Pod Save the World - Syria strikes and North Korea talks

Episode Date: April 18, 2018

Tommy talks with foreign policy expert Kelly Magsamen about Trump’s strikes on Syria’s chemical weapons site, his lack of a broader strategy, and her attempt to “red team” the policy options during the Obama administration. Then they talk about CIA Director Mike Pompeo’s trip to North Korea.

Hello, POSA of the World fans. Welcome back. Thank you guys for listening this week. There was a whole lot of foreign policy news this week and late last week and Friday night. President Trump launched a strike into Syria. Again, there were reports later this week that Mike Pompeo, the CIA director and Secretary of State nominee was sent over to North Korea to meet with Kim Jong-un to prepare for President Trump's talks. So I wanted to get an expert on the line who could talk. me through all of this. You have heard her before. Her name's Kelly Magsman. She works at the National Security at the Center for American Progress now. She's worked on Iran policy, Asia policy. She's worked at DOD. She worked on the National Security Council. She's one of the smartest people.

I worked with period. She's also someone who can speak in plain English about really, really complicated things. So Kelly and I talked through all of it, the strikes, the broader policy objectives, what the outcomes could or should be in North Korea. And some of the work she's doing to help Democrats be

ready, take over the keys of the government and have a proactive foreign policy agenda ready to go on day one so they don't fall on their faces like President Trump did. So, appreciate her talking to me. Here's the interview. I think you guys will enjoy it. My guest today is a recurring friend of the pod. Kelly Magsman, you've heard her talk before. She's an expert on all things, defense policy, Iran, to work on Syria, Afghanistan. So I'm very excited to have her as a guest today to talk about President Trump's latest foray into Syria. Kelly, thanks for being on the show. Great to be here. So on Friday, President Trump ordered another serious strike in response to Assad's use of chemical weapons. The first strike was in April of 2017. He fired 59 Tomok missiles

on one target. It was an airfield that was essentially up and running the next day. This time he hit three targets involved in the production of chemical weapons using double the number of munitions. So I'm very much of the opinion that we should probably wait to judge these decisions and actions based on the outcomes, i.e., does it deter Assad from using chemical weapons again? But since that won't be knowable for a while, here we are, right? But sort of as a matter of policy, Kelly, do you think that this kind of use of force is appropriate and the right way to deter chemical weapons use? Yeah, I mean, I think the response was appropriate.

I think it was important to enforce the international norms around chemical weapons use. I think the challenge is whether or not there's a broader context for the use of force. whether or not there is a consensus in the United States and in the international community about what the strategy should be vis-a-vis Syria. So, well, I think the response was appropriate. I think it sort of betrays all of the challenges we've had over the years and deciding precisely what our Syria strategy should be and how to bring this, you know, terrible civil war to an end. Yeah. So a previous guest on this show, I believe you know, Elliot Cohen, former Bush administration staffer, he wrote a pretty blistering critique of the strikes.

He said essentially it just relieved emotional pressure for Trump and that it didn't really send a message of toughness but of weakness because he didn't go whole hog. Cohen argues that Assad now knows basically what he can get away with, which is anything short of chemical weapons use and that we need that he advocated that we quote, smash the Syrian air defense system, destroy helicopters and aircraft and above all kill a good number of the men who conducted these attacks and the men who ordered them. What do you make of that criticism coming from the right that we need to be much, much harder on Assad when he uses chemical weapons? No, I mean, I think there's something to it. There is a disconnect, I think, between, you know, the situation using chemical weapons and the broader Syria war. I mean, I think the problem is that Syria is not just one war. It's multiple wars. So you've got a civil war that's been ongoing since 2011.

