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Press Briefing by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan
Full Transcript
James S. Brady Press Briefing Room 3/12/2021 12:27 P.M. EST
Psaki: Well, we are ending the week with a very special guest, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan. He’s our first repeat guest here — must be a lot going on in this world. He’s going to give us a readout of the Quad meeting that took place this morning and also, of course, answer some of your questions.
So, with that, why don’t you take it away.
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Sullivan: Thanks Jen. Good to see everybody today. So, as Jen said, this morning the President hosted the first ever Quad Summit — the first time that this group gathered at the leaders’ level. Of course, they gathered virtually because of the constraints of COVID-19.
Each of the leaders independently, in the course of the meeting, referred to this event as “historic” because it cemented a group of strong democracies that will work together going forward to secure a free and open Indo-Pacific.
The President noted in his opening remarks that this is the first multilateral summit he’s hosted since taking office, and that’s on purpose. It reflects his view that we have to rally democratic allies and partners in common cause and his belief in the centrality of the Indo-Pacific to the national security of the United States.
During the meeting, the leaders addressed key regional issues including — excuse me, including freedom of navigation and freedom from coercion in the South and East China Seas; the DPRK nuclear issue; and the coup and violent repression in Burma. The President and his counterparts also spoke to the competition of models between autocracy and democracy, and expressed their confidence that, despite setbacks and imperfections, democracy is the best system to deliver for people and to meet the economic, social, and technological challenges of the 21st century.
And I have to say that, over the course of the meeting, a sense of optimism for the future, despite the hard times we’re in, was on full display.
The four leaders did discuss the challenge posed by China, and they made clear that none of them have any illusions about China. But today was not fundamentally about China. Much of the focus was on pressing global crises, including the climate crisis and COVID-19.
And with respect to COVID-19, these four leaders made a massive joint commitment today: With Indian manufacturing, U.S. technology, Japanese and American financing, and Australian logistics capability, the Quad committed to delivering up to 1 billion doses to ASEAN, the Indo-Pacific, and beyond by the end of 2022.
The leaders also agreed that they would meet in person before the end of the year, and they launched a set of working groups, including an emerging technology group that will help set standards in key technologies like 5G and artificial intelligence, and another on cyber that will help our four countries meet this growing threat.
These groups will deliver results by the time of the summit I’ve just referred to that will happen before the end of the year.
The Quad, at the end of the day — at the end of today is now a critical part of the architecture of the Indo-Pacific. And today’s summit also kicks off an intensive stretch of diplomacy in the region. Secretary Blinken and Secretary Austin will travel to Japan and Korea to meet with their counterparts in a two-plus-two format. They’re getting on the road this weekend.
Secretary Austin will go on to India from there. Secretary Blinken and I will subsequently meet the senior Chinese officials in Anchorage, Alaska. And we will have other high-level meetings and visits in the coming weeks with leaders from the Indo-Pacific that will be announced soon.
Just a word on Anchorage before I turn to your questions. We’ve spoken a lot about our fundamental strategy of establishing a position of strength in the early going. And after the work of the past 50 days, Secretary Blinken and I will enter the meeting with senior Chinese representatives from a position of strength.
President Biden has signed into law the American Rescue Plan, and the OECD has now projected that our economic growth will be the highest in decades and will help power global economic growth. We’re ahead of schedule on the President’s ambitious goal of 100 million shots in 100 days. We’ve launched a bold effort to secure our critical supply chains. We’ve reclaimed our place in key international institutions. And with the current presidency of the U.N. Security Council, we passed a strong statement on Burma just this week.
We’ve revitalized our alliances in Asia and Europe. Last week, with the Europeans, we agreed to a pause in tariffs in the long-running Boeing-Airbus dispute. And we executed a strong joint response to Russia’s poisoning of Aleksey Navalny. We’ve begun deep consultations with our European partners on a common approach to our concerns with China.
In Asia, just in the last few days, we’ve reached new hosting agreements for our troops and our bases with both Korea and Japan. And now we’ve taken the Quad to a new level.
