hundreds of. desperately searching for a way out of the crisis while joins the list of countries to recognize rebels. in the us to face trial on drug trafficking charges claims he was kidnapped by washington some say there's now

a tendency of america snatching people in order. to . fly up to the international space station from the. almost fifteen years. became the first man to go beyond. right. now it's time now. for humanitarian intervention in libya is barack obama's way to justify his nobel peace prize. kick. start. the low and welcome the cross talk i'm peter lavelle is u.s. president barack obama still in the honorable recipient of the nobel peace prize to

be fair he inherited two wars masoom in office but he is also a new war on his watch and that is libya should obama's peace prize be revoked and should politicians be part computer considerations. can. start. to discuss the issues around barack obama's nobel peace prize i'm joined by bill schneider in washington he's a distinguished senior fellow and resident scholar at third way in london we have tariq ali he is a writer and filmmaker and in knoxville we have john williams he is the editor and publisher of new millennium writings and another member of our cross talk team hielan hunger right gentlemen this is cross talk that means you can jump in anytime you want bill schneider as i pointed out in the introduction barack obama inherited two wars ok fair enough he didn't start them a lot of people criticize his escalation of the war in afghanistan and libya is truly his war i mean nobel peace prize and all those noble words and we'll go to

the some of those words later in the program and being a war president. it's very toxic it's made some and not a good mix and and either he should give it back or it should be revoked what do you think. well. that has not been discussed in the united states and let me point out one thing his administration does not call libya a war it says it's a kinetic action it's a little time limited objective to try to commit to a save people's lives they do not think of this is a war in fact they don't even use the word regime change even though the president has said and inject if is to get cut off he out of power so they would not even acknowledge that this is a war ok if i go you and lyman is that a lot of newspeak i mean this is a war if you look what's going on on the ground it's a war and i don't care if the american media doesn't want to call it out or the american white house it's a war and this is a man that was given a nobel peace prize. it is

a war he was given the nobel peace prize where the nobel committee knew full well that in his election campaign he had said he is going to escalate the war in of this time which is he has had more drone attacks on pakistan bush ordered in fact more drone attacks under obama been in the eight previous years of the bush administration so they knew all that he was going to do this when big gave him the prize but they were so relieved to be relieved of bush that they were drooling at the mouth at the sight of obama and essentially couldn't wait to hand him the prize i mean to be fading he was slightly embarrassed but peter they don't go in for revoking these prizes they have wall zero in their mistakes and i don't think any nobel prize recipient is going to give it back ok don williams i'm going to you in knoxville i think you know to be fair to president obama i think a lot of understanding american foreign policy republican or democrat america has

a tendency to go to war infrequently but i thought i think a lot of us thought they'd do a bomber when go into germ wars like bush went into germ wars. iraq was completely necessary ok and i would argue and a lot of other people in the world a growing coalition of the willing i would call it is against this intervention outside intervention into libya what do you think about that. well peter i think comparisons to iraq are odious. start with what's true and what's not president obama was forthright in telling america and the world why we must intervene in libya one might disagree with his decision but who can doubt the evidence that he used to build a case to oppose the bloodbath it was everywhere before our eyes this was not true of bush on iraq eight years ago the comparison as i say is odious the reasons bush concocted for going to war didn't pass the sniff test bush and cheney told the

world that iraqi leader saddam hussein had weapons of mass destruction and that he was giving them to terrorists that we be greeted as liberators they had a broadly that saddam was and i'm not eleven and none of this was true now with my friends on the right one can believe bush and cheney other such things in good faith. they're welcome to that but still these were some of his lies metaphysically bribery a man named curveball code named curveball just last and the recent few weeks has acknowledged that he lied. there was a lot of evidence that. al libi lied and probably ok but you know you. are using i'm not accusing mr obama of line ok and i'm not yet anyway if i could have bill i mean if we still see you know if we see a u.n. resolution about an embargo of arms to the rebels and now we see the slippery slope

oh now it's not called the war it's not intervention there's no talk of boots on the ground but there was no there was no talk of arming people as well and that is not clearly identified who these people are so i'm not calling the president the united states a liar or not this president but there is this this tendency of slippery it's a slippery slope into a war a full out war and this is what i'm getting at and this is why i'm talking about the nobel peace prize that this is this is not an accidental war now at this point . no one will deny that there are a lot of risks in doing what the president is doing we are getting involved in a civil war that's always dangerous and this could be a very slippery slope the president is certainly aware of that he saw an opportunity to avert and impending humanitarian disaster within a day in libya there could have been a slaughter which was promised by qaddafi out hundreds of thousands of people the resistance in that country he saw that the united states might have the ability to