You've got the United States versus ISIS. You've got the Sunni versus the Shia. You've got the Turks versus the Kurds, the Iranians versus the Israelis, the Russians versus the United States, you know, Nikki Haley versus Larry Kudlow. I mean, the problem is it's multiple wars all in one. And what I fear is that the situation could potentially turn into a regional war. Yeah, I mean, you sort of get at my next question, which is like almost every foreign policy decision you ever make is not going to be easy. It's not black and white. You have to identify these core interests and you have to rank them. And you have to make, you know, essentially an imperfect decision. As you just said, in Syria, sometimes those interests are competing, right? You want to deter chemical weapons use and ensure it doesn't fall into the hands of terrorists. You want to deny ISIS a safe haven. But you also want to stop Assad from slaughtering innocent people, even though he's fighting ISIS.

So, I mean, do you have a sense of how this White House is ranking those interests in it? Am I missing anything? No, I mean, I think it's clear, you know, this White House is prioritizing the counterterrorism fight. That's frankly not dissimilar from what President Obama did. on his Syria strategy. The problem is, I think, is that, you know, while we may narrow our interests vis-a-vis Syria, that doesn't mean other actors like the Russians, the Iranians, and Bashar al-Assad are going to narrow their own interests. And so, you know, there are attendant consequences to inaction in other areas. And so that's always been the challenge within Syria policy. We

confirmed this issue throughout the Obama years, which is what should be our priority objective. And how do we address all the other things we care about at the same time? And, And frankly, I mean, I think the whole, you know, I'm looking back on it and reflecting none of us, I think, left the Obama administration feeling very good about the situation in Syria. And the whole was never really greater than the sum of its parts. Yeah. So, I mean, like when you look at the policy now, I think we have about 2,000 service members fighting in Syria. There was a story a couple weeks back that reported that Trump said to his national security staff in a meeting basically that he wanted all of our guys out within 48 hours. apparently General Mattis or Secretary Mattis and others had to wrestle him to get to a six-month

time frame for withdrawal, but they're not allowed to stay time frame because that's what Obama used to say, whatever. So obviously moving 2,000 guys in 48 hours is idiotic and logistically impossible, but some would also argue that getting them out in six months is going to leave this dangerous security vacuum. I read about this decision and I found myself deeply ambivalent about the choice. And I reached out to a handful of smart people, including you, who I used to work with. And it felt like almost everybody was in the same place, right? I mean, this was partly because what you were just saying, that anyone who worked for Syria, worked on Syria for Obama, knows that there's probably no more difficult problem that exists in foreign policy.

We know that Trump was given a mess. We all know how good our military is at fighting, but it's really, really hard to solve these political challenge that are left over after the fighting is done, or at least largely accomplished, especially in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya. So, you know, what do you make of that announcement and that choice that he might pull all 2,000 guys out of Syria? Like, let's do some hand-wringing here, Kelly. Listen, I'm one of those people that believes, maybe I'm old school, but I believe that if you're going to commit American forces into conflict, you've got to have a well-established mission. And that mission has to be embedded in a much broader strategy. So I think that's the fundamental issue, is if we're going to keep 2,000 guys there, what precisely will there?

what precisely will their mission be. I happen to think it would be a good idea to keep them there because I think this conflict is morphing much more into a struggle for influence in the long term in the Middle East. And I think a precipitous American withdrawal at this stage would be unwise. But, you know, I think we owe the guys on the ground clarity, strategic clarity about what precisely they are there for. And then I think we should ask ourselves, you know,

whether 2,000 guys is really going to achieve whatever mission we set out for them. this has to be bigger than an American military presence. It's got to be a strategy of diplomacy. It's got to be a strategy to put pressure on the Russians and the Iranians and Assad internationally. I mean, this can't just be a military-driven strategy. So do you have a sense of what those 2,000 guys are doing? Is it only a counterterrorism mission against ISIS? Are they training, you know, sort of resistance forces?

