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Hi and welcome back to Foreign Office. I'm Michael Weiss, Director of Special Investigations at the FreeRussia Foundation,

and the editor of the English language version of the Insider.

Apologies that it's been a while since our last episode. I've been traveling.

But that's one of the reasons that we're doing this episode, because in my latest exploits,

admittedly not to any sort of foreign or exotic locale, but to Chicago, Illinois,

I attended a conference on security forces assistance for Ukraine,

at which I met a host of very interesting people who know a lot about stuff that basically this show has been delving into for the past two years,

and work it professionally. And before I introduce my guests, I just want to say that I was sat around a table with people who have names out of a Mart name is novel.

And I want to share some of them with you, even though they're some of the most brilliant people in the field of strategic studies and military affairs.

We had one person, Alexandra Chinchilla, who's a PhD in one of the above, a guy called Nathan Toronto,

who sounds like he just stepped off the stage of guys and dolls. And then we have my guest, Tony Tingle.

I'm not making that out, Tony Tingle, but don't let the name fool you.

...