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Speaker 1: vary and rates may vary. So while we are rightfully

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Speaker 1: focused on what is happening in the Middle East with Iran,

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Speaker 1: we've taken our eyes off the ball in two foreign

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Speaker 1: policy stories. When I say we the collective, I guess

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Speaker 1: political media have a little bit. One is, of course

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Speaker 1: the war in Ukraine, and then the other is all

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Speaker 1: is the pivot to Asia. I sort of joke about that.

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Speaker 1: I'm old enough to remember in Obama's second term the

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Speaker 1: pivot to Asia and even the first Trump administration realizing, yeah,

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Speaker 1: you know, the whole point of being energy independent was

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Speaker 1: to then confront China and the pivot to Asia. We have,

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Speaker 1: i think, still waiting for that pivot. But my next

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Speaker 1: guest has a book on a topic. As you know,

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Speaker 1: I've been covering it, probably a bit more than your

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Speaker 1: average political podcaster has covered, which is the issue of

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Speaker 1: Taiwan and the fact that twenty twenty seven, which was

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Speaker 1: a marker that the Chinese had sort of set as

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Speaker 1: sort of the is sort of when she wanted the

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Speaker 1: Chinese military to be prepared to take Taiwan by force

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Speaker 1: if necessary, is suddenly getting a lot closer. Right, object,

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Speaker 1: the object in this Mirrea is quite close now, being

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty seven. So the question is where's this going,

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Speaker 1: where's this headed? And given what's been what we're still

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Speaker 1: experiencing with the war in Ukraine, what frankly the United

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Speaker 1: States has gotten itself into when it comes to Iran,

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Speaker 1: what does this mean for Taiwan. Well, my guess is

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Speaker 1: Ike Freiman. He is the authors from of a new

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Speaker 1: book called Defending Taiwan, a Strategy to prevent war with China,

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Speaker 1: and he joins me. Now, Ike, it is nice to

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Speaker 1: meet you.

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Speaker 2: Crazy meets you, Chuck. It's a pleasure to be on

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Speaker 2: the show.

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Speaker 1: So let's start with the premise of your book. When

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Speaker 1: you say defending Taiwan and a strategy. Is this a

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Speaker 1: diplomatic strategy that you want to outline, A military strategy,

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Speaker 1: a strategy of deterrence, a strategy to eventually recognize independence

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Speaker 1: for Taiwan? What is it?

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Speaker 2: This is a strategy you to prevent a devastating war

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Speaker 2: with China, something that I think should be a goal

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Speaker 2: uniting democrats, republicans, everyone in between. And a strategy to

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Speaker 2: preserve an honorable piece in the Taiwan straight but also

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Speaker 2: in the region as a whole. Something we can get

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Speaker 2: into on this show is that Taiwan's fate is just

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Speaker 2: connected to the fate of the broader region. The United

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Speaker 2: States does not support Taiwan independence. We have a long

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Speaker 2: standing one China policy. It's decades old, it served us well,

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Speaker 2: it's helped to deter war in the past.

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Speaker 1: I appreciate you saying that we've had a couple of

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Speaker 1: presidents who seem to utter some sentences that put that

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Speaker 1: policy in question. I mean, Joe Biden said some things

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Speaker 1: out loud that no American president had said when it

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Speaker 1: came to promising support for Taiwan.

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Speaker 2: That's true, and the One China policy is funny. It's

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Speaker 2: a bit like a magic incantation because we talk a

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Speaker 2: lot about it, but the substance of it is sort

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Speaker 2: of was shifting and evolving. But that's okay, because there

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Speaker 2: really is no such thing as a status quo in

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Speaker 2: the Taiwan straight there never has been. There's a military balance,

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Speaker 2: there's a diplomatic balance. The idea of the One China

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Speaker 2: Policy is that on the whole, we support peace and

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Speaker 2: stability in this region. We don't take a position as

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Speaker 2: to how Taiwan's status is ultimately decided. That's something for

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Speaker 2: Taiwan and for Beijing to work out by themselves. But

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Speaker 2: we don't want that to be resolved by force or

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Speaker 2: by coercion. And especially since Taiwan has become a democracy,

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Speaker 2: we want it to be democratically acceptable to the people

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Speaker 2: of Taiwan. Why because Taiwan's fate for reasons of geography

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Speaker 2: and a whole lot else is just tied up to

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Speaker 2: the fate of our treaty allies Japan, South Korea, Australia

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Speaker 2: and beyond. And there's no way to prevent catastrophic cascading

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Speaker 2: consequences in this region if Taiwan falls by force or coercion.

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Speaker 1: You know, whenever great powers shoot themselves in the foot,

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Speaker 1: it's usually because they have a leader who's obsessed with

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Speaker 1: an historic wrong in their mind, right, it is not

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Speaker 1: usually about the current situation. Take Putin with Ukraine. He

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Speaker 1: just believes Nope, Ukraine is not a country, it's part

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Speaker 1: of Russia. And I get the same sense from she

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Speaker 1: right that he views right. You you even say this

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Speaker 1: that you label that Tay wants. He sees it as

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Speaker 1: a lynchpin to what you call national rejuvenation. Yeah, which

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Speaker 1: means it's an ideological obsession, right of the leaders. But

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Speaker 1: what is it other? Why do they take aside pride history?

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Speaker 1: And maybe that is the strongest reasoning that they want

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Speaker 1: what's the practical reason that they want this so bad?

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Speaker 2: It's a great question. This is how we should start.

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Speaker 2: So as you say, Taiwan is the unfinished business of

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Speaker 2: the Chinese Civil War, and especially since Taiwan has democratized.

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Speaker 2: Since Taiwan has become this staggering success of one of

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Speaker 2: the most open and prosperous and technologically advanced societies on Earth,

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Speaker 2: having it across the strait is a bit uncomfortable for

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Speaker 2: the Chinese Communist Party, right because it's a living, breathing

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Speaker 2: example of what another China could have looked like, a

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Speaker 2: China that is both wealthier and more technologically advanced and

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Speaker 2: accepted in the international community and free. So that's understandable,

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Speaker 2: and season Ping is deeply invested in this issue, but

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Speaker 2: so were his predecessors. And you know, to study the

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Speaker 2: history of this issue is to see that going back

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Speaker 2: all the way to Mao, Chinese leaders have lusted after

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Speaker 2: this prize and they have turned it into a domestic

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Speaker 2: propaganda object. So the thing to understand, though, is that

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Speaker 2: from the very beginning it has always been entwined with

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Speaker 2: relations with the United States. When the Communists took over

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Speaker 2: the mainland in the fall of nineteen forty nine, Now

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Speaker 2: immediately gave his general's instructions to plan an invasion of Taiwan,

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Speaker 2: and they looked into what an amphibious operation would look like,

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Speaker 2: and they decided can't be done because the island's geography

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Speaker 2: is just extremely difficult, and they've been working on that

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Speaker 2: problem for seventy years and I think they're not satisfied yet,

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Speaker 2: but they're getting closer. Why does it matter. The first

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Speaker 2: reason is geography. So Taiwan is a link in the

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Speaker 2: first island chain, an archipelago that goes from Japan actually

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Speaker 2: starting in the Russian Curl Islands, all the way down

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Speaker 2: into the South China Sea. And you sort of have

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Speaker 2: to look at a topographic map because in between those islands,

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Speaker 2: the sea is often so shallow that you can't navigate through.

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Speaker 2: So there's only a few choke points in between these

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Speaker 2: islands that you can actually navigate through. And that means

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Speaker 2: China's navy, which is now the world's largest in fleet size,

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Speaker 2: is like a burd in a cage. They're trapped in

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Speaker 2: these little inland seas, the Yellow Sea, the East China See,

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Speaker 2: the South Tennessee, and they want to burst out into

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Speaker 2: the wider waters of the Western Pacific to project power globally,

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Speaker 2: but they can't do it as long as the US

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Speaker 2: has allies and partners all astride that island chain. So

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Speaker 2: that's the first reason. A second reason is the semiconductor

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Speaker 2: of fabrication facilities on Taiwan. And then the third reason

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Speaker 2: is the role that Taiwan plays in the regional economic order,

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Speaker 2: and the way that Taiwan might fall would set a

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Speaker 2: precedent for China's ability to use economic coercion against other

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Speaker 2: countries in the region. And you put these all together

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Speaker 2: and you see, if they can get this, all of

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Speaker 2: the dominant fall and they can achieve national rejuvenation pretty quick.

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Speaker 1: Okay, I mean, I hear the case, but it still

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Speaker 1: feels more ideological and caught up in history books, and

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Speaker 1: it really is kind of me Chi wants no threat

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Speaker 1: to China. China's built this massive economy. China's probably going

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Speaker 1: to catch up in the chip space we see. You know,

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Speaker 1: you know what is a necessity is the mother of

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Speaker 1: all invention, right, they have to innovate here. So this

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Speaker 1: still feels like a vanity project more than an actual

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Speaker 1: strategic necessity.

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Speaker 2: So I think the overall point that it's nice to have,

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Speaker 2: not need to have, is right. And I end the

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Speaker 2: book with vignette of the last time I was in

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Speaker 2: Beijing in twenty twenty three, where I went to the

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Speaker 2: National museum in Tiana and Square, and I went to

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Speaker 2: this exhibit in the museum called Road to Rejuvenation, which

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Speaker 2: tracks the century of Humiliation and then the party's rise

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Speaker 2: and rule and season. Pain is obsessed with this exhibit.

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Speaker 2: One of the first things he did after taking power

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Speaker 2: in twenty twelve is he took the whole polyp or

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Speaker 2: standing committee there, and he said, this exhibit records our

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Speaker 2: history and our present, and we're going to write the

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Speaker 2: next chapter together. And then he added in twenty eighteen

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Speaker 2: this glitzy new annex to celebrate his achievements in the

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Speaker 2: so called New Era. And it's kind of interesting because

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Speaker 2: the museum is packed with tourists from all over China

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Speaker 2: and this exhibit the museum is, this exhibit is not.

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Speaker 2: It's empty, completely empty. I was there alone for two hours,

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Speaker 2: and you can see the scope of his ambition. Military

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Speaker 2: stuff is clearly part of it, but there's also a

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Speaker 2: whole wall devoted to ethnic minorities where he's smiling serenely

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Speaker 2: as the harmonized ethnic minorities sing and dance. And there's

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Speaker 2: another about how China is going with green mountains and

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Speaker 2: electric vehicles, and there's another of him you know, cheering

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Speaker 2: athletes at the at the Olympics, and you see that

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Speaker 2: National rejuvenation is about putting China at the forefront of

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Speaker 2: literally every human endeavor, literally every human endeavor. It's about

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Speaker 2: getting rich, technologically advanced, green, harmonious, culturally advanced. And so

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Speaker 2: Taiwan is the lynchment of that arch. But if he

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Speaker 2: rolls the iron dice, he has a whole lot to lose.

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Speaker 2: And that is the that's the double edged sword of

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Speaker 2: his ambition, and that is ultimately why he is deterrible.