Like, what is happening over there? Do you know? Is it knowable? I think it's a very good question. You know, it's a counterterrorism mission, definitely a training mission and working with our, you know, sort of Kurdish friendly forces to try to keep that area liberated in northeast Syria. So I think it's a very good question to ask now is if, you know, we're on the verge of a defeat of ISIS, although I think that is an open question. But if we are on the verge of the defeat of ISIS, then what is their mission? And sort of having a bunch of guys garrisoned is not necessarily a good mission either. So I think we owe that to the guys on the ground and gals. Do you think that this is sort of a de facto, I mean, Susan Rice had an op-ed today that said essentially, keep those 2,000 service members in Syria and then essentially help the opposition forces establish territory that they can hold and build up and essentially occupy? Do you think that's kind of like de facto what would happen if we kept these guys in?

I think so. And I think her point was, you know, basically use this as our way of leveraging. a diplomatic process around ending the Civil War. And I think that's right. But I think it's got to be coherent. I think it's got to be well thought through about what the potential consequences are, how long we're willing to keep guys on the ground doing that kind of mission, and then how we evaluate success. I mean, I think, you know, one of the challenges we've had throughout Syria policy is evaluating whether or not we're successful in our strategy. And that's always been an issue. Yeah. I mean, one of the things that the Wall Street,

reported that Trump is essentially trying to pull together a replacement force. They called it an Arab force to replace the U.S. military presence in Syria. He asked the Egyptians to send some troops. He asked the Saudis, Qatar, the UAE to contribute a bunch of money for reconstruction and send troops. Do you think that's a serious option to replace U.S. power in the region? You know, in theory, it could be a good idea. It's one of those ideas that necessarily doesn't actually work out in practice. I'm skeptical, frankly. that that will materialize. But it's clear that the president is looking to invest regional partners in the future of Syria. And I think we need to be thinking in that direction. It's just a matter of

whether or not that will actually happen. And frankly, you know, there is no, as far as I understand, no person really running Syria policy right now. And so unless you have somebody out there doing the spade work to put together that coalition, you have zero chance of success. So I think if the president's serious, then he needs to follow through with some actual diplomacy with our partners. And that is the part I see missing in all of this. Right. Yeah, I mean, that's a really good point about, who would run that? The State Department, where there is apparently no one currently employed in the building? Nobody's home. Maybe Mike Pompeo could take on this job in secret. Yeah, that would be good. Do you think that we will ever be as willing to put serious skin in the game

in terms of military hardware and people and money as serious as Iran or Russia currently are? and then, you know, they clearly have this need to hold territory and maintain influence in the region. Do you think we'll ever be able to match that? It's a good question. I think it's at the heart of the challenge with Syria is, you know, we have essentially narrowed our interests for quite some time. And we haven't had the political will, frankly, to do that kind of engagement. And the Russians and the Iranians do have that will. And I think Bashar al-Assad has proven that he's willing to do whatever is necessary to stay in power.

And he's going to keep killing his people. I mean, let's be clear. Like, American military strikes for the use of chemical weapons are, like, not going to prevent this guy from murdering his people. And, you know, we have over half a million Syrians that have died since the beginning of the conflict. I mean, a half a million. It's incredible. Like, that's terrific. I mean, Assad has proven his brutality even beyond chemical weapons use.

But you raised a really good question. And I actually think this is an issue more broadly. I think Syria sort of represents the fundamental breakdown of the liberal international order. And, you know, why is it that we have a Syria situation? Like, why is it that the UN Security Council can't come together and agree on how to respond to chemical weapons use? Yeah. You know, why the legal consensus, international legal consensus around use of force has totally been obliterated. So I think Syria is a symptom of much larger disease.

in the international system. And I think people are wondering why the international system, not just the United States, but the international system can't solve the problems. Do you think that the disease is sort of infected the UN Security Council where you need Russia, China, the U.S., like all these major players to sign off on things before we can proceed? Yeah, I mean, absolutely. And I think it's proven dysfunctional. And so what it does is it forces, you know, the United States and Britain and France to work outside of the Security Council. And I think, you know, and while there may be good reasons for that, you know, over time, that's going to erode the purpose of the international system and the rules that we're all supposed to be bound by. So, but, you know, but we look at a situation like

Syria and international rules that we've been following don't really solve the situation in Syria. So, you know, I think it's a much bigger symptom of a much bigger problem. Now is the part of the interview where I ask you some questions you can kind of answer. So we'll proceed accordingly. So during the Obama years, when you were still, on the National Security Council fairly early on, you ran something called a red team on Syria policy. Can you just find what a red team is? Sure. It sounds a lot sexier than it probably is. You know, essentially, I was a senior director for strategic planning at the time.

