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Joe Rogan Experience #1763 - General H.R. McMaster

General H.R. McMaster is a retired United States Army lieutenant general who served as the 26th United States National Security Advisor from 2017 to 2018. He is also known for his roles in the Gulf War, Operation Enduring Freedom, and Operation Iraqi Freedom and is currently a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.  His books, "Battlegrounds" and "Dereliction of Duty" are bestsellers. He is host of the podcast "Battlegrounds: International Perspectives" and a regular on the podcast "Goodfellows."

H.R. McMasterguestJoe Roganhost
Jun 27, 20242h 48mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 3:11

    The National Security Advisor’s job: briefing presidents and shaping decisions (without setting policy)

    1. NA

      (drumbeats) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.

    2. HM

      The Joe Rogan Experience.

    3. JR

      Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (instrumental music plays) Ready to go?

    4. HM

      Yeah, ready.

    5. JR

      All right.

    6. HM

      Ready. Yeah.

    7. JR

      Well, thank you, sir. Very nice to meet you. Cheers.

    8. HM

      Hey. Joke. Cheers, great to meet you.

    9. JR

      Great to meet you. (glasses clink) Mm. I always wanted to smoke a cigar and have a scotch with a national security advisor.

    10. HM

      (laughs)

    11. JR

      So here we go.

    12. HM

      (laughs)

    13. JR

      All right. All right. I always wanted to be in one of them smoky rooms.

    14. HM

      (laughs)

    15. JR

      Where all the, all the shit goes down.

    16. HM

      (laughs)

    17. JR

      What... Is there a moment... 'Cause every, every person, every, you know, civilian wants to know, is there a moment when a president gets into office, where someone like you has to sit him down, they just got elected, someone like you has to sit him down and go, "All right, buddy. Here's what's going on in the world."

    18. HM

      Yeah, I, I think so. I mean, I... You know, we, we were facing a number of challenges and opportunities, and a, a new president, you know, I think suddenly realizes that he's responsible for how we respond to those challenges and opportunities. So I think, you know, of course as a national security advisor, you know, that's kind of your job, right? Your job-

    19. JR

      Yeah.

    20. HM

      You're, you're the only person in the foreign policy, national security establishment who has the president as his or her only client, right? So it's your job to help the president succeed, uh, in the area of foreign policy and national security.

    21. JR

      And wha-... That job ve-... Y- you have to kind of be like a psychologist as well as a national security advisor, right? Because you... Especially if you're dealing with someone like Trump, who's a-

    22. HM

      Right, well-

    23. JR

      ... big personality. So.

    24. HM

      Yeah. And, and of course, you know, every, every president is different, right?

    25. JR

      Yeah.

    26. HM

      And, and receives information differently and has a different set of priorities. And so I think it's really important to ensure that the way you interact with that president is consistent-

    27. JR

      Mm.

    28. HM

      ... with the way that president receives information, you know, thinks all, you know, him or herself about, about the world, and help them evolve their understanding of these challenges and opportunities that we face internationally, and then give options, right? As national security advisor, like your job is not to determine foreign policy. Nobody elected you, right?

    29. JR

      Right.

    30. HM

      Your job is to give that elected president the benefit of the best i- information, intelligence analysis available, and then to tee up options, right, and, and have forums for discussion where he can not just listen to you, 'cause you're not omniscient, right? You don't... You're not an all-knowing national security advisor. You should help convene groups that can help the president make the best decisions.

  2. 3:11 – 8:22

    “Strategic narcissism” and the short-war illusion: from Desert Storm confidence to Iraq/Afghanistan reality

    1. HM

      Yeah. Well, the key is, the key is to think through the long-term costs and consequences of any decision. And often that involves a decision to take an action, but also not doing something is a decision, right? So-

    2. JR

      Mm-hmm.

    3. HM

      ... I think what a national security advisor should do, uh, any of the president's advisors should help the president think longer term and to recognize, right, that, that we are involved in complex competitions, right? The future doesn't depend on what we decide to do. It also, it also depends on the actions o- of others, oftentimes, you know, adversaries, rivals, and enemies. And that interactive nature of foreign policy and national security competitions is sometimes lost. And, and this is what I write about in the, in the book is this, is this idea of strategic narcissism, right, the tendency for leaders to think that what they do or decide not to do is decisive toward achieving a favorable outcome. That's actually a pretty arrogant way to look at the world, right? Because you have to, you have to recognize the, the agency, the influence, the authorship over the future that others have.

    4. JR

      But if they decide something that's incorrect or something that's correct, it kind of does have a, a large impact on the world, right?

    5. HM

      Oh, ab- absolute- absolutely, right? I mean, if you think of just, you know, decisions in, in, in recent history, right? Decisions to either engage or not engage, right? How about, you know, for... Everybody wants to talk about, for example, the invasion of Iraq, right? That's been the big debate over the last couple of decades. Should we have done it? Should we have invaded Iraq? And I think what we ought to debate more often is who the heck thought it would be easy and why did they think it would be easy, right?

    6. JR

      Do you think they thought it would be easy just for- because of the first Gulf War?

    7. HM

      I think that's a, that's a big factor. You know, I, I write about this in Battlegrounds. I start... you know, for... It's an odd thing to start a, a book out on, but I, I write about our tank battle in Desert Storm. And I write about that in context of our cavalry troop, the same cavalry troopers who were patrolling the border between East and West Germany from Camp Harris in Coburg, Germany in November of, of 1989, uh, when, when the wall came down. And, and of course, that, that event, I think, was significant in terms of bolstering our, you know, our confidence, right, our optimism about the future with good reason, right? I mean, you know, the East German government faded away, the Berlin Wall came down, right, the Soviet Union broke apart. We won, we won the Cold War, right, without, without firing a shot. And so there was a sense of optimism then going in to the Gulf War as well. And so our troop was training, you know, in, in August of 1990 when Saddam in- invaded Kuwait. And I brought the whole team together, you know, it's, uh, 140 cavalry troopers and I said, "Hey, we need to make the most out of this training because the next operations order I give you will be- probably be in the desert of Saudi Arabia." And then, of course, our experience during Desert Storm was a lopsided victory. We destroyed a force, you know, much larger than us. We s- suffered no casualties. It was one lopsided victory in a war that was full of these lopsided victories. And what, what happened in this period of time, Joe, is we bought into some assumptions about the future that were overoptimistic, right? And I think those assumptions were that, hey, you know, that, that an arc of history...... had guaranteed the primacy of our free and open societies over closed authoritarian systems. The second is, hey, great power competition, that's, that's a relic of the past. You know, how'd that work out? Look what's going on right now with, with Russia and-

    8. JR

      Right.

