how do i win the war? how do i win the war? he's asking the right question, because that is the key question. and with lincoln, if the generals won't give him a plan, he will give them one himself. he's not afraid to think about it and learn. on the other side on the confederacy with jefferson davis, there is absolutely no record of him ever going to any of his generals and saying how do i win the war? he's not even asking the right question. if you're not going to ask the right question, you're not going to get the answer that you need. so, thank you very much and i'm told we have time for questions here. [ applause ] >> okay, we have a couple of mikes. if you would be kind enough to stand so we can see who you are because we're taping this program tonight, and then hold the mike up very close to your mouth so we can hear you. if you hold it like -- [ inaudible ] -- impossible to hear. so, anybody? raise your hand. >> yes, sir. we learn from past to understand the present and maybe we have some idea of our future. and things a

what we now call world war i. aberson-host, father of the host newspaper took a prominent position in the parade. what the spectators didn't see were the people who were not in the parade. the city's unions were asked to march but most did not. it would be working mens and their sons who would have to fill those trenches and die in far away places for a cause that seemed remote to them. still the parade seemed festive and stirring to the audience that crowded the sidewalks. at 2:06 p.m. as the parade was rounding stewart street and heading up market, a suitcase someone had left on the sidewalk exploded. it was a horrific blast. it killed 10 people. seriously injured 30 or 40 more. a hursn newsreel camera reached a few moments later. bodies were being loaded into vans other bodies were being searched by police to find identification inside their bloody clothes. their corpses were shattered, their clothes in rags. authorities look for someone to blame. they found a culprit in tom muney. a rally for the socialist par

they not only fought that war against great odds, but they won that war. they not only saved this nation but they literally saved the world. we also were member those who served on the homefront. never has our nation been so united as they were in that war. we especially remember the 400,000 americans who never came home. they give all of their tomorrow's. when they were only 18 or 19 years old, all of your tomorrows is a high price to pay. they paid that price so that we could live in this strong, free, and beautiful america that we are proud to come home. the board and staff of the national world war ii memorial is privileged to continue to work very hard to ensure the legacy, the lessons, and the sacrifice of the world war ii generation is never forgotten. it is also great pride to work alongside the park service who did such an outstanding job in taking care of this magnificent memorial. we are also proud to partner with the national park service and the department of defense to help cohost special commemorative events like this one today. thank you fo

and the berlin berlin crisis of one nine hundred sixty one two brought us to the edge to the brink of war eisenhower's secretary of state dollars had called it brinksmanship going against the soviet union going to roll back containment but it's a far more aggressive policy in that scene we've had five or six nuclear threats we've made against the chinese and against the soviet you kennedy inherited this office as a young man. and he was suspected by the military leaders the hardliners of the us that he did not have these the wherewithal to really continue the eisenhower policy he had failed to do so in laos to go in to send ground troops he failed in cuba at the bay of pigs to give it to suit the air support that it needed when he failed in the vietnam to really carry through a a much more in gauged process with a b. at the me he said non-combat advisors but not combat people so this was going on that he was fighting and this is known now this is all come out now not when the film came behind the scenes tremendous civil war. and fifty years later right now it is irrefutable evidence came

these mechanize murder weapons that the war on whistle blowers and also just the n.s.a. spying on the world is that just exemplify the tyrannical evolution of the us absolutely what you have a bomb you want to use so we have put up the system where we were looking for terrorists right there is what two thousand three thousand i don't know it's a small file band of people but people would now have the right to look at the entire haystack for the needle we get so the result is it's like hitler what hitler got used a lot of it got a lot of his power from the people because he was wailing about terrorists inside germany always they talk about terrorists that justifies a totalitarian state it's always the first method in george orwell's nine hundred eighty four it's always about terrorists even because the only nutcases joba current the terrorists communists planted in our schools in our government so who is creates this fear that the american people i love when gorbachev left and the end of the day we will have to use technology so this is very scary very scary unless we edu

