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Radio War Nerd EP #153 — Terrorism Expert Max Abrahms on "Rules For Rebels" & DC's Think-Tank Culture (Patreon)

Published:
2018-10-18 15:12:31
Imported:
2026-06
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Guest: Max Abrahms, author & Assistant Professor at Northeastern U

Recorded: October 14, 2018

The War Nerd talks to terrorism expert Max Abrahms about his new book, "Rules For Rebels: The Science of Victory in Militant History" - a study of various rebel groups in different contexts that boils down strategies that work, versus strategies that are proven failures. Abrahms also talks to us about his early career beginnings in the Washington DC think-tank world in the leadup to the Iraq War, and the lessons he learned from watching them get everything wrong without ever paying a price for being wrong. We also discuss some of Max's controversial articles on the Syrian war, Syrian refugees, and all the comfortably-employed pundits who got ISIS disastrously wrong. Great, wide-ranging interview.

Afterwards, at 1:53:00 Ames and the War Nerd discuss the dismemberment assassination of Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi crown prince MBS, darling of the Washington-London elites.

Buy Max Abrahms' new book "Rules For Rebels: The Science of Victory in Militant History" by Oxford University Press. And follow @MaxAbrams on Twitter.

Total time: 2:16:42

Direct link to this episode's mp3 here 

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Comments

Francis Terpening

The Kashoggi Affair is like a cross between the Mayerling Incident and the Buchlau Bargain. Great episode.

Dan P

I think an important aspect of the media response to Khashoggi is that center-left media figures get a near constant stream of death threats (with varying levels of credibility) from MAGA types. This makes them feel like it could happen to them, especially when Trump seems to defend SA - they see the whole world as divided between pro-Trump and anti-Trump.

Paul Vd

Kashoggi was on RT's CrossTalk show last year. The guy did get around. Oh and a fresh dead body is really really awkward to handle. It just flops around

Borvis

I sometimes wonder how in 2003, as a 21 year old know-nothing living in Nashville, I knew the Iraq War was bullshit, but Max didn't with so many more resources. And, it seems that at some level, those resources and that access can actually be a blinder. All of a sudden, you're around a lot of "smart" people, and you just sit there saying "who am I?"

Jim Vail

A RWN guest who supported the Iraq War? Yikes!!

Mark Kapfer

He addressed being very wrong about this in the interview and explained why and how it got it wrong. Zero platforming him seems stupid in the face of the research he did for this book, it sounds incredibly interesting.

Erik Wehler

The price point is high, but this seems to be a serious academic work that will not be widely distributed. So the print run is likely to be small and costly per copy. Given that, the price may very well be fair. I for one am super interested, but I feel the sticker shock to.

Martin Knutsen

He is a bit reinventing the wheel, This is COIN discussion 2006. But the kurds are all right.