Welcome back to The Restricted Handling Podcast—where geopolitics meets high drama and a touch of gallows humor. In today’s episode, “RH 11.20.25 | Russia: Missiles, ‘Peace’ Plans, and Paranoia,” we’re unpacking another chaotic 24 hours in the world of Kremlin theater, drone warfare, and diplomatic doublespeak.

Russia just dropped one of its biggest air assaults yet—nearly 500 missiles and drones tearing through Ukraine’s night sky. Cities like Ternopil and Kharkiv took the hits, leaving dozens dead and energy grids crippled as winter bites down hard. Ukraine’s air force, flying F-16s and Mirages, is holding its own, but Moscow’s aim seems less about victory and more about freezing a nation into submission.

Meanwhile, in Washington and Moscow, a so-called “peace plan” is making waves—and not in a good way. The 28-point draft, reportedly cooked up by Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and Putin’s investment ally Kirill Dmitriev, would have Ukraine surrender huge swaths of land, cut its army in half, and ditch long-range Western weapons. Europe’s reaction? Think “collective eye roll with a side of outrage.” France called it capitulation; Brussels said any real peace deal needs Kyiv in the room, not on the menu.

On the ground, U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll led a high-profile Pentagon delegation into Kyiv, officially on a “fact-finding mission.” Unofficially, it’s a sign that Washington’s walking a tightrope—backing Ukraine while quietly testing the waters for a possible ceasefire. President Zelensky, fresh from meetings with Turkey’s Erdoğan, is juggling diplomacy, corruption scandals, and missile barrages like a man playing 4D chess during an earthquake.

But the battlefield isn’t the only front. Russia’s spy games are back in full swing: the Kremlin’s paranoid security machine claims to have stopped an assassination plot involving poisoned British beer—yes, beer—and is now labeling exiled critics as terrorists. Pro-Kremlin analysts are even admitting what Putin won’t: the war’s going nowhere fast.

Across Europe, tensions are spiking. Poland’s calling rail sabotage an act of “state terrorism” tied to Russian agents, NATO jets scrambled after drone incursions in Romania, and Britain confronted a Russian spy ship shining lasers at RAF pilots near Scotland. It’s Cold War vibes with 21st-century tech and zero subtlety.

Tune in for sharp insight, dark humor, and the day’s biggest global security stories delivered with energy. Russia’s still bombing, Ukraine’s still fighting, and the world’s patience is running on fumes. This is geopolitics—unfiltered, unsanitized, and just a little unhinged.

Welcome back to The Restricted Handling Podcast, where geopolitics gets the energy of a locker room breakdown—minus the jerseys. In today’s episode, “China: Trade Wars, Spy Rings, and Pacific Power Plays,” we’re diving into one of the most chaotic 24 hours Beijing’s had in recent memory.

China’s throwing elbows on every front: trade, military, and espionage. The showdown with Japan has gone from tense to personal, as Beijing ramps up its pen-and-gun strategy—cultural propaganda at home and intimidation abroad. After Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s Taiwan comments, China’s not just mad, it’s making moves. Seafood bans, canceled film releases, and travel advisories are piling up as Beijing labels Tokyo a “revived militarist threat.” Japan’s not backing down either, pushing ahead with record defense spending and closer military drills with the U.S.

Meanwhile, the Pacific’s heating up—literally and strategically. Chinese “research vessels” are still lurking near Guam, mapping undersea terrain that’s suspiciously perfect for submarine warfare. The U.S., India, Japan, and Australia just wrapped Exercise Malabar, a high-octane naval drill aimed squarely at showing Beijing that freedom of navigation still means something. Guam’s turning into a fortress, but locals worry it’s also becoming target number one if things ever go hot.

On the espionage front, it’s a global whodunit. In Taiwan, authorities are cracking down on an expanding Chinese spy network involving retired and active-duty officers. Across the world, the U.K.’s MI5 just outed a Chinese LinkedIn recruiting ring—digital spies masquerading as headhunters. And in the Philippines, the once-glamorous “spy mayor” Alice Guo has officially been sentenced to life for running a massive human-trafficking and scam empire tied to Chinese networks.

The digital front’s no quieter. A China-linked hacker group, PlushDaemon, has been rerouting software updates through hijacked routers to spy on U.S., Taiwanese, and Japanese companies. It’s espionage disguised as maintenance—proof that Beijing’s cyber playbook just keeps evolving.

