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tv   Cross Talk  RT  December 25, 2019 11:00pm-11:31pm EST

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values for the tool and that's what we need to do with artificial intelligence as well. the syrian army pushes deeper into it leave the province forcing extremist fighters from dozens of villages. and french government introduces a new. trucks in its battle to reduce carbon emissions. research shows u.k. arms exports to the saudi led coalition in yemen have spiked in the last 5. the latest on these stories you can head to our crosstalk is next with.
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hello and welcome to cross talk we're all things are considered i'm peter lavelle what explains the bipartisan commitment to an ending wars in foreign military interventions recent polls show the majority of veterans in this century's foreign wars say it wasn't worth it in 2016 trying to gain traction in foreign adventures today. doing the same why are the elite out of touch. and ending wars i'm joined by i guess daniel hsia in new york he is a professor of latin american and caribbean studies at city university of new york and but that is that we have peter cosmic he is a professor of history and director of the nuclear studies institute at american university as well as co-author with all of her stone of the untold history of the . united states and in washington we cross to camp he is the host and head writer
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of the comedy new show redacted tonight on our t.v. america all right coming cross talk rules and in fact that means you can jump in anytime you want i always appreciate let's go to bethesda peter i think that all of us would agree and our audience that it's unlikely that we would ever compared to donald trump ok they're very very different but they do have one commonality and it's an attitude towards foreign adventures now donald trump has not been able to do much about his rhetoric of the campaign while he's been in office but keeps going both of them are slammed every time they go outside the the borders or the perimeters of the bipartisan commitment to these wars why is that why do they get slammed down so hard so fast even with people within their own party go ahead peter. well as you indicate there's a bipartisan consensus when it comes to american foreign policy and it's
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dominated by a neo con neoconservative or a view is based on this idea of american exceptionalism that the united states has the right duty the obligation to intervene around or all of the united states is god's gift to humanity unlike everybody else where alex was to commend evelyn you are spreading freedom and democracy but the net result of this is that we live in a war of the which the richest people have more wealth than the poorest the point 8000000000 people that us policy has been a consistently interventionist one that the cold more never really and the policy change at the end of whole or and there's been a war a war between the 1st world in the 3rd world ever since but it's very very dangerous tulsi understands that i don't agree that donald trump and told syrian any way comparable. views on foreign policy are so much better informed than donald
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trump that's for sure that's what our record is actually in very hawkish very militaristic so even though he has a rhetoric about not want to intervene it's very very different than the kind of aggressive intelligent view in which one is opposed to this i agree with you completely my point is for example removing troops from syria and you know even his own governor his own cabinet you know kind of came piling in i take your point well taken here daniel let me go to to you in my introduction also i mention that recent polling because of memorial day the veterans of these wars in this century these interventionist wars they say the majority of a large majority actually say it quote unquote it wasn't worth it so that should be kind of some wake up call whitney a thank go ahead daniel. one would certainly hope with the foreign policy establishment the pentagon has never listened to the veterans will listen to
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anybody except for their own narrow interests of course the vietnam era veteran still suffering to this day from p.t.s.d. and thousands upon thousands tens of thousands of our loved ones sisters and brothers sent to iraq 'd and afghanistan in these wars of foreign pillage no question that these veterans are against the war and tulsi gabbett very articulately captures that sentiment and she's really a fresh of breath air in the still democratic party debates where no one besides bernie is willing to take on the foreign policy establishment and here you have a very unique individual was 16 years of quote unquote service one might say a disservice if one agrees with martin luther king that the u.s. government in the u.s. military the greatest purveyors of violence in the world but she speaks a certain language and can go on fox news you know and can relate to really millions of american families and they're afraid of their very definitively afraid
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of her yeah they really are and it is really quite interesting that she has a place at fox news who who would have thought it would let me go to leave here in washington you know leave that for my everything we've heard so far on this program here i suppose is that the. democratic process and having popular opinion about foreign policy is simply for bowden ok you can argue about everything else but you can't argue about foreign policy it just isn't there and it and one of the reasons why it's there is because the corporate mainstream media gives this bipartisan view cover all of the time go ahead lee yeah yeah it's totally disgusting that we live in largely a death a column a i mean we make tremendous amounts of money from our weapon sales 55 percent of our discretionary spending is. dumped into the military and if anyone questions it it did they're called right hillary clinton called gabbert
