Commentary

Ariane Tabatabai, the Council's vice president of research on security and defense and senior fellow on the Middle East, joins the podcast to talk through the week's biggest national security stories.

"It's a sign to the American people and to the British public that the relationship is about much more than President Trump and Prime Minister Starmer," Council President and CEO Leslie Vinjamuri tells BBC News.

Council President and CEO Leslie Vinjamuri reflects on the significance of King Charles III's first state visit to the United States and what is at stake for the US-UK relationship moving forward.

A European-led international mission and the Gulf Cooperation Council are trying to determine who will guarantee openness and stability in the strait once the Iran war ends—and how.

Prime Minister Victor Orbán’s fate may signal whether democratic backsliding is reversible.

" Even talking about the US formally leaving or just slowly disengaging sends a very dangerous signal to Moscow," Council Distinguished Nonresident Fellow Ambassador Julianne Smith said of President Trump's remarks about withdrawing from NATO.

"This is an intervention, a war, a conflict that the US began," says Council Distinguished Nonresident Fellow Ambassador Julianne Smith. "It did not take any information about this intervention to the NATO allies to warn them that there could be asks coming from the United States."

"It really puts Europe in a difficult position. On the one hand, they're frustrated that they've been left out in the cold for this entire operation," says Council Distinguished Nonresident Fellow Julianne Smith. "On the other hand, . . . they're also recognizing that they need the strait to be open."

"This is already a relationship that's really encountered some turbulence in recent months," Council Distinguished Nonresident Fellow Ambassador Julianne Smith says of the transatlantic alliance. "Adding this Iran war now into the mix is only creating added friction."

"President Trump has made it extraordinarily difficult to be a partner or an ally of the United States in this moment," Council President and CEO Leslie Vinjamuri tells Sky News.