This week on Sinica, Kaiser welcomes back Lyle Goldstein, director for China engagement at the think tank Defense Priorities and previously a professor at the U.S. Naval War College, where he taught for 20 years. Lyle offers his perspectives on an extensive wargaming exercise focusing on a Chinese amphibious assault on Taiwan, conducted under the auspices of CSIS (the Center for Strategic and International Studies) and published in January of this year — the first such exercise whose findings were made public. He offers insight into the real value of the exercise, as well as some of its shortcomings.
01:03 – The First Battle of the Next War: Wargaming a Chinese Invasion of Taiwan – the first large-scale publicly available wargame conducted by CSIS
04:05 – The history of wargaming and its significance
09:09 – What is the value of wargaming?
13:12 – The physical setup of the wargames and the role of dice and technology in contingency
17:49 – The assumptions that go into the game
22:05 – How much agency do the players have?
24:16 – How are the decisions of other countries factored in the wargame?
26:11 – Pros and cons of the CSIS wargame
31:57 – Thoughts on the possibility of nuclear escalation
38:43 – A take on the report’s assumptions and conclusions
47:37 – Will we get a warning?
A complete transcript of this episode is available at TheChinaProject.com.
Recommendations:
CSIS Report: The First Battle of the Next War: Wargaming a Chinese Invasion of Taiwan
Lyle: Yin Yu Tang in Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts
Kaiser: The Story of Civilization [Volumes 1 to 11] by Will & Ariel Durant
Our Oriental Heritage: The Story of Civilization, Volume 1 by Will Durant
Mentioned:
Meeting China Halfway: How to Defuse the Emerging US-China Rivalry by Lyle J. Goldstein
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Author Rebecca Kuang on her novel Babel, or on the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators Revolution
The best solution for Taiwan is no solution: Jude Blanchette and Ryan Hass argue for kicking the can down the road
China's push for RMB internationalization
A familiar drumbeat: Michael Mazarr on the run-up to the Iraq invasion and parallels with China
Special episode: The COVID lockdown protests, with David Moser and Jeremiah Jenne
Financial Times reporter Yuan Yang on China-Europe relations
Evan Feigenbaum on the U.S. in the Indo-Pacific region
New America President Anne-Marie Slaughter on balancing China competition and global imperatives
The 20th Party Congress postgame show with Damien Ma and Lizzi Lee
Grifter, chaos agent, or CCP spy? The New Yorker's Evan Osnos on Guo Wengui
Overreach and overreaction, with Susan Shirk
Podcasting The Prince: Sue-Lin Wong of The Economist on her Xi Jinping podcast
Legendary BBC presenter and China editor Carrie Gracie, live in London
A conversation with Minister Xu Xueyuan, Deputy Chief of Mission of the Embassy of the People's Republic of China in Washington
China in the Global South, with Eric Olander and Cobus van Staden
Surveillance State: Authors Josh Chin and Liza Lin on their new book on China's tech-enhanced social controls
Yuen Yuen Ang on Xi Jinping, the Party bureaucracy, and authoritarian resilience
Avoiding the China Trap, with Jessica Chen Weiss
Is China's bubble finally about to pop? A conversation with Bloomberg Chief Economist Tom Orlik
China's space program, with NASA astronaut Leroy Chiao
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free