The Burn Bag Podcast

In this week's episode, A'ndre and Ryan breakdown President Biden's address to Congress, noting in particular the focus on China and strengthening democracy. They also discuss the status of Alexei Navalny and India's COVID crisis.

In this week's episode, A'ndre and Ryan talk with Nilanthi Samaranayake, director of the Strategy and Policy Analysis Program at the Center for Naval Analyses.  Nilanthi provides an overview of the Indian Ocean region, its strategic importance, and geopolitics. They also discuss the role of China in the region and how India and the United States can work to push back against Chinese influence. The conversation concludes with a broader discussion of U.S. strategy and then future of bilateral and multilateral relations with Indian Ocean powers.Click here to learn more about Nilanthi and her work.

In this week's episode, A'ndre and Ryan provide an update on  opposition politician Alexei Navalny and discuss the domestic political situation in Russia. They also talk about the implications of the U.S. withdrawal of Afghanistan,  President Biden's coming recognition of the Armenian Genocide, and potential progress in nuclear negotiations with Iran. UPDATE: Alexei Navalny ended his hunger strike and has received medical attention.

In this week's episode, we speak with Dr. John Ciorciari about his new book, “Sovereignty Sharing in Fragile States.” Dr. Ciorciari discusses what sovereignty sharing is, defining it as "consent-based agreements between a national government and international actors to share domestic authority," and he goes on to outline the governance challenges around the world that motivated him to write the book. Dr. Ciorciari explains the common denominators underlying state 'fragility', and why he chose to focus on the 'rule of law' in contextualizing his analysis in the book, and why 'rule of law' reform is very difficult in the international setting -- especially in establishing governmental institutions. Dr. Ciorciari describes incentives and downsides of sovereignty sharing for both host and donor country, whether U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan were sovereignty sharing situations, and how corruption and foreign policy have shaped sovereignty sharing.

In this week's episode, A'ndre and Ryan are joined by Javed Ali, Executive Producer and former NSC Senior Director for Counterterrorism. They discuss President Biden's decision to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan, new sanctions on Russia, the attack on Iran's nuclear facility, and competition with China. 

Welcome to the fourth installment of The Burn Bag Podcast's special collaboration with The Atlantic Council's Scowcroft Center for Security and Strategy,  where we highlight contributions to the Scowcroft Center's "100 Ideas for the First 100 Days" project. The fourth episode in the series delves into two big ideas with Ash Jain and Ambassador Alexander Vershbow. First, Ash Jain speaks on why the United States needs to establish a D-10 — a group of democracies that would work together as a steering committee to address global challenges. Second, Ambassador Vershbow discusses how the United States may want to think about denuclearizing North Korea through a “parallel track” approach.

On this episode of the Burn Bag, we speak with Dr. Kennette Benedict, current Senior Advisor and former Executive Director and Publisher of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, about nuclear weapons and the geopolitical policy challenges surrounding the "world's most dangerous technology." Dr. Benedict begins the conversation by giving us an overview of the origins of the atomic bomb, its usage against Japan, and how it affected war-fighting strategy and whether leaders ever actively thought about deploying the bomb after World War II. We then discuss what exactly a nuclear weapon is, and what U.S. nuclear capabilities look like in the present day. Dr. Benedict also provides us with her take on the how real the threat of nuclear war is today, and why substantial denuclearization is possible.You can check out more of Dr. Benedict's work here. 

In this week’s episode, A’ndre and Ryan talk about the Pape Report on January 6, violence in Northern Ireland, and the Ukraine/Russia situation. They also discuss Jordan’s monarchical infighting and political uncertainty in Singapore.

In the latest episode of The Burn Bag Podcast, we interview Glenn Gerstell, who as General Counsel, was the top lawyer at the National Security Agency between 2015 and 2020. We begin the conversation by getting Glenn's thoughts on why he believes that online disinformation is a national security threat, why cyber-propelled disinformation is very different from the spread of 'old-fashioned' propaganda, and whether the 2020 Election's disinformation was primarily bolstered by Russia or domestic actors. Glenn outlines approaches that we can take to address disinformation, and provides his own views on Section 230. We then move on into the SolarWinds hack and broader issues around cyber-espionage, and what the state of U.S. cyber-security is. We close out the conversation on the topic of grappling with privacy amidst concerns about domestic terror threats, and the clear lines that are drawn with regards to how the NSA conducts surveillance abroad. Glenn ends by talking about why the Intelligence Community needs to adapt, and how we can rethink our idea of what 'national security' is.You can check out more of Glenn's work here.

In this week's episode, A'ndre and Ryan talk about Alexei Navalny's hunger strike, Israeli politics, and the South China Sea. They also discuss the rise of ISIS in Mozambique, a growing spat between Egypt and Ethiopia over water, and Russia's aggressive moves on the Ukraine border.