    9. HM

      ... and, and China. And then third, and this is what I think you're alluding to, is that there was this idea that future war would be fast, cheap, efficient, right? Waged at standoff range with our advanced technologies. And what we forgot, I think, is this interactive nature of war. I mean, there are two ways to fight, and you, you know this from ju- (laughs) jujitsu, you know, is, is, you know, you know, asymmetrically, where you use that person's strengths against them, or stupidly. I mean, Saddam fought us stupidly, and we also had a very narrow political objective. Hey, turn Kuwait back to the Kuwaitis. Now fast forward, okay, to the wars af- after 9/11, uh, the, the, uh, invasion of, of Afghanistan 2001 and then in Iraq in 2003, I think we went into those wars under this assumption, the short war assumption, right? We could just do this quickly and kinda, you know, almost take the George Costanza approach to war and just leave on a high note. When, in fact, war has always been e- an activity that involves the consolidation of gains, to get to a sustainable outcome consistent with what brought you there in the first place. And, and so this idea, uh, in, in, in battlegrounds of strategic narcissism, right? This tendency to not consider, you know, the interactive nature of war.

    10. JR

      The interactive nature of war and the, the consequences of each and every single decision that you have to make.

    11. HM

      Right. Abs- absolutely. And, you know, I, I, I had this, this gr- wonderful experience in the Army across 34 years, right? And, and, uh, and what, uh, in, in recent years, you know, the last couple of decades, I was on the receiving end of, of plans and strategies and policies developed in Washington that made no sense from where I was. (laughs) You know, in, in places like Iraq and, and, and Afghanistan.

    12. JR

      So, how does that work? Like, who, w- w- well, so if a person like you is a national security advisor, like, and, and a general, what, where, who, who comes to you with these ideas and plans?

  3. 8:22 – 10:42

    Unexpected call from the White House: McMaster’s fast-track hiring at Mar-a-Lago

    1. HM

      Well, it's your job to kinda convene the, you know, the, the president's cabinet, right? The Principals Committee of the National Security Council. And, and you know, Joe, I, uh, you know, I, I, I wrote about this in, in the book, I, I, uh, I, I walked into that office really unexpectedly obviously, right? You know, I'd, I had been walking down Walnut Street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on my way to, to a think tank. Uh, my job at the time was design, design the future army. So I'm an active duty lieutenant general, and I was, I'm, I was gonna brief this think tank community, get their thoughts on a study that we had commissioned, uh, t- almost a two-year-long study on Russia's annexation of Crimea and invasion of Ukraine, and Russian new generation warfare, and what it meant, right, for developing the future army and the future military. And my phone rings, and it's a partially blocked number from, you know, from the, you know, from the, from the White House.

    2. JR

      Oh, boy.

    3. HM

      And they say, "Hey, uh, hey, the president would like you to interview for the job of national security advisor at Mar-a-Lago on Sunday."

    4. JR

      It says partially? Partially blocked?

    5. HM

      So it just says 202. It's just 202. There's no-

    6. JR

      That's it?

    7. HM

      That's it, yeah.

    8. JR

      Oh, boy. That's some, like, Batman shit.

    9. HM

      So (laughs) that's-

    10. JR

      (laughs)

    11. HM

      ... so that's why (laughs) , that's why I answered it. Typically I wouldn't answer my phone on the way to a meeting, but I, like, "Maybe I ought, I ought to answer this one." So, so, uh, you know, it came, it ca- came out of the blue, and so that was a Friday, right? And Sunday I'm interviewing for the job.

    12. JR

      Wow.

    13. HM

      He hires me on, you know, President's Day Monday. I fly back to Washington, right? You know, on, on Air Force One.

    14. JR

      And you were interviewed at Mar-a-Lago?

    15. HM

      At Mar-a-Lago.

    16. JR

      So you're having, like, shrimp cocktails and-

    17. HM

      (laughs) Hey, hey, I didn't know how to get food there, man. So when-

    18. JR

      (laughs)

    19. HM

      So and af- after the first interview, right, they said, "Hey, the president would probably like to talk to you again." So I, I stayed, they, uh, they kept me there for the rest of the day. I went into the military aides office, you know, 'cause I know, uh, know those guys and every, uh, that were on, on the military. So I'm hanging out in their office, I'm doing emails from my regular job, and, you know, of course calling my wife and, and calling Katie and talking to her about it. And, and there's, there's no foo- I didn't know how to get food.

    20. JR

      (laughs)

    21. HM

      So I ate everything that those guys had. I ate their pistachio nuts, man. I, I, I, and I left 'em a note, "Hey, sorry guys, I'll have to replenish your supplies."

    22. JR

      You can't ask Trump, "Hey, buddy."

    23. HM

      (laughs)

    24. JR

      "Where, where's a man get a steak around here?"

    25. HM

      No, I probably coulda gotten some meatloaf or something or some-

    26. JR

      I'm sure.

    27. HM

      I'm sure I could have.

    28. JR

      (laughs)

    29. HM

      Missed opportunity. But, but so, so anyway, it, that, that Monday I go, I fly back to, to DC, and, uh, I didn't even live in DC, so they had these Osprey aircraft waiting to take me back to my house in, in, in, in Tidewater, Virginia. I packed a bag and I started on Tuesday, man.

    30. JR

      Wow.