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Speaker 2: But you have to show him that if he messes

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Speaker 2: up over Taiwan, he could put the whole project in jeopardy.

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Speaker 1: Well, this, let's get to deterrence here. I am. I

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Speaker 1: am a real pessimist when it comes to Taiwan because

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Speaker 1: I think that if and this is where I'm not

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Speaker 1: going to pretend I'm an expert in how how Chinese

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Speaker 1: communist policy decision making comes. But if you're just doing

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Speaker 1: game theory in your China and you look at the

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Speaker 1: current geopolitical situation, you're never going to probably have a

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Speaker 1: more pliant American president than the one you have now.

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Speaker 1: The United States is stretched right now financially and militarily

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Speaker 1: particularly we're seeing it in the Middleast where suddenly we're

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Speaker 1: going to end up not being able to sell certain

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Speaker 1: things to Ukraine because we need it for the war

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Speaker 1: with Iran. And if there's ever a time to do it,

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Speaker 1: it's probably while Trump's still president in this current situation,

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Speaker 1: especially since now the appetite with the American public. You know,

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Speaker 1: whatever whatever anti China sentiment one can use to rally

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Speaker 1: the rally Americans around the flag is a lot harder

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Speaker 1: are already due to the unpopularity of this war with

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Speaker 1: the run right. And you know, I sort of I

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Speaker 1: have always wondered in my head, boy, is it how

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Speaker 1: do you sell the American public on defending this island

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Speaker 1: halfway around the globe right that American blood and treasure

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Speaker 1: should be used to defend this island. I think it's

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Speaker 1: just very difficult, just in the current moment we're in

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Speaker 1: the lack of credibility American political institutions have with the

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Speaker 1: average voter these days, so you're just going to have

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Speaker 1: a lot of skepticism. You know how the Chinese think

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Speaker 1: better than I do. You're the expert here, Am I

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Speaker 1: off a? Am I overthinking? This is this not how

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Speaker 1: the Chinese are thinking.

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Speaker 2: I think there's a lot of truth in what you say,

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Speaker 2: but I don't fully agree. I fully agree that the

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Speaker 2: remainder of Trump's term is a uniquely tempting moment because

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Speaker 2: Trump is so transactional, because he doesn't think strategically.

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Speaker 1: Look, the Chinese think they may may be able to

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Speaker 1: get our defense of Taiwan as part of the trade negotiation.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, so there's everything out. There's every reason for them

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Speaker 2: to try to see what they can get out of

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Speaker 2: Trump at the negotiating table, and then, failing that, to

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Speaker 2: squeeze him and see what he gives up. And I

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Speaker 2: think when we talk about dates, we need to recognize

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Speaker 2: it's not a question of whether China does it or doesn't.

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Speaker 2: They are already doing it. They are squeezing Taiwan right now.

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Speaker 1: It's a coersion right now, every direction.

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Speaker 2: It's the Boa Constrictor strategy using every tool of their

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Speaker 2: national power, Squeezing Taiwanese airlines to list themselves as Chinese

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Speaker 2: on their websites, you know, pressuring third countries to extradite

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Speaker 2: Taiwanese nationals to Taiwan to China for trial, you know,

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Speaker 2: establishing a like a near permanent presence of drones and

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Speaker 2: other stuff all around the airspace and waters around Taiwan.

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Speaker 1: Getting other countries that had diplomatic relations with Taiwan to

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Speaker 1: drop it. Yeah, and they've coerced a few to do

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Speaker 1: that exactly.

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Speaker 2: So the question becomes, I think their plan a is

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Speaker 2: just squeeze Taiwan to death, or squeeze Taiwan to the

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Speaker 2: point where it, like Hong Kong realizes no one the

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Speaker 2: cavalry isn't coming. We just have to negotiate, and then

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Speaker 2: we signed some piece. They signed some piece of paper

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Speaker 2: that says one country, two systems, Taiwan version. And then

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Speaker 2: she's in Pinte Claar's victory. And that's that's the Hong

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Speaker 2: Kong model. And that's a lot more attractive than rolling

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Speaker 2: the dice on an invasion, which is Russia showed in

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Speaker 2: Ukraine could go wrong.

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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 2: But here's the thing, China has a political calendar too.

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Speaker 2: Twenty twenty seven is a Party Congress year. And remember

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Speaker 2: the last Party Congress year. Granted it was COVID, but

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Speaker 2: it was also COVID was over everywhere in the world.

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Speaker 2: She's in paying locked everyone in their house for.

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Speaker 1: A year, we took advantage of it.

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Speaker 2: For another, that's how paranoid he was going into the

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Speaker 2: last party Congress to get his third term. So now

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Speaker 2: he's going up for a fourth term. He's completely cleared

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Speaker 2: out the top brass in the People's Liberation Army. I mean,

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Speaker 2: do you really think there aren't more purges coming?

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Speaker 1: Well? What do we how should we read these purges?

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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I thought, I think look as usual, right,

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Speaker 1: you know, we Americans, our American political leaders are just

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Speaker 1: terrible at putting ourselves in somebody else's shoes, whether it

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Speaker 1: was Bush looking into the soul of Putin or Biden

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Speaker 1: and his friendship as when when she was vice Premier,

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Speaker 1: and frankly the wrong assumptions he made about the related

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Speaker 1: personal relationship he had developed with him. I think there's

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Speaker 1: been a there's just been massive miscalculations on the American

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Speaker 1: side of things when it comes to both Putin and she.

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Speaker 1: She's a much she's got a much bigger appetite, I think,

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Speaker 1: at least in his head. Then I think a lot

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Speaker 1: of us thought, and I don't think we view Chinese

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Speaker 1: leaders in the same way we view Russian leaders. I

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Speaker 1: guess whatever it is or we just we assumed there'd

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Speaker 1: be pragmatism and transactionalism, because for the most part, that's

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Speaker 1: how the Chinese have behaved diplomatically around the world. They're

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Speaker 1: very transactional, and so I think that is probably given

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Speaker 1: us false hope. But internally she's behaving like a paranoid dictator.

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Speaker 2: Well, I mean, he's not a man who's given a

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Speaker 2: whole lot of interviews, So in his biography you can

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Speaker 2: read the tea leaves and come up with your own

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Speaker 2: psychoanalytical profile.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, we seem like we don't know much about them,

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Speaker 1: but we don't.

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Speaker 2: But we do know that when he was I mean,

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Speaker 2: Joseph Tarisian, my former Hoover colleague, is a wonderful biography

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Speaker 2: of his father.

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Speaker 1: Yes, I've had I've interviewed him for this page picture

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Speaker 1: for the same reason because I'm obsessed with trying to

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Speaker 1: learn more about she. And it's interesting that it was

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Speaker 1: it was easier to write a book about his father,

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Speaker 1: and it is about him.

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Speaker 2: And Joseph went to all these former archives in the

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Speaker 2: post Soviet world. But what you see is, you know,

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Speaker 2: a portrait of a young man who was raised as

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Speaker 2: much of a princeling as a princely can be, and

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Speaker 2: he has everything ripped away from him. He is everything

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Speaker 2: ripped away, and he's sent down to the countryside to

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Speaker 2: be re educated by pig farmers and his education is disrupted,

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Speaker 2: so so he has to get essentially fake degrees later on,

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Speaker 2: and his sister kills herself because of the harassment. This

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Speaker 2: is a deeply traumatic moment and his his his conclusion

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Speaker 2: is he's going to join the party, become redder than red.

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Speaker 2: But it's a it's a traumatic experience in his young

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Speaker 2: life which shows him that no matter how much security

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Speaker 2: and status and fame you have, it can come apart

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Speaker 2: very quickly. And I think what we know about him.

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Speaker 2: Kevin Rudd, the former Australian Prime Minister, speaks beautiful Chinese

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Speaker 2: and has spent time with him. Rudd recalls in his

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Speaker 2: book You Know, sitting with Season Ping by a bonfire

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Speaker 2: and talking with him about the world and just being

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Speaker 2: taken by how afraid he is of color, revolutions and

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Speaker 2: all these things that could tear China apart. So I

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Speaker 2: think if your Season Ping and you look at this

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Speaker 2: Taiwan question, you're deeply skeptical about your your forces. When

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Speaker 2: your generals say no, we can do this, I think

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Speaker 2: I think you look at this and you say, there's

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Speaker 2: a whole lot of ways that this could go wrong,

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Speaker 2: that the Americans could use this issue against me, and

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Speaker 2: I think you are not in a hurry. I think

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Speaker 2: he does want to be the guy who gets it done,

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Speaker 2: but I think he's very happy to do this through

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Speaker 2: a diplomatic solution that involves signing a piece of paper

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Speaker 2: that allows him to declare victory and then kicking the

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Speaker 2: reintegration or whatever to his successor. This is the thing

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Speaker 2: about national rejuvenation, right. It's a wonderful goal to set

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Speaker 2: because the deadline is twenty forty nine, when he'll be

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Speaker 2: ninety six years old, so he can claim credit for

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Speaker 2: it all. But if there's anything that's not quite many

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Speaker 2: loose ends that aren't quite wrapped up, he can pass

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Speaker 2: in his successor with no loss of face. And I

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Speaker 2: think that's important. He hasn't tied his hands here. If

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Speaker 2: you go into the National Museum, it's not like he's

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Speaker 2: saving a wall or a trophy case in the exhibit

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Speaker 2: for Taiwan. There's just not a mention of Taiwan.

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Speaker 1: the purge of the military leaders, because that's another thing.

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Speaker 1: What does that tell us about our own intelligence capabilities

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Speaker 1: inside the Chinese government? We frankly the West in general,

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Speaker 1: Western intelligence agencies, And look, I have my own concerns

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Speaker 1: about the equality of intelligence right now because for a

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Speaker 1: variety of reasons, we have an American president who doesn't

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Speaker 1: trust the IC. You probably have rank and file i

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Speaker 1: C members that don't trust the leaders. You also have

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Speaker 1: other countries not wanting to share with the US anymore

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Speaker 1: because of this. I mean, there's a there's sort of

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Speaker 1: a cascade of reasons why we may we may We

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Speaker 1: may have bigger problems with our own intelligence apparatus than

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Speaker 1: we've had in quite some time. But it feels like

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Speaker 1: we're not alone in not fully realizing how that this

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Speaker 1: purge was possible. I mean, one of his closest allies, right,

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Speaker 1: one of his longest relationships, but I think both politically

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Speaker 1: and personally was part of this purge. What's spot? I mean,

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Speaker 1: is it just all paranoia? Is it disappointment in the military.

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Speaker 1: Is it a concern he didn't have enough control over

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Speaker 1: the PLA?

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Speaker 2: So unfortunately, I don't know the answer to you.

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Speaker 1: Well, we just talked about we have no intelligence.

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Speaker 2: We have no intelligence. I'm I'm his open source, right,

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Speaker 2: but based on the open source, we have no idea.

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Speaker 2: And I think anyone who has confidence that it's one

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Speaker 2: way or the other on Taiwan is just pitching it

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Speaker 2: op ed because you can spend the story either way.