make a difference that other countries were willing to act and i was an opportunity he was unwilling to pass up despite the very real risks that you described ok. let's continue with bill's logic so the americans this want to learn to look virtuous in all of this but there is a possibility to be a lot of massacres down the road if this isn't managed well and there's nothing to indicate that it is being managed very well but the the international community is tripping itself into a civil war worth and where it has no idea what the outcome is going to be. this is exactly right and i would say to be perfectly frank peter in my opinion this is very little to do with civilian casualties sort of fear of civilian casualties after all no one but no one from the west suggested imposing a no fly zone over garza and no one suggested imposing a no fly zone when lebannon was invaded and attacked a few years ago a sensually what we're witnessing is

a western intervention in libya to try and take the initiative in the entire region back from the people on the ground and to build up the credibility of the west i mean only yesterday bill gates said the desperate in yemen who by the way is killing quite a few people every single day in that can create should stay in power the saudis have been permitted to invade priory and are carrying out a wave of repression in their country this war in libya intervention in libya is part of the country offensive caressed the initiative back then gadhafi who was not an intelligent leader to put it mildly played into the hands of the west by bombing is own people and sending his troops in instead of either negotiating or doing the decent thing in quitting so he's played into the hands of the west they've taken the advantage of that trying to get the initiative back and the results we don't

know i think what is quite likely is that at the very least libya will now be partitioned like iraq was partitioned with a no fly zone after the first gulf war but kurdish territory is ascension it became a u.s. project correct this could happen in the lebanon on and the consequences of that are unpredictable at the moment it might work but more likely trances of it will end up as the. because i was down if i go back here in knoxville. i think brings up a very good point is that there are other actors in the obama administration and it's very duplicitous with a lot of people see a lot of double standards where the united states will stand up take a virtuous stand protect civilians what civilians are still very unclear actually and but it won't do it for other people in the region and i think that you know a lot of people outside of the united states would say because it's really could

have used a no fly zone when the israelis were committing atrocities against the gazan population there double standards it still smells of double standards doesn't it. you make a good point and so does and i would only say that just because obama hasn't acted previously to prevent the slaughter of innocent folks doesn't necessarily mean he's not acting in good faith in this instance i wonder what my friend would say if. we had seen a bloodbath in benghazi then then what would what would the criticism of obama be at that point i think he had to act i mean let's face it there is a wave sweeping the middle east and north africa and i think what's needed is a clear obama doctrine and i don't think it's something he should rush into establishing but he's got to tell those waters take a good deep look and then dive into some because credit or blame will accrue to him no matter what happens ok bill it's interesting i think there are i think i don't

think go ahead go ahead bill gregg. i don't think the president really intended to promulgate an obama doctrine he didn't say this was a president this is a new principle for intervention what he said this was a specific case where we could intervene and make a difference and save lives you could start talking about syria which is after all killing its own people you could talk about gaza you can talk about a lot of places the president has were talking about libya where we saw the opportunity to act and make a difference every other situation is different and many of them like syria are much more complicated so the president didn't seem to want to say this is a new obama doctrine ok time to give my go to you before we go to the break here i think there is a new doctor in here i think there is no obama doctrine coming into play and it's the same thing as the bush doctrine except for we really don't want to put troops on the ground ok and i'd like to point out every one of the panel hillary clinton says well we're not going to intervene into syria yet go ahead toddy. well i think there is no new doctrine we have had this line taking place since bill

clinton was in office and bush continued it and bush lied his way on iraq so blatantly that it caught people off the united states for a long time obama is now carrying on in the same way and trying to win public opinion back to the idea of western wars of intervention cloaked in humanitarian. logic i don't accept the fact that this is a war in good faith i think this is an opportunist war fought in order to give the west an initiative in a part of the world where they had already lost it and i think i did. now for a short break we'll continue our discussion on obama's nobel prize stage with r.t. .

twenty years ago in the largest country. to. get to germany. where did it take to. disarm saddam hussein. passed charge of iraqi citizens. this event brings further assurance that the torture chambers and the secret police are gone forever. tries again over our embassy in kabul. cherish too much occupied afghanistan. and now occupy sales at guantanamo bay.

