Christian Smith
speaker
662 appearances
8 recordings
1 series
first heard Jun 2026
last heard 13 Aug
Christian Smith’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
Trend
recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 8 in all, peaking in Jun 2026 with 4.
Appearances
Talking Geopolitics · The US-Iran "Gut Check" and the Future of European Defense · 10 Jul 2026
podcast
How has it got to the point where they're so significant?
George, on that note, we can leave it there.
Thanks very much, as always.
Thank you very much out there for listening.
We'll be back again soon with another podcast.
Remember, you can go to geopoliticalfutures.com for everything and more about what we've been talking about today.
But until we see you next time, you take care.
Bye-bye.
You can find all of our expert geopolitical analysis
Hello and welcome to this podcast from Geopolitical Futures.
I'm Christian Smith.
It's no great insight to say that energy is about as fundamental for the Russian economy as oxygen is for its citizens.
Between 2014 and 2024, oil and gas made up anywhere between 30 and 50 percent of federal budget revenues.
With the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, fears grew in the West that it could mean a bounce for Russia's economy and its war chest.
And while that could still be the case, with Ukraine targeting Russian refineries and energy storage in recent weeks, including massive attacks with hundreds of drones over the weekend, Vladimir Putin has now acknowledged that the country faces fuel shortages.
So today on the podcast, I am joined by George Friedman, Geopolitical Futures chairman and founder, to discuss where to from here for Russia and whether the country may try to force Belarus or even nuclear weapons into the war.
George, hello.
Before we get to that, let's just set the scene as to how we got here.
Talk us through the details of Ukraine's energy infrastructure attacks.
Why is it doing this?
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