So make no mistake: Today is a big day for American diplomacy, this summit is a big deal for the President and for the country, and we’re looking forward to the work ahead.
And with that, I would be happy to take your questions. Yeah.
Question: Thank you, sir. Jennifer Jacobs from Bloomberg News. In the Quad meeting this morning, did the President and his counterparts discuss the cyber-attack on the Microsoft Exchange? And also — I’m also wondering if they discussed the chips shortage — the shortage of semiconductors. And was there any solution to that?
Sullivan: Without getting into too much detail, they discussed both recent cyber-attacks and semiconductors in the course of the conversation today. And indeed, the leaders agreed, as part of the Emerging Technology Working Group, to look at this supply chain question — including as it relates to semiconductors — to make sure that we don’t have shortages of critical materials going forward, whether it’s semiconductors or rare earths.
And with respect to cyber, the impetus behind this new Cyber Working Group is not just the SolarWinds incident or the Microsoft Exchange incident — both of which the United States is responding to with urgency — but also cyber-attacks that have hit Japan, India, and Australia just in the fast — past few weeks and months.
So this is a common challenge that we face from both state actors and non-state actors, and we do intend to make the Quad a central vehicle for cooperation on cyber.
Yeah.
Question: On this cyber-attack with Microsoft, can you give us a sense of all of the scope and scale of this — how it might compare to SolarWinds? And is this still ongoing?
Sullivan: It is still ongoing, in the sense that we are still gathering information. We are still trying to determine the scope and scale. It is significant, but the precise number of systems that have been exposed by this vulnerability and have been exploited, either by nation-state threat actors or ransomware hackers or others — that is something that we are urgently working with the private sector to determine.
It is certainly the case that malign actors are still in some of these Microsoft Exchange systems, which is why we have pushed so hard to get those systems patched, to get remediation underway. And the U.S. government is mobilizing a robust, whole-of-government response to it. Ultimately, a lot of this comes down to the private sector taking the steps that they need to take to remediate. And we will give them everything we can to help them be able to do so.
Yeah.
Question: Can you declaratively say that the Microsoft Exchange hack was done by China?
Sullivan: I’m not in a position, standing here today, to provide attribution, but I do pledge to you that we will be in a position to attribute that attack at some point in the near future. And we won’t hide the ball on that; we will come forward and say who we believe perpetrated the attack.
Question: You talked about diplomacy. I want to ask you about Iran right now. What is the status of any talks with Iran, given they rebuffed the U.S.’s effort to meet with them?
Sullivan: Diplomacy with Iran is ongoing, just not in a direct fashion at the moment. There are communications through the Europeans and through others that enable us to explain to the Iranians what our position is, with respect to the compliance-for-compliance approach, and to hear what their position is. And —
Question: And if I could follow up —
Sullivan: And we’re waiting, at this point, to hear further from the Iranians how they would like to proceed. But from our perspective, this is going to be — you know, this is not going to be easy, but we believe that we are in a diplomatic process now that we can move forward on, and ultimately secure our objective, which is to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon and to do so through diplomacy.
Question: As it relates to the — to Iran, is the U.S. not going to respond to the last round of rocket attacks that hit al-Assad? And we heard from the former Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, in the last couple of days, saying the Ayatollah recognizes “only strength.” Is the U.S. demonstrating weakness in terms of that relationship?
Sullivan: So first of all, if you look at the pattern of attacks that took place over the course of 2019 and 2020 against American personnel and facilities — how frequently they occurred, what kind of damage they did — I’m not sure that the former Secretary is in a position to be trying to give us advice on the question of how to respond.
Secondly, the United States reserves the right to protect its personnel and its facilities; we will do so at a time and place of our choosing. And we will take whatever steps are necessary to deter further attacks and to impose costs on those who attack us. But I’m not going to telegraph our punches on any particular operation that we may take in the days or weeks ahead.
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Yeah.
