Power Problems Cato Institute

Emma Ashford, senior fellow at the Stimson Center, discusses recent escalations in the Ukraine war, the costs to the United States and European partners of supporting Kyiv, the effect of the conflict on Russia’s economy, the problems with Biden’s strategy, why it’s unlikely Ukraine can achieve total victory, the timing of ceasefire diplomacy and peace talks, how early negotiations proved the significance of Ukraine’s neutrality as a core issue of the war, the wayward mission of NATO and the future of the alliance, and why it’s not in US interests to bring Ukraine into NATO, among other issues.
Show Notes
Emma Ashford, “Testing Assumptions About the War in Ukraine,” Stimson Center Policy Memo, May 23, 2024Emma Ashford, Joshua Shifrinson, Stephen Wertheim, “What Does America Want in Ukraine,” Foreign Policy, May 8, 2024
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Rachel Metz, assistant professor of political science at George Washington University, explains why security assistance, one of the most ubiquitous programs in U.S. foreign policy, so often fails. She argues that bureaucratic interests, organizational processes, and perverse dynamics of civil-military relations discourage conditioning U.S. support for partner militaries. She also discusses the role of norms in the U.S. Army, the need for greater civilian oversight and management, why the policymakers need to be more selective about security assistance, and how U.S. political leaders have expanded the military’s roles and responsibilities to the detriment of an effective U.S. strategy. 
Show Notes
Rachel Tecott Metz; “The Cult of the Persuasive: Why U.S. Security Assistance Fails,” International Security 2022/2023; 47 (3): 95–135.

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Jonathan Kirshner, professor of political science and international studies at Boston College, discusses his most recent book, An Unwritten Future: Realism and Uncertainty in World Politics. Kirshner provides fundamental critiques of structural realism and offensive realism and argues for classical realism’s greater explanatory power and firmer theoretical underpinnings. He also covers rationalist explanations for war, the role of change and uncertainty in world politics, the rise of China, and why effective grand strategy requires a healthy politics, among other topics. 
Show Notes
Jonathan Kirshner, An Unwritten Future: Realism and Uncertainty in World Politics, Princeton University Press, 2022.

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Mark Hannah, senior fellow at the Institute for Global Affairs, the nonprofit housed at the Eurasia Group, and host of the None of the Above podcast, argues that President Biden has not used the leverage US support provides over Israel in its war in Gaza and Ukraine in its war with Russia, prolonging the conflicts instead of imposing real conditions and pressing for negotiated resolutions. He discusses the recently passed aid bill, Israel’s planned attack on Rafah and Biden’s threat to withhold aid, and the politics within each party over Israel and Ukraine, as well as the American addiction to war and tendency to construe international conflicts in simplified Manichean terms, among other issues.
Show Notes
Mark Hannah, “Biden needs to get real with Ukraine and Israel,” CNN, April 26, 2024Mark Hannah, “Straight Talk on the Country’s War Addiction,” New York Times, February 18, 2023Mark Hannah, “Why Is the Wartime Press Corps So Hawkish,” Foreign Policy, March 30, 2022
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David Sterman, senior policy analyst at New America’s Future Security Program, tracks U.S. counter-terrorism airstrikes, particularly with drones. He discusses the history of drone strikes in post-9/11 U.S. counter-terrorism policy from Bush to Biden, the issue of civilian casualties, Biden’s quiet use of drone strikes in Yemen and Somalia, the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force, the problems of threat inflation and secrecy in covert strikes, defining endless war, and reform proposals for how to rein in America’s unachievable objectives and make U.S. counter-terrorism operations more transparent. 
Show Notes
David Sterman, “How Many People Does the US Assess it Killed in Somalia in 2023?,” NewAmerica.org, April 2, 2024David Sterman, “The United States Should Provide a Detailed Accounting of its Operations in Yemen,” NewAmerica.org, August 3, 2023David Sterman, “Endless War Challenges Analysis of Drone Strike Effectiveness,” Journal of National Security Law and Policy, May 6, 2023
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James Bosworth, founder of Hxagon and columnist at World Politics Review, discusses the various "push factors" throughout Latin America and the Caribbean driving the recent upsurge in migration to the US-Mexico border. He covers US-Mexico relations as well as gang violence, poor governance problems, and other instability in Haiti, Venezuela, Cuba, Ecuador, and beyond. Bosworth also discusses the transnational network dynamics of criminal organizations throughout the region, including their involvement in human trafficking, and argues that only an internationally coordinated approach within the hemisphere can mitigate such problems. Finally, he explains why the US's drug war approach to the region is misguided and provides recommendations for how DC can better approach this hemisphere's problems.
Show Notes
James Bosworth at World Politics Review
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