Hello. Before we start this week, a quick announcement. Next month, June 16th in Brooklyn,

I'm going to be part of a night of readings. It's part of this reading series called Friends with

Words, hosted by writer and director Susanna Fogel. The theme of the night is writers reading

risky work that they feel scared to read on stage. I will be there. Alongside This American Life's

Ira Glass, Amelia Clark from Game of Thrones, fiction writer Kristen Rupennian. It is a stacked lineup. There's even more people. I think it's going to be a special night. The venue is roulette in Brooklyn. June 16th. Tickets are 25 bucks. There will be a link in our show notes. One night only. Okay, here's this week's episode after these ads. I'm Welcome to Sturgeon.

No question too big, no question too small.

President Trump met last week in China with President Xi Jinping. They talked only a bit about

one of the biggest points of contention between our two superpowers, the one I was listening for,

Taiwan. Taiwan is an independent democracy 100 miles southeast of China's coast.

China wants to take Taiwan for itself, but the U.S. for decades has stood in the way.

Taiwan also happens to be where almost all of the high-quality graphics chips driving the AI race are made.

If either country controlled Taiwan, the AI race would be fundamentally over.

That is most of what I knew about Taiwan before this week's episode.

I knew about it as an object in two other country's designs.

I didn't know much more about the place itself. How did Taiwan become a democracy?

How did Taiwan end up manufacturing all those high-tech chips?

How did an island this tiny become one of the most important places in the world?

So I did what I do these days when I'm curious.

I asked Garrett Graham, our show's senior producer,

to find me one of America's foremost experts on Taiwan,

and also to select someone who's a really good storyteller.

It took them all of two days.

...