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| <title> - THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION'S FOREIGN POLICY: A MID-TERM ASSESSMENT</title> | |
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| [House Hearing, 116 Congress] | |
| [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office] | |
| THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION'S | |
| FOREIGN POLICY: A MID-TERM ASSESSMENT | |
| ======================================================================= | |
| HEARING | |
| BEFORE THE | |
| COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS | |
| HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES | |
| ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS | |
| FIRST SESSION | |
| __________ | |
| FEBRUARY 27, 2019 | |
| __________ | |
| Serial No. 116-10 | |
| __________ | |
| Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs | |
| [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] | |
| Available: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/, http:// | |
| docs.house.gov, | |
| or http://www.govinfo.gov | |
| __________ | |
| U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE | |
| 35-367PDF WASHINGTON : 2019 | |
| -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | |
| For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Publishing Office, | |
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| COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS | |
| ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York, Chairman | |
| BRAD SHERMAN, California MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas, Ranking | |
| GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York Member | |
| ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey | |
| GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia STEVE CHABOT, Ohio | |
| THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida JOE WILSON, South Carolina | |
| KAREN BASS, California SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania | |
| WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts TED S. YOHO, Florida | |
| DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois | |
| AMI BERA, California LEE ZELDIN, New York | |
| JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas JIM SENSENBRENNER, Wisconsin | |
| DINA TITUS, Nevada ANN WAGNER, Missouri | |
| ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York BRIAN MAST, Florida | |
| TED LIEU, California FRANCIS ROONEY, Florida | |
| SUSAN WILD, Pennsylvania BRIAN FITZPATRICK, Pennsylvania | |
| DEAN PHILLPS, Minnesota JOHN CURTIS, Utah | |
| ILHAN OMAR, Minnesota KEN BUCK, Colorado | |
| COLIN ALLRED, Texas RON WRIGHT, Texas | |
| ANDY LEVIN, Michigan GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania | |
| ABIGAIL SPANBERGER, Virginia TIM BURCHETT, Tennessee | |
| CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania GREG PENCE, Indiana | |
| TOM MALINOWSKI, New Jersey STEVE WATKINS, Kansas | |
| DAVID TRONE, Maryland MIKE GUEST, Mississippi | |
| JIM COSTA, California | |
| JUAN VARGAS, California | |
| VICENTE GONZALEZ, Texas | |
| Jason Steinbaum, Staff Director | |
| Brendan Shields, Republican Staff Director | |
| C O N T E N T S | |
| ---------- | |
| Page | |
| WITNESSES | |
| Honorable Madeleine K. Albright (Former Secretary of State)...... 10 | |
| APPENDIX | |
| Hearing Notice................................................... 57 | |
| Hearing Minutes.................................................. 58 | |
| Hearing Attendance............................................... 59 | |
| ADDITIONAL MATERIALS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD | |
| Submission from Chairman Engel on behalf of Amnesty International 60 | |
| RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD | |
| Question for the record submitted from Representative Yoho....... 73 | |
| THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION'S | |
| FOREIGN POLICY: A MID-TERM ASSESSMENT | |
| Wednesday, February 27, 2019 | |
| House of Representatives, | |
| Committee on Foreign Affairs, | |
| Washington, DC | |
| The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:11 a.m., in | |
| Room 2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Eliot L. Engel | |
| (chairman of the committee) presiding. | |
| Chairman Engel. The committee will come to order. | |
| Without objection, all members may have 5 days to submit | |
| statements, questions, extraneous materials for the record | |
| subject to the length limitation in the rules. | |
| I must say, Madam Secretary, I have been on this committee | |
| a long time, and I have never heard it so quiet at the start, | |
| so I think that is a tribute to you and everybody feeling that | |
| we want to hear what you have to say. And it is almost as if | |
| royalty stepped in here for a little while. So thank you so | |
| much for being here. | |
| As we have so far, this committee will continue to grapple | |
| with the most immediate and critical challenges around the | |
| world. At the same time, I think it is important that we take a | |
| step back and look more broadly at the overall state of | |
| American leadership and foreign policy and to lay out our own | |
| vision and ideas. | |
| As we conduct that assessment of the Trump Administration's | |
| foreign policy, we are honored to welcome one of our country's | |
| most accomplished and thoughtful foreign policy minds, former | |
| Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. | |
| Thank you, Secretary Albright, for joining us today to | |
| share your insight. Welcome back to the committee. Welcome also | |
| to members of the public and the press. | |
| It will be no surprise that I have deep concerns over the | |
| direction American foreign policy has taken in the last 2 | |
| years. We have been walking away from international | |
| obligations. It has called into question America's commitment | |
| to our alliances and core values. It has alienated our friends, | |
| emboldened our adversaries, and cozied up to strongmen and | |
| dictators and the people on the front lines of American foreign | |
| policy. Our diplomats and development experts have been pushed | |
| to the side. | |
| It is also a foreign policy that weakens and isolates the | |
| United States and makes us feel less safe. When we are not | |
| respected around the world, when we denigrate allies and flout | |
| international norms, it makes us less able to build the | |
| partnerships and coalitions that are essential for advancing | |
| our interests and, more importantly, ensuring our security. | |
| Now, it is easy to stand on the sidelines and complain, but | |
| I think if we are going to criticize what we do not like, we | |
| also have a responsibility to offer an alternative. And there | |
| are a few big things that I think would shape such an | |
| alternative. They represent what I consider to be the pillars | |
| of a successful, uniquely American foreign policy. | |
| The first has to do with American values. When we are at | |
| our best, American values are at the center of our foreign | |
| policy. Of course, we always have to prioritize the security of | |
| the American people, and one of the ways we do so is by | |
| supporting and advancing human rights, democracy, the rule of | |
| law. Our foreign policy should reflect our country's spirit of | |
| generosity and compassion, the foreign assistance and | |
| development efforts that help countries and communities lift | |
| themselves up. These are the right things to do. They improve | |
| people's lives and burnish the values that make our country an | |
| inspiration. They show the world our character and bring other | |
| countries on to our side as partners. | |
| And that brings me to the second major thing: working | |
| together with other countries. For American foreign policy to | |
| succeed, we need to be able to work with a wide range of | |
| friends and allies. Our alliances and partnerships underpin our | |
| ability to diffuse crises, to respond to disasters, to push | |
| back against aggressive regimes, and other threats. | |
| Multilateral organizations and agreements helped shape the | |
| world in the second half of the 20th century, and the United | |
| States has traditionally played a leading role under | |
| administrations of both parties. As powerful as our country is, | |
| we are even stronger when we work with others focused on the | |
| same priorities. We are better at combating threats from | |
| overseas, whether it is violent extremism, a deadly pandemic, | |
| or climate change, when we are standing shoulder to shoulder | |
| with our friends and allies. | |
| And finally, the third theme. How will we pursue our | |
| foreign policy goals, and who will be responsible for it? The | |
| way I see it, we need to elevate diplomacy and development, | |
| because whether or not they are treated this way, they are | |
| absolutely essential to our national security. Seeing more and | |
| more traditionally civilian diplomatic responsibilities slip | |
| away to the Pentagon or the intelligence community has always | |
| been a major frustration for me. In all fairness, this trend | |
| started well before the current administration. We would not | |
| ask our diplomats to do the job of our uniformed | |
| servicemembers, and we should not be asking our servicemembers | |
| to do the things that our diplomats and development experts are | |
| trained to do, from conflict prevention to security assistance | |
| to face-to-face negotiations. | |
| In the last 2 years, a bad situation has gotten worse. The | |
| administration has chased some of our most seasoned diplomats | |
| to the exits. They have left important senior national security | |
| positions vacant. They have ignored the expertise of career | |
| officials and sent morale plummeting at the State Department. | |
| These committed men and women are on the front lines of | |
| American foreign policy. What can they possibly think when the | |
| people calling the shots try to slash their budget by a third? | |
| We need to make it clear to these dedicated public servants | |
| and to the rest of the world that the United States understands | |
| the value of diplomacy, and we need to give our personnel the | |
| support and resources they need to carry out this important | |
| work. | |
| I intend to pursue an agenda built around these three major | |
| themes. I look forward to working with our members to find ways | |
| to do that, and I am eager to hear Secretary Albright's views | |
| on where we go from here to build a successful foreign policy. | |
| Secretary Albright has always been my favorite, the words, the | |
| pearls of wisdom that come from her mouth. . . just a wonder to | |
| behold. It is good to hear it. | |
| So we look forward, Madam Secretary, and I will yield to my | |
| friend, the ranking member, Mr. McCaul of Texas, for any | |
| opening remarks he might have. | |
| Mr. McCaul. And thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Welcome, Madam Secretary. It is good to see you again. I | |
| look back on our dinner at the Munich Security Conference last | |
| year, and I cherish that a great deal. We appreciate you being | |
| here today to impart your wisdom on this committee. | |
| Over the last 2 years, I think the President's | |
| administration has implemented a forward-leaning foreign policy | |
| agenda. Right now, the President is in Vietnam to meet with | |
| North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. North Korea has launched--has | |
| not launched a missile or tested a nuclear device since the end | |
| of 2017. They have freed American hostages and returned the | |
| remains of missing soldiers. These are all positive | |
| developments. However, previous administrations, as you know, | |
| have negotiated with North Korea unsuccessfully. The regime in | |
| P'yongyang has a record of making empty promises in return for | |
| sanctions relief. | |
| I strongly urge the administration to continue the maximum | |
| pressure campaign we have for complete verifiable and | |
| irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. I remain | |
| hopeful but also realistic and somewhat skeptical. There are | |
| few threats as dangerous as nuclear weapons in the hands of a | |
| rogue regime. | |
| On Iran terrorism in Israel, I strongly support the | |
| decision to withdraw from the Iran deal. This was a flawed | |
| agreement, in my judgment, that provided over $100 billion to | |
| the world's leading sponsor of terror. The inspections were not | |
| aggressive enough, set clauses that provided legitimacy for a | |
| future nuclear program, and the last administration, I believe, | |
| wanted a deal too badly, and we are less safe today because of | |
| that. | |
| This administration has also made crushing Islamist | |
| terrorism a top priority. As a former chairman of the Committee | |
| on Homeland Security, I have seen the rise and fall of the so- | |
| called caliphate. Now ISIS truly is on the run, but it is still | |
| a very real threat. I urge the administration not to withdraw | |
| our forces from Syria and Afghanistan until ISIS and al-Qaeda | |
| are completely destroyed. | |
| Any strategy for the Middle East must also include | |
| maintaining strong ties with Israel. I look forward to moving | |
| important legislation with the chairman to do just that. | |
| On China and Russia. There are many dynamic threats in the | |
| world today, and we are increasingly under threat from China | |
| and Russia. The Chinese Government steals our intellectual | |
| property, threatens Taiwan, preys upon underdeveloped nations | |
| through their Belt and Road Initiative. China is an adversary, | |
| and I am pleased that the current administration is confronting | |
| Beijing over its trade practices and military adventurism. | |
| Under Vladimir Putin, Russia has invaded Georgia and | |
| Ukraine and attacked the democratic systems of other countries, | |
| including our own and our own elections. I fully support the | |
| sanctions placed on Russia for meddling in the 2016 election. | |
| A great deterrent to Russian aggression is a strong NATO. | |
| Thanks to pressure from the President, more of our allies are | |
| beginning to increase their defense spending. This is bad news | |
| for Vladimir Putin and a great policy achievement for the West. | |
| Finally, I applauded the administration's decision to withdraw | |
| from the INF Treaty due to lack of Russian compliance, and it | |
| is interesting that our NATO allies agreed. | |
| On Venezuela, the current crisis in our Western Hemisphere. | |
| In our own hemisphere, the current situation in Venezuela is | |
| deeply disturbing. The socialist dictator policies of Nicolas | |
| Maduro have turned the country into a failed mafia cartel | |
| state. With little food and medicine, millions of people fled | |
| the country. Maduro's armed thugs are now doing everything they | |
| can to stop the delivery of humanitarian aid. They have blocked | |
| bridges and roads. They have shot innocent civilians and set | |
| aid packages on fire. And yet as Venezuela burns, there are | |
| still people in America and around the world who defend and | |
| promote socialism. | |
| To see the dire suffering that comes from socialism, look | |
| no further than the chaos in Caracas, or the Soviet Union, or | |
| any history book. I commend the President for supporting the | |
| people of Venezuela in their quest to take their country back | |
| from Maduro and his crimes. I believe our Congress needs to | |
| directly recognize Interim President Juan Guaido and support | |
| his calls for a free and fair election. We are committed to the | |
| personal safety as well of Guaido, which I am very concerned | |
| with, and his family. In fact, we met with the Vice President | |
| yesterday who expressed his concerns about the safety of | |
| President Guaido. And I am sure all of us here share those | |
| sentiments. | |
| Madam Secretary, again, it is a great honor to welcome you | |
| here this morning. You have been a tireless diplomat for many | |
| years, and your personal story is inspiring really to all of | |
| us, so I look forward to hearing your testimony. As the | |
| chairman and I always say, partisanship on this committee | |
| should end at the water's edge. These hearings give us a chance | |
| to put these politics aside and offer solutions to very, very | |
| complex issues in what is becoming an increasingly dangerous | |
| world. | |
| And with that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my | |
| time. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you, Mr. McCaul. | |
| So let me start with the introduction. Our witness needs no | |
| introduction, but I will introduce her anyway. Madeleine | |
| Albright, first and foremost, is a great friend of mine, and I | |
| am honored to call her my friend. She served as Secretary of | |
| State from 1997 to 2001, the first woman in American history to | |
| be nominated as America's top diplomat. She had earlier served | |
| as our Ambassador to the United Nations and was a member of | |
| President Carter's National Security Council. | |
| She is now chair of Albright Stonebridge Group, a global | |
| strategy group here in Washington, as well as a professor in | |
| the practice of diplomacy at the Georgetown University School | |
| of Foreign Service; chair of the National Democratic Institute, | |
| or NDI, for International Affairs; and president of the Truman | |
| Scholarship Foundation. She sits on the Department of Defense's | |
| Defense Policy Board, as well as the board of the Aspen | |
| Institute. | |
| So, Madam Secretary, we are delighted to have you with us | |
| this morning, and I now recognize you for your opening | |
| statement. | |
| STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE MADELEINE K. ALBRIGHT (FORMER | |
| SECRETARY OF STATE) | |
| Ms. Albright. Chairman Engel and Ranking Member McCaul, | |
| members of this committee, thank you so much for having me | |
| here, and good morning. And I do want to start out by saying I | |
| believe in a bipartisan foreign policy. I think it is very | |
| important. I am pleased to be here, and I appreciate the chance | |
| to offer my perspective on the many challenging issues before | |
| the committee, and so let's begin with some context. | |
| We live in a world being reshaped for better and for worse | |
| by two major interrelated trends. The first is globalization, | |
| which has brought people closer together than ever before and | |
| enabled us to travel, trade, and share ideas at an | |
| unprecedented rate. But for all its benefits, globalization is | |
| also threatening and faceless. Many people worry that they will | |
| lose their livelihoods to foreign competition and their | |
| separate identities to some vast, faceless, multicultural sea. | |
| And while I believe patriotism is a virtue, I am very concerned | |
| about the rise of a kind of nationalism that equates an | |
| affinity for us with a hatred of them. | |
| The second trend is the constant march of technology, which | |
| has helped the world to become more efficient and broadened | |
| access to knowledge, food, medicine, and markets. Whenever I am | |
| in Africa, for instance, I am amazed at the difference that | |
| cell phones have made to farmers and entrepreneurs and | |
| healthcare professionals, especially women. But technology, | |
| too, has a downside. | |
| A network that can disseminate truth can spread lies just | |
| as rapidly. And the rise of social media has enabled people | |
| everywhere to share their grievances both instantly and | |
| globally. | |
| We thought technology would help democracy by amplifying | |
| people's voices, but it has also disaggregated them. It fueled | |
| protest movements such as Tahrir Square in Egypt, but did not | |
| help those protesters make the transition to governance. In | |
| fact, technology has made governing more difficult and given | |
| demagogues another tool to build emotional bonfires out of the | |
| kindling of lies, prejudice, and paranoia. | |
| These megatrends, for better and worse, are making the | |
| world more turbulent and generating disorder in practically | |
| every region. They were in evidence long before the advent of | |
| the Trump administration and, beginning in 2017, would have | |
| confronted any new Commander in Chief with vexing foreign | |
| policy challenges. | |
| But the question before the committee today is where does | |
| America stand in 2019? And more especially, what has President | |
| Trump's foreign policy meant for the security and prosperity of | |
| the United States? | |
| Now, as you have been told, I am a professor at Georgetown, | |
| and if I were grading Mr. Trump, I would begin charitably and | |
| mark many of his efforts as incomplete. For example, he kept | |
| his promise to negotiate a revised trade deal with Canada and | |
| Mexico, although he did create a lot of animosity with our | |
| closest neighbors. His administration's heavy-handed approach | |
| to China could produce gains, and there have been signs of | |
| progress in recent days. His engagement with North Korea and | |
| Kim Jong-un has yielded scant dividends to date, but talking is | |
| definitely better than fighting. And I hope that the summit | |
| that is now underway in Vietnam will, unlike the earlier one in | |
| Singapore, generate real and tangible progress toward the | |
| denuclearization of North Korea. | |
| Afghanistan is another area where, to its credit, the | |
| administration is now pursuing a diplomatic strategy. But it is | |
| far too soon to tell whether we can responsibly end the | |
| conflict with a political settlement that would benefit the | |
| Afghan people and, therefore, America's interests. In the | |
| Middle East, the administration has been promising for 2 years | |