  4. 10:42 – 12:22

    Decision-making lessons from Vietnam: framing problems before choosing solutions

    1. HM

      I mean, so, so it was quick, but I had this, you know, I had this great gift that the Army gave me, which is the opportunity to study history, you know? And, and so I walk into, to me, McGeorge Bundy's office, the guy who was national security advisor when Vietnam became an American war. And I wrote a book called Dereliction of Duty about how and why Vietnam became an American war, and identified all of the deficiencies in the decision-making, policy-making process, right, in, in, in Washington. So, I resolved at least, okay, I'm not gonna make the same mistakes, right? And, and so those, one of those mistakes or what you're alluding to is, you know, they, they didn't spend enough time thinking about the nature of the problem, right? They didn't frame out the problem, use kind of design thinking to think about it, right? So, when I, when I came into the job, you know, we, we, uh, you know, we established, you know, what I thought were the, the top 16 challenges to our security and prosperity in the world, right? And, and then we organized a framing effort around those, and we put together a meeting called a Principals Small Group Framing Session where the president's cabinet, right, the secretary of state, and defense, and the, all the heads of the intelligence community, um, uh, you know, come together to, to, to really approve how we've described the problem associated with China's Communist Party aggression, with Russian aggression, with Iran and Iran's pursuit of a nuclear weapon, with North Korea and North Korea's nuclear pro- program, and, and, uh, and the other threats from North Korea. Uh, s- threats that, that are, that are occurring more frequently and are, are more con- consequential in cyberspace for example. And, and, uh, so I, as I came into the job, I was grateful for the opportunity to-... studied it from a historical perspective, anyway.

  5. 12:22 – 15:55

    Serving Trump as a nonpartisan officer amid polarization: why foreign policy shouldn’t be tribal

    1. JR

      Well, you're, you're famously non-partisan. You were, you were a guy who didn't even vote while you were in-

    2. HM

      Yeah.

    3. JR

      ... active duty. You, you decided a long time ago that that was, uh, the best course of action to stay completely unbiased and to concentrate entirely on the goals and objectives of the military.

    4. HM

      Right, right.

    5. JR

      So, when you're with a guy like Trump, you're gonna be associated politically.

    6. HM

      Yeah.

    7. JR

      Like, if- if you're a part of the Trump Administration, it's like-

    8. HM

      Right.

    9. JR

      ... you're immediately associated with Trump, and then with, uh, all of the good and the bad-

    10. HM

      Yeah.

    11. JR

      ... that comes with that. So, wa- was that a shock to the system? Like, what was that like to go from-

    12. HM

      Yeah.

    13. JR

      ... you get this phone call from this weird number. All of a sudden, you're in Mar-a-Lago trying to find some food.

    14. HM

      (laughs)

    15. JR

      And then, uh, you're the National Security Advisor.

    16. HM

      Well, you know, you know, uh, I really think it was a benefit to stay on active duty. You know, and, and, and I, I, I really think that... I, I mean, I know like you do. I, when I look at the polarization in our society today-

    17. JR

      Yeah.

    18. HM

      ... this partisan politics, I think, "Okay. Why can't we just talk about what we can agree on?" So, I think in the area of foreign policy, that ought to be an area where we could agree. Like, who wants Iran to have a nuclear weapon?

    19. JR

      Right.

    20. HM

      Who wants the only hereditary Communist dictatorship in the world, you know (laughs) , the Kim family regime in North Korea-

    21. JR

      Right.

    22. HM

      ... to have the most destructive weapons on Earth? Who wants Russia to intimidate all the countries on its periphery, develop destabilizing nuclear weapons, try to coerce us like they're doing now? Who wants China to eat our lunch economically? Okay, let's talk about that across partisan lines, right?

    23. JR

      Yeah.

    24. HM

      These shouldn't be partisan issues. So, I, I think, you know, uh, Donald Trump was the fifth, the fifth commander in chief I served in uniform, right? When I took the Oath of Office at West Point, the oath at West Point as a, you know, as a, as a plebe there, you know, in, in, uh, gosh, the summer of 1980, right? Reagan was president, right? So, it didn't matter to me who the commander in chief was. I was gonna do my best to, to fulfill my oath, which was to, to support and defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic, right? And to bear true faith and allegiance to the same, you know? And, and I felt like I could serve Trump well by, you know, by helping him determine his agenda. He's the guy that got elected, right? And then, and then once he made decisions, to help orchestrate the sensible implementation of his decisions, and that's the, that's the job I, I took on.

    25. JR

      It's such a weird time politically, and just socially in this country, because everyone is so polarized. It's, it's so u- uniquely polarized that even a good decision, a decision that if someone takes that's the president that is good for America will get attacked by the other side.

    26. HM

      Right.

    27. JR

      Just universally. No one from the right is gonna look at anything that Biden does and goes, "That is a great move for America. Kudos to him."

    28. HM

      Right.

    29. JR

      It just doesn't happen anymore.

    30. HM

      I know. And, and we've got to try to get back to that. And I think the only way to do it is for, like, your audience, you know, for people to demand better-

  6. 15:55 – 18:41

    How U.S. China policy assumptions failed: engagement didn’t produce liberalization

    1. JR

      What was the-

    2. HM

      Right. Uh-

    3. JR

      ... what was the original poli- like, from the Obama administration? How did they approach China, and what was the difference between the way Trump approached it-

    4. HM

      Well-

    5. JR

      ... or the Trump administration?

    6. HM

      Yeah. Well, it was, it was a series of administrations, and of course, when the... there's the opening to China in, in '78, right? And, and really even before that with Kissinger's trip, right? But then the opening to China was really based on our view of China in the context of the Cold War. So, we saw China as a potential balancer against the Soviet Union. And what Kissinger and Nixon put together was this idea of triangular diplomacy. We would endeavor to have a closer relationship each with Russia, with, or Soviet Union, and with China than they had with each other, right? And, and so that was the Cold War generated policy. But then after the end of the Cold War, hey, we thought, again, great power of competition's over, right? Arc of history, guaranteed primacy of democratic governments. And, and so a series of, a, a series of administrations, you know, really took this approach to, to China that was based on a fundamentally flawed assumption. And that assumption was that China, having been welcomed into the international order, would liberalize, right? As it prospered, it would liberalize its economy and that it would liberalize its form of governance. And what we didn't consider is the degree to which emotions and ideology drive and constrain China's Communist Party leadership. We underestimated the degree to which, you know, the party is obsessed with control, maintaining its, its, its exclusive grip on power. And, and the party from the very beginning saw themselves in, you know, I mean, from the beginning of this assumption period in the '90s, in an ideological competition with us, but they were smart about it, right? They took a, a hide-and-bide approach. There's, there's a, um, there's a good book out recently by, uh, Ros D- Doshi, uh, about, about the long game, about how the party took this as a long game, and that there's a lot of continuity even between Deng Xiaoping in the '90s, right, and the opening up and Xi Jinping, although Xi is... Xi Jinping, the current chairman of the Chinese Communist Party has taken it to the, to the next level in terms of aggression against us. So, that was the, that was the, the dynamic was this assumption. President Bill Clinton, you know, advocated very hard, you know, for allowing China into the World Trade Organization, even though it was a state-directed economy that had uh, all kinds of unfair competitive advantages like state support for their main state-owned enterprises and so forth.And, uh... And- and- and when asked about, you know, "Well, what's going to happen in China?" He said, "Well, the Chinese Communist Party is gonna have to liberalize, right? Uh...

