Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China

by Hal Brands, Michael Beckley

A provocative and urgent analysis of the U.S.–China rivalry. It has become conventional wisdom that America and China are running a “superpower marathon” that may last a century. Yet Hal Brands and Michael Beckley pose a counterintuitive question: What if the sharpest phase of that competition is more like a decade-long sprint? The Sino-American contest is driven by clashing geopolitical interests and a stark ideological dispute over whether authoritarianism or democracy will dominate the 21st century. But both history and China’s current trajectory suggest that this rivalry will reach its moment of maximum danger in the 2020s. China is at a perilous moment: strong enough to violently challenge the existing order, yet losing confidence that time is on its side. Numerous examples from antiquity to the present show that rising powers become most aggressive when their fortunes fade, their difficulties multiply, and they realize they must achieve their ambitions now or miss the chance to do so forever. China has already started down this path. Witness its aggression toward Taiwan, its record-breaking military buildup, and its efforts to dominate the critical technologies that will shape the world’s future. Over the long run, the Chinese challenge will most likely prove more manageable than many pessimists currently believe―but during the 2020s, the pace of Sino-American conflict will accelerate, and the prospect of war will be frighteningly real. America, Brands and Beckley argue, will still need a sustainable approach to winning a protracted global competition. But first, it needs a near-term strategy for navigating the danger zone ahead.

Genres: China, Politics, Nonfiction, History, War, International Relations, Military Fiction

304 pages, Hardcover

Published August 16, 2022

Reviews

[East West Notes · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China opens with a provocative look at how a 2025 war between the U.S. and China could begin. A contested U.S. election, massive naval exercises in the Taiwan Strait and a global disinformation campaign set the stage for strikes on U.S. aircraft carriers and bases in Okinawa and Guam. It's harrowing reading which lends a sense of urgency to the historical analysis and policy suggestions that follow.

Co-authors Michael Beckley, associate professor of political science at Tufts University and Jeane Kirkpatrick Visiting Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, and Hal Brands, the Henry A. Kissinger Distinguished professor of Global Affairs at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and former Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Strategic Planning, explain why the Americans must recognize that the threat of war with China will climax this decade, as China has reached the stage of a rising power ("the peaking power trap") where it is "strong enough to aggressively disrupt the existing order but is losing confidence that time is on its side."

They argue that the threat of war will be strongest just as China's bloated global ambitions are outweighed by its economic, demographic and political issues. Danger Zone presents suggestions based on the assumption that China will be a falling power sooner than most people think. Until recently, democratic nations were "lethargic and unfocused" in their response to China's "wolf-warrior" diplomacy and confrontational behaviour. Despite the grim introduction, this book is not alarmist or defeatist about the strategic challenge presented by China. It shines light on the pessimistic over-thinking and procrastination that plagues the U.S. approach to China while urging the U.S. to act urgently, not stupidly.

China is entering a perilous stage seen before in the rise and fall of great powers. In incredible detail, authors look to the past to draw attention to what previous peaking powers have done as their windows of opportunity closed. Thucydides, of course, is discussed when analysing what happens when a country peaks and wants to "grab what it can before it is too late." The book first summarises recent Chinese political history, where "paranoia is a virtue rather than a vice," its forthcoming economic and demographic decline and the increasingly hostile geopolitical climate it finds itself in. It has some especially useful sections on why China's territory doesn't naturally hold together and how its resources are under the homeland's of China's minority groups. It outlines border disputes with its neighbouring countries, its objectives of "Asia for the Asians," and why it has been encouraging nationalism after abandoning the original ideology of socialism. It has a fairly short look at the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), but it does cover recent developments with countries that might not have made top news in the U.S. For example, the section "On Every Front" describes briefly how Italy signed on to the BRI and "effectively reversed that decision in 2021" and how the Czech Republic unexpectedly contributed to opposing Huawei and supporting Taiwan.
It is fascinating to read about how China rose purposefully with great subtlety and carefully targeted its influence. Danger Zone describes how the CCP has positioned itself in key positions in institutional superpowers, including ASEAN. I especially enjoyed reading quotes from U.S. policy makers about how they considered China to be tomorrow's problem or compared it to a long book you always put off reading. The authors do a great job of setting the scene - complacent and distracted US policy makers mixing with a Chinese strategy that encouraged over thinking and procrastination. Or as one section put it, "Beijing has a long track record of luring Washington into formal, high-level blab-fests." As numerous other recent publications have shown, this allowed China to take Western technology and capital, export its products while keeping its own market relatively closed, build up its military, fill international organisations with Chinese officials and exploit the pandemic.

This now familiar story of China's spectacular rise is followed up by China's internal institutional decay over the last decade, one that bizarrely prioritizes control over the economy. One example of this is how the state's "zombie firms" have been supported while private firms have to live on small budgets and pay out bribes to party members for protection. This was also the first I've read about how the anti-corruption campaign, which sounds good, actually blocked economic experimentation. The authors argue that "this is a formula for tight political control - and economic stagnation." There is an expected description of China's increasingly well known ghost cities and unprofitable infrastructure projects. Many of these ailments of misdirected state funding and state sector bloat are described as being remarkably similar to the Soviet Union. More alarmingly, "half of all new loans in China are being used to pay interest on old loans."

Elsewhere on the topic of loans, is the acknowledgement that many loans China has paid out worldwide are unlikely to be paid back. This default will happen just as the Chinese people themselves may be grappling with a reduced living standards. Without the economic growth that the younger generations are now used to, "the gravy train of subsidies and bribes that China's leaders use to keep powerful interests (state owned enterprise bosses, local governments, and above all, the military and security services) in line will grind to a halt." Here the authors took the risk of describing how the Chinese people are responding and may respond to these economic changes. Never do the authors describe the Chinese people as an unknowable "other" or unworthy of our sympathy or understanding. That said, the book states that "America has a China problem, not a Xi Jinping problem" and bases this on a brief summary of Chinese political aims from the 1980s to present. Similarly, it criticises the times Washington policymakers seemed to be asleep at the wheel, but recognises what efforts were made later.

After this massive but necessary information dump, readers are then presented with in-depth histories and parallels drawn from the World Wars and the Cold War, where conflict sprung from the "intersection of ambition and desperation." The danger of falling powers is illustrated by 1914 Germany, particularly in its economic slowdown and sense of strategic encirclement. This fear of decline incites "risky, belligerent behaviour." To counteract economic slowdowns, falling powers anxiously expand their territory for an emergency source of wealth, which unites rivals and further feeds the falling power's fears and sense of victimization.

