Geopolitics – like nature – abhors a vacuum. History is replete with examples that demonstrate how the rapid depressurization of a power pulling out from a region too quickly or too soon can lead to instability in the form of civil wars, military coups, or genocide. U.S. disengagement from key areas of Eurasia would create a strategic vacuum portending systemic and regional instability that would undermine the post-World War II international architecture. Join us for a discussion on how opportunist contenders for great power status, such as Russia and China, or even intermediate powers such as Turkey and Iran, will exploit a U.S. retreat as a strategic opportunity to bolster themselves.

Dr. Ariel Cohen is an internationally renowned expert on energy policy, Russia/Eurasia, Eastern and Central Europe, and the Middle East. Dr. Cohen is a Senior Fellow with the International Tax and Investment Center and Director of the Energy, Growth and Security program and a nonresident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council. Cohen is the Founding Principal of International Market Analysis, a boutique advisory firm with a practice that spans the energy and natural resources, defense, finance, telecommunications, and transportation industries.

Dr. Kamran Bokhari is Director of Analytical Development at the Center for Global Policy. He also is a national security and foreign policy specialist at the University of Ottawa’s Professional Development Institute. Bokhari has served as the Central Asia Studies Course Coordinator at the U.S. Department of State’s Foreign Service Institute.