| to unveil an innovative plan for peace, and we cannot judge | |
| what we cannot yet see. | |
| Finally, in Venezuela, the administration is right to press | |
| for democratic change, and we can all see the situation there | |
| is tense and complicated. The United States should not do | |
| anything that inadvertently strengthens Maduro's hand. We | |
| should continue to work closely with colleagues in the region, | |
| while upholding the principle that the Venezuelan people alone | |
| have the right to determine their future. | |
| Now, that is the good news. In other areas, the | |
| administration's record is marked by confusion and | |
| inconsistency, a lack of diplomacy and, in some cases, a | |
| complete abdication of responsibility. | |
| On Iran's nuclear program, climate change, Trans-Pacific | |
| trade, and the INF Treaty, this administration has chosen to | |
| renounce the efforts of previous administrations, both | |
| Republican and Democratic, and I believe each of these | |
| decisions was a mistake. Much of the Middle East is a | |
| tinderbox, and even the most seasoned foreign policy experts | |
| have trouble keeping track of who is on whose side as powers | |
| such as Russia, Turkey, Iran, and the Gulf States compete for | |
| influence. | |
| On Syria, we appear to be pursuing several policies | |
| simultaneously, confusing our allies, delighting our | |
| adversaries, and putting at risk the significant gains made | |
| since 2014 in the fight against ISIS. | |
| In Saudi Arabia, the President and Secretary of State have | |
| aligned themselves with a leader thought by our own | |
| intelligence agencies to have authorized the murder of a | |
| journalist. Henry Kissinger used to talk about the importance | |
| of diplomacy of constructive ambiguity, but there is nothing | |
| either ambiguous or diplomatic about a bone saw. | |
| Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, having just been | |
| with many of you at the Munich Security Conference, I can | |
| attest to my sadness at the state of relations between the | |
| United States under this Administration and our allies in | |
| Europe. I do not, by any means, absolve Europe of all blame for | |
| the disagreements and misunderstandings that exist. We are | |
| right to ask more of them, especially in the form of | |
| contributions to our common defense. I do think, however, that | |
| we can make our points more productively without bullying, name | |
| calling, and threats. If we are not friends with our friends, | |
| to whom will we turn for help? | |
| In that context, even many in the administration are in the | |
| dark about the President's conversations with Vladimir Putin. | |
| Meanwhile, Russia continues to play a spoiler role in the | |
| Middle East, while working to undermine democracies around the | |
| world. And China must be getting very fat because its One Belt, | |
| One Road initiative is larger and larger, having influence in | |
| regions such as the Middle East and Africa that are crucial to | |
| the future of the global economy. | |
| I have more general concerns. The course I teach is about | |
| foreign policy decisionmaking process. My students look at how | |
| information has been gathered, options weighed, and actions | |
| decided on at key points in American history. | |
| Today, I am not sure we have a policy decisionmaking | |
| process. Vacancies persist across the spectrum of national | |
| security agencies. We still have no Ambassadors in, among other | |
| very important countries, Egypt, Jordan, Mexico, Pakistan, | |
| Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Thailand, and Turkey. With the | |
| dangerous confrontation underway between two nuclear armed | |
| States in India and Pakistan, we may soon get to see whether | |
| this administration is equipped to manage a serious | |
| international crisis. | |
| I recently attended a U.N. conference on migration. Among | |
| those present were high level representatives from China and | |
| Russia. The chair set aside for the United States was empty. | |
| Worldwide, there are more refugees huddled in camps than there | |
| have been since the Nazi surrender almost three-quarters of a | |
| century ago, and yet the United States is less welcoming to the | |
| international homeless than at any point in modern history. | |
| Throughout the lifetime of my generation, people around the | |
| world have been able to look to the United States as the single | |
| most powerful leader on behalf of democracy, human rights, and | |
| the rule of law. We have never been perfect, but we have always | |
| been present. And we have always taken our responsibilities | |
| seriously because we have seen firsthand the cost of | |
| abdication, holocaust, and global war. | |
| Today, the enemies of freedom smell something in the air | |
| that gives them hope, the odor of America's absence, and the | |
| impression that our leader shares their disdain for democracy. | |
| All in all, the situation is both sad and dangerous. This | |
| administration still has time to awaken, but my greater hope is | |
| with you, the men and women of the new Congress. | |
| Again, as I tell my students, many of the tools we have | |
| available to advance our interests in the world, including | |
| sanctions, trade agreements, and the use of military force, | |
| depend on Congress to be activated. Congress also plays an | |
| essential role by providing resources for defense, diplomacy, | |
| development, and democracy programs, which are crucial to the | |
| success of our foreign policy. I have met with enough Members | |
| of Congress from both parties to know that you did not come to | |
| Washington to preside over an abdication. You want America to | |
| lead. | |
| And as you know, the powers of the legislative branch are | |
| set out in Article I of the Constitution. Well, 2019 is Article | |
| I time. You can, you must help us put us on the right path. So | |
| I urge you to use your powers of oversight and your influence | |
| with the public to ask the right questions and to hold the | |
| executive branch accountable. | |
| I commend this committee and Chairman Engel for your | |
| leadership in working to end U.S. involvement in the war in | |
| Yemen, as well as the bipartisan legislation which recently | |
| passed reaffirming U.S. support for NATO. I ask you to continue | |
| to protect essential funding for diplomacy, development, and | |
| democracy in the face of the administration's efforts to defund | |
| the State Department. | |
| As chairman of the National Democratic Institute, I have | |
| seen the benefits of these programs firsthand and can tell you | |
| that they are some of the most cost-effective ways of advancing | |
| our interests around the world. I ask you to reassure our | |
| allies in Europe that America will continue to stand with them | |
| and for the democratic values that are at the heart of the | |
| Trans-Atlantic Partnership. Engage with foreign counterparts | |
| wherever possible, including through official travel | |
| delegations. I so believe in the codels. | |
| Finally, never forget that when we work together across | |
| party lines, we set an example for other democracies, both | |
| established and emerging. | |
| At the beginning of the year, I had the pleasure of | |
| traveling down to Williamsburg for the congressional Research | |
| Service Orientation, which new Members of both parties | |
| attended, and it was so interesting. People had their badges on | |
| with their names and their States but not their parties. We had | |
| very interesting discussion. | |
| There is no masking over some of our differences, but I do | |
| believe in the importance of bipartisanship and the powerful | |
| signal that such cooperation can send to the world, and that is | |
| why I have recently invested time and effort in two initiatives | |
| that may be of interest to this committee. | |
| The first, a Declaration of Principles for Freedom, | |
| Security, and Prosperity was launched at the Munich Security | |
| Conference with the goal of rallying the democratic world on | |
| behalf of common values. More than 70 years have elapsed since | |
| the Atlantic Charter was issued and the Universal Declaration | |
| of Human Rights was adopted. Perhaps we started taking some of | |
| these principles for granted. So the time is right to renew our | |
| vows and to engage a new generation in freedom's cause. | |
| The second initiative is the U.S. Institute of Peace Task | |
| Force on Extremism and Fragile States, which is co-chaired by | |
| Governor Kean and former Congressman Lee Hamilton. Yesterday, | |
| we launched a report which called on the United States to adopt | |
| a long-term strategy of prevention, addressing the underlying | |
| conditions that fuel extremism in the first place by better | |
| coordinating U.S. efforts and pooling international resources | |
| to support partners in fragile States. | |
| In the interest of time, I would like to submit both | |
| documents, the Declaration and the Task Force report, for the | |
| record, and I would be very happy to answer questions about | |
| either of these efforts. | |
| Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member McCaul, members of the | |
| committee, we meet at a moment of great uncertainty and global | |
| turbulence. We are in a new era, and we need to work together | |
| to build a consensus on what America's position should be in | |
| the world. For my part, I believe that America must remain the | |
| indispensable Nation, but there is nothing about the word | |
| ``indispensable'' that means alone. We can and must act in | |
| partnership with like-minded countries to advance our common | |
| interests, to build a world that is more prosperous, secure, | |
| and free, and your continued leadership is essential if we are | |
| to achieve that goal. It is Article I time. | |
| Thank you very, very much. | |
| [The prepared statement of Ms. Albright follows:] | |
| [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] | |
| Chairman Engel. Well, thank you very much, Madam Secretary. | |
| As usual, I so appreciate your remarks and so agree with | |
| virtually everything you said. | |
| You mentioned that you had just come back from the Munich | |
| conference, as I did, and we saw each other there. And then | |
| afterwards, I went to Brussels, with the Speaker, to look at | |
| NATO and interact with NATO and the European Union. And one of | |
| the things that really saddened me and worried me at the same | |
| time is the message that we are sending or the administration | |
| is sending to our friends and allies, our closest friends and | |
| allies across the world that somehow or other, we do not value | |
| the alliances, that somehow or other, we want to go it alone. | |
| We do not want to work as closely with them as we have in the | |
| past. | |
| The President, when he first became President, said that | |
| NATO was obsolete, and we found a palpable concern about our | |
| allies--with our allies who are confused as to where the United | |
| States stands. Are we actually pulling away? Do we not take | |
| NATO or the European Union to heart the way previous | |
| administrations in both parties, frankly, have done in the | |
| past? | |
| So I am wondering if you could just give us your | |
| observation of what you saw in Munich and what you heard from | |
| our allies, the concerns, the worries. I would appreciate it | |
| very much. | |
| Ms. Albright. I was born in Europe, and I came to the | |
| United States when I was 11 years old. NATO was created as a | |
| result of what was happening in central and eastern Europe as | |
| the Russians were putting together their empire, and it was not | |
| until the coup, the communist coup in February 1948 in my | |
| native Czechoslovakia that NATO came into existence. I have | |
| been a believer in NATO from day one, and I was very honored to | |
| have been asked to work on the 60th anniversary of NATO on a | |
| new strategic concept. | |
| I think NATO is an essential alliance, and our part in it | |
| is obviously key. I think we have confused our allies, and that | |
| is something that is very troubling. And by the way, we used | |
| NATO, with your help, in the Balkans. It played a very | |
| important role in ending ethnic cleansing, and I think that we | |
| are stronger in that partnership. | |
| What was very troubling for me at the Munich conference | |
| this time, and I have been to many of them, is we are always | |
| the subject of discussion but never kind of a sense that who | |
| are we, what are we doing, what are our goals? And therefore, I | |
| think it was so important that there were so many of you there, | |
| 50 Members of Congress that were there, I think in order to | |
| explain that America is America. And we do know that we have | |
| shared responsibility and that the NATO alliance is very | |
| important. | |
| What is interesting is that when we were doing the 60th | |
| anniversary of NATO, it was when all the NATO activities were | |
| what is known as out of area. NATO is now back in area trying | |
| to deal with the threats that are coming from Russia. And so it | |
| is, in many ways, back to some of the beginnings of it and more | |
| important than ever. And I do think that it is very important | |
| for all of us that believe in partnerships to deliver that | |
| message, because I was very worried about what I saw in Munich. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. In your testimony, you talked | |
| about confusion at the State Department. I want to address | |
| that, because this committee has gone on record as opposing | |
| these draconian cuts, 31 percent, and in fact, in negotiations | |
| with the House, we were able to restore almost all of the cuts | |
| that we did not like. Both parties did it, because we had a | |
| Republican majority in Congress last time, and they fought this | |
| just as much as we are fighting it now. | |
| But what has happened is morale at the State Department has | |
| really plummeted, and the number of Americans seeking to join | |
| the U.S. diplomatic corps has declined during the Trump | |
| administration to its lowest level since 2008, according to | |
| State Department numbers reported this week. And we continue to | |
| hear reports of individuals at all levels choosing to leave | |
| their careers at the State Department because of low morale. I | |
| mean, the State Department is diplomacy. You want to fund | |
| diplomacy so there is not war. We have had the opposite, | |
| funding the defense. And I am for a strong defense, but the | |
| fact of the matter is hand in glove, you need to also have | |
| strong diplomacy. | |
| So I am also bothered by the lack of action by the State | |
| Department to address reports of retaliation against Department | |
| employees for their perceived political views, national origin, | |
| or sexual identity, and left unaddressed, these allegations | |
| have a chilling effect on recruitment and retention, and fuel a | |
| tense climate that makes it that much harder for our diplomats | |
| to accomplish their work. | |
| You led the State Department's work for us for 4 years. | |
| What is your assessment of these recruitment and retention | |
| declines, and what can be done to reverse these trends? And | |
| also, what do you think is the impact of unchecked retaliation | |
| against members of the Department's career work force and their | |
| ability to conduct diplomacy on behalf of the United States? | |
| Ms. Albright. I am very troubled by what I have seen, and I | |
| am grateful to Congress for having restored some of the money | |
| that was cut. You can not do diplomacy without diplomats, and I | |
| do think that--I am very saddened by what I hear and read about | |
| the State Department. | |
| When I left office, I made very clear how jealous I was of | |
| those that were able to stay and do diplomacy for a different | |
| administration. And I thought, they get to do foreign policy | |
| all the time and I have to leave. And the bottom line is what I | |
| found in them were people that are professionals that want to | |
| serve our country. They are not partisans. They are not people | |
| that need to be criticized for various things. | |
| I did something my children call eavesing, which is | |
| eavesdropping on a conversation, and I heard some people say, | |
| well, we have to get rid of those people in the State | |
| Department, they are not loyal Americans, at which point I had | |
| to admit that I had been eavesing and said I disagree totally. | |
| And I think that we cannot, in fact, punish the people at the | |
| State Department, and I am very troubled by the number of | |
| people that have left. | |
| I also am troubled by something else. As I said, I teach at | |
| the School of Foreign Service. It is not the foreign service. | |
| It is a school that really principally is trying to train young | |
| people to go into international relations. The number of | |
| students that have come to me and said, I am not sure I want to | |
| take the Foreign Service Exam, given what is going on; what | |
| should I do? And I say, actually, you are not going to be | |
| making policy at the beginning. You are going to be stamping | |
| visas. But if you do not get into the system, there is going to | |
| be a break in the pipeline. | |
| And so it is not just a matter of what is going on now but | |
| what will happen if we do not have trained diplomats. And so I | |
| am very troubled. I am grateful to all of you. I think that we | |
| need to encourage--it is a tool. It is the major tool in our | |
| toolbox, and it does take trained diplomats to carry out | |
| American policy. So I am very glad that you are focused on | |
| that. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you, Madam Secretary. | |
| Mr. McCaul. | |
| Mr. McCaul. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| First, let me thank you, Madam Secretary, for your service | |
| to the country, but also your service recently on the Institute | |
| of Peace Task Force. The chairman and I were at a press | |
| conference yesterday with Senator Graham, Senator Coons, | |
| Governor Kean. As a former chairman of Homeland Security, I | |
| think we have done a good job protecting the homeland and being | |
| on the offense with our military, but the prevention side is | |
| where we need to really focus. And I think the recommendations | |
| of that task force should be very helpful to Congress. | |
| Shifting gears to Venezuela. There are so many hotspots to | |
| talk about, but when we talk about humanitarian crises erupting | |
| in the globe today, I cannot think of a worse one than | |
| Venezuela, where trucks are attempting to get into the country | |
| to provide humanitarian aid and Maduro's forces are lighting | |
| them on fire and killing people. I know the U.S. is seeking the | |
| U.N. Security Council vote on a resolution calling for | |
| Venezuela to allow this humanitarian aid and hold free and fair | |
| elections. I hope to work with the chairman on a resolution | |
| from the Congress, speaking on behalf of the American people, | |
| in support of what is happening down there against Maduro and | |
| for humanitarian assistance. | |
| But to the point of recognizing Interim President Guaido, | |
| this has come up quite a bit, 54 other nations directly | |
| recognize him as a legitimate Interim President. Would you | |
| support this as a resolution from Congress? And do you support | |
| his efforts toward a peaceful transition? | |
| Ms. Albright. I do think that the situation in Venezuela | |
| and the region is very dangerous and a horror show in so many | |
| ways in terms of what it has done to the people of Venezuela | |
| and the region, so there are various parts that I would | |
| support. I actually do think it is a good idea for us to | |
| recognize, but I also am very glad that there is a multilateral | |
| approach to it, a regional one, with the Lima Group, and then | |
| more and more supported by the Europeans, so that it is not | |
| just---- | |
| Unfortunately, the U.S. does not always have a great | |
| reputation in terms of our policies in Latin America over | |
| decades. And so I think having a multilateral effort on this is | |
| very, very important, and I hope we align ourselves more with | |
| the multilateral approach. | |
| I also do think, and this has something to go back on on | |
| the task force in many ways. The countries around Venezuela are | |
| ones that need help. Colombia. Those of us that worked on a | |
| bipartisan effort on Plan Colombia understand how many issues | |
| are going on there. Then in the Northern Triangle and then | |
| people that are emigrants that are leaving Venezuela are | |
| putting a lot of pressure on those countries. | |
| I hope that we look at how to increase humanitarian | |
| assistance and development assistance to those countries | |
| because they are under a lot of threat. And so my approach to | |
| this would be multilateral, diplomatic. Sanctions, I think we | |
| might want to think about. | |
| What is concerning about a Security Council resolution, | |
| given what the Russians and Chinese are doing in support of | |
| Maduro, one has to be careful about what they might do in the | |
| Security Council. | |
| Mr. McCaul. That is a good point. I agree with you. The | |
| Lima Group. This is viewed as South America, not the United | |
| States trying to do this alone but, rather, a unified effort. | |
| North Korea. The President is meeting with Kim Jong-un. He | |
| met with him this morning. I want to get your--well, over the | |
| past prior administrations, three of them, we made concessions, | |
| but they are now to the point where they have developed an | |