The authors themselves describe how "many countries have followed this path, including some you might not expect." For example, it refers to France, which tried to rebuild its interests in Africa after their economy stalled in the 1970s. The United States did the same in the Philippines and Puerto Rico after the post-Civil War economic surge ended. In short, rapid growth allowed China the ability to expand and behave aggressively, but the forthcoming economic decline is giving it the motive. This situation has historically shown to result in "catastrophic gambles" for last minute glory and to deliver on promises to its citizens. Advice on how not to provoke China was based on the attack on Pearl Harbor and U.S. experiences in reducing tensions with the Soviet Union.
History shows China's actions are not unique and it is possible to predict how China's statecraft may develop and to plan in advance. The case studies follow with proposals for how China may grow techno-authoritarianism and aggravate its neighbours. This book offers a contrarian analysis, which I think many readers will appreciate if they already have a sizeable China-Taiwan library. It challenges received (ancient!) wisdom about the origins of war and argues that states can rise and fall simultaneously. They might "seize territory or arm themselves rapidly even as their economies wheeze and stumble. The anxiety caused by relative decline, not the confidence that comes with rising strength, can make ambitious powers erratic and violent." China has exacerbated its own problems by paranoid policies which led to aggression - aggression that frightened and the unified its neighbours. The country's "strategic holiday" has ended and through its own overreach, has made an enemy out of the U.S., which did so much to help it rise.

Technology and its uses in economic rivalries and modern warfare is a large part of this book, ranging from "intellectual property theft, forced technology transfer, and commercial espionage," to the development of telecommunications infrastructure and the worrisome uses of advanced surveillance equipment. This extends into how to defend Taiwan with potentially useful military technology and how it would be best used based on the island's geography. One small remark that I wish that had been expanded on was that "CCP officials surely have doubts about how well a heavily politicized, still corrupt PLA would perform in the fog of war." This observation came out of nowhere and the reader is left hanging.

How the authors advocate for preparing Taiwan for an invasion, increasing the U.S. military's regional presence and disrupting China's military communication systems may be overly optimistic. They do warn that the U.S. and its allies must mentally and materially prepare for a conflict that could drag on for months or years. It is hugely depressing to read about such potential misery and have it close with how Xi "might keep the war machine running, in hopes of snatching victory from the jaws of defeat or simply saving some face." There are many frightening descriptions on the book shelves of what may come with China, and this book is no exception. It covers the possibility of nuclear war, genocide, a CCP panopticon and seemingly endless human suffering and waste. What sets this book apart from similar recent publications is that it takes pains to present careful studies of history to show that the global community has faced these challenges before and can do so again. The authors take the risk of anticipating how the next few decades will look and what China is likely to do, even after the threat of war has passed. It offers hopeful, point by point policy suggestions for the U.S. and other likeminded countries to follow. For the non-policymaker reader, it is an engaging look at the history of war, the rise and fall of great powers and applies these theories to the current events which will be dominating the news for some time.

This book was provided by W. W. Norton & Company for review.

[Cav · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The “rise of China” may be the most read-about news story of the twenty-first century..."

Danger Zone was an excellent book. It is a very comprehensive broad-based examination of China's desire to usurp the United States as not only a regional hegemon, but a global one. The end of Pax Americana. A new world order; with Beijing at the helm, and not Washington.

“Empires have no interest in operating within an international system,” writes Henry Kissinger. “They aspire to be the international system.” That’s the ultimate ambition of Chinese statecraft today..."

Author Hal Brands is an American scholar of U.S. foreign policy. He is the Henry A. Kissinger Distinguished Professor of Global Affairs at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.
Co-author Michael Beckley is a Fellow in the International Security Program at Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and Assistant Professor of Political Science at Tufts University.

Hal Brands:


The book opens with a somewhat detailed dystopian picture of what a Chinese invasion of Taiwan could look like.

I'll say right up front that I found the book to be exceptionally well done. The writing and formatting here are excellent, and the book contains many quotables. I'll be dropping a few of them here, mainly for my own future reference.

Danger Zone was a top-notch insightful examination of the struggle for global power. To be honest, it is the best account of the global geopolitical situation post ww2 that I have ever read. I'll definitely be reading more of this author's books in the future.
There was some very detailed and nuanced writing on realpolitik, global hegemony and power in these pages.

The quote from the start of this review continues:

"...The prevailing consensus, in Washington and abroad, is that an ascendant Beijing is threatening to overtake a slumping America. “If we don’t get moving,” said President Biden in 2021, “they’re going to eat our lunch.” Countries in every region, a veteran Asian diplomat reports, are “making preparations for a world” in which China will be “number one.”
China is certainly acting like it wants to run the show. The CCP is laying plans to create a Sino-centric Asia and reclaim what it sees as China’s rightful place atop the global hierarchy. Beijing is using an impressive array of military, economic, diplomatic, technological, and ideological tools to protect the power and project the influence of a brutal authoritarian regime. The United States, for its part, is trying to defend a liberal international order it has anchored for generations and prevent Beijing from making the twenty-first century an age of autocratic ascendancy. America and China are thus locked in a fierce global struggle.
It has become conventional wisdom in Washington—a rare point of agreement in a bitterly divided capital—that the two countries are running a “superpower marathon” that may last a century..."

And then adds:

"Our core argument in this book is that the conventional wisdom is wrong on both points. Americans urgently need to start seeing the Sino- American rivalry less as a 100-year marathon and more as a blistering, decade-long sprint. That’s because China will be a falling power far sooner than most people think..."

The writers speak to the urgency of the matter here:

"Why write a book that warns about a coming conflict with China during a year in which Russia started a major war in Europe? The simple answer is that Russian aggression in Ukraine has made the successful containment of China all the more imperative.
If China were to follow in Russia’s footsteps and expand violently in its region, Eurasia would be engulfed in conflict. The United States would again face the prospect of a two-front war, only this time against nuclear-armed aggressors fighting “back to back” along their shared border.
America’s military would be overstretched and, likely, overwhelmed; America’s alliance system might come under unbearable strain. The postwar international order could collapse as countries across Eurasia scramble to defend themselves and cope with the knock-on effects of majorpower war, including economic crises and mass refugee flows. A world already shaken by Russian aggression could be shattered by a Chinese offensive."

