Asian Peace, Sociopathic Diplomats, The Exclusionary Indo-Pacific, and Truly National Interests

You might not think all these topics would be in a single lecture, but chances are you haven’t had an Un-Diplomatic lecture...

Prof. Moon Chung-in recently invited me to give a lecture in Yonsei University’s James T. Laney Lecture Series, which he chairs.

It was an honor, not least because the other folks invited to offer lectures in the series were G. John Ikenberry, Susan Thornton, Charles Kupchan, and the like—people far more prominent than me.

I did my undiplomatic thing. It turned out to be a great opportunity. And it led to a (very candid) Q&A following the lecture. We cover a lot of ground:

• The origins of the Asian peace

• The importance of Sino-US detente to the Asian peace

• What makes the “Indo-Pacific” an exclusionary concept

• The reactionary tendency in geopolitical thinking

• The reason(s) why East Asian risks of war have grown

• The key similarities and differences between Trump’s and Biden’s Asia policies

• The working-class blind spot among think tankers and foreign policy elites

The entire event is available here (the introduction to my lecture starts at the 2-minute mark):

For newsletter patrons, I’ve included below a rough transcript of my remarks and the Q&A—very thorough!