| intercontinental ballistic missile we think possibly with a | |
| miniaturized nuclear warhead that could be delivered as far as | |
| the United States Continent. | |
| What advice would you give to the administration as to how | |
| to move forward with this? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, first of all, it has been a very long- | |
| term problem. I am very glad that we are following a diplomatic | |
| approach at this point. I think it is very important, and I was | |
| not exactly for fire and fury. I, until recently, was the | |
| highest level sitting official to have gone to P'yongyang. I | |
| went there in October 2000 and met with Kim Jong-un's father, | |
| Kim Jong-il. We were working on the issue of missile limits and | |
| a number of different things. And by the way, just a note, Kim | |
| Jong-il, the father, had said it would be fine if we left our | |
| forces in South Korea. | |
| And I think that, unfortunately, those talks were not | |
| carried on, and I think we have gone through any number of | |
| different talks and promises. And I do think that what is very | |
| important is to make sure that whatever steps are taken by the | |
| administration are done in a way that is worked out in a way | |
| where we are not giving away things without something in | |
| return. | |
| I was troubled by the Singapore summit, and I was asked | |
| whether it was a win-win or a Kim win. I think it was a Kim win | |
| because we gave up our exercises with South Korea and Japan, | |
| our allies, and did not get what we needed, which was some | |
| definition of denuclearization, some verification aspects, and | |
| that, I think, is the most important part. President Reagan | |
| said trust but verify, and so I do think that that part is | |
| important, and then some kind of a roadmap. This is going to | |
| take time. It is a dangerous situation. | |
| I think it is very difficult to have a discussion about it, | |
| as President Trump is sitting there now, in terms of how this | |
| is working, and I think one has to be careful not to interfere | |
| in that. I do think what I see as far as this summit is | |
| concerned, more diplomatic preparation with what Secretary | |
| Pompeo has been doing and what Steve Biegun has been trying to | |
| do. So I think that there needs to be reciprocity in the steps | |
| and simultaneity to them of one step or another and for us not | |
| to give away things before we know exactly what is coming from | |
| the other side. | |
| Mr. McCaul. And I agree. Do not make concessions without | |
| getting something in return; defining what denuclearization | |
| means, because it means something different to them than it | |
| does to us; and I think inspection of sites; and then, finally, | |
| a roadmap. And I think those are the three elements. | |
| Ms. Albright. I also do think that the fact that the North | |
| Koreans seem to be big transmitters of technology to other | |
| countries, which is why the sanctions are so important, and | |
| multilateral sanctions on that. | |
| Mr. McCaul. Thank you. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Meeks. | |
| Mr. Meeks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Madam Secretary, it is delightful to see you and hear you | |
| as always. And I am reminded, in looking on my last flight over | |
| to Europe, I read your book, ``Fascism: A Warning,'' and it | |
| reminded me that words matter. And our allies listen to all of | |
| the words that are said, particularly our allies and our | |
| enemies, by the President of the United States of America. | |
| And I must admit that I am deeply concerned about what is | |
| taking place in that I show as an example, for example, while | |
| we were over at the Munich Security meeting, the President | |
| tweeted out, in regards, he said that European countries should | |
| take back and put on trial hundreds of ISIS fighters who have | |
| been captured in Syria. Quote, ``Time for others to step up and | |
| do the job that they are so capable of doing,'' the U.S. | |
| President tweeted, and that was last Saturday night. And he | |
| warned that ISIS is ready to fall, but more than 800 prisoners | |
| could be made their way to Europe, and he would just release | |
| them if they did something. | |
| Those are his words at a time over there with our allies. | |
| There is one person that said that they are American citizen | |
| that wanted to come back and stand trial, and he said that they | |
| are not going to let her back in. So contradictory in terms. | |
| We look at what is taking place in Venezuela, and it is | |
| bad. We see millions of people crossing over to Colombia and | |
| Brazil and Peru, and we compliment them, but people who are | |
| also suffering in Central America, trying to come to the United | |
| States, he wants to build a wall to prevent them from coming | |
| in. Contradictory in nature. | |
| He says he wants to have a peace agreement on | |
| denuclearization of North Korea with nothing that is concrete, | |
| but yet he pulls out of the JCPOA that was with multilateral | |
| individuals that could be verifiable and people on the ground | |
| on a daily basis. So he points on one end where there is | |
| nothing verifiable; on the other end, complete verifiable. He | |
| pulls out of a climate change agreement and then says--and has | |
| the language of America first against all others. That concerns | |
| me with reference to our allies especially. | |
| Do you think that the words of the President of the United | |
| States really matter? And how should we then combat that as | |
| Members of the Congress as you talked about it is time for the | |
| First Amendment here in the United States--in the Constitution? | |
| Ms. Albright. I am concerned about what is being said, and | |
| let me just say about my book. One of the best quotes in there | |
| is from Mussolini, or attributed to him, which is if you pluck | |
| a chicken one feather at a time, nobody notices. So there is a | |
| lot of feather plucking going on. By the way, it is hard to say | |
| those two words together too quickly. | |
| But, basically, the kind of points that you have made are | |
| part of the international feather plucking where people do | |
| doubt what we are doing. And I think so much of international | |
| policy does depend on the relationship and what you say. People | |
| take very seriously what is said by anybody, but certainly by | |
| the President of the United States. | |
| And the issues in terms of--I have to say, for me, I happen | |
| to have supported the JCPOA, because in many ways, it dealt | |
| with the most serious aspect of Iran's behavior, which is | |
| troubling across the board, but their capability in terms of | |
| developing nuclear weapons. I find passing strange that the | |
| President has put himself kind of into a box, because if that | |
| kind of an agreement could be worked out on North Korea, not | |
| dealing with everything that the North Koreans are doing wrong, | |
| it is pretty much of a good blueprint on that. And then also, | |
| by pulling out of an agreement, it has undermined our | |
| relationship with the other members of the P5+1 in terms of can | |
| we be trusted on agreements? And it does go to the point of if | |
| we want to do something with allies and friends in Venezuela, | |
| can you trust America's word? Or on the North Korea, it is | |
| going to take more than us to deal with some of the issues on | |
| sanctions. | |
| And so it is undercutting our own policy, and therefore, I | |
| think that it is very important to call it out. And part of the | |
| problem truly is that I do believe in a bipartisan foreign | |
| policy, and I will tell you what I find personally hard. It is | |
| not appropriate for a former diplomat to be abroad and | |
| criticize one's own country, but also, most of us have to | |
| continue to have some credibility by telling it like it is. And | |
| I think that when all of you were, many of you in Munich, I | |
| think people need to know what the role of Congress is and how | |
| many Americans feel, that we cannot go into this by ourselves | |
| and keep plucking the feathers. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Chabot. | |
| Mr. Chabot. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. | |
| I want to thank Mr. Smith for allowing me to switch places. | |
| I am the ranking member of the Small Business Committee, and we | |
| have a hearing at 11, so he has allowed me to do that, and I | |
| greatly appreciate that. | |
| I also want to thank you, Madam Secretary. You may not | |
| remember this, but when you were Secretary of State, I had a | |
| constituent, Tom Sylvester. He had a daughter named Carina, and | |
| it was an international child abduction case. She had been | |
| taken to Austria, and he had been trying to get her back. He | |
| went all the way to the Austrian Supreme Court, prevailed | |
| there. Went to The Hague, under the Hague Convention, prevailed | |
| there, and could not get his daughter back, and you were kind | |
| enough to be involved. You met with he and I down at Foggy | |
| Bottom, and so thank you. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Chabot. International child abduction cases, they rip | |
| your heart out. And if you are involved in one, whether you are | |
| the person who has been adversely impacted or anybody involved, | |
| it is just a very sad thing. It does not get enough attention, | |
| so thank you for caring enough. I really appreciate that. | |
| Second, you mentioned you are a professor, I believe, at | |
| Georgetown, and you said, if you were grading the President on | |
| international affairs matters, you said you would give him an | |
| incomplete. And just in fairness to the President, this is--you | |
| know, he has been in office 2 years, so it would be half of his | |
| first term, and if he has a second term, it would be a quarter | |
| of his term. So I think he has made progress in different | |
| areas, but it is unknown where we end up with North Korea or a | |
| whole range of things. | |
| And I would just--you know, I think we should recognize | |
| that, for example, Ronald Reagan, who many criticized for being | |
| a warmonger early in his Presidency, it was later on in his | |
| second Presidency that he and Gorbachev essentially changed the | |
| course of history, and the Pope and others as well, so it did | |
| not happen right away. It took time for that to happen and the | |
| cold war to come down--or the Berlin Wall to come down and a | |
| whole range that was under, obviously, the next administration, | |
| but Reagan is the one who set it up. | |
| And even Bill Clinton, you know, he literally as he was | |
| heading out the door, was trying to get an agreement with the | |
| Palestinians and the Israelis and ultimately failed in that, | |
| but he sure tried hard. And that was in the eighth year. | |
| So I think just to be fair to the President, you know, he | |
| has been there a relatively short period of time, and he is | |
| trying in a whole lot of areas, and he has had other things on | |
| his mind. I am sure there is another committee today who is | |
| looking at things, and that has got to be real challenging for | |
| the Commander in Chief. | |
| But let me shift to another area, and that is Taiwan. I | |
| happen to be one of the co-founders of the congressional Taiwan | |
| Caucus. And President Xi recently said that he would not | |
| renounce the use of force in reunification, and I know Taiwan | |
| and the relationship, they are an ally of the United States. | |
| They are a democracy. The PRC, China, is our rival, our | |
| adversary. They are a potential enemy if they do things, they | |
| continue to do things like build islands and then militarize | |
| them. | |
| So in that very important relationship, which I also think | |
| does not get nearly enough attention being the hotspot that it | |
| could potentially be, would you comment on Taiwan and the | |
| importance of the U.S. maintaining that strong relationship and | |
| where you see the PRC ultimately ending up on this? | |
| Thank you. | |
| Ms. Albright. I was in the White House when normalization | |
| with China happened. I was a staff member of the National | |
| Security Council actually doing congressional relations. And so | |
| I went to Taiwan--I mean to China with a codel before | |
| normalization with Senator Muskie, and it was exactly 40 years | |
| ago. And one of the things that I thought was very important as | |
| we got normalization was the Taiwan Relations Act, and it is | |
| something that has guided our relationship and the importance | |
| of maintaining it. | |
| Whenever I am asked about this now, I really do think that | |
| that is a very important piece of legislation in the | |
| relationships that we have. And I was very troubled a couple of | |
| days ago to read about some of the threats, again, that Beijing | |
| is making against Taiwan and missiles and a variety of things, | |
| and I do think that we need to stand up for what is in the | |
| Taiwan Relations Act and make very clear that that relationship | |
| is an important one. We would like to see some kind of a | |
| peaceful way of dealing with our China policy, but I do think | |
| it is not--that we cannot forget what our obligations are. | |
| And it is interesting that it has been 40 years and kind of | |
| think about the things we learned about China's behavior. I do | |
| think that the whole issue of our relationship with China at | |
| this point needs to be looked at. I am very concerned. I talked | |
| in my Statement about where we are at the current time, and I | |
| hate to see the United States withdraw from the international | |
| scene because the Chinese are filling the vacuum. And to have | |
| Xi Jinping all of a sudden be the proponent of climate change | |
| and multilateralism kind of does not make much sense to me. | |
| We are the leaders of the world. I believe in American | |
| leadership, and I am very concerned about our absence in places | |
| because, as I said, the Chinese are getting fat as the belt and | |
| road keeps getting larger, their influence in Venezuela, any | |
| number of things. I think we need to figure out what the right | |
| relationship is with the Chinese on this. They are a threat. | |
| Mr. Chabot. Thank you very much. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Sires. | |
| Mr. Sires. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Good morning, and thank you for being here today. One of | |
| the things that really worries me about this whole situation in | |
| Venezuela is the destabilizing factor that it is going to have | |
| throughout the region. I mean, these countries cannot absorb | |
| the amount of people that are coming over. Quite frankly, | |
| Colombia has done a great humanitarian job in trying to help | |
| these people, but it seems that now--it seems that, for | |
| example, Peru has 700,000 Venezuelans. That is a great pressure | |
| on their economy. | |
| And for the first time since I can remember, I am happy to | |
| see that the countries of the region are taking on Venezuela. I | |
| have never seen so many countries in the region get together to | |
| try to bring us some sort of a resolution, but then I worry | |
| about the direction that some of these countries are going. I | |
| worry about the direction that Brazil is going. I worry about | |
| the direction that Guatemala is going. They just threw out | |
| CICIG, an anticorruption commission that was there, they just | |
| expelled them, got rid of it, disbanded it. So it seems like | |
| this is always the land of extremes. You have these dictators. | |
| They hide under the socialist label, and then you have the | |
| right wing dictators. | |
| So how do we, with our history in this region, talk to | |
| these countries and not so much take the lead but work with | |
| them and let them take the lead? | |
| Ms. Albright. I think it is very important for us. The Lima | |
| Group, really, I think is a very good grouping. I think we need | |
| to look at the functions of the OAS a little bit more in terms | |
| of how they could be helpful on this. I also do think that we | |
| need to be supportive of the neighboring countries. And also, I | |
| have to say, to be more generous in terms of the immigrants | |
| from Venezuela by extending the TPS for Venezuelan refugees. | |
| I think that we cannot all of a sudden be telling other | |
| countries to take people and we are cutting our numbers in so | |
| many different ways. And so if we want to be a good partner in | |
| the Western Hemisphere, then I think we need to work with | |
| partners, the OAS system, and then with others. | |
| And I think the hard part about this is we would like this | |
| to be solved immediately. It is going to take a while. And I do | |
| think the following thing: Americans are the most generous | |
| people in the world with the shortest attention span. And we | |
| need to remember that this is going to take a while, that we | |
| need to put in the efforts with our diplomats, with our | |
| economic tools, and with the partners in a multilateral | |
| setting. Also, Americans do not like the word multilateralism. | |
| It has too many syllables and it ends in ism, but all it is is | |
| partnerships. | |
| Mr. Sires. Well, I like the partnership idea because of the | |
| history that we have had in this region. | |
| Ms. Albright. Yes. | |
| Mr. Sires. We have to work with these groups. And now that | |
| we have all these countries banding together, we could be a | |
| partner with them, but I worry that we are going to try to take | |
| the lead, and some of these countries are going to start fading | |
| away. | |
| Ms. Albright. Yes. | |
| Mr. Sires. I worry about that. | |
| Ms. Albright. I mean, we have to be an active partner. By | |
| the way, the most revolutionary thing I did as Secretary of | |
| State was to move Canada into the Western Hemisphere. According | |
| to the State Department, it was in Europe, and so we wanted to | |
| have more democracies in the hemisphere. They actually are in | |
| the hemisphere, but having the Canadians as a part of this | |
| multilateral approach is also important. | |
| Mr. Sires. Can you talk a little bit about this fake | |
| constitution that was voted in Cuba? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I have--it is very interesting because | |
| kind of the things that had been being done before was how to | |
| live up to a constitution, and meanwhile, the Cubans have gone | |
| another direction, so I am concerned about that. | |
| Mr. Sires. All right. Thank you. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Smith. | |
| Mr. Smith. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. | |
| And, Madam Secretary, welcome again---- | |
| Ms. Albright. Yes. | |
| Mr. Smith [continuing]. To the committee, and thank you for | |
| your service. Time permitting, there is only 5 minutes. Just | |
| two basic questions, if I would--if you could answer. | |
| The first is with regards to China. When President Bill | |
| Clinton delinked human rights performance and MFN in May 1994, | |
| I and others were shocked. As a matter of fact, Nancy Pelosi | |
| and I joined together and worked very hard to try to get that | |
| reversed. It sent a signal that profits trumped human rights. | |
| When the President famously linked it a year before, we | |
| applauded him to the nth. I mean, it was just such a good move, | |
| and the people of China would have benefited had we stuck to | |
| our guns. | |
| Today, as you know, Xi Jinping on all areas of human rights | |
| abuse is in a race to the bottom with P'yongyang in every | |
| single area you look at, especially in the area of religious | |
| freedom. The ruling Chinese Communist Party has undertaken the | |
| most comprehensive attempt to manipulate and control or destroy | |
| religious communities. And under this new policy called | |
| centralization, where every single believer, every single | |
| institution must comport with communist ideology or else; you | |
| know, Gulag, laogai, torture. We look at what they are doing to | |
| the Muslims, the weaker Muslims in the autonomous region, a | |
| million people in Gulags. | |
| What would be your strong statement to the Chinese | |
| Government right now on human rights in general, but especially | |
| what they are doing on religious freedom? They are rewriting | |
| the Bible. They are tearing down churches. What they do against | |
| the Dalai Lama, and of course, his people in Tibet, the | |
| Buddhists, is just absolutely appalling. | |
| Mr. Smith. Second, if I could ask you how you would rate, | |
| you give incomplete scores generally to President Trump. But, | |
| as you know, I was the prime author of the Trafficking Victim's | |
| Protection Act of 2000, and we are always glad that the | |
| President signed it, but getting there was extremely hard. | |
| Secretary Howard Koh sat just where you sat and was against | |
| the sanctions in the regime, wanted to have--rather than having | |
| the TIP report that comes out every year, the gold standard | |
| that does a narrative on every country on prevention, | |
| prosecution, and protection, the three Ps, he said fold it into | |
| the Country Report on Human Rights Practices, that the burdens | |
| of this reporting and this bureaucracy of the TIP office was | |
| just superfluous and we did not need it. He was also against | |
| the sanctions, which I think--just like in our own civil rights | |
| law, Title IX, why did Title IX work so well? Because it was a | |
| sanctions regime against college and universities that would | |
| not have women's sports, and that is all of our civil rights | |
| laws, in my opinion, work because of a sanctions regime. We | |
| have robust sanctions, and he testified against that as well. | |
