Geopolitics Decanted by Silverado

Dmitri Alperovitch talks with Sergey Radchenko, one of the Cold War's preeminent historians, about the untold secrets of that period based on Sergey's unique access to recently declassified Soviet and Chinese archives. They discussed China's role in causing Khrushchev to initiate the Cuban Missile Crisis, a huge Soviet intelligence failure that caused the Korean War and Brezhnev's attempts to prevent Nixon's downfall in Watergate. Sergey and Dmitri also discussed their upcoming books, which are both publishing in the next few weeks, on Cold War I history and the history and strategy of Cold War II with China, respectively. They talked about what lessons the first conflict may offer for the second, whether it is possible to revive the detente strategy of the 1970s, and how America can achieve victory. Dmitri Alperovitch's book "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century" publishes on April 30th (https://WorldOntheBrink.com). Sergey Radchenko's book "To Run the World: The Kremlin's Cold War Bid for Global Power" publishes on May 30th (https://www.amazon.com/Run-World-Kremlins-Global-Power/dp/1108477356/).

Dmitri Alperovitch talks with Bill Hennigan, a New York Times opinion writer currently publishing a series of articles called "At the Brink," focused on nuclear threats and the challenges our world faces in combating proliferation. They discussed the fears that the US intelligence community had in the fall of 2022 that the probability of Russia using a nuclear weapon in Ukraine was estimated to be at 50/50 and how the US planned to respond to that outcome. Bill and Dmitri also debated the proposal to limit the power of the President to launch a first nuclear strike and discussed the destabilizing implication of the recent news that Russia may be seeking to put a nuclear weapon into space. Please check out Dmitri's book: "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century" which comes out on April 30th. https://worldonthebrink.com

Dmitri Alperovitch talks with Shashank Joshi, Defense Editor for The Economist, about the changing nature of warfare and the impact of proliferation and affordability of precision munitions, sensor ubiquity and digital communications like Starlink. They discuss the still crucial importance of infantry mass and artillery ammunition in this revolution, the challenge presented by electronic warfare and its logistical needs, whether unmanned systems are truly offering a radically new capability or are cheap replications of existing systems like torpedoes and cruise missiles, whether hypersonic missiles are worth the cost and the high manpower requirements of unmanned platforms and cyber weapons. Please check out Dmitri's upcoming book : "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century" https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF1TKHY2

Dmitri Alperovitch talks with Dr. Jeffrey Lewis, an expert in arms control and nuclear and missile nonproliferation, currently a professor at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, and director of the CNS East Asia Nonproliferation Program. They discuss whether the nearly $130 billion that the US is planning to spend to modernize its land-based nuclear arsenal is money well spent, whether the nuclear deterrent triad of land, submarine and bomber-based nuclear weapons still makes sense in this day and age, the cyber risk of the nuclear modernization program, why the US does not have any land-based mobile missile launchers, whether Chinese nuclear build up might actually perversely benefit the US, how Camp David Egypt-Israel Peace Accords caused more missile proliferation and whether we have a chance to slow down North Korean production of missiles it is supplying to Russia. Plus: Is nuclear nonproliferation dead? And much more! Please check out Dmitri's upcoming book : "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century" https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF1TKHY2

Dmitri Alperovitch talks with Ivan Kanapathy, a former US military attache to Taiwan, about the looming threat of Chinese invasion and why a Chinese blockade or quarantine of Taiwan is unlikely to succeed. They discuss the implications of the recent Taiwan elections on the island's military readiness and the future of US-Taiwan relations, the challenges Taiwan faces in reforming its defense force and strategy, why an invasion of Taiwan would be one of the most difficult military operations ever conducted in the history of warfare, the evolving Taiwanese national identity and why the Taiwanese have little interest in unification with mainland China. Plus, why the world's dependence on Taiwan's semiconductors is unlikely to go away in the foreseeable future. If you are interested in this topic, please preorder Dmitri's upcoming book that dives in great detail into these and many related issues: "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century" https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF1TKHY2 Episode music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJFkCK_Ex2U

