Great Power Podcast

In this episode of GREAT POWER PODCAST, host Ilan Berman speaks with Andrew Michta of the Atlantic Council on the growing divisions between the U.S. and Europe, and what it might mean for Ukraine, Russia and beyond. BIO:Andrew A. Michta is a senior fellow in the GeoStrategy Initiative in the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security and the former dean of the College of International and Security Studies at the George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies. He holds a PhD in international relations from Johns Hopkins University. His areas of expertise include international security, NATO, and European politics and security, with a special focus on Central Europe and the Baltic states.

In this episode, a rebroadcast of the most recent DISINFORMATION WARS, host Ilan Berman speaks with Laura Cunningham, President of the Open Technology Fund, about how authoritarian regimes are improving their censorship game - and how technology is helping free media fight back against this growing digital authoritarianism. MATERIALS REFERENCE IN THIS EPISODE:— “Does Bypassing Internet Censorship in China Change Individual Beliefs, Attitudes and Behaviors?” Stanford University China Brief, May 1, 2023 (https://sccei.fsi.stanford.edu/china-briefs/does-bypassing-internet-censorship-china-change-individual-beliefs-attitudes-and)BIO:Laura Cunningham is the President of the Open Technology Fund, a position she has held since April of 2020. In that role, she is responsible for OTF’s strategic development, long-term planning, and day-to-day operations to enable OTF to fulfill its mission to support internet freedom worldwide. Prior to joining OTF, Laura was the Senior Advisor for Internet Freedom in the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, where she led the Department’s Internet freedom programs focused on technology development, digital security, Internet policy advocacy, and research.

In this episode of GREAT POWER PODCAST, host Ilan Berman speaks with Michael Kimmage of the Kennan Institute about the dynamics of, and potential problems with, the burgeoning strategic alliance between Vladimir Putin’s Russia and Xi Jinping’s China.BIO:Michael Kimmage is the director of the Kennan Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He was previously a Professor of History at the Catholic University of America and a Non-resident Senior Associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. From 2014 to 2016, he served on the Secretary's Policy Planning Staff at the U.S. Department of State, where he handled the Ukraine/Russia portfolio. His most recent book is Collisions: The War in Ukraine and the Origins of the New Global Instability (Oxford University Press, 2024). 

In this episode of GREAT POWER PODCAST, new host Ilan Berman introduces himself, and makes the case for taking a broader view of the "great power" challenge confronting the United States.

In his final episode as host of GREAT POWER PODCAST, Michael Sobolik says goodbye to AFPC and to the podcast's listeners, and offers a retrospective of recent counter-Chinese Communist Party policy developments in Washington, DC.

In this episode of GREAT POWER PODCAST, host Michael Sobolik speaks with Niklas Swanström about America’s supply chain dependencies on Beijing, related threats to national security, and what it would take to build out alternative supply chain networks. Guest biography Dr. Niklas Swanström is the Director of the Institute for Security and Development Policy, and one of its co-founders. He is a Fellow at the Foreign Policy Institute of the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and a Senior Associate Research Fellow at the Italian Institute for International Political Studies (ISPI). His main areas of expertise are conflict prevention, conflict management and regional cooperation; Supply Chain Security, Cyber Warfare and disinformation; Chinese foreign policy and security in Northeast Asia; the Belt and Road Initiative, traditional and non-traditional security threats and its effect on regional and national security as well as negotiations. His focus is mainly on Northeast Asia, Central Asia and Southeast Asia. Resources from the conversation Read Niklas’ new book Read Michael’s new book Follow Niklas on X Follow Michael on X

In this episode of GREAT POWER PODCAST, host Michael Sobolik interviews Dmitri Alperovitch about his book World on the Brink, how Russia's war in Ukraine impacts Taiwan's political future, and how America should compete to win "Cold War II" with the Chinese Communist Party. Guest biography Dmitri Alperovitch is currently serving as the Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Silverado Policy Accelerator, a non-profit think tank focused on advancing American prosperity and global leadership in the 21st century and beyond. Alperovitch is the author of a new book World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century about the grand strategy for victory in the Cold War II with China. In 2022, he was appointed to both the prestigious Homeland Security Advisory Council (HSAC) of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and as a founding board member of the new Cyber Safety Review Board (CSRB) of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).  He has previously served as a Special Advisor to the Department of Defense (DoD). Prior to founding Silverado, Alperovitch co-founded and served as the Chief Technology Officer of CrowdStrike, Inc., one of the world’s largest cybersecurity companies. Resources from the conversation Follow Dmitri on X Read World on the Brink Follow Michael on X Read Countering China's Great Game

