Is This Any Way to Run a War?
New Thinking for a New World - a Tallberg Foundation Podcast
03/30/23
•34m
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Russia's invasion of Ukraine has settled into a grueling, vicious war of attrition with no end in sight. However, there is a growing consensus in NATO capitals that a long war not only favors Russia but has the potential for nasty, unintended consequences. What does not seem to exist is a strategy to do something about it.
Lots of rhetoric: “Ukraine will win” and “we will do what it takes” as well as tactics galore. Send more weapons; impose more sanctions; threaten the Chinese; cheer Zelensky's Churchillian speeches. But define an endgame or a strategy to get there? Missing in action. Which leaves Russia—and, perhaps, its Chinese sponsor—in the driver's seat.
Anna Wieslander has had the temerity to point out that the emperor has no clothes or more to the point, that the West has no strategy. She is a Swedish defense and security expert, Director for Northern Europe at the Atlantic Council, and Chairman of the board of the Stockholm-based Institute for Security and Development Policy. Listen as host Alan Stoga discusses with her what it might take to end this war, one way or the other.
Previous Episode
Needed: New Thinking about Africa’s Debt Burden
March 23, 2023
•32m
Africa might finally be on the verge of realizing its enormous potential. A booming, young, optimistic population. Vast reserves of the metals needed to power the clean energy transition worldwide. Widespread popular demands to end corruption. A growing middle class. Taken together, these assets could produce the prosperity and peace Africans deserve.
What stands in the way?
One of the most important blockages is too much debt, compounded by too much history of mismanaging past borrowings. Of the 54 countries identified by the United Nations as having severe debt problems, 24 are located in Sub-Saharan Africa today. Many are heading towards default, restructuring or cancellation. Unfortunately, growth and development are likely to suffer as a result.
Bright Simons, a researcher and policy activist in Ghana, thinks it's time to do something different. **He recently published an article in The Financial Times arguing that debt cancellation is not the solution Africa needs now. **Some critics responded that cancellation is as urgent today as it was 20 years ago. But, is rinse and repeat any more likely to work this time?
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Slouching Towards Texas (If Not Bethlehem)
April 6, 2023
•38m
Human history is a long and continuing story of migration. People have always moved out of fear or out of opportunity—and other people have always resisted them. That story continues today: as more people try to flee war, climate extremes and poverty, more walls get built, boats sunk, caravans disrupted, and refugees pushed back.
Aren't we supposed to be better than that in the 21st century? After all, we have the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the UN 1951 Refugee Convention, asylum rights enshrined in national laws in the United States, Europe and elsewhere, and endless media coverage of suffering, scared refugees and migrants calculated to evoke sympathy and empathy.
But the long lines are still there; few make it to the safety they seek. Why?
Amelia Frank-Vitale is an anthropologist with years of experience studying migration in Honduras and Mexico. She's also an activist who's interested in the migrants as people, not as plaintiffs or pawns in a political drama. Listen as she discusses what it takes to walk from Honduras to Texas, and the tragedies along the way.
Do you think your country should allow more migrants and whether you would welcome them to your neighborhood?
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