Fareed Zakaria is the host of Fareed Zakaria GPS on CNN, and a foreign affairs columnist for the Washington Post. He speaks with Preet about the apparent murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who he has known for more than a decade. And, as Nikki Haley leaves the UN, they consider American isolationism and the Trump doctrine. Plus, what might happen if the Dems take the House. Do you have a question for Preet? Tweet them to @PreetBharara with the hashtag #askpreet, email staytuned@cafe.com, or call 669-247-7338 and leave a voicemail.
STAY TUNED: The Death of Jamal Khashoggi (with Fareed Zakaria)
LISTEN- Show Notes
- Transcript
Preet Bharara: Fareed Zakaria, thank you so much for coming on the show.
Fareed Zakaria: Such a pleasure, Preet.
Preet Bharara: Long overdue. So, one thing thatâs been in the news a lot and we should talk about is the mystery, although some people think itâs not much of a mystery, of what happened to the Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who you know personally, correct?
Fareed Zakaria: Yeah. I actually know him quite well. About 16 or 17 years ago, I was invited to go to Saudi Arabia because Iâd been writing some tough stuff in Saudi Arabia in the wake of 9/11. And the Saudi ambassador to the UK, Prince Turki bin Faisalâvery, very powerful Saudi royalâsaid to me, âYou should come and see Saudi Arabia. You donât understand it. Spend a week.â So I decided, you know what? Iâll go. And I spent, I think, even longer than that. Jamal was my handler. He was working for the Saudi government. He was the guy interfacing with people like me. And what was striking to me about him at the time was he was really moderate. I mean, he was clearly the face of liberal reform in Saudi Arabia, so he was making the case for why they should be moving faster on women driving and things like that. But he was staunchly pro-monarchy. He was not in favor of a democracy. He kept saying, âWe canât arrest preachers because these are part of Saudi society.â So, his whole impulse was a very moderate, incremental reform. And, you know, heâs been pretty true to that ever since. Heâs never been somebody whoâs been a radical, âletâs get rid of the monarchy and then have democracy in Saudi Arabiaâ kind of guy.
So, to see him, first of all, to be branded an enemy of the state, essentially had to live in self-imposed exile in Washington, and then to see what has happened to him, itâs actually startling. Itâs surprising. Itâs very unsettling. Because the Saudis were not a police state of this kind. Saudi Arabia was generally a patronage state more than a police state. They bought off their opposition. This is more a Vladimir Putin, you know, kind of gory dismemberment of somebody, to make somebody die a painful death, maybe as a way to signal to other people. Thatâsâthatâs Putin.
Preet Bharara: So why do you think he ended up that high on the enemyâs list for the Saudi regime? What is going on there, and what do you think happened?
Fareed Zakaria: There are two theories, and honestly, nobody knows. This is a black box absolute monarchy. I mean, itâs run like a medieval monarchy from the 16th century or something, so who knows? But I think that thereâs two plausible theories. The first is that Jamal was threatening precisely because he was actually very much part of the Saudi elite. This is a guy who comes from a very prominent non-royal family. That famous arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, a billionaire, heâs Jamalâs uncle. Jamal has relatives who are even in other indirect ways even related to the royal family. So, heâs a well-placed guy. He was working for people like Turki bin Faisal, very powerful royal. This suggests a very powerful schism within the elite. So, thereâsâone theory is that Jamal was important because he was actually an establishment member and was part of an opposing faction of the establishment. The other is, look, this is an absolute monarchy. Mohammed bin Salman doesnât like people writing things against him. He doesnât like the idea that there is somebody out there. And in that classic way, that famous line of Henry II when heâs upset about the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Beckett, and he says, âWill no one rid me of this meddlesome priest?â Mohammed bin Salman said something like that, and people went out and did this.
Preet Bharara: Well, thatâs interesting, because then that suggests that MBS, Mohammed bin Salman, has some plausible deniability, because thatâs the whole point of that famous phrase, right? That it can be viewedâ
Fareed Zakaria: Exactly.
Preet Bharara: âas just a comment as opposed to a directive. So which do you think it was?
Fareed Zakaria: I think, you know, weâre all speculating. It seems unlikely that you would send two planeloads of people to Istanbul, including people who are skilled in the art of apparently dismemberment, if that is in fact true. These are all leaks from the Turkish government, so we donât know if itâs true. But if that story is true, itâs very difficult to imagine that this happened without Mohammed bin Salmanâs knowledge. If in fact, this was an abduction gone awry, which is plausibleâI mean, itâsâwe donât know enough here, butâ
Preet Bharara: But for abduction, you always want to make sure you have a bone saw as a backup plan.
