Hello and welcome to Background Briefing, available 24-7 at background briefing.

I'm Ian Masters, and today we'll examine a number of stories and issues in the news.

We'll begin with conflicting rumors of peace between Russia and Ukraine, with Trump claiming we are

closer to peace than ever and the head of the UK's MI6 Foreign Intelligence Service, saying

Putin will continue to string along the peace process until he gets everything he wants. Joining us to discuss how Ukraine could defend itself without joining NATO, which Shilensky has

apparently conceded on, is Jennifer Kavanaugh, a senior fellow and director of military analysis

at defense priorities, where her research focuses on U.S. military strategy for structure and defense budgeting,

the defense industrial base, and U.S. military deployments and interventions.

Previously, she was a senior fellow in the American Statecraft Program at the Canadian

Endowment for International Peace, and she has an article of defense priorities.

We will discuss an armed non-alignment model for

Ukraine's post-war security. Then we'll speak with Karen Greenberg an

international studies fellow at the New America Foundation, a fellow at New York

University Law School's Rees Center of Security and a permanent member of the

Council on Foreign Relations as well as the co-host of the Spy Talk podcast. She's the author of Rogue Justice, The Making of the Security State,

Suttled Tools, The Dismantling of American Democracy from the War on Terror to Donald Trump,

and our nation at risk election integrity as a national security issue, co-authored with Julian

Zelazar.

We will discuss doubts about Putin's interest in peace coming from the new head of the UK's MI6 and how Trump's new national security strategy has rattled Europe.

Then finally we'll speak with Henry Giroux and renowned educator, author and cultural critic,

who holds a chair for scholarship in the public interest inoux and renowned educator, author and cultural critic, who holds a chair

for scholarship in the public interest in English and Cultural Studies at McMastery University in Canada.

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