women would write to the confederate secretary of war mac elite -- war and ask that their sons would be detailed home and be permitted to help in other ways. and as a comment in those letters there is a very rich wondering if some of the demands and challenges and trauma of the war. that made up the bulk of my research for my earlier book i began to realize that at the heart of these women's experience was death. the loss of their loved ones, the fear of losing their loved ones, the economic consequences of losing their loved, and the impact of death on their families, on their communities and on the nation as a whole. and as i listen to the women telling me about these experiences, i thought about what i have learned reading the history of the civil war into a realized that most of what i had read focused on the pursuit of the military victory, or perhaps the struggle over southern independent or perhaps on the coming of emancipation. but these were not the topics that appeared at the heart of these letters and of these women's experience. these were not the subjects that loomed the

iild war i and world war were not things they were willing to repeat. at the time noted, the conventional balance for most of the cold war was much more favorable to nato than conventional wisdom would have it. we now know the soviets did not think about nuclear deterrence like rand analysts. they saw war as eisenhower did, as something that was unmanageable and uncertain. they were not interested in fighting a war under the nuclear umbrella because of some difference in u.s. targeting policy. they were deterred regardless of the particulars of how we outlined our force. whatever they said, u.s. leaders behaved as if they agreed, in the early cold war and the beginning of the cuban missile crisis, when the u.s. had a better chance of applying a first strike and after. we were not able to coerce the soviets without diplomatic concessions, as was the case it with the cuban missile crisis. the whole irony then was that both sides were so frightened to restrain they were afraid to admit it for fear of emboldening the other. so there was this cold war debate

after world war ii when the demand for cars war pretty big. and so by 1954, and when the sales decreased the didn't have money for engineering to come up with a new design, a new car. the also with regard to engines the had a six-cylinder engine then a 1950s major manufacturers were coming out with modern v 8 engines. and hudson just couldn't keep up with the engineering of the money to do the engineers for a new v 8 engine. and then by 1955 the were out of business. >> we're in the kaiser frazier tucker room of our museum. and what we have here is a collection of cars that were manufactured by kaiser frazier. so after the war was over, the major manufacturers used their dyes and designs from the war and were able to come out with cars right away in 1946 because the didn't have to do any design work the just used their pre-war models. in the case of kaiser frazier the didn't have pre-war models so the had to do their design work and keiser and frazier were a little latent everything the car market after world war ii. the had to do design work.

you deal with the european war. i am about to get into the japanese side of it, which i don't know much about. do you have any suggestions for reading on that? i'll let you go. >> guest: thank you for your question and thank you for the comment about your father. sounds like a mixture of every man. there's a lot of good stuff out there about the pacific were. my friend richard frank is a very fine historian working on a trilogy about the war in the pacific. max hastings writes well about the pacific. if you look on my website, liberation trilogy.com, you will see a short essay on suggested reading and there's reading they are about the global war beyond the war in europe. >> host: rick atkinson, we spent three hours 50 mid-may when "the guns at last light: the war in western europe 1944-1945" came out. we has to then, are you working on a specific trilogy? >> guest: peter, i'm not. i decided some time ago that i wasn't going to do the pacific. 15 years is long enough on world war ii. and so i've begun working on ano

this is a war zone. this is, you know, where the war destruction, as the germans called it, is taking place. the titanic struggle. the partisan warfare, military campaign. i thought ordinary german women were at home taking care of the home front and having babies so more soldiers could go to battle and more territory could be conquered. here is an example of the kind of document -- this is not from the archive, but just to show you the personnel. i started to realize this phenomena of the women going east i could start to find document takes from other parts of eastern europe. local regional records. these are young women. you can see -- the telephone operators. one is situated in the kind of, you know, office as a -- kind of an executive secretary in the front office. and starting to figure out through this documentation that women -- that the document i found is possibly the tip of the iceberg. and when i went back to washington, after that first trip, i went back to ukraine several times after that,

tell right now i mean there are signs of a civil war already. but to what extent it will dissolve the state will dissolve it's not clear yet whether the american decision to intervene and to train the libyans what kind of an effect that will have on the ground is yet to be seen but ok it's a little too late or maybe a little too early or josef i go to you in colombia i mean if we look right now that libya is a failed state i mean so what do you do i mean you train eight thousand troops whose loyalty is very unclear because loyalties in libya itself is very unclear and when the country is breaking up into three discrete parts right now so what is eight thousand troops going to do to salvage the situation in libya. well i think that they will not do anything good and i agree with you completely and you know i was very skeptical to start with about why there should have been any intervention from the outside in libya but you know i mean let's be honest about that it's easier said than done if you're not sleepy and you are outside of libya i really