I ran this red team in late 2012. You know, really, a red team is a group of people that are assigned to take a close look at a problem set who are not necessarily in the day-to-day policymaking. on, you know, for example, in this case it was on Syria. So people who were who had knowledge of the situation, but who were not necessarily handling the day-to-day policy, to basically take a step back, reflect on where we were to just, you know, sort of evaluate what we were doing, whether we were achieving our objectives, should we be thinking about the problem differently and coming at it from a different direction? And that was really the purpose of it.

I mean, we do these on a number of policy issues in this instance, it just happened to be on Syria. And I think, you know, frankly, the fact that we were doing this, that in late 2012 tells you that, you know, we've never been fully comfortable with where we were. And I think it also sort of demonstrates that we knew that Syria was going to evolve and continue to be a very nasty and complex challenge. I guess the only other time people might have heard about the concept of a red team was, I believe they read teams the intelligence that indicated where Osama bin Laden was hiding, right? Yeah.

Yeah. That was public. We're cool. We can talk about that. Yeah. I love, love trying to talk to you guys on a podcast about sensitive shit. Did you guys learn anything interesting in the process that you can talk about? I mean, is the point that there's a whole lot of continuity, the problems that existed then kind of glaringly exist now? Yeah. I mean, I think, yes. I think that the fundamental questions that came up then were probably the same ones that the Trump team is going through now, which is, you know, is U.S. policy going to achieve its objective as.

currently resource or as currently devised. What is our objective? What should our priority be in the context of Syria? So I anticipate that the Trump team is experiencing all those same questions that we experienced early in the Obama years. I guess, look, John Bolton going into this administration is not a good thing on any level, right? I mean, I don't believe. But there's a massive amount of turnover on the staff right now. he's firing, purging everybody, maybe that's going to force a whole rethink of everything they're doing.

I don't know. I'm trying to look for silver linings here. Yeah, I mean, maybe. I tend to think John Bolton's a one-man show. I tend to think John Bolton really thinks he knows everything about everything. So I'll be interested to see whether he actually even staffs this problem on the national security council staff. A one stash show. You know, you made this really interesting point that I've never heard before that part of the disease that leads to Assyria is this breakdown in the international order. It is all these proxy interests from countries like Iran, Russia, in Syria. That reality kind of rubs up against something that really frustrates me when I hear people talking about foreign policy, which is when they say, we need to be tough on Syria to send a

message to Iran, or we need to be tough on Iran to send a message to North Korea, as if we know how the country we're targeting will respond, let alone the response to the response to the response somewhere else, you know? But with all these competing interests, like, it's hard not to hear that complexity and think the limit of U.S. power has been reached. We can't possibly figure that out. Is that like too cynical and throwing your hands up in response? Yes. No, I mean, I think it's letting us off the hook way too easy. Don't let us off the hook. Yell at me. I think America is capable still of doing great things. I think America is capable of marshalling international action to solve big problems when we choose to do so.

Yeah. And, you know, I think in the case of Syria, we clearly – here's one – you know, it's been 15 years since the evasion of Iraq. So we just passed that anniversary. I think that the Iraq war looms very large in the psyche of American policymakers, politicians, and the American public. And I think we can't underestimate the impact of that on how decision-making is happening on Syria, both in the Obama administration and what appears to be in the Trump administration. And like, you know, it's sort of like we had the Vietnam problem, you know, prior to that in terms of how we thought about national. I think it's going to be a while before we get past that.