    7. JR

      Mm-hmm.

    8. HM

      "... because of the internet and information that's available to the Chinese people." He said, "Trying to maintain control by the party in China would be like trying to nail Jell-O to a wall." Well, how's that working out?

    9. JR

      Th- they're pretty good at nailing Jell-O. (laughs)

    10. HM

      They're pretty good... (laughs) They're pretty good at nailing Jell-O. Uh...

  7. 18:41 – 22:48

    Authoritarian capitalism and coercion: why corporations and investors became strategic enablers

    1. JR

      Di-... Was there any anticipation at all, or- or, uh, d- did anybody predict that what China's done today is they've developed a sort of unique hybrid, uh, economy, where they're still communist...

    2. HM

      Yeah.

    3. JR

      ... they're still run by the Communist Party, but they're very much capitalist.

    4. HM

      Mm-hmm.

    5. JR

      I mean, there's- there's billionaires in China, famously, and they walk step-in-step with the orders of the Communist Party. And that's a very unique form of government and a very unique, inexorable connection between the big businesses and the corporations and the government. They all work together. That- w- that seems, at least tactically, to be a unique advantage that they have, uh, economically and militarily over the United States. Because we- w- we- we have conflict between our business and our government. There's conflict, and there's manipulation...

    6. HM

      Right.

    7. JR

      ... and influence, but it's not seamless. What they...

    8. HM

      Right.

    9. JR

      ... seem to have is, like, seamless power and control over their corporations. If you are involved in any sort of large business, electronics, military, whatever, you work with the government.

    10. HM

      Right.

    11. JR

      You work together. You follow their orders.

    12. HM

      You have to, or you're better, right? Yeah.

    13. JR

      Yes, you have to.

    14. HM

      Or you'll be disappeared.

    15. JR

      Yeah.

    16. HM

      Right? You know, and, uh...

    17. JR

      And that's what's wild about that country, that they...

    18. HM

      Well...

    19. JR

      ... they do that.

    20. HM

      A- and we have to recognize, right? We have to recognize that this is an authoritarian regime that is determined, right, to succeed at our expense, right?

    21. JR

      Yeah.

    22. HM

      Xi Jinping just said it, like, last week. He just ca-... He just... He was talking to the provincial chiefs, and he said, "Hey, make no mistake about it. We're in an ideological competition with the United States and other democratic and- and- and free market economic countries and systems." And, um... And we have- we have to acknowledge that, right? Uh, there's a national security law that- that requires every single company in China, you know, whether it's a state-owned enterprise or, like, a pseudo-private company, to act as an arm of the government.

    23. JR

      Right.

    24. HM

      It's a requirement. And if you stray from that, he's gonna reel you in, right? Look what he did to the tech sector.

    25. JR

      Right.

    26. HM

      Look what he did to the education sector. That- that was a, uh... You know, that was a, you know, $60 billion a year industry. It's completely gone, right? Look what he's done to, you know, to s- to many of these- these executives, w- they just disappear for months at a time.

    27. JR

      Yeah.

    28. HM

      Jack Ma, you know?

    29. JR

      Yeah.

    30. HM

      And, you know... (laughs) Joe, what I think what happened there is, I think he l-... He looked at, uh, you know, at- at Dorsey and- and- and others, you know, and- and, uh, Mark Zuckerberg, and- and saw what they were doing (laughs) to Donald Trump in the (laughs) United States and said, "Hey, man. That's not gonna happen here," right?

  8. 22:48 – 31:56

    Supply chains as national security: semiconductors, medicine, green tech, and the CHIPS push

    1. JR

      I'm glad you said that because I think that- that's a real concern, and I think that most Americans aren't aware of this. I mean, I think the- the general population probably isn't totally aware of how the government and the businesses work together...

    2. HM

      Yeah.

    3. JR

      ... and that there is no escape, and they are exactly the same. But when the supply chain got hit during COVID, I think a lot of people woke up to realize that, first of all, most of our medicine is made over in China.

    4. HM

      Yeah.

    5. JR

      Um, a lot of our conductor chips...

    6. HM

      Right.

    7. JR

      So- so much of our electronics and so much of w- what we need for day-to-day life... Like, we can't buy an American-made cell phone.

    8. HM

      Right.

    9. JR

      Like, that seems crazy to me...

    10. HM

      Absolutely.

    11. JR

      ... that we have the- the biggest cell phone manufacturer, Apple, the number one in the country, uh, number one in the world, and it's made in China. We...

    12. HM

      Right.

    13. JR

      We don't have the ability, we don't have a plant, we don't have the capabilities to make the- the core components of our day-to-day lives, our computers, our electronics...

    14. HM

      Right.

    15. JR

      ... electronics in cars. There's a shortage. Right. Can't buy a Ford F150...

    16. HM

      (laughs)

    17. JR

      ... you know, if you try to buy a Raptor. The- the... You can't get 'em 'cause the- the chips...

    18. HM

      Right. Yeah.

    19. JR

      ... the- there's an overseas problem with the, uh, supply chain. That seems crazy to me that we have somehow or another lost our manufacturing in America to the point where essentials, things that we need to run our society, we have to rely on foreign countries to create.

