We are now recording. Well, good afternoon everyone, and thank you for being here today. Welcome at our event conversations with strategy featuring today, Dr. Neil Menvin on research and think tanks. My name is Eleonora Natale. I'm a lecturer in international history at the Department of War Studies. And before introducing our guests today, let me spend a couple of words on our event series. Conversations with strategy is a monthly appointment that offers students at war studies the opportunity to meet and ask our visiting fellows about their research and career paths from former diplomats to intelligence analysts, journalists, TV servants, and policymakers. Our visiting fellows will discuss their career journey and they will provide tips and advice on their chosen profession. They will discuss the lessons they've learned and offer insights into contemporary strategic challenges. The discussion today will be followed by Q&A and conversation with students. So for all those of you who have joined online today, please use the chat function on Zoom. I will monitor it and let you in the conversation. The event is recorded. So it will be available online in our website. And now let me introduce our guest. Here with me we have my colleague, Dr. Natasha Perth. She's a lecturer in international peace and security. She's an expert in Russian security matters and international law. And this is our special guest and visiting fellow Dr. Neil Melvin. Neil is director of international security studies at RUZI, the Royal United Services Institute. His current research focuses on emerging international security dynamics in key regions like Europe and Eurelia, the Gulf, and Middle East, East Africa and the Horn, and in the Pacific. His recent publications have focused on the new external security politics of the Horn of Africa and Indian Ocean and the Black Sea region. Prior to joining RUZI, Neil was director of the Armed Conflict and Conflict Management Program and then director of research at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. He had senior advisor positions in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the Energy Charter, the European Union, and he has been a consultant for the United Nations. Neil has also had positions at the Center for European Policy Studies and Chatham House, as well as several universities. He also defiled from Oxford University. He has been visiting fellow at the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies at Harvard University and the Department of Government at LSE. So thank you so much for being with us today and I leave you the floor. Thank you very much, Eleanor. Hi, Neil. Really good to see you in person. Really great to also meet Eleanor in person. So what I wanted to ask was obviously you're working in the think tank world now, but as we just heard from your biography, you know, you've actually had a really, very varied career. And when I first met you back in the 1990s, I can't remember quite which year, but in the mid-1990s possibly, you were still in academia. I think you were then working on your postdoc at LSE and it was very much focused on Russia, the Russian diaspora, Russian regions.  But how, if you like, was there a particular reason for you to move from academia into the think tank world or did it just sort of happen or tell us something a bit about how that process actually worked? Well, thanks for this. I'm delighted to be here. And it's great to be visiting fellow kings. It's really a privilege, but in response to your question, I think it's a combination of, well, strategic issues in line, I think, with the theme of this, but also personal developments happening in life. So I very much started out in academia and my main interests were Russia and Soviet space. But I got interested in very contemporary issues that the Soviet Union fell apart. In particular, this issue around stranded minorities, to say the name, minority communities have suddenly found themselves outside their home states. And in particular, I was looking at the issue of the Russians. We've already seen in the early 90s that what happened with the former Yugoslavia. And then of course, there was a concern that something similar might happen with Russia at that point because they were calculated at 25 million ethnic Russians or larger linguistic communities. Big questions about national minorities, particularly in the Baltic states, it's only in Latvia, in Latvia, there was a face even becoming a majority community there, large parts of Kazakhstan, Ukraine, of course. So I spent a lot of time working on those issues, initially at a Chattanova house, which became involved in the organization for security and cooperation in Europe which was set up or transitioned from being a Helsinki process to being a CSE and then the OSCE around that time. And one of the mandates in there was to deal with national minority questions where they risk becoming an issue of interstate security. And there was a dedicated mechanism that is the High Commissioner of National Minorities. So I started consulting for the High Commissioner and the first woman of the Max van der Stool former Dutch Foreign Minister, a very distinguished person and very active in precisely these areas of conflict prevention, trying to develop solutions to majority minority problems, focus on a security agenda. So it wasn't human rights were important, but their course, they were structured around the security issues that we were focusing on. And really at that point, I transitioned from being an academic, I was teaching at the University of Leeds, Russian conservative issues, very much in the war area. And I moved to work in this mechanism for five years where we were doing a lot on Baltic states, Moldova, Crimea issue, we helped negotiate the first economy status on Crimea which until the Russians annexed it in 2014 was the basis for managing sort of federal ethnic relations around Crimea, lots of work in Central Asia around similar issues to the Uzbek minority, which is kind of dispersive across the neighborhood in some Kazakh style, in some Uzbek style, Pajak style, very interesting work in Turkmenistan where we had very close society and still very similar issues. So that was sort of, I think the point I moved from being an academic full time into other areas. And then the personal part is while I was working for the OCM, I met my wife, who's a Swedish diplomat. And then of course you have to look to combine two careers and we chose I think the path that we would really try to follow her career in terms of moving. And I would then have a more flexibility to pick up some opportunities around that. So this is where I think I've moved from working in policy community in Brussels, quite a lot of work on it with the energy charter similar to the OCM, but on energy security, European Security Hall of Africa, where I retooled a bit, looking at some growing geopolitics around that. And so that becomes an issue, how many two careers and children are going away. And I thought actually that up until recently years my CV was going in a lot of different and contradictory directions because I worked on Soviet space, on the Middle East issues, let the U.S. Iran dialogue or anti-CTO for some years and then all of Africa. And then suddenly of course the job at Russel came up which was international security, which actually brought all these different things together. So there was a certain serendipity I think. And then suddenly your career which was made for rather personal issues, sometimes jobs appear that bring it together or perhaps you followed your in particular interests. And that was the way the world was going as it turned out. Yeah, that's interesting as well if you, if we think back over to the kind of long delay if you like your career in the sense that you began with looking at the Russian diaspora and so on in Russian regions. And I imagine there was then a point perhaps in the late 1990s and early 2000s where these issues didn't seem to really fade somehow and significance and importance. I mean, you're talking about are you this issue of autonomy, Crimea, 1990s and so on. And so were you, if you like, surprised or had when these issues in a way resurfaced, I guess, not too long ago was I mean, Crimea, but also in other areas. And then the whole idea of the risky near and so on is kind of soft our project. I mean, have you were maybe working in other areas then at that point.  Yeah, I mean, I don't think I was surprised by the timing perhaps, but I mean, the fault lines of these issues were laid down with the break of the Soviet Union and the subsequent failure of the Why the European Security Project, which I'm just saying in the late 1990s, that became clear that on the Western side, there was a large winter expansion agenda, which was, you know, I worked in the mechanisms that were developed to span the East-West divisions both on the security side of the sea but also the energy charter. So I saw it in both those areas that there was a push as the EU and NATO enlarged to minimize those organizations. And of course, the Russians felt that. And they, you know, for example, I think when Baltic States joined the EU, the national minority issue was no longer accepted by the EU to dealt with in the OEC framework and struggled to make sure the national, the high-commissioned national minority still had a role, but essentially it took it away from the OEC for a large degree. Of course, the Russians, that was a key issue. And so they began to also lose interest in those mechanisms when they turned to other issues. So of course, then it became the fault lines that we had worked on in the 1990s. Everyone knew what they were and they haven't gone away. I mean, Transnistria is unresolved over two and a half, two and a half, two and a half, three decades later. Acrazi and South Asetia, Crimea from the beginning. I mean, that's to say I worked on that as an autonomy issue in 1995, 1996, I think it was. And we saw already what the issues were there. Don Bass, the same thing, I mean the whole language issues. So these were the questions I think were there and we thought it was a transitional mechanism. Once those broke down, of course, we've seen them come out in full force and this is now the reality of the security questions. Yes, I mean, that's interesting to look back and I mean, I remember as well, that there was that sense in Russia that the CSC and then later OSCE was actually going to become this kind of pan-European security architecture, if you like. So I mean, how much to what extent and you're obviously talking about all these issues that essentially have kind of come back to haunt us in multiple ways. And as you say, connecting back to Yugoslavia, perhaps Yugoslavia as well, there were a lot of parallels there, so do you feel that there was a way in which had that European security architecture remained in place or been, if you like, institutionalized somewhat differently? As you say, there were various ways in which it came to play a different role or less significant role. Do you think that we would sort of perhaps not have not be facing some of the issues that we're facing today had that organization, if you like, I don't know, had that security architecture actually really being instituted in the way that people, some people included, some people in Russia felt that it should have been? I mean, I think it was very difficult. I mean, looking back on it, it was probably very difficult to find a solution because in the legacy of the Cold War there was a big power in us, in reality, of course, once the Russians thought we were going to have a Vancouver to plant a bus stock, security architecture, in which they would be a leading voice, that's great power in that. And of course, I think they were willing to accept some aspects of the human rights and mobilization agenda around that. But from the Western side, of course, they weren't willing to let NATO be subsubstituted to that. And so once we got to that point, it was very difficult to find a way forward. Plus, you had, of course, many of the countries who had been part of the Soviet bloc and saw this as an opportunity to escape. I mean, obviously they had been oppressed and occupied with a feeling. And so this was a chance for them to break free and they thought that was the opportunity and so there was that coincidence of interest. I think it was, and the Russians, gradually through the 90s, you could see that they were feeling this power imbalance is that their expectations didn't match. On the other hand, their country was in a very bad shape. Disorganized, possibly on the verge of breakup itself on these regionalism issues. Desperate war in Chechnya, feeling that loose