war on terror is a crazy expression for a limited war.sy beetavis: you don't thinkt policies has done in thing to offend the tea party -- i'm just pressing you on this and i don't necessarily disagree that he hasn't done nearly as much as we hoped he would have done, has not been aggressive enough, has not been aggressive enough -- i'm with you on that durin. but there is something that has the opposition so hard on him. >> i know what you're saying. i really think that he is black has a lot to do with it. i don't know why these republican white people -- frankly, the o'connells -- the mcconnells -- it is like they are still fighting for the rights of whites in africa. so they are scared. tom delay is another one of those horrible white people who come along and they go back -- tavis: it's so funny to watch you do that. >> they have taken democracy away from us. elected by a be million and a half votes in 2012 and have the house of representatives so singly republican? that to me is the result of gerrymandering. also their stand on guns,

nineteen -- robo one was a good war, world war ii was bad. the first subject was so horrendous that -- turned is that makes it of the two sides causes could badly to meant -- barely managed. they add a view of what they think happened. until 1941 britain defied the vast evil of nazism, berlin. in russia and the united states took this train encompassing the destruction of hitler. the struggle was nothing like as bloody as its predecessor, says some people kid themselves. the allies had better generals who understood that our soldiers should not be allowed to become the town's sacrifices. but our ideas about the first world war i. much cloudier and indeed cannot fairly confused. even among educated people. if you have much idea why europe exploded, though they may know that a big league with an extravagant mustache got shot. the most widely held belief is that the conflict was simply a guessing mistake for which all the european powers share blame, it's folly compounded by the british incompetence of military commanders. this is what i would c

they saw only a local war. but they were amazingly willing to accept the risk and the general european conflagration would follow. germany was not ruled -- as an -- in which the emperor postured and the generals planned for the premise that war served prussia well with three great victories over austria and france and denmark. they also recognized that democracy, now threatened their control of their own country. it was a socialist majority in the german parliament which was opposed to militarism, and promised to end the kaiser's rule. more than a few politicians and soldiers believed a triumph abroad could halt the advance of the socialist tide. they also made a mistake typical of their age. they underestimated the dominance their country was achieving through its industrial prowess without firing a shot on any battlefield. germany was plowing ahead of britain, france, russia, by every economic indicator, but the keiser and his generals measured strength by counting soldiers. they were fixated by russia's grow

it was an atrocious act of war, but it was an act of war as it were the war against the jews had nothing to do with any kind of military exercise. it was purely about killing. >> yeah. and, in fact, it detracted from the war effort. >> yes. >> [inaudible] >> oh, okay. >> my question segways into that. did america really have to drop the atomic bomb, bombs on japan, or were they so weak they would have surrendered anyway? >> well, they probably would have, but the question is when. and the americans wanted to finish the war as quickly as they could because they were running out of money. most americans were sick of war. they wanted the boys to come home. so the appetite to prolong it was very low. and there was also the fear at that stage that soviets would invade japan first. and so they did want to bring -- they wanted to avoid an invasion at all costs. now, was it really necessary? we will never entirely -- we will never know for sure. what we do know is that even after the second act -- [inaudible] nagasaki, the japanese war council which was, they were the ones who had to decide on w

churchill inherited a war against the most powerful armies in world history in a war that seemed on oneo winston churchill. here is a passage and i would like to make it shorter and i cannot. it is so good. it's one of the first volume of manchester's " the last lion." it is the description under which churchill began his premiership. "the friendship collapsed, the dutch had been overwhelmed, the belgians had surrendered, the british army trapped at dunkirk and was trying to fight free and fell back toward the channel ports. behind them lay the sea. it was england's greatest crisis since the norman conquest. england's new leader, were he to prevail, had to stand for everything the british establishment had rejected. a viewed adolf hitler as a product of complex social and historical forces. their success would have to be a passionate,manicean who saw the struggle to the death between the powers of good and evil who held that individuals are responsible for their actions and the german dictator was therefore wicked. a believer in martial glory was required. who could rally the nation and