Dmitri Alperovitch talks with Yaroslav Trofimov, a Ukrainian-born Wall Street Journal’s chief foreign-affairs correspondent, about his new book "Our Enemies Will Vanish: The Russian Invasion and Ukraine's War of Independence." They discussed why the Russians lost any chance of capturing Kyiv in the first day of the war by failing to take Hostomel airport, why Ukrainian war preparations were quite uneven (stronger in the north than in the south), why the peace talks never had a chance, the strategic problem with the design of last year's counteroffensive and what the path to Ukrainian victory could look like. Please check out Yaroslav's book: https://www.amazon.com/Our-Enemies-Will-Vanish-Independence/dp/B0CFYPX267/ And Dmitri's upcoming book: "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century" https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF1TKHY2 Episode music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzsruxnYwRQ

Dmitri Alperovitch talks with Michael Kofman (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace), Rob Lee (Foreign Policy Research Institute) and Andrey Liscovich (UkraineDefenseFund.org) how the proliferation of FPV drones and countermeasures to them are changing the nature of warfare in Ukraine. They discuss: - Advantages and disadvantages of these new platforms - The development of new tactics and force structures employing them - The challenge Ukraine is having with developing and procuring munitions for drones - The cat-and-mouse battle in electronic warfare countermeasures used by both sides - Whether FPVs provide an advantage to defense or offense - The implications of drones on counterbattery and naval warfare - How Ukraine has emerged as a testing ground for these new technologies and the vital need for Western militaries to better absorb lessons learned from this conflict - How drones are becoming the cheap 'generic', albeit lesser capable, alternatives to expensive 'brand-name' weapon systems such as missiles, torpedoes, ISR platforms, etc. Andrey also discussed how his 501c(3) charity, UkraineDefenseFund.org, is helping train new Ukrainian FPV operators at the total cost of just $500 in 3 weeks.

Dmitri Alperovitch comes to the White House to interview Dr. Ben Buchanan, the White House Special Advisor on AI, about: - The risks and benefits of AI - What the US government is trying to achieve with the President's Executive Order on AI - Why Terminator AIs are not coming to kill us but evil people using AI just might - What the requirements to report to US government about the development of cutting-edge foundational models is all about - How the US can maintain its lead in this technology - White House's thinking on open source AI models - US government's international AI strategy - The plan for how to use AI inside US government - The purpose and mission of the new AI Safety Review Board - And why US government is concerned about China's use of AI - And much more Ben Buchanan's last book on AI (The New Fire: War, Peace, and Democracy in the Age of AI): https://www.amazon.com/New-Fire-War-Peace-Democracy/dp/0262046547 His previous book on cybersecurity (The Hacker and the State: Cyber Attacks and the New Normal of Geopolitics): https://www.amazon.com/Hacker-State-Attacks-Normal-Geopolitics/dp/0674987551 Dmitri's upcoming book "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century": https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF1TKHY2

Dmitri Alperovitch and guest co-host Patrick Gray interview Alicia García-Herrero, a Spanish-born economist based in the indo-Pacific and who specializes on China. They discussed why China has exhausted its growth potential and is now facing structured deceleration, which will be a major global deflationary trend. Other topics covered: why the real-estate bubble will likely not cause a dire crisis, why stimulus spending will not solve China's fundamental problems, why China has not yet experienced the full impact of its demographics collapse, why their economic productivity is not improving and the impact of their economy on the future of Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) Preorder link for Dmitri's upcoming book "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century": https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF1TKHY2

