bodyType

customContents

entityId

printArticlePageQuery

filter

article

body

urlAlias

articleSectionsContent

articleSeoArticle

articleSourceHeaderArticle

contentSchemaRenderContent

contentSubHeadlineContent

contentHeadlineContent

mainImagePrintArticleArticle

authorBlockPrintArticleArticle

contentSponsorTagContent

articlePianoPaywallContent

scmpYoutubeContent

hooksTrackPageViewArticle

query printArticlePageQuery(
  $entityId: String!
  $customContents: [CustomContentInput]
  $bodyType: BodyFormatTypeEnum
) {
  article(filter: {entityId: $entityId}) {
    entityId
    body(customContents: $customContents, type: $bodyType) {
      json
    }
    urlAlias
    ...articleSectionsContent
    ...articleSeoArticle_3o8td4
    ...articleSourceHeaderArticle
    ...contentSchemaRenderContent
    ...contentSubHeadlineContent
    ...contentHeadlineContent
    ...mainImagePrintArticleArticle
    ...authorBlockPrintArticleArticle
    ...contentSponsorTagContent
    ...articlePianoPaywallContent
    ...scmpYoutubeContent
    ...hooksTrackPageViewArticle
    id
  }
}

fragment articlePianoPaywallContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ...hooksPaywallPromiseContent
}

fragment articleSectionsContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  sections {
    value {
      ...helpersCheckIfNewsSectionInFirstIndexSection
      ...entityLink
      name
      id
    }
  }
}

fragment articleSeoArticle_3o8td4 on Article {
  ...hooksArticleSeoArticle
  ...helpersCheckIsPostiesArticle
  ...helpersGetArticleTypeArticle
  entityId
  publishedDate
  updatedDate
  summary {
    text
  }
  subHeadline {
    text
  }
  body(customContents: $customContents, type: $bodyType) {
    text
  }
  keywords
  sections {
    value {
      name
      id
    }
  }
  topics {
    name
    entityId
    id
  }
  urlAlias
  authors {
    name
    id
  }
  images {
    style(filter: {style: "768x768"}) {
      url
    }
  }
  readingTime
}

fragment articleSourceHeaderArticle on Article {
  urlAlias
  ...entityLink
}

fragment authorBlockPrintArticleArticle on Article {
  ...defaultArticleDateContent
  ...authorNamesArticle
}

fragment authorNameAuthor on Author {
  ...entityLink
  name
  entityUuid
}

fragment authorNamesArticle on Article {
  authorLocations
  authors {
    entityId
    location
    ...authorNameAuthor
    id
  }
}

fragment blockquoteQuoteContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ...contentShareWidgetContent
}

fragment checkersCheckContentContainsStarlingImageContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  topics {
    entityId
    id
  }
}

fragment contentHeadlineContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  headline
  socialHeadline
  ...contentHeadlineTagContent
  ...helpersUseContentSponsorContent
}

fragment contentHeadlineTagContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ...hooksContentHeadlineTagContent
}

fragment contentNewsletterWidgetContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  topics {
    relatedNewsletters {
      ...helpersMassageToNewsletterItemNewsletter
      id
    }
    id
  }
  sections {
    value {
      relatedNewsletters {
        ...helpersMassageToNewsletterItemNewsletter
        id
      }
      id
    }
  }
  ... on Article {
    relatedNewsletters {
      ...helpersMassageToNewsletterItemNewsletter
      id
    }
  }
}

fragment contentSchemaRenderContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ...blockquoteQuoteContent
  ...imageContent
  ...inlineWidgetContent
  ...photoGalleryWidgetContent
  ...scmpYoutubeContent
}

fragment contentShareWidgetContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  entityId
  urlAlias
  shortUrl
  socialHeadline
  headline
}

fragment contentSponsorTagContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ...helpersUseContentSponsorContent
}

fragment contentSubHeadlineContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  subHeadline {
    json
  }
  summary {
    json
  }
  ...contentSchemaRenderContent
}

fragment defaultArticleDateContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ...hooksArticleDateUtilsContent
}

fragment entityLink on BaseWithApplicationAndUrlAlias {
  __isBaseWithApplicationAndUrlAlias: __typename
  __typename
  entityId
  entityUuid
  urlAlias
  urlRedirect {
    toUrl
    id
  }
  application {
    entityId
    id
  }
  ... on Section {
    fullSectionPath {
      entityId
      id
    }
    parentSection
  }
  ...helpersAppBarVariantBase
  ...helpersApplicationBase
  ...helpersCheckIsPlusArticle
  ...helpersStyleSectionContent
}

