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Scott brings William Van Wagenen on to talk about his new book Creative Chaos: Inside the CIA’s Covert War to Topple the Syrian Government. They talk about why Wagenen was first drawn to the topic before digging into the details we know about covert US policy in Syria, Iraq and the region more broadly.  

Discussed on the show:

• Creative Chaos: Inside the CIA’s Covert War to Topple the Syrian Government by William Van Wagenen
• Why he was drawn to this topic
• “Questions Mount Over Failure to Hit Zarqawi’s Camp” (Wall Street Journal)
• Israel, Winner of the 2003 Iraq Oil War: Undue Influence, Deceptions, and the Neocon Energy Agenda by Gary Vogler
• “The Redirection” (The New Yorker)

William Van Wagenen is the author of Creative Chaos: Inside the CIA’s Covert War to Topple the Syrian Government. He has a BA in German literature From Brigham Young University and an MA in Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School. You can read his other writings on Syria for the Libertarian Institute here. Follow him on Twitter @wvanwagenen

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: Roberts and Roberts Brokerage Incorporated; Moon Does Artisan Coffee; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; Libertas Bella; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott.

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Phil Weiss comes back on the show to talk about Israel-Palestine. Now that Netanyahu has been ousted, Weiss is hopeful about the Biden administration’s ability to work with Israel’s new coalition government on issues like settlements and the Iran nuclear deal. Although Israel’s new prime minister, Naftali Bennett, is possibly even further to the right than Netanyahu, he is working closely with centrist Yair Lapid and, for the first time ever, with an Arab party in the Knesset. Weiss is also optimistic about the international community: the Israelis have gone too far, he thinks, in “establishing facts on the ground”—in other words, everyone can see that the two-state solution is dead, and the Israeli government is nakedly presiding over an apartheid regime.

Discussed on the show:

• “Israel is ‘considerably weakened’ — as BDS finds a home in the Democratic Party” (Mondoweiss)
• “Biden won’t make Obama’s mistake — so there will be ‘no daylight’ between U.S. and Israel” (Mondoweiss)
• “Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution” (Human Rights Watch)

Philip Weiss is the long-time editor of Mondoweiss.net. Follow him on Twitter @PhilWeiss.

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio.

Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjYu5tZiG.

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Scott interviews James Carden, Adviser to The American Committee for US-Russia Accord, about relations between Russia and the European Union. In recent years, Carden explains, some EU states have shown themselves unwilling to even sit down to cordial negotiations with Russia, who has been getting a reputation—largely thanks to Western media—for aggressive territorial expansion. This depiction could hardly be further from the truth. With the exception of Russia’s annexation of Crimea, which was mostly peaceful and explicitly called for by the residents of that region, Russia has shown no indications of hegemonic designs on Eastern Europe. If anything, it’s the United States and some of its European allies that have been trying to expand into Russian territory by bringing more and more Eastern nations into NATO. Since the Soviet Union collapsed, this project is utterly pointless—and it’s also extremely dangerous. America ought to be careful that it doesn’t cross any Russian red lines, the only resolution to which would be all-out war.

Discussed on the show:

• “Why Ostpolitik with Russia runs along East-West Euro Divide” (Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft)
• “Opinion | The Strange Death of Liberal Russophobia” (The New York Times)
• “Nyet Means Nyet” (WikiLeaks)

James Carden is the executive editor for the American Committee for East-West Accord and former adviser on Russia policy at the US State Department. He is a contributing writer at The Nation.

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio.

Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjYu5tZiG.

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Max Blumenthal tells the shocking story of a recent lawsuit filed against the Grayzone by heiress Sulome Anderson, who alleged that she was slandered as a hack journalist by Blumenthal’s outlet. Blumenthal readily admits that they have criticized Anderson’s work, but insists that every criticism was legitimate—Anderson has a long track record of shoddy journalism, from accidental errors to outright fabrications. And the judge in this case agreed that there was nothing slanderous about what was said of her. That hasn’t stopped Anderson from continuing to make wild claims of victimhood on the internet, and it hasn’t stopped people like Jake Tapper from publicly championing Anderson’s case. The real motive behind all this, says Blumenthal, is to destroy the Grayzone because it tells the truth about the American empire.

Discussed on the show:

• “Judge tosses frivolous lawsuit by heiress Sulome Anderson seeking to destroy The Grayzone” (The Grayzone)

Director and writer of “Killing Gaza,” Max Blumenthal is a senior editor of the Grayzone Project and the author Goliath, Republican Gomorrah and The 51 Day War. Follow him on Twitter @MaxBlumenthal.

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio.

Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjYu5tZiG.

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Journalist Bjartmar Alexandersson explains the outright lies of America’s major witness against Wikileaks’ Julian Assange.

Discussed on the show:

• “Key witness in Assange case admits to lies in indictment” (Stundin)

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio.

Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjYu5tZiG.

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Nasser Arrabyee comes on the show for an update about Yemen. There seems to be some promise of a real peace negotiation, Arrabyee says, though it’s hard to get both sides to see eye to eye on the realities of the situation. The Houthis, as Arrabyee explains, feel they can negotiate from a place of strength, since they have controlled most of the country for the last few years. They are demanding that Saudi Arabia lift the blockade as a condition of sitting down to peace talks. Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, has tried to make demands of their own, since they are on the side of the nominal government and are allied with the U.S. Arrabyee and Scott agree that one of the key factors in pushing a peaceful end to this war across the finish line is American peace activists putting pressure on their politicians, such that Saudi Arabia no longer has strong U.S. support, and must end its unjust persecution of the Yemenis.

Discussed on the show:

• “End of Yemen quagmire? Saudi-led coalition, Houthis near peace deal” (Reuters)
• “Saudi-Led Coalition, Yemen’s Houthis Working on Peace Deal” (News From Antiwar.com)
• The War Nerd on Twitter

Nasser Arrabyee is a Yemeni journalist based in Sana’a, Yemen. He is the owner and director of yemen-now.com. You can follow him on Twitter @narrabyee.

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio.

Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjYu5tZiG.

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Scott interviews Ben Suitt about his work about veteran suicides for Brown University’s Cost of War Project. Suitt conservatively estimates that about 30,000 veterans of America’s terror wars have taken their own lives, a truly astonishing number. This side of modern warfare often goes undiscussed, but it is every bit as concerning as the physical injuries that soldiers sustain overseas.

Discussed on the show:

• “High Suicide Rates among United States Service Members and Veterans of the Post-9/11 Wars” (Cost of War Project)
• “Poll: 42 percent of Americans think the US is winning the ‘war on terror'” (Military Times)

Ben Suitt is the author of “Finding Resonance Amid Trauma: Moral Injury and the Role of Religion Among Christian Post-9/11 U.S. Veterans.” A recent graduate of Boston University, Dr. Suitt’s research investigates the role of religion in the lives of US military veterans as they navigate between competing identities and cultures amid the disruptive experiences of war and trauma.

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio.

Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjYu5tZiG.

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Ted Carpenter discusses the harmful effects of drug prohibition in America, both at home and abroad. First of all, he points out, prohibition simply doesn’t work. We learned this during alcohol prohibition, when consumption remained high but prices and violence skyrocketed, and we continue to see it now, with ubiquitous street drugs, gang violence and millions of people in prison for nonviolent crimes. The public health problem of drug use is very real, Carpenter readily concedes, but that doesn’t in any way imply that the answer is to use the police force and the penal system to try to solve it. In fact, countries like Portugal provide case studies in the ways that decriminalization can lead to lower levels of drug use and far lower levels of the secondary problems caused not by drug use per se, but by the fact that drugs are made to be black market commodities: turf wars, violent crime, dangerously adulterated supplies and police abuse. The failed war on drugs, he says, has had even further-ranging consequences, including being responsible, in large part, for America’s immigration crisis.

Discussed on the show:

• NATO: Dangerous Dinosaur
  
• “Bloodbath in Mexico: Another gift of US drug and drone wars” (Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft)

Ted Galen Carpenter is a senior fellow for defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute. Carpenter has written 10 books including America’s Coming War with China: A Collision Course over Taiwan and most recently NATO: Dangerous Dinosaur. He is a contributing editor at The American Conservative Magazine and the National Interest.

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio.

Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjYu5tZiG.

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Scott interviews Doug Bandow about the U.S. relationship to Ukraine, perhaps the perfect case study in America’s foreign policy arrogance. Ukraine, of course, has very little direct strategic relevance to daily life in America—and yet the U.S. government considers Ukraine one of its closest allies. In practice, what this means is that the United States would have to be prepared to go to war with Russia on Ukraine’s behalf, if there were a sufficiently severe provocation. But as Bandow points out, this is an absolutely crazy policy: Russia, remember, has nuclear weapons, and any war between nuclear-armed countries would at some point be liable to go nuclear. And so when it comes down to it, the American government is potentially risking human life on planet earth over a single alliance with a small country halfway around the world.

Discussed on the show:

• “US Should Close the Door to Ukrainian Membership in NATO” (Cato Institute)
• “Ukraine crisis: Transcript of leaked Nuland-Pyatt call” (BBC News)
• “Nyet Means Nyet” (WikiLeaks)
• “12/4/20 Gilbert Doctorow: Will Antony Blinken’s Past Catch Up With Him?” (The Libertarian Institute)
• The Putin Interviews
• “Opinion | The Strange Death of Liberal Russophobia” (The New York Times)

Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and a regular contributor at Forbes Magazine, the National Interest, and elsewhere. He’s on Twitter @Doug_Bandow.

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio.

Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjYu5tZiG.

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