The war in Iran has exposed visible strains within President Trump’s MAGA coalition. Prominent voices associated with the movement -- including Joe Rogan, Tucker Carlson, Megyn Kelly and Marjorie Taylor Greene -- have sharply criticised Trump’s decision to wage war on Tehran. So, too, has Republican Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky.

Now Massie faces a May 19 primary challenge backed by President Trump as well as pro-Israel and Trump-aligned Super PACs. The contest has become a test case for the future of the Republican Party: is MAGA a coherent foreign-policy worldview rooted in restraint and “America First” principles -- or is it ultimately a coalition held together by loyalty to Trump himself? What does the Massie fight reveal about the future of Republican foreign policy, the politics of the U.S.-Israel alliance, and the balance of power inside the conservative movement?

Guests:

Dan McCarthy, distinguished fellow in conservative thought at the Heritage Foundation.

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Tom Switzer is a journalist and broadcaster who has been a prolific commentator on politics and international affairs. His writing and commentary have appeared in outlets including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times (international), The Australian, and across ABC and Sky News, where he has been a regular presenter and panellist. For 30 years, since 1995, he has worked at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, the Australian Financial Review, The Australian, the London-based Spectator magazine, and the Sydney-based Centre for Independent Studies, which he headed from 2017 to 2025. He is the host of Switzerland, a long-form interview series exploring global politics, modern history, and the ideas shaping the world.

The exchange of missiles and bombs may have paused, at least temporarily, but the struggle between the United States and Iran is not over. The Strait of Hormuz remains closed, U.S. sanctions are still in place, the US naval blockade continues, which is aimed to squeeze Iran’s oil output and exacerbate Iran’s deep economic crisis. Bilateral negotiations have made no meaningful headway, and the gap between them remains wide. What if the U.S. resumes military strikes against Iran? Could they bring Tehran to heel?  Will Trump's plan to guide stranded strips through the Strait of Hormuz work?

Guests are Trita Parsi, co-founder and vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, and John Mearsheimer, professor of political science from the University of Chicago. 

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Tom Switzer is a journalist and broadcaster who has been a prolific commentator on politics and international affairs. His writing and commentary have appeared in outlets including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times (international), The Australian, and across ABC and Sky News, where he has been a regular presenter and panellist. For 30 years, since 1995, he has worked at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, the Australian Financial Review, The Australian, the London-based Spectator magazine, and the Sydney-based Centre for Independent Studies, which he headed from 2017 to 2025. He is the host of Switzerland, a long-form interview series exploring global politics, modern history, and the ideas shaping the world.

Historians reserve the term “watershed” for those rare moments when events do not merely shock the established order but upend it. Think of the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, which hastened the end of the Cold War and ushered in an era of American unipolarity. Or the September 11, 2001, attacks in the US, which ignited the global war on terror and culminated in the long, costly entanglements of the so-called forever wars.

In each case, those living through the moment could sense they were witnessing events whose consequences would extend far beyond the immediate crisis. The question now is whether the Iran war belongs in that category. On the world stage, many allies and partners increasingly worry that the United States as a friend is shrinking with extraordinary rapidity. If this is true, what does this mean for international affairs after the Iran war?

Guests are Sir Max Hastings, the British military historian, columnist and former newspaper editor, and John Mearsheimer, professor of political science from the University of Chicago.  

President Trump insists the U.S. naval blockade is working -- that Washington’s pressure will force Tehran to return to the bargaining table, with concessions likely to follow.  Will Trump get a peace deal with Iran on US terms? Or, with the Strait of Hormuz closed again, could Tehran emerge from this conflict with a blueprint to keep adversaries at bay -- regardless of any restrictions of its nuclear program? Is the US debacle in Iran akin to a “Suez moment” in 1956, that the crisis leads to the end of empire. Is Trump in deep trouble?

Guests are Patrick Cockburn, veteran Middle East commentator for The Independent in Britain, and associate professor Sahar Razavi, director of Persian and Middle Eastern Studies at California State University, Sacramento.

Join Tom's Exclusive Newsletter: https://mailchi.mp/cff5e11f69a3/switzerland-with-tom-switzer

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Tom Switzer is a journalist and broadcaster who has been a prolific commentator on politics and international affairs. His writing and commentary have appeared in outlets including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times (international), The Australian, and across ABC and Sky News, where he has been a regular presenter and panellist. For 30 years, since 1995, he has worked at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, the Australian Financial Review, The Australian, the London-based Spectator magazine, and the Sydney-based Centre for Independent Studies, which he headed from 2017 to 2025. He is the host of Switzerland, a long-form interview series exploring global politics, modern history, and the ideas shaping the world.

In Islamabad, U.S. and Iranian negotiators have failed to reach even the outline of a peace deal. What now? President Trump has announced a naval blockade of the Strait of Hormuz for ships using Iranian ports and could launch a new wave of strikes on Iran. How will Tehran respond? By going up the escalator ladder, is there now a real danger of an all-out regional war and global recession?

At the same time, widening differences between Israel and Washington may force Benjamin Netanyahu to scale back his ambitions -- whether to crush Hezbollah in Lebanon or to bring down Iran’s battered clerical regime -- in order to preserve relations with the White House. Guests are John Mearsheimer from the University of Chicago and Joshua Landis from the University of Oklahoma.