fragment helpersAppBarVariantBase on BaseWithApplicationAndUrlAlias {
  __isBaseWithApplicationAndUrlAlias: __typename
  ...helpersCheckIsLiveArticle
  ...helpersCheckIsPlusPage
  ...helpersCheckIsPostiesArticle
  ...helpersCheckIsPostiesPage
  ...helpersCheckIsPostMagazineArticle
  ...helpersCheckIsStyleArticle
  ...helpersSectionContent
  ...helpersStyleSectionContent
}

fragment helpersApplicationBase on BaseWithApplicationAndUrlAlias {
  __isBaseWithApplicationAndUrlAlias: __typename
  ...helpersCheckIsPostiesArticle
  ...helpersCheckIsPostiesPage
  ...helpersCheckIsPlusPage
}

fragment helpersCheckIfNewsSectionInFirstIndexSection on Section {
  name
}

fragment helpersCheckIsAmpEnabledArticle on Article {
  entityId
  types {
    value {
      entityId
      id
    }
  }
  sections {
    value {
      entityId
      id
    }
  }
  disableOffPlatformContent
  sponsorType
  published
  ...helpersCheckIsPlusArticle
  ...helpersCheckIsPostiesArticle
}

fragment helpersCheckIsLiveArticle on Article {
  flattenTypeIds
  liveArticle {
    status
    id
  }
}

fragment helpersCheckIsMainTopicContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  topics {
    entityId
    id
  }
}

fragment helpersCheckIsPlusArticle on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ... on Article {
    paywallTypes {
      entityUuid
      id
    }
  }
}

fragment helpersCheckIsPlusPage on Page {
  urlAlias
}

fragment helpersCheckIsPostMagazineArticle on Article {
  sections {
    value {
      entityId
      id
    }
  }
}

fragment helpersCheckIsPostiesArticle on Article {
  sections {
    value {
      entityId
      id
    }
  }
}

fragment helpersCheckIsPostiesPage on Page {
  urlAlias
}

fragment helpersCheckIsStyleArticle on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  sections {
    value {
      entityId
      id
    }
  }
}

fragment helpersGetArticleTypeArticle on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ... on Article {
    types {
      value {
        entityId
        id
      }
    }
  }
}

fragment helpersMassageToNewsletterItemNewsletter on Newsletter {
  entityId
  name
  alternativeName
  description {
    text
  }
  summary {
    text
  }
  homepageDescription {
    text
  }
}

fragment helpersSanitizeArticleTypeEntityIdsArticle on Article {
  types {
    value {
      entityId
      id
    }
  }
}

fragment helpersSanitizeAuthorTypesArticle on Article {
  authors {
    types
    id
  }
}

fragment helpersSanitizedAuthorEntityIdsArticle on Article {
  authors {
    entityId
    id
  }
}

fragment helpersSectionContent on Section {
  fullSectionPath {
    entityId
    id
  }
}

fragment helpersStyleSectionContent on Section {
  fullSectionPath {
    entityId
    id
  }
}

fragment helpersUseContentSponsorContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  topics {
    entityId
    sponsor {
      ...sponsorTagSponsor
      name
      type
      id
    }
    id
  }
  ... on Article {
    sponsorType
  }
  ...helpersCheckIsMainTopicContent
}

fragment hooksArticleDateUtilsContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  createdDate
  publishedDate
  updatedDate
}

fragment hooksArticleSeoArticle on Article {
  ...helpersCheckIsPostiesArticle
  ...helpersCheckIsPostMagazineArticle
  ...helpersCheckIsStyleArticle
  ...hooksContentHeadlineTagContent
  ...helpersCheckIsAmpEnabledArticle
  entityId
  headline
  socialHeadline
  types {
    value {
      entityId
      id
    }
  }
  authors {
    entityId
    id
  }
  images {
    generic_og: style(filter: {style: "og_image_scmp_generic"}) {
      url
    }
    styles(filter: {styles: ["og_image_posties_article", "og_postmag", "og_image_style", "og_image_scmp_analysis", "og_image_scmp_explainer", "og_image_scmp_editorial", "og_image_scmp_fact_check", "og_image_scmp_debate", "og_image_scmp_live", "og_image_scmp_obituary", "og_image_scmp_opinion", "og_image_scmp_review", "og_image_scmp_series", "og_image_scmp_generic"]}) {
      url
      style
    }
    type
  }
  urlAlias
}

fragment hooksContentHeadlineTagContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  __typename
  ... on Article {
    types {
      value {
        name
        entityId
        description {
          text
        }
        id
      }
    }
    ...helpersCheckIsStyleArticle
  }
  flag
  sections {
    value {
      name
      id
    }
  }
  ...hooksContentHelperContent
}

fragment hooksContentHelperContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ...helpersSanitizeArticleTypeEntityIdsArticle
  ...helpersSanitizeAuthorTypesArticle
  ...helpersSanitizedAuthorEntityIdsArticle
  flag
}