| But, again, it was signed. How would you rate the President | |
| on this? I have read this report cover to cover. Secretary | |
| Pompeo, again, put China on the worst list, Tier 3, where they | |
| belong, because they have horrible, horrible abuses on both the | |
| labor side and the sex trafficking side in that country. So, if | |
| you could, on those two issues. | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, first of all, let me applaud you for | |
| everything that you have done on human rights and on | |
| immigration issues, I have to say. I do think the following | |
| thing: There was not a time that I had a meeting with the | |
| Chinese, either at the U.N. or later, that I did not raise the | |
| issue of human rights. It has to be raised all the time. The | |
| question is, under what circumstances, when do you do it | |
| publicly? President Clinton and I did raise it publicly. | |
| I am concerned about the fact, at the moment, as far as I | |
| can tell, the issue has not come up between President Trump and | |
| Xi Jinping. And I think it is very important in terms of the | |
| values that we have to always raise it. I think the hard part | |
| always is, is how in diplomacy are you able to raise those | |
| issues and then still continue to have a relationship. And to | |
| look at the larger relationship and when do you use sanctions | |
| and when do you not. | |
| Your point about the MFN, part of it was that, every year, | |
| we had to pull up the plan to see if it was growing to kind of | |
| see what our relationship was going to be with China, and we | |
| were for bringing them into the WTO in order to get some kind | |
| of regularity in it. The Chinese have to be pushed on all of | |
| this constantly. | |
| But I am concerned generally about our relationship with | |
| them. They are a threat. There are times we have to work with | |
| them, we are going to count on them to be helpful on North | |
| Korea. And the question--the art of diplomacy is trying to | |
| figure out what you do when and how, but there should never be | |
| a meeting of any kind with the Chinese where human rights are | |
| not raised in it. | |
| Mr. Smith. And how would you rate the President on | |
| trafficking? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, on human rights in China? | |
| Mr. Smith. No, on trafficking the---- | |
| Ms. Albright. On trafficking, I have not seen a lot of | |
| activity on that, frankly. Incomplete. By the way, my grading, | |
| since I do grade, an incomplete is actually a friendly grade, | |
| because one can give a lower grade. And so it gives the | |
| opportunity, I think, for a change in behavior. I am about to | |
| meet with my students, I have a couple that I think are | |
| incomplete, and I am going to say, we are in the middle of the | |
| semester, do something. | |
| Mr. Smith. But have you been able to read this? | |
| Ms. Albright. I have not, I am sorry. | |
| Mr. Smith. I mean, in every country--we are promoting this | |
| as a country---- | |
| Ms. Albright. I would very much--I will make a point of | |
| reading it. | |
| Mr. Sherman [presiding]. The gentleman's time has expired. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Sherman. I will skip myself and recognize the | |
| gentlelady from California. | |
| Ms. Bass. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I really appreciate you | |
| allowing me to speak. | |
| Madam Secretary, it is an honor to hear you, and I just | |
| really want to acknowledge our appreciation, our country's | |
| appreciation, for your long history and your contributions. | |
| I wanted to ask you where you think U.S.-African relations | |
| are. I chair the Subcommittee on Africa and deal with African | |
| diplomats all the time. I often make a distinction between | |
| where Congress is, which Africa is a very bipartisan issue, but | |
| I do not have much to say when it comes to where the | |
| administration is. I cannot really offer an explanation, | |
| especially when our President is on--has been known to refer to | |
| African countries in such a derogatory way or make up the names | |
| of countries that do not exist. | |
| I also wanted to ask you about how the rest of the world | |
| was viewing how we are handling our own border. And then, | |
| finally, if you could comment about your book in terms of your | |
| concerns about our country. You raised the specter of fascism, | |
| and you make the point that, currently, authoritarian regimes | |
| actually started off as being elected. So if you would not mind | |
| expanding on those. | |
| Ms. Albright. I am very concerned about the lack of | |
| attention to Africa in many different ways. It is a continent | |
| that, it is interesting, people say Africa, when there are an | |
| awful lot of differences among the country. | |
| Ms. Bass. Like it is a country. | |
| Ms. Albright. And really, there are some really good news | |
| stories and some that are pretty tough. You have been very | |
| kind. You have gone on some codels with the National Democratic | |
| Institute, and I think that there really is an important aspect | |
| of trying to understand what the different evolutions are in | |
| Africa. I just had an interesting meeting, actually it was in | |
| Morocco, but there was a discussion about the fact that we | |
| should stop talking about northern Africa and---- | |
| Ms. Bass. Thank you. | |
| Ms. Albright [continuing]. The Sahel, and that there | |
| really--it is an artificial line that we are drawing. | |
| Ms. Bass. Right. | |
| Ms. Albright. And I think that we need to see where we can | |
| be more helpful. For instance, I am very pleased that during | |
| the Clinton Administration, that we did the Africa Growth and | |
| Opportunity Act, and that that is something that needs to be | |
| expanded on to see the opportunities. And so I think there is a | |
| lot of work to be done. It helps if you know where the | |
| countries are. But there are very many aspects of it, and your | |
| help on it has been very important. | |
| I also do think, I am not here representing--on behalf of | |
| the National Democratic Institute, but we do in fact have a lot | |
| of programs there. I think one has to look at whatever has just | |
| happened in the Nigerian election; Nigeria is a key country. So | |
| to pay more attention to it. | |
| I am troubled--I go back, and it goes back to kind of the | |
| way I see the world at this point. We are in a very, very | |
| different phase, for all the reasons that I mentioned. And I am | |
| troubled by the fact that divisions in our societies, whether | |
| it is in the United States or other places, are being | |
| exacerbated by those who identify themselves with one group at | |
| the expense of another, and that there is always kind of the | |
| other, are the immigrants. One of the things that we know is | |
| when you begin to develop scapegoats, and that is part of the | |
| thing of blaming the immigrants in whatever country. The | |
| Europeans have been doing it. | |
| I am stunned. I am an immigrant, and so, when now our--we | |
| have fewer numbers of people coming in than ever before. I | |
| think it is just stunning. So I do think that I am worried | |
| about the divisions in our society that then become | |
| exacerbated, where instead of trying to find common answers, we | |
| are kind of pushing us against the other. The thing that, | |
| frankly, blew my mind as I was doing research on this book, is | |
| that all the countries, beginning actually with Mussolini, they | |
| were--Mussolini and Hitler came into power constitutionally. | |
| The countries that we are worried about now, whether it is | |
| Turkey or Hungary or Poland or Venezuela, the Philippines, | |
| those people were all elected, and then take advantage of it | |
| and then exacerbate. And so I think that is why we need to | |
| begin to look. I think the social contract is broken. I think | |
| there are very serious issues going on everywhere due some to | |
| technology and globalization. | |
| Ms. Bass. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Chair, let me just say that I really have appreciated | |
| my experiences with NDI. I went to Zimbabwe last year to be an | |
| election monitor, and Kenya the year before that. It does put | |
| us in a little difficult situation because people do ask us | |
| about our elections. | |
| Ms. Albright. Yes. By the way, when I was--we were doing | |
| some work in Egypt, and I was telling people--I was meeting | |
| with some Egyptian parliamentarians, and I said, democracy | |
| really depends on compromise and coalition building. And they | |
| said, you mean like you guys? | |
| Mr. Sherman. Thank you. Perhaps we need a parliamentary | |
| system of government in the United States, but that is beyond | |
| the scope of our hearing. | |
| I recognize the gentleman from South Carolina. | |
| Mr. Wilson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| And, Madam Secretary, I was really grateful to be with you | |
| at Munich last week. I was very impressed, and again, your | |
| statements today about bipartisanship and foreign affairs. And | |
| then I particularly want to congratulate you on NDI. I have | |
| worked with IRI, International Republican Institute, and just | |
| as Congresswoman Bass, I have had the opportunity to be an | |
| election observer and how meaningful these programs are. | |
| And I also was very pleased last week to be with you for | |
| the rollout of the declaration. And I had hoped that it would | |
| get more attention. If you could tell everyone what the | |
| declaration is and what the significance of it is and how we | |
| can best promote the declaration. | |
| Ms. Albright. OK. First of all, let me just say, I love | |
| working with IRI. I became very good friends with Senator | |
| McCain, and Senator Sullivan and I are really kind of working | |
| through things now. So thank you very much for your support. | |
| I think the declaration of principles is very interesting | |
| because part of it was sponsored by the Atlantic Council, and I | |
| have to say that I was kind of skeptical at the beginning, but | |
| it is kind of going back to basics in terms of the kinds of | |
| things that bring our societies together, looking at what the | |
| role of the people are, what the responsibilities are. There | |
| are a number of statements to do with it that in a way are not | |
| just renewing our vows from 70 years ago, but also trying to | |
| outline what needs to be done. | |
| One of the things that we are going to be doing is reaching | |
| out and talking to people all over the United States, and a lot | |
| of the--it was international. So in terms of talking about what | |
| the basic principles are and bringing the younger generation | |
| into it. I have said that institutions and people at age 70 | |
| need a little refurbishing. So this is basically a way to go | |
| back and see what is germane now in terms of the role of the | |
| private sector, how countries work together, how people work | |
| together, the role of governments and individuals. I would be | |
| very happy to distribute those. | |
| Mr. Wilson. And it was impressive to me, the public, | |
| private, and also the different international organizations | |
| working together for the declaration. | |
| Ms. Albright. Yes. | |
| Mr. Wilson. I was really grateful to have led a delegation | |
| on May 14 for the opening and the relocation of the U.S. | |
| Embassy to Jerusalem. And I felt like it was just so uplifting | |
| to be there. We have an extraordinary Ambassador with | |
| Ambassador David Friedman. With President Trump, it was | |
| promises made, promises kept. | |
| What is your view about the opening of the embassy in | |
| Jerusalem? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, let me say, I have been a supporter of | |
| Israel forever, and I also spent a lot of time working on | |
| Israeli-Palestinian issues. The status of our embassy in | |
| Jerusalem is a final status issue, and I happen to think it was | |
| a mistake to do it at this point. That it has made things more | |
| complicated. And then also, I have been troubled by the fact | |
| that funding has been stopped to a lot of Palestinian | |
| groupings, which makes it very difficult. The Palestinians do | |
| not--now we have a very serious problem in terms--I am looking | |
| forward to see whatever peace plan is coming out of this, and I | |
| do believe in a two-State solution. | |
| So I do think that every country has a right to recognize | |
| where its capital is, but this was a final status issue and I | |
| think should remain--should have remained in that category. | |
| Mr. Wilson. Well, I just--we have seen the consequence. | |
| There were warnings that there would be mass violence that did | |
| not occur. We were warned of so many different consequences, | |
| and I just appreciate President Trump having the courage to | |
| proceed. Also, I appreciate in 2000 your meeting with Kim Jong- | |
| il, and that we can have progress in diplomacy with North | |
| Korea. | |
| Over the past 2 years, North Korea has not launched a | |
| missile in 457 days, it had not had a nuclear test in 543 days. | |
| There have not been threats against the people of Guam by way | |
| of missile testing. The President's initiatives have secured | |
| the release of four Americans detained in North Korea. DPRK has | |
| made a promise to destroy the missile engine test site in | |
| Kusong. And the remains of 55 American remains of | |
| servicemembers have been released. | |
| Over and over again, there has been progress, and of | |
| course, the real concern, and you have identified it, and this | |
| can be part of what is going on in Hanoi today, and that is the | |
| correct definition of denuclearization. Thank you very much. | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I do think that it is important to be | |
| carrying on these diplomatic steps. I appreciate the steps that | |
| you have mentioned that have been taken, but we are a long way | |
| from where we need to be, and I think that we need to have | |
| diplomats working on this things prepared. And I hope that the | |
| talks today are successful. | |
| Mr. Wilson. And thank you for your efforts in 2000. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Sherman. Thank you. I should point out that during the | |
| Clinton Administration, there was not 1 year but rather a | |
| several-year period of no testing, and that well over 100 | |
| remains of our soldiers were returned, all without giving Kim | |
| or his father the status of a face-to-face meeting with the | |
| President of the United States. | |
| Madam Secretary, at our earlier meeting, I heard you talk | |
| about the importance of Article I of the Constitution. The most | |
| important part of that article is the right to declare war that | |
| is vested in the Congress. Now, the War Powers Act, also known | |
| as the War Powers Resolution, is the preeminent statute | |
| designed to define the role of Congress when it comes to the | |
| most important aspect of the use of foreign policy, and that | |
| is, the deployment of military force. | |
| But administration after administration has honored it, at | |
| most, in the breach, and sometimes deliberately violated it. | |
| When they have presented reports that are called for by the | |
| Act, they are always submitted consistent with the Act, making | |
| a point that the administration does not believe the Act is a | |
| statute or a law that they have to follow. Whereas, other | |
| reports are submitted pursuant to an act. | |
| You are now no longer in the executive branch, you can look | |
| back at it as a professor and scholar. Do you believe that the | |
| War Powers Resolution is binding on the President, or in | |
| contrast, do you believe that a President can simply ignore it | |
| and deploy troops on long-term operations without an | |
| authorization to use military force? | |
| Ms. Albright. Just as you were starting out, I made a note | |
| to myself, consistent with. And I do remember every time I | |
| testify to be absolutely clear to say consistent with, not | |
| pursuant to. So I literally just wrote it down before you said | |
| it. | |
| I do think that the Constitution is definitely an | |
| invitation to struggle on this particular issue. And I have | |
| gone through--I cannot--I do not know how much my students | |
| appreciate this, but the whole history of how these things have | |
| gone on and why the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution created this | |
| issue and how it has been carried out. | |
| Mr. Sherman. Yes, you can go back to Jefferson's deployment | |
| of the Marines on the shores of Tripoli. | |
| Ms. Albright. Right. So I think the question is the | |
| following. And I, frankly, do think it is strange to be | |
| operating by an AUFM that came out, you know, like a long time, | |
| you know, as long as I have been out of office. But basically | |
| this is my question, and I know this is something that you have | |
| been working on is, how does one decide whether one gives | |
| ultimate authority to the President or limits it in such a way | |
| that---- | |
| Mr. Sherman. I want to move on to other questions. But is | |
| the President the emperor who can deploy our troops anywhere in | |
| the world without authorization from Congress? Is that what our | |
| Constitution---- | |
| Ms. Albright. The Constitution does not say that. And so I | |
| do think the consultation and work together on this---- | |
| Mr. Sherman. Well, consultation is what the czar did with | |
| the Duma back in 1905. Does Congress have power or are we just | |
| an advisory---- | |
| Ms. Albright. I think Congress has power, I do. | |
| Mr. Sherman. OK. I want to move on. You are right about the | |
| envoys--about all the open positions in the executive branch. | |
| Perhaps the most glaring vacancy right now is that we do not | |
| have a coordinator special envoy for human rights in North | |
| Korea. But I do want to focus on India-Pakistan. | |
| This is the only place in the world where two nuclear | |
| powers have gone to war with each other, or at least kinetic | |
| military battle, and that has recently resumed or been | |
| initiated. What can the U.S. do to reduce tensions in South | |
| Asia? And what do we do about the fact that Pakistan seems to | |
| at least tolerate, if not support, certain terrorist groups | |
| while, of course, opposing others? | |
| Ms. Albright. You are not going to believe my answer to | |
| this, because my father was a Czechoslovak diplomat who, in | |
| 1948, represented Czechoslovakia on a first commission to deal | |
| with India and Pakistan over Kashmir. And he was the one that | |
| arranged the cease-fire for the end of the first fighting. And | |
| so I am old, he is dead, and the issue is worse than ever. | |
| Also, in my class, we do a role play. And even before the | |
| most recent thing, the scenario is India and Pakistan with | |
| nuclear issues. So I will let you know what my class decides on | |
| this, but I do think---- | |
| Mr. Sherman. We all have brilliant students in our | |
| respective districts. Do we have any guidance from the | |
| professor? | |
| Ms. Albright. I do think that we do need to figure out some | |
| way to make sure that we do not have a nuclear confrontation. I | |
| think the U.S. needs to get involved in this. And I think that | |
| it is--it would be a good idea, actually, to have some kind of | |
| an envoy trying to deal with this. We cannot allow this to get | |
| out of control. | |
| And what happened under President Clinton was there was | |
| various things that went on, President Clinton met with the | |
| Pakistanis on cargo, and were trying to deal with it. We cannot | |
| just avoid this. | |
| Mr. Sherman. My time has expired. | |
| I recognize the gentleman from Pennsylvania. | |
| Mr. Perry. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Secretary Albright, it is a privilege to have you here. | |
| Regardless of any political differences anybody has here in the | |
| room, I think that your personal story is an inspiration to | |
| people, certainly in America and around the world, and we | |
| commend you for your continued engagement in world affairs. | |
| With the rise of anti-Semitism at home and abroad, and you | |
| see it on campuses--and unfortunately, I think we have really | |
| witnessed it right here among some of our own colleagues in the | |
| halls of Congress.--what do you think Congress can do to | |
| highlight this resurgent evil? And what solutions or actions | |
| should we consider that we have not already taken? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I do think that it is something that we | |
| cannot kind of just not talk about and deal with, and I think | |
| people need to discuss what the results of it are and try to | |
| figure out how one deals with--and it is a hard issue in terms | |
| of freedom of speech, and also the boycott. I mean, I think | |
| that there are questions about how to deal with that and still | |
| allow freedom of speech. | |
| I just think that we all have to speak out about the | |
| results of it. And I would be interested to know what kind of | |
| actions you all are recommending on it. Because some of it | |
| makes it hard, it is not something that one can legislate as | |
| much as one needs to keep talking about that we cannot do, what | |
| I said earlier, which is to identify with one group at the | |
| expense of another and make them the scapegoats. That is what | |
| happened. | |
| Mr. Perry. I think we need to, among other things, be | |
| careful about the parsing, which seems to be happening, where | |
| you can say that you are not for the Government of Israel, but | |