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs] Yeah. Thatâsâthatâs the part that makes it very, veryâthe part here that makes this very difficult to believe anything other than a pretty dark interpretation is there is no body, you know? I mean, if he died of a heart attack while being interrogatedâI donât even understand how you can go from interrogation to murder. Thereâs many, many shades between interrogation and murder. I mean, Preet, youâve seen police interrogations your whole life. I imagine you donât see a lot of them that go from, âWeâre asking you a few questionâ to âOops, the guyâs dead.â
Preet Bharara: Yeah. No, but I mean, look, there are stories of that happening when very harsh interrogation techniques have been applied outside the norm. But yes, I agree with you. But can we take a step back? By the way, I should mention that weâre recording this at about noon on Tuesday, and maybe the facts will emerge and change over the next few days before this drops. But assume that it was a premeditated murder. People showed up. In Turkey, there are allegations that they had material, including a bone a saw, and people who were skilled in these arts, if you want to call them arts. So, suppose it was the intentional will of the Saudi regime, MBS in particular, to have Jamal killed. Why go to that length, and why do it in a foreign country in your embassy?
Fareed Zakaria: So, I think, again, stipulating that weâre making all the assumptions you just made, if this was premeditated and planned, it suggests that MBS, Mohammed bin Salman, is actually a much darker figure than we realize, and there really is a quality of the Vladimir Putin-like desire for control. Because what that suggests, very much like Putin, is the reason you do these assassinations outside of the home country is youâre sending a signal to every dissident anywhere in the world that says, âYou can run. You canât hide. You may think youâre safe in the United States. You may think youâre safe in Turkey. Youâre not. We can get to you anywhere.â Thatâs why the Russians have always assassinated people in London, in Surrey, wherever it is, because theyâre a signal. Thatâs why they do the assassinations in a particularly gruesome fashion. Thatâs why you use poison, because you want it to be a slow, painful death.
So, if thatâs the case, as I said, this is a big shift for Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia has not been a place like this. Itâs very different in that way from even a place like Egypt, let alone Iraq under Saddam Hussein. There were never tens of thousands of political prisoners languishing in Saudi jails. Oh no. The Saudi model, as I said, wasâit was patronage. It was bribery. You buy off your opposition. You put a few people in jail. But it does seem like weâre seeing a new and much tougher kind of Saudi monarchy.
Preet Bharara: So, now the question is, this happened. Letâs say it turns out that it was intentional. What is the United States supposed to do about it?
Fareed Zakaria: I think thereâs no question what the Trump administration wants to do about it. Trump has invested so much in his relationship with Saudi Arabia.
Preet Bharara: Right. And not just Trumpâhis son-in-law, too.
Fareed Zakaria: His son-in-law too. And that tells you something, when the relationship is basically being handled within the family. This isâthere is a kind of almost Mafia-like aspect to this element of the Trump administration, where when itâs being handled by Don Corleone and Sunny and Michael, you know this is important, right? So, what they have done is they have subcontracted American foreign policy in the Middle East to Saudi Arabia. If you think about it, the United States used to always try to be the great balancer in the Middle East. That was Henry Kissingerâs famous [?shuttle] [00:08:39] diplomacy, where you were kind of equally trusted by the Israelis, by the Arabs, by the Syrians, by the Egyptians, and the Iranians, by the way.
What weâve done is weâve basically signed on to a Saudi policy that says we support your very vehemently anti-Iran push, so weâre out of the Iran nuclear deal. We support your war in Yemen, even though it makes no sense and is going very, very badly. We support or we donât criticize you when you kidnap the Prime Minister of Lebanon in an attempt to get a shakedown of that regime. Again, it fails. We support you when you try to throttle the small kingdom of Qatar, even though that isnât working so well. We donât have much of a Middle East policy under the Trump administration. What we have is a policy that says whatever Saudi Arabia says, we support. Now, in that circumstance, to suddenly find yourself with the guy youâve put all your chips on, doesnât seem like heâs the kind of international reformer that he was, thatâs a huge problem. And I think the most significant thing thatâs happened in the last couple of days is the breakâand on the Republican side in the Senate. I mean, you have people like Marco Rubio and Lindsey Graham saying that they want to sanction Saudi Arabia. That is a very, very extreme, powerful statement that is setting us up for a head-on collision between Donald Trump and Republican senators.
Preet Bharara: Well, do you really think so, or is that justâis that just talk like we often see?
Fareed Zakaria: My gut is that Trump will winâin other words, that these senators will back down. But they certainly seem to be pretty outraged, and people like Lindsey Graham, I think they feel betrayed, because they felt like they were sold a bigger bill of good about MBS being the straight reformer. What Iâm guessing will happenânow weâre speculating, and as you say, weâre recording before this will air. But my guess is the Saudis will present some face-saving excuse which says, this was an interrogation gone awry. There were some rogue elements. Those people are being disciplined, fired, maybe even jailed. MBS knew nothing about it.
Preet Bharara: Or givenâor given the death penalty. Do you think thereâs a chance that people who engaged in this so that Saudi Arabia emerges from it more unscathed is that those people will face ultimate punishment as well?
Fareed Zakaria: God, thatâs a fascinating possibility, that this guy who probably did this under instructions would now be charged with murder. Itâs certainly plausible that heâll get some very severe penalty. And the crucial thing is that the Trump administration will officially say, âLook, this is the Saudi position. We have found no evidence to doubt it. And so, in effect, we accept it.â And then theyâll go to the senators and say, âYou really want to sanction Saudi Arabia? Oil prices will skyrocket. Our arms contracts will collapse. Frankly, a lot of big businesses will support Donald Trump as opposed to the senators.â Everyone wants to make nice with Saudi Arabia. It is the central bank of oil in the world still, even though there are many other sources.
