Geoff sits down with Chris Kennedy to unpack the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy and debate what it will take for the United States to overcome its dependency on Chinese rare earths. Chris is a Senior Economist with Bloomberg Economics’ Geoeconomics practice and a new Adjunct Senior Fellow with the Energy, Economics and Security Program.

Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department

Ryan Fedasiuk, “In Search of a China Strategy,” The American Enterprise, December 15, 2025

National Security Strategy

Tom Wright joins to talk about his recent article, “What if 'America First' Appears to Work?" about the Trump administration’s “might makes right” approach to foreign policy, and whether this strategy is more politically viable than perhaps it should be, at least in the short term. Tom is senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and former senior director of strategic planning at the NSC under the Biden Administration.

Thomas Wright, "What If ‘America First’ Appears to Work?”, The Atlantic

Dan Wang, Breakneck: China's Quest to Engineer the Future

In a bonus episode this week, we're sharing an episode of the great Geoeconomic Competition podcast hosted by Francesca Ghiretti, director of the RAND Europe China Initiative and a research leader at RAND Europe. Geoff was a recent guest on the podcast to discuss Trump's tariffs and the future of US trade policy.

Listen to the Geoeconomic Competition podcast here.

Derisky Business is off next week for Thanksgiving, with episodes returning the following week.