:00:00. > :00:00.from 29 officers to four. They will continue to follow focus lines of
:00:07. > :00:12.enquiry. Now it is time for HARDtalk.
:00:13. > :00:20.Welcome to HARDtalk. By the time George W Bush left the White House,
:00:21. > :00:26.perceptions of the United States in the wider world were overwhelmingly
:00:27. > :00:32.negative. As the Obama presidency enters its final phase, how have
:00:33. > :00:36.attitudes shifted? A greater focus on soft, rather than hard power. A
:00:37. > :00:42.yes we can commitment to heal political wounds at home and abroad.
:00:43. > :00:47.My guest today is the US ambassador to the UK, Matthew Barzun, a close
:00:48. > :01:16.ally of Obama. Has the promise been fulfilled?
:01:17. > :01:25.Ambassador Matthew Barzun, welcome to HARDtalk. Thank you for having
:01:26. > :01:32.me. Why bad it is your job to explain the policies adopted by the
:01:33. > :01:38.US government. -- It is your job. It is part of the job. The other part
:01:39. > :01:42.of the job is to listen to what the people of the UK are thinking and
:01:43. > :01:46.feeling. What about the idea that the US government may be doing
:01:47. > :01:55.things that are difficult for you to feel good about yourself? How does
:01:56. > :02:01.that make you feel? Most of the time I do things I am proud of. We are
:02:02. > :02:05.trying to make the world more peaceful, more prosperous and more
:02:06. > :02:10.just. Those things are hard to do but sometimes I am in the position
:02:11. > :02:15.of having difficult conversations about difficult subjects but that is
:02:16. > :02:20.all part of it. What is different in your position compared with the
:02:21. > :02:24.senior diplomats in other countries, you are a political appointee. You
:02:25. > :02:30.got your job because you are a friend, an ally of, a help of Barack
:02:31. > :02:37.Obama. He trusted you and wanted to give you a top appointment. That
:02:38. > :02:44.makes you a political appointees rather than a career diplomat. When
:02:45. > :02:50.you hear senior American politicians coming to Europe, saying, I do not
:02:51. > :02:57.believe that Barack Obama truly loves America, how do you feel when
:02:58. > :02:59.you hear that? We have lots of Americans coming through London and
:03:00. > :03:05.exercising their free speech and saying things. In that case, he is
:03:06. > :03:13.certainly saying something I do not agree with. Of course he loves his
:03:14. > :03:19.country. He demonstrates that every single day in the most amazing way.
:03:20. > :03:25.It is an extraordinary thing for a senior politician to say of their
:03:26. > :03:29.own president. It sort of suggests a poisonous, political atmosphere in
:03:30. > :03:34.Washington. I wonder whether you feel that atmosphere is damaging to
:03:35. > :03:41.America abroad. I think it is hard to get excited about political
:03:42. > :03:46.vitriol in our nation's the door. That is not a healthy thing. It is
:03:47. > :03:51.important to put it into perspective. Our democratic system
:03:52. > :03:59.is loud and confrontational. If you look back to 1800 and John Adams,
:04:00. > :04:07.the first guy we sent here as an Amnesty, it was pretty tough. Back
:04:08. > :04:15.then it was pretty tough. It works for us but you can go over the line
:04:16. > :04:20.in questioning someone's patriotism. Crossed a line. You talk about
:04:21. > :04:25.vitriol there is in the American political system. That are similar
:04:26. > :04:28.tensions in other systems. Right now it is election season in the United
:04:29. > :04:33.States and you are watching it very closely. In Europe, we are. I was in
:04:34. > :04:37.conference the other day and there was a live satellite linkup with
:04:38. > :04:42.Donald Trump, currently front runner in all the polls for the Republican
:04:43. > :04:49.nomination. He said to the assembled audience, the problem is, when
:04:50. > :04:55.Barack Obama sits in a room with, Putin has absolutely no respect for
:04:56. > :05:00.Barack Obama. Again, as a US ambassador representing the US
:05:01. > :05:05.government, do you worry about the respect that Obama commands around
:05:06. > :05:10.the world? I wake up every single day and do this wonderful job,
:05:11. > :05:14.working for the president, working for the United States. I see and I
:05:15. > :05:19.hear every single day the respect that people in the UK have for the
:05:20. > :05:23.job he is doing. That fact is, I do not want to get dragged into
:05:24. > :05:30.domestic politics back home, a key part of the job is that I do not get
:05:31. > :05:32.into party politics back home. I am not responding to any particular
:05:33. > :05:37.comments you may just have mentioned. President Obama from day
:05:38. > :05:42.one has been clear that America has two lead and he will lead. How he
:05:43. > :05:46.leads and his style of leadership, which is important in his working,
:05:47. > :05:52.is different from how others will do it. Let's judge it by its fruits.