I think when we invaded Iraq, we were very bad at not just sort of the follow-up, but we were very bad at anticipating. the attendant strategic consequences, that it would emboldened the Iranians, for example, in the region. I think on Syria, we have failed to recognize that inaction also has attendant strategic consequences. So that's, you know, from my perspective, I think some ways, you know, it's important to learn the lessons of the Iraq War, but I also, I worry about overlearning them as well. Right. I don't know that anybody anticipated a half a million dead, a refugee crisis. that is destabilizing half of Europe, the list goes on and on. Did you see that yesterday the New York Times reported that apparently General Mattis wanted to go to Congress and ask for authorization for in advance of the strikes but was vetoed?

I thought that was pretty fascinating coming from, you know, the person that's held up as the sort of hawkish tough guy. Yeah. And I think that reflects the fact that Secretary Mattis, you know, A, he wants to ensure when he puts, you know, U.S. forces in play that it's grounded in a strong. support from the American people and Congress. And I think he's right. And I think the administration, I think President Obama was right when he went to Congress in 2013. I think President Trump should go to Congress now with further authorization. That's just, in my view, I think that is the correct move.

Certainly, if you look at the Constitution, a lot of people would argue you're right. I mean, like, come on, guys. Do your job, Congress. Yeah, you know, and I know that the president has sort of used Article 2 as a broad basis. I think most people would sort of think that's a little bit much. Yeah, especially in this instance. I want to ask you about North Korea if I can, because the Washington Post reported that the CIA director and the Secretary of State nominee, Mike Pompeo, took a secret trip to North Korea over Easter weekend for talks with Kim Jong-un. That's what everybody wants to do during Easter weekend. It's a hell of a good scoop, but maybe not a huge surprise. Don't you kind of think it makes sense to have direct

talks in advance of a Trump-Kim meeting. Apparently, they're targeting June as a date. They're looking at four or five venues outside the Korean Peninsula, including Southeast Asia and Europe. I mean, I would argue they probably should have done this before they agree to the head of state level conversations, but I'm glad it happened. Did you have thoughts on this reporting? Yeah. Listen, I think the fact that Mike Pompeo went to North Korea is, I think, probably very good thing. I think it's good that the Trump administration is preparing in advance the summit. I want to see diplomacy. I want to see Diplompson on North Korea succeed. What troubles me a little bit about the trip was that, you know, Mike Pompeii was being nominated to be the Secretary of State, and he's going through that process right now

with the Senate. And, you know, what troubles me is that, you know, he didn't really tell anybody on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that he was doing this diplomacy. And I feel like that's a little bit of a material omission on his part. And now, listen, he could have told Senator Corker and Senator Menendez is behind the scenes in private, but the fact that that didn't happen troubles me a little bit about his transparency. Yeah. But overall, I mean, I think, you know, listen, the Obama administration, we did a lot of creative things on diplomacy with a number of folks.

And so I don't have a major issue. I do find it interesting, though, that he sort of took us to task on, you know, engaging with Cuba and, you know, he signed the letter, you know, to the Supreme Leader, you know, undermining President Obama's diplomacy with Iran. And so, you know, I find this sort of consistency problem with Mike Pompeo. Yeah, Tom Cotton's infamous letter to the Supreme Leader undercutting Barack Obama, the President of the United States. Yeah, I mean, Mike Pompeo is full of shit. I mean, we should be honest.

But it's such a funny moment. Like, where you sit is where you stand, right? I mean, couldn't you imagine a scenario where we have a nominee before Congress and we're in the midst of some really delicate series of diplomatic overtures with Iran, with Cuba? and I just remember like everything in our DNA told us that if we told Congress they'd leak it to the press, potentially even to prevent the policy outcome that the White House wanted and that they didn't want, i.e. the Iran deal, i.e. attempts to normalize relations with Cuba. Are there moments where you need to withhold classified sensitive information from Congress or do you always need to notify someone on the committee, the big eight, like whatever it might be?

