Crashing the War Party

While all eyes have been turned on Ukraine and China, a nuclear threat continues on the Korean peninsula and in the last few weeks, tensions have gotten a lot worse. The U.S. called North Korea's accusations that Washington and South Korea have been provoking the North "baloney." Meanwhile Pyongyang has been testing missiles and artillery closer to its border with the South, while Seoul and the U....

Washington was all agog this week after the Biden Administration and Congressional Democrats came out swinging against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which refused to influence OPEC-Plus against cutting oil production last week. The move has the potential to roil already struggling energy markets and right before the November midterm elections. Biden is hopping mad — but is he surprised? And why did...

Ever feel like the Washington crowd doesn't talk your language when it comes to how the government solves its problems overseas? After 20 years of war, it seems Americans are much more circumspect about war powers, sending weapons to dictators, the US military footprint in Asia, even the current war in Ukraine, according to a new poll by the Eurasia Group Foundation. Senior researcher and podcast...

In this episode, longtime US foreign policy author and critic Ted Carpenter talks about his new book cataloging the editorial crimes of the American press corps, starting with Yellow Journalism and the Spanish American War, through Vietnam, the Iraq War, and Ukraine today. Media bias in favor of American primacy and exceptionalism has allowed Washington to not only get the public behind their poli...

This week Dan and Kelley talk to Dave DeCamp, who has literally written thousands of news reports for AntiWar.com , the nearly 30-year-old independent news and views source for the non-interventionist, anti-imperialist community. Dave just started a new podcast there, and talks to us about how he landed at Antiwar, what motivates him to work 24/7 for the cause, and this week's headlines regarding...

Is progressive foreign policy in crisis? Stephen Wertheim , author of Tomorrow the World: The Birth of U.S.Global Supremacy doesn't really think so, but he does recognize a serious debate between progressives who want to actively promote democracy and confront global authoritarianism, and those who believe such efforts could entangle the U.S. in conflicts that are averse to national interests. The...

The headlines are almost scary these days: China and Russia together engaging in massive military drills — including live-fire exercises in the Sea of Japan — the US sailing so-called 'freedom of navigation" operations through the Taiwan strait, Taiwan boosting its defense budget in anticipation of a Chinese attack. The tensions are high since House Speaker Nancy Pelosi decided to visit Taipei thi...

For decades Americans have been conditioned to support the idea of American Exceptionalism and the nation's obligation to promote its liberal values globally, even if it means war. This is at the very root of the American Empire, author and podcaster Daniel Bessner tells us in this week's episode. Movements are afoot to expose the narrative and start adjusting to new realities on the world stage —...

It's been a year since the U.S. military withdrew from Afghanistan and the Taliban took over, leaving Afghans behind with an uncertain future. The 20-year war had ended but instead of facing its mistakes and making sure Afghanistan doesn't become a festering wound, Washington has refused to work diplomatically with the Taliban or help ease the economic situation that is driving the country into a...

In this episode, Daniel talks to Ali Wyne , author of  “America’s Great-Power Opportunity : Revitalizing U.S. Foreign Policy to Meet the Challenges of Strategic Competition.” They discuss the potential dangers of defining U.S. foreign policy simply in terms of countering Russia and China, the need for internal American renewal, and steps to be taken to avoid the Great Power war. In the first segme...

The U.S. has been locked in a delicate dance with its European partners and Iran over re-entry into the Iran nuclear deal for more than a year. Meanwhile, relations between the two countries are either frozen or dangerously hot — never in-between. How did it get this way? Is there anyone in the US government who doesn't view Tehran as the enemy? Will Iran's own mullahs dial down the rhetoric long...

After the fall of the Soviet Union, scholar (and former Army linguist) Monica Duffy Toft noticed something odd: the number of U.S. interventions overseas seemed to go up, not down, after the Cold War was supposedly over. Today, she is fully embroiled in a project that is collecting data on all of those interventions, their toll on the American taxpayer, and on peace across the globe, and is coming...

The U.S. seems determined to manage the world order, even if that means taking the current integrated global economic system and re-calibrating it based on shared national security concerns — like the West on the one side, China and Russia on the other, and the 'non-aligned' like India and the rest of the Global South pressured to pick a team. That seems to be afoot given recent statements by the...