Dmitri Alperovitch interviews Gilbert Herrera, Director of Research at the National Security Agency (NSA) and a member of the U.S. National Quantum Initiative Advisory Committee. They discussed the current state of quantum computing, why its current applications outside of breaking certain types of public key cryptography are highly limited, why we may not see a useful quantum computer for many years and why AI will deliver faster and more revolutionary progress to our daily lives than quantum computers. They also dived into the present challenges of the AI technology and why we need to develop a theoretical basis for addressing errors and hallucinations in AI models. If you are interested in understanding quantum computing, quantum sensing and quantum communication and the real-world applications of these technologies, this is the episode you do not want to miss! Preorder link for Dmitri's upcoming book "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century": https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF1TKHY2

ATACMS episode: - What variants of the missile exist - What unique advantages they offer over already provided Storm Shadows / SCALP-EGs from UK and France - How many missiles may exist in the US inventory and why some can be provided to Ukraine without jeopardizing US military readiness - Why the German Taurus missile is also a much needed munition for Ukraine - The state of production of the next-generation Precision Strike Missile and its advantages over ATACMS - How ATACMS usage in Ukraine might enhance deterrence in the Indo-Pacific Dmitri Alperovitch sits down with Colby Badhwar, a Canadian security analyst, who has written an extensive X thread on ATACMS, to discuss these topics Preorder link for Dmitri's upcoming book "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century": https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF1TKHY2 Colby's ATACMS thread: https://x.com/ColbyBadhwar/status/1703757651623162271

Dmitri Alperovitch talks with Patrick Gray, host of Risky Business podcast, about why the Starlink-Elon saga is much more complicated than it might seem at first glance. Blaming Elon for his Crimea action is probably unfair, but he does deserve both praise and criticism for his contributions to Ukrainian battlefield successes and challenges. And so does the Department of Defense for taking too long to come up with an appropriate solution, which they thankfully ultimately did Preorder link for Dmitri's upcoming book "World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century": https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF1TKHY2

Dmitri Alperovitch sits down with Bryan Vorndran, Assistant Director of FBI's Cyber Division, to discuss why FISA Section 702 is by far the most valuable intelligence program in the US government's arsenal and is responsible for the majority of the most valuable intelligence the country collects. In this episode, Vorndran provides some examples of 702 successes including disrupting attempted assassination plots of American officials by a foreign country and identifying the perpetrator of the Colonial Pipeline hack and recovering the paid ransom. Vorndran also highlights compliance issues that the FBI has faced with the program and what it is doing to address them going forward.

Dmitri Alperovitch talks to Russian military analyst Rob Lee and Wagner Group expert Jack Margolin about the implications of reports of Prigozhin's fiery death in a plane crash in Russia. Where does Wagner go from here? What happens to Russian ambitions in Africa? Does this event help restore Surovikin, Russia's most competent commander of this war, back to command one day? And what impact this might have on the future of the war Music: Richard Wagner's Funeral March

In this joint Geopolitics Decanted and Risky Business feature interview, Dmitri Alperovitch and Patrick Gray talk to Illia Vitiuk, the Head of the Department of Cyber and Information Security of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) about the cyber dimension to Russia's invasion. From turning off Ukraine's power grid with a cyber attack in 2015, to the Viasat satellite communications hack in 2022, Russia's intelligence services are world renowned for executing creative destructive cyber campaigns. Despite this, after a year and a half of Russia waging war on Ukraine its power grid is up, its telcos are functioning and its banks are still processing transactions. How has Ukraine been able to withstand Russia's onslaught in the cyber domain? Illia Vitiuk joins us to reveal insights into how Russian intelligence services are operating in Ukraine, and how the SBU is countering them.

Dmitri Alperovitch talks with geoeconomist Douglas Rediker (Senior Fellow at Brookings and formerly with the IMF Executive Board) about the enduring dominance of the U.S. dollar and why it won't change any time soon. Why the dollar continues to have no realistic alternatives and why Chinese renminbi is not a viable replacement. Also, what are the prospects and obstacles for seizing Russia's Central Bank Reserves to pay for Ukrainian reconstruction and other budget needs. And is there anything that China can do to diminish the impact of any future U.S. sanctions if it choose to invade Taiwan?