Perspectives On Foreign Policy - Madeleine Albright and Bruce Riedel
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2012-04-26/perspectives-foreign-policy-madeleine-albright-and-bruce-riedel
Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was a small child when her family fled Czechoslovakia just after the Nazi invasion. A half century later she learned she had Jewish ancestry and that many of her relatives perished in the Holocaust. As secretary of state in the Clinton administration, she was an advocate for victims of tyranny. In a new book, she writes about her Czech roots and family history - and how that affected her world view. Albright and veteran foreign policy adviser Bruce Riedel discuss America's role on the global stage and U.S. policy toward fledgling democracies today.
Guests
Secretary Madeleine Albright
chair of Albright Stonebridge Group, a global strategy firm, and chair of Albright Capital Management LLC, an investment advisory firm focused on emerging markets; secretary of state in the Clinton administration; author of a new book, "Prague Winter: A Personal Story of Remembrance and War, 1937-1948."
Bruce Riedel
senior fellow, Brookings Institution; 30-year CIA veteran; a senior foreign policy adviser to four U.S. presidents as a member of the National Security Council; former deputy assistant secretary of Defense for the Near East and South Asia.
Comments
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You can hardly slip a piece of paper in between your two guests on foreign policy ideology. Get Michael Scheuer on the phone immediately!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Scheuer
When I was in elementary school we had 'Duck and Cover' practice drills regularly. As a child I could not grasp why our WWII ally the Russians would attack us.As a retired person,I still don`t understand. 100,000 Americans died fighting Communism in Korea and Vietnam,yet today we export our jobs,wealth and future to them WILLINGLY . Iran,Iraq,Afghanistan,South and Central America,Cuba and more are yesterday`s foreign policy mistakes.
What our foreign policy has given us is,the most powerful military power on earth,and a country who must live in total fear.
What I remember of the "Duck and Cover" drills was thinking at the time how stupid the whole thing seemed. We were taken down to our school's basement, stood against a wall, and told to crouch down and put our arms over our heads. Up above us, on the ceiling, was the heating duct. I stared at it and thought: "Great, when the bomb drops all of that will come crashing down on top of me!"
I was in the first grade at the time. Maybe the "geniuses" who came up with that program should have been "sent back" to first grade too!
libertarians r us wrote:
You can hardly slip a piece of paper in between your two guests on foreign policy ideology. Get Michael Scheuer on the phone immediately!
Normally I agree with what you have to say for the most part. But today you need to realize this isn't a news piece this is a book review. We all know that NPR and pretty much all the shows it hosts are extremely liberal. Let them have their editorials, fight the news coverage.
Cordially MNemecek
Oh, in the interest of full disclosure I'm of Czech descent so maybe I'm a little biased to letting this one pass, but I don't think so.
Bruce, your voice is a tad lower than in the high school debate club... I'm eager to buy Ms. Allbright's book, and fascinated by every detail you're both detailing. One of my earliest memories is of my grandmother going to Israel in the later 50s, seeing a very early "holocaust museum", seeing her family's "number" tattooed on a lampshade--which had formerly been the skin of one of her relatives...and that she had to be carried out. Bruce, your insight, through your books and other sources, continues to fascinate me.. make me feel that, while I'm helping people one-by-one you're doing something so VAST and critical! Mighty glad Jimmy put us back in touch...
While you're talking about Iranian sanctions, can you ask Madeleine Albright if she still feels that the deaths of over 500,000 children during the Iraqi sanctions if the price was still worth it?
Thanks to madeleine Albright, over 1 million Iraqis have died because of the sanctions she worked tirelessly to impose. According to UN reports, the vast majority are children. Funny how she is talking about her cousins has died in the holocaust, yet she is indifferent to the suffering of the Iraqi children during the sanctions. I guess they are born with the wrong blood in their veins. It is quit shameful that she is to receive the Medal of Freedom from President Obama.
A book review, not so much. If it was only a book review, why is that boot licking Brookings guy there.
Bruce, you spent your earliest years living in East Jerusalem. How has that impacted your views on Middle East relations?
Madam Secretary:
I would be very interested in hearing your perspective and justification with respect to the opening of the Balkan Conflict.
Specifically, why did the US Government not act when Germany decided to extend diplomatic recognition to Croatia.
Many would say this was the crucial moment. Formal German recognition of the Croatian Government, which appears to have included Ustasi, put the ethnic Serbs in Croatia in a position where they felt they had no choice but to fight, which appears to have been the opening shots of a very bloody war.
It would seem the US had the power to delay this recognition but chose not to. It seems ironic, particularily with your historic understanding of the NAZIs and their puppets (the Ustasi being some of the worst of the worst), that this would not have been something the US would have been concerned about, German recognition of a government that included individuals responsible for genocide in the 1940's.
Why?
Were only interested in pinning on medals and high fives today. Liberal democrats congratulating other liberal democrats.
Oh dear!
Here we go again, with Obama courting women.
Within exactly one week, Pat Summit (April 19) and Madeline Albright (April 26), will both be receiving the Medal of Freedom.
Wouldn't you think that each of these deserving women could have received the medal before the third week in April 2012!
Oops! I almost forgot. Obama is on the cusp of announcing his re-election campaign (not that he hasn't already been campaigning for months).
Obama's "recognition" is so crass, it demeans the value of the medal.
About Madeline Albright:
She is to be admired for acknowledging mistakes she made as secretary of state. Not enough public officials do that.
On the other hand, her response to having discovered her Jewish background was fascinating. It was part of her background, she said. Period.
Makes you wonder. What in her current activities, her ambitions, her views on Israel, etc., made her unable to say more on the air about her Jewish background.
Our foreign policy can be summed up in one word: disastrous. George Washington advised us to avoid foreign entanglements. We didn't listen. It has led us to a series of disastrous wars and economic exhaustion. The people (or at least the ones who think) no longer trust our leaders, who appear to be in the pockets of international big business.
We didn't listen to George. Now our generation, barring a miracle, will have to pay the price.
Congratulations, Madam Secretary, on being awarded the Medal od Freedom. You have done amazing things in your life and it is well deserved. Every time I hear you speak Czech (excellent), I am more proud to be from the Czech Republic. I can't wait to read your new book.