Preet Bharara: Is some of our reliance on Saudi Arabia overstated? So, Iâm not an expert on arms, but this idea that the president has put forward that the Saudi Arabia government is buying $100 or $110 billion of military productsâisnât it true that Saudi Arabia has long used American military aircraft and weapons, and that they are not in the position to immediately shift to buying weapons elsewhere, that these things take some years to transition away from? And so, donât we have some leverage in that regard?
Fareed Zakaria: Yeah. So, first of all, as with everything Donald Trump says that involves numbers, I mean, divide by four is usually a good rule of thumb. So, $110, itâs actually, I think, about $20, $20 billion of arms sales. Secondly, much of this was actually stuff that was started under the Obama administration. Thirdly, as you say, itâs not easy to switch. These systems are not interchangeable. You canât buy one aircraft thatâsâyou know, one American aircraft, one French aircraft, and one Russian aircraft. It doesnât kind of work that way. Where they do have some leverage is they are the central banker of oil. I mean, even though we are now energy independent and we produce a lot of oil, Saudi oil is the easiest oil to extract. And so, that makes it very easy for them to switch on and switch off production in a way thatâs very hard to do with fracking or Russian oil, because these are very expensive projects, and once you put the money in, you canât take it out. So, the Saudis have that capacity to go on and off, which makes them very powerful, because they can essentially control the price by just turning on the taps or turning off the taps. The issue, I think, is not so much all that, Preet. Itâs just that if youâre looking for something thatâs gonna end this recovery, sanctions on Saudi Arabia, oil spiking to $150, even in the short-term, thatâll do it.
Preet Bharara: Yeah. So, there are other considerations. And weâve kind of tied our hands. I kind of want to go back to the Trump administrationâs unfolding response. Is it sometimes the case, based on your experience, that obviously, your hands are tied a little bit, and you have an ally. And your ally does some thing terrible, and thereâs a lot of pressure from political forces in your own country, even from your own party, like the Republican senators you mentioned, to do something about it, but you want to, in your public commentsâTrump has been very careful to say, well, thereâs been a strong denial. It was a very, very strong denial. He believes strong denials, apparently. But then privately, you say to your ally who has done something bad, you send them angry words, and you yell at them. So, for example, Secretary of State Pompeo apparently had a very short meeting. He was dispatched immediately by the President to go meet with MBS. What happens in that meeting? Does somebody say, âYou know what, youâve put us in a terrible spot. You did this terrible thing. Knock it off. Weâre gonna knock your block off next time. Donât do it again,â or do they hold hands and say, âLook, this will blow over. Iâll take care of our opposition in the States. What happens there?â
Fareed Zakaria: My gut is that itâs more the former in this case. My gut is that Pompeo probably went into this meetings and he said, âLook, you guys need to understand, this is a big deal. This guy was an American resident. Heâs a Washington Post columnist. This has snowballed. We need a fully transparent account of what happened.â And I think that particularly, the Trump/Putin meetingâs unusual. Usually, there are no takers at these meetings. There are other people involved. Itâs very rarely literally one-on-one. And so, Pompeo would be very unlikely to say something that could get back which suggested that he had in some way given a green light. So, both for reasons of propriety, which is it wouldnât be the right thing to say, but also just politically, he would be making sure that he didnât say something that would leave him vulnerable to being seen as having given a green light. So, I think thatâs probably what they said, and that my guess is the Saudis are absolutely stonewalling, in the sense that they are absolutely denying any knowledge and involvement, because if they show any crack on that, from their point of view, I think it would be a disaster. So, they have to maintain the line. We knew nothing about this. Weâre trying to figure out what happened. Itâs a terrible tragedy. Weâre as shocked as anybody else. The wholeâI mean, thereâs a bizarre element here, which is that Khalid bin Salman, Mohammed bin Salmanâs brother, who was the ambassador to the U.S., many people have thought that when the Crown Prince becomes king, he, Khalid, will become the crown prince. Theyâre that close. He was a friend of Jamal Khashoggi. So, thatâsâas I said, the whole thing isâthereâs a truly bizarre element to this, where what the eff where they thinking?
Preet Bharara: [Laughs] Right. Not to put too fine a point on it.
Fareed Zakaria: Yeah.
Preet Bharara: Can I ask you two things? One, in order to engage in foreign policy in an intelligent way, is it necessary for our politicians to sort of lie and mislead the public in order to calm the waters with allies, and tow a party line where behind the scenes, maybe thereâs more frank discussion? Is that just the nature of how foreign policy has to work for us all to maintain our safety and our relationships in the world? Is that just a fact of life?
