John Allen Gay and A.J. Manuzzi interview Dan Spokojny, a former U.S. Foreign Service Officer and the founder of fp21, a think tank devoted to promoting more evidence and learning based foreign policy processes. This conversation discussed knowledge management, groupthink, U.S. policy processes, and efforts at State Department reform.

You can learn more about fp21 here: https://www.fp21.org/

John Allen Gay and A.J. Manuzzi interview Jennifer Kavanagh, a Senior Fellow and the Director of Military Analysis at Defense Priorities, discussing the state of the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.

This episode was recorded on October 25, 2024

John Allen Gay and A.J. Manuzzi interview Kelly Grieco, a Senior Fellow at the Stimson Center's Reimagining US Grand Strategy Program, discussing geography and the regional balance of power in East Asia, proposals for an "Asian NATO," the Air Force's ongoing modernization efforts, and more.

John Allen Gay and A.J. Manuzzi interview Christopher Shell, a Fellow in the American Statecraft Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Un-Diplomatic episode

John Allen Gay and A.J. Manuzzi interview Ari Tolany, Director of the Security Assistance, Technology and the Arms Trade program at the Center for International Policy.

AJ Manuzzi and John Allen Gay have a conversation with Peter Harris, Associate Professor of Political Science at Colorado State University in Fort Collins and Non-Resident Fellow at the think tank Defense Priorities. Dr. Harris’s teaching and research focuses on international security and U.S. foreign policy. He received his PhD in Government from the University of Texas at Austin, where he was also a graduate fellow of the Clements Center for National Security. His work has appeared in journals including Asian Security, Chinese Journal of International Politics, International Affairs, Journal of Indo-Pacific Affairs, Survival, and Political Science Quarterly. He is also the author of the forthcoming book Why America Can’t Retrench (And How it Might).

Note - this episode was recorded September 26th, before the news about the Chagos islands.

Dr. Harris's "Broken Nest" Taiwan article

Dr. Harris on the Chagos Islands

This week on Security Dilemma, Patrick Carver Fox and John Allen Gay have a conversation with Dr. William Ruger – the President of the American Institute for Economic Research and the Chair of the Board of Directors of the John Quincy Adams Society. Dr. Ruger is a long-time advocate for realist foreign policy, a decorated veteran of the war in Afghanistan and an officer in the U.S. Navy Reserves, in addition to being President Donald Trump’s nominee for U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan in 2020. Dr. Ruger was previously the Vice President of Research and Policy at the Charles Koch Institute, where he played a big role in building the realism and restraint movement. Our conversation today ranges from alliances to grand strategy principles to the war in Afghanistan and military Keynesianism.

This week, we have a live recording of one of our JQAS summer conference sessions - "Redteaming Restraint with Dr. Eugene Gholz and Dr. Michael Desch". In it, John Allen Gay and our conference participants asked some of the most challenging questions they had about restraint in U.S. foreign policy and Dr. Gholz and Dr. Desch answered them.

Note: This is our first live recording, so there are a few audio issues. Additionally, to preserve the anonymity of conference participants and their questions, we're dubbing their question with Patrick's voice but trying to ask the question verbatim.

This week on Security Dilemma, Patrick Carver Fox and A.J. Manuzzi spoke about Haiti with Jake Johnston, Senior Research Associate at the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington DC. Jake is the lead author of CEPR's Haiti: Relief and Reconstruction blog and the author of the book Aid State: Elite Panic, Disaster Capitalism and the Battle to Control Haiti. We spoke about the humanitarian military intervention there, the state of the island and international efforts to promote democracy in Haiti.

This week on Security Dilemma, Patrick Carver Fox and John Allen Gay spoke with Mike DiMino and Dan Caldwell of Defense Priorities. Mike is a fellow at Defense Priorities, a former career CIA military analyst and counterterrorism officer who’s worked on everything from operational assignments overseas to the EUCOM to the President’s Daily Brief. Dan is a public policy advisor at Defense Priorities and a veteran of the United States Marine Corps, having deployed to Iraq and conducted operations in Al Anbar and Ninawa provinces. Today, we’re going to be talking about the state of democracy in Ukraine, manpower issues and the Kherson front, demographics in Ukraine, escalation between Israel and Hezbollah and the pathway out of American primacy in the Middle East.

Check out Mike's recent explainer on Ukraine

Check out the letter John and Dan signed

Check out the EU studies on Ukraine's demographics