And while the world’s watching its moves, China’s President Xi Jinping is locking down control at home, pushing “law-based governance” that really means one thing: Party rule is the only rule. Add in Beijing’s soy trade power plays, chip diplomacy with the Netherlands, and angry words for Washington over warships near Venezuela, and you’ve got a full-spectrum China power hour.

It’s trade wars, spy rings, and Pacific brinkmanship—all in a day’s work for Beijing.

Subscribe to The Restricted Handling Podcast for sharp, fast, and unfiltered global intelligence—because geopolitics doesn’t take a day off, and neither do we.

China’s making headlines again — and not the peaceful kind. In today’s episode of The Restricted Handling Podcast, we dive into the chaos swirling around Beijing’s latest global power plays — espionage, economic coercion, and military muscle-flexing. If you thought yesterday’s news was wild, today’s developments crank the tension up to eleven.

The diplomatic brawl between China and Japan over Taiwan has gone nuclear — metaphorically, for now. After Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi doubled down on her comments about defending Taiwan, Beijing’s throwing every kind of punch it can. We’re talking a total seafood ban, over 540,000 canceled flights, and a propaganda storm calling Japan “a danger to peace.” Meanwhile, Japan’s response? Calm, collected, and backed by its biggest defense budget in modern history. Add in the U.S. flying B-1B bombers with Japanese F-35s over the East China Sea, and it’s clear this standoff isn’t cooling down anytime soon.

But that’s not all. Two of China’s aircraft carriers — the Fujian and Shandong — were just spotted operating together for the first time, conducting joint drills off Hainan Island. The Fujian’s cutting-edge electromagnetic catapult system is front and center, launching fighters like it’s auditioning for the next Top Gun movie. Meanwhile, in the South China Sea, China’s still fuming over joint naval drills between the U.S., Japan, and the Philippines — accusing them of “colluding with external forces.” Translation: Beijing’s nerves are showing.

Over in Taiwan, that espionage story we broke yesterday just got darker. Authorities confirmed the Chinese agent detained — a Hong Kong national named Ding — had been personally recruiting active and retired Taiwanese officers for years. It’s not just remote hacking anymore — Beijing’s physically planting operatives on the island. Taiwan’s tightening its defenses, boosting counterintelligence, and sending a clear message: not today, not ever.

And while all that’s happening, China’s global influence game is still running full throttle. The Netherlands just paused its state control of chipmaker Nexperia after “constructive talks” with Beijing. In London, the MI5 alert naming Chinese spies using LinkedIn as headhunters has Parliament on lockdown. And in Zambia, Premier Li Qiang’s visit is sealing new Belt and Road deals even as Western nations rush to keep up.

We connect every dot — from China’s $2.1 trillion global spending spree to U.S. warnings about Beijing’s grip on supply chains. It’s spies, seafood, and supersonic bombers — all in one fast, sharp, no-fluff episode.

If you want to understand how China’s rewriting the rules of 21st-century power — from your grocery store to your newsfeed to your next vacation — this is the episode you don’t skip.

Listen now to RH 11.19.25 | China: Spies, Seafood Bans, and Bomber Runs — where global strategy meets raw reality, and every headline tells a story bigger than it looks.

The war in Ukraine just took another chaotic turn — and The Restricted Handling Podcast is here to break it all down with bite, energy, and insight. In this episode, “RH 11.19.25 | Russia: Missiles, Mayhem, and the Fog of War,” we’re diving into Russia’s largest air and missile barrage in months, Ukraine’s daring counterstrikes deep into Russian territory, and the Kremlin’s spiraling paranoia that’s now rewriting the rulebook for life inside Putin’s fortress state.

We start with the night that lit up Ukraine’s skies: more than 470 drones and 48 missiles raining down on cities from Ternopil to Lviv. Apartment towers reduced to rubble, power grids crippled, and NATO countries scrambling jets as Russia’s war machine spills over its borders. But Ukraine’s not sitting still — Kyiv just fired U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles straight into Russia, striking near Voronezh. Moscow claims it shot them all down, but debris in the heart of Russia tells a different story. If this sounds like escalation, that’s because it is.

Then, we return to the Pokrovsk front — where last week’s “encirclement” has turned into a full-on bloodbath. Russian troops are crawling through the ruins of a city that now looks more like Stalingrad 2.0 than a modern battlefield. Fog, drones, and exhaustion define the fight, and both sides are paying a heavy price. Ukraine’s still holding, but the cost is rising by the day.

