WORLD Radio Rewind

LEIGH JONES: This is WORLD Radio Rewind: a 10-minute review of some of our news coverage and features from the past week on WORLD Radio. I’m managing editor Leigh Jones.

First up, countering China. The new pact between the United States, Great Britain, and Australia caught some of our European allies by surprise. But as Josh Schumacher reported on Tuesday’s program, the need for the agreement has been building for quite some time.

JOSH SCHUMACHER, REPORTER: The AUKUS pact mostly focuses on technology sharing. But that’s not what made headlines.

BIDEN: Now as a key project under AUKUS we are launching consultations with Australia's acquisition of conventionally armed nuclear-powered submarines for its navy.

President Biden never mentioned China during his announcement. But Beijing’s military buildup definitely set the stage.

Bradley Bowman is senior director of the Center on Military and Political Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

BOWMAN: The People's Republic of China has been pursuing the most ambitious and aggressive military modernization effort in the history of the People's Republic of China. And this is not just like a one or two year thing. This is a multi year deliberate campaign by which they are seeking to field a military that can dominate the region and then be a preeminent or the preeminent global power.

China’s stated goal is to have a “world-class military” by the end of 2049. Although Beijing hasn’t defined exactly what that means, it definitely involves being bigger and better than its rivals. It already has the largest standing army and the largest navy in the world. Its air force is the third largest but is rapidly catching up to Western capabilities.

China’s military buildup has given it several significant advantages over the United States.

INBODEN: First, by far most significant one is missiles.

William Inboden is executive director for the Clements Center for National Security at the University of Texas at Austin.

INBODEN: So China has a very substantial missile force, nuclear and conventional. And the reason this matters is China has designed its missile force to counter what had historically been America's advantages with our Navy and Air Force.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Josh Schumacher.

LJ: Next up, the congressional hearing on Afghanistan. On Tuesday, top U.S. military commanders testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on the way we ended the nation’s longest running war. On Wednesday’s program, Mary Reichard talked to retired Lt. Col. James Carafano about what they had to say.

REICHARD: General Milley said our pullout from Afghanistan created the very real possibility that terrorists from al-Qaeda, ISIS, any other group, could strike the United States. How should we, or can we, deal with that reality now that we no longer have forces on the ground over there?

CARAFANO: Well, we have three problems. One is it's going to happen. Al-Qaeda is going to go back to Afghanistan to erase 20 years of humiliation. They're going to plan the next 9/11. They're going to plan it from Afghanistan. They're going to let the world know that because it's important that the world know what they did. And we have dramatically reduced our capacity to deal with that in theater. And when you look at the flip side, we've dramatically disarmed home. We have a wide open border. It's way more open, wide open than it was on 9/11. It's the safest way to get a team in here to do the next 9/11. We have used our domestic security instruments like the Department of Justice and Homeland Security, really focused on political agendas. We want to focus on domestic extremism, and people that we politically don't like. But we’re not focusing on transnational terrorism. So we've kind of disarmed on both ends of the problem. And that's a more dangerous situation and more vulnerable than we were on the original 9/11.

REICHARD: Final question here. I want to get your take on this. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin summed up the U.S. experience in Afghanistan like this: “We helped build a state, but we could not forge a nation.” What do you make of that comment? And perhaps most importantly, what are the biggest lessons we need to learn from the last 20 years?

CARAFANO: It’s a nonsense comment. We weren't in Afghanistan to build the nation of Afghanistan. That was kind of a side project. We were in Afghanistan to prevent a terrorist sanctuary from reoccurring, and to keep the region stable. So it would be more favorable to us. And we talked about the great power competition with the likes of China and Russia. We were achieving that. All we did by leaving Afghanistan is make us more vulnerable to transnational terrorism and make the region less stable. Building the nation was not essential to achieving our mission. Being there was essential to achieving our mission. Leaving made doing that thing almost impossible.

REICHARD: Retired Lt. Col. James Carafano with The Heritage Foundation has been our guest. Colonel, thanks so much!

CARAFANO: Thanks for having me.