nukes. So it was sort of, I think that relationship became very difficult. And then Putin came into that mix and of course began to change it. And I think, I mean, now, of course, what we see is, I think we're beginning to see this, is that European security as a concept itself is now being contested. You know, European security was forged, in my view, anyway, in the sort of Cold War environment when Europe was the center of geopolitics. Once Russia stepped away from that project, that was the first step. Now we're seeing other steps. And European security is in transformation and shrinking. Enlargement seems to be dead now, despite the ambition. We've seen that in the Western Balkans, this is the neatest place they're not going to join, but perhaps they're not. Turkey, UK is now left, the EU. So there's a movement now in which, and of course, also what we're seeing is that European security is being defined by a debate about Indo-Pacific. Oh, it's just about to turn. So, I mean, the parameters of what European security is, I think is shifting very fast. And in Russia, we're just creating a European security program, partly to examine, and I'm going to try and leave it on the UK thinking front of those Brexit, but also because looking ahead, it's very hard to see what European security may look like in 10 years. I mean, it may not be NATO or the EU. We don't know exactly what the parameters are. I mean, that's a bit radical thinking now, but I mean, you can see that there's a lot of movement, a lot of coalitions of the will emerging outside to peel off European security. OSCE is probably on its last legs, still going on in some areas, but I think we'll press back. And so that's a question to me, I think about what this all looks like. That's really interesting. I think also, in some ways you could, I suppose, argue that European security was for a long time in a way defined this RV, the Soviet Union. I mean, obviously that's another question whether it was actually part of Europe. I mean, and obviously had the bifurcation of Western and Eastern Europe, but then this idea of a kind of larger Europe and then the whole question of whether Russia became part of that and actually Turkey, as well as you say, of course, Russia is now, has its idea of a kind of greater Eurasia, which is supposed to be a kind of condominium of the Eurasian Economic Union within Russia and the former parts of the former Soviet space in tandem with the Belt and Road Initiative, although I don't think that China actually talks about greater Eurasia, the greater Eurasian partnership it's kind of a little bit of a fantasy, I think, perhaps that Russia indulges in, but in a way, we're all having to define ourselves much more now in relation to China and the rise of China. And so that does leave that whole European project in something of a, I don't know what the word is, limbo or quandary, and as you say, obviously the whole idea of this tilt to the Indo-Pacific, which obviously has been also rolled out in our own integrated review, but actually, it has raised so many questions in so many countries about where Europe is going. No, I think it's a very interesting time to work with international students, it's very difficult time, it's also quite worrying, I think, I mean, my lifetime of obviously there's a lot of optimism, idealism, say at the end of the program, or I think we're entering a much more worrying period now. Many more actors, we talked about a unicode world ending, I'm not sure they're there yet, but as you said, Russia has now broken out to the post-Soviet space, I've seen that since 2040, the annexation of Crimea, the presence in Syria, military base in Syria, supposedly setting up military base in Sudan, playing a bigger role in East Mediterranean, but it's not just the Russians, Turkey is now pursuing in many ways independence or the security policy of those two members of NATO. Golf actors are becoming much more important, and I saw that in the whole of Africa space. So I'm joined, Lucy, is that Qatar, UAE, Saudi, are big investors, but also looking to play a larger role in historic areas as they view it, you know, just to Saudi coast, and also you see Japan, China, South Korea, the military presence in the whole of Africa, the entrance to the Red Sea. So these areas I think that we saw as a southern flank of Europe are no longer just that, there's many other people and the definition of European security, I think it's being pushed in East Mediterranean now, no longer just a European space. And we've seen that even this recent deal between France and Greece on around ships, but with extra security guarantees beyond NATO, and obviously focus on a NATO member, Turkey. So I mean, this is a very different world, even 10 years ago, I'd say. So this is the UK, how we navigate that is a challenge. There may be some advantages, of course, from being outside the EU, because there is a flexibility and a fluidity and having some successes. Perhaps the Orca Steel, the UK's become an observer to the Cassian very quickly and trade issues and so on, but what now is the balance and priorities between these traditional European questions and the Russia questions fundamentally? And these other ones, this is I think going to be an issue we have to work through. And others are struggling too. Yeah, I mean, when the integrated review came out, there were a lot of people saying, well, it's all very well to talk about tilting to the Indo-Pacific, but shouldn't we really, shouldn't the heart of our sort of security strategy really be Europe? And particularly now, defending against Russia? Yeah, I mean, that's the language, and of course there's a lot of critical boosterism around global Britain, but I think you can begin to see the skeleton of the UK approach, which is a much firmer focus on the Franks, so Northern Europe, Mediterranean, a much more maritime engagement around these things, this joint military forces, CF, and hanging off relations with other European countries around those frameworks, which again, go beyond NATO and outside the, so in the Northern Europe case working with Sweden and Finland very closely now to non-NATO members in a mechanism that's UK defined, so even though Europe is the core, and NATO is very clearly identifying and integrated review as the focus, UK I think is also doing not unlike what France has done with Greece, this is the way things are going, and of course countries are looking to how they can secure their security when they're not sure where the US is going. The EU has big ambitions, but it's not, suppose it's seemingly able to deliver on security and defence, we'll see you next year, but that actually pans out, and this I think in the current reality is the dad cap and formal prohibitions of states, so Brexit, I think a lot of focus on Brexit, but I think Brexit maybe historically, and I have a story in here in the panel, when you look back on these things, I wonder whether Brexit will be seen to be part of a larger movement that's beginning to happen, and these bigger shifts in international security around the rising in the Pacific, not a shift of interest back towards Asia historically, and the pivot by the US, these are all factors that maybe Europe, the core of the security, they will move now, and I think these are the kind of tectonic forces maybe beginning to move around our understanding of what security means in the European space. Yeah, sure. I mean, that puts me in mind of, with Amitabh Acharya talked about a multi-plex world, not multi-polar, multi-plex, but like going to a multi-plex cinema, and choose what screen to watch, if you like, there could be 20 different screens to watch all these different films on, and the idea that essentially, we don't really, okay, we've obviously got NATO, but I mean, essentially, we don't have these kind of durable set-in-step alliances, that there are these kind of shifting alignments, and they are maybe more like alignments rather than alliances. Yeah, and you want to be in the crowd, let's go into the IMAX 3D. Exactly. That's the challenge very much. Not the 2D. Exactly, yeah. No, and this is, I think, a very interesting moment, but of course, we also want to preserve what was important on the solidarity and the close ties, which was the core, and is the core of European relations. So, I mean, the EU obviously is a very important actor, it's not a big ambition, so that's another dimension of the UK, I think, to look at in this case, very difficult at the moment, but what we're not sure is what this all looks like going forward. I mean, there's a lot of status quo momentum, but I think we need to do a bit more strategic thinking about what the vision is. Can't be anymore, I think, the Paris charter idea would lead to Europe hold, and so on, because things are moving beyond that. Another thing, I mean, again, coming back to the UK, it's been interesting because the integrated review, if that's one of the first European countries to really start to think about it, the French course would be there as well, but it's not, I mean, I think for me, an interesting point in that was it's not just about defending the rules-based order, which became a bit of a mantra, which is a very reactive status quo position. The first time I said the UK has to start to move on to the front foot and be more assertive, look to deter more, be unpredictable. And so you see that in relation to Russia, when the UK has, in a way, whether we're focusing on the tilt, the specific UK's pivoted against Russia, but clearly in the North and in the Black Sea. And it's leading, I think, and we saw this British frigate, Defender, which sails through Canadian territorial waters are out of the ground, quite primeal. And that was, I think, perhaps the first time there's been such an explicit pushback to what's been going on for the last 10 years. Now, this is why I say there's the danger now because we now have both sides beginning to move on, returning to a more deterrent-based, active deterrent-based concepts with all the risks around escalation, misunderstanding that can come from that. Yes, and I don't think we're gonna see a scenario playing out like the final scene of James Bond, but for those of you who haven't seen it, it's a bit of a strange incident that plays out there. It seems to bomb one of the courier lines. Yes, exactly where, well, spoiler alert, if you haven't seen the film. I think, as my son said, this is a last-ditch attempt with him to reclaim its status as a global power. No, it's always also in the flex, I think when you can see that is it's a kind of, it's also a synergy of the evolution of the bomb thing with the ends with a very old-style, baddie inside a sort of giant base. But also there is this geopolitically-contested island with Russia and Japan and the UK sort of in the mix. So I think there's a certain relevance to where we are in terms of our own traditions, perhaps. Maybe they've been reading them to go to the US. Yeah, obviously they've been reading them to go to the US. And the Lucy website of course. Of course, sorry, the Lucy website. So just, I mean, I'm not sure how we're doing for time. Yeah, yes, yeah. Oh, good, yeah. So, I mean, is it about two years you've been in Lucy now? Yeah, so I started just before the lockdown. Yes. And yeah, again, it's an interesting time because Brexit was just about to happen after a long period. Yeah. I think UK policy was not, I don't know if that's true, it's on Brexit now it's started something else. Then of course, like everyone went to work online. Yes. Which from a think-tank perspective, I think it's been quite uninteresting. And something is difficult in some ways, but also it's forced us to rethink what we did. Yeah. Because Lucy, as many people know, it's linked to this historic building in Whitehall, obviously the foreign office, Lucy was started by the Duke of Wellington in the 1830s and others to look at military science.  How do we engage with the audience? Is this an opportunity to also have a much more diverse discussion around security, not just a sort of Whitehall focus, London focus conversation or a UK focus conversation? Yeah. Because suddenly you can have events online where you can reach out all over the world. Of course, my team, which is the international team, we've been looking for security to be able to actually engage directly in India, South Korea, Africa, Middle East without having to travel. Yes. But also to reach audiences. Yeah. Again, outside their capitals. Yes. It's been a very interesting way to think about how you do them, how you think how it should work. Yes. In this time, before we started a very clear model of traveling to events where experts and officials would show up in quite closed rooms, but perhaps it's a chance to also democratize a bit the discussion around security and bringing communities who perhaps not felt that we received their institution, what this conversation was about then. Yeah. So that's been, I think, a very liberating part of COVID and what actually, for us, do we think similar numbers to issues? Yes. Yeah. I mean, I think in academia, it's been a similar thing. I mean, obviously now we can go back to in-person conferences, for example, but certainly for young researchers, there have been some benefits to be able to be online experience. But also, as you said, you build a much more diverse audience and also more diverse panels. I mean, I certainly know that some of the panels I attended at RISC in the past year, for example, you had the one on the Russian Far East and then you're able to bring in people actually from the Russian Far East, you wouldn't normally obviously be able to do it. No. And I think, I mean, this is my team, again, this is something very important, is that we can actually bring the conversations taking place around the world into the London Sea. Yeah. So that we don't, and obviously this is a bit of a bubble sometimes in the transatlantic community where we're telling ourselves how great we are. And so on. And it might not, well, it's important to engage with others, partly to have a discussion about how you perceive, but also to have these conversations. And so it's also been interesting, I think on what's happened a lot since Brexit is a really strong desire to engage with the UK on dialogues about how to have a relationship with the post-Brexit UK, and so it's in a big demand from Japan, Australia, India. And again, I think this, you know, moving online has actually made those conversations easier. Yeah. It can happen more regularly. It's easier now to travel at long distances. So it's actually been quite a useful way for us to hear how the UK is perceived in different parts of the world. So could we have a check sometimes? Yes. With some of the conversations in London? Yes. Right. So Sarah, do you feel that Roussin has enlarged its membership or, I mean, has it attracted younger people to Roussin? Do you think by virtue of being able to be online? Well, I think that's been an opportunity, yeah. I mean, because you've been to Roussin events, I think it's, you have a pretty diverse workforce. That's been a huge success. It's brought in a range of people with expertise from gender to gender balance. We've made progress there. We now have commitment to have some gender balance of all our panels, for example, as a policy group of Roussin, so we don't end up with lots of men. Of course, our traditional constituency has been Ministry of Defence. So we've also started discussion about how security can be also diversified in terms of our audience. Because obviously, sometimes our events will not very diverse in terms of the audience. So that's big as you can't really necessarily alter that. But I think we can promote a wider interest in Roussin. So online events, we can target more young people, different ethnic communities, people outside London. Yeah. And that is a big challenge. And also, I think, as I mentioned, we had a very good event, I think, where we brought in people from Iran, experts, to talk about how Iran views. Yeah. I think it's a very important thing to agree with them. We often don't. But just to hear the perspective and to hear why, not to the view, but also what is the reason. Yes. I think we don't often get that. We may get a headline view, but to understand why countries have particular interests in Roussin, is very important. Then you know why what it is underlying. Most countries, they have a reason to what where they are. It's not just that they are values clash or something else. Yeah. So now we've just started in the European security program again to try and keep these conversations with our European neighbors. Also, as I mentioned, I think it's a very important thing to be aware of. Some other. Yeah. So now we've just started in the European security program again to try and keep these conversations with our European neighbors. Also, active. Yes. I think it's very dynamic time. So that's separate from international security. There that's. That's the program. It's a new regional program launching on the 14th of this month. To recharge on European security. Yeah. is to try to understand some of these changes we spoke about at the beginning, to engage with European partners, I think in a third of course, is to say where does the UK powers is controlled now on these issues. So we have India-Pacific programme, Russia and Eurasia, MENA, Africa and Europe, which is quite a new thing, I think reflects the recent, it's very thematic in the past now, we're having a lot of more geographical, mutual security focus. Although even that is becoming more complicated because I think many of these European, even East security regions were defined around a Western-centric world. So you can see the Middle East and parts of the whole of Africa are interacting in a new way, which isn't just African security and MENA. So as these things change, I think we may have to reclassify some of these security spaces. That's very interesting and I think for example, when you look at say the Belt and Road initiative, I mean in a way that's not really about regions, it's just a global idea. And as you say, in these regions in any case, they're quite the kind of orders of these regions, if you like, if you're just thinking about it, they're kind of imaginary, if you like kind of geopolitical imaginary with that space, I mean they're all kind of seeping into each other and overlapping and I think as we say that's happening much, much more. And those borders are often the contested ones, we see that in Asia, is it European security or is it Euro-Eurasia? Yeah. So Gulf Africa, you go to talk to the foreign ministry in India or South West Asia? Yes, exactly, so it depends on where you sit. It depends on your views and the linkages I think, and as Asia rises, of course those linkages will reshape, they're already reshaping. Yes, yeah, so it's a very exciting time really to be doing what you're doing. No, I think, I mean I saw the audience, if you're a student now, of course it's in my advice, I think is also what we're going to need is people who know these regions, people who know the history and understand them, we've moved away from that often.  Yeah, I mean in my team I can see that, it's a very diverse team, and it's people who speak Farsi, or you know, Mandarin, or whatever it is, that's the kind of expertise that you need to start with, because then of course it's very important to build up your analytical international relations and politics, but I mean this party, maybe why also I moved this bit away from academia is because you could see that in the 90s, there was a strong push on comparative politics and decoupled from cultures and histories and languages. I mean there's a merit of us to that kind of approach, but I think we're seeing now that perhaps we may have gone a little bit too far with the license on some of these formal methodologies, maybe to this doesn't really help you understand what's sometimes really happening. Yeah, that's very true. Dave, this was absolutely fascinating, thank you so much Mila and Natasha for such a rich conversation. Let's see, we have questions from the public, so for those of you who are online please leave your comments and questions in the chat, and I will read them, otherwise do we have questions from public here? Yes? Thank you so much for the conversation. I have a question regarding the career, as an MA student in most of these aspiring to have a job research position in Ntank, what do you advise us to do in order to get a position in Ntank? Is it like trying to build a portfolio, writing as much as writing or connections? Yeah, I mean if I reflect on my time, the big changes I've seen when I started out is it's become much more competitive in the Ntank, there's many more Ntanks, so there is a career track there, but the competition has grown enormously, issues around fundraising have become very important, and I think there's a lot more focus on creativity, so it used to be that of course people expected to write a lot of non-reports, now that's not really the case, people want very snappy things, data visualization, so I think that there's a set of skills beyond writing now about how thinking about things, but I've also said I think having experience in my area anyway, experience in other countries or on the issues working in government or the MGO sector, because I think going straight from an academic background into think tanks, there's going to be less of that because you need to know how governments work, how policy is made, because what ultimately think tanks are about is impact, it's not writing a great report, it's not what it's going to read, you need to have your creativity, the ideas, but also know how that can feed into policy making processes, so I think it's, you need quite a range of skills and a range of experiences, and my career in a way I sort of see a bit of things you can do, you probably won't sit in a think tank for your whole life, it won't be a 30 year career, you might go in for a few years, and then on the basis of that go into some other area, get some experience out there and then come back to a think tank, which I want to think about that and try and impact, so I think it's not a job for life in a sense, very few people I can imagine, it's going to be much more about moving between different areas, now of course I'd say there is a career there, but it's not going to be very predictable necessarily, perhaps that's true for many things now, so I think it would be, once you finish your master's degree, if you can get another opportunity to work in international organization or an organization working on your issue of interest, then I think it's easy to come back into think tanks from that. Thank you, we have a couple of questions in the chat, so someone is asking here, bearing in mind the more complicated geographical sense of security, would you recommend that undergraduate and master's students specialize around the particular themes, for example cyber security rather than a particular region, is there a possibility to combine both perhaps? I mean I think you can, I mean obviously some of the strongest people will have range of those skills, at Rusey we're organized into mostly thematic teams, so for example we have a cyber team, which is extremely busy at the moment, because obviously this is becoming a huge issue and the UK is discussing whether it is a cyber power and what that means, so there's a big debate in government I think about this and you may have seen in the news there's a establishment of a new national cyber center that explicitly will be involved in offensive cyber, but then we're also, I mean that team is also working with my team on how the UK can work with other countries and what capacity-building issues and how that can also translate into positive UK relationships with friends and allies, with other partners, so you know I think if you've got, if you've got the knowledge about other countries, but also as a strong thematic focus, that is probably the best combination because then you can work on these issues in different ways and so I mean obviously there's a lot of emerging security issues, cyber and all the issues really in movement now and indeed of course another big change from when I started is the concept of security has become so huge, it used to be about state-to-state consciousness, actually going back to that, we have teams working on wildlife trafficking and traditional military science areas, terrorism conflict, eranicalization, criminal justice issues, migration, so in all this now under the security route in a way it never was used to be, the Chatham Hours they have health issues which perhaps today is understandable but in the concept of security, so I think also you have to think how what is your approach to the issue, is it a security frame, climate change? Yeah I mean some people have been critical of that of course, you know Edward Newman and others of course you know we've talked about you know the dangers of you know making everything about security, I don't know what you think about that. Yeah I mean I think it is, I mean it's become difficult to prioritise and so we actually are going to reflect what happened during COVID and we obviously COVID or pandemic preparedness was a UK priority and I remember people were rather proudly talking about how the UK had one of the best preparedness in the world ahead of this but of course it turns out it was a priority