PRESS ROOM

Nearly three dozen progressive groups have appealed to President-elect Joe Biden to fold up the new Space Force and cancel major weapons, impose a cap on private contractors, and prohibit lobbyists from filling top Pentagon positions, according to a detailed blueprint sent to the transition team.

The United Arab Emirates has enrolled its fleet of lobbyists to try to assuage bipartisan concerns from Capitol Hill and the incoming Joe Biden administration over its pending acquisition of the F-35 fighter jet.

Others have pointed to the UAE’s military actions in Libya and Yemen, which have come under international criticism, as reasons to be wary about selling the Gulf country more weapons.

“The UAE’s active role in a number of regional conflicts raises the prospect that the arms and munitions announced as part of the package could directly contribute to ongoing violence and a troubling history of international humanitarian law violations,” the dovish Center for International Policy said in a Nov. 13 issue brief.

Ali Soufan, former FBI agent who investigated al Qaeda in the late 1990’s up to and including the 9/11 attacks, chairman and CEO of The Soufan Group, and author of several great works, including the recent second edition of “The Black Banners”, now completely unredacted, stops by the podcast to discuss his work as a federal agent, his portrayal in The Looming Tower (both the award winning book by Lawrence Wright and the Hulu limited series), his youth in Lebanon and how he was dared to apply for an opening as a FBI agent, his thoughts on the Global War on Terror and how U.S. military operations have changed the “landscape” of the Middle East, the long journey of fighting to unredact The Black Banners, and a whole lot more.

Dozens of progressive groups on Friday put their support behind Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) to be the next chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee... The endorsement was organized by the Center for International Policy and co-led by Justice Democrats and the Sunrise Movement and includes support from a total of 50 progressive organizations.

“We need a fundamental shift in U.S. foreign policy. Rep. Castro has demonstrated a commitment to centering the voices of impacted communities at the forefront of U.S. foreign policy,” said Yasmine Taeb, Senior Fellow at the Center for International Policy. “Rep. Castro embodies a progressive vision for the U.S. in the world, one that prioritizes diplomacy and multilateralism over militarism,” Taeb added.

Another advocacy organization, the Center for International Policy concluded in a new report that, in spite of the Trump administration’s assertions the deal will enable the UAE to address threats posed by Iran, the armed drones and precision-guided munitions included, “are more likely to find practical use in Yemen or Libya.”

William D. Hartung, director of the Arms and Security Project at the Center for International Policy writes that if President Donald Trump, who helped broker the agreement, “had been honest for a change, he would have dubbed those Abraham Accords the ‘Arms Sales Accords.’” Impeding the sale to the UAE was a long-standing US commitment not to impair Israel’s “qualitative military edge” over its Middle East rivals.

Beware savvy, sophisticate liberals bearing gifts of evasive and ethically empty prose. Having, for my sins, spent a few weeks reading just about everything on offer from what unrepentant neocon zealot – and born-again Washington Post columnist – Max Boot dubbed Joe Biden’s foreign policy "A-Team," I can vouch for the new transition team’s vapidity and verisimilitude. Put another way, Boot’s favored Biden Posse – the Iran nuke channeling, P4 (Tony Blinken, Avril Haines, Jake Sullivan, and Nicholas Burns) +1 (Michèle Flournoy) – have a rare gift for typing tons but saying little.

President-elect Joe Biden's transition team is full of war hawks and weapons industry shills. We speak with US Army veteran Danny Sjursen, who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan before becoming an anti-imperialist activist and journalist, about what a Biden-Harris administration foreign policy would look like.

Sjursen, who previously taught at the United States Military Academy, also discusses how warmongering members of the West Point Mafia dominate the US government and military-industrial complex.

Justice Democrats, the Sunrise Movement, the Center for International Policy and others are boosting Castro’s run for House Foreign Affairs Committee chair.

Yasmine Taeb, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, said Castro could pioneer “a fundamental shift... Rep. Castro embodies a progressive vision for the U.S. in the world, one that prioritizes diplomacy and multilateralism over militarism... After four years of destructive policies that have undermined America’s standing, Rep. Castro’s leadership will not just get us back on track but will lead us forward.”

Danny Sjursen discusses Vets vs. Armistice Day, and what got lost in the name/sentiment change on The Zero Hour with RJ Escow.

One of the occupational hazards of a 24-year career as an intelligence analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency is the tendency to anticipate the dark side. Whenever I see a floral arrangement, for example, I expect there to be a corpse nearby. Now if I were still an intelligence analyst at the CIA and watching events in a Third World democracy that resemble the goings on taking place in the United States of America, I would be deeply concerned.

"Most of the biggest challenges we face — from Covid to climate change to racial and economic inequality — are not military in nature, suggesting that a substantial shift from high levels of Pentagon spending to other security priorities writ large is in order," said William Hartung, director of the Arms and Security Project at the left-leaning Center for International Policy.

But like most of the others on the team, they come from think tanks or consulting firms heavily financed by leading defense companies, including CSIS, New America and the Center for a New American Security.

Those think tanks, which are largely considered center-left, are among the top 10 recipients of defense industry donations, according to a study published last month by the Center for International Policy.