Debate over US Interventionism

I enjoyed this video debate:

Bill Kristol and Scott Horton Debate U.S. Interventionism

A leading proponent of the invasion of Iraq vs. the editorial director of Antiwar.com.

The audience was overwhelmingly against Kristol and his neo-con interventionism.

Horton blamed every foreign debacle on some previous US interventionism. I am not sure that is right either. He kept arguing that we could do more displomacy, but I am not sure how that works if we never intervene in anything.

I was struck by how they were both Trump-haters, and they both had long lists of specific gripes about American foreign policies, but none of those gripes were about anything Trump did.

Kristol still defends the Iraq War, and criticizes interventions as not going far enough. But he seems to concede that the Iraq WMD intelligence was bad. The Wikipedia article on Iraq and weapons of mass destruction had indeed failed to destroy its WMD materials, just as the USA had claimed.

The one most accused of lying was Colin Powell, who just died at age 84. In Jan. this year, he announced "I can no longer call myself a fellow Republican." No one else considered him a Republican for a long time, as he last endorsed a Republican in 2004. He endorsed Barack Obama in 2008, with the main argument being that they are both Black. Obama is half-Kenyan, and Powell is Jamaican. That is the way American politics today. All non-whites just vote according to their ethnic allegiances. Only White believe in universal justice.

NY Times obituary:

“Leaving Saddam Hussein in possession of weapons of mass destruction for a few more months or years is not an option, not in a post-September 11th world,’’ Mr. Powell declared. The speech failed to persuade many skeptics in the international community, but Mr. Powell’s personal appeal swung many Americans to support the war, however reluctantly. After American troops invaded in March 2003, however, it became clear that there were no weapons of mass destruction. The intelligence had been wrong.

The speech did not persuade because the evidence presented was thin. The weapon stockpiles appeared to not exist in March 2003, as they were discovered in 2005. See Wikipedia on this, as the source is several NY Times articles.