This week, Patrick C. Fox and John Allen Gay interview Dr. Alexander Thurston, an expert on conflicts, jihadism and stability in West Africa. Dr. Alex Thurston is a professor at the University of Cincinnati and a non-resident fellow at the Quincy Institute. This conversation covers sources of instability ranging from the French presence to the American intervention in Libya along with a conversation about the politics of the region, ranging from Niger's path to dictatorship, Nigeria's new leadership and the comparatively stable situations in Senegal and Chad.

This week, Patrick C. Fox and co-host John Allen Gay interview Dr. Stephen Wertheim, a diplomatic historian and Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Dr. Wertheim is a leading voice on foreign policy for the left, with essays in the New York Times and Foreign Affairs and appearances on programs including CNN and NPR. Our conversation covers the left's relationship with realism, Dr. Wertheim's research on America's changing perception of their role in the world and progressive interpretations of the rise of great power competition and BRICS.

This week, Patrick C. Fox and guest co-host A.J. Manuzzi interview Dr. Paul Heer, a decorated former intelligence official and National Intelligence Officer for East Asia from 2007 to 2015. Now a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Dr. Heer's book Mr. X and the Pacific was just released in paperback. Our conversation covers how China and Xi Jinping think, the foreign policy legacy of George F. Kennan and the role that the intelligence community should play in foreign policy.

This week, Patrick C. Fox and guest co-host A.J. Manuzzi interview Elizabeth Shackelford, a Senior Fellow at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. Our conversation covers the practice of diplomacy in U.S. foreign policy, conflict in Somalia, the coup in Niger and tensions in Southern Africa.

For a bonus episode, Security Dilemma interviewed Dan Caldwell, a VP at the Center for Renewing America and a conservative veteran foreign policy advocate. We recorded this episode on August 24th, the morning after the first GOP primary debate. Our conversation covers the foreign policy of a second Trump administration, conservative rhetoric about Europe and the southern border, the foreign policy legacy of Ronald Reagan and engagement with China.