Fareed Zakaria: Yeah. I mean, I think itâs not quite as nefarious as you make it sound. Iâd say thatâs probably true in all serious public policy, right? That thereâs a certain amount of transparency that you want for a democracy, for accountability. But you canât have total, complete transparency at every moment, particularly in the middle of a complicated and sensitive negotiation. So, for example, take the renegotiation of NAFTA. If each side had been divulging what concessions they were about to make, and then thus mobilizing the opposition to those concessions domestically, it would be a disaster. You wouldnât be able to get anything done. But I donât think thatâthe fundamental problem here is not that. The fundamental problem here in my view is the Trump administration has made a bet about Saudi Arabia that is, at the very least, wildly naive and exaggerated in its hopes for what Saudi Arabia can deliver as a force for progress and stability in the Middle East. And now that you have this symbol of something that suggests that theyâre not the great reforming guys that they were being presented as, it calls into question that whole policy.
So, for example, this is leading people to take a second look at the Yemen War, the Saudi war in Yemen. Yemen is now the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. And thatâs saying a lot. Worse than Southern Sudan. Worse than the Congo. And itâs entirely inflicted by one country, Saudi Arabia. And so, thereâs a question of why are we supporting this? Why are we allowing American weapons arms training to be used in this process? It certainly doesnât seem to serve American interests. This one murder has perhaps made us look a little bit more thoughtfully or a little bit more critically at that question.
Preet Bharara: I have a question about cause and effect. So, you mentioned this naive bet that the American government placed on MBS and on Saudi Arabia generally. And on the other hand, we have this evidence that maybe there was a premeditated murder of a journalist named Jamal Khashoggi. Did the first thing potentially cause the Saudis to think they could get away with the second thing, or were we just being naive in placing the bet, not realizing that Saudi Arabia was capable of doing this terrible thing?
Fareed Zakaria: I think itâs very plausible to suggest that the Trump administrationâs unquestioned embrace of Saudi Arabia emboldened them. Because this is not a normal Saudi tactic. And the Trump administration has been soâso unqualified in its embrace that it may have allowed a new leader in Saudi Arabia who wants to be tougher than previous ones, who wants to assert his authority, Mohammed bin Salman, to say, âYou know what? We can rough things up a little bit, and we donât have to worry about the Americans. I have the American covered.â Iâd make an even broader point about this, Preet. And I donât know that in this particular case, this was going on. But there is no question that when Donald Trump calls the press âthe enemy of the peopleâ, it emboldens people who want to do bad things to a free press around the world. There is absolutely no question that even the Turkish president, Erdogan, who has many journalists in jail; the Philippines president, Dutarte, who doesâthatâs the smallest part of what he does. He unleashes death squads to take care of political opponents.
All these people know that the one country that used to call them out on these things, that used to raise the issue in bilaterals, bring it up at the UN, is not gonna say anything, because the President of the United States is going on about how the press is the enemy of the people. And of course, many of those people use the same language. So, Dutarte talks about fake news. He talks about how the press are the enemy of the people. Erdogan does the same thing. So, itâs not an accident that the last two years have been in some ways the worst years to be a journalist in many parts of the world. Itâs because the force that used to be in some ways speaking up for these things, the United States government, is AWOL.
Preet Bharara: So, I want to use the example of Jamal Khashoggi, who weâve been talking about for a while, to sort of take a step back and ask the question, how should our foreign policy be conducted? So, for example, some other country does something. Thereâs evidence that they interfered with our election. Theyâve harmed an American citizen, or theyâve taken someone hostage, or theyâve taken an American residentânot a citizen, which is a distinction seemingly important to the Presidentâbut theyâve taken someone like him, and perhaps murder him in a foreign embassy. How is the public supposed to think about what our foreign policy should be, what our reaction should, and how they judge the actions of our government?
So, for example, let me give you a hypothetical. Would it have made a difference and should it make a difference if Jamal was not only an American resident, but also a citizen? And let me make it even more stark. And suppose there was an action taken against him in the Saudi embassy in the United States. Everything else is still the same, right? We still have this bet that you said weâve placed on Saudi Arabia. We still have the issue of oil. We still have all these other things going on. Does that then take us to a level where the current reaction is woefully inadequate, and we should do something much more dramatic? How do you think about those principles?
Fareed Zakaria: Yeah, itâs a really profound question, because it sort of gets at both substantive and the optics that govern political life. First, I think whatâs really interesting here is the way that the American system, by which I mean Congress, the press, has reacted to Jamal, even though he was not an American citizen. The President, as you point out, tried to make this very churlish and narrow distinction. Well, he was an American resident, but he was not a citizen. But you know, I think that the fact that Congress has been so outraged, the press has been so outraged, other governments have been so outragedâlook, the guy was a full participant in American life. He was living here. He was paying his taxes. He has three kids who are American. Heâs being employed by one of the great national institutions in the United States, the Washington Post. In some very fundamental sense, he is an American. He is a participant in American political and civic life. For a foreign government to do this should be considered an outrage, whether or not technically he was. So, Iâm very glad that Trumpâs attempt to say, âWe shouldnât worry about him because he doesnât have an American passportâ hasnât seemed to work. And even he has had to come around.
Preet Bharara: So, what if it happened here? What if it happened on American soil? I mean, weâve had the same discussion with Putin. He does things in the UK. Could he do things here? Like, what happens if a country does something like that here?
