Are cooler heads really in charge on both sides, or is the United States and Russia heading for a real clash over Syria? Ron Paul Institute Board Member Mark Almond joins RT’s Crosstalk to explain why, as in the run up to World War I, we should look closely at how the media is ginning the people up for war.
Says Almond:
We’ve passed the stage of the initiation of a new Cold War. We are actually in some ways like the atmosphere before the First World War. Michael Howard, the famous historian, said, don’t read the diplomatic papers if you want to understand why the First World War broke out. Read the newspapers. Read the opinion articles. Read the atmosphere of belief that it was now or never on the part of the Germans. That somebody had to be sure they are not going to be pushed around.
Professor Almond continues that the atmosphere here, in the US and UK media, is that it is a game of chicken. Washington is not only telling Russia that it must back down, but the news media is threatening politicians that they must be tough or they will be the ones who look like chickens.
Watch the whole lively debate, which includes former CIA officer Larry Johnson and current Brookings Institution foreign policy fellow Michael O’Hanlon:
