Lyle Goldstein: Not feeling great about being right on Ukraine
Lyle Goldstein: Not feeling great about being right on Ukraine
Appears in this episode
Eighteen months into the war in Ukraine and the picture is grim. After so many US officials — including former military — pumped up the prospects of the Ukraine counteroffensive — it looks like the conflict is headed into a bloody stalemate if not a Russian rout. Lyle Goldstein, Director of the Asia Engagement program at Defense Priorities, has been one of the more sober voices calling for a diplomatic pathway rather than a commitment to endless war, because, as a military historian and strategist he could see that the Russians had the advantage from the beginning of the year. He returns to the show to talk about what went wrong and where things can go from here.
In the first segment, Kelley & Dan discuss this week's Human Rights Watch report that charges Saudi Arabia of systematically killing hundreds — perhaps even thousands — of Ethiopian migrants at the Saudi border. If true, how can Biden continue to justify reported plans to deliver goodies for Riyadh — including a security pact and sophisticated US weaponry — in exchange for Saudi-Israel normalization?
More from Lyle Goldstein:
China Studies Nuclear Risk in the Context of the Ukraine War, with Nathan Waecher, The Diplomat, 7/21/23
Is the Ukraine War moving toward a ‘Korea solution’?, Responsible Statecraft, 1/30/23
Seeking Alternatives to Military Escalation in the Ukraine War, Inkstick, 11/16/22
Lyle Goldstein: Not feeling great about being right on Ukraine
I do not agree that Americans are a peace loving people. Ignorance is not innocence. We are an ignorant people who pay little or no attention to a ferociously militarized U.S. foreign policy. We are easily propagandized to support wars based on simple-minded notions of good guys and bad guys. We are completely unaware of U.S. dirty tricks, coups, color revolutions, economic wars, and the chaos and destruction we have wrought. If we are so peace loving, where is the anti-war movement? As for presidential candidates running against the Ukraine War, does anyone really believe Donald Trump? Whatever political opposition there is to the Ukraine War is not based on anti-war sentiment but rather a preference to go to war with China. As for RFK, Jr., he has already walked back a number of his positions so I am not counting on him. No one in the leadership class is serious about cuts to the defense budget. And until that happens, it's going to be endless war.