Fareed Zakaria: So there, youâre raising this very profound question, which is, thereâsâyou have the interests of the state, the interests of the nation, and they are about stability in the Middle East, low oil prices, maintaining a good relationship with the Saudi monarchy. Then there are these things, not just human rights abuses that they do at home, but, as you say, stuff that involves American citizens or impacts on American citizens, and how do you make that balance? Here, I find myself, as always, something of a centrist, because for all those people who say, oh, we should just sanction the hell out of Saudi Arabia, do this, thenâwell, ask yourself, if you do that, and oil prices go to $150, and you cause a recession, and people get laid off. And think about the cost youâre inflicting on Americans because of that.
So, part of what youâre trying to balance is what is the right thing to do, the moral thing to do, in terms of standing up for individual rights, liberty, and dignity? And how important is it also to maintain some level of stability in the world that allows for a functioning global economy, that allows the United States to function well, that allowed people to have jobs. And obviously, these things are gonna affect people on the margins. Youâre notâno single action is gonna put millions of Americans out of work. But you have to balance those two. And to pretend that there isnât a tradeoff here is a mistake.
Put it another way. If this had happened under Obama, Obama would also be torn. Itâs not just Donald Trump. I mean, Donald Trump is doing it in a particularly crass way where heâsâfirst heâs saying the guy doesnât count because heâs a resident. And then heâs saying, well, weâve got these arms sales. But Obama would be thinking many of those same things and be trying to wrestle with this dilemma. It does get much, much harder, I think. Youâre doing that classic lawyer thing, the law school thing, where youâre making it harder and harder for me. So, if it were in the U.S., in the Saudiâ
Preet Bharara: [Laughs] Iâm doing no suchâI donât know what youâre talking about, Zakaria.
Fareed Zakaria: If it were in the U.S., in the Saudi embassy, very hard not to react very strongly, I think. Soâand why is that? Look, this is not rational. There is an emotional element here. Why is it that that boyâs photograph on the beaches of the Mediterranean, that Syrian boy, triggered a response? And not evenâit triggered [?Anglo America] to take in one million refugees, when there have been plenty of other people washed up dead on the shores of the Mediterranean, somehow didnât seem to trigger that. Sometimes these things are difficult toâsomething that happens that triggers a response. Someâbut it usually is a critical mass, that thereâs been a lot of stuff going on, and then one particularly dramatic event happens. And thatâs when it gets triggered.
Preet Bharara: Yeah. Thereâs a tipping point, and sometimes the tipping point is a word or a speech or an event or a photograph, as you said. But I want to go back to something you said a moment ago then. Youâve been lauding senators, and in particular, Republican senators, for being strong in their statements.
Fareed Zakaria: Mm-hmm.
Preet Bharara: Are they being strong in their statements because they would do something different as president, or are they being strong in their statements because they can afford to be, because itâs not on their watch, because theyâre merely senators and not the president?
Fareed Zakaria: A very brilliant point. Thatâs absolutely right. I mean, the Senate plays that role. Senators play that role. But by the way, I think itâs a good thing in the American system that you have a little of that, that the president can be tasked with kind of looking after the longer-term, more real politic interests of the country. The senators can give voice to moral outrage. Iâve never seen that as a bad thing or as hypocrisy. I do think it sends a signal to the rest of the world that Americaâs aâit cares about these issues. And while the president may not be able to shut off relations with another country because of that, there is a reaction in the country, and there is a condemnation in the country, and I think thatâs very healthy.
Preet Bharara: That presumably allows someone like Secretary of State Pompeo to go into that meeting and say, âLook what the senators are saying. And theyâre gonna push sanctions. And the next time, itâs not gonna be so easy.â
Fareed Zakaria: Exactly. And I think thatâI think every administration uses that very effectively. But they need for those senators to sound like they mean it, that itâs not just an act. And I think it isnât an act with people like Lindsey Graham. I think that he is genuinely outraged.
Preet Bharara: Let me ask you a broader question about foreign policy, which we should talk about more on the show. Is there such a thing a Trump doctrine? And if so, what is it?
Fareed Zakaria: To the broadest extent, the Trump doctrine before he came into office was easily identifiable. It was a kind of isolationist Jacksonianism. We use Jackson, Andrew Jackson, as a way of describing a certain kind of isolationism, which is to say, donât bother me. I donât want to be too involved in the world. But if Iâm gonna get involved, weâre gonna come and beat the shit out of you and then leave.
Preet Bharara: [Laughs] Right.
Fareed Zakaria: Donât expect us to do any nation-building. Donât expect us to have any alliances. Itâs stay at home, occasionally bomb the hell out of people, go back. And thatâs his mentality. And he was very clear. He hated NATO because itâs a permanent, continuing alliance with all the thorny issues of burden-sharing and budgets and things like that. He thinks that trade is basically bad because people take advantage of us. So, he has a very strong isolationist streak in him. Whatâs interesting is, in office, some of that has shown through, as youâve seen with the NATO stuff. But the truth of the matter is, if I were an establishment Republican trying to convince other Republicans, establishment Republicans, that Donald Trump has been okay, Iâd say, âYou know, he says all this stuff. He lets off all this hot air [?about America] [00:29:01], but what has he actually done? He hasnât gotten out of NATO. He hasnât gotten out of Afghanistan. He hasnât gotten out of Syria. In fact, in all those places, heâs actually doubled down. The relationship with Japan is fine. I mean, heâd been threatening to pull our troops out of Japan, South Korea, Germany.
