK.
Mcfarlane: I just wanna quickly jump in because you, you know, you used Ukraine as an example of something that is unifying America. And I'm not sure I agree with that because it was not that long ago that you saw in Republican conventions that there were people wearing t shirts saying, would rather kiss a Russian than a Democrat. I think Ukraine is not as unifying as we may hope it is. And I mean, I think the Roe v Wade and the gun rights, you have these two sides. These two sides in America that are growing further and further apart. And even if you were to take a map and to look at which states are now likely to outlaw abortion, it is very, very clear what color these states are.
Dearlove: I was very struck by a tweet from Simon Schama, who is a very well respected historian. Simon and I are old friends. We were same here. I've known Simon since we were undergraduates.
Mcfarlane: Wow. That is yeah. Well, no. I always find it so interesting hearing from historians and how they pass breaking news developments because US journalists have to do things at the speed of sound, but they're able to take a much more macro look at things. And I was really struck by what he said today, which was what really is the point of preserving a United States Of America when the two divided sets of states are so utterly irreconcilable in the most serious matters of citizenship. Right now the minority is imposing its dogma on the majority and ultimately this cannot stand.
Dearlove: That's true to little Simon. And I don't often agree with him.
Mcfarlane: What do you mean by that?
Dearlove: Well, you know, always takes a rather messianic view of a situation and he loves sort of extrapolating, you know, in a sort of grand and big way. But what I would also say about The States, I mean, that the strength of civic life at the local level in The United States is so much more resilient than it is in Europe. And you know the commitment of people locally to, let's say, local government, local representation and town councils and the way that that whole structure works. And an awful lot of Americans do not take much notice of what goes on in Washington and they're much more concerned with what's going on down the street and in their town. Okay, that's perhaps a rather naive comment on my part, but it does have validity and I'm not sure that I don't agree with Simon taking this sort of extreme messianic view.
Mcfarlane: I disagree. I disagree with you, Richard. I don't think it's messianic because I think, I mean, I don't think Simon is calling for a messianic figure to heal America's broken divides. I think that The United States is much more brittle, you know, than a lot of other countries. I think perhaps it is the malaise of being the world's superpower. You have no external threat, so you turn against yourself. Maybe it is a result of America leading the world for so long that it has inevitably started to tear itself apart, in the absence of any unifying external threat.
Dearlove: I've got a book on my shelf, Julia, with the title of which is rather clever. It's The Untied States Of America as opposed to The United States Of America, The Untied States Of America. And that was written about fifteen years ago on exactly the same theme. And you know, its predictions have not, you know, come true. It just hasn't sort of showed itself. Yes. Well, let's see what happens because I mean you've got the midterm elections coming up and of course part of the problem at the moment is that Democrats like Simon Schama, and come on, let's face it, he's a paid up Democrat, know that they're gonna lose control of the House, and probably the Senate as well. And they also know that, you know, they haven't got a natural successor to Biden. And they might end up with this rather fragile, semi senile old man as their running candidate again for the next presidential election. I mean, god, what a mess. And, you know, and they won't have control of the house anyway. So they're in a pretty parlous situation. And let's see how this plays out. But I personally do not think that the The United States is on the point of falling apart.
Mcfarlane: Well, I tell you what, because I have spoken to more than one of your former colleagues, senior intelligence officers for MI6 who've worked for you, and more than one of them has said to me that they think the risk of civil conflict in The United States is a lot more real than we may fear. And the trouble is we have a highly weaponized, highly armed country. And I mean, January 6 was just one day. And, you know, I think you're right. A lot of things depend on what happens in the midterms. It's hard to see where things are going. But I think in The US, you have simmering of tensions that can very easily boil over. And I think social media is contributing to the raising of emotions.
Dearlove: Maybe. Maybe. But I mean, let's say the attack on the Capitol was incompetent policing. I mean, let's be clear about this. It's a total catastrophe in terms of, you know, the security measures. If it had been in France, you would have had the gendarmerie mobile, you know, in full armor around the building, and they would have set, they would have sent the pack of demonstrators running in all directions. That's because France is always demonstrating. They are well practiced in the art of quelling riots. Over and over France. They were so incompetent in Washington. They just had not a clue how to deal with a good manifestation. And I mean my first night in Paris, we were sitting in a cafe and this is when I lived in Paris and there was the most phenomenal street battle outside which was absolutely an eye opener. But one got used to the fact that, you know, in certain democratic countries they can be very violent. And I mean look at the way the gilets jaunes, you know, sacked bits of Paris, bust up shops, burnt cars, and the French do not have a fundamental crisis about it. I mean okay, it's not entirely a fair parallel. And there are some very very sinister social phenomena at work in America, but to say that The United States is sort of fundamentally threatened, I don't agree. Anyway, it's always good to have a disagreement, Julia.
Mcfarlane: Yeah. No, I do. I keep thinking back to that story that happened a few years ago when there was that group of militiamen who occupied the headquarters of a refuge. I think it was in Oregon. And it lasted for weeks and the National Guard got involved in it, and it was a standoff between this local armed militia and state and federal forces. And that was just one story. It was limited to one state. There are similarities you can tie with January 6, but the point that I'm trying to make is I think you have the potential for this sort of thing to happen on a wider scale.
Dearlove: Well, you do. There's, and there, you know, look at some of these extreme religious groups and you know, look at the Waco incident in Texas and you know, the people who died in that. I mean you do get some very hairy primitive, you know, militia groups that go off into the woods. But I mean, in a way, that's an integral part of the whole question of the American frontier and the way that America was built and the sort of traditions that still are retained in bits of American society. And they're very disconcerting if you're a European because they just, we just don't have them. Very disconcerting indeed. But do they fundamentally threaten the security of the state? I don't know. Well, I mean, Bob obviously is worried. Bob Gates is clearly worried. He obviously thought so.
Mcfarlane: I tend to agree with him. A question I wanna ask you because I've had conversations with people who have speculated that actually if the Republicans were to win the White House, if they were to take back control of the executive and Congress and the Senate. Does that mean that another January 6 would be more or less likely to happen? And so if the Democrats stay in power, do you think that may lead to a lot more instability in The United States?
Dearlove: No. Because I think that the majority of Americans, and I mean the vast majority, will accept the democratic mandate, whoever wins. I mean I think the important thing in the short term is that Trump should not be the presidential candidate and I think in a way you know he is too compromised now and he's been too far out on a limb. And we just have to hope that the Republicans can, you know, sort out whether it is DeSantis from Florida or one of the other candidates. There are some good potential Republican candidates and I mean the Trump factor is, we're all going to sleep uneasy whilst the Trump factor is still prominent within the Republican Party. I couldn't possibly comment, Richard. Well we are going to be uneasy about that but I don't think, my prediction is he will not be the presidential candidate.
Mcfarlane: Interesting. Interesting. I'm also gonna note down your words that the majority of Americans will accept a democratic mandate. Let's see how that takes ages as we get closer to the election cycle.
Dearlove: Okay. No, it's very good. I mean, gives us a nice theme to pursue. And I think, you know, it was very good of Bob Gates to raise that issue because, you know, we should think about it carefully and talk about it. And I'm not saying there isn't a problem, I'm saying it isn't a problem that's going to ultimately, you know, destroy the American polity. But the Americans are going to have to do a lot of work to sort Washington out because, okay, the divisions are deeper than they've been for a long time. I think that's a note to end on.
Mcfarlane: We'll see how all predictions hold up and what decisions are ahead this week at the NATO Summit. Please join us, listen, and follow One Decision Podcast.