but not the top priority. Yeah so it's um yeah this is I think one of the risks now is that everything is securitised and so everything is important at the same time and then it becomes very difficult to have these discussions about where your resources go. Yes I mean there is a danger that you pull yourself too too broad and there was an interesting discussion a few years ago where you shouldn't even have a discussion about threats but you should just have a discussion about flexibility in governments to be able to respond to a crisis because you couldn't you can't really predict what is going to be the threat. Yeah what's going to be most important is your ability to respond quickly to that and reorganise and bounce back. Yeah there is a defined set of things you're ready for almost inevitably things that come along will not be on that list. Yeah and so I think there's some merit to that as well in this world with everything being securitised. I mean I think once we've seen that as well with the UN security council you know the number of things that are defined as a threat to international peace and security you know which is all very well but then you know what are you going to do. They see that with I mean with mandates for peace operations I mean they become so huge that everything you do anything about peace operations between cyber security intelligence you know against organised crime and doing traditional peace building working on gender issues and human rights and post-conflict justice and then trying to solve the conflict then of course it becomes a big shopping list where it's very hard to perhaps deal with conflicts and so perhaps we may have seen peak comprehensive security. We can't disagree with comprehensive security but practically it becomes very hard to deliver it in a meaningful way I think. Yeah thank you. Speaking of theft we have a question like from Kun which country in European and pose the greatest security factor in the UK, China or Russia? Yeah that's a difficult one. I mean I think I mean directly of course Russia is very clearly number one security threat and we see that every day there are efforts to have incursions either online or even planes and ships and submarines and this is it was an active threat and quite worrying trend. I think a very tough situation there. Down the road of course I mean China is I think very far away from the UK but the UK is coming more involved in the region. China is also coming to us in terms of now it has a larger world, it's the largest navy, you've got port and Djibouti and so it's got a very close relationship to Russia. It's not on the access to strategic alliance yet but nonetheless of operation on the security side and others going ahead. So I mean I think it's starting to see a shift there. I mean it's going to be interesting I think looking ahead whether Russia continues to be the main threat as China rises because Russian-Chinese relations may also evolve and China becomes more powerful. Russia has to make a strategic choice there. So I think it's I mean I would see that's where we are. I mean the trajectory seems quite clear. UK hasn't yet clarified what its security posture is towards China. Caught in this I think cooperation and competition and threats dynamic. Does the orcus deal mean that the UK is engaged in a deterrence relationship in the Indo-Pacific with China? I'd say not at the moment. But of course if there is a major conflict in the region it now makes it that much harder for the UK not to become part of it. So there is stepping into that space and still it's not. There are Article 5 latest type of relationship around these issues but there is a hardening of those security relationships. Thank you. We have another question in the chat from Giovanna about I think it's relevant to anyone who is seeking a career with China. She's asking how important is the academic background? How much would you value someone with a PhD compared to someone who spent that time working in NGOs, dash organizations or private companies? I think it's I mean I think we have to look at the individual when that's normally the way we do it. A PhD can be very helpful. It can also mean that the person has a very academic track and I mean that's more what they're focused on. So it's I think you have to go through the interview process and make sure that is the right person qualifications, academic qualifications are a very good gut. Still I think it's the main guide point for us but it's not an automatic qualification I would say. I mean some people are are even suggesting I think it's too far that we do blind recruiting. We don't look at anyone's qualifications at all but we set them tasks and just to see how people respond in a creative way to particular tasks and we put on that basis because of course some of the most creative people may have actually struggled to go through the university and find out for their best reasons but I think we still in I think it's still very much to be looked to what the cover letter and to be the one the most important actually is often the cover letter. I mean I begin with that have they dropped a very well written thought through cover letter that's also concise. My advice is do not go over one page in your cover letter absolutely. You want it in there is it focused on what the job is about to make sure your experience links to the job so again I'm sure you're very proud of having a PhD I wasn't mine but you know that it has to also link into what the what's required for the position and then of course it's a experience that's going to also be very relevant here so you're going to want people you can also bring in the perspective I think of having perhaps worked in different environments. Okay, thank you. I'll wait for a couple of minutes more to see if we have any final question from the audience. I want to practice to ask you what do you think is the most challenging aspect of working here think back you know because often students they have a very big idea about the line so I was wondering if you had any suggestion any advice about what one should expect you know what's surprised you about that maybe you wouldn't expect something particular. I mean I think personally the toughest one is fundraising I think that's I mean that's become it's become a very important aspect of what we do so people can have very creative ideas but to turn that into something that you can persuade people should be funded and also to know have the networks that you can get the idea into a funder which is why I say it's very important I think to have experience not just because you practically know what to do but also you have these broader networks in which you can know often when you get support for your idea so a big part of my job has become a managerial wall of 24 7365 funders now Lucy has actually been very successful we've grown a lot and there's some tension here but of course you're only as good as your last project and so we have to continually be searching out funding there is no core funding so you know and this this I think is it's a very tough job for researcher because they have it's not just about sharing your opinions and being in workshops and writing nice things it's this really hard graft of staying ahead of the agenda into what is coming how can how can I find a unique angle on that someone's going to say actually this field is coming what we need to know more about it so it's you don't have a lot of time to reflect and perhaps you can value the university to the end of think more deeply that may be the environment for you but it's of course it's exciting because you're constantly on but I think that aspect has changed a lot yes perhaps coming to universities as well but particularly now in the think tank environment and it is so competitive yes because again there used to be think tanks that was chatting house now NGOs do work and consultancies do universities do it so even what the space and competition around ideas has become much more dynamic I would say and we'll see what happens with COVID because of course we had an idea also the think tank being a physical thing it's Lucy it's our building we're meeting our building we have access to the white hall scene because we're there now of course anyone can set up online think tank and invite senior UK officials to come on to Zoom calls and so the opportunity there for startups or perhaps it wasn't going to be recently set up yeah council for geo strategy exactly so I mean all this the space now for a new dynamic so I think yeah but again you need to have funding for it yeah can I just briefly ask about the funding issues and obviously in academia we also have to not as much as you but we also have to you know raise research money funding and that does lead to that question you know who are you writing for you know that question that comes up in time to time you know I you know he who plays the pipe of course the tune essentially you know do you you know to what extent and what escaped that sense of having to kind of write with that particular audience of mine or you know by the person with bank role in a particular project you know there's one always writing then you know with that audience or funder in mind you know to what extent you feel that you can be independent still as that raise issues yeah well when Lucy is an independent think tank and it's governed by the charity commission so yeah there are statutes and requirements around that and so also there's this transparency process so we have a list of funders which is available as an ethics process around fundraising so our trustees have to approve new funders and so we often do quite a bit of you know thinking through this is the right unknown yeah but think tanks of course also are not sort of outside looking in on issues you know of course so Lucy is a it's a transatlantic British think tank so I think we reflect that broad view that of course there's many different perspectives in that and we reflect I think that we don't there's no Lucy view on anything but of course we do I think have a transatlantic sort of perspective on issues and and post Brexit I would say there is a feeling that we should perhaps reflect a British perspective more and then so maybe a bit of a shift in the often there was a European think tank view for the Europe okay and I think now that you seem an integrated review the first step towards a debate about what the UK national interest is in a much better way that has been really since perhaps the 1980s when used to have even less yet in my recruitment it's become an interesting issue because we used to recruit security people yeah but now you can also perhaps sometimes you have a British background understand the British world a bit more and when I was starting out there were some British foreign policy but they've all disappeared into this sort of European policy world so you don't really have often it's often not a base a very strong expert base on some security issues that has a UK sort of outlook but don't have to be from the UK but unless you understand how the UK's position of these questions so that is going forward of course we're going to need more of those people if government has that yeah universities it's not so strong and see if the PhD is coming out and people have written about you know European police issues in the Balkans or something like that yeah they haven't written about how the UK should address the Balkans going forward yeah interest so you may start to see some people coming your way with those more specific national PhD research reports let it go fantastic thank you so much for this very very very interesting conversation thank you Eleanor and thank you all for joining us I will see you hopefully next month with our next conversation and you all have a good day bye thank you thank you both


We're wrapping nursery rhymes. We're gonna tell you how to do it so you can play too. Yo mo goose, give me a beat. Humpty dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty dumpty had a great fall in. All the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again. Yeah! Now we're gonna show you how to play. First you need nursery rhymes. And then you need a beat. I just flipped over this bowl. Just a nice and steady beat to go with the rhythm. I have two forks and I'm adding a little more rhythm. You just wrapped your nursery rhyme to the beat. First I'm getting a nursery rhyme. Which one did you get? I got little Miss Muffet. Cool. Yo mo goose, give me a beat. It's a surprise. Oh really? Yeah, okay. Okay, let's do it. Yo mo goose, give me a beat. Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water. Jack fell down and broke his crown and Jill came tumbling after.