Preet Bharara: Is that all happening? Just in fairness, is that happening because he isâhe is smartly saying one thing publicly and blowing off steam, and then being rational and moderate, and or is he being protected by the adults, like General Mattis and others? Which do you think it is?
Fareed Zakaria: I tend to think itâs probably the latter. Itâs what youâre describing. But letâs be honest, Preet. This isâthis is like aâthis is a freak show. I mean, this isâthis is a circus. Nobodyâs ever seen an administration like this, where, as Michael McFaul, Obamaâs ambassador to Russia, said, âIf you look at the administrationâs policy toward Russia, itâs actually very serious and very tough. Theyâve armed the Ukrainians. Theyâve put additional sanctions on the Russians. Theyâve called them to account in various international bodies. The only problem is, the President periodically seems to suggest that he doesnât agree with the administrationâs policy at all. And soâ
Preet Bharara: Right.
Fareed Zakaria: âweâre trying to figure out like, what does that mean, when the President says, âWell, I donât think they even did it, and I donât think they should beâshould be held accountable for it. And by the way, Putinâs a great guy.â And meanwhile, the administrationâs slapping additional sanctions on them. So, is it possible, for example, that we end up with the same situation with Saudi Arabia, where thereâll be some measures put in place, and Trump will be like, âWell, I like King Salman is the greatest guy in the world, and I totally believe him. It was a rogue operation.â
Preet Bharara: Right.
Fareed Zakaria: âPeople came in from the windows into the Saudi consulate and somehow managed to do this.â
Preet Bharara: Itâs an interesting thing that suggests that the words of the president matter more than the words of anyone else, and that people put a lot of stock in it. And thereâs some cognitive dissonance sometimes when a president says something, but his administration is doing something else. So, for example, if you flipped itâa lot of people think that this president is not tough on Russia because everything emanating from his pores and his mouth suggests a more romantic love of Vladimir Putin. But suppose it was the opposite. Suppose a president had very harsh words, but nobody did anything about it. What would the publicâs reaction be? And in some ways, I think, and you would know better, that maybe the public would place the importance of the words and the calling out of an adversary in strong language as more important than these sanctions that they only read about from time to time, and they never actually see how they work in practice?
Fareed Zakaria: No, I think youâre absolutely right. And you know, thatâs because the American system is very unusual, in that it really is a court. The president is the king, as you know. In manyâmost parliamentary systems, the cabinet is comprised of very powerful leading figures from whatever political party that the prime ministerâs from. These are not people he can really fire. These are veryâthink of Gordon Brown when he was Tony Blairâs finance minister. The American system, the president is the king. Everybody serves at his pleasure. He can get rid of everybody he wants. I mean, thereâs that famous cabinet meeting where Lincoln asked the cabinet what they thought about some policy, and everyone said, âNay, nay, nay, nay, nay,â and then Lincoln says, âWell, I vote aye, and I guess, gentlemen, the ayes have it.â
Preet Bharara: I think what he said, in the same way that Donald Trump said to Lesley Stahl this Sunday, âIâm the president and youâre not.â
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs] Exactly. Exactly.
Preet Bharara: So that goes back to Lincolnâs time.
Fareed Zakaria: But thatâs true, you know? Think about it, Preet. The president has enough power that he can fire even you. And soâ
Preet Bharara: Why you gottaâwhy you gotta mention that? Why you gotta mention that? We were having such a nice conversation. I was really enjoying this.
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs] I think youâreâI think youâre having an interesting life. This is surely more fun than putting bad guys in jail.
Preet Bharara: Yeah. Well, you know, I donât have a TV show like some people.
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs]
Preet Bharara: Preet Bharara GPS. I think thatâI think that has a nice ring to it.
Fareed Zakaria: Hey, come up with your own acronym. [Laughter]
Preet Bharara: Global Positioning System, right? Thatâs what it stands for. No, itâs Global Public Square.
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs] Global Public Square.
Preet Bharara: I know. I know. I watch. Can I ask you about another figure whoâs been in the news? Nikki Haley, who happens to be a fellow Indian American, for whatever thatâs worth. Have you seen anyone else perform sort of as deftly in a prominent position in the Trump administration in terms of balancing their reputation, their relationship with the president, and future political viability than Nikki Haley?
Fareed Zakaria: No. I think you have it exactly right. And frankly, itâs one of the most impressive political balancing acts Iâve ever seen, period, because as you say, she comes inâby the way, doesnât have any particular relationship with Trump. Has spoken out against him during the primaries. Also has no background in foreign affairs. Manages to overcome all that by working hard, you know, getting quite expert on some foreign policy issues, the ones that she had to present; somehow developing a good enough relationship with Trump, but at the same time, being able to represent herself independently. For example, she was one of the toughest voices on Russia early on, at a point where it wasnât clear that Trump would allow that to happen. So, I give her credit for kind of pushing the envelope there. And then, very smartly, leaving at the top of her game.