it was an act of war. it was an atrocious act of war but it was an act of war. the war against the jewish had nothing to do with any kind of military exercise. it was purely about killing. >> my questions segues into that did america really have to drop the atomic bombs on japan or were they so weak they would have surrendered anyway? >> they probably would have put the question is when and the americans wanted to finish the war as quickly as they could because they were running out of money and most americans were sick of the war and they wanted the boys to come home. the appetite was very low and there was also the fear that stage that the soviets would invade japan first and so they wanted to avoid an invasion at all costs. was it really necessary? we will never know for sure. what we do know is that even after the second war is not the sake the japanese war council which they were the ones who have to decide whether to surrender or not and it had to be unanimous decision. diehards in the war council still wanted to fight for the last man, woman and child. it

that in theng shadows of world war ii, and and the dawn of the cold war, when some at home hoped thestates would turn inward, churchill looked outward again and across the atlantic. he traveled to the heartland of our country to a tiny college in fulton, missouri and he spoke of america's awe-inspiring accountability to the future. with so many challenges, all across the world today, struggles to be one, pandemics to be defeated, history yet to be defined, churchill can be heard once again at this dust -- with this bust for all of us to define our time in a manner befitting of a country that still stands, as he said then, at the pinnacle of power. that went essential british subject and statesman upon whom president kennedy, as we learned from the speaker, conferred american citizenship, help define the relationship, the special relationship between the united states and the united kingdom. more than that, he understood that even the greatest patriots are not just citizens of their own countries but citizens of the world. that gosponsibilities with it. as the proud recipient of the s

nineteen -- robo one was a good war, world war ii was bad. the first subject was so horrendous that -- turned is that makes it of the two sides causes could badly to meant -- barely managed. they add a view of what they think happened. until 1941 britain defied the vast evil of nazism, berlin. in russia and the united states took this train encompassing the destruction of hitler. the struggle was nothing like as bloody as its predecessor, says some people kid themselves. the allies had better generals who understood that our soldiers should not be allowed to become the town's sacrifices. but our ideas about the first world war i. much cloudier and indeed cannot fairly confused. even among educated people. if you have much idea why europe exploded, though they may know that a big league with an extravagant mustache got shot. the most widely held belief is that the conflict was simply a guessing mistake for which all the european powers share blame, it's folly compounded by the british incompetence of military commanders. this is what i would c

it will be tried by war. the results of free elections for the presidency must be respected. lincoln was rigorous and ruthless. they sent 750,000 men to die. i think lincoln might have chuckled we're so hot and bothered about this current, temporary, crisis. >> that's a hard act to follow, but do you want to comment on that comparison? do you want to comment on what james just said? >> strictly speaking, nothing but another civil war is equivalent to the original civil war. >> right. >> but i think the discussion of nullification of earlier suggests this is one of a series of maneuvers by which white southerns have tried to compensate for the fact since the 1830s, they've been a minority in the electorate. we have the conservative coalition in the 1950s. we have the solid south within the democratic party. the party of lincoln has now been captured by its base, largely of which is democrats. half of the members of the tea party are from the south. it's disproportionately from the south. this is the latest inc

war, the korean war.hat more so many don't think about when you think about the history of war in the 20th century. it led to a successful show "mash", and a movie by the same title. >> it's true. i bet you, though, given when machine was on tv, a lot of people to this day equate it to the vietnam war. "mash" was about the korean war, letting the tv people play with the vietnam war. >> you are a consultant, tim clemente, what are the biggest issues you have about how war is portrayed in hollywood? >> there's a disconnect between hollywood and war fighters. i don't think physically they are connected to individuals going into the military. those that live in the hinter lands, fly-over country are more connected to the military. every one of my neighbours is a former marine or served in some capacity with the military. the thing that hollywood misses is the actual type of person that goes into the military. you look at the movies you mentioned. platt on and vietnam, and a lot of those soldiers were not idea