| you are for the Jewish people. The Jewish people form the | |
| government of Israel. The State of Israel is formed by the | |
| Jewish people. And if you are maligning the government and the | |
| State of Israel at the same time, they are congruent, they are | |
| one and the same, they are the Jewish people. And I think that | |
| is the biggest thing we can do. | |
| I want to move on to a little bit, looking at some of your | |
| statements that you read to us here this morning, particularly | |
| regarding the North Korean dictator, Kim Jong-un, and the scant | |
| dividends to date based on the President's actions. And I agree | |
| wholeheartedly with you that talking is much preferred to | |
| fighting. Fighting is the absolute last resort that we should | |
| seek. But at the same time, I think we need to give this | |
| administration space. | |
| I do not like to see the President of the United States | |
| with a dictator anywhere. I think it does provide them some | |
| status that they would not normally have, but in the past, | |
| other Presidents have done it, and there has been little hue | |
| and cry from the other side that seems to revile this one. I am | |
| not looking through the world with rose-colored glasses. Kim | |
| Jong-un is a murderous dictator, but we have a circumstance | |
| that has been created because of the failures of previous | |
| administrations where we have a dictator with nuclear weapons. | |
| And you would know of anybody how complicated these issues are, | |
| and especially in that culture where a personal relationship, a | |
| personal relationship makes the difference in the negotiation | |
| as opposed to as much of the eaches. | |
| And while we say that this President has not done enough | |
| from the first meeting, it was the first meeting, the beginning | |
| of the dialog. And I will remind everybody that in the past, | |
| under an administration that you served in, we offered security | |
| guarantees, fuel, food shipments, and help on building | |
| reactors. And, you know, North Korea, as you know, after they | |
| said that was the last missile test, lied directly to you and | |
| continued to test missiles and build nuclear enrichment | |
| facilities in secret. | |
| So I just want to make the record clear here. And also, | |
| regarding comments on Syria, we appear to be pursuing several | |
| policies simultaneously, confusing allies and delighting our | |
| adversaries. I do not think--you know that is a very difficult | |
| situation, and this President has been put in an awful position | |
| of cleaning up a circumstance where our policy had kept Russia | |
| out of the Middle East for over 60 years, and the last | |
| administration gave them full entree and walked away, and now | |
| this President is trying to pick up the pieces on a horrific | |
| situation of a civil war which is supported by dictators in | |
| China and folks in Iran. | |
| And, finally, I am very concerned about comments where we | |
| would say that America--there is an impression that our leaders | |
| share a disdain for democracy. And with the little time I have, | |
| this President has supported democracies in Venezuela, put | |
| pressure on China, pressure on Russia, pressure on Iran, | |
| supported the only democracy in the Middle East, Israel, tried | |
| to maintain a relationship with Turkey, bringing back Pastor | |
| Brunson, and supported the Ukrainian defense against Russia. | |
| This President is a supporter of democracy, and I reject | |
| wholeheartedly--that is an inflammatory comment that is very | |
| dangerous, I think, to suppose or to imply that the President | |
| of the United States does not support democracy anywhere in the | |
| world, including the United States. But I appreciate your | |
| input. | |
| Mr. Sherman. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Cicilline. May I ask the witness be permitted to | |
| respond to what I think was a question? | |
| Mr. Sherman. I will recognize her for a short time, yes. | |
| Ms. Albright. Let me say I am troubled by the relationships | |
| with some very authoritarian leaders. I think that a lot has | |
| been done to raise Kim Jong-un's status. I agree with some of | |
| the positive steps that have happened, but I would also say | |
| that when the Clinton Administration left office, there were no | |
| long-range missiles, there was no more fissile material, and no | |
| nuclear weapons. And I think that it is very hard to deal with | |
| North Korea, because it is the trust but verify. And I do not | |
| know how many times they say they have destroyed Yongbyon. I | |
| think that we need to figure out what is really going on. And | |
| kind of having a love affair and some of the terminology is | |
| kind of difficult for people to understand. | |
| I do think---- | |
| Mr. Perry. Difficult for all of us to stomach, but once | |
| again, it is better than fighting. And I would say that---- | |
| Ms. Albright. I definitely agree. | |
| Mr. Perry. I would say at the end of the last | |
| administration, most Americans saw the United States at the | |
| brink of war with North Korea, and a great concession by North | |
| Korea at this point is no testing, and we are not at the brink | |
| of war. While I find it--some of the rhetoric distasteful, that | |
| is---- | |
| Mr. Sherman. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Cicilline. Could the witness be permitted to finish her | |
| answer? She was just interrupted. It is her time. | |
| Mr. Sherman. It is actually the extended time of the | |
| gentleman. You will have--I am about to yield to you. | |
| I do want to just comment on one thing the gentleman said, | |
| and that is, I have never met an Israeli who did not malign the | |
| Government of Israel. It is a national sport. | |
| And with that, I am going to yield 5 minutes to the | |
| gentleman from Rhode Island, that I am sure he will want to | |
| build on---- | |
| Mr. Cicilline. Thank you, Madam Secretary, for being here | |
| today and for your continued leadership and extraordinary | |
| service to our country. We could spend many hours, even days, | |
| discussing all of the shortcomings of the Trump | |
| administration's foreign policy, but since I only have 5 | |
| minutes, I would like to focus in particular on values, namely, | |
| democracy and human rights. | |
| It is alarming how this administration seems to conduct | |
| foreign policy in a values-free vacuum. President Trump calls | |
| gross human rights abusers our allies, and treats our allies, | |
| including our closest NATO allies, like adversaries. As you | |
| said in your testimony, if we are not friends with our friends, | |
| to whom will we turn for help? | |
| The administration's reckless approach and carelessness in | |
| damaging our alliances, in my view, is making America less | |
| safe. Congress, and in particular this committee, has a key | |
| oversight role to hold this administration to account and also | |
| to send a message to our allies about what America stands for. | |
| And in particular, I would like your thoughts on what is | |
| happening in eastern Europe, in Poland and Hungary, where it | |
| seems democracy and rule of law are under increased threat. In | |
| your book, you refer to the erosion of democratic values and | |
| attacks on democratic institutions in Hungary. Unfortunately, | |
| as you know, Hungary is not an isolated case. We are also | |
| seeing warning signs of democratic backsliding in Poland. | |
| So I would be anxious to hear your assessment of what is | |
| happening in central Europe and eastern Europe, what is the | |
| state of democracy in this region, and particularly, what | |
| influence the United States has and how we should be using it, | |
| and what we can do more to support democracy in civil society | |
| in this region, in particular. | |
| Ms. Albright. I am very concerned about what is happening | |
| in eastern Europe. And it is interesting, and I have gone over | |
| in my mind, frankly, what we might have done wrong in terms of | |
| our euphoria after the end of the cold war. Thinking that many | |
| of those countries were ripe for democracy, and democracy, as | |
| we know, is much harder than we think. | |
| And so--and believe it or not, Viktor Orban was everybody's | |
| favorite dissident. He came to the United States--and by the | |
| way, George Soros paid for his education in England--and I | |
| think he is an example of exacerbating some of the issues that | |
| the Hungarians had. I did a survey over all of Europe at the | |
| end of 1991, and I cannot remember all the statistics and the | |
| questions, but one I remember is: Do you believe a piece of | |
| your country is in the neighboring country? Eighty percent of | |
| Hungarians thought so. | |
| And so Viktor Orban, who is a demagogue in many things, | |
| having invented a term called illiberal democracy, which is an | |
| oxymoron, has taken advantage of that anger in order to get | |
| support for policies that are completely undemocratic. And I | |
| think that that is a concept that makes it very difficult. | |
| Poland, I also, as kind of the birthplace of a lot of | |
| democratic action, I think again there is--I find | |
| hypernationalism a very dangerous aspect as far as democracy is | |
| concerned. And I do hope that what we try to do is to go and | |
| explain without being domineering. I am going to Poland next | |
| week. I am giving a speech in honor of Zbigniew Brzezinski, who | |
| was my professor and my boss. Then I am going to the Czech | |
| Republic, and the Czechs treat me as some combination of a | |
| queen and an irritating older sister. I am going to give an | |
| irritating older sister speech since it is the anniversary of | |
| bringing them all into NATO. That NATO is not just a military | |
| alliance, it is a political alliance, and democratic values are | |
| a very important part of it. And I think we need to make it | |
| clear. | |
| And what I am worried about, our increasing separations | |
| between eastern Europe and western Europe. | |
| Mr. Cicilline. Thank you. And I have just probably time for | |
| one more question. One of my criticisms of the Trump | |
| administration is that they seem to have little time for what | |
| have been real cornerstones of American foreign policy that you | |
| have written a lot about, democracy and human rights. And I | |
| wonder if you would just tell us a little bit about what role | |
| you think those values of democracy and rights play in our | |
| foreign policy. What effect will this administration's | |
| disregard for these values have on our standing and leadership | |
| in the world? And, in particular, the administration has failed | |
| to speak out in support of LGBT rights or to condemn atrocities | |
| committed against the LGBT community in Chechnya, is one | |
| example. What is the impact--do governments, when they fail to | |
| hear from the United States, behave in a different way? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I think that is a big impact. And one | |
| of the things that bothers me is, for instance, in Poland, | |
| there is no respect for the judiciary. There are those--I am | |
| concerned about what has happened in terms of this | |
| administration's respect for our judiciary. About the role of | |
| the press. The rule of law. A variety of things that we hold | |
| are essential to democracy, and literally the extent to which | |
| some of them can point to what is going on here, saying, well, | |
| if you guys do it, why cannot we. | |
| So I believe that we do have a role to play as leaders, and | |
| I do think that we need to be very clear about what we believe | |
| in in terms of the rights of various groups and what our value | |
| system is, and we have been kind of burying that. | |
| Mr. Cicilline. Thank you, Madam Secretary. | |
| I yield back, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Mr. Sherman. The gentleman from Kansas is recognized. | |
| Mr. Watkins. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Thank you, Madam Secretary, for being here. I represent | |
| Kansas' Second District, eastern Kansas, think farmers, | |
| ranchers, producers, and what can we do as diplomats and | |
| Congress Members to enhance access between our growers and | |
| international buyers? | |
| Ms. Albright. You know, I think this has been a very | |
| important part of American foreign policy for a long time with | |
| PL-480 that really started the farm programs. And I think that | |
| we need to make clear that our relationships with countries is | |
| based on a free trade aspect of this, and that we need to make | |
| clear how important our farming communities are, and to be as | |
| helpful as possible. I believe in that. | |
| Mr. Watkins. Thank you, ma'am. And in your testimony, you | |
| noted that this administration's approach to China, quote, | |
| could produce gains with signs of progress in recent days. Now, | |
| given that, what should be the next step, particularly with | |
| regards to China? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I do think that we have been worried | |
| about some of the things they have been doing in terms of our | |
| intellectual property and just generally in terms of how they | |
| operate. And I think that the trade talks, from what I can | |
| tell, have gone fairly deeply, and while they need to be | |
| continued, I think there is a question--the President postponed | |
| the time of raising the tariffs, and so I think we need to keep | |
| pursuing to have some kind of a fair system, but where what we | |
| do is to be able to protect our intellectual property. And I do | |
| know that they have said they were going to buy more | |
| agricultural products, soy beans, so I think that is a good | |
| idea. | |
| Mr. Watkins. Thank you, Madam Secretary. It is good to see | |
| you again. | |
| I yield my time, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Mr. Sherman. The gentleman from California is recognized. | |
| Mr. Bera. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| And I will reiterate my colleagues in thanking you, Madam | |
| Secretary, for your service. I would also recognize, and I | |
| think you would agree with this, the men and women of our | |
| foreign services, our diplomats, our civil servants, our aid | |
| workers around the world, the tremendous work that they do | |
| representing us, and really just want to acknowledge to them | |
| that this body appreciates what they do every day, and the | |
| NGO's that also project American soft power and presence around | |
| the world. | |
| Secretary Albright, in your written testimony, you talked | |
| about that there was some concern about the foreign policy | |
| decisionmaking process, and I would second that. And I will use | |
| two examples, you know, recent examples, and also about a year | |
| ago. If you think about the decision to withdraw from Syria, I | |
| was in the region in December, met with our special envoy to | |
| ISIS, Brett McGurk, and talked to our commanders in the field, | |
| and they are prosecuting their mission very well. | |
| Nobody seemed to have any idea that a public statement was | |
| going to be made by the administration. If I infer from | |
| Secretary Mattis' decisions, it did not appear that Secretary | |
| Mattis had been consulted. We know from testimony on the Senate | |
| side, General Votel had no idea and was not consulted on this. | |
| And it is of deep concern. Let's separate the actual decision, | |
| there is a deep concern amongst myself and I hope everyone on | |
| this committee, that there is not an interagency process that | |
| seems to be taking place as major policy decisions are being | |
| made. | |
| I would say the same thing about a year ago when a decision | |
| to support the Saudis and the Emiratis on their blockade of | |
| Qatar. You heard mixed signals coming out of the | |
| administration, Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense | |
| saying, no, we are not going to take sides; the President of | |
| the United States taking sides. | |
| You know, from your time at State, what would the right | |
| interagency process look like, and where should we, from an | |
| oversight perspective, dive into this? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I have been fascinated at the | |
| decisionmaking process and participated in it. So it is one of | |
| my subjects that I spend a lot of time on. And since the 1947 | |
| National Security Act, there has been a process. Each President | |
| puts a somewhat different spin on it in terms of their own | |
| proclivities and how they like to do business. But the bottom | |
| line is the U.S. Government makes thousands of decisions a day. | |
| The harder the decision, it gets pushed up the line. And the | |
| hardest ones go to the National Security Council in order to be | |
| able to present a proposal to the President. | |
| And the very important part is how those decisions are set | |
| up, prepared by an interagency process, and then having a | |
| meeting of the principals committee, which means the Cabinet | |
| members that the National Security Advisor runs. And the best | |
| meetings, the ones that I have witnessed or studied, are the | |
| National Security Advisor makes a point of finding out how | |
| different departments feel about it. | |
| I kind of talk about it as breaking the eggs so that you | |
| really--and then the National Security Advisor would like to | |
| make an omelet out of them to give to the President. If you | |
| cannot make the omelet, then you go and meet with the President | |
| and go over the decisions again and present your different | |
| views. That, from everything that I can tell, is not taking | |
| place. There are some questions as to whether--I mean, I do not | |
| know anything beyond what I read in the papers, but whether | |
| there have been principals meetings. | |
| I think the Syria decision, and I am sorry that I could not | |
| answer before, I do not think we have done Syria right. I think | |
| there are many issues, and they go back to any number of | |
| aspects of it. But the part that was really ridiculous was | |
| having different members of the Cabinet say something | |
| different, so that we did not have any idea what the policy | |
| was, thereby making ourselves look completely inept. And the | |
| kinds of things--not just Secretary Mattis and various people-- | |
| but, I mean, on any hour of the day you did not know what U.S. | |
| policy was, and that is the result of a nonexistent | |
| decisionmaking. | |
| Mr. Bera. And that has to be of deep concern to us, and | |
| certainly deeper concern to our allies if they do not know what | |
| our policy is and how that policy is being discussed and made, | |
| you know. I have the privilege of being the subcommittee chair | |
| on Oversight and Investigations, and certainly one of the | |
| things that we want to do is take a deep dive and a deep look | |
| into how these decisions are made, and we do think there is a | |
| congressional role in this. And if we are all speaking with one | |
| voice in a bipartisan way, we may or may not agree with the | |
| policy, but if we actually understand the thought and decisions | |
| that went behind that policy, it does project our soft power | |
| and our commitment both to our allies, but to the rest of the | |
| world, in a much more positive way. So thank you for that | |
| comment, and we look forward to---- | |
| Mr. Sherman. Thank you. | |
| The gentleman from New York. | |
| Mr. Zeldin. Thank you. | |
| I would like to thank Chairman Bera for his remarks. I | |
| certainly agree with that sentiment of having a bipartisan | |
| analysis of foreign policy decisions. | |
| And, by the way, thank you, Madam Secretary, for your great | |
| service to our country over the course of many years. You would | |
| be hard-pressed to find any Member of Congress that does not | |
| have respect for all of your service to our country, so thank | |
| you. | |
| Some of the observations with regards to an absence from | |
| the national scene or an odor of American absence of | |
| leadership, I do not want to misquote you, but some of the | |
| statements that you made today. We can have a difference of | |
| opinion on decisions that President Trump makes in some cases | |
| where the President might withdraw from the Paris climate | |
| accord. You can argue that that is taking a step back from | |
| American leadership, others are strongly in support of the | |
| decision. I think it is really important to note, which is part | |
| of the scope of today's hearing, that there are many decisions | |
| that were made that it was America stepping up and being more | |
| involved and showing more leadership. | |
| And earlier you say the USMCA, as one area with regards to | |
| Canada and Mexico, where it was a tough negotiation, and there | |
| were improvements that were made to an agreement that was | |
| decades old, and it certainly was not easy in dealing with | |
| allies. I believe that withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal | |
| was American leadership, and obviously, you would argue the | |
| opposite. But, you know, I have strong opinions as to why we | |
| should have withdrawn from the Iran nuclear deal. Moving the | |
| embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, I would argue, was showing | |
| American leadership. | |
| ISIS is almost completely wiped off the map in Iraq and | |
| Syria, which is fantastic. This is something that has been | |
| going on, an effort over the course of a few years. But that | |
| map, just a few years back, looked really bad as far as the | |
| amount of territory that they controlled. The decision to use | |
| the MOAB in Afghanistan. I was in Afghanistan right after that | |
| decision was made. It was one that helped American forces, | |
| coalition forces, and it raised morale amongst the troops that | |
| I was speaking with. Passing the Taylor Force Act through | |
| Congress and then getting signed by the President, because | |
| there is a pay-to-slay policy amongst the Palestinians to | |
| financially reward terrorism. | |
| Congressman Cicilline brought up a great point with regards | |
| to the LGBT situation in Chechnya. That is a huge concern. But | |
| I think it is also important for us to acknowledge that it was | |
| just a week ago that there was an announcement made amongst the | |
| Trump administration led by Ambassador Grenell of Germany to | |
| start a global campaign toward decriminalizing LGBTQ all across | |
| the entire world, and I think that we should acknowledge that | |
| effort from a week ago and then decide--figure out how we can | |
| be helpful for that effort. | |
| I believe the American involvement in Venezuela, the | |
| support for the Venezuelan people and recognizing Guaido, is | |
| the Trump administration showing more leadership, not less. In | |
| August 2017, with regards to North Korea, the U.N. Security | |
| Council voted unanimously to increase sanctions, and China and | |
| Russia ended up voting with us. And I credit Ambassador Haley | |
| and her team and the Trump administration for their efforts to | |
| get that vote, but obviously there is a lot of other dynamics | |
| and complications as it relates to North Korea. We are having | |
| this hearing while the President and his foreign policy team | |
| are in North Korea. | |
| So while we are having a really important hearing where | |
| opportunities are going to be taken to share, it could be | |
| frustration or criticism with certain decisions the President | |
| made, because that is a congressional role with oversight, and | |
| it is important for us to do that. | |
| I just wanted to use my brief time just to cover a few | |
| other topics that are going on that, I would argue, are | |
| important for American foreign policy, even if we might | |
| disagree with some of it. So I just think there was a few more | |
| topics to add to today's discussion. | |
| And once again, thank you for your great service to our | |
| country, for being here today, and the United States, really. I | |
| was a couple years younger when you were serving as Secretary | |
| of State, an honor to meet you in person, but I think our | |
| country is better off that you have dedicated so much time in | |
| your life toward the United States and global foreign policy | |
| and so many great causes. | |
| I yield back. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you very much. And if I just might say, | |
| I do think it is important to think about the unintended | |
| consequences of foreign policy decisions, and we all need to | |
| work on that more. I believe in executive legislative | |
| partnership on foreign policy, and I believe in bipartisanship, | |
| and I proved that by being very good friends with Senator Jesse | |
| Helms. | |
| Chairman Engel [presiding]. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Espaillat. | |
| Mr. Espaillat. Thank you, Madam Secretary, for your many | |
| years of service and your commitment to our Nation and | |
| democracy across the world. At this very same committee last | |
| hearing, we heard from Elliott Abrams. He sat right where you | |
| are sitting and provided testimony and answered questions | |
| regarding the administration's actions and intent toward | |
| Venezuela. | |
| Despite his attempts at reassuring us, I am still | |
| particularly worried about his involvement in our efforts to | |
| support the people of Venezuela. This country has a long and | |
| dubious history of interfering militarily in Latin America, and | |
| Mr. Abrams himself played a particular role in that story. | |
| President Trump has frequently appointed individuals who | |
| are the anthesis to their positions in making high-ranking | |
| positions across our government. Yet the appointment of an | |
| individual who was criminally charged for lying to Congress | |
| about his role in arm sales to fund a coup in Nicaragua seems | |
| to particularly be irresponsible, even for Mr. Trump. | |
| Are you concerned that Mr. Abrams' past participation in | |
| Iran-Contra disqualifies him as an impartial arbiter, if you | |
| may, in this particular conflict in Venezuela? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I think that I would not have named | |
| him, but I do think that the President has the right to name | |
| the people that he wants. | |
| Mr. Espaillat. As a refugee yourself--and I have read about | |
| your particular story, a very compelling story, and one that I | |
| think should enlighten all of us during these troubling times. | |
| Do you mind sharing your view on how we are treating folks that | |
| are coming up to the border seeking asylum, many of them | |
| obviously running from violence, running from gangs, and | |
| natural disasters and the like? | |
| Ms. Albright. My short answer is it is un-American. That I | |
| really do believe that this country has had a generous policy. | |
| I do think every country has a right to make its immigration | |
| policy, and I wish that there would be a comprehensive bill to | |
| do with immigration. | |
| And I have to tell this story. One of my favorite things in | |
| life is to give people naturalization certificates. And the | |
| first time I did it was July 4, 2000, at Monticello. I figured | |
| since I had Thomas Jefferson's job I could do that. And so I | |
| hear this man leaving, and say, can you believe it? I am a | |
| refugee and I just got my naturalization certificate from the | |
| Secretary of State. And I went up to him, and I said, can you | |
| believe that a refugee is Secretary of State? | |
| I think our country is about welcoming people, and what is | |
| going on at the border is un-American, separating the children, | |
| having no process, absolutely appalling. And I do hope that you | |
| all address that. | |
| Mr. Espaillat. Thank you. Let me go back to Mr. Abrams. | |
| Many in Venezuela, the folks that are fighting for democracy | |
| there, have been asking for arms there. Many feel they should | |
| be able to protect themselves in the fate and the likes of what | |
| the Maduro regime is perpetrating against them. | |
| First of all, do you think that that is advisable? And are | |
| you concerned that Abrams is at the helm, and he already did | |
| something like this in the past, and he may again engage in | |
| this type of behavior? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I think that we do not need to add more | |
| arms there. I am not for--I am for assistance, I am for | |
| negotiation, I am for sanctions. I think we have to be very | |
| careful not to exacerbate the situation. | |
| Mr. Espaillat. And what about military intervention? I know | |
| that when you served as our Secretary of State, you were | |
| involved in some military actions in certain parts of the | |
| world. Do you feel that the crisis in Venezuela has reached a | |
| level where that could be a potential option? | |
| Ms. Albright. I think--I happen to agree that normally what | |
| is said is all options are on the table. But I do think at the | |
| times that I was involved in using force, which was in the | |
| Balkans, was really after a great deal of negotiation and | |
| attempts at various other solutions. I have not seen that. | |
| There have been--the way that we brought people to the table at | |
| Dayton, for instance, was with very strong sanctions and a | |
| number of different diplomatic efforts, and I do not think | |
| enough of that has happened at this point. | |
| Mr. Espaillat. And, finally, do you feel that the Maduro | |
| regime is a narco regime? | |
| Ms. Albright. I think that it has an awful lot in | |
| supporting corruption in a variety of different aspects in | |
| Venezuela. I think there is a genuine question about what | |
| happened in the elections, and I think that they certainly have | |
| had a lot to do with the drug trafficking and with corruption. | |
| Mr. Espaillat. Thank you for your service, Madam Secretary. | |
| Thank you. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Yoho. | |
| Mr. Yoho. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Madeleine--Secretary Albright, thank you for being here, | |
| ma'am. I view this committee as the most important committee in | |
| Congress. And I say that because the right and strong foreign | |
| policy is good economics policy, it is good trade policy, and | |
| it is definitely strong national security. Therefore, welcome | |
| to the best committee in Congress. | |
| When you look at the world today, it is in the largest flux | |
| that we have seen since World War II, there is a tectonic shift | |
| in world powers we have not seen since World War II. Different | |
| countries are jockeying for different positions, as we see with | |
| the rise of China in the South China Sea and around the way | |
| they are going after the ports in the strategic areas around | |
| the world. | |
| Yet if we look over the past, and I cannot blame any | |
| administration, it is an accumulation of administrations over | |
| the last 30 or 40 years, that has let a country go from a very | |
| backward economy to one of the second strongest in the world. | |
| Yet some things have been left unchecked. | |
| You know, when Xi Jinping came to the Rose Garden in 2015, | |
| with President Obama, said that the South China Seas, the land | |
| that they were reclaiming, would never be militarized, yet at | |
| the same time, they are being militarized. Today, they are | |
| fully militarized. And then we see what is going on in the | |
| Middle East, over 70 million refugees, the largest number since | |
| World War II, and in our own hemisphere with Venezuela, over 3 | |
| million or pushing 3 million. And we are going to have an | |
| influx of refugees at our borders this country has never seen | |
| before. | |
| Stating all that, and the flux--not the flux, but the | |
| assault against Western democracies with what China, Russia, | |
| Iran are offering, mainly China, socialism with Chinese | |
| characteristics. As far as I am concerned, it is still | |
| communism, it is in their name. | |
| And then with Xi Jinping in 2017, the 17th Chinese | |
| Communist Party Congress said the era of China has arrived. No | |
| longer will we be made to swallow our interests around the | |
| world. It is time for China to take the world center stage. | |
| Do you feel that is threatening and the right thing for a | |
| world leader to say? | |
| Ms. Albright. You have described a world, the diplomatic | |
| term for which is, it is a mess. And I do think that there are | |
| all those issues out there, and we keep harking back. And I | |
| think we need to look at what our various institutional | |
| structures are and the relationships. | |
| I am very worried with the kind of pulling back of America | |
| from a number of roles that the Chinese are filling the vacuum. | |
| They are on the march in many different ways, and Xi Jinping is | |
| using nationalism as a way to motivate his people when they are | |
| having a number of different problems. But the issue, and this | |
| is what has to happen, is to have--to be able to have areas | |
| where we try to find some cooperation, and then find the areas | |
| where we have to compete and make very clear what our views | |
| are. | |
| I am troubled, in reading the threats issue that the | |
| intelligence community put out, they state this very clearly, | |
| the Chinese problems, the Russian problems, and then areas | |
| where we need to look at regional stability. And the thing that | |
| I--I am very glad to be at this important committee, and I am | |
| very happy to continue whatever longer term discussions, | |
| because with all of you I think we have to look at what our | |
| policies are going to be that are relevant for this part of the | |
| time and not keep thinking---- | |
| Mr. Yoho. Can I cut you off there because that is where I | |
| kind of want to go? Knowing the change in the world that is | |
| going on and all the conflicts that are going on, with your | |
| expertise, you history, knowing politics back in the 1990's, | |
| knowing it today, and it has changed tremendously, what would | |
| you advise this committee to direct foreign policy, you know, | |
| to counter China and the BRI, we did the BUILD Act to counter | |
| that, and this committee passed that, it got signed into law. | |
| What else would you recommend that this committee--because | |
| I want to set policies in place for 50 years down the road that | |
| an administration just cannot come in and change on a whim, | |
| that it will have to go through a committee of jurisdiction. | |
| Ms. Albright. I do think that one has to look at what the | |
| institutional structures are that we are working with and our | |
| decisionmaking process, but then also look to see to what | |
| extent we need international organizations, how we operate with | |
| them. Is the UN--does it need help without us cutting our | |
| funding? I think we have to take a very large picture in terms | |
| of the institutions. I would hope that you would actually ask | |
| members of the private sector and academia and people like me, | |
| former practitioners, to come and talk about what the various | |
| issues are and not get involved in policies that bring | |
| unintended consequences. We need some forward thinking | |
| together, and the private sector also has to be involved in it. | |
| Mr. Yoho. One of your colleagues that got elected, Donna | |
| Shalala, was here in the nineties. She said--I asked her how | |
| things were going here, and she goes, this is completely | |
| different than when I was here. It is toxic. It is all | |
| politics, not policy. And I think that is a great warning. | |
| Thank you. | |
| Ms. Albright. Yes. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Ms. Wild, | |
| Ms. Wild. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Madam Secretary, it is an honor for me to be sitting on | |
| this committee and to be listening to your testimony. My late | |
| mother had the privilege of serving as a foreign service | |
| specialist under your leadership and was assigned to African | |
| affairs, and I am sure she would be thrilled to know that I am | |
| here today with you and that I was appointed vice chair of the | |
| Africa Subcommittee. | |
| I share Chairwoman Bass' concerns that African countries | |
| are often ignored or overlooked in our foreign policy | |
| positions, but that is not the subject of my question to you | |
| today. Let me switch gears. | |
| In August 2017, the Trump administration announced its | |
| intention to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate | |
| agreement which, of course, as you well know, was adopted in | |
| 2016 to create a structure for nations to pledge to voluntarily | |
| reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to climate | |
| change. My primary concerns are these: One, it shows a clear | |
| disregard for the seriousness of climate change; but second, | |
| and within the province of this committee, it demonstrates a | |
| recklessness in backing out of an agreement that the United | |
| States made with our close allies. | |
| I would like you, if you would, please, to discuss how the | |
| allies of the United States reacted to President Trump's | |
| decision to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement. And | |
| also, what is the impact of us doing so with our allies in | |
| terms of our international standing and reputation for | |
| trustworthiness? | |
| Ms. Albright. I think it raises that very question, because | |
| so many agreements and diplomatic relationships are based on | |
| understanding and trust and living up to your word, frankly. I | |
| think both that and withdrawing from the JCPOA undermines what | |
| it is. Negotiations are negotiations, and people make | |
| compromises. And then if you walk away from them, why would | |
| they trust you on the next one? | |
| I actually think both of them are difficult, but the | |
| climate change, when you think about it, was done in way that | |
| left an awful lot of choice for each sovereign State. It was | |
| not kind of an order about everything. It was a setting up of a | |
| system to talk about things. | |
| I also know when we withdraw from agreements or are not | |
| there when treaties are being negotiated, we lose our position. | |
| You know, the international criminal--we may not agree with | |
| everybody, but issues when we are not there, we walked out of | |
| the land or did not pay attention to the landmine treaty or did | |
| not pay enough attention to the International Criminal Court. | |
| We have to be there, and I think that a lot of agreements like | |
| that are based on trust, and we have undermined our trust. We | |
| are the most powerful country in the world, and we are | |
| destroying the capability to deal with problems by walking away | |
| from issues that we have agreed to. | |
| Ms. Wild. So we lose our place at the table. | |
| Ms. Albright. Definitely. | |
| Ms. Wild. Can you discuss which countries have not ratified | |
| the Paris climate agreement, and whether the United States | |
| historically has aligned with the priorities of those | |
| countries, if you know? | |
| Ms. Albright. I cannot list them, but I do think that when | |
| we align ourselves that way, we are sending a message. They are | |
| not exactly the ones that we would like to have something to do | |
| with. What I do find fascinating, and I mentioned this earlier, | |
| is all of a sudden the Chinese are the leaders on this. And | |
| when we do not--when we are away from the table and we do not | |
| lead, somebody is going to step in. | |
| Ms. Wild. Thank you very much. I yield back. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Levin. | |
| Mr. Levin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| It is so great to be with you, Madam Secretary, and I want | |
| to take this precious opportunity to ask you to think in broad | |
| and historical terms about the proliferation of nuclear weapons | |
| and the arc of history and what we have done as a country and | |
| what is going on in the world. I think you touched briefly on | |
| India and Pakistan earlier. They are fighting right now, and | |
| obviously, they both became nuclear weapons States in recent | |
| years. Now we have--you know, I am very sad that we withdrew | |
| from the Iran nuclear agreement, and I am very worried about | |
| Saudi Arabia trying to obtain nuclear weapons. | |
| So I wanted to ask you broadly about that, but in the | |
| context of our own actions about our own nuclear weapons and | |
| those of Russia and China. You know, recently, the President | |
| withdrew from the intermediate nuclear weapons agreement with | |
| Russian because they were not complying, which they were not, | |
| but it is hard to understand how that is a constructive | |
| response. And I am very concerned that if we are stalled over a | |
| period of, really, many years of not getting anything done | |
| ourselves, and also, with these many other States trying to | |
| develop nuclear weapons, we are setting the stage for disaster. | |
| So I wondered what your perspective on this situation is. | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, it is really, for me, that kind of was | |
| a witness to the evolution of nuclear weapons but also the | |
| agreements that were made, I think we have come to a very sorry | |
| state. I think one of the general themes here has been, and I | |
| have supported that, is that one has to look at what agreements | |
| are and then bring them up to date in any number of ways | |
| because they do not always suit the exact situation, but | |
| withdrawing from them is a mistake. | |
| And the New START Treaty is up for negotiation. And what is | |
| happening is the Russians are updating their nuclear weapons | |
| systems, doing all kinds of things that are of great concern to | |
| us. We are modernizing our nuclear arsenal, but I think that | |
| what it means is that we cannot withdraw from things. What we | |
| need to do is to update the negotiation on them. I would hope | |
| that we could commit ourselves to a New START Treaty or to | |
| negotiating on the basis of the New START Treaty. | |
| And I think partially the way that the treaties have been | |
| set up, they are supposed to deal with when there is failure | |
| and cheating. Withdrawing from them does not exactly help, and | |
| it is giving an excuse to the Russians to go forward with | |
| things. We need arms control treaties. We also need people. | |
| There used to be kind of a priesthood of people that really | |
| understood all the nuclear--all the arms control things. Some | |
| of those people are no longer around, but we really do need to | |
| give a lot of emphasis to arms control agreements. And it goes | |
| back to the previous question in terms of trust and things like | |
| that, and I think we are undermining our own strength by not | |
| paying attention. | |
| The other thing is nuclear proliferation is a multilateral | |
| problem, and we need to look at it from that perspective. | |
| Mr. Levin. You know that when we sold nuclear technology to | |
| the United Arab Emirates, they agreed to sort of a gold | |
| standard of nonproliferation language in that situation, and I | |
| am concerned about the Trump administration possibly selling | |
| nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia without that kind of | |
| guarantee. How do we--I really appreciate your comments about | |
| our own nuclear weapons and agreements with others about that. | |