Preet Bharara: Right. She did not overstay her welcome.
Fareed Zakaria: Yeah. Yeah. It rarely happens in politics. What she knows is, sheâs done a good job. The chances of having two more good years isâjust because life is complicated, are not that great. So, why not leave at the top?
Preet Bharara: Is she special in some way, so that only she could have gotten away with that, being harsh in some language, pushing back in other places? I mean, in other words, are there things for other people in the Trump administration that they can learn from her, or is she unique?
Fareed Zakaria: You know, itâs a very good question. I donât understand how she pulled it off, because Rex Tillerson was not able to. I think that either she had a conversation with Trump and said something like, âLook, I think itâs important that you allow me to say these things so you donât have to say them,â or something like that. There was some kind of deal or, more likely, sheâs very intuitively good politically, and figured out that this would be the place you could go. Because everything I know about Donald Trump suggests you canât sit him down and have a conversation like that, because first of all, heâll forget it two days later. It wonât make any difference. Heâll react the way heâs gonna react anyway. So, you have to in some way figure out how to approach this in a way that constrains him without him feeling constrained. And I think thatâs why I said it was brilliant, because nobody else has been able to do it, even Mattis. Mattis has been able to maintain his independence, but he has not really been able to speak out in a highly critical way.
Preet Bharara: Right.
Fareed Zakaria: So, thatâyeah, I donât know. I donât know her, so. Maybe you do. But as you know, there isnât really a kind of Indian American club,
Preet Bharara: [Laughs] Itâs the Illuminati. Come on.
Fareed Zakaria: Yeah, where we all meet and plot the eventualâthat weâre gonna have vedas sung at the next inauguration.
Preet Bharara: This is an example of one of those things where we have to not be transparent publicly, and tell everyone that thereâs no such thing.
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs] Exactly.
Preet Bharara: But obviously, you and I, we have the special handshake, Fareed, which we wonât share with other people.
Fareed Zakaria: Exactly. Exactly.
Preet Bharara: So, youâve been complimentary of her, Nikki Haleyâs, political deftness. What is your assessment of her time as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations?
Fareed Zakaria: Not particular impressive. I think that the key opportunity when youâre at the UN is to see if there are ways in which you can get the rest of the world to support American initiatives that is gonna solve global problems. Look, weâre in a world that is totally globalized in so many waysâfor economically, of course. But you have diseases, and they get globalized immediately. You have climate change, which is a global phenomenon. And yet, our solutions are all national, because we still have a politics of nations, as we should. So, the trick is, how do you getâhow do you get that level of cooperation? And it seems to me, that should be the measure of a U.S. ambassador to the UN, or of Americaâs engagement with these kind of bodies. And I donât think she did very much on that front. I think she positioned herself well for her own purposes. She didnât use it to try to do what itâs meant to do, which is to solve problems that are by nature transnational.
Preet Bharara: Whatâs the continuing relevance of the UN to America and the world?
Fareed Zakaria: Just that, that you have a world in which these problems are spilling over borders, and you need some forum in which you can meet, negotiate, talk to people, get a critical mass of people who become a majority, which then forces other people to go along. Itâs not ideal, and look, I mean, ifâthe closer you get to the UN, the more you see the dysfunction. But it didnât exist, youâd have to invent is, because you need someplace where people can get together. And the UN has a unique legitimacy, because it isâit does include everybody, you know? So, at some level, the G20, which is the sort of 20 largest countries in the world, sort of, may be a more efficient way. You just have 20 countries. Theyâre the big boys. If they agree to stuff, everybody else will probably have to agree to it. But that lacks legitimacy, because the small countries are not at the table.
So, the UN has this very powerful legitimacy, which is, everyone is represented. It makes it more unwieldy. It makes it more dysfunctional. But the UN has by and large massively served American interests. Weâve been able to mask American power, American preferences, American interests, as global interests, because we have much more say in the UN than any individâany single country.
Preet Bharara: I want to switch gears a little bit, because weâre coming up to the end of our time, and ask you about how we should think about historical leaders, historical world leaders. Youâre a highly educated person. You have three or four PhDs. How many PhDs do you have?
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs] Just this one.
Preet Bharara: One.
Fareed Zakaria: After that, it becomes too many.
Preet Bharara: Thatâs one more than I have. So, you have infinity times the number of PhDs than I have. And recently, there was aâand thereâs controversies all the time, but I want to ask you about one in particular. Scott Kelly, well-known astronaut whose twin brother is also an astronaut, and whose sister-in-law is Gabby Giffords, former Congresswoman, who quoted, approvingly, Winston Churchill. And then there was an avalanche of criticism about that because there was an unseemly side, some people say, to Winston Churchill, and he was not so modern in his views in all the ways we would like someone to be. And then he apologized for quoting Churchill. Is it appropriate to quote Winston Churchill in 2018?