Although a global power struggle is already occurring, and many talking heads in the media class have been sounding the alarm, the future is uncertain. The authors will go on to examine both the headwinds and the tailwinds that the near and long-term future hold for the balance of power:

"This book offers a contrarian take on China by explaining why that country is in more trouble than most analysts think, why that trend makes the coming years so perilous, and how America can prepare for the storm that is about to strike. We also challenge the received wisdom about the origins of major war and the rise and fall of great powers..."
"...China’s predicament offers good news and bad news for America. The good news is that, over the long run, the Chinese challenge may prove more manageable than many pessimists now believe. An unhealthy, totalitarian China won’t effortlessly surge past America as the world’s leading power.
We may one day look back on China as we now view the Soviet Union—as a formidable foe whose evident strengths obscured fatal vulnerabilities. The bad news is that getting to the long run won’t be easy. During the 2020s, the pace of rivalry will be torrid, and the prospect of war will be frighteningly real..."

And despite China being mentioned in the book's subtitle; the scope of the writing here was quite broad-based. The authors give the reader deep historical context to the current power struggle that dates back to before the First World War. Some excellent writing that's worth the price of the book, alone, IMO. The underlying thread is the divide between secular liberal democratic countries and authoritarian socialist/communist regimes, and their respective desires to project these ideas, social and economic systems outwards.

We fought a Cold War against the spread of communism for almost 50 years, which was actually "hot" in many areas, at many different times during that epoch. Communism's inherent untenability ultimately proved to be its downfall. However, since some major economic reforms in the 1970s onwards, the ideology has had new life breathed into it with an authoritarian China at the helm; eager to spread its geopolitical reach.

Unfortunately for them, there are many structural headwinds to face before they can maneuver their way to becoming the world's top dog. The authors examine the many facets of these obstacles. The writing was so good that I wanted to share some of the quotes here (again; mainly for my own future reference). I've covered them with spoilers for those not interested:
• China's demographic decline: "China’s demographic crisis will be kicking into high gear... From 2020 to 2035, China will lose roughly 70 million working-age adults and gain 130 million senior citizens. That’s a France-sized population of young workers, consumers, and taxpayers gone—and a Japan-sized population of elderly pensioners gained—in just fifteen years. And then things will get really bad. From 2035 to 2050, China will lose an additional 105 million workers and gain another 64 million seniors. As early as 2030, therefore, China will be careening down a demographic mountain and headed toward a cliff.
The speed and scale of China’s population collapse could very well cripple its economy...
Meanwhile, spending on pensions and health care will need to double as a share of GDP from 2020 to 2035 (and triple by 2050) to keep tens of millions of seniors from falling into abject poverty. The financial and physical burdens of providing elder care on an industrial scale will stunt the savings, professional development, and consumption of China’s dwindling population of able-bodied adults."
• Dwindling Resources: "China isn’t just running out of people. It is running out of resources, too.
China’s impressive economic performance was the very definition of unsustainable growth because the country trashed its environment in the process...
Half of China’s river water and nearly 90 percent of its groundwater is unfit to drink. A quarter of China’s river water and 60 percent of its groundwater is so contaminated that the
government has declared it “unfit for human contact” and unusable even for agriculture or industry... Beijing has roughly the same amount of water per person as Saudi Arabia. This crisis is exacerbated because China remains one of the least efficient users of water on the planet...
China’s food security is also deteriorating... Finally, breakneck development has made China the world’s largest net energy importer."
• Institutional Decay: "Under Xi Jinping, China is now sliding back toward neototalitarianism, and this deterioration is undermining its economic growth... Since taking power in 2012, Xi has appointed himself “chairman of everything,” helming all important committees and doing away with any semblance of collective rule. At the 2017 Party Congress, Xi Jinping Thought—a conscious echo of Mao Zedong Thought—was made part of the country’s guiding ideology. Indoctrination has become more pervasive at all levels of education and in nearly all facets of everyday life... Now China is a rigid oligarchy ruled by a dictator for life.
This might not be so bad if Xi was an enlightened economic reformer. But he consistently prioritizes political control over economic efficiency."
• A More Hostile Geopolitical Environment: "Finally, the world beyond China is no longer conducive to easy growth. Cold War politics made the Chinese economic miracle possible by giving that country a respite from incessant militarization. But Beijing now faces a different situation... Western intelligence agencies predicted that China would overtake the United States as the world’s leading economy. These fears exacerbated growing concerns about China’s rise as a trade juggernaut...
To boost growth while maintaining domestic order, the Chinese government decided to crack down on internal dissent and erect protectionist barriers. It engaged in mercantilist expansion abroad, trying to lock up resources, markets, and economic influence through initiatives such as BRI. Powerful interests in the United States and other countries took notice. China’s economic protectionism and mercantilist expansionism alarmed Western business communities. Organized labor, which had never liked the flood of low-cost Chinese imports, clamored for retaliation."
• China’s Economic Quagmire: "China’s astonishing economic performance was never going to continue in perpetuity: Growth slows once countries pick the low-hanging fruit of development. The economic formula that allows a country with low wages and vast labor resources to become an industrial superstar is not the same formula that will allow it to make the transition to a mature information-age economy...
China’s official gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate dropped from 15 percent in 2007 to 6 percent in 2019. That was already the slowest rate in thirty years, and then the COVID-19
pandemic pushed China’s economy into the red. A growth rate of 6 percent would still be spectacular, but only if it were true. Rigorous studies based on objectively observable data—such as electricity use, construction, tax revenues, and railway freight—show that China’s true growth rate is roughly half the official figure and China’s economy is 20 percent smaller than reported...
To make matters worse, practically all of China’s GDP growth since 2008 has resulted from the government pumping capital through the economy. Take away government stimulus spending, some economists argue, and China’s economy may not have grown at all..."

