Conservative Conversation and Community
Misha and John return after an extended sabbatical. They discuss the burning issue in Asia — the democracy protests in Hong Kong — with Jillian Melchior of the Wall Street Journal editorial page. After playing out the scenarios for how the Hong Kong protests end, Misha and John take up Misha’s recent article on the collapse of pork production in China and the political pressure of rising food prices on the Xi regime.
More Xi Jinping is usually touted as the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong. How has he pulled power into his hands, and is there a reaction to his strength? Richard McGregor discusses this, as well as looks back at his popular book The Party, ten years after its publication. Meanwhile, Japan and South Korea are falling into a trade war; is it about economics or the poor political relations between the two? How low will relations between America’s two closest allies sink?
More Hoover Institution fellows Misha Auslin and John Yoo interview John Pomfret, the former Washington Post and Associated Press reporter in China. Pomfret discusses his response to an open letter in the Washington Post, signed by dozens of leading US foreign policy and China scholars, criticizing the Trump administration for making China “an enemy.” He explains “why the United States doesn’t need to return to a gentler China policy.”
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Presidents Trump and Xi meet at the G-20 meetings in Osaka and decide to restart trade negotiations, and then President Trump took a remarkable step across the DMZ into North Korean territory. Misha and John address these developments, and also the massive Hong Kong protests, trade developments, and divisions within the US foreign policy community.
More Hoover Institution fellows Misha Auslin and John Yoo welcome one of Britain’s leading experts on China to the podcast: Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China, St. Cross College, Oxford University, and the Director of Oxford’s China Centre. Professor Mitter is the author of Forgotten Ally: China’s War with Japan, 1937-45, and A Bitter Revolution: China’s Struggle with the Modern World.
Professor Mitter discusses the student-led demonstrations of the Tiananmen Square Massacre thirty years later and the 100th Anniversary of the May Fourth Movement. We then turn to the changes in China since Tiananmen and the future of Chinese pluralism after the coming to power of Xi Jinping.
More Hoover Institution fellows Misha and John have a special treat today: they are joined by another Hoover fellow, H.R. McMaster, retired general, scholar, and President Trump’s former national security advisor. They discuss the rise of China, America’s response, trade, and what keeps the Chinese leadership up at night. Misha and John then turn to a discussion of US-China trade tensions, the new Japanese emperor, and the centennial of the May 4th uprising in China.
More As China tests Japan and Taiwan with air and naval challenges, Hoover Institution fellows Michael Auslin and John Yoo discuss why Japan and Taiwan play important roles in the United States’ Pacific strategy, and what measures the Trump administration can take to help their defense/military. They share their thoughts on why Taiwan is worth protecting, and conclude with a few words on the recent Thai elections.
More Historian Niall Ferguson joins Michael Auslin to discuss whether the United States is entering a new Cold War with China. Ferguson explains the quick change in public and government attitudes toward China and steps that the Trump administration is taking toward Chinese economic and military aggressiveness. Hoover fellows John Yoo and Auslin then discuss the pros and cons of the Cold War analogy, or whether the rise of Germany before WWI is the better comparison.
More Hoover Institution fellows Michael Auslin and John Yoo discuss two major developments in Asia. First, they explain why the “failure” of the Hanoi summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un wasn’t a failure at all. They then dissect the details of a proposed trade deal between the United States and China, asking whether policymakers miss the boat when they focus on tariffs and trade deficits instead of the theft of American inventions.
More Hoover Institution fellows Michael Auslin and John Yoo start their inaugural podcast on China, Asia, and the Pacific Century by discussing the upcoming summit between President Trump and North Korean President Kim Jong-un, trade tensions between the United States and China, the Justice Department’s indictment of Huawei, and Chinese arrest and trials of westerners.
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