day it is appropriate today in court as which is speaking if he could even. if a slap so it's life if you can shoot him enough so that it shocks especially if it's slow but you don't actually break it in tunes could interrogation techniques that we use it. for the senior leadership. would be nothing to. believe transference. welcome back across europe to remind you we're talking about obama's nobel peace prize.

but first let's see what russians think about all of this. two years ago the newly elected american president barack obama was awarded the nobel peace prize for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples but now as the u.s. into in libya many want it if the so would be taking away the russian public opinion research center all citizens one thing to. do about libya sixty two percent of the respondents say libya turmoil is exclusively domestic problem and prone countries should not interfere and another twenty seven percent believe international community should step in to stop the civil war they are in the ongoing conflict in libya has once again stressed the controversy awarding

president obama the u.s. commander in chief well the peace prize. ok gentlemen let's go back to the nobel prize here i'd like to listen to some of the words that rock obama gave for the committee which he picked up his award in two thousand and let's listen to what he had to say. so i come here with sense. of armed conflict i face the world as it is and cannot stand idle in the face of threats to the american people. for make no mistake evil does exist in the world. well if i go to you bill i've always called obama the commander in speech i mean we have to give him that it least he speaks very well but has he changed it is he painted the the award because there's always expediency i mean he was elected by a group of people there is something called even i admit the national interest he's going to act in the actual interest as he understands it for his the people that voted for him ok and everything else is secondary ok so he ok got the nobel prize

well sorry i'm still going to be commander in chief i mean doesn't this does it change the award. the award has already got a few points on it long before barack obama you know we're going to know when the prize to yasser arafat's or henry kissinger ok i mean that's what a lot of other people and larry kissinger ok but still in this case actually i mean that i mean but when the prize was given to obama americans were surprised and shocked what do you think about that what do you think everybody as you premature do you think the or if you think it has the same value now as it does back in two thousand and nine go ahead. yes yes i do because it has been tainted in the past and also let me just point out that obama inspired the world just by getting elected i know he's got a lot of detractors now especially not part of the country but he did inspire the world just getting elected prevented a person who was singing bomb bomb bomb bomb bomb iran and twenty to one hundred

years of possible warfare in iraq part of the fact is obama's put fewer boots on the ground than nearly any of our recent presidents now now he might who knows that could change because there is a lot of turmoil in the world but i don't think you can fault him for acting in libya there's a cost in violence a cost in human lives to not acting and when you've got people marching with banners and people saying we want democracy i think you have to be cognizant of that and have a certain thing for those folks who could see heartbreak and heart fall from the skies if we did not that ok try to find out she i mean we're giving the nobel peace prize was sitting president that really hadn't done anything to that point i mean was it just like you pointed out this thank goodness he's not george bush and just hoping that a war is a preemptive war is coming out of washington would slow down or maybe come to an end i mean it was it was it a an award of hope because it certainly those hopes have been are in tatters right now i mean with. tomahawk missiles being fired and who knows what in libya today.

i don't think it was an award of hope it was an award of wishful thinking and an award of sycophancy i mean if you look at the list of nobel prize prize winners. you have had a lot of u.s. presidents on delays the award has been pretty tainted i don't know whether you're aware of this peter but in one nine hundred fifty six someone suggested old hitler thought of peace prize this was of course not taken up but he was suggested might amount gandhi never was awarded the peace prize so it is a pretty there's a there's a very interesting norwegian jury is frederick care from a who's written a book on the nobel peace prize and he says that the peace prize for truly from the beginning violated alfred nobel's instructions that nobel peace prize should only go to those people actively engaged in peace and it's been hijacked by retired norwegian politicians and

a cold war academic from the past to hand it out at will and there was a lot of criticism in norway when obama got it and when others got it i mean kissinger is a case in point. but numerous other people have caught it and gabrielle garcia marquez himself a prize winner of the nobel prize winner on literature said it would be more accurate to call it when the bell war price them they will give it to whoever they wanted whenever. vilifying you actually go to people go ahead to people that are about peace prize al gore when we defeated theoretically gore got more votes in two thousand and brock obama i mean that was it was a real sense that there was so much relief and so much anger george bush they gave it to two different people the one who really deserve the nobel peace prize who didn't get it i'm sure easy as i doubt is bill clinton and he of course did make war in kosovo but that war was seen as a no other humanitarian intervention but clinton has probably done more for peace

