As the wars in Iran and Ukraine continue, this episode brings together two conversations with leading scholars whose work offers essential historical context—and contrasting perspectives—on U.S. foreign policy at a moment of global uncertainty.

We begin with Matthew Frakes, professor of diplomatic history at The Ohio State University and author of Rogue States: The Making of America’s Global War on Terror. Drawing on newly declassified documents, Frakes examines how the United States managed conflicts with Libya, Panama, and Iraq—and how those strategies helped shape the modern era. The roots of today’s “regime change” debates, he argues, can be traced to the Reagan and George H. W. Bush presidencies.

We then turn to my April 17 conversation with John Mearsheimer of University of Chicago. He warns that the war with Iran risks spiraling into a far broader conflict, with potentially severe consequences for the global economy—“like the Titanic heading toward an iceberg.”

On Ukraine, Mearsheimer challenges conventional thinking even more directly, arguing that a lasting peace remains unlikely. Instead, he suggests the future may resemble the Korean Peninsula: a tense, frozen conflict, uneasy and unresolved.

Host:   Jim Falk

Guests: John Mearsheimer, Professor of International Relations, University of Chicago

Matthew A. Frakes, Associate Professor of Diplomatic History, The Ohio State University and author, “Rogue States: The Making of America’s Global War on Terror”