in afghanistan he thought that the war in iraq was the wrong war and the real war should be fought in afghanistan against. where the attack on the united states originated so he believed that he would. do this and in stages of counterinsurgency it first he adopted the idea that if you had the right general at the right time that you could in fact mation build if you will not since he was. not unlike president george w. bush but when counterinsurgency failed as it inevitably did in afghanistan then he turned to drones and his major advisor on that was a man by the name of john brennan. and he had other their advisors and in the same way you have to also understand it seems to me that the two things here one there is counterinsurgency and that assumes that you have a government that's worth defending and that you are eliminating illegitimate insurgency and the other is a problem of terrorism of the two separate problems. and in this case president obama stepped up the counterinsurgency and when that failed he turned to drone well i mean he campaigned for the due for due process and the

red cloud war still going on today. you know it is you know chris hedges calls places like pine ridge the sacrifice of capitalism why have all native american lands become pretty much the primary victims of predatory capitalism well to begin with the lands that were given to the indians were the least desirable lands you were going to give the indian tribes lands that were great for farming for ranching that were rich with minerals and gold and silver and everything you gave them the land that the white people did not want and nothing's changed you know there's no opportunity there there's no you they can't farm that was so it's it is an example of how capitalism is was was reserved for the white people capitalism was not allowed for the original original inhabitants of this country although i'm not quite sure of capitalism would have worked anyway for the american indian tribe some of them be the cherokee certainly adopted to adapted to it very well but i'm not sure for the plains tribes if capitalism ever would have w

vietnam war medal of honor harvey barnum, united states marine core. [ applause ] >> and vietnam war medal of honor recipient bruce crandel, us army. >> it is also our honor to have irene here. and her husband. thank you for being here to remember this special day at the world war ii memorial. ladies and gentlemen, please rise for the national anthem and invocation. [national anthem and invocation] >> please joining me praying according to your faith as i pray according to mine. heavenly father, your word instructs us to be strong. on this day we take time to remember the veterans, but particularly the world war ii veterans. our congress in 1926 established this as a day to honor the military. for us to take pride in those who died in the country's service. this day is remembered with thanksgiving and prayer and exercises to increase peace. we begin this ceremony with prayer and thank you for the blessings of peace in our land that were blood fought during world war ii by the sacrifice of fellow citizens. we thank you for those days. and for those who still bless us with their presen

them to end the war. this notion of a narrative about a gentleman's agreement, it exists from the very start and even some of these editors like greeley who are arguing about the terms, there's there is an air of self congratulation. america has ended ended ended its civil war and a way that no country has ever done before. the gentleman's agreement is rooted in a -- how remarkable we are able to end their war without massive reprisals. across the spectrum that impulse for self congratulation is present even the old in the next breath will argue with the terms really meant. my argument here is nothing that will fit clearly on a book billboard. i don't think one has to throw out the billboard so much as remember that the surrender was controversial. how could it not the? 700,000 men had lost their lives the road to true reconciliation was a very difficult one. i think to appreciate the meaning of the surrender for those who looked at this time you have to remember that they looked to lee and grant the two

war is -- they say war is hell. >> you don't want to look back on it as bad times.ook back at it as good times. it's something that you learn. you profit from. if you have the right mind. a lot of people look back and they hate it. i look back at it as something that brought me through life. experienced life. being a better person. made me much better. i'm sure of that. >> i recently had the chance to speak with one of today's combat veterans. ceo of concerned veterans for america. pete, what about that? let me ask you that. because you've been dough employed three times since 9/11. do you look back on it and hate it? love it? how do you feel about it? >> it's always a mixed feeling. there's such a sense of purpose in what you're doing with the guys and gals you're with, the mission you have, the country you're defending, a difficult task, complex situations, but you know what? he's right. you look back on the good stuff. and even the difficult stuff, you look back and realize what you were in the middle of, what you were attempting to do, how significant it was, an

into a civil war that everyone wanted to call a revolution and now it's just a proxy war which is taking the lives a lot of people that do not want these foreigners in their country this is i'm glad you mentioned lebanon earlier because this is what it's going to get down to in my opinion a partition go ahead joseph. you know that i mean i'm kind of find myself in a kind of funny situation as it is rarely to intervene between iran and saudi arabia to decide who started what self doesn't matter anymore look it's the sushi war as they call it the sunnis and the shes and led in lebanon and syria have become there are enough of this war whether it was started by the saudis or the iranians doesn't matter i'll just mention my little fact that maybe not everybody knows one of the main forces of ideological inspiration for the airlie wabi movement way big is the famous syriani been tamia who is the one we issued the famous fatwa against the alawite you know many of the fields ago so the saudis said that the legal situation here which is very obvious is they don't want to see the syrian regime su