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Tom Switzer is a journalist and broadcaster who has been a prolific commentator on politics and international affairs. His writing and commentary have appeared in outlets including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times (international), The Australian, and across ABC and Sky News, where he has been a regular presenter and panellist. For 30 years, since 1995, he has worked at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, the Australian Financial Review, The Australian, the London-based Spectator magazine, and the Sydney-based Centre for Independent Studies, which he headed from 2017 to 2025. He is the host of Switzerland, a long-form interview series exploring global politics, modern history, and the ideas shaping the world.

President Trump threatens to destroy all of Iran’s power plants if the country’s leaders don’t agree to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. What if Tehran does not accept a deal on American terms? Why would Tehran negotiate in good faith when Iran was bombed during the last round of negotiations on February 28? Is the Persian Gulf on the cusp of “living hell,” as both the Americans and Iranians make threats? Does the Iran war mark a watershed moment in world history where we are witnessing the end of US global hegemony? Rosemary Kelanic from Defense Priorities and Trita Parsi from the Quincy Institute address the risks involved in an escalation of the Iran conflict. 

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Tom Switzer is a journalist and broadcaster who has been a prolific commentator on politics and international affairs. His writing and commentary have appeared in outlets including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times (international), The Australian, and across ABC and Sky News, where he has been a regular presenter and panellist. For 30 years, since 1995, he has worked at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, the Australian Financial Review, The Australian, the London-based Spectator magazine, and the Sydney-based Centre for Independent Studies, which he headed from 2017 to 2025. He is the host of Switzerland, a long-form interview series exploring global politics, modern history, and the ideas shaping the world.

Professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt examine Israel’s role in the Iran war and the wider regional crisis -- and revisit their most controversial argument in 2006 about the lobby shaping U.S. foreign policy.

Did President Trump enter this war on his own terms, or under pressure from Israel and its allies in Washington? In a striking resignation letter, former U.S. counterterrorism official Joe Kent argued that Iran posed no imminent threat, and that the conflict was driven in part by external pressure. This raises a deeper question: if Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu helped draw the United States into the conflict, can he prevent Washington from stepping back? And what happens if Israel continues the war alone?

At the same time, Israel faces mounting strain at home. With warnings from its own military leadership about manpower shortages, the longer-term sustainability of the war is increasingly in doubt.

Join Tom's Exclusive Newsletter: https://mailchi.mp/cff5e11f69a3/switzerland-with-tom-switzer

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Tom Switzer is a journalist and broadcaster who has been a prolific commentator on politics and international affairs. His writing and commentary have appeared in outlets including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times (international), The Australian, and across ABC and Sky News, where he has been a regular presenter and panellist. For 30 years, since 1995, he has worked at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, the Australian Financial Review, The Australian, the London-based Spectator magazine, and the Sydney-based Centre for Independent Studies, which he headed from 2017 to 2025. He is the host of Switzerland, a long-form interview series exploring global politics, modern history, and the ideas shaping the world.

Professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt explain why U.S. and Iranian demands are fundamentally irreconcilable -- and why this crisis is far from over.

Instead of bringing Tehran to terms, Washington now finds itself further from a diplomatic settlement than it was in May 2025. Iran has played a weak hand with discipline and patience. The United States, by contrast, risks stumbling into another major strategic failure in the Middle East.

At the core of the impasse is a basic reality: both sides are demanding the impossible. Washington insists on the full dismantling of Iran’s nuclear and missile capabilities, while Tehran seeks sanctions relief, reparations, and long-term security guarantees. Neither side is prepared to yield. The result is not a pathway to peace, but a deepening stalemate -- with escalation, not resolution, the more likely outcome.

Join Tom's Exclusive Newsletter: https://mailchi.mp/cff5e11f69a3/switzerland-with-tom-switzer

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Tom Switzer is a journalist and broadcaster who has been a prolific commentator on politics and international affairs. His writing and commentary have appeared in outlets including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times (international), The Australian, and across ABC and Sky News, where he has been a regular presenter and panellist. For 30 years, since 1995, he has worked at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, the Australian Financial Review, The Australian, the London-based Spectator magazine, and the Sydney-based Centre for Independent Studies, which he headed from 2017 to 2025. He is the host of Switzerland, a long-form interview series exploring global politics, modern history, and the ideas shaping the world.

The war in Iran has entered its fourth week. What are the political costs for Donald Trump and the Republican party in the leadup to November’s congressional elections? The GOP was already expected to lose the House of Representatives, but could the Republicans also lose the Senate? Is it likely the President could be the lamest of lame ducks in 2027-28? Doug Bandow, a former adviser to President Ronald Reagan, is a veteran scholar at the Washington-based Cato Institute. Henry Olsen is a leading expert on US public opinion.   

Join Tom's Exclusive Newsletter: https://mailchi.mp/cff5e11f69a3/switzerland-with-tom-switzer

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Tom Switzer is a journalist and broadcaster who has been a prolific commentator on politics and international affairs. His writing and commentary have appeared in outlets including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times (international), The Australian, and across ABC and Sky News, where he has been a regular presenter and panellist. For 30 years, since 1995, he has worked at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, the Australian Financial Review, The Australian, the London-based Spectator magazine, and the Sydney-based Centre for Independent Studies, which he headed from 2017 to 2025. He is the host of Switzerland, a long-form interview series exploring global politics, modern history, and the ideas shaping the world.