Dr. Nadia Schadlow previously served as the U.S. national security advisor for strategy, and she led the drafting and publication of the 2017 National Security Strategy (and in record time). She shares what it was like to formulate such a strategy while in the Trump White House and while her predecessors rejected much of it, she shares one Strategy “core which is very, very important” reiterated by the Biden administration.

She expands on her sentiment in the Wall Street Journal that the uptick in global chaos is a direct consequence of U.S. failure to deter Russia, Iran, and China; why advancing some of Biden’s “aggressive domestic agenda” actually harms U.S. interests abroad; how America’s inability to defend its territorial integrity at its southern border has direct international security implications, including emboldening the likes of the Chinese Communist Party and the Houthis; and why it is notinconsistent to care about both the sovereignty of Ukraine and that of the U.S. southern border.

Dr. Schadlow explains how Americans have benefitted from the world order they helped build and lead and the vitality of maintaining such order; the harm in continuing to empower fundamentally corrupt international organizations like the Red Cross and UN Human Rights Council; and why a 20-year investigation of an “existential threat” is an oxymoron and we should demand better outcomes for our tax-dollars.

She and Cliff also discuss whether there’s value in the “Cold War 2.0” analogy — and why Dr. Schadlow says there’s one major and critical difference when it comes to China; why U.S. posture with the Houthis appears to be only defensive and not offensive; the Obama doctrine of mollifying Iran’s rulers and thinking they’d “share the neighborhood” — a strategic doctrine that Cliff points out is “less Clausewitz and more Mr. Rogers,” and more.

DR. NADIA SCHADLOW

Nadia Schadlow was the U.S. national security advisor for strategy in the Trump administration. In that capacity, she led the drafting and publication of the 2017 National Security Strategy of the United States.

She has also served in the Defense Department and with the Smith Richardson Foundation, identifying strategic issues that warranted further attention from the American policy community.

She is currently a senior fellow at Hudson Institute and a co-chair of the Hamilton Commission on Securing America’s National Security Innovation Base, and she conducts research and analysis on a range of issues at the intersection of strategy, national security, and technology.

She is the author of War and the Art of Governance: Consolidating Combat Success into Political Victory.