A terrifying scenario for the annexation of Taiwan to "reunify" China is also discussed:

"In the most likely contingency, the war would start with thousands of ground- and air-launched Chinese missiles raining down on Taiwan, American military bases on Okinawa and Guam, and the U.S. carrier strike group that has its home port in Japan. All over Taiwan, undercover Chinese special forces and intelligence operatives would emerge, detonating bombs at military facilities and assassinating Taiwanese leaders. Chinese cyberattacks would cripple Taiwan’s critical infrastructure. The PLA would also use cyberattacks and, potentially, ground-launched missiles to destroy the satellites that allow U.S. forces to communicate with each other and with Washington—thereby rendering America unable to respond or even reliably know what is happening for days or weeks. The PLA’s cyber units would simultaneously stir up trouble on the American home front, unleashing disinformation campaigns to sow confusion and exacerbate political disputes in the United States.
Meanwhile, a Chinese flotilla previously engaged in military exercises in the Taiwan Strait would dash for Taiwan’s beaches while hundreds of thousands of Chinese troops on the mainland start piling into ships and helicopters in preparation for the main assault. Small amphibious assault craft could emerge from civilian ferries in the strait and try to seize a key port or beach before Taiwanese forces can respond. The United States, having lost many of its forward-deployed forces in China’s surprise attack, would have to surge aircraft and warships from thousands of miles away and fight through a hail of missiles, smart mines, and electromagnetic interference to get anywhere close to Taiwan. Summoning those assets, moreover, might require wrenching them away from other important priorities, such as protecting NATO’s Eastern flank from an aggressive Russia. The United States might find itself facing dire security challenges against two-nuclear armed great powers—with a military resourced to cope only with one.
America would confront agonizing global trade-offs, and U.S. forces in the Pacific would incur losses unlike anything since the Vietnam War or possibly World War II. American leaders might even find themselves up against an awful dilemma—whether to accept a humiliating military setback or threaten to use nuclear weapons if China doesn’t stand down.
The United States, a blue-ribbon commission of defense experts concluded in 2018, could suffer “a decisive military defeat” unless it resorts to strategies that risk nuclear apocalypse. Geopolitics doesn’t get any more dangerous than this..."

It's not all doom and gloom, however, and the authors lay out complex solutions; including a coalition of liberal democratic countries to collectively outcompete and encircle China, to stop the spread of its illiberal authoritarianism. Some more excellent, insightful writing here.

They close the book with this quote, tying a knot in the writing:

"America’s task, in this decade, is to prevent a peaking China from imposing its will on the world. Yet strategic urgency must be followed by strategic patience: Washington’s reward for getting through the danger zone could be a ticket to a longer struggle in which America’s advantages prove decisive only over a generation or more. That may seem like a meager prize for a country that likes quick, decisive solutions. But it is surely worth winning, in view of the perils that America and the world confront today."

***********************

I wasn't sure what to expect from Danger Zone. I am happy to report that the book far exceeded my expectations; as I had not heard of the author before this, and the book is not very widely-known.
I was also pleasantly surprised by the quality of the analysis here. TBH, It was remarkably insightful and intelligent. A++. Kudos to the authors.
I would definitely recommend this one to anyone interested.
5 stars, and a spot on my "favorites" shelf.

[Nikhil · Rating 4 out of 5]

Danger zone

The US-China conflict now seems front and center, especially after Nancy Pelosi’s escapade to Taiwan ratcheted up tensions by giving Xi Jingping another reason to flex his muscles.

If Kevin Rudd’s ‘The Avoidable War’ presents the Chinese perspective to an American audience, ‘Danger Zone’ by Pentagon - historian Hal Brands, take a more historical approach to set the fault lines into context and presents his own strategy on how the US could navigate these troubled waters over the next decade or so.

The primary thesis centers around debunking (or re-phrasing) the Thucydidian thesis that great wars are often the outcome of the power conflict between two great rising (risen) powers. To that extent, a substantial part of the book is dedicated to explaining how China may have already peaked as a power, whether from a demographics perspective or from an economic growth or balance sheet perspective. Then of course is the consideration that China’s consistent bellicosity and unabashedly self-serving approach to foreign policy has antagonized most of its neighbours and many of its large trading partners. Combined, the two present a rather difficult geo-political environment that China has created for itself.

The author’s contention is that the Chinese leadership is acutely aware of these challenges. The Chinese leadership also believe that they have a military advantage over the US led alliance, especially in the Asian theatre, which may not last for long. Given this background, the Chinese leadership could believe that there is a small window, before gravity takes over, within which to complete their unfinished historical agenda (or reunification of Taiwan) as well as upend USA’s position as a super power.

Combined with the CCP’s internal challenges of slower growth, Covid lockdowns, etc, Xi Jingping might, out of desperation, trigger a military conflict over Taiwan which could then take a life of its own.

The rest of the book is spent in learning from Cold War history, the Truman doctrine and how the US turned a potential disastrous situation in Europe post WW II. The author has some simple but powerful pointers on how the US needs to think about the China conundrum going forward.

The author advocates an approach which requires the US to form an alliance (with 7 other nations in particular) and run a policy of being in and navigating the danger zone till such time as either China starts declining under the pressure of its own weight or the alliance has strengthened itself enough to ensure China doesn’t start a misadventure.

Overall a fast and easy read. Insightful and interesting too.

The one shortcoming - like everything else about the US, the author’s narrative revolves around the one shining defender of democracy all over the world wherein all others play second fiddle 😀

[Paul Frandano · Rating 1 out of 5]

I do not believe I have ever given a single star to any book, CD, teabags, toothpaste...anything. And no, I'm not a panda hugger. But I have, however, spent a significant portion of my professional life studying, thinking about, writing and editing (analytic papers, for government officials' use) on the People's Republic of China, and, in my opinion, the book Professors Brands and Beckley have written is dangerous--indeed, at many points, it reads like a manual for either luring, or otherwise provoking, the PRC into a hot war with the United States. I can only surmise that those who wrote the enthusiastic blurbs for the jacket simply didn't read the book, or at the very most skimmed quickly through it.

What we should fear is that the authors have provided the GOP Congressional Warhawks with a New Testament for managing PRC relations, which, as of this writing, are almost wholly in the tank. Brands and Beckley want us to accept that the current decade will be do or die for Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist Party,, and the United States must prepare for an act of aggression, presumably the taking of Taiwan. Moreover, some of this thinking already may have bled over into the Biden Administration's China policy, components of which are part of the "We're Tougher on China" domestic political performative tussle with the GOP Warhawk contingent. Meanwhile, both the USA and PRC continue to fling spitballs at each other...

I know...I need to insert a few examples to make a case, but today I'm grappling with a new computer and popups that suggest, every 30 seconds or so, that I should buy something from Microsoft and that will make my life entirely splendid. I'll get back to you...

[Nick · Rating 1 out of 5]

Danger Zone is one of the worst books written about China and the potential confrontation with the U.S., which is a tragedy given the qualifications of the writers, both professors, and the opportunity to write a book that balanced academic rigor with accessibility to politicians, bureaucrats, and people new to studying China. Danger Zone repeats arguments of others, prominently Graham Allison's Thucydides Trap, without providing any new analysis and failing to capture the nuance of the original ideas.