I would say it this way. I mean, I think it's really important on major national security initiatives for the Congress to be on board. And, you know, yes, there's always a value to sort of private diplomacy, secret diplomacy, and everyone overvalues that, I think, to a certain degree. But, you know, if you want to have a durable policy initiative, you really need to have, you know, key members of Congress on board. Now, I don't think you need to go tell. everybody in the world. But I think, you know, the proper notifications, I think probably should have happened. I think the other thing is I don't think, well, I don't think President Obama would have put a nominee in that, in that situation, quite frankly. Yeah. Do you think it's a weird to end? I don't think it's necessarily weird. I mean, there's been this channel with the North Koreans for quite some time. Intel channels or what channel? Intel channel, yeah. Like, so the CIA to CIA equivalent kind of thing. So that's not that surprising to me. You know, having Mike Pompeo, the nominee to be Secretary of State go is like a lot.

But again, you know, they are clearly, the president is putting a lot of pressure on this summit. It's clear that where Trump might be heading on this. My fear is, frankly, that that if the summit doesn't work out, you know, what the plan is for potential failure. And it worries me that Trump has pressurized this one meeting so much. He's raised expectations on it. And so while we're all like crossing our fingers and hoping for good. outcomes, I am very fearful that, you know, if there isn't, you know, massive success,

the president could quickly pivot to war. Yeah, I'm a little worried about that, too. What's plan B? No one has mentioned to us. You like me, I mean, I was not surprised, really, that Pompeo would be the channel to the North Koreans, in part because they fired everybody else, but also, like, you know, there is some history there. Why do the Intel goons, as we used to call our friends, Like, why did the Intel channels handle some of these more delicate conversations with bad actors? It's just that these people who are like, know how to keep a secret? What was your sense? Yeah.

I mean, I think part of it is that, you know, some of these regimes, you know, that's their main mechanism, right? Right. You know, their foreign ministries aren't particularly empowered in many cases. So, you know, getting access to the decision makers in some of these countries requires different channels and the traditional diplomatic ones. So that's, I think, partly it. Yeah. Do you think these talks are actually going to happen? Like, if you would ask me two months ago whether Trump will actually sit down with Kim Jong-un,

given the sort of things they need to define, the terms of the conversation in advance, the sort of ill-defined goals, the quickness with which it happened, the challenge of getting either to the Korean Peninsula or somewhere that both parties will agree to go to, seemed so great to me that I would have bet a whole lot of money against it happening. But do you think this is a sign that it might or is this just the motions you have to go through no matter what? I think it's going to happen. I think Trump has personally put his reputation on it at this stage. So I think there will be a follow through.

I think the best possible outcome for this summit would be some sort of broad agreement around the principles for future negotiations. And then to start, have it be the beginning of a process and not the end of a process. You know, you remember Bill Burns, you know, this is sort of his MO, you know, you get them in the room and you get them talking. You set the agenda. You build trust and you keep a process going. That's when you're going to get outcomes. I think putting too much pressure on the first meeting is potentially problematic in this space. Bill Burns, former Deputy Secretary of State, served under the Bush.

I mean, he served, what, like five presidents? Forever. Forever. Like one of the most experienced diplomats in history, so much so that, Normally, the deputy secretary of state is a political appointee, not someone who came up through the Foreign Service. Bill was one of the most senior career Foreign Service officers ever to serve in that role, right? Yep. I mean, Bill, Ambassador Burns was just saying.

Ambassador Burns was famous for saying, you know, always under promise and over-deliver. Right. And what I, you know, with the Trump team, I feel like they're probably all over-promising to the president right now. Yeah. Bill's, Ambassador Burns' perspective on that made all the press people. happy be as boy, didn't make our job easier. But yeah, but his MO is essentially you get the relevant parties in a room, have them talk and talk and talk and talk and see what?

That serves obviously to iron out maybe some points of agreement, but also I guess generally calm things down if there are tensions. Yeah, and test the proposition of whether or not the other side is serious. Yeah. So, you know, sometimes the first meeting is really just agreeing to a schedule of meetings. Right. And in part, that's to ensure, like, for example, North Korea, which has been undertaking a number of accelerated missile tests recently can't drive the clock, that they are required that, you know, that you basically put them on a clock by bringing them into a process of accelerated meetings. So hopefully, you know, the summit will come forward with some sort of, you know, short-lived process.

