You are listening to the War in the Rocks podcast on Strategy, Defense, and Foreign Affairs.

My name is Ryan Evans. I'm the founder of War in the Rocks. This is a very special episode.

We're actually giving you a three episode of the Iran Reckoning with Afshan

Ostevar, which is one of our members-only shows. We decided to ungate this great conversation

that lasts about an hour that Afshan and I just had about the burgeoning protest movement in Iran,

the regime's efforts to suppress it violently and what outside actors, including the United States,

Israel, Russia, China, and others might do. It's really deep. It's the result of decades of study of this issue by Afshan. And if you really want to understand what's happening, I think this is sort of the must-listen episode. This one's free, of course, but you can listen to all episodes of the Iran Reckoning if you become a member at war on the rocks.com slash membership. You don't just get access to this show, but you get access to the Russia contingency with Michael Kaufman, thinking the unthinkable with Anki Ponda, a bunch of newsletters, a bunch of other podcasts that only our members get that come out all the time. So if you are a national security professional, a hobbyist, a nerd, someone that's just passionate about these issues that finds importance in understanding what's going on in the world, this is the ultimate program for you.

Again, that's at war on the rocks.com slash membership.

And now to my conversation with Afshan.

Afshan, lots going on in the topic that you've dedicated your adult life to studying.

You must be going through a lot of not just thoughts, ideas, but also emotions in a way.

It's been a busy time.

I mean, whenever things pop off in Iran like this, you always have these mixed emotions.

On the one hand, you want to remain your usual, objective,

analytical self. If I've tried to do anything in my career, it's to be sort of cool-headed

about things and try to look at things as clear-eyed and objectively as I can. But on the

other hand, when it touches something that's personal to you

that you have a stake in personally, not just professionally, it's difficult to maintain that

usual kind of objective self. And so, yeah, it's always kind of an interesting time. But

in some ways, it's very exciting. In some ways, it's really,

you know, heart rendering. So we're recording this on Monday in the middle of the day,

U.S. East Coast time. Things are changing fast. But I think it's fair to say, correct me if I'm

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