Brands and Beckley, despite being academics, apply different standards and theories for considering the U.S. and China. They criticize, perhaps rightly so, the idea that the risk of conflict will decrease as China becomes more engaged with the global market. However, Brands and Beckley ascribe Chinese actions and motivations as driven by a desire to assert influence and control over other countries while portraying U.S. actions as driven by a desire for openness and democracy. In this way Brands and Beckley suggest that we apply a realist view to Chinese economic and political activity, but that when viewing the U.S.'s own influence we, and others, should view ourselves as helping other countries achieve democracy. This ignores the obvious problem that China is unlikely to see U.S. promotion of democracy, which also supports U.S. interests and the expansion of U.S. markets, as benign and/or good for China, and the U.S. has a disastrous and inconsistent record when it comes to democracy promotion. The U.S. failed to establish stable regimes in Iraq and Afghanistan and continues to support authoritarian regimes in the Middle East. From a realist perspective, and perhaps the view of hawks in China, the U.S. supports democracy when it fosters the expansion of U.S. markets and marginalization of U.S. competitors, but will partner with authoritarian states when it supports U.S. security interests.

Brands and Beckley also do an inadequate job of providing additional context and explanations for China's rapid economic and military expansion. Both China's economy and military have expanded rapidly, but from a very low base. Brands and Beckley provide an alarmist view of China's military expansion by focusing on the numbers of new pieces of equipment and expansion of China's military budget while suggesting that aging U.S. military equipment poses a liability. However, they ignore that China itself also has aging military equipment in worse condition than the U.S.'s and that China's latest generation planes and ships are less numerous and less capable than the U.S.'s. Economically, China has also expanded rapidly from a low base, finding itself with mature companies in search of markets for goods and services. This is a natural course of economic development and we should distinguish between paths that many other countries have followed and deliberate national strategies to corrupt other countries. In failing to address this nuance with good references Brands and Beckley weaken their own arguments.

Danger Zone has many examples of poor judgment. Brands and Beckley suggest that a low-quality animation of China attacking Guam should be seeing as alarming, but fail to acknowledge that the U.S. itself has held China under the threat of nuclear retaliation since the Korean War and that China would have to reconcile the nuclear threat before engaging such an attack. They also suggest that U.S. military bases being 500 miles away from Taiwan is a weakness, which it is, but seem to ignore that this is not because of a lack of will, but a simple fact of geography. Any military bases on islands closer to Taiwan would be at great risk and the U.S., long ago in World War II, adapted to the challenges of geography when it developed advanced force projection capabilities in amphibious assault and aircraft carrier operations, critical capabilities for the defense of Taiwan. U.S. military planners must simply accept the environment they are asked to operate in and plan to accomplish objectives with those limitations.

Ironically, Brands and Beckley, as political scientists, overlook the possibility that their analysis could risk making the security dilemma facing the U.S. and China worse. If war is avoided, it will be because cooler heads in the U.S. and China find ways to accommodate each other's security interests. If the U.S. and China both look for evidence that support biased views of the other side being an existential threat, they risk taking policy and military actions that reinforce the actual threats they pose to each other. This is not to suggest that Brands and Beckley will ultimately be wrong about their views, but, if they were wrong, that they risk reinforcing a self-fulfilling prophecy that itself makes the risk of war and conflict more likely.

It is worth repeating that Brands and Beckley may be right in their analysis, but this should not give them the misplaced confidence to do a poor job in making their points. Instead of quality analysis, they provide a biased, selective, and theoretically inconsistent view that, if we consider that there are probably Chinese scholars providing the same sort of lazy analysis, risks influencing policy makers in a way that makes conflict more likely.

[Justin Goldman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This work is a useful contribution to the literature from two distinguished professors whose perspectives are also informed by their experience in government. The opening of the book is indeed provocative with a timestamp of January 2025 on the eve of war breaking out between the U.S. and the People's Republic of China (PRC). It sets the scene of a U.S. in disarray with both the Democratic and Republican Presidential candidates claiming victory with their rival supporters agitated. Beijing determines this is the time to conduct the invasion of Taiwan with the backdrop of a major naval exercise and a massive disinformation campaign while its rival in no position to respond across the "tyranny of distance" as key nodes in the U.S.network are attacked. The book is tightly argued on the thesis of the 2020s being an era of maximum danger as they write "the greatest geopolitical catastrophes occur at the intersection of ambition and desperation.” The authors highlight the economic challenge of the coming years within the PRC and at the same time address Japan, whose alliance with the U.S. is described as a "cornerstone," and as it is investing in its military capabilities. The PRC's firing missiles over Taiwan in response to the Speaker Pelosi visit, that landed in Japan's Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) in August 2022 (which unfolded just days before this was published) only enhances the realism of this discussion. PRC actions such as this have sharpened thinking in Tokyo on how Japan would respond to a Taiwan Strait flashpoint that would very rapidly impact Japan's Southwest Islands. This reinforces the fact that Professor Brands and Professor Beckley provide the reader with a lot to think about along a challenging path ahead in the coming years.

[Joshua Sprinkle · Rating 5 out of 5]

A dynamic account of China's cannibalistic brinksmanship. Brands argues that the very ideologies and statecraft responsible for catapulting China from a backwater failed state to an international superpower over the course of the past few decades are also barrelling China toward a conflict in the all-to-near future. Can China escape its crippling economic, demographic, and environmental disasters long enough to seize their moment in history? What (and why) must the United States do to stop it? Danger Zone is a ruthlessly hawkish, incredibly accessible primer on all these issues and the theoretical underpinnings of all the relevant history necessary to understand the monumental stakes.

[Mihai Zodian · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this book because it was trendy for a while, and I don't recommend it to anyone. Danger Zone starts with a frightening scenario which I`ve already seen in a book published in the 1990s, in a slightly different form. I've read some of H. Brands and M. Beckley's works before and I wasn't overly impressed. In this case, avoid also The New Makers of Modern Strategy, published last year.

Danger Zone is a bit like a thriller. It tells the reader that we live next door to a disaster, but most can't do much to thwart it. The authors are immensely proud that they go against the trend, without understanding that doomsterism is mainstream. The book was published in a period marked by pandemics, economic hurdles, regional warfare, political infighting, and security competition.     

Danger Zone argues that China`s power is declining and that its leaders will be forced to start a preventive war. As Bismarck once said, “suicide for fear of death,” an expression which isn`t just a figure of speech in a nuclear age (Jervis 1978). I don't think that any reasoning about general warfare which relies on analogies with the pre-1945 timeline makes any sense. This is true for both H. Brands and M. Beckley`s approach and the opposite framework of G. Allison`s Thucydides Trap.