investigation by human rights groups make it abundantly clear obama's drone policies may constitute war crimes under international law the white house dismisses these claims it would appear washington reserves the exceptional right to murder with impunity. to cross-talk washington's drone policies i'm joined by medea benjamin in washington she is the code founder of code pink and author of drone warfare also in washington we have morris davis he is a professor at the howard university school of law and in new york we cross to. he is a journalist and a former fellow of the council on foreign relations where i cross talk rules and effective means you can jump in anytime you want and i very much encourage it i mean if i can go to you first in washington before we talk about the look ality and you're teaching elements and moral elements of the drone policy i'd like you to reflect upon the fact that only four lawmakers listened to that pakistani family that made it all the way to washington who lost a loved one in a drone attack is official washington just doesn't care. oh definitely i don't

they saw only a local war.ey were amazingly willing to accept the risk of the general european congregation would follow. germany was ruled not quite like a monarchy like the czar's russia, but an emperor who loved posture and stand from the premise that war served prussia well with three great victories in the previous half searching ri over denmark, austria, and france. they also recognized that the democracy now threatens their control of the own country. it was a socialist majority in the german's parliament who was opposedded to militarism and promised soon to end the dysfunctional personal rules. more than a few politicians and soldiers believed that a abroad could halt the advance of the socialist highs. they made a mistake typical of their age underestimating the dominance their country was achieving through its industrial powers without firing a shot on any battlefield. the attorney generals majored stakes by counting soldiers. they were fix sated by russia's growing military might. their calculations

war. in the korean war this would be condemned and israel would be reprimanded as force would behave like a sovereign nation. but everybody. and the reason that is because the president obama. were to occur otherwise it could not occur. syria may now have destroyed all of its equipment used to produce toxic weapons but the job is just beginning this is the first time a nation has gone through a process of chemical disarmament during a time of war and as paula still reports from damascus that makes the task far from straightforward. dangerous and dirty that's how the nobel prize committee described the work of chemical weapons inspectors inside syria not to mention a brutally tight deadline october twenty five damascus provides a detailed plan of its chemical weapons stockpiles done october twenty seven foreign inspectors visited all declared sites missed and by today syria finishes destroying all equipment used in the production and mixing of poison gas and nerve agents done yesterday wish

great depression followed by currency wars then trade wars then world war two and you wrote quote actually back then no matter what their leaders said or promised the public felt in their bones that the economy would not soon proven that a war was on the horizon in the mood for uplift they turned to swing and dance their troubles away now i got to ask you mr sunday do you honestly think of the majority of americans are doing that today kind of dancing their troubles away oh no no this is. you know i just let this past weekend i went to see the new orleans preservation of wall jazz it up here in woodstock. and i remember the old days when you went to woodstock and you could go out at night after the after the band play it's pig patrols everywhere you can't go anywhere without being watched there's no fun ville there you cannot have a good time anymore if you're if you're life simply that is why it is out if you didn't put your signal on if you going seven miles over the limit they are clamping down on the people at levels like i've never seen before i wanted to go out if this seeing this gr

manufactured prior to the war, after the war was over. they used their bodies and their dyes that they had used for their cars in the 1930s. and maybe updated the decoration, the grill a little bit. but esntially, they were what we called rebadged cars. they took their 1930s early 1940s cars and no production during world war ii. and brought them out again after world war ii when the demand for cars was pretty big. and so by 1954 and when the sales decrease, they didn't have money for engineering to come up with a new design, a new car. they also, with regard to engines, they had a six-cylinder engine and in the 1950s, major manufacturers were coming out with modern v-8 engines. and hudson just couldn't keep up with the engineering. the money to do the engineering for a new v8 engine. and then by 1955, they were out of business. >> we're in the kaise kaiser frazer/tucker room of our museum. and what we have here is a collection of cars that were manufactured by kaiser frazer. after the war was over, the major manufacturers used their dyes