In this episode of GREAT POWER PODCAST, host Michael Sobolik interviews Jerry Hendrix about the Soviet Union's launch of the Sputnik satellite in 1957, the popular and governmental response to it, and what this history means for America's new cold war with Beijing today. Guest biography Dr. Henry J. “Jerry” Hendrix, PhD is a senior fellow at the Sagamore Institute. He is also a retired Navy Captain, having served 26 years on active duty following his commissioning through the Navy ROTC program at Purdue University. During his career Hendrix served in a variety of maritime patrol aviation squadrons as well as on supercarriers and light amphibious assault ships. His shore duty assignments were as a strategist on the staffs of the Chief of Naval Operations, the Secretary of the Navy, the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy and within the Office of Net Assessment. Following his retirement from the Navy following a standout tour as the Director of the Navy History and Heritage Command, he has worked as a senior fellow the Center for a New American Security and as a vice president at a Washington, DC defense consultancy. Dr. Hendrix holds a bachelor’s degree from Purdue University in political science, a masters in national security affairs from the Naval Postgraduate School, a masters in history from Harvard University, and a PhD in war studies from Kings College, London. Resources from the conversation Read Jerry's analysis on Sputnik Follow Jerry on X Follow Michael on X Read Michael's new book, Countering China's Great Game: A Strategy for American Dominance

In this episode of GREAT POWER PODCAST, host Michael Sobolik chats with Alex Gray, former Deputy Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff of the White House National Security Council, about "America First," President Trump's foreign policy, and America's relationship with the People's Republic of China (PRC). Guest biography Alexander B. Gray is the Chief Executive Officer of American Global Strategies LLC, an international strategic advisory firm that he co-founded with former U.S. National Security Advisor Robert C. O’Brien. In addition to the day-to-day management of the firm, Mr. Gray’s wide-ranging practice includes the defense, aerospace, maritime, and technology sectors. Mr. Gray most recently served as Deputy Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff of the White House National Security Council (NSC), where he directed the daily operations of the National Security Advisor’s immediate office, as well as the budget, personnel, and security functions of the NSC. Previously, he served in the White House as Special Assistant to the President for the Defense Industrial Base at the National Economic Council (NEC), the principal Executive Office of the President (EOP) official responsible for matters impacting the defense and manufacturing industrial base, and as the first-ever Director for Oceania and Indo-Pacific Security at the NSC. Mr. Gray is a Senior Fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council (AFPC). Resources from the conversation Follow Alex on X Read Michael's new book, Countering China's Great Game: A Strategy for American Dominance

In this episode of GREAT POWER PODCAST, host Michael Sobolik speaks with Geoffrey Cain about Big Tech in America, how these corporate giants have enabled Beijing's rise, and what policymakers should do to reign them in. Guest biography Geoffrey Cain is an award-winning foreign correspondent, author, technologist, and scholar of East Asia. His first book, Samsung Rising: The Inside Story of the South Korean Giant That Set Out to Beat Apple and Conquer Tech, from a decade of his coverage of the world’s largest technology conglomerate, was longlisted for the Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year award, and was named a Cult of Mac best tech book of 2020. His second book, The Perfect Police State, received the citation for the “best non-fiction book on international affairs” in 2021 from the Overseas Press Club. A former correspondent at The Economist, Cain is a regular commentator in The Wall Street Journal, Time, Foreign Policy, The New Republic and The Nation, a contributing editor at The Mekong Review, and a frequent guest on CNN, MSNBC, BBC and Bloomberg. Cain writes about the ways that technology is upending our lives, communities, governments and businesses. His work takes him to the world’s most authoritarian and far-off places, from inside North Korea to the trans-Siberian railway across Russia, from investigations into genocide in Cambodia to experiments in technological surveillance in China. Cain is sought out as a consultant on government, business and technology, having advised the World Health Organization, Open Government Partnership, the United Nations humanitarian affairs office, and major multinational corporations and hedge funds. A Fulbright scholar, he holds a master’s with distinction from London’s School of Oriental and African Studies and a bachelor’s at The George Washington University, which he attended on a music scholarship. He is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a senior fellow at the Foundation for American Innovation, a tech think-tank. Resources from the conversation Buy Michael's book, Countering China's Great Game Buy Geoffrey's book, The Perfect Police State Read Geoffrey's op-eds in The Hill and The Dispatch Read Geoffrey's think-piece in American Affairs