But let's look closer at the reasoning from Danger Zone. China has many problems, from demography to slowing economic growth and extreme political centralization. Talk of the Great Rejuvenation and the Chinese Dream reminds me of the old romantic nationalism and Nicolae Ceausescu`s slogans of the past. But it's one thing to say that there are problems in Paradise, and another to argue that we are facing the Apocalypse in 10 years.

Danger Zone is useful for understanding the timeless attraction of skepticism. Good specialists in political science and international relations start from the same data and questions and end up with opposing explanations and recommendations. In this case, even grasping the same information is an issue, since China may be growing or going down depending on who`s authoring the book. For a mature discussion of this state power`s limits and perspectives, I would recommend any of D. Shambaugh`s texts.    

Sources

Robert Jervis, "Cooperation Under the Security Dilemma", World Politics, 30(2), 1978.

[Peter Hansen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Audiobook. Great work here by brands and bekley. Deeply informed scholarship drawing extensive parallels between situations and ranges of options faced by the US in the last Cold War and comparing it to the one we’re now in the early stages of. The two find a nice, pragmatic way to take the best insights of both liberal internationalism (the role of values) and the hard nosed world of realism—without succumbing to the pathologies of either. Builds well on the works of Rush Doshie’s The Long Game.

[Awais · Rating 5 out of 5]

An essential book for current foreign policymakers as well as anyone seeking to understand the most important conflict that will play out this decade and the next. Brands and Beckley play the role of contrarians compared to others in the field. Their arguments are clear and compelling, food for thought.

[May · Rating 3 out of 5]

The theories in this book were super interesting, and it leaned heavily towards military interventions and scenarios. Good overview as well on background. It is an interesting idea that China is facing down future decline and increasing geopolitical encroachment making it possibly more volatile. I wish the book had touched a bit more on what the US needs to do internally (re: democratic backsliding) to prepare for handling future international conflict rather than assuming the US will be in a place to lead / form multilateral alliances. Fun fact, the book was co-authored by an HKS Belfer fellow!

[Dylan Ciraldo · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent book outlining that despite the meteoric, exponential rise of China economically, militarily, and demographically, it is actually a very weak country, a ticking time-bomb, a house of cards, that will plateau today and decline rapidly and in an ugly manner tomorrow. From environmental degradation, to the scarring one-child policy, to the fact the country has no regional friends or regional alliances regarding foreign policy, to its real estate values dropping like a brick, to its F.D.I. evaporating overnight as it becomes more bellicose, China is not a rising power. China is a power that plateaued today and is now headed for a swift and ugly descent tomorrow. Stay tuned.

[Junhyuk Park · Rating 3 out of 5]

미중간의 전쟁 가능성이 생각보다 높을지도 모른다는 주장을 꽤나 설득력 있게 펼치지만 곳곳에 드러나는 노골적인 편향성이나 논리적 비약은 가려서 들을 필요가 있다. 사실 러시아의 우크라이나 침략 전쟁이 발생한 마당에 중국의 대만 침략 가능성을 제로로 보는 것이 더 나이브한 생각일지도 모른다.

인구 구조 위기나 무분별한 공격성으로 스스로 초래한 국제적 고립, 그로부터 비롯된 내부의 위기 의식은 분명 우리가 목도하는 현상이지만, 단기적이나 장기적으로 내놓는 저자들의 중국에 대한 전망은 지나치게 극단적이다. 저자들에 따르면 중국에게 가능한 시나리오는 대만 침략 전쟁, 신냉전, 불량국가로의 전락 뿐이다. 평화적인 시나리오는 거의 한두단락에 언급하고 끝난다. 흥미로운 책이지만 목적성을 가진 편향된 저작이라는 것을 상기할 필요가 있다.

[Je'vache · Rating 5 out of 5]

Saved my butt for my last minute essay final🫡🙏🏻

[Albert Chung · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I came across this book co-authored by Michael Beckley, I was immediately intrigued and decided to purchase it. I was very impressed by Beckley’s speech, The End of China’s Rise and The Future of Global Order, that he delivered at the 2024 World Knowledge Forum. Both he and Professor Brands are distinguished American political scientists, specialising in great-power competition, U.S.-China relations, and national security. Beckley serves as an Associate Professor of Political Science at Tufts University, while Professor Brands holds the esteemed position of Henry Kissinger Distinguished Professor at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. This book was released in August 2022.

China has experienced four decades of peace and prosperity, which has been an exceptional historical anomaly since the 1970s. However, the authors argue that China is not a rising power, but rather a risen one, now facing the limits of its growth. The nation stands on the brink of a demographic cliff, with its working-age population declining since 2014. Between 2020 and 2035, China is projected to lose roughly 70 million working-age adults while gaining 130 million senior citizens. By current trajectory, the country will have two workers available to support each retiree by 2050, placing immense strain on social and economic stability. While China’s economic expansion has been remarkable, it has come at a steep environmental cost. Half of its river water and nearly 90% groundwater are unsafe for consumption. Alarmingly, a quarter of its river water and 60% of its groundwater is so contaminated that the government has declared it “unfit for human contact” and unusable even for agriculture or industry. As a result, China has become the world’s largest importer of agricultural products and the largest net energy importer, including oil and natural gas. These deteriorations raise pressing questions about the future of China’s growth and sustainability.

Under Xi Jinping, China has been sliding back toward neo-totalitarianism, and this deterioration is undermining its economic growth. Rigorous studies based on objectively observable data, such as electricity consumption, construction activity, tax revenues, and railway freight, show that China’s actual growth rate is roughly half of its officially reported figures, and its economy is estimated to be 20% smaller than claimed. Despite private firms being the primary drivers of China’s wealth and employment, politically connected state-owned enterprises, often called ‘zombie firms’, have received 80% of the loans and subsidies distributed by Chinese banks. In contrast, private businesses have been starved of capital and forced to bribe party officials for protection, stifling innovation and efficiency. Decades of unproductive economic expansion, coupled with relentless corruption with the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) and its elite ‘princeling’ class, have left Communist China (共產中國) burdened with massive debt. Between 2008 and 2019, total debt exceeded 335% of GDP on the eve of the COVID-19 pandemic.

China’s increasing assertiveness and long-standing aggressive economic practices, such as intellectual property theft, forced technology transfer, and commercial espionage, have significantly escalated geopolitical tensions. In response, nations have implemented countermeasures, including trade restrictions, investment screening, strategic encirclement, and enhanced cybersecurity policies, creating a more adversarial global environment for China. Beyond these economic tactics, China has pursued mercantilist expansion through the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), seeking to secure mineral resources, dominate key markets, and extend its political and economic influence abroad.

