Young China Watchers

In this episode, Sam speaks with Lt. General H.R. McMaster about his new book, "Battlegrounds," in which McMaster lays out his vision for some of the key foreign policy challenges facing the current and next U.S. administration. McMaster discusses what he believes to be the flawed assumption embedded in previous U.S. administrations' China policy — namely, that the PRC would liberalize. McMaster puts it bluntly: "Engagement with the Party has not worked," and has in his view emboldened the Party. They also discuss China's overseas investment and the difficulty of imposing international standards of accountability as well as China's aims to export its model, what McMaster says has been called a "new type of colonialism." McMaster makes the case for characterizing Trump's trade war within the appropriate bounds of competition rather than confrontation with China. "This is not a U.S. and China problem; it's a free world and China problem." — Lt. General H.R. McMaster is a former National Security Advis