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Episode 28, a historian for our time.

The ancient Greek historian Thucydides has been in the news a lot recently.

Now, when I say a lot, I don't mean, obviously, as much as the Kardashians.

But compared to other ancient authors, Thucydides has been killing it.

It all started in 2012, when political scientist Graham Allison coined the phrase Thucydides Trap in connection to U.S.-China relations. He sees the U.S. and China locked on a

collision course reminiscent of the trajectories of Athens and Sparta as they headed towards

war with each other two and a half millennia ago, as chronicled by Thucydides.

Now, Thucydides said that when a new up-and-coming power threatens to surpass the established

superpower, war is often inevitable. That's the trap. So the question becomes, can the U.S. and

China avoid the kind of mutually destructive conflict that consumed Athens and Sparta.

Within a year of Allison putting forth this analogy, it was picked up by Chinese President

Xi Jinping himself, who declared that the U.S. and China need to work together to avoid

...