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Speaker 2: So we don't know why he did it, but we

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Speaker 2: can say something about the situation now that he has

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Speaker 2: done it. Now that he has done it, he's in

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Speaker 2: full control of the PLA. How do you know, Well,

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Speaker 2: look at the ORG chart. There's more empty chairs than

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Speaker 2: full chairs. So he's now running the show. What he

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Speaker 2: doesn't have yet is a new cast of hand picked

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Speaker 2: characters who will carry out his wishes. Now we don't

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Speaker 2: know why he did it, but we do know that

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Speaker 2: it's a little strange to start a war or start

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Speaker 2: a crisis that runs a high risk of escalation to

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Speaker 2: war if you don't have military officers at the top

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Speaker 2: that you trust. I think going into the next party Congress,

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Speaker 2: he has some big decisions to make, not just about

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Speaker 2: the PLA, but about succession. So far he has raised

433
00:25:57,640 --> 00:26:02,200
Speaker 2: a couple of or a loud rumors to brew about

434
00:26:02,200 --> 00:26:03,919
Speaker 2: a couple of bright young things.

435
00:26:04,680 --> 00:26:07,640
Speaker 1: Like traveling their version of travelings, aren't they right? Yeah?

436
00:26:07,640 --> 00:26:09,720
Speaker 2: And then he has smacked him down with a hammer.

437
00:26:10,200 --> 00:26:12,880
Speaker 2: So the lesson has become the last thing you want

438
00:26:12,920 --> 00:26:15,560
Speaker 2: to be in the CCP is like rumored to be

439
00:26:15,640 --> 00:26:16,400
Speaker 2: the next in line.

440
00:26:16,560 --> 00:26:19,320
Speaker 1: That's like, that's like today's Republican Party in America.

441
00:26:19,400 --> 00:26:21,880
Speaker 2: But yes, something like that, something like that. I wonder

442
00:26:21,920 --> 00:26:25,680
Speaker 2: where we got that from. So so, but seriously, he's

443
00:26:25,720 --> 00:26:28,000
Speaker 2: not getting any younger. You know, there's all these rumors

444
00:26:28,000 --> 00:26:31,400
Speaker 2: about his health. Who knows what's true, right, But he's

445
00:26:31,440 --> 00:26:33,280
Speaker 2: either going to go in with a successor in mind

446
00:26:33,400 --> 00:26:35,240
Speaker 2: or he's going to go in without a successor in mind,

447
00:26:35,720 --> 00:26:37,800
Speaker 2: he's probably going to have more purges he wants to do.

448
00:26:38,359 --> 00:26:41,280
Speaker 2: And if if he wants to move against Taiwan, why

449
00:26:41,440 --> 00:26:46,480
Speaker 2: initiate something that could become an open ended cluster, you know,

450
00:26:46,640 --> 00:26:50,560
Speaker 2: his equivalent of the Russia's invasion of Ukraine or are

451
00:26:50,880 --> 00:26:54,520
Speaker 2: Ron War. When he's got this, you know, he has

452
00:26:54,600 --> 00:26:58,240
Speaker 2: to deliver his work report and he wants everyone to clap,

453
00:26:58,320 --> 00:27:00,320
Speaker 2: and he wants everything to be controlled. Much more likely

454
00:27:01,000 --> 00:27:03,399
Speaker 2: he gets a statement, gets everyone to sign the statement

455
00:27:03,760 --> 00:27:06,119
Speaker 2: that gives him permission to take a harder line on Taiwan,

456
00:27:06,240 --> 00:27:07,679
Speaker 2: and then he comes out of in twenty twenty eight

457
00:27:07,720 --> 00:27:11,119
Speaker 2: with basically a new mandate. Then Taiwan has elections that spring,

458
00:27:11,440 --> 00:27:15,040
Speaker 2: and he's like, okay, guess what the DPP, the current

459
00:27:15,080 --> 00:27:19,640
Speaker 2: ruling party, isn't allowed to win or else? Oh interesting,

460
00:27:20,040 --> 00:27:23,560
Speaker 2: I think that's a much more plausible timetable. Trump will

461
00:27:23,600 --> 00:27:25,800
Speaker 2: be a lame duck. We will be in the midst

462
00:27:25,840 --> 00:27:28,280
Speaker 2: of our twenty twenty eight cycle. Who wants a war

463
00:27:28,359 --> 00:27:30,200
Speaker 2: with Taiwan over twenty.

464
00:27:30,040 --> 00:27:33,560
Speaker 1: Do you see twenty twenty eight actually as the moment

465
00:27:33,680 --> 00:27:37,840
Speaker 1: to move a week er Trump? But Trump's still there,

466
00:27:38,200 --> 00:27:40,879
Speaker 1: and in America that is going to be more focused

467
00:27:40,920 --> 00:27:43,639
Speaker 1: on its domestic situation than wanting to.

468
00:27:44,200 --> 00:27:48,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, because because if their strategy is the Boa constrictor strategy,

469
00:27:50,160 --> 00:27:53,600
Speaker 2: then they're just going to keep doing it and at

470
00:27:53,680 --> 00:27:58,879
Speaker 2: some point Taiwan's going to choke unless we intervene. So

471
00:27:59,359 --> 00:28:01,639
Speaker 2: this is that's the problem with thinking about deterrence as

472
00:28:01,720 --> 00:28:04,440
Speaker 2: like we're trying to stop him from doing X. No,

473
00:28:04,600 --> 00:28:10,200
Speaker 2: he's already doing it. So his his threat is you Americans,

474
00:28:10,320 --> 00:28:12,920
Speaker 2: It's on you to draw the line right, and when

475
00:28:13,000 --> 00:28:16,400
Speaker 2: you draw the line, the markets for the Nasdaq collapses

476
00:28:17,000 --> 00:28:21,280
Speaker 2: and everyone panics, and then you are accepting the consequences

477
00:28:21,359 --> 00:28:24,359
Speaker 2: of holding us to account. But it's really on us.

478
00:28:25,080 --> 00:28:28,000
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I mean, look, this is why Oroan's probably

479
00:28:28,040 --> 00:28:31,840
Speaker 1: playing out as about as well for she's interests as

480
00:28:31,880 --> 00:28:36,399
Speaker 1: you could possibly put out. Let me go to the

481
00:28:38,320 --> 00:28:40,760
Speaker 1: It seems as if we know how to do deterrence

482
00:28:42,040 --> 00:28:46,200
Speaker 1: for kinetic deterrence right where we will sell arms to

483
00:28:46,320 --> 00:28:51,080
Speaker 1: Taiwan and we will create new military alliances or call

484
00:28:51,160 --> 00:28:56,240
Speaker 1: them diplomatic alliances that are pretty that are quasi military alliances.

485
00:28:56,280 --> 00:28:58,880
Speaker 1: The QUAD, I think is on its way to becoming

486
00:28:58,960 --> 00:29:01,160
Speaker 1: a you could see how it could become, at least

487
00:29:01,360 --> 00:29:05,680
Speaker 1: as far as Chinese deterrence, a military alliance Japan, Australia,

488
00:29:06,000 --> 00:29:13,080
Speaker 1: the United States, India maybe right, and that's possible. And

489
00:29:13,560 --> 00:29:16,040
Speaker 1: some of this has to do with something that I

490
00:29:16,160 --> 00:29:17,960
Speaker 1: did a couple of years ago at Meet the Press,

491
00:29:18,200 --> 00:29:21,200
Speaker 1: and what I know many a think tank has done

492
00:29:21,320 --> 00:29:24,960
Speaker 1: is when you do the military wargaming of what would

493
00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:30,240
Speaker 1: happen if China invaded Taiwan and we decided to defend Taiwan,

494
00:29:30,440 --> 00:29:33,640
Speaker 1: help aside with Taiwan and help them do it, that

495
00:29:34,640 --> 00:29:39,080
Speaker 1: China wins that standoff seven times out of ten when

496
00:29:39,120 --> 00:29:43,400
Speaker 1: you go through these wargame exercises, So we seem to

497
00:29:43,560 --> 00:29:47,360
Speaker 1: know what needs to be done. If we got into

498
00:29:47,440 --> 00:29:50,640
Speaker 1: an actual kinetic back and forth with China and we're

499
00:29:50,680 --> 00:29:53,520
Speaker 1: trying to fix that, it seems as if we do

500
00:29:53,760 --> 00:29:57,960
Speaker 1: not have an effective deterrence strategy to this boa constrictor

501
00:29:58,040 --> 00:30:02,800
Speaker 1: strategy right that this is it's and I don't know

502
00:30:02,920 --> 00:30:07,520
Speaker 1: what deterrence would work. You've got a Taiwanese population that

503
00:30:07,720 --> 00:30:11,640
Speaker 1: is the more they flex independence, the more that it

504
00:30:11,760 --> 00:30:14,960
Speaker 1: seems that that's worse for them. You know, what does

505
00:30:15,520 --> 00:30:18,240
Speaker 1: deterrence of the Boa constrictor strategy.

506
00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:22,800
Speaker 2: Look, okay, I'm going to agree wholeheartedly with half of

507
00:30:22,880 --> 00:30:25,840
Speaker 2: your question and challenge the premise of the other. Okay,

508
00:30:26,200 --> 00:30:29,240
Speaker 2: So for the last fifty years, really for the last

509
00:30:29,320 --> 00:30:34,480
Speaker 2: seventy years, we have maintained deterrence. Since mal first gave

510
00:30:34,560 --> 00:30:37,800
Speaker 2: his generals the instruction to you know, consider the invasion

511
00:30:37,800 --> 00:30:43,320
Speaker 2: of Taiwan in nineteen fifty. We have deterred aggression. We

512
00:30:43,400 --> 00:30:44,880
Speaker 2: have kept the peace in the region through what we

513
00:30:44,960 --> 00:30:47,640
Speaker 2: call the strategy of denial, which is just showing we're

514
00:30:47,720 --> 00:30:51,360
Speaker 2: militarily stronger. We don't even have to use nukes to

515
00:30:51,440 --> 00:30:54,560
Speaker 2: do it. If China moves against Taiwan, we can defeat

516
00:30:54,640 --> 00:30:56,520
Speaker 2: their ability to put men on the beaches and to

517
00:30:56,560 --> 00:30:57,200
Speaker 2: take the island.

518
00:30:57,520 --> 00:30:59,280
Speaker 1: Well, that was obvious through two thousand.

519
00:30:59,680 --> 00:31:03,959
Speaker 2: Yeah, So with the wargames that you cite, I wouldn't

520
00:31:03,960 --> 00:31:06,160
Speaker 2: put any stock at all in those. Basically, war games

521
00:31:06,200 --> 00:31:08,560
Speaker 2: are not crystal balls, they're not simulations of what's going

522
00:31:08,640 --> 00:31:13,280
Speaker 2: to happen there. There games to explore what one side

523
00:31:13,320 --> 00:31:15,680
Speaker 2: or the other might do in specific situations and like

524
00:31:15,800 --> 00:31:19,120
Speaker 2: expand your imagination. So I recently took part in a

525
00:31:19,760 --> 00:31:22,960
Speaker 2: wargame where I was playing China and nukes were involved,

526
00:31:23,040 --> 00:31:28,880
Speaker 2: and like, yeah, nukes to make them realistic. But you know,

527
00:31:28,960 --> 00:31:31,080
Speaker 2: there's a whole lot of assumptions. You say we want

528
00:31:31,120 --> 00:31:33,320
Speaker 2: to do and you know, shoot the shoot at the

529
00:31:33,360 --> 00:31:35,200
Speaker 2: following ships, and you either sink them or you don't.