Nick Turse is the master of annoying the Pentagon with his pesky questions about their secret military deployments and how they're spending U.S. taxpayer dollars in places you've never heard of. He lives up to his reputation with a new Intercept piece, written with Alice Speri: "How the Pentagon uses a secretive program to wage proxy wars." This week, we discuss how their Freedom of Information re...

After four months the war is grinding on with Russia gaining territory in the east, day by day. Scholar and author Rajan Menon joins the show this week to talk about the ways this could end: De facto partitioning? Neutrality with sweeteners? A new Russia? In the first segment, Kelley and Dan talk about the bullet that killed Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Aklheh in May. A U.S. forensic investig...

As President Biden sets out to fit the world into a  "democracies versus autocracies" frame and more importantly, firm up allies in his China containment policy, the countries in Southeast Asia — including Vietnam, Indonesia, Philippines, Cambodia — have other ideas. We talk to Sebastian Strangio, Southeast Asia editor for The Diplomat, on how these countries are positioning on China, the war in U...

The Russian invasion of Ukraine and subsequent oil and gas embargoes have triggered an energy crisis and sent the Biden Administration in search of the dreaded fossil fuels to increase world supplies and stave off price hikes. This is where Venezuela comes in. William Neuman, author of "Things Are Never So Bad That They Can't Get Worse: Inside the Collapse of Venezuela," gives us a clear-eyed view...

Media and cultural analyst and podcaster Bob Wright talks to us this week about his recent look at the Institute for the Study of War and its predominant role in mainstream coverage of the War in Ukraine. This Washington think tank, founded during the height of the Iraq War by Kimberly Kagan, specializes in maps and rigorous regional analysis, but hidden in the attic is a string of defense industr...

Black gold: Oil is responsible for making great powers, provoking endless military conflict, and splitting the world between dependents and power brokers. There is nothing like a petrostate, says Emma Ashford , who just released the book, "Oil, the State, and War: The Foreign Policies of Petrostates."  Emma's book explores why this resource is the most powerful driver of not only global economics,...

Is Russia poised to invade Sweden or Finland? Likely not. So what problem does adding both countries to NATO solve? Furthermore, how much is the U.S. willing to defend these countries down the road? Kelley and Dan talk to Cato Institute's Justin Logan about why offering them membership is an "impetuous move" that will likely cost more than the immediate benefit. In the first segment, we explore th...

Iraq war veteran Dan Caldwell talks to Dan and Kelley this week about his work at Stand Together, Concerned Veterans of America, and about how he is trying to challenge Washington's hubristic war policies, including its current approach to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He says the American people have had no say in the $50 billion in weapons and aid pledged and fast-tracked to Kyiv, and senses...

Wondering why the Biden administration's Ukraine policy seems so scattershot? Who exactly is giving him advice and where did they come from? Asia Times columnist and longtime blob-watcher James Carden joins us to answer some of these million-dollar (or should we say $40 billion ) questions. He finds that most of the tight inner circle are Obama holdovers — surprise! — toeing the status quo foreign...

The United States makes a lot of stupid mistakes and policy choices driven by the idea that not only are we the center of the universe, but by our obsession with maintaining "credibility." Tulane professor Chris Fettweis , author of Pathologies of Power, and Psychology of a Superpower, talks to Kelley and Dan about how it's comforting to think we are in control and can shape the way other leaders...

It's our one-year anniversary at Crashing the War Party, and what better way to celebrate it than to interview one of our favorite voices on foreign policy restraint— Senator Rand Paul . Dan and Kelley talk to the Kentucky senator about that exchange with Secretary of State Antony Blinken this week , where he challenged the administration dangling NATO in front of Ukraine while agitating Putin bef...

Wheat, corn, and sunflower exports from Eastern Europe have been severely impacted by the war, and guess what, the countries most affected are those already reeling from Western-led/assisted wars and famine (Yemen), economic breakdown and instability (Lebanon), and systemic corruption and repression (Egypt). Bottom line, says energy and markets expert  Amir Handjani: the poorest people of the Midd...