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a russian asset that is completely not allowed to question our military industrial complex and if you are you are pushed out by the 2 corporate parties you are you are purged from them like something they needed to vomit up because you dared question these things and as you mentioned earlier in the few instances that donald trump has tried to do something that was against war against death against our military such as withdraw troops or peace with north korea he is shut down and you know that is not to say he's some kind of dove. that obama dropped 26000 drone bombs his final year in office and we're under trumpet went up to 40000 a year or so he has no dog it's a bomb every 12 minutes you know there's blood on all of our hands as americans and blood in those few instances where he does seem like he has some desire to create peace or to limit war he is completely shut down and it raises the question have we seen basically a soft coup in terms of foreign policy if it's completely run by our military
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industrial complex and you cannot question it even if you're the press to present the united states then who's in control of it and you know the president's not congress well peter as we heard a few weeks ago from a former deputy director of the cia thank god for the deep state ok and everybody clapped ok peter saying with you ok given everything we've said here on this program it but if we look at these interventions particularly since in this century there all have been utter failures so there's no learning curve on top of this beis bipartisan commitment to an ending wars so they think they can even in a knowledge failure is that even worse go ahead peter. well we've had some stunning successes we did several dozen cuban construction workers in grenada in 83. since. really gotten since the korean war i mean how much more do we have to learn
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there exists a big conference last week in washington about the vietnam war you know and. it's the worst atrocity since the holocaust 3800000 vietnamese died according to robert mcnamara when he came into my class he said he accepts the 3800000 vietnamese died but we look at the track record since then there's been military intervention after military intervention with this low results creating more problems not only killing millions of people but. wreaking havoc of many of the problems that we're facing in the world now are result of the u.s. invasion of iraq in 2003 and people who aren't beforehand that that would be the effect oh yeah i think when he gets the media did not allow that that point of view the only one who are talking about that phil donahue and he lost his job yeah he lost his job. and the n.b.c.
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it's special said well everybody else is waving the flag we don't want to be seen as some kind of doves over here it is then been that dangerous kind of consensus you turn on c.n.n. or in this and these say even fox news is absurd you turn on c.n.n. and some b c and you'll have 4 talking heads there who are experts saying that the russian intervention in the 26 election was an actor who are and nobody even thinks to read any of the ok peter i was kind of hoping to avoid the impeachment thing but you opened that can of worms i'm going to go to daniel you know daniel i've been watching part of some of the hearings because there's so absurd and they're so boring and they're so opaque. it is really just a 6 show to watch what the ok given that i watch the quote unquote experts on. ukraine why do they have their jobs they have no idea what they're talking about and then you can add on what peter was saying the media just says oh my goodness
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these patriots are so knowledgeable you have to defer to them their their expertise no they're not they're all political hacks daniel. the impeachment proceedings is the other guests have said are a massive distraction from the very real issues in new york city right now every day more poverty in homelessness the opioid epidemic all these real working class issues that need to be addressed in the media spin doctors 247 with every minute boring detail about ukraine in all the russia phobia and russia gate field so now there's this whole ukraine thing it's extremely distracting and what's really behind that is. donald trump is not a reliable dependable candidate for what you call the deep state for the pentagon state department good point of course he should be impeached he should be overthrown because he's a racist warmongering zina phobia homophobic massage honest but the mainstream
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media doesn't focus on that they focus on really these. deceptive and rush hysterical plus that they've concocted ok but you know daniel last 30 seconds go to you for before we go to the break but what russia gate was a hoax it failed why do they think it's going to get traction if you just put ukraine in front of it here i mean that it's absurd to go 25 seconds to before we go to the break. again it's designed to distract the top 10 new york times stories and fox stories and c.n.n. and there is this media i gem many then the everyday american people can see outside of that box and the everyday american populace is not educated on u.s. foreign policy still subscribe to this idea of what the professor called american exceptionalism all right gentlemen i'm going to jump in here we're going to go to a short break and after that short break we'll continue our discussion on an ending war stayed with.