    20. HM

      It i- it is crazy. And if you think about it, it's gonna get worse before it gets better because you mentioned semiconductors and microelectronics and the degree to which that is dis-... that is the critical point, right, the... the- the- the, uh, the point of failure in- in many supply chains. But as we transition to, you know, renewable energy and green energy, so much of that supply chain is also concentrated in China. So- solar pan- me- panel manufacturing, but also what goes into that, rare earth metals and rare earth metal refinement, battery manufacturing, and so...... what we have seen is an artificial concentration of a huge percentage of the world's manufacturing in the southeastern portion of China. That's unnatural, right? So, I think businesses that get ahead of this, that recognize it's time to adjust, it's time to make supply chains more resilient, it's time to onshore, nearshore, diversify, uh, they're, they're gonna be ahead of the game. The ones that are doubling down on their bets in China, look at what Xi Jinping is doing, right? He's completely doing everything he can to extinguish human freedom, right, and, and any inkling that any Chinese person might have that they might, you know, deserve a say in how they're governed, for example, right? You see this with the extinguishment of, of human freedom in, in Hong Kong now, uh, and, and, and the, you know ... (laughs) you see this with Peng Shuai, the tennis star, uh, you know, who disappeared. But you see it in a, in a, in a genocidal campaign in Xinjiang. There's no way, there is no way to say that it's not genocide, right? It's a campaign of slow genocide. You know, Uyghur birth rates in, in certain areas are down, down 60%. Right? I mean, so I, I think it's im- important for us to ev- all take a stand now, you know, and demand better from our leaders, and demand better from your pension funds, demand better from if you, if you c- contribute to universities, right, that they're aware of the threat of, uh, of, of, uh, China's sustained campaign of industrial espionage against us to, to steal sensitive technologies and, and, uh, and intellectual property. I, I mean we, we really have to wake up to the competition.

    21. JR

      We have done some things like ban the use of Huawei cellphones in the United States.

    22. HM

      Mm-hmm.

    23. JR

      They, they, they came very close to selling, I believe they had a deal with AT&T and some other, uh, providers and they decided to cut that off at the ... And China's phones are ... th- that's another thing is, like, technologically, they're, they're at the peak. Like, those Huawei phones are, like, fantastic phones. And especially back then when they imported, that ban, like, a lot of people were very excited about them, like technophiles.

    24. HM

      Right.

    25. JR

      But w- is there something that the government can do to impart to the general public and to put pressure on some of these, uh, technological corporations-

    26. HM

      Yeah.

    27. JR

      ... to let them know, like, "We're ... You're in a quagmire here." It's a bad situation because you're doing what you're doing because it allows you to maximize your profit by utilizing these plants and using, you know, the p- places like, uh, you know, the, the, the plant that makes, uh, cellphones or iPhones-

    28. HM

      Yeah. Right.

    29. JR

      ... for China that famously has the nets around it to keep people from suiciding-

    30. HM

      Right.

  9. 31:56 – 41:01

    Building a coalition for the ‘Free World’: Indo-Pacific strategy and transparent competition

    1. HM

      At all. And it should be a multinational issue, right? The, the reason the subtitle of the book is The Fight to Defend the Free World is we need others to come with us, right?

    2. JR

      Yeah.

    3. HM

      We need the European Union and the UK and Japan and Australia. I think that's starting to happen as well, right? Because, you know, the, you know, look at what Xi Jinping has done just since the pandemic, right? Foisted the pandemic on the world, you know, crushed anybody who was trying to ring the alarm bells about it. These are reporters and, and doctors, right? Then added insult to injury w- with this wolf warrior diplomacy, which I know you've talked about on, on the show here as well. Uh, and then, and then a range of aggressive actions, like, you know, bludgeoning Indian soldiers to death on the Himalayan frontier, right? Scores of overflights into, into Taiwanese, uh, air defense identification zone. Weaponizing islands in the South China Sea, and if they, if they succeed, there will be the largest land grab, so to speak, in history. And that's, you know, by the way, an area across which one-third of the world's surface trade flows, right? You know, the intimidation towards Japan, a massive campaign of economic coercion against Australia and now Lithuania. And so what I would often hear, you know, from friends, you know, in, in Southeast Asia and beyond, you know, these are my counterparts when, uh, who I was engaging when I was National Security Advisor, they would say, "Hey, don't, don't force us to choose," right? "Don't force us to choose between Washington and Beijing." And what I, what I would tell them is, "Hey, that's not the choice you face," right? "The choice you face is between sovereignty and servitude," right? And, you know, the, the United States is on the side of sovereignty. China wants servitude, because what Xi Jinping wants to do, and the party's clear about this, is they want to establish exclusionary areas of primacy across the Indo-Pacific region. And excluding who? Us, right? As the first step in, in really being able to rewrite some of the rules of international commerce and political discourse and, and then to isolate their, their regional rival, Japan, right? And so I, I think it's, we're at a critical moment where we have to compete effectively, and this is not, this does not mean that we have to, we're on a path to confrontation. Actually, I think, Joe, because we had vacated these competitive spaces, China became more and more emboldened, and we were actually on a path to confrontation. When now, I think this idea of transparent competition is, is the, is, is what we ought to really pursue with China.

    4. JR

      So do you, do you think that that makes us less likely to be in competition with China in terms, or, or less likely to be in conflict with China if we can change our whole, uh, economic profile here in terms of tech, in terms of manufacturing?

    5. HM

      I, I do. I do, because I think really we have to recognize what China's trying to do, right? So we, and people, people talk about decoupling all the time, and you alluded to this a little bit, like, hey, you know, businesses have to make a decision, right? I mean, they, they've got responsibilities to their shareholders, they, you know, and, and so forth. So the whole idea of a complete decoupling, that's always been kind of like a red herring, right? That's not what we're talking about. I mean, what we ought to do is, is ask businesses, take a Hippocratic Oath, right? Don't do any hurt or harm in three areas. First of all, don't help the Chinese Communist Party gain an unfair differential advantage over us militarily or in the emerging data-driven, you know, uh, global economy. Second, right? I mean, don't help the party, you know, do, do, don't, don't help the party, uh, perfect its technologically-enabled Orwellian police state, right? Don't help them do that. Don't invest in Chinese AI companies, right, that are extinguishing human free- freedom and weaponizing peoples' social networks against them and everything. And then the third is, don't compromise the long-term viability of your company in exchange for short-term profits, right?

    6. JR

      Right.

    7. HM

      And so many companies have been through this, right?

    8. JR

      Yeah.

