Nation States: What’s the Right Use of American Power?
The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show
iHeartPodcasts
4.5 • 11.4K Ratings
🗓️ 26 May 2026
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
From Iran and Ukraine to China, Taiwan, Venezuela, and the Strait of Hormuz, Steve Yates breaks down one of the biggest questions facing the Trump administration: what is the prudent use of American power? Yates explains why today’s military and economic conflicts look very different from Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan... and why America is increasingly relying on alliances, technology, deterrence, and targeted force instead of long-term occupations and nation-building.
Follow Nation States with Yates for practical insight into China, geopolitics, and the national security issues affecting your household and America’s future. Steve Yates breaks down complex world events as your personal national security advisor, without the Washington jargon.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Nation States with Yates. |
| 0:07.0 | We're going to do episode number five today with a look at what is the prudent use of American power. |
| 0:14.0 | We've seen a lot of different examples in the early stages of the Trump administration. |
| 0:19.0 | We also have our past history that sort of informs |
| 0:22.3 | what people think are advisable or inadvisable options. We're going to take a quick look today |
| 0:28.2 | at what some of the pros and cons of these are and what you might think about how these things are |
| 0:33.2 | going. But as you can see, you've had the headlines come at you fast. You've heard a lot of the |
| 0:38.1 | talking points. Nation states with Yates, we want to serve as your personal national security advisor |
| 0:43.2 | to help sort through how this matters and impacts, not just the White House, but your house. |
| 0:48.7 | So after a little bit of a break, we'll come back and continue our conversation about what exactly might be the prudent use of American power in this wild and woolly world we face in 2026. Back in a moment. Welcome back to the nation states with Yates. We're going to have a fun little conversation today talking about the war and peace what's the good use of american power what are |
| 1:12.2 | some of the risks that we want to avoid these days you've seen some of the headlines we've had |
| 1:17.3 | the kind of episodes pop up in every part of the world just about we've had options in the western |
| 1:24.6 | hemisphere in venezuela and talk about Cuba. We've had the use of American |
| 1:29.8 | force in Nigeria, which you may or may not have even noticed in your headlines. We've had the |
| 1:34.6 | long-going negotiations in war with Russia's invasion of Ukraine and what should the American |
| 1:40.0 | role be there. And of course, we have current operations on pause for negotiations with Iran |
| 1:46.7 | and the strait or Hamoos and the questions that the president was addressing just recently |
| 1:51.8 | in visiting China with regard to whether China is going to do something dangerous towards Taiwan |
| 1:57.4 | and what is or should be the American response and allied response to that. |
| 2:01.6 | That's a pretty full plate. |
| 2:03.4 | I have to say from some experience, having served in the White House for five years before, |
| 2:08.1 | I don't really ever remember a president's plate being this full with so many of these |
... |
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