fragment hooksPaywallPromiseContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  entityId
  ...helpersCheckIsPostiesArticle
}

fragment hooksTrackPageViewArticle on Article {
  entityId
  publishedDate
  headline
  sections {
    value {
      name
      id
    }
  }
  urlAlias
  authors {
    name
    id
  }
  entityUuid
}

fragment imageContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  headline
  ...checkersCheckContentContainsStarlingImageContent
}

fragment inlineWidgetContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ...contentNewsletterWidgetContent
}

fragment mainImagePrintArticleArticle on Article {
  images {
    title
    url
    isSlideshow
    size_652x446: style(filter: {style: "652x446"}) {
      url
    }
  }
}

fragment photoGalleryDialogContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  __typename
  ...contentShareWidgetContent
}

fragment photoGalleryWidgetContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  ...photoGalleryDialogContent
}

fragment scmpYoutubeContent on Content {
  __isContent: __typename
  entityId
  urlAlias
  publishedDate
}

fragment sponsorTagSponsor on Sponsor {
  name
  type
  images {
    url
  }
}


sections

types

disableOffPlatformContent

sponsorType

published

headline

socialHeadline

authors

images

publishedDate

updatedDate

summary

subHeadline

keywords

topics

readingTime

authorLocations

entityUuid

Ben Naparstek

As US president George H. W. Bush's national security adviser, Brent Scowcroft became famous for sleeping on the job. The older Bush established the annual Scowcroft Award for the senior official most liable to fall asleep during critical meetings, naming Dr Scowcroft as the first recipient.
His narcolepsy might have caused concern, given his pivotal role in shaping the US administration's foreign policy. It was Dr Scowcroft, more than any other adviser, who convinced the president to soft-pedal Ronald Reagan's 'Star Wars' defence initiative and to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait.
But it was a sign of the respect he commanded from his colleagues that  Dr Scowcroft  felt comfortable dozing off during meetings. The veteran Washington insider also served as national security adviser to Gerard Ford and military assistant under Richard Nixon.
Interviewed in the Washington office of The Scowcroft Group advisory firm that he directs, Dr Scowcroft speaks in calm, measured tones that betray none of the ideological fervour of the second Bush administration.
He remains one of Mr Bush Snr's closest friends and a symbol of the rift between him and his son over Iraq. George W. Bush marginalised Dr Scowcroft for opposing US military action. Mr Bush Snr reportedly made repeated attempts to reconcile  the two men. For his part, Dr Scowcroft says simply: 'It's just rumour.'
In August 2002, after failing to dissuade the George W. Bush administration through private talks, Dr Scowcroft published an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, headlined 'Don't Attack Saddam'.
Mr Bush's irritation at the editorial is imagined in Oliver Stone's film W and was probably a factor in his failure to reappoint Dr Scowcroft as chairman of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board in 2004. Dr Scowcroft says he hasn't seen W but has been averse to Stone since his 1995 biopic Nixon, which he argues caricatured the 37th president.
Asked how he felt about being essentially fired from the board, Dr Scowcroft declined to comment. Nor will he be drawn into criticising US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, whom he hired as a Soviet specialist on the National Security Council in 1989.
His one-time protegee is said to have phoned Dr Scowcroft after reading his editorial, yelling: 'How could you do this to us?' Yet Dr Scowcroft  professes to feel no dismay at her right-leaning  political trajectory. 'I offered her a chance at what could have been a critical point of her career and she's gone on to bigger and better things,' he says.
The Bush-Cheney crowd proposed a revolutionary form of foreign-policy idealism in which the US would topple dictatorships and remake the world in its own image. Dr Scowcroft takes a more sober view of the use of military force.
'I've always considered myself an enlightened realist,' he says. 'Realism without some ideal towards which one would realistically work is fake. But the notion that, if we just turned all the countries of the world into democracies, we would abolish war, is idealism that is dangerous.'
Born in Ogden, Utah, the son of a grocer, Dr Scowcroft enjoyed a distinguished career in the armed forces and military academia, rising to  lieutenant general. He served in three Republican administrations, but the former Republican stalwart will not disclose whom he voted for in the November election.
At the start of the year, Barack Obama wasn't even favourite to beat Hillary Rodham Clinton, let alone John McCain, and Dr Scowcroft is surprised that he was elected.  'This was a very difficult year for the Republicans,' he notes. 'But, in view of the fact that Senator Clinton was better known, and had most of the establishment working for her, it was something of a surprise.'
He worried that American voters would be deterred by Mr Obama's mixed ethnicity.  'The fact that the United States could elect somebody as president who represents no more than 10 per cent of the ethnic division of the population is dramatic,' he says.
