The Truth of the Matter
A weekly analysis of the complex policy issues driving the news.
Episodes
July 10, 2025 • 31 mins
“We’re in a whole tangled mess…we’ve gotten ourselves into a tangled mess around not just securing our infrastructure, but also around competition for the pieces of our infrastructure.” AI has become a cornerstone of modern defense, economic security, commerce, and more. But without effective cybersecurity strategies, the technology that has helped drive U.S. innovation and productivity could become our Achilles heel.
Kemba Walden...
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July 3, 2025 • 16 mins
This summer, millions of Americans will head to the beach to beat the heat. But how clean is the water they're swimming in? At many beaches, especially on the East Coast, water quality is rarely tested for bacteria, pollution, and other health hazards that may be dangerous to both beachgoers and the many species that live in marine habitats. While the importance of clean drinking water is a well-known issue, pollution in swimming w...
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June 30, 2025 • 24 mins
“I think what happened here is Europeans made a lot of commitments that they don’t have any intention of fulfilling—at least in the near term—and this is all about appeasing President Trump to keep him engaged with the NATO alliance.” At the recent summit in The Hague, Netherlands, NATO allies agreed to spend a target 5 percent of GDP on defense in a win for Donald Trump, who has repeatedly expressed the belief that European NATO a...
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June 30, 2025 • 22 mins
“The word ‘obliteration’ is being used a lot…I think there’s a little more nuance to it.” Intelligence assessments from the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran, and the United States have provided competing accounts of the functionality of Fordow, Iran’s critical uranium refinement site, and the Iranian nuclear program as a whole. The intelligence community still has a lot of blanks to fill in, including the extent of the dama...
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June 26, 2025 • 28 mins
“They didn’t understand the essence of Israel, and they are now dead.” Are Iran and regional terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah considering the reality of Israel’s military posture and motivations? Iran may have underestimated Israel’s willingness to launch a surprise attack like the one that started the 12-day war, but with a fragile ceasefire in place, it is unclear whether Tehran’s military calculus has changed.
Ambassad...
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June 25, 2025 • 13 mins
CSIS Missile Threat Program director Tom Karako joins the podcast to assess conflicting reports about the degradation of Iran’s nuclear and missile program and how soon Iran may be able to rebuild.
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June 24, 2025 • 25 mins
CSIS’s Jon Alterman, a longtime Middle East scholar and geopolitical expert, joins the podcast to discuss potential outcomes from Israel and Iran’s 12-day war and shaky ceasefire. Key question: Does the conflict and ceasefire make the world a safer place and reduce nuclear proliferation, or does it possibly increase nuclear proliferation?
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June 23, 2025 • 15 mins
CSIS Middle East Program Director Mona Yacoubian joins the podcast to discuss Monday’s strike by Iran on Al Udeid Air Base, the largest American military installation in the Middle East and the broader strategic implications of the conflict.
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June 20, 2025 • 47 mins
In this cross over episode, Mariana and Andrew are joined by Gopi Kallayil, Google’s Chief Business Strategist for AI, to explore what he calls “the most profound technology ever created by human beings.” Gopi shares how AI’s evolution is reshaping industries while amplifying human cognition and creativity. They discuss the tightrope between AI’s promise and risks, including the need for new “checks and balances” and emerging defen...
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June 20, 2025 • 29 mins
CSIS’s Norm Roule, a former senior U.S. intelligence officer for the Middle East joins the podcast to discuss how conflict with Iran might end, what regime change could look like, the wider implications for the United States and the region and more.
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June 18, 2025 • 23 mins
CSIS’s Eliot A. Cohen, former dean of Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and former councilor to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice joins the podcast to discuss Israel’s strategic objectives, potential regime change in Iran and what Israel’s military operation indicates for the future of warfare.
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June 17, 2025 • 18 mins
"This is easily once of the biggest ballistic missile and ballistic missile defense engagements in history, and it is truly momentous in terms of the overall context and the overall posture that Israel is taking." Israel and Iran have been at war since June 13, with each country firing hundreds of ballistic missiles in just a few days. Iran's defense enterprise is severely weakened following Israel's huge initial attack, but Israel...
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June 13, 2025 • 30 mins
CSIS’ Seth Jones, Emily Harding and Ben Jensen join the podcast to discuss Israel’s strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, leadership and other targets.
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June 9, 2025 • 13 mins
"The spectrum is a scarce national resource...it is absolutely a defense priority." Much of the spectrum has been auctioned off for commercial use, sparking a fierce debate on Capitol Hill: How can we balance spectrum use between commercial and national defense needs? While fast telecommunications is crucial to our economy, leaving spectrum space for military radar is also key for U.S. homeland security and intelligence.
Tom Kara...
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June 3, 2025 • 26 mins
“I do believe we’re in a strategic competition. I believe it’s fine to describe it that way analytically. But if it’s a competition that is purely strategic, what’s the goal? What’s the endpoint?” U.S. strategic competition with China is a cornerstone of our Indo-Pacific policy. However, this suggests that the U.S.-China relationship is always a zero-sum game when the reality is much more complicated.
Dr. Tom Christensen, Colum...
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May 29, 2025 • 17 mins
“The stark reality is that the Russians really aren’t doing well on the battlefield, and their economy is also in pretty tough shape.” CSIS experts examined several indicators of Russia’s battlefield performance and found that it has been performing poorly since January 2024. Russia’s rate of advance on some fronts has been as slow as just 50 meters per day—the slowest rate since World War II. It has also only seized around 5,000 s...
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May 15, 2025 • 20 mins
“Back in 2015, about $12.8 billion, or about 7.6 percent of DOD’s modernization, went to missile defense of some kind. Today it’s up to $25.5 billion, and 8.2 percent of DOD’s modernization budget.” As hypersonic missiles, cruise missiles, and unmanned aerial vehicles become increasingly more common on the battlefield, focusing on the full spectrum of missile threats is crucial, especially as the missile threat from China and Russ...
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May 15, 2025 • 16 mins
“The Gulf is an absolutely critical player in critical minerals, because they’re all working on their goal of diversifying away from a reliance on oil…Each of these countries has adopted critical minerals as a central priority for their own economic development agenda, and that mirrors President Trump’s prioritization of minerals.” Minerals collaboration is already growing between the United States and Middle Eastern nations, inclu...
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May 14, 2025 • 27 mins
“The economic costs were beginning to become much more obvious—not just in terms of the market volatility, but potential shortages, inflation, the rare earths restrictions that the Chinese imposed. Those were going to bite soon.” On May 12, the White House announced a 90-day pause in the trade war between the United States and China and a significant reduction in tariffs following talks in Geneva. However, the impacts of the tariff...
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May 9, 2025 • 31 mins
“Modern war is almost a new missile age.” Missiles have played a crucial role in the Russia-Ukraine war, with Russia beginning to send mass missile salvos at command and control nodes, political centers, and even civilian targets. The CSIS Futures Lab has launched an innovative new project, the Russian Firepower Strike Tracker, that uses AI and data analysis to determine the success of these attacks and ways for Ukraine to fight ba...
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