China has engaged in a massive military buildup over the past few decades. Since the early 2000s, China has rapidly modernised its armed forces, invested heavily in advanced technology, expanded naval capabilities, missile development, cyber and space warfare, and increased its nuclear arsenal. As a result, China's growing military capabilities have heightened concerns among neighbouring countries, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region, where its rising influence continues to reshape regional security dynamics.

Chinese leaders, undoubtedly, are aware they are heading toward inevitable economic and political decline. History has shown that peaking powers often seek to expand abroad in a final push to achieve long-standing strategic ambitions before their window of opportunity closes, making such periods particularly dangerous. The authors express growing concern that China’s aggression toward Taiwan will escalate in the latter half of the 2020s. They argue that Americans must recognise the increasing likelihood of war with China, as Beijing believes they are strong enough to disrupt the existing international order aggressively. Still, Chinese leaders are losing confidence that time remains on their side. If conflict over Taiwan is inevitable, the authors present a chilling scenario in which China moves to annex the island in a bid to ‘reunify’ the nation. This unsettling catastrophe is also discussed in the book's introduction.

Overall, I appreciate that the book articulates many of the perspectives I have long held, and I agree with most of the authors’ insights. I was particularly shocked to learn the extent to which Communist China has become a serious threat to liberal democracies and my home country, Taiwan, when President Trump initiated Trade War 1.0 with China in 2018. Before that, I frequently travelled to China to perform for an IT technical & Sales role from 1996 to 2010. During this period, I also spent three years as an expatriate in Beijing, and my family and I were assigned to live and work there. My job role spanned various state-owned enterprises and government agencies, including top banks and telecommunication firms. I also had numerous meetings with Huawei, tax bureaus, and the government transportation department. Looking back, I am convinced that the mainland Chinese citizens experienced the most significant degree of freedom during that era before Xi Jinping assumed the power in 2012.

As an overseas Taiwanese, I want to share my perspectives and expectations on how the unfolding events in the coming years could shape Taiwan’s future. I grew up in Taiwan, where I completed my compulsory military service and worked there for several years until my early thirties. Most of my education, except for university, occurred in the Chiang Kai-Shek era. During his rule, Chiang adamantly maintained that he would someday lead his Nationalist Party, Kuomintang (KMT國民黨), to launch a counteroffensive to reclaim mainland China, a mission he declared after fleeing to Taiwan with his troops in 1949. In the school, we were taught we were Chinese, and mainland China was our motherland. I lived through Chiang’s authoritarian rule and experienced the prolonged period of martial law, which lasted for 38 years until it was lifted in 1987, making it the second-longest martial law imposed on any nation. Taiwan’s transition to democracy was a gradual reform process, beginning in the late 1980s and culminating in its first direct presidential election in 1996.

For seventy-six years, Communist China has continuously sought to disrupt and pressure Taiwan through a range of aggressive tactics:

• Military Threats and Provocations, including large-scale military drills and frequent incursions into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone (ADIZ). The People's Liberation Army (PLA) has intensified naval patrols and missile deployments aimed at intimidating Taiwan. Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in August 2022 triggered a strong response from China. It marked a shift in China’s approach to Taiwan and set a new status quo of heightened military pressure and diplomatic isolation.

• Diplomatic Isolation: Communist China has systematically pressured countries and international organisations to deny Taiwan diplomatic recognition, seeking to limit its presence on the global stage.

• Economic Coercion: Communist China has leveraged trade restrictions and economic dependencies to manipulate Taiwan’s policies, using financial pressure to assert control.

• Cyber Warfare and Disinformation: The CCP has launched cyberattacks targeting Taiwanese government institutions and infrastructure while spreading disinformation campaigns designed to sway public opinion and erode confidence in Taiwan’s leadership.

• Political Influence Operations: Beijing has attempted to shape the Taiwanese political landscape by supporting pro-China candidates and parties, utilising media influence and financial incentives. After Chiang Kai-Shek and his son, President Chiang Ching-kuo, passed away, the KMT shifted from a steadfast anti-CCP stance to becoming increasingly aligned with the CCP’s interests, advocating pro-China policies, deepening economic engagement, and promoting closer ties to the mainland.

• Multi-pronged approach to punish Taiwan Independence Advocacy: Taiwan has never been under the CCP’s ruling, it has a fully functioning government, military, and economy. Nonetheless, the CCP has escalated efforts to delegitimise Taiwan’s sovereignty, issuing new legal guidelines defining Taiwan independence as a crime, threatening with severe punishments, including the death penalty, for those deemed separatists. In 2022, China's ambassadors in Paris and Australia publicly stated that the Taiwanese people would be "re-educated" when the CCP take over Taiwan.

A recent 2024 Pew Research Centre poll found that 67% of people in Taiwan identify themselves as Taiwanese, while only 3% consider themselves Chinese, and 28% see themselves as both Taiwanese and Chinese. Additionally, a 2021 survey revealed that 72.5% of Taiwanese expressed a willingness to defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion.

Since the end of World War II, Independence movements have reshaped the global political landscape, with more than 100 countries achieving sovereignty or undergoing transformation. Yet, many people wonder why the CCP has continued to cling to an outdated imperial mindset, and claim Taiwan remains an inseparable part of China.

• Symbol of National Unity: The CCP uses Taiwan as a political tool to reinforce its legitimacy, portraying reunification as essential to national strength and unity.

• Historical Framing: The CCP promotes the narrative that Taiwan is part of China's "ancestral land," shaping public perception through controlled historical interpretations.

• Escalating Rhetoric: Xi Jinping has declared that the Taiwan issue must not be deferred to future generations, signalling a more aggressive approach.

• Threat to Authoritarian Control: Taiwan’s thriving democracy presents a fundamental challenge to CCP rule. For over a century, China has failed to establish a liberal & democratic political system, leaving its citizens without fundamental freedoms in most aspects of daily life. If Taiwan can succeed economically while preserving democratic freedoms, it raises the question of why can’t China?

• The Century of Humiliation and China’s Rejuvenation: Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, China endured a series of military defeats and foreign interventions that led to national decline. These included the Opium Wars, which resulted in the cession of Hong Kong to the United Kingdom, and the First Sino-Japanese War, which forced China to surrender Taiwan. In response to these historical humiliations, the CCP has placed national rejuvenation at the core of its political agenda, aiming to end foreign domination, restore territorial integrity, and modernise China’s economy and military. Reuniting with Taiwan has become a critical component of the CCP’s national rejuvenation campaign, reinforcing its determination to assert control over the island.