530
00:31:35,480 --> 00:31:38,000
Speaker 2: But that's just a computer model in the best case.

531
00:31:38,640 --> 00:31:38,760
Speaker 1: Uh.

532
00:31:39,520 --> 00:31:42,080
Speaker 2: As far as I understand, my last book was called

533
00:31:42,080 --> 00:31:45,760
Speaker 2: The Arsenal of Democracy, was about the specific military and

534
00:31:45,840 --> 00:31:49,280
Speaker 2: military industrial parts of this. My best understanding is that

535
00:31:49,320 --> 00:31:52,200
Speaker 2: if we fought China today, a high intensity war in

536
00:31:52,360 --> 00:31:56,120
Speaker 2: the Western Pacific, it would be nasty. Thousands of Americans

537
00:31:56,160 --> 00:31:58,720
Speaker 2: would die, but within a matter of days to a

538
00:31:58,800 --> 00:32:02,320
Speaker 2: couple of weeks, pretty much all of the PLA Navy

539
00:32:02,600 --> 00:32:05,120
Speaker 2: would be at the bottom of the Taiwan Straight most

540
00:32:05,160 --> 00:32:08,200
Speaker 2: of their air force would be obliterated. We would essentially

541
00:32:08,360 --> 00:32:11,480
Speaker 2: maritime wars, air naval wars, the kind we haven't fought

542
00:32:11,520 --> 00:32:14,120
Speaker 2: for eighty years. They work fundamentally differently from land wars.

543
00:32:14,640 --> 00:32:18,080
Speaker 2: It's not about attrition and holding back reserves. It's just

544
00:32:18,160 --> 00:32:21,280
Speaker 2: about who can deliver the hardest, most effective opening punch.

545
00:32:21,800 --> 00:32:23,520
Speaker 2: And a lot of that has to do with cyber

546
00:32:23,600 --> 00:32:27,000
Speaker 2: and electronic warfare and other classified stuff that allows you

547
00:32:27,120 --> 00:32:31,080
Speaker 2: to fry the other guy's eyes and ears, and we

548
00:32:31,200 --> 00:32:34,560
Speaker 2: have various advantages in those capabilities which are super classified.

549
00:32:35,440 --> 00:32:39,000
Speaker 2: The balance is tilting. It's not as much of a

550
00:32:39,080 --> 00:32:41,160
Speaker 2: sure bed as it was before. But I think it's

551
00:32:41,160 --> 00:32:43,880
Speaker 2: safe to say if China thought they could defeat us

552
00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:47,960
Speaker 2: in a high end conventional war, our problems would go

553
00:32:48,240 --> 00:32:51,000
Speaker 2: way beyond Taiwan. It would be about the defense of

554
00:32:51,080 --> 00:32:54,080
Speaker 2: Japan and the Philippines and South Korea and Australia and

555
00:32:54,200 --> 00:32:57,080
Speaker 2: Guam and Hawaii, and China would be acting in a

556
00:32:57,200 --> 00:33:00,760
Speaker 2: much less cautious and restrained way. However, as you say,

557
00:33:02,760 --> 00:33:05,080
Speaker 2: China doesn't necessarily have to think they could win that

558
00:33:05,200 --> 00:33:09,120
Speaker 2: war if they're confident that they can keep the contest

559
00:33:09,240 --> 00:33:12,920
Speaker 2: in a crisis sort of short of war. And this

560
00:33:13,120 --> 00:33:15,720
Speaker 2: is your question about how to deter the gray zone strategy.

561
00:33:16,360 --> 00:33:19,000
Speaker 2: I think the basic idea should be we need to

562
00:33:19,040 --> 00:33:23,000
Speaker 2: show we're going to push back proportionally to maintain an

563
00:33:23,040 --> 00:33:27,959
Speaker 2: overall stable situation. And that's tricky because let's say they

564
00:33:28,040 --> 00:33:33,680
Speaker 2: have thousands of fishing vessels, civilian fishing vessels which are

565
00:33:33,720 --> 00:33:36,560
Speaker 2: paramilitary trained by the PLA, that are hanging out around

566
00:33:36,600 --> 00:33:39,040
Speaker 2: Taiwan harassing shipping. We're not going to do the same

567
00:33:39,120 --> 00:33:43,680
Speaker 2: thing to China. So we need to stabilize the situation

568
00:33:43,760 --> 00:33:46,760
Speaker 2: in another domain. And it's tricky to establish, like what

569
00:33:46,960 --> 00:33:51,480
Speaker 2: is proportional, But basically, according to these age old traditions,

570
00:33:52,120 --> 00:33:55,200
Speaker 2: we don't have like an explicit military to military relationship

571
00:33:55,200 --> 00:33:57,800
Speaker 2: with Taiwan, Like certain levels of senior US officials aren't

572
00:33:57,800 --> 00:34:03,240
Speaker 2: supposed to go to Taiwan. And as China has proceeded

573
00:34:03,280 --> 00:34:06,600
Speaker 2: with this both constrictive strategy we have it has been disclosed,

574
00:34:06,880 --> 00:34:11,080
Speaker 2: sent more trainers to Taiwan to help them develop their

575
00:34:11,160 --> 00:34:14,240
Speaker 2: forces and that kind of thing. Pushing back in another

576
00:34:14,320 --> 00:34:19,800
Speaker 2: domain to help Taiwan defend itself, improve the confidence of

577
00:34:19,840 --> 00:34:22,040
Speaker 2: the people of Taiwan. That's kind of the best we

578
00:34:22,120 --> 00:34:23,560
Speaker 2: can do. And there's a whole bunch of stuff we

579
00:34:23,600 --> 00:34:27,799
Speaker 2: can do. Energy partnerships, technology partnerships, giving visas to Taiwanese,

580
00:34:27,880 --> 00:34:29,719
Speaker 2: more direct flights. There's a whole lot of stuff that

581
00:34:29,800 --> 00:34:32,560
Speaker 2: we can do that can stabilize an overall balance. But

582
00:34:32,640 --> 00:34:34,719
Speaker 2: we have to threaten China. If you push harder in

583
00:34:34,800 --> 00:34:36,600
Speaker 2: the gray zone, we will push harder to.

584
00:34:37,880 --> 00:34:44,880
Speaker 1: The Let's talk about Taiwan's domestic politics, because there's not

585
00:34:45,960 --> 00:34:49,759
Speaker 1: Look just like Russia did with Ukraine starting fifteen years ago.

586
00:34:50,480 --> 00:34:51,920
Speaker 1: You know, Russia was trying to win it at the

587
00:34:51,960 --> 00:34:57,360
Speaker 1: ballot box, right, They were basically trying to trying to

588
00:34:57,480 --> 00:35:03,520
Speaker 1: win find comp client leaders that would want to stay

589
00:35:03,719 --> 00:35:07,239
Speaker 1: in the sphere of Russia's influence. And then when they gave,

590
00:35:07,400 --> 00:35:10,960
Speaker 1: when they frankly, you know, took a couple of losses

591
00:35:11,000 --> 00:35:12,880
Speaker 1: there for them to decide, all right, we can't do

592
00:35:13,000 --> 00:35:14,400
Speaker 1: this this way. We're going to now try it the

593
00:35:14,440 --> 00:35:18,040
Speaker 1: other way. I think China still thinks they can win

594
00:35:18,200 --> 00:35:23,480
Speaker 1: this when a pr campaign in Taiwan. Is that what

595
00:35:23,600 --> 00:35:23,920
Speaker 1: you think?

596
00:35:25,120 --> 00:35:27,560
Speaker 2: Absolutely? And I think that's another reason not to invade.

597
00:35:29,160 --> 00:35:31,520
Speaker 1: Right, So if you look at the surveys, invade, you

598
00:35:31,640 --> 00:35:34,040
Speaker 1: harden the opposition. I mean, Ukraine's never going to be

599
00:35:34,040 --> 00:35:37,080
Speaker 1: in Russia's sphere of influence in our lifetimes, exactly right,

600
00:35:37,239 --> 00:35:39,920
Speaker 1: exactly too many Ukrainians. Do you think they're angry now?

601
00:35:40,480 --> 00:35:41,799
Speaker 1: And do you think they were angry at the start

602
00:35:41,840 --> 00:35:42,200
Speaker 1: of this war?

603
00:35:42,640 --> 00:35:45,560
Speaker 2: And this raises a really important point about public opinion

604
00:35:46,239 --> 00:35:48,719
Speaker 2: that is missed in surveys. That gets back to the

605
00:35:48,760 --> 00:35:52,120
Speaker 2: point you asked earlier about why would the American people

606
00:35:52,560 --> 00:35:55,239
Speaker 2: go for this? Why would an American president go for this?

607
00:35:55,480 --> 00:35:58,719
Speaker 2: And the answer I'm a historian, so I think about

608
00:35:58,800 --> 00:36:02,200
Speaker 2: these things is sort of pass dependencies. That's why I'm trained.

609
00:36:02,760 --> 00:36:04,560
Speaker 2: But when you look at the history as of great

610
00:36:04,600 --> 00:36:06,640
Speaker 2: power of wars or even great power crises like the

611
00:36:06,760 --> 00:36:09,239
Speaker 2: Cuban missile crisis, these things do not fall out of

612
00:36:09,239 --> 00:36:14,960
Speaker 2: the clear blue sky. They emerge over the course of years, months,

613
00:36:15,280 --> 00:36:18,560
Speaker 2: then weeks through a path dependent arc where someone does this,

614
00:36:19,000 --> 00:36:20,640
Speaker 2: and then we do that, and then they do this,

615
00:36:20,760 --> 00:36:23,480
Speaker 2: and then we do that, and we put reputational capital

616
00:36:23,520 --> 00:36:26,359
Speaker 2: on the line saying hey, publicly, don't do this or else.

617
00:36:26,920 --> 00:36:31,000
Speaker 2: And then by the time it's time for choosing, we

618
00:36:31,120 --> 00:36:34,040
Speaker 2: have skin in the game and backing down means something

619
00:36:34,120 --> 00:36:37,000
Speaker 2: totally different than it did at the beginning. And maybe

620
00:36:37,040 --> 00:36:38,680
Speaker 2: we choose to back down, but we have chips on

621
00:36:38,760 --> 00:36:43,399
Speaker 2: the table now. And that is why I can't think

622
00:36:43,440 --> 00:36:46,440
Speaker 2: of an example in American history where a president has decided,

623
00:36:46,520 --> 00:36:48,640
Speaker 2: for reasons of strategy, we need to go to war

624
00:36:49,000 --> 00:36:50,279
Speaker 2: or we need to go to the brink of war,

625
00:36:50,520 --> 00:36:54,520
Speaker 2: and the American public hasn't come along. This Iran war

626
00:36:54,600 --> 00:36:56,359
Speaker 2: may actually be the first time. This is the first

627
00:36:56,440 --> 00:37:03,600
Speaker 2: time we're an American president. She'll military success was not

628
00:37:03,920 --> 00:37:09,200
Speaker 2: greeted with a decisive approval from the American public.

