BLOG Post #245: Overreach, the Achilles Heel of Autocrats 6 Oct 20196 Oct 2019 It Has Happened Here and Everywhere It seems like just yesterday that we were celebrating the democratic wave sweeping Europe in the wake of the Soviet Union’s collapse. It seems…
BLOG Post #241: China’s Hong Kong Nightmare, and the US Response 16 Aug 201916 Aug 2019 Donald Trump has kept his promise, reportedly made to Xi Jinping in June, that Washington would "tone down" its comments on the spiraling HK protests. "Very tough situation" Trump tweeted…
ARTICLES A Few Suggested New Readings 5 Aug 20195 Aug 2019 Video: A Moving Cry for Change in Gun Laws: https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2019/08/04/relative-of-victims-message-to-trump-dayton-ohio-mass-shooting-nr-vpx.cnn My friend and Asia scholar Mark Selden teamed up to write the following on “The Dangerous New US Consensus on…
BLOG Post #239: The US-China Trade War: A Cease-fire, Nothing More 25 Jul 201928 Jul 2019 The Financial Times reported on July 10 that Donald Trump, at his last meeting with Xi Jinping in Osaka in June, promised to “tone down” criticism of China’s actions in…
BLOG Post #238: Trump-Kim III: Making History Without Making Progress? 2 Jul 20192 Jul 2019 Taking a few steps onto North Korean soil, and posing for pictures with a friendly dictator, seem to fit Trump-era diplomacy better than a carefully laid out process. But unless…
BLOG Post #237: The Trump Way of War 29 Jun 20191 Aug 2019 Notice how similar are the Trump administration’s interactions with Iran and North Korea? The pattern in both cases is dangerous, ill-informed, and bound to fail. US adversaries by now understand…
BLOG Post #234: Why the Trade War with China is So Dangerous 4 Jun 20193 Jun 2019 The trade war with China that Trump so confidently predicted would result in a great new deal now threatens to become a permanent feature of US-China relations. Why that is…
BLOG Post #231: National Security—A Dangerous Confusion 7 May 201927 May 2019 This blog also appeared in Informed Consent, May 6, 2019, https://www.juancole.com/2019/05/backward-ignoring-interference.html There is a dangerous confusion in US national security policy when evaluating relations with Russia and China. The Trump…
BLOG Post #226: On China, the US Public Stands Apart 5 Feb 20194 Feb 2019 Why isn’t the American public as agitated about China as are the Trump administration, the mainstream media, and even many China specialists? In a recent article (www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/01/31/china-gap/), Daniel Drezner, a…
BLOG Post #225: Trump’s Crusade in Latin America 28 Jan 201927 Jan 2019 What we are witnessing in Venezuela is a Latin America policy that draws from the Cold War and the era of US interventions, when regard for democracy and international law…
BLOG Post #223: Happy New Year from Kim Jong-un 6 Jan 2019 Kim Jong-un looked quite cosmopolitan on January 1 as he made his annual New Year’s address to the nation from the comfort of a paneled office, wearing a spiffy Western-style…
APB What the Chinese are Saying About the Trade Summit 3 Dec 20183 Dec 2018 Kicking the can down the road is a familiar way to avoid dealing with a problem. That is what happened in the Trump-Kim talks in Singapore on denuclearization, and it…
BLOG Post #220: China Policy: Disappointment is No Excuse 30 Nov 2018 Greg Sargent writes in the Washington Post (November 30): For years after Deng Xiaoping’s decisive turn toward modernization in the late 1970s, U.S. business executives and diplomats supported not only…
BLOG Post #219: Is China a “Responsible Great Power”? 31 Oct 201830 Oct 2018 President Xi Jinping would like everyone to pay attention to how China is exerting leadership in world affairs as a “responsible great power.” While the Trump administration is in retreat,…
BLOG Post #215: On Dealing with China 18 Sep 201826 Sep 2018 (Note: A slightly different version of this article has been published as "The China Conundrum" at https://www.chinausfocus.com/foreign-policy/the-china-conundrum.) A Self-Confident China Ever since China’s economic reforms began in 1978, the goal…
