Robert Draper of The New York Times joins us to talk about how a combination of groupthink, faulty intelligence and a flawed decision-making process led to a war that spawned many unintended consequences.
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A Former Ambassador To Iraq Talks Iran
Former U.S. Ambassador to Iraq from 2016-19, Douglas A. Silliman joins us to talk about U.S. strategy in the region – and about what it will take to improve relations with Iran.
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How President Bush Made The Call On The 2007 Iraq Surge
Jeffrey A. Engel, director of the Center for Presidential History at Southern Methodist University, and Will Inboden, executive director of the Clements Center for National Security at the University of Texas at Austin, join us to talk about the behind-the-scenes White House strategy that led to the Iraq troop surge.
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Why We Should Bring Back The Draft
Elliot Ackerman served five tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan as a Marine, and he joins us to discuss why, he says, we’re writing blank checks for protracted conflicts with an all-volunteer military.
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A Marine Revisits The Battlefield
Veteran and writer Elliot Ackerman joins us to talk about the people he met upon returning to the Middle East after previous military tours.
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The Wars We Couldn’t Win
C.J. Chivers joins us to tell the stories of war in Afghanistan and Iraq through the eyes of the U.S. military members fighting them.
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A Battlefield Doctor’s Story
Jon Kerstetter joins us to talk about saving lives in the world’s deadliest places, which he writes about in “Crossings: A Doctor-Soldier’s Story.”
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Covering Conflict: A Conversation With Novelist Elliot Ackerman
Elliot Ackerman joins us to talk about tapping into his firsthand knowledge of conflicts in the Middle East for his novels.
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War Crimes
Allan Ryan joins us to talk about how war crime investigations work – and about how some of the most notorious war criminals of the last century were eventually brought to justice.
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Caring For Our Vets
This hour, from NPR headquarters in Washington, we’ll talk about keeping our veterans healthy and helping them to return to civilian life with Dr. Harold Kudler, chief consultant for Mental Health Services; and Michael Fisher, program analyst for the VA’s Readjustment Counseling Service.
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Writing About War
This hour, we’ll talk with author Elliot Ackerman about how his five tours of duty in the Middle East influenced his debut novel, “Green on Blue,” which is set in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan.
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Some Gave All
On this Veterans Day, we’ll tour Arlington National Cemetery with Robert Poole. His new book is Section 60: Arlington National Cemetery: Where War Comes Home.
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