| How do we lead on these problems of increasing numbers of | |
| nuclear weapons States? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, we do have to have an agreement, the 1- | |
| 2-3, to really--and the Saudis, as far as I know, there has | |
| been no movement on that. | |
| Mr. Levin. That is right. | |
| Ms. Albright. And legally, we should not and cannot sell it | |
| to them. But I do think that we need to constantly keep looking | |
| at the nuclear nonproliferation regimes that are out there, and | |
| as I said, require a multilateral action. But I think we have | |
| to be very careful not to be those that help the proliferation | |
| of nuclear weapons, and that has a lot to do with what we are | |
| doing with North Korea and the stuff that they are selling to a | |
| variety of people. That is what people are concerned about is | |
| some sale from North Korea more to the Pakistanis or to the | |
| Saudis. | |
| Mr. Levin. Thank you so much. I yield back, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Malinowski. | |
| Mr. Malinowski. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| It is wonderful to see you, Madam Secretary. I remember | |
| staffing you at these marathon sessions years ago, and now here | |
| I am with a chance to ask you some questions. | |
| I want to start by saying that I really appreciate your | |
| commitment to bipartisanship and your effort to give credit | |
| even to an administration that you are largely critical of on | |
| some issues. I have tried to do the same thing; largely | |
| supportive of what they are trying to do in Venezuela, for | |
| example. I think they, in some ways, are giving China more | |
| right than some previous administrations. | |
| But I do want to come back to a question that has permeated | |
| our discussion today, and that is what is happening to our | |
| moral authority in the world. Does it help us in the struggle | |
| for democracy and against dictatorship around the world when | |
| our President is calling our free press the enemy of the people | |
| or questioning the credibility of our own democratic elections | |
| or attacking the integrity of our intelligence community and | |
| our law enforcement community? | |
| Ms. Albright. I think it is very damaging, because I | |
| think--having spent a lot of time talking to a variety of | |
| foreign leaders and them basically saying, you mean you want us | |
| to do this, but what are you doing and saying? Our moral | |
| authority makes a difference. I think that one of the issues-- | |
| and I always like to refer back to my father. He believed that | |
| the U.S. needed a moral foreign policy. That is different than | |
| a moralistic foreign policy, which kind of dictates everybody | |
| what to do, but we do need to have our value system in place. | |
| And the press, a free press is the basis of democracy. You | |
| cannot call them the enemy of the people because it gives Putin | |
| a chance to say the same thing. So I am very much concerned | |
| about what kind of a model or example we set. | |
| Mr. Malinowski. In the same vein, I could ask does it help | |
| us stand up to the Maduro regime, which has turned Venezuela | |
| into a socialist country by issuing emergency decrees in | |
| opposition to the elected Congress of that country when we are | |
| issuing emergency decrees of ourselves? | |
| Ms. Albright. I have been troubled by that, because | |
| emergency decrees are sometimes used for the wrong purposes in | |
| order to exacerbate problems. I am very glad that the Congress | |
| voted against the emergency decree that President Trump put | |
| out. | |
| Mr. Malinowski. Thank you. On to the Senate. | |
| And I think that the bigger picture here, and we have not | |
| really brought this out thus far, is it is not North Korea, it | |
| is not Venezuela. These are individual crises. It is that we | |
| have two great powers, Russia and China, that are challenging | |
| the world order that we built and our moral authority to lead | |
| it. And it seems to me we are squandering some of our greatest | |
| advantages in that fight, our alliances with democratic | |
| countries that willing work with us. The example that we set at | |
| home, the consistency in the application of our principles | |
| around the world. | |
| I was there with you in Munich and heard Vice President | |
| Pence's speech, and one part of it that really struck me was | |
| when he asserted at the very beginning that America is back as | |
| the leader of the world, and virtually nobody applauded. Can we | |
| be the leader of the world if nobody follows? | |
| Ms. Albright. No. I mean, and that is the part of the thing | |
| that is terrible, is I cannot--and you were there. I cannot | |
| repeat how proud I was to represent the United States. And I | |
| think that the fact that we have given up on a lot of our | |
| principles and that people question our trustworthiness or what | |
| our motives are, I think is weakening us. And the | |
| responsibility of any President of the United States is to | |
| worry about our national interests, but they are being | |
| undermined by the way that we are treating our friends and | |
| allies. | |
| Mr. Malinowski. And would not you agree that President | |
| Putin's primary strategic goal with respect to the United | |
| States is to divide us from our allies and to break our moral | |
| authority? | |
| Ms. Albright. No question. And we forget that we are | |
| dealing with a KGB agent who knows exactly how to use | |
| propaganda, and he has now militarized information, and what he | |
| is doing is systematically undermining our friends and allies | |
| in central and eastern Europe. He developed another oxymoron | |
| term which is authoritarian capitalism, you know, or a liberal | |
| democracy. That is what he and Orban have in common. And I | |
| think he knows how to separate and undermine, and we have to | |
| push back on that because he--I have said this, he has played a | |
| weak hand very well, and we have played a strong hand poorly. | |
| Mr. Malinowski. Thank you. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Burchett. | |
| Mr. Burchett. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. | |
| Thank you, ma'am, for being here. By my accent, you | |
| probably think I am from New York---- | |
| Ms. Albright. Definitely. | |
| Mr. Burchett [continuing]. But I am actually from | |
| Tennessee. It is very cool for me sitting here talking to you. | |
| I was just thinking--I am cutting into my time, but I think it | |
| is important--that in my pin collection I have a Muskie for | |
| President pin. I believe you were involved with that. | |
| Ms. Albright. Definitely. | |
| Mr. Burchett. I was 4 years old when that was going on, so | |
| I just wanted you to know that. | |
| Ms. Albright. I was a little older. | |
| Mr. Burchett. Yes, ma'am. That is all right. That is all | |
| right. And your story is very American. I was thinking of my | |
| momma, and she flew an airplane during the war. And she was | |
| kind of a nontraditionalist. I wish she was alive to see me | |
| sitting up here, say hello to you. | |
| But my question has to deal with China and dealing with | |
| their telecom giant. I believe it is pronounced Huawei. | |
| Ms. Albright. Huawei. | |
| Mr. Burchett. OK, thank you, ma'am. And as the carriers | |
| prepare to roll out the 5G wireless networks, officials have | |
| raised some concern that Beijing could use Huawei to spy on our | |
| various networks or even to disable them. It has been reported | |
| in a couple of instances. But this has led, of course, the | |
| Trump administration to press our allies to avoid using their | |
| equipment. | |
| I was wondering what your take was on that. And do you see | |
| them as a national security threat? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I am very concerned by Huawei because | |
| they are very much a part of selling component parts that | |
| undermine the whole system. And I am very concerned about | |
| something generally that we are not thinking enough about a | |
| cyber approach and what technology could undermine, and I am | |
| very glad that we are pushing back on this. But it is a problem | |
| because our friends and allies do have the same systems, and we | |
| have to figure out how to work with them on that. | |
| And by the way, I do think we need to also begin to look at | |
| some rules of how cyber works. So, you know, we had a | |
| conversation about arms control. We also have to think about | |
| what the next threat, and a lot of this has to do with | |
| technology, and there need to be some rules about that. I am | |
| concerned about Huawei. | |
| Mr. Burchett. Yes, ma'am. I am glad you said that. I do not | |
| represent it, but about 6,000 hardworking folks at Oak Ridge | |
| National Laboratory live in the district I represent, and I | |
| just this past weekend toured some of their--they have one of | |
| the worlds's largest computers, and I can assure you that | |
| cybersecurity is at the forefront of everything they were | |
| talking to me about. | |
| The next question I have was about NATO. And I know you | |
| addressed that earlier. And I apologize, Mr. Chairman, if this | |
| questionhas been asked before. If it has, you just say, I have | |
| answered it already. Go on to something else. But NATO, you | |
| know, we--apparently, the other countries have been expected to | |
| pay the 2 percent in the past. They have not, really. A lot of | |
| them have. I think we paid maybe 50-plus percent of the NATO | |
| budget. | |
| Do you think that the threshold this year--or do you think | |
| we are close to getting to that threshold with these other | |
| member countries? | |
| Ms. Albright. I think that this is an agreement that was | |
| made that they need to do it. I think a lot of people, however, | |
| do not understand what is being referred to. This isn't putting | |
| some money into a NATO pot. | |
| Mr. Burchett. Right. | |
| Ms. Albright. It is what they need to spend out of their | |
| own defense budgets in order to be part of the system, and I do | |
| think we need to keep pushing at it. And I think that--but not | |
| by bullying. I think it is a matter of trying to keep pushing | |
| them as partners and then to really look at what the threats | |
| are. So I am all for it. I think that they need to do it. I do | |
| not think it is as close as I wish it were to be, and I think | |
| we need to raise it, but it is more the tone of how it came out | |
| and some understanding, and I think the American people need to | |
| understand what we are talking about and how NATO works. | |
| Mr. Burchett. Yes, ma'am. It comes to mind a saying my | |
| mother used to say, and it skipped my mind right now, but it is | |
| something to do with it is a little easier to lure bees with | |
| honey than vinegar, so I can understand that. Thank you so | |
| much, ma'am. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Burchett. And I appreciate your--it is a great story. | |
| And if any of the young folks are watching this, I think they | |
| ought to research this lady, your grandparents, and where you | |
| came from in Czechoslovakia. I mean, it is just a really cool | |
| story. So thank you so much. | |
| Ms. Albright. It is a good American story. | |
| Mr. Burchett. That is what I said. I had it written--I | |
| wrote it in pencil up here. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you. Thank you so much. | |
| Mr. Burchett. Typically American. Thank you so much, ma'am. | |
| Chairman Engel. Mr. Burchett, I want you to know that I | |
| only called on you because I thought you were from New York. | |
| Mr. Burchett. Yes, sir. Well, I know. We have had this | |
| conversation. My accent threw you off a couple of times. You | |
| asked me where I was from up there, and I have never--I hardly | |
| get to north Knoxville, much less New York City, But I plan on | |
| doing it 1 day, and I am going to hang out with you | |
| specifically. | |
| Chairman Engel. Let me invite you. | |
| Mr. Burchett. Thank you, brother. | |
| Chairman Engel. We would be pleased to have you. Thank you. | |
| Ms. Omar. | |
| Ms. Omar. Thank you, Chair. Hopefully, I can join that | |
| invitation to visit New York as well. | |
| Madam Secretary---- | |
| Chairman Engel. You are invited. | |
| Ms. Omar. Madam Secretary, it is such an honor to have you | |
| in this committee. And my apologies for having to run to | |
| another committee, but I am so glad we have this opportunity to | |
| chat. | |
| Yesterday in my office, I met with some veterans who are | |
| part of Common Defense. They are veterans of wars we have had | |
| in Afghanistan and Iraq. They asked me some questions that were | |
| a little puzzling to me, and I did not really have answers for | |
| them. Those that I met who served in Afghanistan were not | |
| convinced that after 18 years of fighting, Afghanistan was | |
| better off for our having been there. And the ones that served | |
| in Iraq, they spoke of the trauma inflicted on communities | |
| there, as well as their own traumas and the ravages of war that | |
| they have been subjected to. In Libya, we talked about some of | |
| the stories. We are reading about migrants who being sold into | |
| slavery and the complete horror that is being faced by Libyans | |
| trying to flee their country as refugees. | |
| What worries me as someone who survived war and understands | |
| the horrors of wars firsthand is that the planning of wars does | |
| not seem to genuinely consider the human toll it takes, and | |
| plans do not seem to be made for recovery, and our moral | |
| responsibility to the people of these countries does not seem | |
| to be taken seriously. So my question to you and something I | |
| wanted to explore with you, Madam Secretary, is about the | |
| decision to militarily intervene in a foreign country. | |
| When it is made, how much weight is given to the dramatic | |
| toll that is going to be inflicted on the innocent civilians in | |
| that war? I do not just mean the civilian casualties. I also | |
| mean to the extent we weigh the long-term impact that we will | |
| have after we get there. | |
| Ms. Albright. I think that one of the hard parts is trying | |
| to decide what tool you use in order to deal with a particular | |
| problem, and force is usually the last tool to be considered. | |
| And I have to tell you, things that I never thought I would | |
| have to do in my lifetime, either at the U.N. or as Secretary | |
| of State, to raise my hand in order to say that we needed force | |
| somewhere. It is something that I did in the Balkans because I | |
| thought people were being ethnically cleansed not for anything | |
| they did, but what religion they were. And so I think it was | |
| the right thing to do. | |
| Afghanistan was something that was the result of 9/11. The | |
| murderers came out of Afghanistan. I think the war kind of--the | |
| purpose of having troops there changed at a certain point. I do | |
| not think there was enough discussion about it. And I think | |
| that--I hope now that whatever agreements are made benefit the | |
| Afghan people and that it is done in a good way. | |
| Libya was an interesting example because, in fact, there is | |
| a new concept about responsibility to protect, which, if you | |
| know, that the leader of a country is killing his own people or | |
| calls them cockroaches, whether the international community has | |
| some responsibility for it. But I think you raise a very | |
| important point, which is that it is not just the moment of the | |
| force but what you do, how long you are there, do you continue | |
| to discuss it, and the decisionmaking process to what extent | |
| are the other parts of our government involved in it and not | |
| just doing it through the Defense Department. So I think you | |
| raise a very, very important point. | |
| Ms. Omar. Thank you. For the remainder of my time, I wanted | |
| to speak about some of the other tools that you mentioned, the | |
| tool of using sanctions. You know, some scholars and | |
| practitioners of foreign policy have questioned whether | |
| sanctions are effective at changing the behaviors of certain | |
| governments. There is also a perception that sanctions are | |
| easily avoidable by the rich and the powerful, individuals that | |
| we target in using those sanctions. | |
| So I wanted to ask you, do you believe that there is a risk | |
| in enacting sanctions because of the real and perceived harm | |
| done to the people of the country? Is it possible that the use | |
| of sanctions undercuts our national security by furthering | |
| anti-Americanism in the countries we target with sanctions? | |
| Ms. Albright. I cannot wait to go back to my class and tell | |
| them the questions you asked, because I talked about sanctions | |
| as a tool on Monday in class, and part of the thing is that | |
| there are not enough tools. We are the most powerful country in | |
| the world, and there are not a lot of tools. And sanctions get | |
| chosen often as kind of the middle tool. More bite than | |
| diplomacy, less bite than force. | |
| We have learned a lot about sanctions. We have learned that | |
| comprehensive sanctions, which we did in Iraq, hurt the people, | |
| and began to look more at targeted or smart sanctions. I think | |
| there are times they do work because what you are trying to do | |
| is change the behavior of a country. They need to be assessed | |
| at various times. | |
| The question is when do you remove them? Who is really | |
| affected by them? But it goes back to another whole question, | |
| is, does the United States get involved when we see terrible | |
| things happening in a country? Do we have a responsible | |
| international role? And I do believe in the importance of | |
| American action, and the question is which tool you choose. But | |
| they need to be assessed. It needs to be discussed about how | |
| they work together, which ones do you use when. | |
| But sanctions are often the tool of choice for obvious | |
| reasons, but I do think they need to be assessed in terms of | |
| whom who they really affect. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Allred. | |
| Ms. Omar. Thank you for your question. Thank your for | |
| giving me the extra time. I really appreciate it. Thank you. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you. | |
| Chairman Engel. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Allred. | |
| Mr. Allred. Hello, Madam Secretary. It is good to see you | |
| again. Thank you for being here today. I want to just say that | |
| I think that your story is the epitome of the American dream. | |
| And to anyone who is watching, who does not know your story, I | |
| would encourage them to learn about what brought you to the | |
| United States and the work that you have done here. And I want | |
| to thank you for a lifetime of service to our country. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you. | |
| Mr. Allred. And, you know, I am increasingly concerned that | |
| future Madeleine Albrights might not see their future in the | |
| United States, that our light abroad is dimming. | |
| And I represent an area that is deeply tied to our foreign | |
| relations and our foreign affairs. We are an area that has | |
| benefited from trade, and so when we pull back from trade or | |
| enact tariffs, it hurts my region. It hurts our economy. We are | |
| an area, and I have spoken with a lot of business leaders in my | |
| community who want the best and the brightest in the world to | |
| come to north Texas and to work in our businesses there, and | |
| they are deeply concerned at the decrease in foreign students | |
| coming to some of our universities. And Texas, of course, has | |
| some of the largest ports in the country, and in north Texas, | |
| we have one of the largest airports in DFW. So we are an | |
| international hub. And so what happens in our foreign affairs | |
| deeply affects my district and my State. | |
| And I wanted to ask you, and I know you have worked on this | |
| and spoken about this, and maybe you have spoken about it | |
| today, and I might have missed it. But I wanted to ask you what | |
| we can do in Congress to better inform the American people | |
| about the effect of our foreign policy on our domestic | |
| tranquility. | |
| Ms. Albright. I have to say it is the key point of all of | |
| this. We are such a large country and think that we are not | |
| affected by foreign policy. And one of the things that I have | |
| tried to do is make foreign policy less foreign in order to | |
| have people understand that our well-being depends on having | |
| international relations, in having a foreign policy. And so I | |
| do think that what is very important to do is to spend time | |
| explaining in everybody's district which is how are you | |
| benefited by trade or foreign policy, or if there is terrorism | |
| somewhere, to hope that it does not come to America, any number | |
| of different aspects of it. | |
| And I have said--and I am happy to repeat this in front of | |
| everybody--I am very willing to go to people's districts to try | |
| to explain why foreign policy affects our domestic life, that | |
| in this day and age, every American is somehow affected by what | |
| happens abroad. And for us to build walls or put--or moats or | |
| whatever undermines what we need in the world, is to be able to | |
| connect with other people. And trade is good for America, and | |
| technology, development, and any number of things, but we need | |
| to explain it better. | |
| I definitely--it is a vital part and most important for all | |
| of you. You are the ones that represent America, and so I think | |
| it is very important. I am happy to help in whatever way I can. | |