I think the problem is, you know, I wouldn't want to see too long of a process because, you know, the North Koreans could play that to their advantage. Right. If they can string this out, they can make one, two, five, 12 more nukes and were that much worse. But you do make a really good point. I mean, Jake Sullivan, who is one of former senior State Department official for Hillary Clinton, Vice President Biden's chief of staff, was one of the people who negotiated the Iran deal. And I think he would say that the first meeting they had was really just to see, can this person actually speak for the Supreme Leader? Is this person actually authorized and powered? Is this serious? I think the toxin. Afghanistan as part of that peace process, we're the same. It's like, is this person really a representative of the Taliban? How the hell do we even figure that out if we don't sit down with them, right? Yeah, exactly. I think the difference here is that is Donald Trump. So the president's team is dealing with a lot of uncertainty with their own president. And I do not envy the team

on this at this point. Not easy. Kelly, I want to ask you about your current gig. You are the Vice President for National Security and International Policy at the Center for American Progress. You guys do CAP, Center of America, Ragus, CAP does amazing work, formulating domestic policy, pushing back on sort of crazy right-wing attacks, bogus policy papers, you know, unfair media. What kind of work are you guys doing on foreign policy? How are you guys helping Democrats think about, talk about these issues when they come to a head or come to the fore like they are right now with Syria and North Korea? Yeah. I mean, so I think, like, the rest of everybody else, you know, we're dealing with the sort of day to day of having to react

to what the president and his administration is doing and hold them accountable on the foreign policy side. But I think more importantly, and where my heart lies, is figuring out what our own theory of the case is for America's role in the world. And, you know, looking beyond Trump, you know, knock on wood, we don't have another term of Donald Trump, you know, What does American foreign policy look like after Trump? And what should progressives stand for in that space? Right. And I sort of see this time period as much as we're having to deal with the ins and outs of North Korea summits and, you know, all these sort of crazy things that are happening on the foreign policy stage.

We have to be disciplined about generating that theory of the case and set of policies. And so we're doing work here. My team at CAP is fantastic. We're starting to work through some of those issues and sort of design what an affirmative foreign policy agenda would look like post-Trump. And at the heart of it, frankly, is going to be a return to democratic values. And small D, just for clarity. And I think this administration to sort of cast them aside sort of sees values in the context of foreign policy as sort of inconvenient. It's all about the bottom line. It's all about transactionalism.

I think that, you know, for the future of American foreign policy in the world, we're going to have a lot of digging out to do, I think, from Donald Trump and the damage he's done to America's reputation. And so we're working on what that looks like. Well, a plug for what you guys are doing, because it is so smart and so important because look at the Trump team. No one thought they were going to win. They had this huge fight in the primary that was never really settled. there was no infrastructure thinking about what their policy agenda was going to be when they got handed the keys to the car and then they just fell in their face. And we just cannot be in the same place. We went back to White House in 2020. We just can't.

That's right. Kelly Mags, thanks for geeking out with me. This was so much fun. It's always fun. I really, really appreciate it. Thank you for all the work you're doing over there and for helping me understand a whole bunch of really complicated stuff. There are no clear answers. There's no easy answers, but...

I know. I feel like every time I'm on, I'm just like, there are no easy answers. You know, though, like, I... It's nice for me to be reminded of what a regular process and order looked like when people in good faith of all parties and, you know, from all different components of the national security world, we're at least working on these problems, fighting it out, arguing, and, like, thinking. It is important.

Yep. So, thanks for what you're doing, buddy. I'll talk to you soon. Thank you. Thanks again for listening to Pot Save the World. If you like the show, please rate and review us on iTunes. Share it with your friends. This thing grew solely through word of mouth.

And I would love to keep it going because I really like talking to you guys about this stuff. Have a great week.