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facts and stacie are continuing on our south american tour and as you can see behind me we are in rio de janeiro oh my god so beautiful so much going on this is a country in transition. i'm not one who will ever argue that there are worthy and unworthy victims it's also important to also distinguish the fact that whenever we have a crime. of genocide and other cases of genocide that's that we're talking about issues confronting it acknowledging it and injustice and reparations for it
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are important it is important to confront the crimes wherever they happen but it shouldn't be a means to dilute you know the experience of. in this particular case of the. welcome across the uk where all things are considered i'm peter lavelle to remind you we're discussing an ending wars. ok let's go to lee in washington it's part of my job lead to watch the media as much as painful and stupid and a waste of time as it is i have to keep up with what other people are saying i should i should get hard i should get a hardship pay because i watch a lot of nonsense ok we i want to pick up on 2 points that we were brought up on this program peter brought up american exceptionalism here and daniel is also
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talking about how poorly educated americans are about foreign policy and i think that's really kind of the nexus because most americans maybe not for through no fault of their own actually have no idea the impact of american foreign policy around the world i mean what's going on in bolivia right now it is horrendous what's going on it really when you look at. opposition figures being kidnapped and being tied to trees being tortured. every constitutional law there is and it's not bear the grays own will cover it the interceptor will cover 1 it in a few other people you will cover it lee ok but the american people largely have no idea about these things and because of what we heard about american exceptional that's the bow on the top isn't it where it kind of keeps everything and stay says go ahead. yeah i think it's a testament to what
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a brilliant job they've done and shutting down an actual discussion in the media of the truth behind these these coups that we've helped create in bolivia right now with many of these leaders were trained at the school the americas which has been renamed for branding purposes you know the brand was getting solid so they had to change the name but you know an inventive swale our economic sanction or economic war has killed 40000 people over the past couple of years and americans don't know any of this because you're not going to get it really on just about any mainstream outlet and that includes n.p.r. and p.b.s. and those that that are now you know the head of n.p.r. is the former head of voice of america so you have a full a full scale american propaganda network across all of the outlets and many of the independent outlets so it's really an impressive job they've done a dumbing down the american populace and i do real quick want to take issue with one thing that was said earlier i don't know that all of these wars and invasions
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that we've been involved in are of failures from the view of the neo cons and the you know the neo liberals that have run them i think destroying the country of iraq and and making it so it basically is is powerless but i think that you know their view is probably a success probably similar with syria just seeing them collapse it's chaos theory i've heard this argument and i think it has a lot of military i'm glad you brought it up thankfully let me go to peter now what happened to the anti-war movement what happened i mean i remember the marches all around the world particularly in europe in the protests in the u.s. were protesting the iraq war and it's gone and it's why is it because of the media or is it because of control of the internet and social media platforms how do we explain it go ahead peter. had a good answer to that maybe. but it's not that you know i'm on the campuses and i go around the country speaking quite a bit and it's. not that the young people students don't care they do care
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1st of all they're not very well informed on this issue they're very vocal lives on climate change they're really activists about that they're very sensitive to gender and sexual issues and need to movement they're very concerned about racial issues but there's very little concern about nuclear issues number one and number 2 foreign policy in general and we're talking about you you introduce trump to someone in a positive way the beginning you look at his nuclear policies and it's an absolute disaster yet no not on it he. pulled out of the c.p.o. and the nuclear deal with iran not only did he agree i.n.f. treaty. is the new start treaty if you want to look at its nuclear posture review lots of pushes back to the nuclear arms race like the 1980 s. when we had 70000 nuclear weapons in the world so they're not they're not focused
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on these issues either so that's not that they don't care but i think that they do have a 7 minute sense of existential threat which is why they're concerned about climate change but some of the other issues the issues of us and then do morse and the issues of nuclear threats it's not on their agenda right now i guess peter rabbit well guess what that you know you ring up the environment i suppose your students know that the pentagon is the biggest polluter in the world ok they probably know that but probably not in the foreign interventions around the world and how they happen here daniel the same question to you i mean i'll use peter as you know how do we rebuild the anti-war movement we have code pink out there it's great and i agree with him on those issues here but you know how do you how do you capitalized on what we had before because it's only getting worse i mean i think one of the biggest changes in the last couple years is that you have the neil. and baiting the left the liberals now i mean now they're in but they have equal footing in each
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party and you can hear neo con propaganda talking points on the mainstream corporate media 247 ok i mean it's just blanket coverage right now i couldn't you know peter is an expert on vietnam i mean it was members of the media that started questioning the war nobody in the media mainstream media questions it or their silence go ahead daniel. in the bush years we had marches in d.c. and right below me in times square of hundreds of thousands of people consistently against george bush in the war machine what happened was the barack obama effect and obama nation if you will a new face of imperialism. that was able to really full so the whole liberal wing of the anti-war movement folded and suddenly on marches when libya was destroyed bomb to smithereens and recall and and we marched here in times square and across the country our marches went from hundreds of thousands to maybe
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a 100 but honestly dozens and when we stood up to syria and imperialist dance for syria who would come into the streets of syria we've had marches for bolivia and for venezuela but again in general the american public it's the last thing that they're thinking about it's the last thing that they're educated on so really there's a lot of work in front of us as popular educators to have these conversations that venezuela is not the enemy they cuba is not the enemy that our enemy is right here in washington d.c. on wall street so i don't want to project any type of cynicism but we have to get in you to have that dialogue to to educate and build this anti-war movement so what it was in the early years of the invasion and occupation of iraq you know you know i keep want covering what's going on dinner in iraq and afghanistan because i think it's really important too but you know. i have to think twice about doing
