The General & the Journalist

Having first demanded that Iran 'open the fucking strait', President Trump followed up with a post vowing 'an entire civilisation will die tonight' if it did not do so.

But could any such order ever be legal, and would the American military even agree to carry it out?

Patrick and Tom chew over these and other questions, including whether it's time for America's long-standing allies to bail on it, if bombing a country into submission ever works, and what the sacking of the head of the US army tells us about the state of the country's military and, perhaps, its constitution.

But first up, in a week which saw possibly the finest rescue mission ever carried out, John Nichols recalls his experience in the first Gulf War of being shot down over enemy territory, attempting to evade capture, and waiting for the infantry to arrive.

Hosts: General Sir Patrick Sanders and Tom Newton Dunn
Guest: John Nichol
Producer: Micaela Arneson
Executive producer: Fiona Leach
Image: Getty

Get in touch: [email protected]

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For their Easter special, Tom and Patrick turn the entire show over to you. They answer as many listener questions as possible that have landed in the General & Journalist inbox since Christmas. Among them: whether Europe could defend itself in the events of an immediate Russian incursion, and whether the Iran war has changed Xi's calculus over taking Taiwan - and many more.

Hosts: Tom Newton Dunn & General Sir Patrick Sanders
Producer: Shabnam Grewal
Executive producer: Fiona Leach
Get in touch: [email protected]
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Kremlin's treasury runneth-over with oil revenues, Moscow's military is being treated to a lesson in the latest US warfare in real time, and the world's eyes are averted from Ukraine.

Trump's war with Iran has been a boon for President Putin. And yet rumours of paranoia, deserting elites, and strange defections abound.

To decipher what exactly is going on in Moscow, Patrick and Tom are joined by Russia-watcher extraordinaire, Mark Galeotti.

Hosts: General Sir Patrick Sanders and Tom Newton Dunn
Guest: Mark Galeotti
Producer: Shabnam Grewal
Executive producer: Fiona Leach
Image: Getty

Listen here to Mark's podcast, In Moscow's Shadows
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

World-renowned historian Peter Frankopan joins Tom and Patrick to dissect the escalating conflict in Iran through the lens of ancient history and shifting civilisations. The Silk Roads author argues the war is less a standalone event and more the continuation of a century-long struggle for control over the "spine of the world" and its vital resources, namely oil.

Upending international law, decades-long alliances, and the norms of democracy, Frankopan posits that the war has buried multilateralism for good, and is as consequential for geopolitics as either the fall of the Berlin Wall or 9/11.

Hosts: General Sir Patrick Sanders and Tom Newton Dunn
Guest: Peter Frankopan
Producer: Shabnam Grewal
Executive producer: Fiona Leach
Image: Getty
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We are in the second week of a war that was supposed to be over by now. Yet the world is facing soaring oil prices, rising inflation and a regime which doesn't seem ready to capitulate.

While President Trump continues to threaten Iran, he faces the limits of what air power, alone, can achieve and increasing pressure at home.

Recording on Day 12 of the conflict, Patrick and Tom are joined by Sir Simon Gass, former Ambassador to Tehran and Chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, to dissect the rise of a new Iranian dynasty and the high-stakes search for an off-ramp that no one seems able to find.

Hosts: General Sir Patrick Sanders and Tom Newton Dunn
Guest: Sir Simon Gass
Producer: Shabnam Grewal
Executive producer: Fiona Leach
Image: Getty
Clips: War.gov
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.