:05:53. > :05:57.You talk about the commitment to leave. Perhaps the signature
:05:58. > :06:02.commitment at the beginning of the pregnancy -- presidency was to
:06:03. > :06:07.disentangle America from commitments he felt were counter-productive. I
:06:08. > :06:12.went back and read his first inaugural. I was with 2 million
:06:13. > :06:17.others on a cold, January day. He talks about rebuilding alliances and
:06:18. > :06:23.working with old friends and former foes. He says a great and powerful
:06:24. > :06:28.line. We will extend our hands if you unclench your fist. So, in all
:06:29. > :06:32.of those examples he realised the threats we face as a country and the
:06:33. > :06:37.opportunity to be had in front of us, all of them require American
:06:38. > :06:44.leadership. America cannot do them on their own, nor can they dumb
:06:45. > :06:51.about be done -- nor can they be done without American leadership.
:06:52. > :06:56.When he fulfilled his commitment to pull US forces out of Iraq, in
:06:57. > :07:03.retrospect it look like something of a mistake. US forces are now back in
:07:04. > :07:08.Iraq as advisers, thousands of them. That is true. Let's remember how
:07:09. > :07:16.that happened. The democratically elected government of Iraq asked us
:07:17. > :07:20.to leave. Now, the democratically elected government asked us to
:07:21. > :07:25.return. The US government also had the decision to take, whether it was
:07:26. > :07:29.going to act lead to a request to leave, which could have been
:07:30. > :07:33.political, or whether the Americans felt, baby in Afghanistan this is
:07:34. > :07:38.relevant as well, that there needed to be a long-term and military
:07:39. > :07:42.commitment to the safeguarding of these countries and whether Obama
:07:43. > :07:47.believed he could disengage and has had to learn through bitter
:07:48. > :07:56.experience. It is not as simple as that. I I disagree that
:07:57. > :08:01.disengagement was his approach from the beginning. That's good back to
:08:02. > :08:10.2009, there was an economic crisis and two major ground operations.
:08:11. > :08:14.What he said at the time was, being on a perpetual war footing with
:08:15. > :08:18.major ground troops is not sustainable. It is not sustainable
:08:19. > :08:27.economically and it is not sustainable for us. It is not a
:08:28. > :08:34.healthy thing. He talked about specific terrorist networks trying
:08:35. > :08:43.to help -- hurt us and our allies. It was about having a sustainable
:08:44. > :08:48.way to keep us safe. It is about having partnerships with people like
:08:49. > :08:53.the Government in Afghanistan. We can help them train Armed Forces so
:08:54. > :08:59.they can secure themselves. Then the much less glamorous work of building
:09:00. > :09:05.rule of law and capacity so they can become safe, secure and stable. What
:09:06. > :09:08.is the message from Syria? You are sitting in Europe, representing the
:09:09. > :09:16.United States. The message from a banner in 2012 was that President
:09:17. > :09:23.Assad must go. If he uses chemical weapons, we will respond militarily.
:09:24. > :09:29.He actually said, if a side uses chemical weapons, that will change
:09:30. > :09:35.my calculus. That represents a red line for us. What then does that
:09:36. > :09:45.mean? Our goal has not changed. We maintain we do not think sad can
:09:46. > :09:52.play -- President Assad can play a future in Syria. We stand by what we
:09:53. > :09:55.said those years ago that he cannot remain. I go back to the point I
:09:56. > :10:03.made about Vladimir Putin and he right now appears to be acting,
:10:04. > :10:06.rather than reacting, in a host of international arenas we are talking
:10:07. > :10:13.about. Vladimir Putin sent in bombers big-time. Look at the data.