    9. HM

      I mean, and, and, uh, and, and so I, I think that's a way to think about it, and to think about it in light of what the Chinese Communist Party leadership wants, right? So what Xi Jinping talks about is a dual circulation economy, right? Where, where they get a grip on critical supply chains internationally. I mean, if you want to look at human rights abuses, look at what they're doing in, in the DRC, in the Congo, right? Uh, in terms of extracting, at a horrible humanitarian price, the, the, the rare earths that they need, uh, to continue their, their manufacturing of, of microelectronics, for example. Um, and, and, but what he wants to do is get a grip on those supply chains and then create enough domestic demand that he doesn't need anybody else, right?

    10. JR

      Right.

    11. HM

      That he can write the terms to everybody else, that he has everybody else, you know, uh, i- in a position that, uh, of, of where he can use coercive power. And, and what, what I describe in Battlegrounds is this strategy, this, I think the, uh, the easy way to think about it is co-option, coercion, and concealment, right? Co-opt you, co-opt businesses, co-opt elites, right? With the lure of short-term profits and access to the Chinese market, right? Be it, you know, uh, uh, Chinese investment. And then once you're in, right, to use that, that influence for coercive purposes, right? Look at what they're doing to Lithuania. Look at what they're doing to Australia, right? Look at what they did to Marriott, MBA, you know, all, you know, uh, US and international companies. Um, and then, and then, and then to conceal all of this, say, "Oh, this is just normal business practices."

    12. JR

      Mm-hmm.

    13. HM

      Well, it's not.... normal business practices, right? If you look at, at One Belt One Road, right, which is their ... They have three main strategies, right? Military-civil fusion. I dis- and I describe all of these in the book. Military-civil fusion, then they, then the, then, the, you know, the ... Associated with that is Made in China 2025, which is part of this dual circulation economy becoming completely, you know, un- uh, no longer dependent at all on any external sources of, of, uh, advanced technologies, for example, or s- or, uh, aspects of supply chains. Uh, and then, and then finally, One Belt One Road, which is an effort to create servile relationships with companies by overly indebting them.

    14. JR

      Mm.

    15. HM

      Right? And so, the new vanguard of the Chinese Communist Party, (laughs) you know, is, is a Chinese Communist, uh, Party official accompanied by a Chinese national bank guy with a duffle bag full of cash, right? And, and th- th- they get the most traction in corrupt governments. You know, and then once they indebt them, for generations, right, then they can trade debt for equity or they can use it for coercive purposes. "If you say one cross word about the Party, we're gonna call back all your debt and you're gonna go broke." Right? So, so I think we just have to recognize co-option, coercion, concealment, defend against it, but then of course, you know, as we look to the future, how do we, how do we maintain and expand our competitive advantages? Because we have tremendous competitive advantages in this country, right, that we ought to be aware of and, and we ought to accentuate. And especially, I would say, you know, the unchecked, unbridled entrepreneurial spirit, right? I mean, if you look at China's centralized control, do you really think that's gonna work in the long term, you know, compared to the freedom that we have here? You know, I, I don't think so.

    16. JR

      The ... What- what concerns me is that they're utilizing our entrepreneurial spirit by co-opting these companies, by g- getting involved in these companies, by making these enormous investments, and, and getting them to give up whatever it is, semiconductor chip technology, AI technology, and then it's theirs.

    17. HM

      Absolutely.

    18. JR

      I mean, uh, Saagar Enjeti from, uh, Breaking Points did this, uh, brilliant piece on ... I forget the name of the company, but there was a, uh, an American company that d- sold a, a large percentage of what they were to China, and then the Chinese people that they were communicating with stopped communicating with them back, renamed the company-

    19. HM

      Right.

    20. JR

      ... and completely took all of the technology and then proclaimed it to be Chinese technology, and they're gonna utilize that technology for AI.

    21. HM

      Ab- absolutely. I mean, and you see this in so many areas, right? In, in solar manufacturing, in, in wind turbines. You've seen it, uh, I mean, if you've seen it with, um, you know, with, with, uh, you know, other, uh, industries as well, like, like battery manufacturing, right? I think, I think, uh, I think (laughs) Elon Musk, who I know you've had on, I mean, uh, I think he's, uh, in for a wake-up call sadly there, you know, I think he's-

    22. JR

      In China.

    23. HM

      In China, yeah.

    24. JR

      Yeah, because he's very high on China. He, he, he-

    25. HM

      Right.

    26. JR

      You know, he said, "China's awesome," and he goes over there and he's make ... And a lot of people are criticizing it because, uh, you know, where, uh, he's p- put this showroom is, uh-

    27. HM

      In Xinjiang, yeah. Yeah.

    28. JR

      Yeah. And a lot of people say, like, "Well, look what's happening there."

    29. HM

      Right. And of course, you know, the dilemma is, right, what people say and what he says, I'm sure he believes this, is, "Well, you know, do we really wanna give up all engagement with China?" Right?

    30. JR

      Right.

  10. 41:01 – 53:38

    Espionage and influence on campuses: vetting researchers, CSSA pressure, and Confucius Institutes

    1. HM

      We oughta try ... I, I believe we oughta try to, to advance areas of cooperation. Like I for one, Joe, I think we oughta ... Every Chinese national who comes here for a graduate-level education in, in a key area of science and technology oughta get a green card stapled to the diploma, right? I mean, stay here and work for a US company. Now, you know, you have to, you have to be careful, right? But-

    2. JR

      Are they able to do that? Like, when they get sent over here, I mean, w- do we know what the motivation is-

    3. HM

      No.

    4. JR

      ... of a lot of these g- guys? I mean, have they been courted by these Chinese corporations and the government? I mean-

    5. HM

      A- a- absolutely many of them have. And what we were s- ... We were so complacent. You know, I, I work at the Hoover Institution and we have a program there called the China Global Sharp Power initiative. I, I recommend going to the website. It's g- there's great material on there and one of these is a, is a study of Chinese espionage within research facilities, in universities, in, in, uh, in, in, uh, in, in, y- uh, US labs and so forth.

    6. JR

      How prevalent is it?

