This week, Jeremi and Zachary are joined by Hal Brands and Michael Beckley to discuss China's rise as a military power, lessons from the Cold War, and the changing relationship between the United States and China.

Zachary sets the scene with his poem: "Probably"

Hal Brands is the Henry A. Kissinger Distinguished Professor of Global Affairs at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He is also a columnist for Bloomberg Opinion. He is the author of several books, including, most recently: The Twilight Struggle: What the Cold War Teaches Us about Great-Power Rivalry Today (2022), The Lessons of Tragedy: Statecraft and World Order (2019) co-authored with Charles Edel, and American Grand Strategy in the Age of Trump (2018). Professor Brands served as Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Strategic Planning from 2015 to 2016. He has also served as lead writer for the Commission on the National Defense Strategy for the United States, and consulted with government offices and agencies in the intelligence and national security communities.

Michael Beckley is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Tufts University and a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Previously, Michael was an International Security Fellow at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and worked for the U.S. Department of Defense, the RAND Corporation, and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He continues to advise offices within the U.S. Intelligence Community and U.S. Department of Defense. He published his first book in 2018: Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World’s Sole Superpower.

Brands and Beckley have co-written a new book: Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China: 

Danger Zone.

This episode was mixed and mastered by Karoline Pfeil.