than any. president jimmy carter you mean carter no you bring out jimmy carter of peace prize ok but i mean if i go in john places turn off it i don if i can go to you ok because i had i had to go ahead and clinton deserve the peace prize this guy imposed sanctions maintain sanctions on iraq madeline albright his secretary of state defended the killing of for at least a million iraqi children because of sanctions saying it was necessary imposed a no wallsten on iraq destroyed virtually everything so softening the country for bush and cheney to take away he deserved the peace prize give us a break ok don what about it what about former politicians foreign policy is look at jimmy carter because jimmy carter if i were a lot of people criticize him for some of his thoughts since spread his presidency but he i think it's fair to say that even his detractors while he was president say he's done good he's done the best job of former president could ever do for peace

and helping. just poor people in general all the way to recognizing different issues around the world and sometimes the media forgets or sometimes gives a certain view on that maybe is very. for american and western interests ok one thing about the middle east but is that the case maybe your former politician has done well because one of my thesis is that politicians probably shouldn't get it at all go ahead on. no i think there's a lot of value in giving them to former politicians that sets an example for others who leave office and do good works even though their power base no longer exists in a political sense but let's you know so many people get this award though who have no power base except whatever power base the people. or international opinion gives them i think of two thousand and four one gary. and i think the pardon my pronunciation but who started this amazing movements plant trees thing kenya and

transformed the car tree and made life easier for especially for women who had to gather the firewood and is really helping transform the world into a greener place without the nobel who knows what might have become of her and her movement shirin baby disbar judge whose human rights advocacy in iran for women and children was suppressed what might have become of her without the world's attention i think the nobel prize definitely serves i wonderful function in the world yes like anything else it's subject to abuse and i think the jury frankly is still out on obama his legacy is yet to be made but again there is a cost in not acting ok tell you what do you think i mean i can think of and when he got the award in looking at his presidency since then it still is in the nobel prize. peace prize is still very discourse of western. international relations is still very nice is that is the paradigm and i think a lot of people in the world see it if i you know be very blunt it's kind of a white people's award when it comes to politics it is totally dominated by people

who essentially to friend western inclusive everywhere i mean look at the latest one ok surely to give it to the right people i agree sharing about these a case in point but this chinese guy they gave it to loucheux beat in the last nobel peace prize it's quite astonishing that because though he is in prison and he shouldn't be in prison let me make that very clear the chinese government of keeping him in. prism but his political beliefs are walked one one tapes china should have been colonized for three hundred years by a western or. in order for it to learn civilization that the iraq war was justified that kerry was wrong to criticize bush would be iraq war that of crime is down is justified but the vietnam and korea and waltz were wars against totalitarianism that is right good and this is the guy who gets the nobel peace prize so you know it's obvious that the motive is ideological and the chief of the

prize winners jaclyn the next norwegian politician said we wanted to teach china a lesson that's really sad it's actually the opposite him it's very interesting i mean a lot of the thing a lot of people say that he did the chinese dissident did win the award irritated a lot of people but julia is doing a sign irritates a lot of people too and but he's considered a villain by the united states but a hero for so many other people empowering hero by the way and he's certainly not a person that's creating war or promoting conflict. look the chinese this it was an article in a surprise because of his views on all these previous issues he was given his nobel peace prize because of his stand in defiance of chinese authorities and it work i mean it created a lot of attention to that issue it wasn't because of things he's written in the past and nobel peace prize does best when it's clearly clearly an award for human rights activism but when he gets involved in political controversies on the left or

on the right it's always going to be disputed ok john i'm going to give you the last word on this do you think that obama now has to it's incumbent upon him to make good on the his words of being a peacemaker he still got a little time left in his first term. well i hope it's possible i hope it's possible i think the jury is out i think obama's legacy is yet to be made he's only been in office for two years a little over and they've been very distracting years that the whole world faced. economic decline you know he's been distracted every which way and so i think we just have to kind of give him the benefit of the doubt all right gentlemen i have to jump in will run out of time let's give mr rove on the benefit of the doubt many thanks to my guests again washington london and in knoxville and thanks to our viewers for watching you see it our teeth so you next time and remember crosstalk rules.