2026-08-13
1 小时 1 分钟This week, we're pleased to bring you a particularly rich and relevant episode from our archives.
At the end of last year, I spoke with the historian Odd Arne Westad about China's complicated past
and how that history shapes the way Chinese leaders see their country's place in the world today.
Policymakers in Beijing are now watching Washington struggle against Iran, rankle allies and partners,
and retreat from the international system it built.
They sense a moment of opportunity and are looking to their own history for the lessons or warnings it might hold.
I hope you enjoy our conversation with Odd Arne Westad. We'll be back next week with a new episode.
As we see from the 20th century, for great powers, appetite sometimes increases with eating.
So, the fact that China doesn't today have a uniform strategy for becoming globally predominant
is not the same thing as China wouldn't move there over time if given the opportunity to do so.
The biggest questions in US foreign policy today tend to be about China.
Policymakers and analysts argue over the implications of China's rise, the extent of its ambitions,
the nature of its economic influence, and the meaning of its growing military strength.
Underlying these arguments is a widespread sense that where Beijing once seemed likely
to slot comfortably into a US-led international order, it now posed a profound challenge to American interests.
No one brings more perspective to these arguments than the historian Odd Arne Westad.
In a series of essays in Foreign Affairs over the past few years,
Westad has explored the drivers of China's foreign policy, its approach to global power,
and its fraught ties with the United States.
He sees in the long arc of Chinese and global history a stark warning about the potential for conflict,