
Decoding Geopolitics Podcast
Decoding Geopolitics is a podcast that tries to make sense of today's dangerous world by talking with real experts on international relations, strategy and security.
Latest episodes

Jul 10, 2024 • 50min
Is North Korea Preparing for War & North Korean-Russian Alliance | Ep. 27 Jean H. Lee
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Jean H. Lee is a journalist and foreign policy analyst renowned for her expertise in covering North Korea and Northeast Asian affairs. She is co-host of the award-winning Lazarus Heist podcast for the BBC World Service and a former Pyongyang bureau chief for the Associated Press news agency.
Jean began reporting on the ground in North Korea in 2008. In 2011, she became the first American journalist to join the Pyongyang foreign press corps in North Korea. In 2012, she opened AP’s Pyongyang bureau, the first and only US news bureau in North Korea. Her work in North Korea from 2008 to 2017 included nearly three years working alongside North Korean staff and colleagues in Pyongyang on assignments that took her across the closed nation to visit farms, factories, schools, military academies, and homes in the course of her exclusive coverage.

Jun 26, 2024 • 50min
#26 Dr. Jack Watling: Russia's War Machine Is Peaking. Next Year, It Runs Out of Steam
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Dr. Jack Watling is Senior Research Fellow for Land Warfare at the Royal United Services Institute. Jack works closely with the British military on the development of concepts of operation, assessments of the future operating environment, and conducts operational analysis of contemporary conflicts.
In this conversation, we talked about two wars that Russia is currently waging: an overt one against Ukraine and a covert war against the West. Thank you to everyone who supports this podcast on Patreon - and if you want to support what I'm doing, do consider becoming a supporter on Patreon as well.

Jun 16, 2024 • 42min
#25 Jake Broe: 'This War Will End With a Russian Collapse. Donald Trump Will Leave NATO.'
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This is a conversation with Jake Broe, a former Nuclear and Missile Operations Officer and one of the biggest Youtubers providing daily updates on the war in Ukraine.
We talked about why Jake thinks Donald Trump will leave NATO, why the war will end with a political and economic collapse of Russia and much, much more.

Jun 3, 2024 • 49min
#24 Mykola Bielieskov: This Is Not Working Anymore - What Ukraine Really Needs to Win
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This is a conversation with Mykola Bilieskov, a Ukrainian analyst and a research fellow at the National Institute for Strategic Studies of Ukraine institute under the Ukrainian presidential administration.
We talked about why Ukrainians are hesitant to join the military, why Western model of support for Ukraine is not working anymore, why he is more worried about the next year than this one and why NATO might have to join the conflict one way or another.

May 21, 2024 • 41min
#23 Minna Ålander: How Finland Joining NATO Checkmates Russia & Why Is It Ready For War
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This is a conversation with Minna Alander - a research fellow at the Finnish Institute for International Affairs who's focusing, among other topics on Finnish security and defence policy, Nordic defence cooperation and Arctic security.
Finland is quite an exception among European countries - because while today many are panicking and trying to make up for years of underfunding, Fins seems to be quite calm - as they have been ready to fight Russia on their own for decades - as they have done in the past in multiple iconic conflicts.
In this conversation we talk about why is Finland prepared for war better than almost anyone else, what is the Finnish perspective of the Russian threat, how did Finland joining NATO completely changed the calculus for both NATO and Russia and what would a Russian invasion fo Finland look like.
Thank you to everyone who is supporting this podcast on Patreon - it's incredibly helpful. And now, enjoy the conversation.

May 12, 2024 • 42min
#22 Thomas Van Linge: Why Myanmar's Military Junta Is On The Verge of Collapse
This is a conversation with Thomas Van Linge - a freelance journalist and a researcher covering the world's forgotten conflicts, including the civil war in Myanmar. Recently, he came back from a research trip to the rebel-held areas in Myanmar where he stayed with the rebels, visited the frontlines and saw up close what the war looks like.
In this conversation, we talk about why is the military starting to lose and how close it is from a final defeat, why is Russia supplying the military dictator, what is China's role in the conflict and what will happen to Myanmar once the dictatorship falls.

May 5, 2024 • 45min
#21 General Ben Hodges: Retaking Crimea, NATO in Ukraine and Russian Collapse | Ep. 21 Gen. Ben Hodges
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This is a conversation with Ben Hodges, a retired three star general of the US army, the former Commander of US Army Europe and someone who spent more than three decades as a military officer and achieved one of the highest posts in the US Armed Forces.
In this interview, we discussed what the latest military package means for Ukraine, why the West seems to prioritize avoiding escalation more than defeating Russia, whether we should send troops to Ukraine, how could Ukraine retake Crimea or whether we should worry about the fall of Putin's regime.
Thank you to everyone who supports this podcast on Patreon - and now, enjoy the conversation.

Apr 28, 2024 • 54min
#20 Lukas Milevski: This Is What Happens If Russia Invades The Baltics
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This is a conversation with Lukas Milevski, a professor at Leiden University and an expert on strategy and defense and security of the Baltic countries. In this interview, we talk about what would happen if Russia invades the Baltics, how prepared they are, if they could be successful and how big of a risk it actually is.
Thank you to everyone supporting this podcast - and now, enjoy the conversation.

Apr 21, 2024 • 54min
#19 Brian Hart (CSIS): How Strong Is China's Military & Is It Prepared for War?
➡️ PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/DecodingGeopolitics
This is a conversation with Brian Hart - a researcher at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and an expert on China's military and its foreign and security policy. We talked about what is the real capability of China's military, whether it's a paper tiger or if it's prepared and ready to take Taiwan by force, if 2027 is the year when we should expect the war to happen or how ready is Taiwan to fight back.

Apr 11, 2024 • 58min
#18 David Gioe: CIA Officer on Outsmarting the Russians, Chinese Spies and the Ukraine War
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This is a conversation with David Gioe. David has two decades of experience as an intelligence officer, starting his career in the FBI and then joining the CIA, first as an analyst and later as an field-qualified operations officer. He deployed a number of times overseas and worked on counter-intelligence, clandestine operations and covert action. After retiring from the CIA, David has moved to academia and today he works as a professor of History at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and he is a visiting professor of Intelligence and and International Security in the Department of War Studies at King's College London.
We talked about how the world of intelligence really works, how it has changed since the cold war or how agents working in the field do their job at a time when anonymity is increasingly disappearing. And how the CIA manages to stay ahead of the Russians, why Chinese spies work differently than anyone else and much much more.
Thank you to everyone who supports this podcast on Patreon. If you want to follow David you can go to his Twitter or website and now, enjoy this conversation.