Fareed Zakaria: Of course it is. The whole thing struck me as bizarre. I mean, he was quoting from Churchillâsâthe first page of his memoirs of World War II. It was the most anodyne quote. Churchill says, and he quoted, âIn victory, magnanimity. When youâre winning, be generous.â It strikes me as a perfectly reasonable thing to say. So then you get these people saying, âOh, but Churchill was a racist, and he was an imperialist.â And then Scott says, âOh, Iâm so sorry, I should have looked this up. I stand corrected.â This is absurd. Look, every historical figure of any significance is complicated.
Iâll tell you, itâs funny you bring up Churchill. My father was a kind of figure from the Indian independence movement. When India was being ruled by the British, my father was one of these guys who was struggling to get the British to give India independence, and he became a politician and things like that. And he was always a big fan of Churchillâs. He had all the Churchill books, and he had a bust of Churchill and things like that. And he one day told me that when he was in England in 1945â thatâs the election right after World War II, because he was a Britishâa subjectâif you were an Indian who was in London at the time, you were allowed to vote. So I said, âOh, you must have voted for Churchill because you haveâyou admire him so much.â He said, âOh, no, no. Of course not. I voted for the Labor Party.â He said, âYouâve got to understand. I admire Churchill because heâs a great world historical figure and heâs a great leader. From an Indian point of view, he was terrible, because he was the most terrible imperialist, who wanted the British to rule India forever. And so, of course, for me, a vote against Churchill was a vote for Indian independence.â
It just shows, you know, people are complicated. Churchill made many mistakes in his life and did many bad things. And I think itâs basically fair to characterize him as a racist. But on one incredibly important thing, which was the rise of Nazi Germany, he was right, and everybody else was wrong. And the fact that he was right had a very important effect in saving Western democracy, which I think isâon the whole, was a good thing.
Preet Bharara: On the whole, yes, I wouldâI agree with your assessment, Dr. Zakaria.
Fareed Zakaria: Yeah. A bad idea for the Germans to have won World War II, right? So, thisâbesides which, even if he had done some things worse, the quote was so anodyne. The only thing Iâll say about this, Preet, is thereâs a tendency to overreact to things on Twitter. I mean, when you say there was an outrage, there was like, 20 guys on Twitter saying stuff.
Preet Bharara: Right. But he apologized.
Fareed Zakaria: And he shouldnât have. He should have realized, these are 20 guys in their pajamas in basements tweeting out stuff. I meanâ
Preet Bharara: Those are the same guys who interfered with the election, right? Weighing 400 pounds, eating Cheetos?
Fareed Zakaria: Yeah. This is not the wave of moral outrage. I mean, itâs likeâyeah, but thatâs my point, which it might actually be one person with 19 bots.
Preet Bharara: May I risk quoting from Churchill, my favorite quote from Churchill?
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs] As you can see, Iâm okay with that.
Preet Bharara: Well, you know. In 2018.
Fareed Zakaria: [?I think now]. [00:42:25] But if you get 10 tweets against it, just let it be.
Preet Bharara: But you can tell me if this is anodyne or not, and then you can define anodyne so I know what that means.
Fareed Zakaria: Mm-hmm.
Preet Bharara: So, Churchill has the best joke about prepositions that Iâve ever heard, right? Somebody onceâthis person who won the Nobel Prizeâfor what? For literatureâapparently ended a sentence with a preposition. And do you recall what Churchill said in response?
Fareed Zakaria: That somethingâs up with which I will not put.
Preet Bharara: He said, âThat is the kind of errant pedantry up with which I shall not put.â You can send your complaints to cafe.com.
Fareed Zakaria: I think itâs great. I only say this. I think whenever I have tried, because when youâre writing a column, and you have fact checkers, and you have people breathing down your neck, youâre alwaysâIâm very careful to try and track down where these quotes come from. What Iâve discovered is many famous Churchill quotes were actually not said by Winston Churchill. What I mean by that is they were said by somebody not very important or impressive or well-known. And what Iâve discovered is there is a kind of inflation that takes place in the world of famous quotes, where you want your quote to have been said by Churchill, by Lincoln, by Jefferson. When itâs said by somebody else, somehow magically, the attribution of the quote keeps moving up. So, I think that I would just check. It may beâit might not turn out to be Lord Darby or somebody like that.
Preet Bharara: Well, I think a lot of quotes attributed to Churchill were actually said by Benny Hill. I donât know if people know that.
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs]
Preet Bharara: Thatâs definitely true. Fareed Zakaria, I look forward to your tenure as Secretary of State one day. Maybe you can have Nikki Haley.
Fareed Zakaria: [Laughs] Thank you. Thank you. Soâ
Preet Bharara: Maybe you can have Nikki Haley as your deputy and teach you about politics.
Fareed Zakaria: No. Letâs make Nikki Haley president. You become Attorney General. Iâll become Secretary of State. We need [?Adasi] to be Secretary of Defense. Thatâs the one areas where we donât haveâ
Preet Bharara: Right. Wellâ
Fareed Zakaria: Like, people wouldnât think of an Indian as a viable Secretary of Defense. I donât know why.
Preet Bharara: Why are you telling people the goals we arrived at at our secret meetings? I donât know why youâreâI donât know why youâre doing that. [Laughter] Fareed Zakaria, thank you again. It was a pleasure.
Fareed Zakaria: Pleasure, Preet.
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