Excerpt
SUMMARY: Outgoing Secretary of State John Kerry joined other Obama administration officials for an event Tuesday at the U.S. Institute of Peace focusing on the importance of a smooth political transition. Judy Woodruff sat down with him to ask about the Trump transition and the problems the world faces today.
JOHN KERRY, Secretary of State: What troubles me a little bit is that people are not separating a remarkable transformation that is taking place globally [and] naturally, from things that we’re really responsible for.
Let me give you an example, Arab Spring. We didn’t start the Arab Spring. We couldn’t have stopped the Arab Spring, particularly with respect to Syria. And I think there are some things that might have been able to have been done.
But that had nothing to do with the red line. And let’s make that absolutely clear, folks. President Obama never retreated from his red line. He never changed his mind about his readiness to bomb Assad to make it clear, you don’t use chemical weapons, never. There’s a mythology that’s grown up around this.
One of the greatest challenges we all face right now, not just America, but every country in the world, is, we are living in a factless political environment. And every country in the world better stop and start worrying about authoritarian populism and the absence of substance in our dialogue, if you call it that.
No comments:
Post a Comment