629
00:37:09,760 --> 00:37:12,320
Speaker 1: But this was also unusual the first three days.

630
00:37:12,719 --> 00:37:14,560
Speaker 2: But he never gave a speed He never gave an

631
00:37:14,600 --> 00:37:18,000
Speaker 2: Oval Office address to the American people saying, hey, listen,

632
00:37:18,480 --> 00:37:21,399
Speaker 2: like I know this is people don't want this. Here's

633
00:37:21,480 --> 00:37:24,440
Speaker 2: my reasoning. He still hasn't even articulated what we're fighting for,

634
00:37:24,600 --> 00:37:27,719
Speaker 2: what the warriams are. I think at Taiwan situation would

635
00:37:27,760 --> 00:37:32,319
Speaker 2: be different. A Taiwan situation, China would China would push,

636
00:37:32,840 --> 00:37:36,240
Speaker 2: and it might be the case that either Taiwan's morale

637
00:37:36,239 --> 00:37:40,120
Speaker 2: implodes or our morale implodes, or both, and then Taiwan

638
00:37:40,239 --> 00:37:43,400
Speaker 2: just gets China gets the prize of that fighting. That's possible,

639
00:37:44,040 --> 00:37:47,879
Speaker 2: but I think equally possible, in fact, probably base case,

640
00:37:48,400 --> 00:37:52,640
Speaker 2: if China starts squeezing Taiwan, we do posturing to try

641
00:37:52,680 --> 00:37:55,960
Speaker 2: to make them stop, and then they do a little more,

642
00:37:56,040 --> 00:37:57,239
Speaker 2: and we do a little more, and we do a

643
00:37:57,280 --> 00:38:00,399
Speaker 2: little more, and they maybe mobilize their forces on side

644
00:38:00,400 --> 00:38:03,759
Speaker 2: of the strait or start doing economic coercion, and we

645
00:38:03,920 --> 00:38:07,719
Speaker 2: start surging ships to the region, and you know the

646
00:38:07,800 --> 00:38:11,320
Speaker 2: market starts getting nervous, and then by the time we

647
00:38:11,400 --> 00:38:14,240
Speaker 2: actually get to the to the precipice, it's a completely

648
00:38:14,280 --> 00:38:15,040
Speaker 2: different situation.

649
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Speaker 1: use that code. The other thing that I fear is

681
00:40:09,680 --> 00:40:14,000
Speaker 1: about to happen with for those that want Taiwan independent

682
00:40:15,160 --> 00:40:20,280
Speaker 1: is that they flee the country and given what's happening

683
00:40:20,400 --> 00:40:27,440
Speaker 1: with the big chip maker there at t SMC, thank you.

684
00:40:27,760 --> 00:40:30,640
Speaker 1: I was going to say TCMs and the fact that

685
00:40:30,719 --> 00:40:33,200
Speaker 1: they're basically stuck having to build their business in the

686
00:40:33,280 --> 00:40:37,080
Speaker 1: United States now right, something that it's been fascinating to watch,

687
00:40:37,160 --> 00:40:40,279
Speaker 1: where it's so clear that company wishes they weren't doing this.

688
00:40:40,960 --> 00:40:42,759
Speaker 1: They're doing this because they feel like they have to,

689
00:40:43,000 --> 00:40:49,320
Speaker 1: not because they want to. Could the unintended consequence be

690
00:40:49,480 --> 00:40:52,719
Speaker 1: that those that want to fight just leave, and then

691
00:40:52,840 --> 00:40:55,719
Speaker 1: those that stay just want to have peace and then

692
00:40:56,040 --> 00:40:57,040
Speaker 1: become more compliant.

693
00:40:57,880 --> 00:41:02,279
Speaker 2: Possibly, uh, But I think it would take a lot

694
00:41:03,160 --> 00:41:05,560
Speaker 2: to get to the point where all those people leave.

695
00:41:06,040 --> 00:41:08,360
Speaker 2: You know, there's elites. And when I go to Taipei

696
00:41:08,680 --> 00:41:11,480
Speaker 2: and I have, you know, friends who are in business,

697
00:41:11,520 --> 00:41:13,680
Speaker 2: and you know, they're going out to Omakase every night,

698
00:41:13,760 --> 00:41:16,520
Speaker 2: and like some of them have Canadian citizenship for their kids,

699
00:41:16,560 --> 00:41:19,919
Speaker 2: and they've got the ski chalet and Switzerland or whatever.

700
00:41:20,040 --> 00:41:23,320
Speaker 2: And some of these people do exist in Taiwan. But

701
00:41:24,120 --> 00:41:27,600
Speaker 2: for the most part, ordinary people, they don't have a

702
00:41:27,640 --> 00:41:30,440
Speaker 2: place to go. They don't have a visa status that

703
00:41:30,480 --> 00:41:32,319
Speaker 2: allows them to just pick up and go to Japan

704
00:41:32,440 --> 00:41:35,560
Speaker 2: or Australia or somewha else. And it takes a lot

705
00:41:35,760 --> 00:41:40,680
Speaker 2: to walk away in abandon your home. And what could

706
00:41:40,840 --> 00:41:45,160
Speaker 2: happen and what I warnt about in the book, so

707
00:41:45,280 --> 00:41:48,840
Speaker 2: you mentioned wargames, right. The wargames usually start with the

708
00:41:48,880 --> 00:41:53,120
Speaker 2: wargame I played a couple of weeks ago. It started

709
00:41:53,239 --> 00:41:57,319
Speaker 2: with you know, in the pre turn, US Team China

710
00:41:57,360 --> 00:42:00,680
Speaker 2: had blown up a US aircraft carrier. Like, so that's

711
00:42:00,760 --> 00:42:03,640
Speaker 2: like T equals zero, that's like the first turn. But

712
00:42:03,760 --> 00:42:06,120
Speaker 2: that's not in the real world. How a crisis happens.

713
00:42:08,000 --> 00:42:12,800
Speaker 2: The crisis starts happening before those first shots. And usually

714
00:42:12,840 --> 00:42:16,120
Speaker 2: what would happen historically is people would say, well, this

715
00:42:16,239 --> 00:42:17,960
Speaker 2: is basically a non issue. It's a non issue. It's

716
00:42:17,960 --> 00:42:20,040
Speaker 2: a non issue until everyone panics at the same time,

717
00:42:20,800 --> 00:42:22,560
Speaker 2: and then how do you get everyone out of the country,

718
00:42:23,360 --> 00:42:27,120
Speaker 2: Like we thought that the evacuations from Saigon and Cobble

719
00:42:27,200 --> 00:42:32,279
Speaker 2: were hard. Try type ai right, right, Taiwan is a

720
00:42:33,080 --> 00:42:36,560
Speaker 2: is a wealthy, sophisticated democracy with tens of millions of people.

721
00:42:37,200 --> 00:42:40,480
Speaker 2: There's eight hundred thousand foreigners there right now, including tens

722
00:42:40,520 --> 00:42:43,840
Speaker 2: of thousands of Americans. We got thousands of Brits, of Japanese,

723
00:42:43,880 --> 00:42:47,040
Speaker 2: of Germans, of Australians and so on. How do you

724
00:42:47,040 --> 00:42:51,600
Speaker 2: get all those people out? If I'm China, I want

725
00:42:51,640 --> 00:42:54,719
Speaker 2: to put the squeeze on to see if the Americans

726
00:42:54,840 --> 00:42:58,120
Speaker 2: yank their people, because once the foreigners try to pull

727
00:42:58,160 --> 00:43:00,560
Speaker 2: out their citizens, what is that message say to the

728
00:43:00,640 --> 00:43:02,080
Speaker 2: people of Taiwan. You're on your own.

729
00:43:03,120 --> 00:43:06,080
Speaker 1: You're on your own. But doesn't this war not start

730
00:43:06,160 --> 00:43:07,960
Speaker 1: with a I mean you sort of seem to outline

731
00:43:08,040 --> 00:43:10,560
Speaker 1: this not with a shot fire, but with essentially a

732
00:43:10,600 --> 00:43:13,880
Speaker 1: blockade of the island, right, I mean that's the I

733
00:43:13,920 --> 00:43:16,759
Speaker 1: think the wargame I participated and that was the beginning, right,

734
00:43:16,840 --> 00:43:19,400
Speaker 1: and then it got the United States to send military

735
00:43:19,480 --> 00:43:22,000
Speaker 1: you know that that's what triggered the US military response

736
00:43:22,080 --> 00:43:26,560
Speaker 1: of then sending a presence to try to break the blockade.

737
00:43:27,160 --> 00:43:29,799
Speaker 2: I think the blockade is not plan A. I think

738
00:43:29,840 --> 00:43:33,479
Speaker 2: blockade is planned B for a couple of reasons. First

739
00:43:33,520 --> 00:43:36,680
Speaker 2: of all, according to the Taiwan Relations Act, if the

740
00:43:36,680 --> 00:43:38,480
Speaker 2: President wants to ben in Taiwan, the President's going to

741
00:43:38,520 --> 00:43:41,439
Speaker 2: ban in Taiwan. But according to the Taiwan Relations Act

742
00:43:41,960 --> 00:43:46,920
Speaker 2: and probably eighty percent of Congress, a blockade of Taiwan

743
00:43:48,080 --> 00:43:53,120
Speaker 2: is tantamount to an invasion for the reason that China

744
00:43:53,200 --> 00:43:57,560
Speaker 2: is trying now to get the TSMC chip making facilities,

745
00:43:58,400 --> 00:44:01,880
Speaker 2: and they're declaring war'st the people of Taiwan the civilians

746
00:44:01,920 --> 00:44:05,040
Speaker 2: of Taiwan. Blockade means no food, no fuel, nothing in

747
00:44:05,200 --> 00:44:09,400
Speaker 2: or out, and that I think creates such a humanitarian

748
00:44:09,480 --> 00:44:13,040
Speaker 2: emergency that it's just such an appalling thing.

749
00:44:13,160 --> 00:44:14,920
Speaker 1: We're in the middle of doing this right now in

750
00:44:15,000 --> 00:44:15,719
Speaker 1: our hemisphere.