    7. HM

      Oh, it's, it was, it was terrible. It's getting better, right? And, and what we did in, uh, you know, in the early days of the Trump administration is we stood up the, you know, the, the China division in the Department of Justice. And I'm telling you, they did great work. They did really good work at, at really starting to focus on this problem. What- what's happened is once we focused on it, and there are investigations and some prosecutions, now the, the Ministry of State Security, their intel arm, and the People's Liberation Army, who also is in charge of a big part of the infiltration of our, uh, sensitive technology and research, they had to back off, right? So, a lot of, a lot of those people who were here under false pretenses as academic researchers or associated with private companies, they have been pulled back. And so, what we need now is a better effort at counterintelligence, right? You don't wanna turn, you know, Stanford University, where I am, into the FBI, right?

    8. JR

      Right.

    9. HM

      But the FB- the FBI's gotta do their job. But also, you have to just do some, you know, decent due diligence, right? And, and if you especially are taking US government money from the Department of Energy or the Depart- (laughs) or the Department of Defense, hey, I think it's, uh, I think it's pretty reasonable to say we shouldn't have People's Liberation Army scientists in those programs, for example, right?

    10. JR

      Yeah.

    11. HM

      And, and what's happened in universities in particular-... Chinese students are a cash cow. Uh, I mean, you know, they pay full price, right? They, uh, for, for, for tuition. And, and a lot of universities have become dependent-

    12. JR

      Mm-hmm.

    13. HM

      ... on Chinese international students. Now, I think we should have ... I would welcome more Chinese students here, right, but with more diligence, and to make sure they get a really good experience in terms of understanding the American system, American democracy, and maybe expose, right, uh, that as a contrast to what they hear from the Party, you know? (laughs)

    14. JR

      Right.

    15. HM

      In terms of democracy is a failed system, and, you know, the Party is superior, and you don't really need a say in how you're governed, and freedom of speech is overrated. And, you know, I, so I, I think, you know, I, I, I think that, that we, that more students here is a good thing as long as they're, th- they are not working for the PLA and the MSS and infiltrating our, our, you know, our m- our sensitive, uh, our sensitive research.

    16. JR

      How-

    17. HM

      And this is biomedical too, is another area where this has been a, a big problem.

    18. JR

      How does one vet that? Like, how do you find out ... I mean, y- you know, if you have a student that comes over here from China, how do you know if it's just, uh, a student who wants to go to Harvard and, and-

    19. HM

      Yeah.

    20. JR

      ... learn at the, the best place in the world versus someone who has been indoctrinated in the Chinese Communist Party, and they're sent over here specifically to learn things so that they can aid the Party. And then once ... And then also infiltrate and get all sorts-

    21. HM

      Right.

    22. JR

      ... of secrets and wha- whatever-

    23. HM

      Right.

    24. JR

      ... they could possibly get, and then bring it back to China, particularly, like, if their family is still over in China, which I'm sure has influence over them over here.

    25. HM

      Yeah.

    26. JR

      Like, uh, you mean, you can't do a, a detailed, in-depth investigation on every single Chinese student, can you?

    27. HM

      No, but what you can do is you can, you can understand the problem better and, and understand what kind of operations are run out of, out of some of these, uh, embassies, right? And, and I think what is, what is most galling and what we ought to be the most upset about is how the Party is extending its repressive arm into our own country and intimidating Chinese students who are here, who are afraid to say anything in class, right? Because others might be reporting on them and reporting back to the Ministry of State Security or into this organization called the Chinese Students and Scholars Association, the CSSA, which is really a front organization for the MSS, the Ministry of State Security. And then, of course, these other, these other organizations, like Confu- Confucius Institutes, which are used as an arm of influence of the Party. I mean, tho- those ought to be shut down, you know, or marginalized. Um, and then we ought to, we ought to maybe take it on ourselves, and I think this is what every university president and provost and, should get behind, is, hey, make sure that no student, regardless of where they come from, are subjected to intelligence collection and intimidation, right? A university campus ought to be a university campus, right, that allows for the free expression of ideas. So, I think there's a lot that we can do that's not controversial at all, right, in, at, at the university level. And in this report I mentioned, uh, on, on the China Global Smart Power Initiative, we, we provide a guide for, like, "Hey, if you, if you run a research, you know, uh, activity, here are just some steps you can take, to just to do due diligence, right? Not to become an investigator, but just to make sure that you're insulating your sensitive technologies and intellectual property from industrial espionage broadly, not just from China, but especially from China, because theirs has been such a massive effort."

    28. JR

      Yeah, it's ... When y- I look at it personally, um, with, uh, the entrepreneur- entrepreneurial spirit of, uh, America and the freedom that America provides its citizens versus this connection that the Communist Party has with all businesses, and th- looking at it side by side, it's, it's a very unique and unprecedented competition. It's never existed like this before.

    29. HM

      Yeah.

    30. JR

      And there's really no roadmap to follow in terms of, like, a historical l- competition that we can look at, like, "Well, this is how this has fared before, and this is where the shortcomings are." We're kind of navigating it in real time. Would you, uh, say that's accurate?

  11. 53:38 – 56:15

    Social media as a weapon: TikTok, algorithmic conditioning, and Russia/China polarization tactics

    1. JR

      It's, it's a high-stakes competition. There's certain aspects of it that just haven't existed before, and one of them is social media. Um, in, in watching what's going on with social media, particularly the use of, uh, troll farms and, and bots and even apps like TikTok-

    2. HM

      Oh, yeah.

    3. JR

      ... when you find the difference between the way China uses their version of TikTok to highlight scientific experiments and athletic accomplishments, and then they shut it off for kids at 10:00 PM.

    4. HM

      Yeah.

    5. JR

      Like you're not even allowed to use it.

    6. HM

      Right. Right.

    7. JR

      I mean, meanwhile in America, kids are, uh, drinking piss and lighting their farts on fire and doing anything they can to get likes.

    8. HM

      (laughs)

    9. JR

      And, and they're rewarded with these likes. And the- there's unquestionably a concerted effort to make these kids more addicted to these apps, get them-

    10. HM

      Yeah.

    11. JR

      ... more, more viral with the most ridiculous things that they can do.

    12. HM

      Right.

    13. JR

      And it's sort of like the, it's like it's a directed dumbing down-

    14. HM

      Yeah.