Question: Thank you, Jake. Jonathan Lemire, with Associated Press. On a sort of broader picture: As a candidate, now-President Biden called Saudi Arabia a “pariah.” He vowed a new approach on China. He vowed to be tough on Putin. You know, but as he’s — in his early days of his administration, both Republicans and Democrats alike have suggested that he’s taken a little more cautious, more conservative approach.
What should we read into this? Is this him — is this him displaying a more realist — more realism approach to foreign policy? You know, why not perhaps be the optimist that he did on the campaign trail?
Sullivan: Joe Biden is the ultimate optimist, and today was the ultimate testament to his optimism: pulling together, for the first time ever, the leaders of Japan, Australia, and India in a grouping that is going to allow the United States to drive forward its agenda, its interest, and its values more effectively going forward. And to lift up democracy, as the signal — form of government that can deliver for people and meet the challenges going ahead.
So, you heard him last night in his speech about where we’re going to be on COVID-19. You heard him yesterday at the bill signing about domestic renewal. And you heard him today about his deep belief that the United States will be in a position to lead and to succeed in the 21st century on the global stage. That — that’s the broad answer to your question.
The more specific answer to your question is that — let’s take each of those in turn: On Saudi Arabia, the President said he was going to change America’s relationship with Saudi Arabia, and he has. He has not only removed American support for offensive operations in Yemen, he has also taken additional steps to sanction individuals and to publish — something the last administration was not prepared to do — an unclassified report on the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.
He has also indicated to the Saudis that, going forward, we are not going to give them the blank check the last administration did either on how they treat their own citizens or how they operate in the region.
But at the end of the day, his metric is what’s going to advance American interests and values. And our near-term interest right now is to get a ceasefire in the war in Yemen so that we reduce humanitarian suffering there, and to get de-escalation in the region so that we increase America’s security and the security of our allies and partners.
On both of those issues, he has pushed Saudi Arabia hard, and we believe that we are making progress as a result of his policy.
If you look at Russia and China, he has both taken a firm line with respect to Russia, including working with the Europeans to impose costs already for the poisoning of Aleksey Navalny and preparing additional responses to other malign actions that Russia has conducted.
And as far as China is concerned, the United States, as he has said repeatedly, believes that we are going to end up in a stiff competition with China, and we intend to prevail in that competition. And he is amassing the sources of strength that we need to be able to prevail. And that is 100 percent in line with everything that Joe Biden said on the campaign trail. And 50 days in, we believe we are in a better position to deal with the challenge from China than we — than we were the day that he took office.
Yeah.
Question: Jake, Steven Portnoy, from CBS News Radio. Thanks for coming in and taking our questions. I want to ask you a question about immigration diplomacy. When he was Vice President, Joe Biden went to Guatemala in the summer of 2014. You were on that trip as his national security advisor at the time. He went because of what was then an unprecedented surge of unaccompanied minors coming across the border.
One of the things he said on that trip, in June of 2014, was: “We can, A, first make clear in each of our countries in an unrelenting way, not just with a public service announcement, that there is no free pass; that none of these children or women bringing children will be eligible under the existing law in the United States of America.” He said that was “number one.” And then he went on to describe root causes of American aid.
Why has that not been the message that this White House is sending now — clear and unrelenting — that none of these children or women bringing children will be eligible under the existing law?
Sullivan: So, the President has made clear, and this administration has made clear, that we are going to pursue an effective and humane immigration policy and unwind what we believe was the ineffective and inhumane policy over the course of the last four years. That’s point number one.
Point number two is: We’ve made clear that now is not the time to come to the United States. We are dealing with a circumstance in which we have to build the capacity to be able to assess the asylum claims of individuals who arrive here, and we have to deal with the obvious public health effects of a pandemic. So we are sending the message clearly, and you heard it from Roberta Jacobson from this podium earlier this week. We’re doing so in the region, as well.
But the President also believes that, under our laws, people who are claiming asylum deserve to have their cases heard properly, effectively, efficiently, and as swiftly as possible, and that is the policy that we are going to pursue going forward.