751
00:44:17,400 --> 00:44:23,360
Speaker 2: It's true, it's true, but Taiwan, among other things, is

752
00:44:23,400 --> 00:44:26,320
Speaker 2: the epicenter of the ai Revolution. Ninety nine percent of

753
00:44:26,520 --> 00:44:29,640
Speaker 2: the in video GPUs that that are training the next

754
00:44:29,760 --> 00:44:33,160
Speaker 2: Claude and GPT are coming from Taiwan. You don't want

755
00:44:33,280 --> 00:44:36,080
Speaker 2: China to just seize those let alone sees those factories

756
00:44:36,200 --> 00:44:43,040
Speaker 2: completely intact with all the engineers. So I think if

757
00:44:43,080 --> 00:44:46,200
Speaker 2: they blockade, they create a panic, they get the whole

758
00:44:46,239 --> 00:44:48,439
Speaker 2: world against them, in the same way the whole world

759
00:44:48,520 --> 00:44:49,640
Speaker 2: is against Iran right now.

760
00:44:50,040 --> 00:44:52,360
Speaker 1: Interesting what they could just think a blockade is so

761
00:44:52,480 --> 00:44:56,719
Speaker 1: aggressive that those that might be neutral about this issue thinking, hey,

762
00:44:56,760 --> 00:44:57,520
Speaker 1: this ain't our fight.

763
00:44:58,080 --> 00:45:00,759
Speaker 2: Yeah, much much much, much much more like likely they

764
00:45:00,800 --> 00:45:01,000
Speaker 2: do it.

765
00:45:01,040 --> 00:45:04,800
Speaker 1: That's what happened with Ukraine, right the invasion. Russia's invasion United,

766
00:45:05,120 --> 00:45:08,080
Speaker 1: you know, brought Europe together in a way that I

767
00:45:08,120 --> 00:45:09,960
Speaker 1: think Putin failed to imagine.

768
00:45:10,239 --> 00:45:12,480
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, and I think much more likely they do

769
00:45:13,040 --> 00:45:16,520
Speaker 2: what I call it quarantine or some have called an

770
00:45:16,560 --> 00:45:17,840
Speaker 2: indirect control scenario.

771
00:45:18,239 --> 00:45:21,000
Speaker 1: What is quarantine? What what makes quarantine different from a

772
00:45:21,080 --> 00:45:21,480
Speaker 1: black eight?

773
00:45:22,040 --> 00:45:24,719
Speaker 2: What's different is it's not saying nothing can come or go.

774
00:45:25,440 --> 00:45:27,279
Speaker 2: It's just saying we control what comes and goes.

775
00:45:27,760 --> 00:45:28,120
Speaker 1: Gotcha.

776
00:45:28,480 --> 00:45:30,920
Speaker 2: So it's saying, you want to fly from San Francisco

777
00:45:31,000 --> 00:45:36,640
Speaker 2: to Taipei. Cool, connect in the port of Shanghai or Fujo,

778
00:45:36,719 --> 00:45:39,080
Speaker 2: in the airport in Fujo and clear customs.

779
00:45:39,680 --> 00:45:41,400
Speaker 1: And decide whether you clear customs or not.

780
00:45:41,560 --> 00:45:44,440
Speaker 2: Will decide whether or not. Oh, you want to you

781
00:45:44,520 --> 00:45:47,800
Speaker 2: want to export these chips terribly, Sorry, you have to

782
00:45:47,880 --> 00:45:52,240
Speaker 2: go through this port in China. And that means essentially

783
00:45:52,360 --> 00:45:54,880
Speaker 2: Timewan's on it. If we if we give into that principle,

784
00:45:55,040 --> 00:45:58,400
Speaker 2: we're checkmated because we're not going to be able to

785
00:45:58,440 --> 00:46:02,200
Speaker 2: send more diplomats, more military, Taiwan will never be able

786
00:46:02,239 --> 00:46:04,800
Speaker 2: to build the weapons it needs to defend itself, and

787
00:46:05,160 --> 00:46:07,520
Speaker 2: China will seize control over the chip supply chain with

788
00:46:07,600 --> 00:46:12,400
Speaker 2: those factories intact. And that's a much. But then they

789
00:46:12,440 --> 00:46:15,319
Speaker 2: can say we're not waging war against the civilians. We're

790
00:46:15,360 --> 00:46:18,480
Speaker 2: not saying you can't send oil and food, right, and

791
00:46:18,600 --> 00:46:21,920
Speaker 2: then blockade you know, the really medieval stuff. That's a

792
00:46:21,960 --> 00:46:24,400
Speaker 2: plan B, and everyone knows it's there. And if we

793
00:46:24,440 --> 00:46:26,600
Speaker 2: don't play ball, it's always something that they can blockade.

794
00:46:26,640 --> 00:46:28,800
Speaker 2: Is what you're saying is blockade might as well be

795
00:46:28,840 --> 00:46:34,200
Speaker 2: a declaration of war. Correct, Let's let's let's end this

796
00:46:34,480 --> 00:46:40,080
Speaker 2: conversation with something that I think we're I'm constantly you know,

797
00:46:41,040 --> 00:46:45,040
Speaker 2: we all know this. Dictatorships they and slowly.

798
00:46:44,760 --> 00:46:48,800
Speaker 1: Then quickly, yeah, right when things go south with the people,

799
00:46:49,040 --> 00:46:51,520
Speaker 1: they suddenly you know, it's incremental, and then it's it's

800
00:46:51,560 --> 00:46:55,839
Speaker 1: suddenly gone. There's a massive youth unemployment in China. There's

801
00:46:56,280 --> 00:47:00,600
Speaker 1: all of the you know, I've I could continue my

802
00:47:00,880 --> 00:47:07,160
Speaker 1: My optimism about US China relationships are simply that China's

803
00:47:08,000 --> 00:47:11,480
Speaker 1: you know, they've grown a middle class that is going

804
00:47:11,560 --> 00:47:14,719
Speaker 1: to demand some services. Now we see it in our

805
00:47:14,800 --> 00:47:18,839
Speaker 1: more mature economy, and and you know that that can

806
00:47:19,000 --> 00:47:26,600
Speaker 1: be the lynchpin between domestic strife and domestic equility. You

807
00:47:26,680 --> 00:47:31,000
Speaker 1: know this is China's economy has not been great as

808
00:47:31,040 --> 00:47:33,279
Speaker 1: far as they've at least when you and everything is

809
00:47:33,520 --> 00:47:36,920
Speaker 1: by comparison. Yes, they're still growing in a large faster

810
00:47:37,040 --> 00:47:39,960
Speaker 1: clip than than we are. Well, we're two different economies

811
00:47:40,040 --> 00:47:40,319
Speaker 1: or something.

812
00:47:40,320 --> 00:47:42,000
Speaker 2: I don't think they are. By the way, the data.

813
00:47:42,160 --> 00:47:44,360
Speaker 1: Interesting, you think the numbers are. They're fudging their numbers

814
00:47:44,360 --> 00:47:46,959
Speaker 1: a little bit. But the point is it's pretty clear.

815
00:47:47,200 --> 00:47:50,560
Speaker 1: This is they've got an issue. They've got cranky middle class,

816
00:47:50,640 --> 00:47:54,200
Speaker 1: they've got youth unemployment, they have their own population issues.

817
00:47:56,080 --> 00:48:00,360
Speaker 1: How stable are things domestically in your view? You know, again,

818
00:48:01,000 --> 00:48:03,960
Speaker 1: it's like with Russia, that economy is horrendous, and yet

819
00:48:04,560 --> 00:48:08,040
Speaker 1: you know they're just for now sticking with them because

820
00:48:08,080 --> 00:48:10,160
Speaker 1: there isn't an obvious alternative at the moment.

821
00:48:10,440 --> 00:48:11,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think you said it best. In

822
00:48:11,920 --> 00:48:16,240
Speaker 2: an authoritarian regime, things are stable until they're not, because

823
00:48:16,640 --> 00:48:18,960
Speaker 2: no one wants to go against the guy with the guns.

824
00:48:19,480 --> 00:48:19,600
Speaker 1: Right.

825
00:48:20,760 --> 00:48:24,279
Speaker 2: China has some massive structural headwinds, and I think the

826
00:48:24,360 --> 00:48:27,120
Speaker 2: way to think about their economy is the only way

827
00:48:27,200 --> 00:48:32,160
Speaker 2: they have left to grow is through exports, which is

828
00:48:32,280 --> 00:48:34,239
Speaker 2: another way to say this is the only way they have.

829
00:48:34,480 --> 00:48:35,480
Speaker 1: Well, that's deterrence.

830
00:48:35,800 --> 00:48:38,600
Speaker 2: That's great, stealing growth from other countries, sure, but.

831
00:48:38,760 --> 00:48:41,880
Speaker 1: In some ways, if they don't have stable relations around

832
00:48:41,880 --> 00:48:42,919
Speaker 1: the world, they can't grow.

833
00:48:43,480 --> 00:48:47,680
Speaker 2: Yes, So that's this is the economic piece of min deterrence.

834
00:48:47,920 --> 00:48:50,959
Speaker 2: Concept in the book. I think, you know, the first

835
00:48:51,160 --> 00:48:54,120
Speaker 2: question with economic deterrence is if we go to the brink,

836
00:48:54,200 --> 00:48:56,440
Speaker 2: do we have a contingency plan for the crisis and

837
00:48:56,480 --> 00:48:58,640
Speaker 2: we do not just barrel into the crisis or that

838
00:48:58,760 --> 00:49:01,320
Speaker 2: thinking that markets are going to go crazy, you know,

839
00:49:01,400 --> 00:49:02,360
Speaker 2: prices will go up.

840
00:49:02,560 --> 00:49:03,320
Speaker 1: How do we deal with this?

841
00:49:03,680 --> 00:49:06,239
Speaker 2: So you need a plan for that, But then you

842
00:49:06,360 --> 00:49:09,440
Speaker 2: also need a plan how do you use a Taiwan

843
00:49:09,520 --> 00:49:14,840
Speaker 2: crisis as an opportunity to reset the world economy on

844
00:49:14,960 --> 00:49:16,960
Speaker 2: terms that are more favorable to the rest of the

845
00:49:17,000 --> 00:49:22,760
Speaker 2: world and less favorable to China and the you know, India, Brazil, Indine,

846
00:49:22,880 --> 00:49:26,840
Speaker 2: these countries may not take our position exactly on Taiwan,

847
00:49:27,320 --> 00:49:29,279
Speaker 2: but none of them want to be hollowed out the

848
00:49:29,360 --> 00:49:33,239
Speaker 2: way the American rust belt was by just the tsunami

849
00:49:33,320 --> 00:49:35,959
Speaker 2: of Chinese experts. And that's the world that China wants,

850
00:49:36,440 --> 00:49:40,160
Speaker 2: a world where China makes everything and you they're the

851
00:49:40,239 --> 00:49:42,759
Speaker 2: factory and you're the farm. Like they want to turn

852
00:49:43,200 --> 00:49:46,640
Speaker 2: turn us into Argentina. That's the goal, and no one

853
00:49:46,719 --> 00:49:49,680
Speaker 2: wants that. And so how do you build a coalition

854
00:49:49,960 --> 00:49:52,040
Speaker 2: of not just your allies but the whole rest of

855
00:49:52,120 --> 00:49:55,280
Speaker 2: the world and say if God forbid, deterrence fails over Taiwan,

856
00:49:56,120 --> 00:49:58,799
Speaker 2: whatever happens over the fate of Taiwan, we have an

857
00:49:58,800 --> 00:50:01,160
Speaker 2: idea for how we're going to re set use this

858
00:50:01,320 --> 00:50:03,359
Speaker 2: to reset the global trading system in the way we're

859
00:50:03,440 --> 00:50:07,279
Speaker 2: China can't pull this stuff anymore, and then you're taking

860
00:50:07,360 --> 00:50:10,319
Speaker 2: the juice out of their economic machine. One hundred million

861
00:50:10,360 --> 00:50:13,320
Speaker 2: people in China are employed making stuff for export. You

862
00:50:13,440 --> 00:50:16,320
Speaker 2: take those jobs away, that is what implodes their regime.

