FDD's Foreign Podicy

This Christmas week, we're left to confront a hard truth: Christians are under attack in many corners of the world.On October 10, the Chinese Communist Party arrested Pastor Ezra Jin, founder of Beijing’s Zion Church — along with 28 other leaders — in the largest crackdown on a Christian church in China in decades.Pastor Jin’s daughter, Grace Jin Drexel, joins host Cliff May to scrutinize Beijing’s campaign against Christians and Christianity.

Watch this episode on YouTube here.China isn’t just competing economically — it’s coercing strategically. Drawing on the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission’s latest report, guest host Craig Singleton is joined by Commission Vice Chair Randy Shriver and Commissioner Mike Kuiken to unpack how Beijing weaponizes its economic power — and why Chinese economic statecraft now sits at the center of U.S. national security.

Politicians love to tell Americans what we think about U.S. leadership, our military, our allies, and our enemies — but the data tells a different story. A new Reagan National Defense Survey cuts through the noise to reveal what Americans actually believe during a moment of strategic flux. To unpack the findings and what they mean for U.S. power, deterrence, and America’s role in the world — guest host Bradley Bowman is joined by Roger Zakheim, Washington Director of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute and co-founder of the Reagan National Defense Forum. 

Guest host Behnam Ben Taleblu is joined by former U.S. intelligence official Norman Roule to examine Iran’s postwar moment: from puncturing the comforting illusion created by viral clips of loosened social activity (or, as Norm puts it, why “a few videos of dancing and hijab-free afternoons don’t outweigh 21,000 arrests and expedited executions”) to exposing the harsh reality of a regime so unpopular that its fragility may leave it with “no alternative but to crack down” and the rising pressure both guests describe as the Islamic Republic’s “greatest” — and “most dangerous” — long-term threat.

Watch this episode on YouTube here.Africa rarely makes the headlines — but it should. Here are just a few: Islamist movements are expanding from Nigeria to Mozambique, Mali to Somalia. The French have been pushed out, Russian forces are moving in, while China is building influence and quietly extracting wealth from African earth and people. Ambassador Alberto Fernandez joins Cliff to explain how jihadist militias, local warlords, regional powers, and great-power competition are reshaping the continent — and why America ignores this at its own risk.

President Trump gave Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, A.K.A. MbS, a royal welcome to Washington. But beyond the flashy diplomacy, quite a lot of business was transacted. Host Cliff May is joined by Edmund Fitton-Brown to discuss the visit, the future of U.S.–Saudi relations, the threat from Tehran and the Houthis, Turkey’s neo-Ottoman ambitions, and how a changing kingdom is changing the Middle East.

📺: Watch this episode on YouTube here.Filmmaker Michael Pack joins host Cliff May to tell the extraordinary story of The Last 600 Meters, his gripping documentary on the battles of Fallujah and Najaf. Though the film was finished in 2007, it sat on a shelf for 17 years before PBS finally aired it this Veterans Day. From young Americans fighting al-Qaeda and Iran-backed militias in brutal urban combat to political leaders pulling the plug mid-mission and media outlets like Al Jazeera shaping the narrative, Cliff and Michael connect these lessons highlighted in the film to the wars of today — a long-buried film that tells a long-overdue story. 📺: Watch The Last 600 Meters here.

Guest host and Senior Director of FDD’s Iran Program Behnam Ben Taleblu sits down with historian Ali Ansari to explore why the Islamic Republic is rewriting Iran’s past to justify its present, how Iranians are reclaiming their identity from the regime, and what the nation’s search for identity reveals about the Islamic Republic’s fading future.

President Trump just returned from a whirlwind week in Asia closing trade and investment deals and strengthening security alliances. Host Cliff May sits down with FDD’s Craig Singleton to discuss what Trump accomplished, as well as the challenges – and threats – that remain.

Watch this episode on YouTube here.For two years, Israel has been fighting a war on multiple fronts. And although it has delivered blows to Iran, Hezbollah, and Hamas on the ground, it’s losing another fight: the information war, a campaign of slander and blood libels fueled by a media empire built by the Muslim Brotherhood. To expose where — from Al Jazeera’s studios in Doha to Turkish satellite channels and newsrooms in London — and how this empire works — amplifying Hamas, laundering Islamist ideology through “journalism,” and reshaping the narrative from Cairo to Washington — host Cliff May is joined by FDD’s Mariam Wahba. Mentioned in the episodeRead Mariam's piece for The Free Press, "How the Muslim Brotherhood Built a Media Empire," here.Watch Mariam's appearance on Haviv Rettig Gur's podcast, Ask Haviv Anything, here. 

