Mark Helprin

Mark Helprin, writer, novelist and pundit, joins Frank for a full hour to discuss the most pressing national security issues of the day, from terrorism, Afghanistan, Iran, China, to the defense budget. Helprin, former adviser on Defense and Foreign Relations to presidential candidate Robert Dole, describes the current Administration’s view of terrorism as a law enforcement issue: “the people that crashed our planes into our buildings are all dead so the case is closed.” This mentality, coupled with a policy of refusing to name our enemy, is inadequate in fighting the war on terror, he contends. Next, Helprin talks about the difficult situation in Afghanistan and a pattern in recent years of the U.S. destabilizing situations in the Middle East. Helprin also gives his take on the so-called Anti-Terrorism Conference in Iran, and China’s ship building capacity, which he claims will reach naval parity with the U.S. in five years. Finally, Helprin addresses the question of maintaining the defense budget amidst the debt crisis. He maintains that the idea that the economy must be in order before building up our defenses is a fallacy, and that the Republicans risk losing their position as the party of strong national defense if they succumb to this misconception.