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doing our part, the

0:30

Armstrong and Getty show. Well.

0:37

There have often been discussions about

0:39

war at Kept David. There have been discussions about

0:41

peace there as well. Then some pretty bad

0:44

actors traveled through that place throughout

0:46

recorded history. What

0:48

was Mike Pompeo talking about? Well? Donald Trump

0:50

tweeted about it over the weekend. Unbeknowns to

0:52

almost everyone, the major Tally band leaders

0:54

and separately, the president of Afghanistan. We're

0:57

going to secretly meet with me at Camp

0:59

David on Sunday. They were coming

1:01

to the United States tonight. Unfortunately, in order

1:03

to build false leverage, they

1:05

admitted to an attack in Kabul that

1:07

killed one of our great soldiers. I

1:10

immediately canceled the meeting and called off peace

1:12

negotiations. What kind of people would kill so many in

1:14

orders seemingly strengthen their bargaining position.

1:17

They didn't. They only made things worse.

1:19

I have so many questions, And

1:22

since neither Donald J. Trumper nor Mike

1:24

Pompeio was available, our third choice

1:26

was the fabulous my clients military analyst

1:28

for CBS News, and Mike that was that's

1:31

a strange introduction, I realized. But when I am

1:33

president, you will be my secretary of Defense.

1:35

Does that make you feel better? That makes me feel

1:37

great? Perfect. It's great to be back on with an excellent

1:40

excellent, So listen, Uh,

1:42

why don't we get your thoughts overall on

1:45

hearing about the secret negotiations

1:47

that were aborted? What was your reaction? So

1:50

so, initially, it's classic Donald Trump,

1:52

okay, in that he wants

1:54

to create a photo op, he wants to create an opportunity.

1:57

He's got the mentality of Jimmy Carter and

1:59

Arab Fat at Camp David, you know, the

2:01

accords and all that stuff, and that's his mentality.

2:04

And he struck a nerve with this not

2:06

eleven generation of like, how dare we bring

2:08

these terrorists to Camp David? I think that's one

2:10

thing that came out of it. But so he

2:12

finally gets talked out of this, I think by Mike Pompeo

2:15

who says, look, we're not going to get any kind of deal

2:17

here that's going to have any teeth, and in

2:19

classic transaction based Donald

2:21

Trump mentality form of what i'll call fill

2:23

er kill, is going to fill the requirement. If it works

2:26

or not, he just kills it. He sends a tweet out,

2:28

and all of the work that was done in the back,

2:31

you know, for the past few months, is now gone

2:33

and they have to reset everything. But it

2:36

was the right move. But again,

2:38

the way he conducts foreign policy is

2:40

just something like we've never seen before. Okay,

2:43

that explains my question because to say we

2:45

we can't negotiate with these people they killed one of

2:47

our guys, while Mike Pompeios on the talk shows

2:49

saying, listen, we've killed a thousand Taliban

2:51

in the last ten days. So

2:53

that explanation just didn't really make sense to me. Okay,

2:56

I get it, I get and

2:58

I think I think, um, we've

3:00

been getting indications from the past week's secretary

3:02

espimate a comment about, hey, we're gonna walk away from a

3:04

bad deal. We're we're coming to realize that.

3:07

You know, we were looking for historical analogies,

3:09

right, and we looked at that's in Fain

3:11

when they were negotiating with the British with

3:13

the IRA. The bottom line is they had a very

3:15

direct connection to the military arm of the IRA

3:18

because the money flowed through the political arm

3:20

to the military arm, and once that

3:22

stopped, if you can negotiate with that political arm,

3:25

you could get a real cease fire. Well,

3:27

we're discovering that the people were talking

3:29

to at the Taliban have no control

3:31

over the tribe that runs the military arm. They

3:33

do whatever they want to do, and it's you know,

3:36

the spirit hydra, fifteen different heads, whatever

3:38

you want to call it. The bottom line is there's

3:40

a disconnect there. So we're gonna negotiate

3:42

with somebody that's not capable of enforcing the deal.

3:44

And I think we're starting to realize that now. But from the

3:46

standpoint of just being there.

