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Wall Street Journal | China is “making incremental changes to the status quo that add up over time,” said Ely Ratner, a former assistant defense secretary for Indo-Pacific security affairs who is now a principal at the Marathon Initiative, a Washington think tank. “Every new little assertion of sovereignty and control matters.”........
Financial Times | “Allies won’t stick their necks out for Taipei if Trump is reducing support for Taiwan and cosying up to China. Beijing will take actions at some point that test the Taiwanese and US response,” says Ely Ratner, a former top Pentagon official now at the Marathon Initiative think-tank........
Word on Fire Institute | Wess Mitchell discusses his book Great Power Diplomacy and how diplomacy has allowed unlikely nations to grow empires, prevent wars, forge friendships, and make peace.........
New York Times | Trump’s accommodation of China may yield more military engagement in the near term, but it will also invite greater P.L.A. coercion against U.S. allies,” [Ratner] said, referring to the Chinese military. “That’s not a recipe for strategic stability.”........
Mackinder Forum | Wess Mitchell discusses Great Power Diplomacy and how great powers in history have utilized diplomacy as an instrument of grand strategy..........
Commonplace | Wess Mitchell discusses the renewed intensity of U.S. foreign policy debates, the Iran war, economic and military power, and the future of American power abroad.........
Waitt, What? Podcast | Wess Mitchell discusses the return of great power competition and why the world may be reverting back to something far more familiar: geopolitical rivalry between major powers..........
Net Assessment Podcast | This episode debates Wess Mitchell's proposed U.S. strategy of consolidation, as outlined in Foreign Affairs, and discusses whether it would realign America's objectives and resources.........
Foreign Affairs | Wess Mitchell discusses the strategy driving Trump’s second-term foreign policy and where that strategy should go from here.........
Semafor | Ely Ratner, a Biden-administration defense adviser, told me that Chinese leader Xi Jinping is “in a wait-and-see mode.” He argues (and most analysts agree) that Xi would prefer a peaceful solution........