the wars in yugoslavia also became a part of my job. then, i became the first bureau chief in istanbul which was a great assignment. partly because it allowed me to start getting into iran and beginning to understand the country that we have a lot of difficulty understanding because of our emotions. when i got to iran, i remember asking people, why is a country with this history and this culture so unhappy and miserable and isolated and poor? people told me, actually we had a democracy here once. the dulles brothers came and destroyed it. i didn't know anything about that. i don't think most americans did or do. this book is trying among other things to explain to americans not only why some countries in the world have fallen into this chaos after american intervention, but who organized that intervention and what were the forces that propel those that repelled those interventions? thosedpro-pal interventions? you left "the new york times" what year? what are you doing now besides writing books? >> i left in 2006 after 23 years. i am no

wars. and the v.a. benefits and the da hospitals are so backlog, so shamefully backlog. that they have the nerve of talking about another wars. -- though that on veterans day like we do the poor for thanksgiving. all the food. the same with the vets are treated. we need to stop spending any on military supplements of supplies and stuff and start getting these vets astray into. behind thist hurt thing. host: arnold of morning from north carolina. we will be talking about some of those issues later in the show, but this morning we are asking who are the faces of veterans day for you? have the wars in iraq and afghanistan changed the face to you? faces, some veterans who are not around to celebrate veterans day from the recent conflict. "the washington post" ran the occasional feature "faces of the fallen." "the washington post" has posted galleries of the fallen since 2003 and the information about those fallen have been compiled by military releases and news service reports and local newspap

great depression followed by currency wars then trade wars than world war two and you wrote quote actually back then no matter what their leaders said or promise the public felt in their bones that the economy would no we're not seeing improve and that a war was on the horizon in the mood for uplift they turned to swing and dance their troubles away now i got to ask you mr slant do you honestly think of the majority of americans are doing that today kind of dancing their troubles away oh no no this is. you know i just let this past weekend i went to see the new orleans preservation of wall jazz band here in woodstock. and i remember the old days when you went to woodstock and you could go out at night after the after the band play it's pig patrols everywhere you can't go anywhere without being watched there's no fun in. there you cannot have a good time anymore if you're if your life simply that is why it is out if you didn't put your signal on it going seven miles over the limit they are clamping down on the people at levels like i've never seen before i wanted to go out after seeing this

these people wanted war. this new book whose book does not agree with our assassination concept, he goes into detail in "camelot's court," about how kennedy was finding those years with the military on all fronts. >> we're going to take a break and come back. our guest is oliver stone, three-time academy award-winning director, producer and screenwriter. among his films, "jfk." this month is the 50th anniversary of the assassination of john f. kennedy. when we come back, we will also be joined by peter kuznick. did,her they did oliver "oliver stone's untold history of the united states." ♪ [music break] >> this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. our guests for the hour, oliver stone, many time academy award- winning director, producer and screenwriter. peter kuznick. they co-authored, "the untold history of the united states." it is both in book form as well as dvd. it is a showtime series. i want to go right now to this clip from "the untold history of the united

, open ended war over there.emies are saying don't even try it because, oh, it might work. >> yeah. >> your thoughts. >> yeah. exactly right. and they want that state of conflict that obama referred to in the sound clip you used at the beginning. and they want war. many have said very openly. john bolton very openly among them. they want war with iran. and they don't want to go down this path of negotiation at all. and if negotiations succeed, and it's a big if, it is going to be a very tough negotiation over this next six months and we might not get anything out of it. but if this negotiation does succeed, like i wrote, it blows the neocon world view to pieces. and they have no credibility. and the american people will be able to look over the last ten years of what this country has done, chris, and see what the neocon alternative brought us in iraq and see if obama succeeds here, what his path brought us in iran. and i think the very clear majority will be able to reach the obvious conclusion. >> this may belit