Yolanda, what is one thing you have not done with the show that you want to do? The one thing I can honestly say, I haven't had a chance to spin this show off. When I went into Every Way Woman, I already had my magazine laid off, laid out, already had show ideas. What, you laugh? I created a show to spin off. I created a segment to be 30-minute magazine shows by themselves, besides being a part of Every Way Woman. So that's the one thing I haven't had a chance to spin the show in new directions. So that's the one thing I haven't had a chance to do. Also, I haven't had a chance to discover a new talent. And when I say that, one thing I do on the show, I just start introducing performers, singers, and comedians. And I want to give that woman who can sing, or who's so funny, an opportunity, not to have to go on American Idol or whatever those other shows are. And just see.  I'm not mad at you, but, you know, the girl who just want to sing, you know? That's it. I'm looking for the next Carita Franklin, just to let you know. All right now. Okay.


Here to talk about a naturally existing contingency. A natural existing contingency is one that exists independent of the practitioner or the behavior analyst. It exists in the real world in a natural environment, not in a clinical setting. So an example of a natural contingency would be the effects of caffeine on me, which is why I'm talking very quickly this morning, or another example would be the effects of alcohol on my self as I start to consume more alcohol. My words get a wee bit slower. So anyway, those are two examples. There's millions of them pretty much, or bazillions, however you'd like to define bazillions. Anything that happens independent of somebody trying to make it happen is really what it is. But ironically, if it's not a practitioner trying to make something happen, then it's still a natural conti- I think you get the idea. It's just stuff that happens when you're not involved in a clinical or a treatment setting. So, um, effects of whatever it is. A car wreck, natural existing contingency, running a red light, natural existing contingency, getting pulled over for a cup, or doing 743 miles an hour in a school zone, natural existing contingency. Ironically, I pretty much described all punishers. There could be reinforcers as well, because contingencies go either direction. Cheerio, cheerio, cheerio!


The Asian carp live up to their reputation they were jumping all over the place including into the boat and almost taken out Nate Dirk and Austin score a few kill shots and me Well, it's not about me. It's about the fish and Dirk has a few recipes. He's ready to try on me and some unsuspecting customers So we're putting this fish into the grinder So find grind and we're gonna do here and this holds most of the bones back any small bones that might get through or basically Just calcium for us. So you need a little bit of dill here red onion papers Pepper a bit of kosher salt And a little bit of mustard sauce is their own secret recipe mustard sauce We put a little panko in this guys just helps hold it together a little bit. So that's how easy making a burger is It's actually harder to catch the fish and it is to make the burger All right, these are our wet cedar planks. You want to make sure they're damp and been soaked for a couple hours These are the burgers. We just ground in back. This is a teriyaki burger I brought some teriyaki sauce on top just so we know which one was which this is a salsa So long girl burger kind of southwestern style. We call it We're gonna put this cedar plank on the grill and it's gonna give it the flavor the smoke It's got the resin from the cedar and then that's what gives it a nice smoky flavor It's one of my favorite ways to do all kinds of fish Asian carp in particular So I'm gonna close the lid now and we're gonna time this gives about 15 minutes All right, so we're gonna dress up these burgers is this is a Cuban ketchup with a little bit of that we make here It's kind of like a tomato jalapeno chutney. I'm gonna dress this on up for Scott with Kind of just a basic burger right lettuce onion tomato No, we're gonna do the Southwest is sell burger on this one Then I just wanted to try this burger is our teriyaki burger here This one I just wanted to try straight up that we taste the carpet full But I want to have this one is an American All right, so now we just showed you the burgers another very popular thing with these carp that we love at home a lot Terry's Cuban for Cuban heritage croquettes are a popular thing. It's actually made with leftover ham chicken, etc We found out it works excellent with carp. So our recipes online dirksfish.com This is almost the finished product.  You do not know it is past the stage of being carp now No, it's the culinary delectable thing, you know We're gonna put a little spicy mayo on there just you know what though I'm gonna put that on there first But why don't you try this one with nothing and that way you'll have an idea what this tastes like It is really creamy on the inside.   I had the croquette which was absolutely delicious. Tell me about what we did This is a kind of an Asian stir-fry here. So this pan sauté the carp steaks there It's another whole steak so you might find a few bones in that you're not gonna have to know The flavor of the fish just by itself is Mild white and flaky. I mean look at this right I mean that's like the epitome of a good piece of fish, right? If you're a carp eater That's not what you're used to seeing right there. Oh, look, there's a bone All right now I'm anxious to try this burger So again looking at that looks like a regular burger there, you know put cheese on it be perfect But I like the small I need to figure out how to get on the bandwagon to get people eating more Right, I'm kidding. I mean that's you put that on a burger like that That's just it's outstanding and this is a teriyaki style burger here So it's gonna be a little more Asian style there and I just wanted to try this and kind of plain So that way you can you know see what the fish tastes like it's got a softer texture to it You know, it's kind of a creamy center if you're like a little more well done You can plant them out and crisp them up a little more so now we have another kind of Asian style meatball here So I made these carp meatballs again just kind of a basic blend to it there And it's with a coconut curry simmering sauce. I served over rice and you know, right of the lesser Thought of species that I've had on the dead meat show over the years This is some of the best eating fish I've ever had and that is not blowing smoke This is really good. The flavors are great. It doesn't you haven't disguised the flavor of the fish, right? It still tastes like fish and Pretty much across the board everyone that's tried it that hadn't tried it before Describes it as creamy. It's creamy, but savory. Right, right It's definitely got a distinct taste, but not overpowering. It's very creamy It reminds me a lot of like tilapia and catfish in terms of like taste and flavor. I'm sold on Asian carp So get a hold of Peoria carp hunters Go out there and have a great day of carp flying out of the water and it was an awesome day as you're dodging carp And of course you have to go to Dirk's fish and gourmet in Chicago and you've got a website 2070 north link north fly barn and Lincoln heart and Websites are ex fish calm recipes on there. You can get a recipe for this on there. I'm sold


