“Chinese War Games” with Sam Roggeveen

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps

Josh Szeps

Comedy Interviews, Self-improvement, Society & Culture, Education, Comedy

4.6 • 863 Ratings

🗓️ 27 February 2025

⏱️ 104 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

How should medium-sized countries respond when they're bullied by a superpower? The question applies as much to Canada dealing with President Trump as to Australia reacting to China.

Last Friday, the pilot of a Virgin Australia flight from Australia to New Zealand noticed a flash of weapons from a Chinese warship just a few hundred miles off the coast of Sydney. Other passenger planes suddenly got mid-air warnings to divert course. The Australian government scrambled to reassure citizens that nothing was amiss.

But this is the first time China has sent naval assets so far south down the Australian coast. It's the first time they've conducted live-fire exercises so close to Australia, inside its exclusive economic zone, in a busy flight corridor linking the region's only two Western democracies.

What's going on? How should we react? Is a China-U.S. war in the 21st century inevitable?

Sam Roggeveen is a former intelligence officer and a foreign policy analyst who now heads the International Security Program at the Lowy Institute, Australia's preeminent international policy think tank.

He and Josh discuss China's belligerence, the Australia-U.S. alliance, Trumpist isolationism, Taiwan, NATO, and immigration. His book is The Echidna Strategy, an argument for developing an independent security strategy.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Gahey, humans. Welcome to the safe space for dangerous ideas. Here's a dozy for you of a
0:07.8	dangerous idea. Let's say that you are a medium-sized country, medium-sized power. And a gigantic
0:14.7	superpower that could wipe the floor with you begins to bully you, cajole you, coerce you,
0:20.3	intimidate you. Your natural reaction is to
0:23.6	push back and bully them a little bit. So they bully you a little more and you bully them back.
0:30.6	But you know that at the end of that long chain of escalation, they will win. What do you do? How do you stand up for yourself at the same
0:41.3	time as making it clear that you're not going to be pushed around? This is a scenario that could
0:46.0	apply to Canada's current situation with regard to the United States as much as with regard to
0:51.4	Australia's situation vis-a-vis China.
0:54.6	Last Friday, a Virgin Australia pilot was flying the heavily trafficked route
1:01.8	between Australia and New Zealand and noticed some flashes in the water underneath him.
1:08.9	And he called it in and began to divert away from what seemed to be live
1:13.7	firing taking place, and the seas between Australia and New Zealand. Several flights had to
1:20.1	divert because of these mid-air warnings over what turned out to be massive Chinese warships, at least one of them was a massive Chinese
1:30.2	warship accompanied by others, conducting live fire training sessions directly underneath one of the
1:37.5	busiest flight paths between Australia and New Zealand. This is the first time that the Chinese
1:43.1	have ever sent naval assets this far south down the Australian coast. It is the first time that the Chinese have ever sent naval assets this far
1:46.1	south down the Australian coast. It's the first time they've conducted live fire exercises
1:51.3	so close to Australia inside our exclusive economic zone. And it has a lot of Australians
1:57.9	scratching our heads. Why would you send warships 13,000 kilometres
2:02.9	from your home base immediately off the coast of the largest city in Australia, into a busy
2:10.7	flight corridor that links the only two Western democracies in the region to shoot at things
	...

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