John Feffer, co-director of Foreign Policy In Focus at the Institute for Policy Studies, discusses the Afghanistan debate following Osama bin Laden’s death; his disagreement with Jonathan Landay, who says we can’t withdraw for fear of the terrible consequences; the sea-change in public opinion (and even in Congress and among elite opinion-makers) on the wisdom of staying in Afghanistan; why Syria may be a bridge too far for US intervention; the failed “kill the chicken to scare the monkey” US strategy in Libya; bin Laden’s partial victory, wherein the US empire is bankrupt and failing, but Islamic radicalization was eschewed in favor of a democratic, non-fundamentalist Arab Spring; how neoconservatives and antiwar libertarians are close cousins with similar backgrounds who have arrived at diametrically opposed worldviews; whether the US empire is a stabilizing force globally, or an impediment to ending unhealthy stalemates (as on the Korean peninsula); and the complex (wonkish even) history of N. Korea’s uranium enrichment program, plutonium nuclear weapons, and broken deals with successive US administrations.
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