What's going on everyone? Sam here with Layton Sportsguards. We are doing 2022. Panini Chronicles Draft Basketball Hobby 8 box, half case break, number 6 random teams. Here's a look again at your random results. Gonna have to ban this person really quick. As always you can find these on the website under the results tab as well as the link that's in chat. Let's get going. Again guys, it's gonna take a little bit longer. We gotta look up where everybody is. For the most part, obviously there's some that we'll know right off the bat, but... You know this is a new very early product. So Joel and B, there's a Jalen Suggs. That's going to the magic. Nice one there. Congrats Orlando. Orlando Joshwhiti. 20 to go. Breaking necks guys. JD Nottay. That's gonna be Malachi Branham. Brady Manic. DJ Lido. Well these fancy new TVs have that feature. Keegan Murray. Tools of the trade, Zion Williamson. Nice. There you go Pelicans. Player Warn Zion. Very cool. That is so true James. That's going to be Mark Williams, Rookie Aura for the Hornets. Jabari Smith, Quartzside and Dyson Daniels. It's true man, the TVs don't do that. I know yeah. That's awesome guy too. Chet Holmgren Rookie. Kennedy Chandler. Otto is going to be Abu Kigba, or Kig Ab. Abu Kig Ab. 93 out of 99. He might actually be in the NBA. We're looking him up. Abu Kig Kig Ab. Fort Wayne Mad Ants. Is that Pacers then? I believe that's Pacers. Yes Pacers. Pacers. Via the Fort Wayne Mad Ants. Jason Tatum. There's a Jaden Ivy. Red. Nice one there. 22 out of 149. Jameran. Go for there. And guys 20 to go on the next one. Let's get that filled up. Keep on breaking. Walker Kessler. That's going to be 11 out of 25. Dailin Terry on the Purple Auto in-flight signatures. 19 to go. Very nice. Chicago Bulls. Dailin Terry. Chicago Bulls. So a brand new case on the next one as well. Chet Holmgren Gamma Race. Nicola Jovic, Heat and Jeremy Sochan. Mark Williams. That's going to be autographed. Justin Minaya for Providence. Let's see where he is. Justin Minaya. He is assuming it looks like he's still at Providence. Think this will be a random NBA summer. Hold on. Wait, wait, wait. Let me have a dream plan for Michael Jordan. This will be Charlotte Hornets. I just read an article. He, in the end, 6'6", 210 pound Harrington Park native chose the Charlotte Hornets because the Michael Jordan franchise liked his defensive tenacity and skill set. So that'll go Hornets. They'll do some real digging on that one. Benedict Matheran. A.J. Griffin. Isaiah Mobley-Silver. Cabs. Jaden Nivey. And Kennedy Chan. It's pretty solid as Optic Value Packs. That's not bad, Stefan. You thinking of picking one up or no? Jalen Duran. Palo, Palo Rookie. Recon, Kennedy Chanler. Marjan Bochan. Christian Braun. Walker Kessler-Mosec. And A.J. Griffin Rookie. The Hawks. All right, let me go back off this article. Confused and scared, says James. James, the way it works is basically like one product a year will have downtowns or optics or cabooms. So Crown Royale Basketball has cabooms for basketball. I think Absolute Football has cabooms. We've got Max Christie for Michigan State. I'm tweeting that when you get a chance to. Thanks, sir. Lakers. Lakers. Wendell Moore. Party. Ryan Rollins. Tyler, or Trevor Kiehl's and Benedict Matheran. Lakers, baby. This one's heavy right here, man. I don't know what's going on in this one, but it's heavy. Trent Holmgren. That's because we've got, nice, Benedict Matheran. 143 out of 199, going to the Pacers. It's a nice one there.  He's gonna be so good. We've got Palo. Palo Bancaro on that one, as well as another Palo Bancaro, both magic. Ja, Shaden Sharp, and Oche Agbaji. Agbaji. Walker Kessler. We've got Scotty Pippin Jr. That's pretty cool, actually. Where's Scotty Pippin Jr. at? Los Angeles Lakers. Scotty Pippin Jr., baby. Keegan Murray. That's gonna be a Christian Braun to 99. Johnny Davis, and Jaden Hardy. Does it again. Turn of the Century, Isaiah Mobley. That'll be going to the Cavaliers. Nice one there. Both the Mobley brothers play on the Cavaliers, just so everybody knows. Isaiah and Evan. That'll be Cavaliers right there. Brady Manic, Dyson Daniels, Silver, Jalen Duran. Kennedy Chandler, and a Christian Braun. So I think all of the base cards are guys who are either vets or actual rookies on the main teams, and I think the autos can be guys who are still in college or haven't played. So I think that makes it a little easier. That's gonna be Kendall Brown on the Jersey card. Kendall Brown. He is Indiana Pacers. Kendall Brown, Indiana Pacers. That actually makes everything a lot more helpful here. Jabari Smith, Agbaji. There's a Palo. Nice, 23 out of 25. Rise above. There you go. Congrats on that one, Magic. I think you probably mad at this Palo. Congrats on the nasty Palo, 23 out of 25. Sick one there. Jabari Smith, Nikola Jovic. Yeah, I kind of agree with you on that one, James. Walker Kessler to 99. Gamma Reyes, Jason Tatum. Jayden Ivey. Blue, Steph Curry. Nice one there. To 99, Sicko is asking about that one. There's a Blue Curry. Chet Holmgren Rookie and Dyson Daniels. So we're gonna look up every single numbered card, which is good, just the hits. So that makes it a little easier. Can watch every NBA game, Stream. Streamy, X, Y, Z, or Sport Surge. That'd be my advice to you there, Rory. Yeah, it's just straight up Streamy's. You can watch everything of everything. Yeah, honestly. Kennedy Chandler. That's gonna be Alandes Williams on the freshman fabric, Jersey Auto. I don't know. Alandes Williams. Brooklyn Nets, nice one there. What do we miss, we miss. What do we miss? Yeah, what do we miss? Somebody say something for us? Oh, it was a bop, that's all. Johnny Davis. Chet Holmgren here, I gotta go block that. He is Nets, yes. Chet Holmgren, Boya or Boye to 149. Patrick Baldwin Rookie and Johnny Davis. I gotta go block that bop really quick, hold on. I blocked them in Re-Stream, I didn't block them on YouTube. I used there. There we go, now we're good to go. Sorry guys, how do I get back? I wanna be noticed. Got EJ Liddell. We got a EJ Liddell again. Nice one there. 23 out of 99. That is Liddell was Heats. Pelicans. Pelicans. Pay member on YouTube. Hope YouTube graces you. Gamma Rays Chandler is a Jaden Ivey Mosaic Silver. Shaden Sharp. Jaden Hardy. Oh, what's up Gills. That's what I thought it was. Gills. Gills. Benedict Mathurin. Josh Green. Arizona. I'm assuming that's Mavericks Josh Green. Pretty sure that's Josh Green. Yes, Dallas Mavericks for Josh Green. He's a piece of that. Strange that put in there. Christian Braun. It's gonna be Anthony Davis on the Spectra not numbered. Christian Braun and Joel Embi. Wendell Moore. That's gonna be to 149. EJ Liddell. Mark Williams. Steph Curry. There's an EJ Liddell Red. 20 out of 149 for the Pelicans. Keegan Murray and OJ Bajie. Luminous. Two packs to go guys. Paolo Rookie. We've got Wendell Moore. I forget where he is. He went late first round. I think he's somewhere decent actually. Minnesota Timberwolves. Nice one there. T Wolves on the Wendell Moore. He was one of those five Duke guys you got drafted. Kim Paolo, Griffin, Mark Williams. I had one other. Yeah, their entire starting five basically. Went to the NBA. All first round too because Paolo went one. Griffin and Williams went back to back. Nice Keegan Murray. That is going to the Kings. Nice Keegan Murray. Iowa Hawkeye legend. Rise above. Joc for the Grizzlies. Mark Williams. Flux. Mark Williams. Mark Williams. 17 to go guys. Breaking next is another half case of this guys. Pretty solid Travis. I pulled a gold standard Jaden Ivey 101. A patch auto in the last box. So pretty good. I mean not in the last box in the last break. Last break. So I've been happy man. I've been very happy with it. That's going to be Jaden Hardy on the substantial swatches to 99. I forget what Jaden Hardy is. Mavericks. Jaden Hardy. Mavericks. Chet Holmgren Rookie. Gamma Race. Hatem. Christian Braun. Yeah that's J&D music. Josh is the one who hit that one of one last break. There's a Jaden Ivey again. That's going to the Pistons. Nice one there Pistons. Speaking of. Benedict Mathern. AJ Griffin. That's Rookie Aura. Keegan Murray. Nice. Not numbered on that one. Mello. KD. And Benedict Mathern again. Now and later so like crayons but they're so good. 13 out of 49. Aminu Muhammad. He was Aminu Muhammad. Sixers. Brad. They are pretty good. I like now and later. Johnny Juzang to 149. Where was he? He was supposed to go like number one. He kind of just fell off. Johnny Juzang is Jess and Shindra. I like you know I really like the same kind of categories. Mike Knight. Mike Knight's a lot right. You like Mike Knight still. Good. Good. Kendall Brown on the elites RPA. We pulled a Kendall Brown recently. Is he um. Okay. No. Pacers. Pacers. That's who it is. Nice one there Pacers. Kendall Brown. Again Pacers doing well. Let me pull on Mathern now. Liddell. AJ Griffin. Mark Williams. Silver. Ochaig Bhaji. Jaden Hardy. Two to go out of this box. Benedict Mathern. We've got Josh Minot. That is. I know he's in the NBA for sure. We've pulled him last. Timberwolves for Josh Minot. Shaden Sharp. Jaw. The Curry on the not number. Silver. Jaylanderan and Kennedy Chandler. Christian Braun to 149. Jeremy So-Chan. Nice. There's a blue chat Holmgren. 