Full Program

Today on Memorial Day we will present a special broadcast to commemorate the 100^th birthday of Benjamin Britten whose great work the Latin Mass for the dead “War Requiem” was commissioned to consecrate the rebuilt Coventry Cathedral that was destroyed by German bombers in World War 11. As result of the destruction and the death of close friends in the first world war, Britten became a pacifist and his “War Requiem” was inspired by the poems of Wilfred Owen who was killed in World War 1, one week before the armistice that ended The Great War, “the war to end wars”.

And as we approach the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of World War 1, many contemporary scholars and historians are pointing to the similarities of the diplomatic failures and entangling alliances back then to the volatile situation in Ukraine where the all-but moribund NATO alliance is facing a possible confrontation with Vladimir Putin's more assertive Russia. And in the far east China and countries with whom the U.S. has alliances like Japan, are facing off over piles of rock and uninhabited islands in the South China sea that could trigger a wider confrontation between the world's leading powers if brinkmanship over territorial disputes erupt and drag the world into a catastrophic conflagration as happened during that fateful August 100 years ago.

Today’s program is called “The Pity of War” and it was performed at the UCLA/Hammer museum in Los Angeles by British stage and screen actress Rosalind Ayers and her husband actor and director Martin Jarvis. They will read a selection of poems from World War 1 and World War 11 that depict the horror and futility of war, not the jingoistic patriotic verse that accompanied these massive tragedies, the first of which ended in an Armistice ninety five years ago today, an armistice in which historians have observed the seeds of World War 11 were sown out of the punitive reparations imposed on Germany by the victorious allies, since at the very same spot the armistice was signed, 22 years later, Adolph Hitler staged the signing of France’s surrender to Germany in World War 11.

Full Program

Part 1

We begin with the escalating violence in Ukraine ahead of Sunday’s election and examine the extent to with Vladimir Putin has lost control of the pro-Russian thugs he organized in Eastern Ukraine while he rides the tiger of media-driven nationalism at home. Anders Aslund, a former Swedish diplomat who served as an economic advisor to the governments of Russia, Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine and is co-chairman of the board of trustees of the Kyiv School of Economics, joins us to discuss the likely election of the so-called chocolate king in the first round of elections and what Putin’s next move is likely to be after an election he had hoped to prevent, provides legitimate leadership for Ukraine.

Part 2

Then we examine the latest military coup in Thailand, the twelfth since a constitutional monarchy was put in place in 1932. Gerald Fry, who has written extensively about Thailand and is the author of the definitive book on Thailand, “A Historical Dictionary of Thailand”, joins us to discuss the political polarization in the country between the red shirts and the yellow shirts and whether the military might side with the more conservative minority of yellow shirts against the majority of red shirts and their deposed brother and sister populist leaders.

Part 3

Then finally following Secretary of State Kerry’s remarks in Mexico on Wednesday expressing frustration with the Venezuelan government’s “total failure” to talk with the opposition to resolve the country’s increasingly violent political crisis, we speak with Rory Carroll, the UK Guardian and Observer’s Latin American Correspondent in Caracas, Venezuela and author of “Comandante: Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela”. We discuss the failure of the talks brokered by Venezuela’s neighbors and the Argentine Pope’s special envoy, and growing congressional pressure to impose sanctions on the Maduro government that are likely to be spectacularly counterproductive.