:10:14. > :10:19.Since the Russians started their intervention in Syria, serious
:10:20. > :10:25.intervention, US bombing raids in Syria have fallen in the bar as the
:10:26. > :10:32.Russian military action in Syria has exponentially risen. It does look
:10:33. > :10:39.like Putin is calling the shots. Absolutely not. You see Russia
:10:40. > :10:44.reacting in a way that is quite predictable. They have been trying
:10:45. > :10:51.to prop up residence Assad for some time. Publicly privately we have
:10:52. > :10:56.been encouraging them to stop. What you see right now is not leadership.
:10:57. > :11:00.It is a mistake for any of us to think it is leadership, coming in
:11:01. > :11:06.and dropping bombs. On the positive side, Russia could be hugely helpful
:11:07. > :11:11.in two ways. They could be really helpful by helping to bring
:11:12. > :11:15.together, we have a meeting on Friday, they do, in Vienna, to bring
:11:16. > :11:20.a political solution. They are saying the right things. There is a
:11:21. > :11:27.military solution that is raspberry is not a military solution to what
:11:28. > :11:32.is happening in Syria. There is a political solution. They could be
:11:33. > :11:39.helpful to joining the coalition of countries and organisations we had
:11:40. > :11:49.built under the leadership of President Obama to destroy Isil.
:11:50. > :11:53.Messages are being sent from Washington and now not being heeded
:11:54. > :11:57.in Moscow. It comes back to the broad theme I put out at the
:11:58. > :12:02.beginning of this interview, where does America's standing in the world
:12:03. > :12:07.sit today? How did it compare when Obama took over in the White House?
:12:08. > :12:12.Would you not acknowledge that many people around the world look at, for
:12:13. > :12:17.example, a relationship between Obama and Putin today and they do
:12:18. > :12:26.wonder whether the United States is able to project power and its
:12:27. > :12:28.interest in the way it used to? Let's talk about the 55 nation
:12:29. > :12:40.coalition against Isil. That is American leadership. President Obama
:12:41. > :12:44.drew attention to the problem and that is leadership. Look at Russian
:12:45. > :12:49.aggression in Ukraine and the United States leadership with the UK and
:12:50. > :12:58.others in getting together to impose real costs and consequences. Has the
:12:59. > :13:02.US-led coalition allies in the sanctions programme against Russia,
:13:03. > :13:05.have they succeeded in rolling back the annexation of Crimea and
:13:06. > :13:12.removing Russian influence in eastern Ukraine? Yellow magnet let's
:13:13. > :13:18.look at what has happened in the Russian economy. -- Let's look at
:13:19. > :13:22.what happened. The economy went down from 2 trillion to 1.2. Everything
:13:23. > :13:27.you want to see as a country going up is going down and things like
:13:28. > :13:32.borrowing costs are going down. It is not working. That is not
:13:33. > :13:36.leadership. It is reaction from a position of weakness. John Kerry
:13:37. > :13:42.talks to Foreign Minister said gay lover of a lot there will be a
:13:43. > :13:54.chance for Russia to do it has been doing. -- Sergei Lavrov. We have
:13:55. > :13:59.seen terrible images of the refugee crisis. There is another arena over
:14:00. > :14:04.which the United States is trying to project power and that is the South
:14:05. > :14:08.China Sea. One of the strategic choices of President Obama was to
:14:09. > :14:13.focus on Asia. Some called it the pivot to Asia. This is what a state
:14:14. > :14:18.owned newspaper is saying today about the US warships ploughing
:14:19. > :14:22.their way through a channel very close to these newly created islands
:14:23. > :14:29.in the South China Sea that China claims as its own. The US cannot
:14:30. > :14:34.finish the situation in Iraq or Afghanistan it is only to make noise
:14:35. > :14:40.against Russia. It has failed to achieve anything in Syria and cannot
:14:41. > :14:43.really take down Pyongyang. China has not provoked this crisis in the
:14:44. > :14:51.South China Sea but it is obvious that the US truly is only a paper
:14:52. > :14:56.tiger. Needless to say, I could not disagree more strongly with those
:14:57. > :15:03.statements. I wonder how alarmed you are that this feeling is spreading.