863
00:50:16,520 --> 00:50:19,120
Speaker 2: But you can't do that overnight. It's a ten year,

864
00:50:19,280 --> 00:50:20,200
Speaker 2: fifteen year project.

865
00:50:20,560 --> 00:50:23,840
Speaker 1: Well, and it's now a twenty year project, right because

866
00:50:24,120 --> 00:50:28,160
Speaker 1: this president has set back economic relations with every single

867
00:50:28,480 --> 00:50:33,480
Speaker 1: country on this gloat on this earth with his tariff

868
00:50:33,719 --> 00:50:39,680
Speaker 1: policies that have completely shaken up relationships. I mean, look

869
00:50:39,719 --> 00:50:42,120
Speaker 1: at this deal that China cuts with Canada. We work

870
00:50:42,360 --> 00:50:46,520
Speaker 1: for the last decade to keep Canada from doing these

871
00:50:46,600 --> 00:50:50,560
Speaker 1: deals with China, and now, understandably, so what choice. If

872
00:50:50,600 --> 00:50:54,320
Speaker 1: you're in Canada's shoes, you look at it like, we

873
00:50:54,440 --> 00:50:57,160
Speaker 1: can't we can't trust the Americans at this moment. For

874
00:50:57,239 --> 00:51:01,480
Speaker 1: our for our economic We're gonna have to We're going

875
00:51:01,560 --> 00:51:04,680
Speaker 1: to have to play ball with everybody. I mean, how

876
00:51:04,800 --> 00:51:09,080
Speaker 1: much has this tariff strategy of Trump's made it harder

877
00:51:09,400 --> 00:51:12,480
Speaker 1: to rally what you just described here, which would be

878
00:51:12,840 --> 00:51:17,920
Speaker 1: very rational economic deterrence of China. How much, how much?

879
00:51:18,680 --> 00:51:19,960
Speaker 1: How much of a setback this has been.

880
00:51:20,480 --> 00:51:23,800
Speaker 2: It's been one step forward but two steps back. And

881
00:51:24,320 --> 00:51:26,920
Speaker 2: the reason is China is so big of a challenge.

882
00:51:27,480 --> 00:51:30,840
Speaker 2: China is a third of global manufacturing. You cannot just

883
00:51:31,800 --> 00:51:35,400
Speaker 2: stop buying stuff from them overnight. Won't work. They're in

884
00:51:35,440 --> 00:51:38,000
Speaker 2: every supply chain and you can't tell other people to

885
00:51:38,080 --> 00:51:42,080
Speaker 2: do that either. So we learned this on Liberation Day.

886
00:51:42,280 --> 00:51:44,320
Speaker 2: We're like, we're going to go called Turkey on trade

887
00:51:44,320 --> 00:51:47,520
Speaker 2: with China. Ooops that that's not gonna work. And countries

888
00:51:47,560 --> 00:51:49,160
Speaker 2: that are even more dependent on trade with China are

889
00:51:49,200 --> 00:51:52,719
Speaker 2: never going to do that. But what we have discovered is,

890
00:51:53,560 --> 00:51:55,560
Speaker 2: you know, no credit to the Trump administration on this,

891
00:51:55,760 --> 00:52:00,680
Speaker 2: just credit to China's predatory trade policies. China is hollowing

892
00:52:00,760 --> 00:52:04,759
Speaker 2: out the industrial base of the European Union, like Europeans

893
00:52:04,800 --> 00:52:09,200
Speaker 2: are raising the populist parties because Volkswagen is dying, right,

894
00:52:09,640 --> 00:52:12,040
Speaker 2: The economic heart of the European Union is dying. And

895
00:52:12,120 --> 00:52:13,719
Speaker 2: it's if you go to India, if you go to

896
00:52:13,760 --> 00:52:16,400
Speaker 2: South Korea, it's it's the same thing. They're being swamped

897
00:52:16,440 --> 00:52:20,839
Speaker 2: by Chinese products. So the solution is, in principle, as

898
00:52:20,920 --> 00:52:23,720
Speaker 2: many countries as possible should put up tariffs on China,

899
00:52:24,080 --> 00:52:26,880
Speaker 2: and they should take them down on one another. Because

900
00:52:27,000 --> 00:52:29,480
Speaker 2: what broke the global trading system is not that trade

901
00:52:29,520 --> 00:52:33,520
Speaker 2: itself is bad. It's that we allowed a communist country

902
00:52:33,560 --> 00:52:35,640
Speaker 2: that doesn't play by the rules into the system.

903
00:52:36,120 --> 00:52:41,920
Speaker 1: Yeah, boy, it'd be nice if if America created this coalition.

904
00:52:42,080 --> 00:52:45,360
Speaker 1: Maybe we could call it the Trans Pacific Partnership and

905
00:52:45,600 --> 00:52:51,239
Speaker 1: it was a alliance of of Asian Pacific countries not

906
00:52:51,400 --> 00:52:54,000
Speaker 1: named China and the United States. Oh wait, we tried that.

907
00:52:55,640 --> 00:52:59,160
Speaker 2: TPP isn't coming back, but some version could really use it.

908
00:53:00,120 --> 00:53:02,840
Speaker 2: Version of it, some version of it is. And you

909
00:53:02,960 --> 00:53:06,000
Speaker 2: already see the beginnings of this with the US deal

910
00:53:06,040 --> 00:53:09,040
Speaker 2: with Japan. Just announce on the Takaichi visit. There's going

911
00:53:09,120 --> 00:53:12,040
Speaker 2: to be co op collaboration on economic security, supply chains,

912
00:53:12,080 --> 00:53:14,560
Speaker 2: critical minerals. We're working with the Europeans on this stuff.

913
00:53:14,560 --> 00:53:17,200
Speaker 2: Why because China is so big of a challenge that

914
00:53:17,480 --> 00:53:21,759
Speaker 2: actually this time we don't have a choice but resetting

915
00:53:21,800 --> 00:53:26,640
Speaker 2: the terms of this international trading system. If we're doing

916
00:53:26,719 --> 00:53:29,200
Speaker 2: it in peacetime, it's going to be step by step.

917
00:53:29,239 --> 00:53:31,759
Speaker 2: It's going to be political and messy. What we should

918
00:53:31,800 --> 00:53:36,040
Speaker 2: be thinking about is if God forbid, deterrence fails with China,

919
00:53:36,560 --> 00:53:38,759
Speaker 2: there's the question of what you do economically on day

920
00:53:38,840 --> 00:53:41,840
Speaker 2: one to prevent the financial crisis, and then there's the

921
00:53:41,920 --> 00:53:43,880
Speaker 2: question of what you want the world to look like

922
00:53:44,000 --> 00:53:47,120
Speaker 2: on day one hundred, day one thousand, day two thousand,

923
00:53:47,840 --> 00:53:51,840
Speaker 2: after the immediate hostilities are over. This is like a

924
00:53:51,920 --> 00:53:55,120
Speaker 2: break the glass scenario. So if this happens with China,

925
00:53:55,280 --> 00:53:57,960
Speaker 2: our trading, our economic relationship with them won't be the same.

926
00:53:58,400 --> 00:54:01,280
Speaker 2: Maybe we'll have some probably we will not break it entirely,

927
00:54:01,520 --> 00:54:03,800
Speaker 2: but it won't be the same. So what what is

928
00:54:03,880 --> 00:54:06,160
Speaker 2: our vision for what it should look like? And that

929
00:54:06,360 --> 00:54:08,319
Speaker 2: is the contingency plan that we should be doing now.

930
00:54:08,360 --> 00:54:10,759
Speaker 2: You're not going to have like a perfect plan, you know,

931
00:54:10,920 --> 00:54:13,040
Speaker 2: in a in a desk and you take it out

932
00:54:13,040 --> 00:54:16,360
Speaker 2: of the envelope, but you can agree on principles, the

933
00:54:16,480 --> 00:54:19,280
Speaker 2: basic ideas of like how that system should be organized.

934
00:54:19,520 --> 00:54:22,120
Speaker 2: Those are the conversations we should be having now to

935
00:54:22,200 --> 00:54:26,320
Speaker 2: imagine that the world after wouldn't necessarily just be economic

936
00:54:26,440 --> 00:54:29,200
Speaker 2: mutually sure destruction, there's another way through, you.

937
00:54:29,239 --> 00:54:32,040
Speaker 1: Know, you're actually outlining and this look, I kind of

938
00:54:32,120 --> 00:54:34,680
Speaker 1: think that we ought to be thinking like that, that

939
00:54:34,800 --> 00:54:38,640
Speaker 1: we're basically about to have another Cold War in the

940
00:54:38,719 --> 00:54:43,400
Speaker 1: best case, right, And in some ways, isn't that what

941
00:54:43,480 --> 00:54:47,120
Speaker 1: you're articulating, Like let's let's let's put together a plan

942
00:54:47,239 --> 00:54:51,880
Speaker 1: to effectively win a Cold war against China kind of.

943
00:54:52,280 --> 00:54:54,759
Speaker 2: But this, this situation is different from the Cold War

944
00:54:54,840 --> 00:54:58,719
Speaker 2: and some fundamental ways, and the biggest one is that

945
00:54:59,040 --> 00:55:00,719
Speaker 2: we're all economically interconnected.

946
00:55:01,000 --> 00:55:03,839
Speaker 1: No, right, the Soviets had no economic skin in the game, right,

947
00:55:03,880 --> 00:55:05,640
Speaker 1: It made it easy to isolate them, and it made

948
00:55:05,640 --> 00:55:09,160
Speaker 1: it easy for them to then, you know, make a

949
00:55:09,320 --> 00:55:12,200
Speaker 1: common cause with those isolated with them exactly.