61 out of 99. Going to the Thunder. Nice one there Thunder. Christian Braun and Nikola Jovich. I'm pretty sure Josh got the Thunder in this random too. So he had the Pistons last random and he got the Thunder this random. We need to pull another big chat. I'm gonna pull a Jabari or Apollo too though. Pulled like most of the big guys. Big Keegan Murray maybe too. Yeah maybe Orlando in the next one. Yeah you'll get Orlando in the next one and then you'll get what? Sacramento in the far. No you'll get Houston in the last one. Get all the big ones Josh. That's gonna be Tyrese Maxi going to the Sixers Tools of the Trade Jersey. Nice one there. I think Forrest Folder 101 of Che Gildius. Of that yeah. Palo Bancara. Kevin Durant. Of that Tools of the Trade one with Mikey Swooshes and Hatches and stuff all over it. Yeah. I would say Top Team's Magic, Rockets, Thunder, Pistons, Kings. Hawks are decent. Pacers are really good. Those would probably be like the Top 7 or so. Tools of the Trade Jamal Murray for the Nuggets. Nice one there. A.J. Griffin, Gamma Rays. Seventeen to go. Still guys. Jabari Smith, Silver. A.J. Griffin. Chatholmgren Rookie. Am I tweeting it when you get a chance as well? Lakers are okay in this honestly Paul. There's been a couple hits for Lakers so far. Plus you get all the vet stuff. Jordan Usher, Rookie Roll Call. 84 out of 99 for the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets. Jordan Usher, NBA. There's Jordan Usher. Summer League deal with the Jazz. That'll go Utah Jazz. No Kabooms yet. No Josh. San Braun, E.J. Liddell. Ty Ty Washings in for the Rockets. That is to 149. Did he retire? No he didn't retire, right? That was somebody else who did that. That's going to be nice. 47 out of 49. Mark Williams. That's going to the Hornets. Nice one there. This is number six, Travis. Yeah, running a little behind because we got to look everybody up on this one. Kendall Brown. Shaden Sharp, Silver. Ryan Walker-Kessler. Probably skipped the recap on this one, I would think. Paolo Van Carroll. Mark Williams. Got Ron Harper Jr. for Ruckers. 99 out of 99. Ron Harper. Raptors. Ron Harper. Caleb Houston. Steph Curry rise above. Mark Williams and a Johnny Davis. Wendell Moore. Paolo Van Carroll. Keegan Murray-Rookie. Gamma Rage. Patrick Baldwin. Oche. Ajabi. Bajie. All right, three boxes to go here guys. Good luck everybody. Definitely looks like Ron Harper Sr. Shaden Sharp. We've got Franz Wagner. Tools of the trade. That's going to the magic. Nice one there, magic. Jaylen Williams. Jayden Ives. Davis. Chandler. And that is Jason Tatum on Illuminates. Probably we've got 85 out of 199. Trey Young. That's going to the Hawks. Nice one there, Hawks. Chet Holmgren. Benedict Methurin. Paolo Van Carroll. Patrick Baldwin Jr. and Keegan Murray. See what we got on this next one, guys. Sixteen to go on the next one. Fifty dollars a spot to get in on this. Get you a random team. Teddy Allen. That's actually nasty. Six of ten on the Illusions Auto. It's kind of wild looking. He's got Teddy Allen. Looks like he still might be in college. I don't think anybody I'm thinking this is a random to all. Teddy Allen. I'm not seeing anything on that one. Gamma Rage. Dyson Daniels to 99. Oseman Jang. Nice one there. I believe he is thunder. I want to say, let me see. He got traded on Draft Night. I just don't remember who traded to who. Oseman Jang. Yeah, thunder. Nice one there. Marjan Bochamp. EJ Liddell. Silver Tai Tai Washington. And Tai Tai Washington. Did he join Denver for the Summer League? That means it'll go nuggets. If that's the case, Vaughn. Hey, let me double check. Vaughn, if you have that article, can you drop it in chat really quick? I just want to take a look at it. Just one second. Just keep that. Yeah, Teddy Allen to the side. I'll show it again after. Kai Sato or Soto on the Illusion Zotto. I believe he is going to be random to all for sure. Random to all on that one. Is it really your first time doing basketball? Kofi Coburn. Played in the NBL. Keegan Murray to 149. It's kind of wild actually, Travis. I would have thought you would have jumped in at one point or another, but nice. It hit you something big then. Two boxes to go. It might not, since you're not a mod. I'm just going to random it to all. I'll look him up one more time. Said Teddy Allen, right? Teddy Allen is the guy we're looking up. Teddy Allen. I want to see if there's anything on him. Wikipedia. End of the season. Summer League. Yeah, Teddy Allen is a Denver Nugget. He played on the Summer League. Yes, I was going to say right there. There is your link saying Teddy Allen to join Denver Nuggets for NBA Summer League. Thank you, Paul. Appreciate that. Since you guys aren't mods and members, I don't know if the link goes through. So yeah, there is the link to that article. I'm assuming that's what everybody else saw. So thank you for doing some digging for me, guys. I appreciate that. It's going to be Bryce McGowans, Ohio State. He is Charlotte Hornets. Charlotte Hornets. Shaden Sharp. Steph Curry, Mark Williams base. Is that Nebraska? Whoops. My bad, Nebraska. Nice. Chet Holmgren for the Thunder. There you go again, Josh. EJ Lidell. John Morant rise above. CP3. John Bochamp and Shaq. What was I going to say to you? How's the next break look? I think Travis said he was going to join, so there's probably a few spots gone. Hallow. David McCormick. Not numbered. Ticket auto for the J-Hawks. David. 15 to go, guys. 15 spots left in the next one. Yeah, huge strikeout. Timberwolves, right? Here he played in the summer league for the Timberwolves. David McCormick. Hallow. That's 3 out of 49. Nice one there, Magic. Jack Bajie, A.J. Griffin. Harper's time? Oh yeah, Harper's up. That's Kason Wallace for Kentucky. Kason Wallace is still at Kentucky, random to all at the end. Caleb Houston. Silver Chat. Gigan Murray, Jabari Smith, rookie. My apologies, guys. Like I said, we're going to run pretty behind schedule tonight just because it takes a lot of time to look everything up. Isaiah Brockington on the jersey, not numbered. Isaiah Brockington is Pelicans. Pelicans on the Brockington. It's Palo Rookie. Davis, Johnny Davis, Joel Embiid. Last pack of box number 7. Nice. 7 out of 10. Ja Marant. There you go, Grizzlies. Nice one there on the gold ja. Take that. So Chan. Jabari Smith on the red. 24 out of 149. Rockets. Christian Braun and Bajie. Wacom. Yeah, smart, honestly. Last box of the break here. Good luck, everybody. Going to skip the recap on this on probably on most of these guys just because we're a little behind, but we've got Jalen Suggs to 99, going to the magic tools of the trade. We'll do the randoms at the end and then we did a pretty good job showing you which ones were which team and everything. It's not a little harder to open, I will say that. Chet Holmgren Rookie. That's going to be Anthony Edwards, tools of the trade for the Timberwolves. Nice one there. T Wolves. KD. Rise above Jeremy So Chan on the silver. Johnny Davis and Dyson Daniels. 15 to go on the next one, guys. 15 to go. That's going to be Nicer Brooks. Let's do a quick look up on this one for Ole Miss. Taking a look. I'm not really seeing anything. I think he's still at Ole Miss. So that'll be a random to all. That's going to be Kendall Brown on the purple. 6 out of 49. And Jock. Jayden Ivey. That's going to be nice. Johnny Davis. On the ticket auto. I forget where he is already. He's relatively high pick. Wizards. Going to the Wizards. Johnny Davis. Nice one there. That'll work. Benedict Mathurin. Gowan. Silver EJ Liddell. And Jeremy So Chan. We've got Michael Foster Jr. Michael Foster Jr. on the auto. Sixers. Michael Foster. Dyson Daniels. Rise above. Nice 30 out of 49. Nice one there. Thought that was going to be a 1 on 1 for a second. That kind of looks like a 1 on 1, right? Jabari Smith. That's why I didn't want to get too pumped before I flipped it over. Alright. Last pack of the break guys. Good luck here. Mark Williams. Steph Curry. So Chan. And A.J. Griffin. Let's double check. There wasn't a numbered card in there. I don't believe there was. Yeah. No numbered card in there. That was just a base pack. Alright guys. Let's do this random really quick. The way I'm going to do this is in order that these cards were polled, it'll go 1, 2, and 3. We'll each receive the card. So number one will get Kai Sato. Number two will get Kasin Wallace. And number three will get Nicer Brooks. So let me just get these copied over to a random really quick, guys. Take it over to the screen. So again, doing the random for Kai Soto, Kasin Wallace, and Nicer Brooks. I'm just going to do it in the order they were polled. Pull the Soto first, the Wallace second, and the Brooks third. Number one will get the first. Two will get the second. Three will get the third. So I'm going to roll the dice three times. One, two, and three. Lakers will get Soto or Soto. Pistons will get the second. And Rockets will get the third. Alright guys, that'll do it for the break. Thanks again for the fill. Next up, we've got another one of these.