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a program on it because when like the last couple of programs i did on both countries the questions on you tube what is he talking about why are they talking about this i mean to the research here because nobody i mean you go to antiwar dot com every day at one of the things i do with my morning coffee every single day and i keep up you know incrementally what's going on here and but i could understand how someone that would just flip on this channel right now and say what in the world are they talking about you know because that's that that is really an indictment of the media because it doesn't have any pedagogical purpose whatsoever anymore go ahead lee. well i and it's even being purged from social media so even the outside outlets that people used to get that information from are now being purged you mention antiwar dot com i'm pretty sure they're one of the ones that were purged from facebook and there you know editors purged from twitter and you know the idea that anybody speaking out against war should be eliminated from these social media outlets it's so disgusting and it's revolting and it shouldn't people
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and one other thing i want to say about why the the anti-war movement has been has dwindled so heavily is all of america is told to put our entire energy and anger and frustration and and all this funnel it all into the presidential election that is it that's all that can be talked about if you are angry about these things go vote and it look you should vote but you should vote if you vote against picking up a piece a litter it's a tiny little thing you do to help your society it is not going to it's not the way if you're angry about things you need to get angry beyond just your voting or your arguing about which political candidate you know said something silly the other day you know you know peter is i think one of the great tragedies you know when it walked away from all of these important arms control agreements the agreement with the random nucular deal which i thought obama was right in doing that we're all fakes at least we're told are not going to take a tear a page from leave right right now we're all told to focus is ourselves on the
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orange man in the white house that is the biggest distraction that could possibly be and i keep telling my viewers so much is going on in the world right now that you're not paying attention to that are detrimental to everyone involved but it is this huge distraction on donald trump and i think that's a huge mistake but it does work well for the deep state the intelligence community because everybody is arguing with each other and they're making their own decisions on their own peter. you know people have their television wallets while the planes are flying off to distil. moore's nobody's paying attention and that's you know donald trump sucks all the out of the room he wants everything to be focused on him and the media does it does it. and it's going in some ways it's important because he is dangerous and we do need to get him out of office as quickly as possible but the other issues that are so important is that any
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discussion of the fact that we've got more than $800.00 overseas military bases is there any discussion of the fact that u.s. special forces operated proximately $143.00 countries last year is there any discussion of our arms sales and how dangerous they are around the world the fact that the u.s. is bombing 7 countries right now. then the real issues about what's going on are not think this cost and you know we're all very frustrated with the media you get on mainstream media in the united states if you've got a clear if you're critical of american empire there is no discussion of american empire well they will be but they won't even say it let me go to the annual finish i'll put you 30 as i can see it's for bowden to say american empire but that's exactly what it is 30 seconds to my friend go ahead yeah look what happened in marc lamont hill on c.n.n. a critical voice for black liberation and for sallust on in
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a given the acts just because he did to mention palestinian self-determination and i think it's always important with my students or with the general public to clarify that these are not our wars we did not invade iraq the ruling class using our bodies and our limbs invaded iraq for their benefit but this is not our government our system our wars so we have to oppose them. ok gentlemen that's all the time we've had fascinating discussion we have to get the anti-war movement moving again many thanks to my guests in new york but that's day and in washington and thanks to our viewers for watching us here at r.t.c. the next time you remember. i'm going to fulfill the repeated promises ok politics to the people and come on you know we've all but been going to. be ready
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for a long. time. now you want to 1st. know. all 5 the. big. coming coming coming. today there are good tennis and bad attitudes the bad news in yemen the united states deems to be
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a threat the good to those who work in syria the cia and the u.s. military were engaged in covert actions really throughout the world. where they were assassinating populist leaders they were backing up right away military juntas funding an army of death squads there's no end because there's always a small. really good. come on welcome to worlds apart their minions like to say that the the won't always
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stay behind the cloud implying that the suffering of their ancestors and the crumbling ottoman empire will sooner or later be recognized as a side but a century later it can be squashed for historic truth and earthly justice after be dived forced from contemporary politics well to discuss that i'm now joined by maura down lecturer in middle eastern south asian and african studies at columbia university professor more again it's good to talk to you welcome to the show thank you for having me now i'm sure you would agree with me that the american armenians will remember this december as a major landmark as both u.s. house and the u.s. senate have now recognized the massacres of their mean eons in the early 20th century as genocide is there anything more to it though than just a symbolic victory yes as you mentioned this is a significant month for or mean americans but not just i mean americans i believe
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that this is significant. you know these have been a few significant weeks for armenians around the world who have been following clause closely these developments i remember growing up in lebanon myself and following these discussions in the united states as they were have. and i think. as you mentioned this is significant and at the same time it is clearly cannot be divorced from the current situation on the ground this in balik aspect of this is important but i believe that these resolutions also go beyond the symbolism he you mentioned that this is not just a symbolic event but this was passed as in the form of simple resolutions which are non-binding and i assume non executive will what exactly do you think the passing of this dock.

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