Question: Just to follow up, do you really believe that message is being received clearly, in an “unrelenting” way? I mean, there was a young man quoted in the Wall Street Journal this week who said that this President seems more friendly to him than the prior one, and he believes he’ll be able to come to the United States on that basis.
Sullivan: So this is, day by day, something that we need to be able to communicate from a range of different perspectives — from this podium, in the region itself, on the airwaves — and we will continue to do so as we go forward.
Question: Just a follow to next week’s meeting with representatives from China. Do you think that tariffs and export controls targeting China will be part of the talks? And what does China need to do for the U.S. to dial back on tariffs and export controls?
Sullivan: I don’t expect that, for example, the phase one trade deal is going to be a major topic of conversation next week. This is our effort to communicate clearly to the Chinese government how the United States intends to proceed at a strategic level, what we believe our fundamental interests and values are, and what our concerns with their activities are — whether it’s on Hong Kong, or Xinjiang, or in the Taiwan Strait — or, frankly, the issues that we heard today from our Quad partners: their coercion of Australia, their harassment around the Senkaku Islands, their aggression on the border with India.
So this will stay more in that zone than get into the details of questions around tariffs or export controls. But we will communicate that the United States is going to take steps, in terms of what we do on technology, to ensure that our technology is not being used in ways that are inimical to our values or adverse to our security. We will communicate that message at a broad level.
But in terms of the details of these issues, we have more work to do with our allies and partners to come up with a common approach, a joint approach, before we go sit down point by point with the Chinese government on these issues.
We will also want to bring other key representatives, senior economic representatives of the Biden administration into those conversations at the point in time when they’re appropriate to occur.
Psaki: We can do one more here, guys.
Sullivan: Yeah.
Question: Taiwan’s foreign minister has said he wants to see more security cooperation with the Quad. Do you see the Quad, in coordination between the different nations, as a way of perhaps increasing the potential cost to China of any move against Taiwan? And did Taiwan and its status come up in your discussions this morning?
Sullivan: So the way that we look at this is that the Quad is not a military alliance; it’s not a new NATO, despite some of the propaganda that’s out there. What it is, is an opportunity for these four democracies to work as a group, and also with other countries, on fundamental issues of economics, technology, climate, and security.
So I’m not going to get into detail on what the elements of that security will look like because we have work to do as an emergent institution to define what the agenda looks like.
What we know is that broad-based maritime security is already core to the Quad agenda, that humanitarian assistance and disaster response and the work of our militaries in that space is already on the agenda. Where we go from there on everything from freedom of navigation to broader regional security questions, that has to be worked through, not just at the leaders level but at the working level as well. So we’ll see how that unfolds over the course of the months to come.
Question: One more from Reuters. Please, Jake.
Sullivan: Sure.
Question: Thank you. We’re —
Sullivan: For Reuters.
Question: For Reuters. Thank you. (Laughter.) We’re reporting that India is likely to block its mobile carriers from carrying — or using telecoms equipment by Huawei. Is that something that the United States welcomes?
Sullivan: The United States has expressed its concerns about Huawei and the relationship between Huawei and elements of the Chinese government and military apparatus. And so this is a sovereign decision for India to make, but we certainly think it’s consistent with the decisions that we’ve made and advocated as well.
Question: And just a follow-up on the vaccines. We also have reporting from India that the temporary U.S. ban on exports of key raw materials for vaccines could affect the objective of quickly ramping up production. Is the U.S. open to easing that ban?
Sullivan: So, first, the President had the opportunity to speak with the Prime Minister about this bold initiative that we’re undertaking, and we feel very good about our ability to execute against that.
Secondly, I do not believe that there is an export ban. But the United States will happily work with countries around the world to make sure that we are doing our part, not just to make sure every last American citizen is vaccinated as quickly as possible, but that the rest of the world gets vaccinated as quickly as possible as well. So I’ll leave it at that.
Thanks, guys.
Psaki: Thank you, Jake.