LJ: Next up, redistricting. Every 10 years, states redraw their congressional maps to account for changes in population. But as Sarah Schweinsberg reported on Thursday’s program, pandemic-related delays to the 2020 census created ripple effects that could influence next year’s midterms.

SARAH SCHWEINSBERG, REPORTER: David Canon is a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin Madison. He says extending the 2020 census deadline seven months, from April to October, has had continued ripple effects on redistricting.

Reapportionment felt it first. That’s where states find out whether they’ve gained or lost seats in the U.S. House of Representatives based on national population shifts.

CANON: That first step of reapportionment is supposed to happen at the end of the calendar year in which the census happens. So December 31 2020, that was supposed to be done. That was delayed until April 26 of this year.

That four month delay jammed the next step: giving states the detailed census information they need to redistrict.

CANON: That's supposed to be released on April 1 of 2021. That actually didn't come out until August 12. And so we're about four and a half months behind schedule right now.

Next year’s midterm elections may seem like a long way off. But David Canon says in some states, the election process actually starts this year. Texas and North Carolina both require candidates to register by December. But without the new congressional maps, many potential candidates still don’t know what districts they live in.

CANON: And so if we don't know the maps, you're really in tough shape.

Some election experts say, while delays are hard on candidates, the redistricting process shouldn’t be rushed.

EGUIA: As a voter, I feel this is hard for 2022 politicians and candidates, but it will make better maps for 10 years.

John Eguia is an economist and political scientist at Michigan State University. Michigan’s Constitution mandates congressional and state legislative maps be completed by September 17th. Eguia says the state’s independent citizens redistricting commission has already missed that deadline. And unless the Michigan Supreme Court intervenes, the commission also plans to miss its extended November 1st deadline.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Sarah Schweinsberg.

LJ: And finally, we end today with a visit to a New Jersey dairy farm. At one time more than 500 dairies dotted the rolling hills of The Garden State. Today, that number has dwindled to just 50. On Wednesday’s program, Amy Lewis explained why.

AMY LEWIS, REPORTER: Adonis Cooke Dean lives on a 120-year-old dairy farm in Blairstown, New Jersey. She’s seen it all—as a farmer’s daughter, a farmer’s wife, and for 40 years, a farmer’s mom.

ADONIS: It’s not an easy life. I don’t care who you talk to. It’s long hours, it’s hard work. But the good part was that you were always with your family.

Until a year ago, her son, Bill Dean, carried on the family’s dairy tradition by caring for 60 cows on his parents’ land.

But in 2020, feed costs sky-rocketed and milk prices stagnated at $16 per 100 pounds of milk—or $8 per cow per day. Plus there were annual property taxes. Dean had to sell.

DEAN: The price of milk bottomed out. At the time when I sold the cows, I was losing a hundred dollars a day. Basically, I sold the cows to pay the bills off.

Meanwhile, Ryan Whitmore and his wife were looking for a place to start their own dairy farm. Whitmore had dreamed of being a dairy farmer ever since his dad sold out when Whitmore was 8 years old.

WHITMORE: I went to college for dairy farming, and that’s where I met my wife, Samantha…And she pushed me over the cliff to start on our own. (laughs)

The Whitmores' story holds promise for saving the small dairy farm by selling dairy products directly to the customer and embracing the farming lifestyle for the process, as well as the product.

WHITMORE: I think there is huge potential for doing more local distributing and local direct marketing. I mean, if you were trying to do everything what’s been typical for the past 50 years, selling to the co-op, it’s much more challenging...There’s very few people who are doing it the way we’re doing. It’s a bit of a new venture in that way.

Reporting for WORLD from Blairstown, New Jersey, I’m Amy Lewis.

LJ: That’s it for this edition of WORLD Radio Rewind.

We’ve posted links to each of the stories we highlighted today in our transcript. You can find that on our website.

Next week, we’re going digital. First, with a report on cryptocurrencies. Some countries are embracing electronic money. Others … not so much. And, NFTs. If you’ve heard the term but never really understood what it meant, we’ve got you covered.

For the latest news, features, and commentary from WORLD News Group, visit wng.org. For WORLD Radio, I’m Managing Editor Leigh Jones.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.