:15:04. > :15:13.Were just hosted the Chinese delegation in Washington. -- we have
:15:14. > :15:18.just hosted. We have areas of real disagreement. What you saw, and it
:15:19. > :15:22.comes to without getting into military details of how the Navy
:15:23. > :15:26.works, every single year, as a matter of routine, our Navy goes
:15:27. > :15:32.around the world in international waters, which that was, to keep open
:15:33. > :15:35.the free flow of navigation. That is a core principle and one of the
:15:36. > :15:41.major functions of our Navy and other people's navies to go and do
:15:42. > :15:45.that. We should not take it for granted. The United States benefits
:15:46. > :15:49.and the whole world economy benefits from keeping those lines open. Our
:15:50. > :15:55.position has not changed. We do not weigh in to territorial disputes.
:15:56. > :16:00.What we do weigh in on is, we cannot do this through coercion. There is
:16:01. > :16:05.an international law that these things can be resolved peacefully
:16:06. > :16:10.and not through coercion. We have talked about US strategy with regard
:16:11. > :16:16.to rivals, let's talk about allies. Use it here in London as one of the
:16:17. > :16:20.most senior diplomats on top of America's relationships with allies
:16:21. > :16:25.in Europe. When you look at the European Union today, we have had
:16:26. > :16:28.disarray over the years then and now we have disarray over the massive
:16:29. > :16:38.migration challenge that faces the European Union. Do you, as a senior
:16:39. > :16:41.American diplomat, worry about the ability of Europe to respond to
:16:42. > :16:46.today's challenges? With specific reference to the migrant crisis kite
:16:47. > :16:50.you look at those images and you think first of the families in
:16:51. > :16:54.crisis. Then you think about communities and friends in Europe
:16:55. > :16:59.receiving them by the thousands and thousands and thousands. My first
:17:00. > :17:03.reaction is empathy for what the refugees are going through and what
:17:04. > :17:08.these municipalities are going through. What the leaders of these
:17:09. > :17:14.organisations are trying to do to make sense of it and deal with the
:17:15. > :17:19.humanitarian crisis. Do you think the United States needs to do more
:17:20. > :17:26.as well? President Obama has been clear, as has John Kerry. We have
:17:27. > :17:30.done a lot historically and we have to do more and are doing more. The
:17:31. > :17:34.British government is not even from taking refugees inside your about
:17:35. > :17:40.once to focus on camps in the region. It has committed to 20,000
:17:41. > :17:46.refugees by 2020. What is the number the United States will commit to
:17:47. > :17:50.take? We have opted to 10000 and working with Congress to get the
:17:51. > :17:56.number increased for the following year. That is not many people, is
:17:57. > :18:04.it? We would like to do more and we are doing more. Absolutely. If you
:18:05. > :18:08.look back to 1980, the United States through the United Nations refugee
:18:09. > :18:13.system has taken 4 million refugees, more than any other country in the
:18:14. > :18:16.world. We will stand up to any country and generously welcomed
:18:17. > :18:21.refugees. What we are seeing is not the normal, annual flow of refugees.
:18:22. > :18:26.It is draining the systems of all of these places. We are doing more to
:18:27. > :18:32.react to that. And we are trying to get to the root cause. Not everyone
:18:33. > :18:41.is coming from Syria. Look what is happening in Syria! That is the
:18:42. > :18:47.fault of Assad. Half the country is displaced. If you think at Lebanon,
:18:48. > :18:59.Turkey, what they are going through, what people" are going through... We
:19:00. > :19:04.need a political solution to end the conflict. We have heard about
:19:05. > :19:08.meetings that will happen in Vienna on Friday with stakeholders, who
:19:09. > :19:13.care about that, differing opinions within that group, to be sure. But
:19:14. > :19:19.to try to get to a political solution. That is what is going to
:19:20. > :19:24.bring stability to the people of Syria, so that most of them want to
:19:25. > :19:27.move home. As Europe and the United States wrestles with Syria, there
:19:28. > :19:34.are other things you need to be aware of. There is to be, by the end
:19:35. > :19:39.of 2017, a referendum here in the UK, on whether to walk away from the
:19:40. > :19:43.European Union. Let me quote to you words of Philip Gordon, former
:19:44. > :19:49.Assistant Secretary of State. He came to London in 2012 or 2013 and
:19:50. > :19:56.he said, British membership of the European Union is in the American
:19:57. > :20:00.interest. Do those words still stand? Yes. Phil Gordon said it back
:20:01. > :20:04.then. President Obama has said it more recently than that. That
:20:05. > :20:13.decision is up to you, the British people. You say, you know what,
:20:14. > :20:20.Britain is staying in the European Union and that is a call American
:20:21. > :20:26.interest. I wanted to start by saying, it is up to you and we care.
