Philip Giraldi, former DIA and CIA officer and columnist for Antiwar.com, discusses his scoop for the American Conservative magazine that the information leading the FBI to Ben Ami Kadish came from inside the Israeli government, speculation that it may have been an attempt by antiwar factions in Israel to thwart scheduled testimony by Israeli intelligence agents in favor of the bogus story of the North Korea/Syria nuclear weapons program, the promotion of Gen. Petraeus to commander of Centcom, the remaining danger of war with Iran given a suitable pretext, the detriment of the narrative of the indivisibility of Israeli and American interests, the natural divisions between groups like Hezbollah, al Qaeda, the Iranian Mullahs, the War Party’s claims about their cooperation, the FBI’s bogus terrorism prosecutions since 9/11, America’s regime change in Somalia, the case for immediate withdrawal from Iraq and the McCain prescription for confrontation with Russia and China.

MP3 here. (39:51)

Philip Giraldi is a former DIA and CIA officer, partner at Cannistraro Associates, Francis Walsingham Fellow for the American Conservative Defense Alliance, contributing editor at the American Conservative magazine and columnist at Antiwar.com.

Gareth Porter, historian and journalist for IPS News, discusses the recent/ongoing battle between “Iraqi government” forces and the Mahdi Army in Basra and Baghdad, how Maliki jumped the gun and thwarted Cheney, Hakim and Petraeus’s plan for a much larger effort against the Sadrists this summer, Maliki’s plain explanation that having his guys attack with Americans would have only weakened his position even more than happened anyway, Maliki’s desperate escape from Basra, Iran’s role in negotiating a cease fire in Basra, the retirement of the “special groups” talking point, the fact that the Iranian regime still supports the Da’wa/ISCI/Maliki regime over Sadr’s forces as the U.S. regime prefers, Ayman al-Zawahiri’s accusations that the U.S. is in cahoots with the Iranians even as the U.S. backs al Qaeda allied groups in Lebanon and Iraq, the continuing danger of war with Iran and full scale war against the Shi’ites of Iraq and ultimate defeat.

MP3 here. (38:03)

Dr. Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist on U.S. national security policy who has been independent since a brief period of university teaching in the 1980s. Dr. Porter is the author of four books, the latest of which is Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam (University of California Press, 2005). He has written regularly for Inter Press Service on U.S. policy toward Iraq and Iran since 2005.

Dr. Porter was both a Vietnam specialist and an anti-war activist during the Vietnam War and was Co-Director of Indochina Resource Center in Washington. Dr. Porter taught international studies at City College of New York and American University. He was the first Academic Director for Peace and Conflict Resolution in the Washington Semester program at American University.