The Eurasian Century: Hot Wars, Cold Wars, and the Making of the Modern World

Moscow’s war isn’t a distraction. It’s part and parcel of the threat posed by Beijing.

The United States and nearly two dozen partner nations said they would accelerate weapons production, in anticipation of a sustained conflict with Russia.

The United States needs to prepare for a major war, not because its rival is rising but because of the opposite.

The Eurasian heartland is the axis of what the great geographer Halford Mackinder called the “World-Island.”

Two years ago the telecom giant was set to control global 5G, but now its goal is survival. Beijing’s belligerence is to blame.

Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China

Playing up East-West societal differences gives Beijing an excuse for its police state.

If America can’t pass a Ukraine aid package even with a friendly president in office, why would any other nation trust it in a crisis?

Forget the doom and gloom of the MAGA isolationists — the underlying indices of American power look quite good.

Beijing’s ambitions are about to crash into its problems.

On trade, military aid and pushing democracy, Washington’s China rhetoric has overtaken its China policy.

America Firsters seem unaware of just how quickly and completely the international order can collapse.

Stop debating Beijing’s intentions and take Xi Jinping both seriously and literally.

Xi’s military has options ranging from stepped up coercion to an outright invasion of the island.

Military security and economic growth are at risk globally.

The United States has committed to keeping the peace but isn’t doing enough to stop the war.

The essential resource on military and political strategy and the making of the modern world

Allies in the Middle East and Pacific could well seek the bomb if they feel abandoned by the US.

America’s top rivals aren’t allies in the conventional sense, but acting in unison they could stretch a superpower well beyond its military capabilities.

The growing transatlantic alliance kept the peace in Europe for decades and actually made Russia safer.

They don’t look like America’s—but they’re still dangerous.

Other powers in Syria have begun positioning themselves to take advantage of the vacuum left by a U.S. withdrawal.

With its global power at a peak and domestic problems mounting, China is likelier than ever before to make good on its threats.

If the US is hoping to deter Xi from invading Taiwan, it had better not count on economic punishments being as effective as military might.

The main effect of the most destructive weapons the world has ever known is now mostly psychological.

Washington’s latest crises with Russia and China are part of a new—and long-term—competition.

The sustained, broad-reaching investment in Soviet studies paid off in the Cold War.

The grim calculus behind any American decision to defend a small, faraway democracy.

The Twilight Struggle: What the Cold War Teaches Us about Great-Power Rivalry Today

Viktor Orban sneers at democracy and threatens the transatlantic order.

Major Chinese exercises are giving way to smaller efforts to demoralize the island’s leaders.

Global proxy conflicts were a constant in Cold War I, and Russia’s invasion marked the first of Cold War II.

Providing Kyiv with weapons has depleted the Pentagon’s munitions alarmingly, and defending Taiwan would be far more costly.

Joe Biden once envisioned a “world without nuclear weapons,” but Beijing and Moscow are rolling back the clock to the Cold War.

Today’s regional conflicts resemble the ones that produced World War II.

Tokyo is boosting military spending and its diplomatic profile but still needs to be firmer in standing up to China.

If the US abandons Ukraine and ignores the Middle East, why would any Asian allies trust it against China?

Over the long term, competition with China may prove more manageable than many pessimists believe.

A recent study confirms a disturbing trend: American college students are abandoning the study of history. Since 2008, the number of students majoring in

Between China's 20th Communist Party Congress, that began Sunday, and the next one in 2027, Japan will undertake its biggest arms buildup since World War Two in a race to deter Beijing from war in...

Authoritarian states have a history of underestimating democracies, becoming more dangerous after realizing their mistake.

History doesn't support the idea that countries "stumble" into major conflict.

How a flawed “war on terror” eventually yielded the right approach

Sir Halford Mackinder believed that major showdowns in international affairs of the 20th century would revolve over control of the Eurasian continent and its maritime approaches. His thesis is worth...

Xi’s “intimate friend” Putin is proving vulnerable, which endangers the global axis of authoritarianism.

Russia and China are on war footing while the Pentagon struggles to modernize ships, subs and nukes.

The US now realizes it can’t outpace its foremost rival simply by running faster; it must also slow Beijing down.

Kyiv has fought too well to simply give up, but Russia and China will achieve their goal of splitting the West.

Authorities struggling to restore confidence in post-Covid recovery want analysts to avoid mention of deflation risk

The world’s most dismal science could make Eurasia safe for illiberalism and predation—or protect it from those forces.

If the Kyiv government falls, it would be tempting to try to bleed the Russian victors. But insurgencies inflict a high toll on all sides, and can spread across borders.

Empires — especially the biggest ones — don’t end quickly or peacefully.

Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, Putin — every century gets dictators who strip away pleasant illusions about where the world is headed.

The U.S. hoped bringing Beijing into international organizations would change it for the better, but the opposite is happening.

History shows that when an autocratic leader takes full command of a powerful state, the results are rarely good for anyone.

While concerns of war weariness grow in the US and Europe, there is no letup of support for Kyiv from key parts of East Asia.

The Chinese Communist Party is deadly serious about its authoritarian designs, and it is bent on promoting them. It is time for the world’s democracies to get serious, too. | Michael Beckley and Hal…

A swathe of the world is adopting China’s vision for a tightly controlled internet over the unfettered American approach, a stunning ideological coup for Beijing that would have been unthinkable less...

A provocative and urgent analysis of the U.S.–China rivalry., Danger Zone, The Coming Conflict with China, Michael Beckley, Hal Brands, 9781324066101

In this Marshall Paper, Jude Blanchette and Hal Brands explore four coercive approaches that Beijing could use to change the status quo around Taiwan short of outright invasion or blockade.