:20:27. > :20:30.When Phil Gordon gets asked President Obama gets asked or I get
:20:31. > :20:35.asked, we say the same thing. We feel like we had to say what we
:20:36. > :20:41.feel. The United Kingdom makes every organisation it is part of better
:20:42. > :20:44.and stronger. We know that first-hand, the United Nations
:20:45. > :20:51.Security Council and Nato, to pick two important groups we are all part
:20:52. > :20:55.of. We happened to sit together because of an accident of alphabet
:20:56. > :21:02.in those considerations. It is not an accident we see eye to eye with
:21:03. > :21:08.the British on so many issues. I use the word ambassador at Pfizer delay.
:21:09. > :21:13.ambassador. -- advisedly. This is a ambassador. -- advisedly. This is a
:21:14. > :21:21.sensitive political issue in the United Kingdom. What right do you,
:21:22. > :21:27.as a senior American official, to wade into the debate? I have said it
:21:28. > :21:31.is up to you all to decide your relationship in Europe. Then you
:21:32. > :21:36.say, what do you think? From our perspective, Europe is the first
:21:37. > :21:40.place we turn. We see eye to eye with the UK on the major issues of
:21:41. > :21:45.the day, of the threats we face and the opportunities we have for things
:21:46. > :21:50.like trade. We see IT light on these things. We would love a strong UK in
:21:51. > :21:57.a strong EU. It would be good for us. We are telling you what is good
:21:58. > :22:03.for America. We are clear and simple about that. It is interesting that
:22:04. > :22:09.you say, we see IT light of that you would not see eye to eye with
:22:10. > :22:16.Britain if, as is possible, Jeremy Corbyn, a long-time anti-US foreign
:22:17. > :22:24.policy protester, if he were to become next Prime Minister of Great
:22:25. > :22:30.Britain, how worried are you? You pointed out what the role of a
:22:31. > :22:34.diplomat is to be, it is not about wading into domestic politics. I
:22:35. > :22:38.will say, without reference to any particular leaders, we have a long
:22:39. > :22:42.tradition of people who have had this particular job of engaging with
:22:43. > :22:53.the major political parties, whether they are in power or add of power. I
:22:54. > :23:03.am intrigued. As you spoken to Jeremy Corbyn? It was at the state
:23:04. > :23:08.dinner for president Xi. We got a chance to say hello. He is a senior
:23:09. > :23:14.member of the campaign for nuclear disarmament. He has been on every
:23:15. > :23:20.anti-US foreign policy protest for 40 years. You may want me to dive
:23:21. > :23:25.into domestic politics. I am going to disappoint you, I am not going to
:23:26. > :23:30.do it. You have said in the past, what is important that the UK in the
:23:31. > :23:36.US, we have the same world-view. this goes through democratic,
:23:37. > :23:41.Republican, Labour, Conservative, all different configurations over 70
:23:42. > :23:46.years. Churchill coined the phrase, special relationship. It is not just
:23:47. > :23:49.Gutmann officials, it is business relationships, student links,
:23:50. > :23:56.cultural links, that is what makes the relationship so special. Yes, we
:23:57. > :23:59.do. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, ambassador. Thank you for
:24:00. > :24:24.having me. If you are watching yesterday you
:24:25. > :24:29.will know it is a mild outlook. As we head into November many of us
:24:30. > :24:31.will be heading towards the central heating switch, to turn it