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no bull and the aftermath.

And then what you do to make the Terrence really work is you threaten very subtly to use

nuclear weapons if you're in a losing fight over Taiwan. This is the way you make the

Terrence work. You just tell the Chinese that look, there is a possibility you'll win.

You believe that you'll pay an awful price to win. But you want to remember that if you

win, there's no guarantee that we won't turn to nuclear weapons. You can do this in

various subtle ways. And just the width of possible nuclear use has an enormous amount

of return value. So I think, you know, for the foreseeable future, the United States

can maintain a formidable deterrent posture vis-à-vis Taiwan, even though we are rapidly reaching

the point. I may have already reached the point where we can't win a military victory over

Taiwan.

I'm Jack Goldsmith and this is the LawFair podcast, November 9, 2021. I sat down with

John Mirschimer, the R. Windel Harrison Distinguished Service Professor in the Political

Science Department at the University of Chicago to discuss his recent article in foreign

affairs called the inevitable rivalry, America, China, and the tragedy of great power politics.

That essay argues that America's engagement with China following the Cold War and its

fostering of the rise of China's economic and thus military power was the worst strategic

blunder any country has made in recent history.

...