Kim Zolchak Berman is definitely the queen of her castle or her mansion in Alfreda Georgia. In the past the reality star has said she hardly likes to leave her lavish estate and I can see why. She moved into her dream home with her husband Croy Berman back in 2013 where they still currently live with their six children and it makes sense they need such a sprawling home for such a big family. We'll take a look inside Kim's beautiful mansion and more, we even found the listing. In these videos we don't reveal any addresses and even though I've done a house tour of my own place, please do not show up at any private residences because it's not safe for anyone. While Kim Zolchak Berman may have left her role on the Real Housewives of Atlanta long behind her, she also let the public into her life on her spin-off show Don't Be Tardy which had its final season in October 2020. In the series we've seen plenty of glimpses into her beautiful home located in Alfreda Georgia that spans a whopping 17,000 square feet of space. Kim is a TV personality and singer who appeared back in 2008 as one of the original Housewives on the reality show The Real Housewives of Atlanta and left the series in 2012 during the 5th season. She returned as a friend of the Housewives for the show's 10th season in 2017 to 2018 but by then she was doing her own thing. Kim, who was married to football player Croy Berman, received her spin-off series in 2012 titled Don't Be Tardy for the Photoshop which focused on their wedding preparation. The show was renewed, the title was shorn to Don't Be Tardy and ran for 8 seasons focusing on the couple and their 6 children. At the time of this recording the couple has an estimated net worth about $8 million or more and Kimz is at over $3 million alone so let's just say it pays off to be a reality star.  I've been noticing a lot of copycat channels recently but we're the original source for Celebrity House Tours so be sure to hit that subscribe button and show your support. We post a new video daily. Today we're going to take a look at reality star Kim Zolchak and where she calls home with her family including her epic mansion in Alpharetta and more. If you liked this video be sure to check out our recent House Tours on some of her former Real Housewives co-stars Just Kenya Moore and Portia Williams which we'll link to at the end. As always don't forget to follow me on Instagram to tell me who's up next and now let's get into this video. Before we look at Kim's current mansion let's take a look at her formal high priced rental of both. This may recognize this particular residence from the series when Kim called it her dream home. It seems like every house is her dream home according to her and she lived here during two seasons of Housewives with Croy and the kids. They even lived here during the first installment or season of her spin-off show while they were planning their lavish wedding in this very backyard. The home was listed after the couple moved on for nearly three million dollars and it was a stately Georgia mansion as you might expect. The brick house sat on two acres of land and it came with a celebrity pedigree since it was seen on TV. The home had features like a sprawling kitchen with large marble island and designer appliances as well as a formal living room with classy white fireplace. There was also an entryway and what looked like an attached great room with soaring double height ceilings, dramatic staircase and floor to ceiling windows. According to listing materials and photos Kim's former rental mansion also had two additional full kitchens because three is better than one. An out-pair suite with one of the full kitchens, a gentleman's library and a caterer's planning office whatever that is. If that's not enough the mansion amenities just go on and on. If you want to entertain guests there were three family rooms to choose from and other fun hangout spots like a games room, a billiards room and a movie theater. Elsewhere there was an elevator home gym and a reading loft. Kim didn't end up wanting to stay at this home but her and Croy enjoyed quite a luxury master suite while they lived here. They came with a morning room, coffee bar and more. Outside on the grounds there was a large outdoor living area as well as a sports court and impressive pool with waterfall. Kim and her fam famously clashed with the home's owners about interior decorating services and the cost and tabloids released rumors of eviction from this mansion. Kim claimed she was always on time with her rent that the Zolciak bearmen's were renting with the intention of purchasing the place. However when the inspection came back at a million dollars lower than the owner's 3.25 million dollar asking price the couple decided not to overpay. They moved back to Kim's townhouse while they awaited the completion of their bigger a better current mansion. So let's take a look. Just last year Kim opened up the doors of her mansion for a tour and gushed about how much she really loves the place. She and Croy purchased the home back in 2012 for 880k but didn't move in until 2013 because they were renovating and customizing the home to be absolutely perfect. The estate is in the Manor Golf and Country Club in Alpharetta, Georgia built with a gorgeous brick and stone exterior and located on the 18th hole of the course. It also sits on the lake creating a tranquil vibe and giving amazing views. Kim's not so humble about is the place she's famously said in the past that she hardly ever likes to leave and considers it her dream home. It's situated on a 1.78 acre lot with manicured grounds and a ton of amenities. Alpharetta is about 40 minutes from the heart of Atlanta and in the other direction you'll find the enchanting North Georgia Mountains for some scenery. Kim absolutely loves her mansion which spans 17,000 square feet with five beds and 6.5 baths. Even with all that space the pair has six kids so I wonder who shares a bedroom. Kim married Croy back in 2011 and they share four kids together while Croy adopted Kim's children Brielle and Ariana from previous relationships. The dramatic floor plan in the mansion wasn't complete when the family moved in however Kim made sure they custom finished it themselves. The luxurious home has a basketball court outside a sprawling pool with spa and a waterfall that Kim likes to keep at 98 degrees as well as a bunch of surrounding sun loungers. In true Kim fashion the steps that lead into the pool have sparkles while the basketball court is lined with trees for privacy. The mansion has a sprawling master suite on the main level as well as a huge basement level in a six car garage. They have a dining room that's been designed with dark colors like black walls for a classy vibe and a modern chandelier overhead. Then there's a fancy bar area with red cushion chairs in the mostly white kitchen. In the dining room there's also a Versace China set in the cabinet that they apparently never use and two large thrones at the table for Kim and Croy. Of course Kim also decked out the dining room chairs in bling because she loves it. There are thrones in other rooms of the house too such as the wood paneled study which also has fireplace. However Kim's favorite room in the home is the entertainment room which she's named the Hollywood room where her daughters apparently hang out with their friends and watch TV. She said this is my favorite room in the whole house it's called the Hollywood room and this is actually my girls TV room where they hang out with their friends. I am obsessed with this room.  It's also super glamorous. In Kim's to-ever mansion she also showed the elevator and said that her family takes advantage of the space sometimes using it to hide presence or even have some fun with her husband in private. The estate also has amenities like a home theater, a gym and a man cave for Croy with classy full bar in one corner. We also know the famous family likes to decorate for the holidays. Just last year for Christmas Kim and her family were getting ready to deck the halls. She explained she has five storage units full of Christmas decor. As Kim showed in her Insta stories they already decked out the grand staircase in ornaments, flowers and big red bows as well as a Christmas tree with lights and silver details at the top of the stairs. Downstairs there was a huge tree with owls, snowflakes and bird cages. While they only paid under a million for the original property since Kim and Croy basically built their home and customized it how they wanted it would be now worth five million dollars or something around that. On an episode of don't be tardy we also saw Kim looking for a property in Arizona as well for a potential move. We have yet to hear if a family is buying a place there. During the house hunting Kim and her family looked at a super modern 6,600 square foot home but Kim wasn't into that one. She was more impressed by the next place a 7,600 square foot mansion with wine storage, huge closets and an enclosed private backyard. However Kim did admit it would be hard to move saying we built our house in Georgia so it is kind of hard to look at somebody else's work and fall 100% in love with it. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens. So now we've checked out the homes of former real housewives of Atlantis star Kim Zolcek Bierman. So I think I'll bring this house to her to an end. What did you guys think of her current mega mansion in El Fereda or her former spot? I love her current mansion but it is pretty massive and I have no idea what I would do with all that space. But I love the pool area most of all especially with the beautiful waterfall. Be sure to let me know what you guys liked or didn't like about Kim's homes down below. I've also been reading all your comments on our house tours and I'm gonna be shouting you guys out. I love hearing everyone's opinions. These are from our recent Candy Burrus house tour. Rebecca L said, thank you for doing this video amazing as always. I love how Candy mixes expensive items with more affordable items for her decor. Hey Rebecca I agree. I love that about her place too. It gives some down-to-earth vibes and good ideas for decorating. And Phoebe Brown wrote, I love candy always have she has so much class and everything across the board. I hope that she doesn't leave real housewives. But if that's what she needs to do then so be it. If you guys want me to show you out next time don't forget to leave me a comment about Kim's mansion and keep your eye out at the end of our next house tour. Thanks for watching. Don't forget to follow me on Instagram and I will see you all next time. Bye.