Meanwhile, Putin’s locking down his country tighter than ever. New laws let the Kremlin mobilize two million reservists to “guard infrastructure,” block cell networks for returning travelers, and jail teenagers for sabotage. Russia’s morphing into a digital police state while even its pro-war bloggers — once its loudest cheerleaders — are being silenced, arrested, or branded as extremists. When a regime starts eating its own propaganda machine, you know the walls are closing in.

We’ve also got a wild espionage subplot unfolding across Europe — Poland uncovering Russian sabotage on its rail lines, NATO scrambling over drone breaches, and a spy tug-of-war in Azerbaijan involving a GRU agent accused of running a Europe-wide parcel bomb plot. Add in Zelensky’s peace talks in Turkey, Europe’s defense deals, and a U.S. warning that China could weaponize global supply chains — and you’ve got one jam-packed episode that feels like Tom Clancy meets Black Mirror.

It’s raw, it’s fast, and it’s the kind of real-world drama you can’t make up. Tune in for RH 11.19.25 | Russia: Missiles, Mayhem, and the Fog of War — where geopolitics meets chaos, and every headline feels like a cliffhanger.

Step beyond the headlines and official spin to uncover the deeper realities inside Russia and China’s economies. We take a close look at how Moscow and Beijing project power abroad while grappling with fragile foundations at home, from Russia’s unsustainable wartime spending to China’s faltering growth and anxious workforce. We cut through state narratives to reveal the costs of these economies, costs borne not by leaders, but by ordinary citizens facing higher prices and shrinking opportunities. With insights from data, policy shifts, and on-the-ground reports, we trace how these two authoritarian powers strain to maintain control, and how their choices reverberate across global markets, diplomacy, and the lives of millions.

Buckle up for another high-tension, high-drama ride through East Asia on The Restricted Handling Podcast. In today’s episode — “RH 11.18.25 | China: Spies, Carriers, Nukes & Tourism Wars” — we break down the fast-moving storm swirling around Beijing’s latest diplomatic tantrums, covert operations, and saber-rattling military flexes. From spy rings to aircraft carriers to economic warfare waged through canceled vacations, China’s playing every card in the deck, and we’re unpacking it all.

The episode kicks off with China’s escalating feud with Japan, now entering full-blown economic warfare mode. After Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s blunt warning that Tokyo would defend Taiwan against a Chinese invasion, Beijing went nuclear — metaphorically and maybe literally. We’re talking canceled half-million tourist trips, billions in economic losses, and a propaganda barrage that paints Japan as the new villain of the East. We get into how Beijing’s “weaponized tourism” tactic works, why it’s hitting Japan’s economy where it hurts most, and how Tokyo’s surprisingly unfazed — with Takaichi’s approval ratings actually rising as the standoff deepens.

Then we move to the South China Sea, where the U.S., Japan, and the Philippines just wrapped another round of joint naval drills. The USS Nimitz took center stage while China’s bomber squadrons circled in response, warning its neighbors not to “collude with external forces.” We talk about how this cat-and-mouse game is shaping the new Indo-Pacific playbook — and why the PLA’s latest warships and drone carriers are sending shivers across the region.

Back on Taiwan’s shores, it’s spy season. Authorities just busted a Chinese espionage network run by a Hong Kong agent who actually infiltrated the island in person — a first. Two active-duty Taiwanese officers are under arrest, and Beijing’s getting bolder with every move. We also explore how China’s turning AI tools into cyberweapons, reportedly hijacking Anthropic’s Claude AI model to automate hacking campaigns. Welcome to the new frontier of espionage: artificial intelligence with Chinese characteristics.

And we can’t forget the nuclear file — new satellite images show a massive expansion at China’s Lop Nur test site. More tunnels, more shafts, more questions. Is Beijing prepping to break the test ban era?

Listen now to The Restricted Handling Podcast — where geopolitics gets bold, fast, and fun.

It’s another wild 24 hours on the Eastern Front — and we’re diving straight into the chaos. In today’s episode of The Restricted Handling Podcast, “RH 11.18.25 | Russia: Fog, Fire, and Fractures,” we’re breaking down how Moscow’s brutal push around Pokrovsk is grinding into a meat grinder of its own making. The fog that once gave Russian troops cover is now blinding them, and Ukraine’s answering with precision drone strikes, mobile defenses, and some old-fashioned grit. It’s the latest chapter in Russia’s endless obsession with turning cities to rubble — and Kyiv’s refusal to break.

