Ep 113: Rebeccah Heinrichs on Today’s Crisis of American Deterrence

School of War

Rebeccah Heinrichs, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and the director of its Keystone Defense Initiative, joins the show to talk about the state of U.S. deterrence of Russia, Iran, and China—and what Washington could be doing better.

Rebeccah Heinrichs, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and the director of its Keystone Defense Initiative, joins the show to talk about the state of U.S. deterrence of Russia, Iran, and China—and what Washington could be doing better.▪️ Times     •      01:42 Introduction     •      02:18 Conventional and strategic deterrence    •      04:06 A failure of strategic deterrence    •      09:38 Integrated deterrence     •      13:33 Putin is committed to the bit      •      15:36 If Russia wins, what’s it to the US?     •      19:16 Options if Russia uses nuclear weapons    •      24:06 The pendulum keeps swinging      •      28:20 Washington’s confusion regarding Iran and Israel    •      31:56 Red Sea adrift    •      36:00 China and the rest    •      40:01 Pacific flashpoints  <a href="https://bit.ly/41EloxN">Follow along </a> on Instagram Find a transcript of today’s episode on our <a href="http://schoolofwar.substack.com/">School of War Substack</a>

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This podcast seeks to learn what war teaches. There has been a steady decline in the study of military history and its associated theoretical discipline, strategy.This podcast seeks to fill that gap through in-depth interviews on military and diplomatic history.&nbsp;Our guests have included former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, the Cold War historian John Lewis Gaddis, and China Select Committee chairman Mike Gallagher. We discuss the battlefield commanders, diplomats, strategists, policymakers, and statesmen who have had to make wartime decisions in the ancient and modern eras.The subject of an episode may be an historical battle, campaign, or conflict; the conduct of policy in the course of a major international incident; the work of a famous strategist; the nature of a famous weapon; or the legacy of an important military commander or political leader.&nbsp;&nbsp; Aaron MacLean is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. He has worked as a foreign policy advisor and legislative director to Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas and spent seven years in the U.S. Marine Corps. <a href="https://schoolofwar.substack.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Visit our Substack for episode transcripts</a><a href="https://www.instagram.com/school.of.war/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Follow along on Instagram</a>