DNI Gabbard Remarks at the IISS Manama Dialogue 2025 in Manama, Bahrain

DNI Gabbard Remarks at the IISS Manama Dialogue 2025 in Manama, Bahrain

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On October 31, 2025, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard addressed the IISS Manama Dialogue 2025 in Manama, Bahrain. The transcript of her remarks is below.

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard

Transcript of Remarks

IISS Manama Dialogue 2025

Manama, Bahrain

October 31, 2025

Thank you, distinguished guests, excellencies, friends, and fellow peacemakers. It's a privilege to join all of you here this evening. Your Highness, thank you very much for your kind hospitality and welcoming us in hosting this important event. To IISS and your team, thank you for yet again putting on a phenomenal dialogue. It's an honor to be able to address you here in the Kingdom of Bahrain at this pivotal time in global history.

As we gather here, we're reminded that true security, true stability, and peace cannot be forged in isolation, but in the common collection of peacemakers working towards that common purpose. Today, I want to speak plainly for myself as a veteran and a soldier who has seen firsthand the high cost of war. As someone who serves under President Trump's leadership, I have experienced the promise of peace. His vision is about delivering real wins, not just for America, but for our collective cause of peace and prosperity, and doing so through a very principled realism, rooted in shared goals, interests, and values.

The old Washington way of thinking is something we hope is in the rear-view mirror and something that has held us back for too long. For decades, our foreign policy has been trapped in a counterproductive and endless cycle of regime change or nation-building. It was a one-size-fits-all approach of toppling regimes, trying to impose our system of governance on others, intervening in conflicts that were barely understood, and walking away with more enemies than allies. The result: trillions spent, countless lives lost, and in many cases, a creation of greater security threats, the rise of Islamist terrorist groups like ISIS.

We've heard President Trump and Vice President Vance speak just last week about their hope that the Abraham Accords will continue to grow and expand to allow for a true lasting regional stability and peace. This is what President Trump's America First policy looks like in action, building peace through diplomacy, with an understanding that there cannot be prosperity without peace. President Trump de-escalated tensions on the Korean peninsula through direct talks. During his first term in office, he opened lines of communication with North Korea that had been frozen for generations. He did what no other president had been willing to do: engage directly to speak about peace. He restored American leadership abroad. He brokered economic normalization between Serbia and Kosovo, promoting stability and peace in the Balkan region.

And now just nine months into his second term, President Trump's America First agenda is supercharging these efforts and securing peace on a scale that we haven't seen in decades. He secured ceasefires between India and Pakistan, Israel and Iran, a peace agreement between Rwanda and the DRC, a peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Cambodia and Thailand, and averted conflict between Egypt and Ethiopia over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam. As was mentioned previously, and is very much in focus for so many of us, he negotiated the release of all living hostages from Hamas. While fragile, a historic ceasefire and peace plan is moving forward. It is doing so with integral support from many of our partners here in this room.

So, what ties all of this together? A simple and revolutionary idea: Pursue joint interests. Find those win-win solutions where they align and recognize that yes, we will have differences and we will work through them.

President Trump understands that not everyone shares our exact values or our system of governance, and that's okay. What's most important is finding where our shared common ground exists and building those partnerships and progressing on those common grounds. Things like energy independence that stabilizes global markets, things like countering terrorism, something that continues to grow in different parts of the world, strengthening trade partnerships to boost economic growth and innovation. These are the components, the glue of enduring partnerships and friendships. So, America First is not about isolating ourselves. As President Trump has shown, it's about engaging in direct diplomacy, being willing to have conversations that others are not willing to have, and finding that path forward where our mutual sovereign interests are aligned.

And that's really why we're all gathered here today in Manama. We can commit to this path ourselves and put it into action with Bahrain's own leadership. Year after year, hosting these critical dialogues shows us the way forward, convening nations from around the globe, amplifying shared stakes and strengthening partnerships and lines of communications that allow us to resolve our differences and deliver results for our respective people.

Under President Trump, the United States is your partner in executing this vision as a deal maker who is committed to peace. And together we look forward to continuing this path towards peace, to ending wars that have defined too many generations, unlocking prosperity for millions, and helping support the future of a Middle East where security is a dividend of cooperation, not a cost of conflict.

Thank you very much. God bless you. God bless the pursuit of peace.

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