We’ll catch you up on how the Pokrovsk siege has evolved since yesterday’s briefing. What was a slow encirclement has become a brutal, close-quarters slugfest. Russian troops are literally crawling through smoke and ash while Ukrainian defenders fight back with unmanned ground vehicles and artillery guided by drone eyes in the sky. Both sides are losing heavily, but one thing’s clear: Moscow’s losing more men than it can replace.

Meanwhile, Russia’s “fog of war” has turned into something far more literal. Poor visibility and nonstop drone warfare are forcing both sides to fight blind — and the balance of tech is starting to tilt Ukraine’s way. On the other side of the border, Kyiv’s striking deep into Russian territory again, taking out S-400 air defense systems and hitting Novorossiysk, the same port that once housed Moscow’s Black Sea Fleet.

We’ve got sabotage, too — and this time, it’s inside NATO territory. Explosions on Polish railways, linking directly to Ukraine’s supply lifelines, have investigators pointing fingers squarely at Russia’s infamous GRU Unit 29155 — the same shadow operatives behind Europe’s past poisonings and pipeline explosions.

In Europe, things are heating up politically even as the continent braces for another freezing winter. France’s deal to send 100 Rafale F4 fighter jets to Ukraine is official — and Macron’s making sure Paris, not Washington, is seen as Europe’s security quarterback. But while the defense deals look bold, the money behind them is anything but stable. The EU’s plan to bankroll Ukraine using frozen Russian assets has stalled, and Belgium’s holding up the works. A funding cliff by spring? It’s on the table.

Add to that Zelensky’s new corruption scandal, Russian repression at home, Europe’s scramble for U.S. LNG, and a new wave of espionage drama — and you’ve got an episode packed tighter than a Kremlin press conference.

Buckle up — this episode of The Restricted Handling Podcast takes you straight into the blast zone of global geopolitics. On November 17, 2025, China’s making waves on every front: underground in the deserts of Xinjiang, over the skies of Japan, and deep in the contested waters of the South China Sea. We’re breaking down the biggest moves and most eyebrow-raising developments you need to know.

First up — China’s secretive desert project at Lop Nur. Satellite imagery shows the People’s Liberation Army expanding its Cold War–era nuclear testing site with new tunnels, vertical shafts, and support facilities. As President Trump vows to restart U.S. nuclear testing “on an equal basis” with Beijing and Moscow, the world’s three biggest nuclear powers are once again circling each other like it’s 1962 all over again. Think of it as a high-stakes remix of the arms race — only this time, the nukes are smarter, faster, and pointed at more places.

Meanwhile, Xi Jinping’s nuclear modernization drive is speeding ahead. China now has over 600 nuclear warheads, new missile silos, and the flashy DF-61 intercontinental ballistic missile — capable of hitting anywhere on Earth. It’s a clear message to Washington: Beijing’s not playing small ball anymore.

But nukes aren’t the only story. Japan’s new prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, set off diplomatic fireworks after saying Tokyo might use force if China attacks Taiwan. Beijing didn’t take that well — dispatching Coast Guard ships into Japanese waters, flying drones near Yonaguni Island, and unleashing a social media tirade that included an actual decapitation threat from a Chinese diplomat. Yeah, it’s gotten that spicy.

Add to that the South China Sea showdown, where the U.S., Japan, and the Philippines just wrapped up massive naval drills led by the USS Nimitz. China fired back with bomber patrols and a shiny new amphibious assault ship, the Sichuan, fresh off its maiden sea trial. The PLA’s message? “We’re ready whenever.”

On the tech and cyber front, it’s not getting any calmer. Anthropic uncovered that Chinese state-backed hackers used AI to run near-autonomous cyberattacks. Taiwan’s National Security Bureau also warned that Chinese AI chatbots like DeepSeek and Doubao are collecting user data and spreading propaganda disguised as conversation.

From desert nukes to drone duels, from cyber spies to diplomatic shade — this episode has it all. RH 11.17.25 | China: Nukes, Drones, and Desert Drills brings you the sharpest, fastest, and most irreverent take on global power plays you’ll find anywhere.