And so I'm curious, like, what you think is going on? Because it seems like the politics might be moving on this conflict in a way that it wasn't for quite a while.

Well, thank you very much for the invitation.

I'm happy to start this conversation.

I just want to stress that all my answers and commentary are my own personal opinion.

I don't reflect any institutional views.

perspective for any of the institutions that I work with.

Look, matters have come to a head at the end of 2026 for a war that the Russians thought would only last a couple of weeks, for a war that many in the West were convinced would be over by 2023 with the Ukrainian counteroffensive, the fact that we're still here in a war of attrition in a battlefield stalemate effectively yes there's changes on the front lines but this is not a world war ii blitzkrieg style with arrows rapidly advancing across the maps.

So, you know, looking at those different goals and interests and questions that Russia is facing, what does good look like for the United States? What should our end goal be vis-a-vis Russia? And also with regard to, you know, the possibility of resolving the conflict in Ukraine, what should we be aiming for? I

How do you think these two conflicts link and interact over time? What sort of implications does that have for the United States?

I mean, I think the first starting point is to understand, as we've seen over the last 20 years, that Russia and Iran, both as major suppliers of energy to the global economy, were in a position where you can really pressure one or the other, but it's hard to pressure both simultaneously.

We saw this in the run-up to the JCPOA, the nuclear deal in 2015, that in order to maximize pressure on Iran, the United States and other countries were prepared to somewhat turn a blind eye to Russia or to expect that Russian energy supplies would help make up for some of the differences if we were asking parties to sanction Iran.

After 2022 and the resumption of full-scale military operations on Russia's part in Ukraine, we We were interested, we and our allies, in putting a lot more pressure on Russia, including finding ways to limit Russia's ability to export its energy in order to gain revenue and influence.

Now that we have this crisis in the Gulf, and not only Iranian energy, but energy from all the Gulf states, from Iraq, from Kuwait, from Saudi Arabia, from the UAE, are impacted by it, the question then becomes, whether or not we retain the pressure on Russia.

And as we've seen over the last several months, the United States has been prepared or willing to relax some of its sanctions pressure on Russia in order to ensure that global energy markets were not completely destabilized by the crisis in the Gulf.

So that is one area of interrelationship where we are all trying to navigate this balance.

achieve your goals vis-a-vis Taiwan?