investigation by human rights groups make it abundantly clear obama's drone policies may constitute war crimes under international law and the white house dismisses these claims it would appear washington reserves the exceptional right to murder with impunity. i was a new alert animation scripts scare me a little bit. there is breaking news tonight and we are continuing to follow the breaking news. alexander's family cry tears of the why it great thing that. he had. found alive there's a story made for a movie is playing out in real life. well . sunny it's technology innovations all the lives developments from around russia we've gone to the future and covered. hello and welcome to cross talk or all things considered i'm peter lawwell this week members of a pakistani family were in washington to tell congress what it's like to be victims of a drone strike only for a lawmaker showed up and recently a un report an investigation by human rights groups make it abundantly clear obama's drone policies may constitute war crimes under international law the white house dismisses these claims it

until right now i mean there are signs of a civil war already. but to what extent it will dissolve the state will dissolve it's not clear yet whether the american decision to intervene and to train the libyans what kind of an effect that will have on the ground is yet to be seen but ok it's a little too late or maybe a little too early or josef i go to you in colombia i mean if we look right now that libya is a failed state i mean so what do you do i mean you train eight thousand troops whose loyalty is very unclear because loyalties in libya itself is very unclear and when the country is breaking up into three discrete parts right now so what is eight thousand troops going to do to salvage the situation in libya. well i think that they will not do anything good and i agree with you completely and then i was very skeptical to start with about why there should have been any intervention from the outside in libya but you know i mean let's be honest about that it's easier said than done if you're not a libyan you are outside of libya i really believ

policymakers has the cold war ever you know ever we grabbed everything we could at the end of world war two we held on never turned anything back and defense spending skyrocketed again after two thousand and one japanese army and japan in the asia was our main bulwark germany in europe was i mean both work we broke off our treaty with the russians and we made in the west germany the country which terrified the soviets that's why there was so much tension when kennedy care. office. was convinced as were his hardliners that they were be set up for the first strike with this president who was acting a bit like a cold warrior at the beginning they were worried very worried that's why they put missiles into cuba it was really to tear the us from thinking that it could completely dominate the. reason to fear the time because we had about overwhelming talk about the missile gap deployed back to. the beginning of his administration to find out what the real reality was in the missile gap they found that there was a missile gap but the united states was far ahead of the soviet union by the time

i came to france in the war to end all wars, i am an american veteran. day of infamy, stormed the beaches of normandy, and i scaled the cliffs. i met battle on island after island, and i raised the flag. i am an american veteran. i was there with macarthur in korea, and in the jungles of vietnam. i was there in desert storm, iraq, and today, in the mountains of afghanistan, and i remain ready to pledge my all, for i am my brothers' and sisters' keeper. i am an american veteran, and humbly i beseech thee to hearken to my prayer, and make haste to establish justice, freedom, and peace among men and women and nations. for this we humbly pray, amen. >> now i would like to invite mr. harold fritz to lead us in our pledge of allegiance. >> i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> please be seated. it is now my distinct privilege to introduce the members of the veterans day national committee. the committee was formed by presi

the french and british and say, ho chi minh won the war. there is nothing we can do. he decided to go and fight. when you look around the world, you see today the results of the dulles brothers' interventions. .e have now forgotten them i am trying to bring them back to life and show how not only they were central to shipping the world we now know, but how they reflect many deep impulses in the american psyche and the american politics. bewe have video from 1952 to able to see what john foster dulles looked and sounded like. yeare we stronger this against russia than we were last year? >> i think probably not. it is hard to judge those things. my estimate would be that the tide is still running against us. everywhere i look around the world, the question is what are we going to lose next? we seem to be on the defensive and they are on the offense it. the question is, what are we going to do -- lose this year more than what are we going to gain? you can look around the whole circle of the world and you find one spot after another where the q

what the war is, the war of 1812 which lasted into 1815. and those of you who know about this occupation and the partial burning of washington was right after the british had occupied washington and all the buildings were burned. and jefferson was writing that letter so he didn't know yet about that. but he knew that the war was going very badly for the united states. and this includes a more leadership role in a struggle to achieve emancipation and this includes his day had passed and he thought that the moment had not yet arrived in virginia and then there's a very interesting passage here. the emancipation and trans- emancipation is inevitable. but he lays out to possibility as to how it could be achieved. and one is that virginians can achieve the generous energy of our own minds that they would set aside self-interest in order to emancipate the slaves. and then he considers a more imminent possibility because while jefferson had said the moment had not arrived for virginians to exercise this generous energy, he thought there was anothe