Host Cliff May is joined by retired Ukrainian Admiral Ihor Voronchenko, the former inspector general of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine and former commander of the Naval Forces of Ukraine; along with retired U.S. Marine Colonel Andy Bain, executive director and co-founder of the Ukrainian Freedom Fund; and FDD's retired Rear Admiral Mark Montgomery to assess the state of Russia’s war on Ukraine — what Kyiv needs from the West and where the fight goes next. 

Watch this episode on YouTube.LTG (Ret.) H.R. McMaster and Brad Bowman join host Cliff May to explain why diplomacy only works when backed by force. From Gaza to Ukraine, they trace how strength — not illusions — shapes outcomes and frustrates the ambitions of the Axis of Aggressors: Beijing, Moscow, Tehran, and Pyongyang.

Watch this episode on YouTube here.From China’s stranglehold on critical minerals to the coming AI power crunch, an energy arms race is underway. Rich Goldberg, on loan from FDD to the White House, helped establish a new National Energy Dominance Council. He’s now building a program at FDD that will focus on energy as a key component of national security. Rich, who has served as a Navy Intelligence Officer and National Security Council official, joins host Cliff May to discuss.

Born into a well-educated and well-off Syrian family, Ahmad al-Sharaa – also known by his nom de guerre Abu Mohammad al-Julani – joined Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's organization, al-Qaeda in Iraq, after the U.S. invasion of that country in 2003. Following the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011, he established al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria: Jabhat al-Nusra. In 2016, he severed ties with al-Qaeda, and al-Nusra evolved into Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS — the force that in 2024 toppled Bashar al-Assad’s Tehran-backed regime.Today, the former terrorist is the interim president of Syria. With the U.S. bounty on his head gone, he last week became the first ex-al-Qaeda member to address the UN General Assembly – in a suit and tie, no less.The U.S., the Turks, the Saudis, the Qataris, the Israelis, and others want to influence him. FDD’s David Adesnik and Ahmad Sharawi join host Cliff May to discuss.

America’s military faces extraordinary threats — and when resources lag, missions can fail. Guest host Bradley Bowman is joined by Krista Auchenbach of CSIS to discuss her forthcoming report, alongside Rear Adm. (Ret.) Mark Montgomery, as they unpack how presidents convey orders, how the Pentagon manages risk, and how to avoid a dangerous ends-means mismatch.

On the 24th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks, Cliff May sits down with Amb. Edmund Fitton-Brown, former British ambassador to Yemen and UN terrorism monitor, now a senior fellow at FDD, to assess what we’ve learned — and failed to learn — about global jihad.From Hamas leaders living lavishly in Qatar, the Houthis’ missile attacks, al Qaeda’s quiet alliance with Tehran’s rulers, and the West’s waning influence in Africa to the Taliban’s return to Kabul and the UN’s support for Hamas, Cliff and Edmund warn that the Long War Against the West is far from a conclusion.

For fifty years, the United Nations has waged a war on Israel—not with rockets or tanks, but with words: resolutions branding Zionism as racism, false charges of apartheid, fabricated famine, and now even cries of genocide. It’s a propaganda war that empowers Hamas and delegitimizes Israel on the world stage.On this episode of Foreign Podicy, host Cliff May is joined by his FDD colleague Rich Goldberg to pull back the curtain on the UN’s alliance with Hamas, expose how disinformation became a weapon of war, and lay out what America and Israel must do to finally break this toxic “business model” of lies and terror.

The world’s most endangered democracies—Taiwan, South Korea, Israel, and Ukraine—face relentless threats from the Axis of Aggressors: Beijing, Pyongyang, Tehran, and Moscow. With Ukraine locked in an existential war, host Cliff May welcomes British historian Mark Galeotti, host of In Moscow’s Shadows, for an unflinching look at Russia’s ambitions, Putin’s imperial drive, and what it all means for the future of the free world.

Not every U.S. strategic partner is a democracy, but those receiving American aid should not trample such basic freedoms as religious liberty. Years ago in Egypt, Coptic Patriarch Pope Tawadros II told host Cliff May that discrimination was diminishing under President Sissi. Today, USCIRF reports show the opposite: systemic repression of religious minorities.FDD’s Mariam Wahba, writing recently in The Free Press, calls out the “brazen attacks on Christianity” in Egypt and beyond. She joins Cliff to discuss what’s gone wrong — and why it matters — on Foreign Podicy.

America’s edge in artificial intelligence may rest on one decision now facing Washington: whether to keep our most advanced chips out of Beijing’s hands. President Trump has moved to lift the export ban on Nvidia’s H20 processors—a move some warn could supercharge China’s AI ambitions and military power—arming the Chinese Communist Party for dominance in the AI age. Cliff May and Matt Pottinger pull back the curtain on the high-stakes race, the players vying for advantage, and what’s really at risk if America loses its lead.