950
00:55:12,320 --> 00:55:15,080
Speaker 2: And what's different about the world now is that not

951
00:55:15,200 --> 00:55:19,080
Speaker 2: only are we and the US and China deeply economically interconnected,

952
00:55:19,480 --> 00:55:21,400
Speaker 2: but even if you imagine a world where we get

953
00:55:21,440 --> 00:55:24,759
Speaker 2: divorced or we just like pretend to get divorced, we're

954
00:55:24,760 --> 00:55:27,200
Speaker 2: still going to be trading with each other via Mexico

955
00:55:27,640 --> 00:55:31,239
Speaker 2: and Europe and India and everyone else. So there's no

956
00:55:32,000 --> 00:55:34,719
Speaker 2: there's no universe in which you bifurcate the world, and

957
00:55:34,880 --> 00:55:37,160
Speaker 2: it's just like China on the one side and US

958
00:55:37,320 --> 00:55:39,200
Speaker 2: and everyone on the other. It's going to be a

959
00:55:39,280 --> 00:55:43,719
Speaker 2: trifurcated world where like, if deterrence collapses and we have

960
00:55:43,800 --> 00:55:47,160
Speaker 2: to reset the economic relationship, we're going to be trading

961
00:55:47,280 --> 00:55:49,560
Speaker 2: some with them. Maybe we'll still buy their nikes, but

962
00:55:49,640 --> 00:55:53,160
Speaker 2: we won't buy their iPhones or something. And then there's

963
00:55:53,160 --> 00:55:55,000
Speaker 2: a whole lot of countries in between the trade with

964
00:55:55,080 --> 00:55:58,000
Speaker 2: both sides, and we don't want those countries to sell

965
00:55:58,040 --> 00:56:00,600
Speaker 2: our nvidio chips to China, and we don't want those

966
00:56:00,680 --> 00:56:06,400
Speaker 2: countries to sell components that China can sabotage remotely access

967
00:56:06,560 --> 00:56:09,719
Speaker 2: or something into us. And so that means you need

968
00:56:09,840 --> 00:56:13,840
Speaker 2: to reimagine how the whole economic system is wired. Because

969
00:56:13,840 --> 00:56:16,280
Speaker 2: you actually have to have control over the entire supply

970
00:56:16,400 --> 00:56:19,160
Speaker 2: chain nowhere goods are coming from, know where all the

971
00:56:19,200 --> 00:56:23,200
Speaker 2: components come from. That's a completely different architecture. You need

972
00:56:23,719 --> 00:56:26,319
Speaker 2: institutions that don't exist to do that. But that may

973
00:56:26,400 --> 00:56:27,680
Speaker 2: be the world that we're moving towards.

974
00:56:28,920 --> 00:56:32,640
Speaker 1: Well, like, this was pretty thought provoking, and you know,

975
00:56:33,719 --> 00:56:35,799
Speaker 1: you dealt with so much nuance, it's hard to turn

976
00:56:35,880 --> 00:56:38,919
Speaker 1: this into a fifty fifteen second social media bite.

977
00:56:39,000 --> 00:56:42,600
Speaker 2: Come on, now, Well, it's podcasts like yours that help

978
00:56:42,719 --> 00:56:43,760
Speaker 2: us dig into the details.

979
00:56:44,000 --> 00:56:48,080
Speaker 1: No, I mean, it's it sounds like you don't think

980
00:56:48,160 --> 00:56:51,560
Speaker 1: this is inevitable, and you're actually assume at this point

981
00:56:52,480 --> 00:56:55,399
Speaker 1: that we're probably not going to have a kinetic hot

982
00:56:55,600 --> 00:57:00,839
Speaker 1: Connecticut kinetic military exchange with China this decade. I think

983
00:57:00,920 --> 00:57:03,959
Speaker 1: you see work. Just the way you're speaking, you seem

984
00:57:04,000 --> 00:57:06,600
Speaker 1: pretty confident that I know you said hope, but that if.

985
00:57:06,520 --> 00:57:10,600
Speaker 2: We if we do, I think we'll win, but are

986
00:57:10,640 --> 00:57:11,160
Speaker 2: not ready.

987
00:57:11,719 --> 00:57:12,399
Speaker 1: That is what you're saying.

988
00:57:12,640 --> 00:57:15,160
Speaker 2: I think there's a lot of uncertainty, but I like

989
00:57:15,239 --> 00:57:16,320
Speaker 2: our odds more than theirs.

990
00:57:17,440 --> 00:57:22,280
Speaker 1: And you think she is reality based enough to know this.

991
00:57:22,880 --> 00:57:27,160
Speaker 2: It's so basically, it's just really really hard to get

992
00:57:27,240 --> 00:57:29,640
Speaker 2: tens of thousands of guys across the taime went straight.

993
00:57:29,720 --> 00:57:31,160
Speaker 2: I mean, this is like, this is one of the

994
00:57:31,280 --> 00:57:33,880
Speaker 2: nastiest waterwiess in the world. You've got like fifty mile

995
00:57:33,920 --> 00:57:36,560
Speaker 2: an hour winds, fifty foot waves in the islands in

996
00:57:36,560 --> 00:57:37,240
Speaker 2: the middle of the strait.

997
00:57:37,280 --> 00:57:39,080
Speaker 1: The trees go aside, Well just wait till we have

998
00:57:39,320 --> 00:57:42,440
Speaker 1: you know, sharks with lasers on them as well.

999
00:57:42,560 --> 00:57:45,760
Speaker 2: Right, and and undersea drones and all the and the Yeah,

1000
00:57:46,400 --> 00:57:49,200
Speaker 2: lots of lasers involved, but like, what you really don't

1001
00:57:49,200 --> 00:57:51,080
Speaker 2: want to do if your season paying is put fifteen

1002
00:57:51,120 --> 00:57:53,480
Speaker 2: thousand troops on the beaches and then be unable to

1003
00:57:53,560 --> 00:57:58,000
Speaker 2: supply them and watch them get massacred. So a lot

1004
00:57:58,080 --> 00:58:00,520
Speaker 2: has to go right for him. There's many pathways that

1005
00:58:00,560 --> 00:58:02,520
Speaker 2: are just passive least resistance.

1006
00:58:03,360 --> 00:58:05,880
Speaker 1: This I should have asked as sooner. But it's a

1007
00:58:05,960 --> 00:58:07,040
Speaker 1: question I'm meant to ask.

1008
00:58:07,840 --> 00:58:08,040
Speaker 2: Is the.

1009
00:58:09,720 --> 00:58:11,880
Speaker 1: You know, there's always been this question. Boy, the Chinese

1010
00:58:11,920 --> 00:58:16,000
Speaker 1: military hasn't been tested. How would they test themselves? Is

1011
00:58:16,040 --> 00:58:19,000
Speaker 1: there another action they might take that has little that

1012
00:58:19,120 --> 00:58:22,000
Speaker 1: we don't care about, that they may do that they may,

1013
00:58:22,640 --> 00:58:25,560
Speaker 1: you know, in some ways the way the Russians you know,

1014
00:58:26,520 --> 00:58:30,280
Speaker 1: went into Georgia and things like that, or is there

1015
00:58:30,440 --> 00:58:34,560
Speaker 1: some is there some way that they that that they

1016
00:58:34,600 --> 00:58:37,480
Speaker 1: would want to test their military might on a soft target.

1017
00:58:38,040 --> 00:58:39,680
Speaker 2: So you ask, you ask you is there a way

1018
00:58:39,680 --> 00:58:43,080
Speaker 2: that they can test? I think the thing to understand

1019
00:58:43,960 --> 00:58:47,240
Speaker 2: is that they have a direct pipeline of knowledge from

1020
00:58:47,280 --> 00:58:50,640
Speaker 2: the Russia Ukraine War, and they have a direct pipeline

1021
00:58:50,680 --> 00:58:52,480
Speaker 2: of knowledge from our ran.

1022
00:58:53,560 --> 00:58:55,120
Speaker 1: And that's their that's their test.

1023
00:58:55,600 --> 00:58:59,920
Speaker 2: They're using this as they are supplying the entire Russian

1024
00:59:01,160 --> 00:59:06,280
Speaker 2: military industrial ecosystem, but particularly Russia's drone base. And then

1025
00:59:06,640 --> 00:59:11,440
Speaker 2: just as importantly, they're learning the counter drone tech, right,

1026
00:59:11,520 --> 00:59:14,880
Speaker 2: the electronic warfare mainly that you use to kill drones.

1027
00:59:16,120 --> 00:59:18,680
Speaker 2: And then I am sure they've got a whole lot

1028
00:59:18,760 --> 00:59:24,000
Speaker 2: of spooks in Ukraine, yep, trying to buy up Ukrainian

1029
00:59:24,120 --> 00:59:27,320
Speaker 2: know how. So they're seeing both sides of that war

1030
00:59:27,640 --> 00:59:30,480
Speaker 2: in a way that we're not. That's the first thing.

1031
00:59:30,760 --> 00:59:32,439
Speaker 2: And then the second thing is in the Middle East,

1032
00:59:32,960 --> 00:59:35,080
Speaker 2: they're watching all they're seeing how we do a high

1033
00:59:35,080 --> 00:59:39,440
Speaker 2: intensity bombing campaign, and if we go in with special

1034
00:59:39,520 --> 00:59:44,520
Speaker 2: forces and Marines, they're going to see that too, and

1035
00:59:44,560 --> 00:59:46,800
Speaker 2: they're going to learn from that. And I wouldn't be

1036
00:59:46,880 --> 00:59:49,520
Speaker 2: surprised if they will have some advisors on the ground

1037
00:59:49,560 --> 00:59:55,040
Speaker 2: in Iran, very very quietly. But still it's like studying

1038
00:59:55,080 --> 00:59:56,760
Speaker 2: in a textbook. It's not the same thing as actually

1039
00:59:56,800 --> 01:00:00,240
Speaker 2: fighting for the thing. And as we said it you're

1040
01:00:00,280 --> 01:00:04,800
Speaker 2: in this conversation, it's one thing to learn how to

1041
01:00:04,880 --> 01:00:07,160
Speaker 2: fight a land war over years and years and years.

1042
01:00:08,400 --> 01:00:11,320
Speaker 2: It's another thing when you're fighting a war in the

1043
01:00:11,360 --> 01:00:14,400
Speaker 2: air and at sea, where basically everything's decided in the

1044
01:00:14,440 --> 01:00:17,240
Speaker 2: first forty eight hours, because if you lose your key

1045
01:00:17,360 --> 01:00:20,160
Speaker 2: assets in the first forty eight hours, there's no way

1046
01:00:20,160 --> 01:00:23,560
Speaker 2: you can come back and win, and that it puts

1047
01:00:23,640 --> 01:00:26,000
Speaker 2: more of an impetus on us to win quick and

1048
01:00:26,160 --> 01:00:29,000
Speaker 2: go big. I don't think they want to fight a

1049
01:00:29,040 --> 01:00:30,760
Speaker 2: war with us. It's too right.

1050
01:00:31,800 --> 01:00:34,240
Speaker 1: This is terrific. I really appreciate it. Good luck with

1051
01:00:34,280 --> 01:00:38,720
Speaker 1: the book again. The book is called Defending Taiwan. Make

1052
01:00:38,760 --> 01:00:41,840
Speaker 1: sure I get it right and reading Defending Taiwan a

1053
01:00:41,920 --> 01:00:45,840
Speaker 1: strategy to prevent war with China. Like I said, very nuanced,

1054
01:00:46,000 --> 01:00:49,720
Speaker 1: very rational, and a very important conversation. Really appreciate it.

1055
01:00:50,160 --> 01:00:50,720
Speaker 2: Thank you, Chuck.

1056
01:00:50,760 --> 01:00:51,240
Speaker 1: Appreciate it.