Mr Obama is said to have been extensively in touch with Dr Scowcroft following his election victory. Dr Scowcroft, however, denies that their communication has been extensive or that he has offered Mr Obama advice.
Whatever he told Mr Obama, Dr Scowcroft is adamant that the new administration urgently needs to restore America's reputation as a benevolent power committed to leading without dominating.
'We are the only power around which nations of the world can gather to pursue great things like addressing climate change,' he says. 'We've not been able to play that role in recent years.'
One of Mr Obama's first moves, he says,  should be to revive the Israeli-Palestinian peace process: 'The outlines of a settlement are broadly known; most of them were agreed in one way or another at the end of the Clinton administration with the Taba Accords.'
His main concern is that Mr Obama's plans to withdraw troops in Iraq are premature. 'I don't believe we should draw down troops based on a calendar,' he says. 'We should draw down troops based on the situation on the ground. The calendar seems purely artificial. What it says is, 'we don't care what the situation is, we're leaving'.'
But isn't the US presence in Iraq part of the problem? 'The Iraqis don't want us to stay there, but they didn't want us in, either. We didn't ask them before we went in, and we have a responsibility to the Iraqis to leave that country and the region in as good shape as is possible.'
Mr Obama's proposal to redirect troops from Iraq into Afghanistan troubles Dr Scowcroft, who doubts that more forces in Afghanistan would make much difference: 'Afghanistan is not going to be a military conflict won by arms.'
The difference between Iraq and Afghanistan is obscured by Mr Obama's policy, he suggests. 'Afghanistan historically is a collection of tribal lands, warlords, ethnic groupings, joined together loosely by a weak central government. If we're trying to build a strong unified central government, which can dominate the country, I'm afraid we have a problem which dwarfs that in Iraq.'
Mr Obama's decision to retain Mr Bush's defence chief, Robert Gates, disappointed some  supporters. Does Dr Scowcroft see the appointment as inconsistent with Mr Obama's opposition to Republican strategy on Iraq? 'Maybe on Iraq it sends a puzzling message,' he concedes, 'but, on the whole, Obama keeping him on is a solid gesture of solidarity that he is moving forward as a leader of the country, not just of the Democrats.'
Mr Obama's campaign was  sketchy on foreign policy, but Dr Scowcroft was still struck by how little China featured - especially, he noted, given American anxieties about Beijing's intervention in the currency markets. He is optimistic that Taiwan's growing economic ties across the strait will help alleviate tensions with Beijing.
In America and the World, a recently published book of conversations with former Democratic national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski,  Dr Scowcroft predicts the emergence eventually of 'a greater China of which the mainland is a part, Taiwan is a part, Hong Kong, Tibet, and so on ... a kind of brotherhood of indistinct relationships'.
Ever since Dr Scowcroft accompanied Nixon on his visit to Beijing in 1972, US administrations have maintained a bipartisan policy of engaging with the Chinese leadership. 'It is one of the greatest successes of US foreign policy over the last almost 40 years now,' Dr Scowcroft says.
His enthusiasm for amicable relations with China led to controversy when, six months after the Tiananmen Square massacre, he attended a banquet in Beijing and toasted China's rulers. Dr Scowcroft knew he'd face  condemnation for participating in the toast, but felt that it would have been too damaging to US interests to walk out rather than follow protocol.
Confident that Mr Obama also recognises the importance of solid relations with America's rivals, Dr Scowcroft suggests that his conciliatory manner will be an asset in dealing with a resurgent Russia.
Moscow's aggression stems from its feelings of humiliation at being ignored after the end of the cold war, he says. 'What Russians need is a sense that we do take their views seriously, believe that they're an important power and want to co-operate with them.'
Some are concerned that Mr Obama will not be sufficiently hawkish to deal effectively with Iran, but Dr Scowcroft believes that diplomacy is far preferable to using force. 'While Iran is not much liked by the Arab world, attacking Iran would confirm that the US  really is anti-Islam,' he says. 'If for no other reason, we must try diplomacy.'
He wagers that Iran can be persuaded to abandon its nuclear programme. 'We have to demonstrate to Iran that we don't require them to surrender before we'll talk to them. And we have to make sure that our negotiating allies - the Europeans, the Chinese and the Russians - are with us wholeheartedly, so that the Iranians can't play one party off against the others, as they're so skilful at doing.'
Falling  oil prices could be an advantage for the Obama White House in bargaining with Iran, Dr Scowcroft suggests, though he also points out that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad  has shown himself relatively impervious to economic circumstances.
The phone rings to summon Dr Scowcroft to his next appointment, occasioning a final question. How is he sleeping these days? 'Very well,' he boasts, smiling. 'I deserved the award, and I practise to make sure that my skills are up to it.'



The enlightened realist