This week, the first episode in a special podcast produced jointly by Foreign Policy and the Brookings Institution. On each episode of “,” host Johnathan Tepperman, FP’s editor in chief, and a Brookings expert discuss one of the world’s most vexing problems and trace its origins. And then the hard part: Tepperman asks the Brookings expert to focus on plausible, actionable ways forward. In this first episode in the series, Brookings Senior Fellow shares his insights on challenges in the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia, America’s oldest alliance in the Middle East. Upcoming guests in the weekly, eight-part series include North Korea specialist Jung Pak; Europe and Russia expert Alina Polyakova; and Brookings President John R. Allen. Subscribe to “And How the Hard Part” on or . Learn more at Subscribe to Brookings podcasts  or , send feedback email to , and follow us and tweet us at  on Twitter. The Brookings Cafeteria is part of the .