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Secrets of Statecraft is a bimonthly podcast hosted by Distinguished Visiting Fellow Andrew Roberts that explores the effect that the study of history has had on the careers and decision making of public figures. The podcast also features leading historians discussing the influence that the study of history had on their biographical subjects. The title is taken from Winston Churchill’s reply on Coronation Day 1953 to a young American who had asked him for life advice, to whom he said, “Study history, study history, for therein lie all the secrets of statecraft.”
Episodes
Tuesday Feb 14, 2023
Tuesday Feb 14, 2023
Sir Trevor Phillips is the founder of the Policy Exchange’s History Matters project, the UK chairman of the Index on Censorship, and was longest-serving equalities commissioner in British history. Here he gives his characteristically trenchant views on the subjects of history, race, and free speech.
Thursday Jan 05, 2023
Thursday Jan 05, 2023
British historian Simon Sebag Montefiore has written a new history of the World, which analyzes the last 10,000 years of global events through the prism of famous (and often infamous) families.
Wednesday Dec 14, 2022
Wednesday Dec 14, 2022
Michael Gove is that rare thing in politics, a genuine intellectual who is also a very effective politician. One of the longest-serving conservative cabinet ministers, he has served under four prime ministers and twice stood for the premiership himself, but his real metier is as a Tory thinker.
Tuesday Nov 08, 2022
Tuesday Nov 08, 2022
Karl Rove started his career as a political consultant, eventually helping George W. Bush get elected Governor of Texas and later, President of the United States. In this conversation, Rove discusses his rise through the business of politics, his days in the White House, and his current career as a historian.
Tuesday Oct 25, 2022
Tuesday Oct 25, 2022
David Cameron was well prepared to be the British prime minister from 2010 to 2016, after receiving a first-class education at the hands of top historians. He explores how much his schooling in history affected the decisions he took when called upon to make it.
Tuesday Oct 11, 2022
Tuesday Oct 11, 2022
Understanding the psyche of Russia and the Russians has bewildered Westerners for generations; foremost expert Stephen Kotkin gives some penetrating insights into how to do it.
Wednesday Sep 28, 2022
Wednesday Sep 28, 2022
Distinguished combat commander Lieutenant General H. R. McMaster speaks about his time as President Trump's National Security Adviser, American mistakes during the Vietnam War, his belief in learning from the past to help to think strategically about the present, and finally he discusses what the Biden Administration is getting wrong and right about the Russo-Ukrainian War.
Tuesday Sep 06, 2022
Tuesday Sep 06, 2022
From murderous Jim Crow–era Birmingham, Alabama, via the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, to the defeat of Soviet Communism, the past has had a powerful influence over the worldview of Dr. Condoleezza Rice, former national security advisor and secretary of state. She also comments on the life and career of the late Mikhail Gorbachev.