Stay ConnectedPower Problems is a bi-weekly podcast from the Cato Institute. Host John Glaser offers a skeptical take on U.S. foreign policy, and discusses today’s big questions in international security with distinguished guests from across the political spectrum. Podcast Hashtag: #FPPowerProblems.
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Copyright: © Cato Institute 2022
Stephen Wertheim is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for Peace. He discusses 20 years of failed post-9/11 national security policies, the strategy of global military dominance, and the ongoing the battle of ideas on the U.S. role in the world.
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U.S. Naval War College professor Peter Dombrowski argues that the most pressing problems Americans face are internal domestic challenges and non-military risks like pandemics and climate change. But national security policy devotes disproportionate time and resources to confronting inflated threats from external actors. He joins the show to discuss the problems with an overly militarized grand strategy that has failed to properly identify or prioritize threats.
Show Notes
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The chaos that accompanied the U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan does not negate the wisdom of bringing the war to an end, despite protestations in Washington about U.S. credibility and the "sustainability" of endless war. Benjamin H. Friedman, policy director at Defense Priorities, weighs in.
Show Notes
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The now-popular "ending endless wars" slogan has generated more political rhetoric than real policy changes. David Sterman, senior policy analyst at New America, helps define the concept of "endless war" as a strategy based on unachievable objectives and offers practical policy solutions for a substantive shift away from the War on Terror.
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Boston University’s Joshua Shifrinson weighs in on a new critique of the restraint school in U.S. foreign policy debates and explains why the strategy proposed by some liberal internationalists to confront a rising China - a strategy he terms "neo-primacy" - is bound to fail.
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9/11 set the course for U.S. national security policy in the 21st century, often with counterproductive results. Cato Institute senior fellow Justin Logan explains how post-9/11 foreign policy went off the rails and thrust America into disastrous elective wars and wasteful spending sprees. The lack of accountability for those who carried out such failures bodes ill for the future.
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As the U.S. military withdraws from Afghanistan, the Biden administration is retaining some presence nearby. Tactics are shifting, but U.S. intervention looks far from over. Cato research fellow Sahar Khan discusses the debate over building bases in Pakistan and the role of U.S. security contractors in the so-called Forever War.
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Many realists assume that national leaders are rational. But are they? University of Southern California professor Brian Rathbun draws on classical realism to argue that realpolitik is a demanding psychological standard that is less prevalent than often assumed. Constructive diplomacy obligates policymakers, therefore, to better account for both their own subjective biases and those of other states.
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The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has erupted again, but the politics in both Israel and the United States on this longstanding issue appear to be undergoing change. Jeremy Pressman, a political scientist at the University of Connecticut and an expert on the conflict, explains the historical context of the recent outbreak in violence, argues the cycle of military force undermines the objectives of both sides, and discusses the current tensions in the U.S.-Israeli relationship.
Show Notes
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One longstanding predicate of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East -- that America's military presence in the Persian Gulf region protects the free flow of oil -- is false. That is according to University of Pennsylvania professor Robert Vitalis, along with a growing academic literature scrutinizing the claim. Because of the global nature of the oil market, even infamous past disruptions, such as the so-called Arab oil embargo of 1973, have not had as significant an effect as commonly believed. This erroneous basis for U.S. strategy, Vitalis explains, also justifies a misguided emphasis on Washington's close relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, among other costly consequences.
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