A riveting exploration of how American leaders have made foreign policy decisions when faced with reports of genocide, war crimes and mass atrocities after the fall of the Soviet Union, when America stood as the only global superpower.
The Corridors of Power airs Saturday, April 19 at 12 p.m. on WXXI-WORLD and streaming live on the WXXI app.
Rare archival footage and in-depth interviews with political leaders offer insight into the workings of the White House to understand not only what happened, but why it happened. Major figures from multiple presidential administrations, including Madeleine Albright, Henry Kissinger, Colin Powell, Hillary Clinton, James Baker, Paul Wolfowitz, Antony Blinken and many others, provide candid testimony about the anguishing choices they faced as to whether or not the United States should intervene.
The Corridors of Power delves into how these leaders set policy goals and tried — or failed — to achieve them. In Iraq, the White House maintained close ties with Saddam Hussein while he gassed and murdered tens of thousands of Kurds but decisively intervened in Bosnia and Kosovo and saved thousands. Why did the entire world stand by in 1994, as nearly one million people were murdered in Rwanda? How did the US decide to intervene in Libya to remove Qaddafi but watched as Assad used chemical weapons and murdered thousands of innocent civilians in Syria? As the events of each crisis unfold, leaders explain what drove their decision-making process and how that affected the ultimate outcome of events.
Photo: President Obama in brief with the Generals, Credit: Barack Obama Presidential Library