    15. JR

      ... of kids. And it... and this insanely addictive app that when software engineers have back engineered TikTok and looked at how it's operated, it's one of the most invasive applications they've ever found in terms of the way it, uh, ch- checks your use of all other platforms and-

    16. HM

      Absolutely.

    17. JR

      ... and, and collects data. I mean, it was stunning when they looked at it.

    18. HM

      Yeah, absolutely. I heard your conversation with Tristan on this, by the way.

    19. JR

      Yes.

    20. HM

      Which was great. You know, and he's, he's awesome at the-

    21. JR

      Yeah, he is.

    22. HM

      ... on this topic. And, you know, I, I think the point that he makes and the point that's absolutely right here is that, you know, we, we, we made this assumption, right? Hey, the opening up, the, you know, the internet, social media, it's, it's, I mean, it's gonna make authoritarianism untenable, right? There's no way they're gonna be able to maintain control. Well, I mean, the Chinese Communist Party has figured out a way to weaponize social media in a way to extend their grip on power to do what you mentioned, which is really to condition people with certain messages, right, and, and in the US too, right? What, you know, the w- the way that the algorithm presents information is a way to slowly change kind of your opinion of China, Chinese Communist Party-

    23. JR

      Yes.

    24. HM

      ... and so forth. But internal to China, it, they've also weaponized people's social networks against them, right?

    25. JR

      Mm-hmm.

    26. HM

      So that ... So if you say a cross word about the party, then, then those who are in your social circle could get punished.

    27. JR

      Right.

    28. HM

      And so they put pressure on you, "Hey, conform, conform." Right? And so it is, you know, it's something beyond Orwell even ever mentioned, uh, uh, ever imagined in-

    29. JR

      Right.

    30. HM

      ... '84.And, and so I think what we have to do is we have to recognize, obviously, you know, the negative effects of social media here and, and protect ourselves against it. Because China and Russia, especially, is quite adept at this.

  12. 56:15 – 1:14:24

    Election legitimacy, January 6, and FBI informant controversies: rebuilding institutional trust

    1. HM

      Uh, tries to magnify kind of extreme messages, you know, to, to, to, to polarize us further and to pit us against each other, to reduce our confidence in who we are as a people, right? And our confidence in our democratic principles and institutions and processes. You know, for example, I mean, I don't think, I don't think the Kremlin gives a damn who wins our elections-

    2. JR

      Right.

    3. HM

      ... as long as a large number of Americans doubt the legitimacy of the result. Now-

    4. JR

      That's important to, to state.

    5. HM

      Right. Yeah.

    6. JR

      Because I think a lot of people are under the impression that they wanted one party or another party to win. Their goal is to undermine democracy in America.

    7. HM

      Absolutely. And this was, this is what they did in 2016 and again in 2020. In 2016, remember, I, I went into the... I arrived in the White House at the end of February, right? So, uh, unexpectedly, my, my, my, uh, my predecessor, uh, had, had just left, um, you know, just started the job and left g- early and, uh, quickly. And, um, but, uh, again, you already heard this cacophony, right, of, of, uh, "Hey, the, the election was determined, you know, by the Russians," which I, I believe is untrue, right? I, I really don't think the Russians cared who won in 2016 either. What they wanted to do was to, to raise doubts about it. And, and one of the reasons why I, I conclude that is that if you look at the Russian bot and troll traffic from the Internet Research Agency, this front organization, right, for the, for the, the GRU and the SVR, the, you know, the military and, and civilian intelligence wings who were running this operation. The, the traffic went like way up, you know, after the election, right? And, and, and the purpose of that was, again, to raise doubts about it. The initial campaign that they actually launched and then had to pull back was that... on, on, on the assumption that Hillary Clinton won. I mean, I, actually, I think, I think that the Russians were as surprised as Donald Trump was (laughs) when, wh- wh- when he won the election, right? (laughs)

    8. JR

      Mm-hmm.

    9. HM

      And, and, uh, and so, you know, uh, you know, I, their, their initial campaign was, "Hey, Trump would have won, but it was rigged." Well, then they realized, "Oh, God, Trump won. What do we do now?" And so they changed the message to, "Trump would have won the popular vote if it wasn't rigged." Right?

    10. JR

      Mm-hmm.

    11. HM

      So they, what they want you to do is believe that the results of the election are invalid. But why is that? Because the strength of our democracy is that we believe we have agency, right? We have a say over our future, right? Because we have a vote, right? That's a beautiful thing, man, that we can, you know, we have the opportunity for self-correction and improvement short of revolution. But if you stop believing that, right, you, you start believing that, "I am disenfranchised, I don't have a say-"

    12. JR

      Oh, right. Yeah.

    13. HM

      ... it, it's encourages all kinds of, you know, maybe even violence, right? And, and what you saw on January 6th, for example. So I-

    14. JR

      Yeah.

    15. HM

      ... I, I really... Or what you saw in Portland and Seattle on the other end of the spectrum. So, what they want is they want more Americans to feel disenfranchised, to feel like they don't have a say in how they're governed. And the main way to do that, "Hey, reduce confidence in our elections."

    16. JR

      Did you see, um, Ted Cruz question that woman, I don't remember her name. Uh, she's, uh, from the FBI, and he asked her about agent provocateurs at January 6th and whether or not they, uh, engaged in any activity there? And she said she could not r- answer that. And whether or not they engaged in encouraging violence, and she could not answer that.

    17. HM

      No.

    18. JR

      Like, did you see that?

    19. HM

      I didn't see it, but I, I mean, I, I would be surprised if there weren't, right? Now, now, the thing is-

    20. JR

      Why do they do that?

    21. HM

      The, the, the... why, why they-

    22. JR

      Why would the FBI engage in that?

    23. HM

      Would... Not, not answer. Oh, the FBI wouldn't, wouldn't provoke-

    24. JR

      That's what, that's what they were talking about. Agent provocateurs.

    25. HM

      I don't... Not from us, I wouldn't say. Now, now, I would say there might be FBI agents who infiltrate organizations that have a violent agenda, right? We want them to do that. But I, I thought you were talking about the Russians. I think what the Russians-

    26. JR

      No, we... But-

    27. HM

      ... try to do is-

    28. JR

      But FBI agents that... if, if the FBI agents were involved in January 6th.

    29. HM

      Yeah.

    30. JR

      Right.

Episode duration: 2:48:15

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