Stephen F. Cohen Drops the Mic

One of my regular listening habits is the weekly discussion of Professor Stephen F. Cohen, hosted by John Batchelor.  The interview from this week, I will suggest, offers the most powerful and direct comments offered by Cohen on what he has long described as “the new Cold War.”  Several of his comments demonstrate his contempt for the mainstream media and for the US War Party.

I have listened to this interview twice – I have never done this before.  I have listened to several of Cohen’s comments more than twice.  I offer below several of these comments – paraphrased, not direct transcripts.  I suggest that the entire interview is worthy of a listen

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Let me be blunt: people like Senators McCain and Graham, the New York Times and Washington Post would prefer to fight Russia as opposed to international terrorism.  What they say about Russia verges on pornography, not analysis.

These people lack humanity.  Let me say as flatly as I can: people like McCain, these senators, the editors of the New York Times and the Washington Post have become the enemies of American national security; considering the actual existential dangers to the United States – not the fictitious ones – Vladimir Putin is potentially the most important national security partner the United States can have.  The road to American national security runs through Russia.  For these people to block that road – and they are blocking it now with vigor, because they are afraid Trump may go down that road – this is undermining our national security.

There is no CIA.  There are many factions in the CIA, each with its own agenda.

This [US] congress today is more uncritical, more easily manipulated, more docile, more politically cowardly than any American congress I have ever seen.

Regarding charging Putin with war crimes for Aleppo: many people would point out that with what the Americans are doing in Mosul to free it from the Islamic State, the civilian casualties are every bit as significant as what is going on in Aleppo.

Obama said he would isolate Putin; today it is Obama that is isolated.  Putin is perceived in China, Europe, Latin America, not as a demon but as a man who stood up to the American hegemon – the America that tried to dictate not only power in the world but what people believed.