| Mr. Allred. Well, thank you, Madam Secretary. You are | |
| welcome in Dallas any time. We would love to have you, | |
| especially with some of my high schools, to talk about the work | |
| that you have done and how important our foreign policy is to | |
| what we are doing on a day-to-day basis. | |
| Ms. Albright. And the young people make all the difference. | |
| By the way, in my book, I always say there is not a speech or a | |
| book that is written that does not quote Robert Frost. So he | |
| said, the older I am, the younger are my teachers. And I am | |
| learning from my students, but I am very happy to go and be | |
| helpful. | |
| Mr. Allred. Yes. Well, thank you. And in my remaining time, | |
| I just want to address another theme that I think that has been | |
| discussed today, which is American withdrawal from | |
| international leadership. And I know you have maintained your | |
| connections. You were at the Munich conference recently, and I | |
| just want to ask, do you think that the damage that has been | |
| done is irreversible? And what concrete steps do you think | |
| Congress should be taking in these next 2 years to continue to | |
| repair some of those relationships and restore trust abroad? | |
| Ms. Albright. It is not irreversible, but it requires | |
| contact and experience, which is why I think having so many of | |
| you go to the Munich Security Conference as being very | |
| important. And I also hope that you all meet with your | |
| counterparts, parliamentarians from other countries. At the | |
| National Democratic Institute we are very interested in rule of | |
| law in the role of the legislative branches. And I just flat | |
| out invite you now to come with us on some of our election | |
| observing missions and to do a variety of things. They need to | |
| see what America really looks like and how you want to be | |
| helpful in this and that we need to have leadership. | |
| So please, I think it is a very--codels. I was talking | |
| about that earlier. I think it is a very important part. There | |
| was a time that there were Members of Congress that were proud | |
| not to have passports. Please, you know. So I do think you guys | |
| need to get out there. So any time. | |
| Mr. Allred. Thank you Madam Secretary. | |
| Thank you, Mr. Chairman--or Madam Chair. | |
| Ms. Spanberger [presiding]. The chair recognizes the | |
| gentleman from Maryland, Mr. Trone. | |
| Mr. Trone. Madam Secretary, thank you again for your | |
| patience today. It has been a long day today. | |
| Ms. Albright. It is a lot of fun, I have to say. | |
| Mr. Trone. I have been really struck by your tremendous | |
| leadership with compassion, leadership with civility, and | |
| leadership and bipartisanship. And I will tell you, that is all | |
| in short supply here. | |
| Ms. Albright. Yes. | |
| Mr. Trone. So thank you very, very much. We talked about, | |
| followup on Mr. Malinowski's point earlier, about America's | |
| reputation. We think about how President Trump in Venezuela has | |
| held them to standards, held Maduro and held his feet to the | |
| fire, but at the same time, to juxtapose that in the | |
| Philippines, in Russia, in Korea. We have had elections stolen. | |
| We have not held anybody to the fire of truth. And do you think | |
| that lack of consistency causes us irreparable harm to our | |
| reputation? | |
| Ms. Albright. I think it does, and it is very hard to | |
| follow. I mean, the hard part is to figure out what the | |
| strategy really is, and even though there is documents--I mean, | |
| what I found interesting is that the Trump administration put | |
| out its National Security Strategy very early. The question is | |
| to what extent is it being followed. And we do confuse people | |
| very much. And I think it goes to the points about trust, what | |
| our leadership role is, what our relationships are, and I do | |
| think consistency is something that would help. | |
| Mr. Trone. Yes. It really drives at competence at the end | |
| of the day. | |
| Talk about Saudi Arabia a second. I have been concerned | |
| that--you mentioned earlier the bone saw. The situation with | |
| Khashoggi. We think about what has happened with Qatar. We | |
| think about the dissidents that have disappeared in Saudi | |
| Arabia and taken away. We think about the theft of probably | |
| $100 billion from other Saudis locked in the hotel. We think | |
| about the Prime Minister of Lebanon who has been kidnapped. And | |
| then we think about Yemen; over 100,000 folks are dead, | |
| probably 20-some million on the brink of starvation. We have a | |
| 33-year-old Crown Prince that is--you know, the country has | |
| been our ally, but we have a tremendous amount of arrogance, | |
| perhaps driven by age, perhaps driven by wealth beyond | |
| imagination. | |
| What should we be doing about this? Should we just say, oh, | |
| it is OK, and let it go? Because once we do that, my concern | |
| is, for 50 years, your grandchildren and their grandchildren | |
| will have to deal with this. | |
| Ms. Albright. I think the hard part about State craft is | |
| trying to figure out how you say what is your value system, | |
| what you believe, everything, and at the same time, recognize | |
| that sometimes you have to have a relationship with a | |
| leadership that you disrespect or do not like or whatever. I | |
| think we need to make very clear that the actions that you have | |
| talked about are unacceptable, and at the same time, try to | |
| keep a relationship with Saudi Arabia. That is very hard. That | |
| does not mean selling arms to them, but trying to sort out how | |
| you can do both things, you know, kind of this, at the same | |
| time. | |
| And basically, I do think that we need to keep calling out | |
| what happened on Khashoggi and what our intelligence | |
| communities have been saying and not deny that those kind of | |
| things are going on. But it is Franklin Roosevelt who | |
| established the relationship with Saudi Arabia. Never was | |
| simple. We need to figure out where we have to tell it like it | |
| is and, at the same time, maintain some relationship. | |
| I have felt it is a mistake always to cutoff relations with | |
| a country or not have that conversation, because that is what | |
| diplomacy is about. | |
| Mr. Trone. I agree with you. I think we need to continue | |
| the conversations and be relenting in our open discussion of | |
| what was right and what was not right, but at the same time, I | |
| do not think we should just accept the fact that this behavior | |
| can go on unchecked. | |
| Ms. Albright. No. I agree. And I think kind of having | |
| normal, smiley discussions with the Crown Prince is not the way | |
| to go. | |
| Mr. Trone. Anything we can do to mitigate the damage to the | |
| America First policies? | |
| Ms. Albright. I think by recognizing that we believe in | |
| partnership with others, but that is again--I do not mean to | |
| put everything on your shoulders, but I really do think that | |
| the role of Congress in this is key. And when you all can | |
| explain what we are really about, I think it makes a big | |
| difference. Your role in all national security policy and the | |
| kinds of things that people say. And I do think one of the | |
| aspects in terms of understanding that America, actually, we | |
| are great, and that our greatness has come from understanding | |
| partnerships and respecting our friends and allies. | |
| Mr. Trone. Thank you, ma'am. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you. | |
| Ms. Spanberger. The chair recognizes my friend from | |
| Pennsylvania, Representative Houlahan. | |
| Ms. Houlahan. Thank you, Madam Chair. | |
| And thank you, Secretary Albright, for coming. It is a | |
| pleasure to see you again and a real privilege to have this | |
| conversation. | |
| I have two separate questions that are fairly disparate, so | |
| I am hoping that I have enough time to get to both. The first | |
| one has to do with women and girls and particularly the fact in | |
| 2019, Fiscal Year 2019, we appropriated $10 million to fund the | |
| Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women's Issues, and apparently | |
| this position still remains open to this day. So I am wondering | |
| if you could be helpful in elevating what it is that this | |
| special envoy should do and why we should continue to fund this | |
| initiative given that it has not been filled. | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, I have to say that when I became | |
| Secretary, I was the first Secretary to put women's issue | |
| central to American foreign policy, not just because I am a | |
| feminist, but because I know that when women are politically | |
| and economically empowered, societies are more stable. Then the | |
| whole position was created, which I think is very important. | |
| And frankly, you know, in most countries, more than half the | |
| population is female, and so we are undercutting our own | |
| national interests by undermining that. | |
| I also do think--and by the way, what I am very proud that | |
| the National Democratic Institute does is support women | |
| candidates in--across the board in countries and trying to | |
| figure out how to be helpful when they are harassed in their | |
| countries, working with the United Nations on that. So I think | |
| that we need to see the issue from two ways. One is what makes | |
| it better for U.S. national interests, and then obviously the | |
| fact that I do think that the world is better off when women | |
| are equally empowered. | |
| Ms. Houlahan. I could not agree with you more. And my | |
| second line of questioning has to do more with cyber and bio | |
| security and a little bit about what you talked about in your | |
| opening testimony regarding sort of the decimation of the State | |
| Department. I had the privilege of going to the Pentagon on | |
| Monday for almost a full day tour, and a very senior ranking | |
| member of the Secretary of Defense's office was asked about the | |
| state of the relationship between the Pentagon and the State | |
| Department, and he said it had never been better in his entire | |
| career. And he thought that there were no problems and no | |
| hiccups in their relationship. | |
| And so I would love it if you could talk a little bit about | |
| the sort of line level and staff level state of affairs in the | |
| State Department, and also how it relates to cybersecurity and | |
| our ability to stay secure in that space. | |
| Ms. Albright. I do think the importance of a relationship | |
| between State and Defense is essential. And one of the things | |
| that I have to say, Secretary Mattis said that if the State | |
| Department was not funded, he would have to get more ammunition | |
| and a real understanding of that relationship. | |
| I do think that across the levels there are a lot of | |
| department discussions between State and Defense. I think the | |
| problem at the moment is that some of the people in the Defense | |
| Department do not have a counterpart in the State Department | |
| and that they end up then doing what State should be doing, | |
| Defense begins to do. And so I do think--and this goes back | |
| again to the funding of the State Department and having people | |
| there. I also do think that specifically on areas like cyber, | |
| which obviously have a lot of technical aspects to them, also | |
| have diplomatic parts in terms of negotiating with other | |
| countries about what is acceptable, what is not. The question | |
| about Huawei, for instance, or how the Russians are using their | |
| asymmetrical tools in countries and then the diplomatic part. | |
| So we have those two departments for a reason, but one is | |
| operating--I have to say I am for a strong defense, but the | |
| difference in terms of $700 billion and something just under | |
| $60 billion is a little off base. | |
| Ms. Houlahan. I very much appreciate your time. And I yield | |
| back the balance of my time to madam chair. | |
| Ms. Spanberger. The chair recognizes the gentleman from | |
| Virginia. | |
| Mr. Connolly. I thank the gentlelady from Virginia, and I | |
| am proud to call her madam chair. | |
| And welcome, Secretary Albright. Great to see you again. I | |
| think I saw you a little over a week ago in Munich at the | |
| security conference. And I do not know about you, but I was | |
| really struck by sort of the evolution in reactions among our | |
| allies in Europe to the evolution of diplomatic and foreign | |
| policy here in the United States. I would say 2 years ago, | |
| there was anxiety, there was consternation. There were | |
| questions. There was the seeking of reassurance. This time, led | |
| by the Chancellor of Germany herself, Angela Merkel, I saw a | |
| sort of anger and defiance and resistance, frankly, to the | |
| abrogation of U.S. leadership and the evisceration of policies | |
| and treaties that were, in fact, initiated by and presided over | |
| by the United States. | |
| I do not mean to put words in your mouth, but that was my | |
| observation. Big, big change in 2 years in terms of where our | |
| allies are vis--vis current United States foreign policy. And I | |
| think Mr. Pence, the Vice President of the United States, got a | |
| dose of that with the complete and utter silence in response to | |
| his speech, unlike Angela Merkel who criticized the United | |
| States specifically on JCPOA, on the Paris climate accord, on | |
| even naming a German auto manufacturer a threat to the national | |
| security, and she got a standing ovation. | |
| Your observation. | |
| Ms. Albright. I have been to many of the meetings, and I | |
| was appalled at what was going on in terms of kind of a sense | |
| of, who are these people? What happened to America? And I was | |
| so glad that you all were there, because I think that it made | |
| really clear that we did care, but it was as a result of kind | |
| of an American approach to things, of bullying and name calling | |
| and not understanding what the role is. | |
| I am not saying the Europeans are always easy to work with, | |
| but I do think that this was particularly an uncomfortable | |
| time, an embarrassment, if I might put it that way. I have seen | |
| some official releases of a transcript of the Vice President's | |
| speech, and you know how they often have in parentheses--it had | |
| parentheses, applause, and I thought where the--you know, who | |
| wrote that? So I do think that it was an embarrassing kind of | |
| time, and I do think it is an important convocation of people. | |
| And so the fact that you were there made a big difference, but | |
| your analysis of it totally matches mine. | |
| Mr. Connolly. I thank you, Madam Secretary. If I may, in my | |
| remaining time, I want to talk about refugees. One of the most | |
| disturbing aspects, among many, in the foreign policy of this | |
| administration is its hostility toward refugees. Here we are, | |
| you know, the Statue of Liberty. You come from a refugee | |
| family, Madam Secretary, as do millions of Americans, and yet | |
| we have gone from 100,000 level of refugees under the last year | |
| of the previous administration to a ceiling, a proposed ceiling | |
| of 30,000---- | |
| Ms. Albright. Yes. | |
| Mr. Connolly [continuing]. In this next fiscal year. What | |
| is wrong with that? What is wrong with limiting the number of | |
| refugees? And what are the consequences of doing that, from | |
| your point of view having served, of course, as Secretary of | |
| State? | |
| Ms. Albright. Well, first of all, I think it is inhumane | |
| toward the people that want to come in and the many refugees | |
| that have been created, and so I think it is, frankly, un- | |
| American. We are a humane society. People want to be helpful to | |
| each other. | |
| I think that the other part that makes it a problem, and we | |
| are not the only country, I think, that is being less than | |
| generous on this. It makes it very hard when America says you | |
| need to let in more people, and meanwhile, we are cutting our | |
| own numbers. So we are losing our authority on it. | |
| I do think it is very important for there to be some | |
| comprehensive immigration legislation. I think it is a | |
| complicated issue, and as you know, there are distinctions | |
| between refugees and immigrants and a number of different | |
| aspects. And there are a lot of studies that have been done, I | |
| have been a part of a lot, and how technology can now help in | |
| identifying people, any number of things. And there is a | |
| commission--I will be very happy to send that report over. | |
| But I am appalled, frankly. And I describe myself as a | |
| grateful American. And everything about the possibility of | |
| having come here as an 11-year-old and understanding democracy | |
| in America's role. So I do think we need to do something to | |
| really not have the Statue of Liberty weep. | |
| Mr. Connolly. And speaking of that, and then I will end, | |
| but I welcome your support. I have introduced a bill called the | |
| Lady Liberty Act, picking up what you said, which, by the way, | |
| is H.R. 6909, and that would say, oh, no, no. The President | |
| gets to set the limit, as he does currently; however, that | |
| limit can never fall below 100,000. | |
| Ms. Albright. Yes. | |
| Mr. Connolly. And I welcome your input, if not your | |
| support, on trying to get that bill to the floor. I thank you. | |
| And thank you, Madam Chairman. | |
| Ms. Albright. Thank you for doing that. | |
| Ms. Spanberger. I will recognize myself for 5 minutes. | |
| And, Secretary Albright, it is such an honor to have you | |
| here with us today. I thank you for your time, and I thank you | |
| for the opportunity to ask a few questions. | |
| I am a former intelligence officer, and some of the | |
| greatest accomplishments of my life have been knowing that the | |
| information I was out collecting would inform our diplomats and | |
| our policymakers on issues that are complicated and difficult | |
| and nuanced. And last week--or last month, excuse me, following | |
| the intelligence chief's annual threat testimony, you said you | |
| were stunned by the President's immediate and vehement | |
| dismissal of their assessments and by his overall regular | |
| attacks on the integrity and the trade craft of American | |
| intelligence officers. | |
| I am deeply concerned about what appears to be a growing | |
| disconnect between our political and our intelligence leaders, | |
| in particular, because I see that it undermines the ability of | |
| our lawmakers, of our diplomats, of American leadership to make | |
| informed, strong, quality decisions based on intelligence that | |
| was collected by people, by Americans who risked their lives to | |
| get it. And in light of this week's summit on North Korea, my | |
| question is, do you have an opinion of how we as Members of | |
| Congress can help ensure that the White House is receiving and | |
| considering the intelligence as part of the administration's | |
| policy formulation? And if that is not possible, as a former | |
| diplomat and as a teacher, do you have recommendations for what | |
| we as Members of Congress and as those with a platform within | |
| our own communities can do to ensure that the American | |
| population understands the value of intelligence in the way | |
| that it informs and the value of diplomacy in the way that it | |
| helps protect our communities and the way that it is a vital | |
| portion of our national security efforts? | |
| Ms. Albright. It is a key part of our national security | |
| efforts, and I had--well, first of all, what I truly miss not | |
| being in the government is the intelligence. And I would read | |
| the papers, and then I would come into my office, and there | |
| would be the State Department INR part, and then the | |
| intelligence person would come in and brief me, and read the | |
| PDB and all kinds of things, and I always thought, gosh, I wish | |
| I could spend hours all day doing this. But the greatest | |
| respect for the intelligence community. Leon Panetta at the | |
| time asked me to be on the CIA External Advisory Board, which I | |
| did with General Petraeus and John Brennan. I am no longer on | |
| that, but it was a way to understand what the intelligence | |
| community did. | |
| And I think something that is very important in terms of | |
| all the work that is done on open source and all the | |
| information that is out there, and it is impossible for the | |
| government to operate without having that kind of knowledge. | |
| And I think that what needs to happen is obviously the funding | |
| of the intelligence community, but also the respect for the | |
| intelligence community. And I think one of the things that the | |
| External Advisory Board was there to do, because that is what | |
| Panetta thought, was to try to explain it more to Americans. | |
| And I think that that needs to happen, is that it should not-- | |
| not the product so much but the fact that it is important. How | |
| can you possibly make policy without both kinds of | |
| intelligence, frankly? But I think that it is very important. | |
| And I think your coming here and being a Member of Congress | |
| is also a very important part in terms of being able to explain | |
| what it really does. So I will do my best to keep talking about | |
| the importance of intelligence. | |
| Ms. Spanberger. Well, thank you, Madam Secretary, for your | |
| comments, for your insights, and your continued service to our | |
| country. | |
| Thank you to the members of this committee. The hearing is | |
| now adjourned. | |
| [Whereupon, at 1:01 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] | |
| APPENDIX | |
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