The Evening: Tariff Man, INF, Ray Donovan and More

December 4, 2018

Good Evening,

It's Tuesday, December 4th.

Rage on Capitol Hill Over Khashoggi Murder

A CIA briefing today on Capitol Hill left senators raging at Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, with Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) declaring a jury would find him “guilty” of murdering journalist Jamal Khashoggi and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) asserting the Trump administration must be “willfully blind” not to hold MBS accountable for the killing of Khashoggi, as Politico’s Burgess Everett and Marianne Levine report.

Dive Deeper: “There’s No Reason Congress and Trump Can’t Achieve Their Goals for Saudi Arabia,” by the Washington Institute’s Dennis Ross.

Tariff Man

President Trump expressed optimism today that China would hold to commitments made in Argentina last week, but indicated he was willing to pivot and continue a campaign of tariffs if China doesn’t move to end the trade dispute, tweeting “President Xi and I want this deal to happen, and it probably will. But if not remember... I am a Tariff Man” as the WSJ’s Vivian Salama reports.

Meanwhile, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell nearly 800 points and bond yields plummeted as investors’ doubts over the U.S.-China trade truce renewed anxieties about the pace of economic growth, as the FT’s Peter Wells and Nicole Bullock report.

And, as Bloomberg reports China today announced an array of punishments that could restrict companies’ access to borrowing and state-funding support over intellectual-property theft, a key sticking point in its trade conflict with the U.S.

Dive Deeper: “Technological Competition and China,” by CSIS's James Andrew Lewis.

INF Ultimatum

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced today that the United States is prepared to withdraw from a crucial weapons treaty signed by the world's two biggest nuclear powers. Pompeo offered Russia an ultimatum: come into compliance in 60 days or the United States will leave the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces, or INF, Treaty as CNBC’s Amanda Macias reports.

Dive Deeper: “What Comes after a U.S. Withdrawal from the INF Treaty? The Case for a NATO Strategy,” by CSIS’s Rachel Ellehuus, Ricklef Beutin and Quentin Lopinot.

"Leaving the INF Treaty Now Is the Right Call,” by CSIS’s Ian Williams.

Your Questions

Do you have any questions about trade and how a changing U.S. trade policy may affect your life? If you do, please email me your question(s) to aschwartz@csis.org. We’ll publish some of the best questions and get our experts to answer them on an upcoming CSIS podcast.

In That Number

15,000

There are between 10,000 and 15,000 ISIS militants now in Iraq.

Source: CSIS report, “The Islamic State and the Persistent Threat of Extremism in Iraq.”

Critical Quote

"There's not a smoking gun - there's a smoking saw."

— Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC).

iDeas Lab

Check out CSIS's new video series: "What's Happening?" The newest video, "What's Happening in Idlib, Syria," dives into the brutal intricacies of the Syrian Civil War.

The Andreas C. Dracopoulos iDeas Lab at CSIS enhances our research with the latest in cutting-edge web technologies, design, and video.

Optics

(Photo credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images). Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) speaks to members of the media today after a closed door briefing by Central Intelligence Agency Director Gina Haspel to members of Senate Foreign Relations Committee and Senate Armed Services Committee on Capitol Hill.

Recommended Reading

From the CSIS Bad Ideas in National Security Series “Bad Idea: Expecting the Private Sector to Drive Innovation in National Security,” by CSIS’s Sam Brannen.

This Town Tomorrow

At 11:00 a.m., CSIS will host a book launch event for Dr. Max Abrahm's newly released “Rules for Rebels: The Science of Victory in Militant History.”

Also, starting at 9:00 a.m., The Inter-American Dialogue will have a day of discussion on the opportunities and challenges that exist for LGBTQI leaders in the Americas.

And at 2:00 p.m. The Wilson Center will hold a conversation with Aric Toler, the Eastern European and Eurasian lead researcher for Bellingcat, on open-source investigative methods and their role today.

Video

In September 2015, the 193 member states of the United Nations adopted the 2030 Development Agenda and the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Today, CSIS hosted a public forum focused on how the international development community, governments, and the private sector can work together to help developing countries provide affordable and clean energy (SDG #7). Watch the full discussion here.

Podcasts

The Smart Women, Smart Power biweekly podcast features powerful, in-depth conversations with women leaders from around the globe who are experts in foreign policy, national security, international business, and international development.

Listen on SoundCloud or Apple Podcasts.

Smiles

There is so much music out there now that it can be hard to access the best of it. It’s not like the old days where radio led you to the good stuff or record companies effectively marketed their artists. The technical barriers to distribution used to be high and they created a landscape where the tastemakers ruled over what we had access to. I’m not saying that was an ideal situation but at least we were all on the same page and we usually knew about what was good.

Now, everything is available instantly and it’s overwhelming. If a new sound in rock and roll or some other new sound was emerging would we even know about it? How would we? For instance, did you know that there is a new jazz scene emerging in Chicago led by a young drummer named Makaya McRaven based on his recorded, improvised live performances? The Times finally wrote about McRaven today so maybe somebody will find out about his music that way.

As it is, there hasn’t been a new rock in over three decades since Seattle roared. I guess we’ll know it when we hear it. But what if there is so much out there that we miss it?

Because premium television is so cool, I am constantly finding out about great music that I would otherwise miss. Showtime’s hit series “Ray Donovan” is now in its sixth season. I’m loving it. The soundtrack is excellent. The latest episode features a track called “Warm Shadow” by a band called Fink that I had never heard of. How did I even know the name of the song or the artist featured on Ray Donovan? I fired up my Shazam app while watching Ray Donovan and it told me instantly what it was hearing. In the old days if you heard a song and didn’t know who performed it you had to go on a vision quest. But now it’s instant access.

Fink has a rich history which I won’t get into here. But I love what I heard of them on premium TV and am now exploring their music. It turns out that Fink is now working with U2 producer Flood. “Warm Shadow” is actually a track they recorded a few years ago and I’m really glad I now know about it.

I invite you to email me at aschwartz@csis.org and follow me on Twitter @handrewschwartz