3:48

Pompeo is making the argument on the shows

3:51

yesterday, Look, there's all kinds of places around

3:53

the world where we've got problems

3:55

with terrorists that are you

3:57

know, trying to come up with a plan to attack the United States,

3:59

not just Afghanistan. So

4:02

his point is, I think what

4:04

he was trying to say, why why are we putting so much emphasis

4:06

on this particular little stretch of crappy

4:08

land. Well, I think because

4:11

the President did make a campaign promise to get

4:13

us out of there. But I think he needs to

4:15

repivot this whole thing. And you've got again the nine

4:17

eleven generation who thinks to fighting an

4:19

endless war and they

4:21

want out. They want to say that this is enough, we just

4:23

want to leave there. The bottom line

4:25

is, you know what we're doing Afghanistan.

4:28

It's similar to what we did at the end of the Second World WARLD. We kept

4:30

troops in Europe for fifty five years. We've have

4:32

troops in South Korea since the end of that conflict

4:35

as well, and we should

4:37

not look to actually leave Afghanistan. That's the

4:39

President needs to kind of pivot back to the

4:41

fact that we could keep sevent troops

4:44

in Afghanistan and still get all the things

4:46

we need to accomplished militarily that we

4:48

did when we kept a hunt at the thousand troops there. So this

4:50

is actually a bargain. This is actually a good thing. It's something

4:52

that the military can do. And

4:55

I think that's what Pompeo is trying to shift the attitude

4:57

too, because Trump again going back to the third kill mentality,

5:00

he knows that if he doesn't get the troops out, well,

5:02

all the political enemies of his are going to hit him over the head

5:04

with the fact that he didn't do that. And he's now back

5:06

to where the same troop level he

5:08

wants is what Obama did when he left

5:10

office in two thousands sixteen. Now

5:13

there are any Nazis attacking American soldiers

5:15

in nineteen sixty twenty years later

5:17

though, yeah, well yeah, And

5:20

I think that the United States has got to

5:22

take this role of this kind

5:24

of mission, maybe as a leader

5:26

of NATO, in order to have these wars

5:28

eight time zones from where you Where do you want to fight these people?

5:31

You want to find them in the streets in New York City, you want to fight them

5:33

in Kabul? And I think the

5:35

projection is, let's fight to make time zones from here.

5:38

So, just to finish this discussion,

5:41

if you were advocating that point of view or Trump

5:44

were, should he say something

5:46

like, listen, every one of our guys

5:48

who dies is a tragedy and is injured

5:50

and it's terrible and we're seeking to prevent it,

5:53

but it's not really more than die

5:55

in a big city police force. Yeah.

5:58

Yeah, it's exactly the analogy. And that's

6:00

exactly right. And the fact that he

6:02

should say we're winning an Afghanistan because

6:05

we don't have to keep a hundred thousand troops there that

6:07

we have trained troops

6:09

to the Afghan security forces are getting better every day,

6:12

and maybe we'll get it down to five thousand, but the bottom

6:14

line is based on the strategic weapons

6:16

we can always bring to the table and the amount of

6:18

troops that we have, they're unlike anytime else in warfare.

6:21

I think we had a conversation once about how

6:23

fifteen hundred troops in Syria can control

6:25

everything that's going on there. We used to

6:27

have to send twenty thousand troops anyplace fifty

6:30

thou in order to get anything done, but nowadays

6:32

we don't have to. We don't have to do that. And I think

6:35

he's got to re educate the population

6:37

about how we do this, and and politically

6:40

it's not going to go well for him because again the Democrats

6:42

are gonna say, oh no, you say we're all coming out,

6:45

you know, peace, love and the grateful dead, and you know

6:47

everything's gonna be great. But but no, this is

6:49

the kind of new way that the military I

6:51

think needs to position these kinds of

6:53

these kinds of depens interesting military analysts.

6:55

Mike Lions on the line, Mike, have you gotten a chance to

6:57

take a glance at the d i as new

7:00

unclassified report on the Chinese military?

7:03

A little bit? I could tell you that

7:06

their missile program is something that we've got to be

7:08

real concerned about. And the

7:11

thing is, you know, they're they're not We're

7:13

gonna be swapping ordinance I think soon in the Pacific

7:16

Ocean. I mean, they're gonna they're gonna go after

7:18

our our carriers, and we're

7:20

gonna have, you know, got a nine eleven decision, Because

7:22

you take out one of those carriers and you kill five thousand

7:25

sailors, you know what's going to be our

7:27

response that they they have looked at nine

7:29

O eleven, and they looked at what happened in Desert

7:31

Storm, and they looked at the fact that the United States can

7:33

bring command and control of literally

7:36

everything and every tool in the toolbox to

7:38

the battlefield and they're gonna

7:40

try to get out in front of that. And you

7:42

know, I think the Navy is preparing for the Navy,

7:44

I think is going to be leading our country in the

7:46

next twenty to fifty years and projecting

7:48

power against what's going to be at Chinese

7:50

military that's going to continue to try to

7:53

grow and and expand its capability.

7:55

So do you think is some sort of punch in the nose

7:57

is imminent? Then it sounded like your

7:59

lane in that way, you know imminent is

8:02

um imminent? Is maybe

8:04

too close? I think that we're

8:07

getting to the point where the amount

8:09

of ordinance that they have on those ay tolls

8:11

there that you know, that they built up as opposed to putting

8:13

you know, condos on them. Um, the

8:15

missiles that they have there were now getting to

8:17

the point where they could make a mistake and may

8:19

they might not hit a U S cruiser or destroyer,

8:22

they might hit something else, but they're looking

8:24

to instimidate those shipping lanes that are taking place in the

8:26

South China see and um, yeah,

8:28

I think we're getting to the point where you could have

8:30

you know, Cuban missile type of crisis mistake if

8:33

we don't figure out a way to to

8:35

respond back or open up the dialogue with

8:37

what's what they're doing there? May you live in interesting

8:39

times? Mike clients military analysts for CBS

8:41

News. Mike, always a pleasure. Thank you, great

8:44

guy. Thanks from me. Yeah, so I haven't read it. I've

8:46

just seen the headlines. But what, well, what are

8:48

the headlines. Well, that China's

8:51

China's military is a near peer

8:53

of the United States in a lot of capabilities.

8:56

Their missile programs, Mike said, is

8:59

leaping for word. We still

9:01

own the seas um

9:03

to a large extent. But you know, my

9:05

my brother's active duty in the navy,

9:07

and and you know, I've known many

9:09

sailors. And if if

9:12

you blast a ship out of the water,

9:14

many people die. It's

9:17

unless you're you know, firing off warning shots,

9:19

and it's that posturing thing a naval

9:21

attack. People die. And

9:26

I'm just I'm thinking over what Mike

9:28

said and how poligerent China has been about

9:30

building these little islands in the South China Sea

9:32

and then arming them and turning them in a military

9:35

basis, and and they're gonna want to flex their muscles

9:37

soon or later. Um. The other thing they

9:39

said is that cyber wise, it's difficult

9:41

to say who's ahead, but both of

9:43

us are are cyber superpowers, and

9:45

China may well be ad um,

9:49

but oh they're They're spending

9:51

more on the military than anybody

9:54

on Earth except the United States and are are

9:56

growing it by leaps and bounds. It's a huge

9:58

priority. So yeah,

10:00

yeah, although you know, if there's

10:02

one kind of softening

10:05

note a couple of experts I was listening

10:07

to her pointing out that it's very different

10:09

from the Cold War because we had very

10:12

very little relationship with the Soviet Union.

10:14

We didn't have trillions of dollars in trade

10:17

and and and billions and billions

10:19

of dollars in tourism and and thousands

10:21

of students going back and forth to each

10:23

other's countries. That's That's

10:25

not to say that's going to prevent anything ugly

10:28

from happening, but it is different. It's the through

10:30

Clidean trap. I was afraid

10:32

of that for many, many thousands

10:34

of years, an established

10:36

power and arising power almost

10:38

always go to war, like nine

10:40

out of ten times. Eventually.

10:43

Yeah, I once accidentally caught a

10:45

skunk in my through Clidean trap, and I didn't

10:48

know what to do. Mike Lyons. Saying we in

10:50

China will be swapping ordinance at some

10:52

point is frightening.

10:54

Will you talk about rattling the markets? Yeah?

10:58

Yeah, well you've seen what's happened in the Persian Gulf,

11:01

various warning shots. And how about Russia

11:03

buzzing? Our fighters are our our our

11:05

boats? Yeah well let's hope not. But

11:08

you know, world keeps

11:10

spinning. Are

11:13

strong and getty.

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