• The Outdated Governance Model: Today, the CCP leadership operates more like a bureaucratic feudal system from the nineteenth century, resistant to political reform and unwilling to embrace true modernisation.

There are rumours that Xi might step down from the position of the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party in the coming days, and he has lost the power to reign over the Central Military Commission. If these claims prove false, I firmly believe Xi will initiate an invasion of Taiwan within the next two to three years to cement his legacy as the CCP’s most formidable leader before entering his anticipated fourth term in 2027. If this war is not inevitable, what near-term strategy should Taiwan and Western allies adopt to navigate the volatile geopolitical landscape ahead?

• Taiwan’s president has announced that the defence budget will rise to 3% of GDP in the current financial year. Over the past five years, Taiwan has gradually increased its defence spending in response to criticism from US officials regarding its military readiness. Whether the KMT was in power or opposition, it has consistently advocated for significant reductions in Taiwan’s defence budget, limiting the government’s ability to allocate further military spending. Given the KMT’s political alignment with Beijing, Taiwan will unlikely surpass the 3% GDP threshold for defence spending. Taiwan’s slow and gradual increase in military expenditure has sparked serious concerns among Western allies regarding its commitment to defend their nation. In contrast, most allies led by the US have significantly increased their defence budget and are actively preparing for a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

• The former president, Tasi Ing-wen, extended Taiwan’s compulsory military service from four months to one year. I believe the service should be at least one and a half years, ideally two years, to ensure soldiers can effectively train and adapt to operating advanced weaponry. However, given Taiwan’s current political climate, extending the service beyond six months would be extremely difficult to implement.

• While the US Congress struggles with partisan polarisation, the Taiwan Legislature remains deeply divided and confrontational. As a young democracy, Taiwan faces significant challenges in achieving national unity, which has become a pressing concern for its people. It is widely understood that the voters who support the opposition parties, such as the KMT and TPP (Taiwan's People Party), are generally not staunchly anti-CCP. Unlike Western liberal democracies, Taiwan lacks a bipartisan consensus on national security when confronted with existential threats.

The CCP’s ongoing bullying against Taiwan has persisted for so long that many Taiwanese have grown desensitised to it and favour the maintenance of the status quo. At the same time, they place considerable trust in their national Silicon Shield, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC), for its dominance in semiconductor manufacturing, making Taiwan indispensable to the global economy, creating a strong incentive for Western nations, particularly the United States, to defend Taiwan against potential threats from China.

• Many of my Chinese friends, who are not CCP members, have always remarked that the party’s actions consistently contradict its words. They believe that whatever the CCP publicly claims will do the opposite. Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo famously stated that when dealing with the CCP, we must distrust and verify their statements. The CCP operates as the most ruthless organisation in the world. They are not a party serving the Chinese people, but rather a system functioning more like a mafia. Its primary objective is not governance but securing the legitimacy of the party, its party leader, and the elite ‘princeling’ class. At its core, it is a regime built on coercion and control.

• Despite Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption campaign, which has investigated nearly five million officials since 2012, corruption remains deeply entrenched in China’s political system. High-ranking officials continued to be implicated in bribery, embezzlement, and abuse of power, while the lack of transparency allows corruption to persist. Critics argue that Xi has used the campaign as a tool to eliminate political rivals rather than genuinely reform the system. Over the past four decades, China has amassed massive economic surpluses through exports. However, ordinary Chinese people have seen little benefit from these economic gains. Their GDP per capita remains low compared to Western Liberal democracies, with wealth concentrated primarily at the highest echelons of the CCP.

• The American technological and Wall Street financial institutions have inadvertently bolstered China’s military capabilities. The CCP employs a Military-Civil Fusion (MCF) strategy, systematically integrating civilian technological advancements into military development. This approach is designed to transform the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) into a world-class military force by leveraging innovations from China’s commercial and academic sectors. To counter this growing threat, American companies and the US government must take decisive action to blunt China’s MCF-driven advancement in artificial intelligence, semiconductors, quantum computing, biotechnology, and other critical technologies.

• The United States’ military capability in East Asia may be slipping behind China’s, and its military modernisation efforts will not fully materialise until the 2030s. To prevent conflict, the US must urgently enhance its deterrence capabilities, prioritising strategic military advancements while reinforcing partnership with Asian allies, such as the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD), to counter the CCP effectively.

The authors dedicate significant coverage to arguing why China is entering a “Danger Zone” after its long period of economic expansion comes to an end. They draw historical parallels to the origin of World War I, the launch of World War II in Asia by Imperial Japan’s militarisation in the 1930s, and even Russia’s recent invasion of Ukraine, suggesting that similar geopolitical forces may drive the CCP toward a decisive and potentially dangerous move in the second half of the 2020s. This book presents a striking and provocative narrative, offering crucial insights into how countermeasures might be developed to address the looming risks. It is a compelling read and deserves a five-star rating.

[Filbert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well-researched and nuanced piece analysing the current situation, how we got here, similarities from history, and how it can be managed towards stability.

Recommended read for any diplomat and policymaker of Uncle Sam.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Likely the most important book I’ll read this year. Highly recommended if you’re in the defense, diplomacy, and/or national security fields, or maybe just a voter who understands that “doing your own research” is not listening to sound bites from demagogic politicians or conflict entrepreneurs posing as journalists, but actually engaging the ideas of recognized experts in the field. We are already engaged in a great power competition with China, and navigating it safely and effectively is not for amateurs.

[Martin Kraft · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an extraordinary informative, timely and alarming book. It gives a concise and clear-eyed perspective on 1) What China wants 2) Why this decade is especially precarious 3) What the US (and the rest of the free world) can do to counter Chinese ambitions.

It is an essential read for anyone interested in the US-China relations.

[Turgut · Rating 5 out of 5]

Finished reading "Danger Zone" by Hal Brands and Michael Beckley. The authors are great readers of history. A lot of good prescriptive advice as well.

Learned a lot. Recommend reading together with "The Sleepwalkers" by Christopher Clark.

[Chad Manske · Rating 5 out of 5]

What happens when a couple of my favorite IR authors collaborate on a work together? An outcome much greater than the sum of the parts! Brands and Beckley team up with an interesting thesis most don’t really consider, but makes sense when they articulate it. A rising China at the scale they have over recent decades—militarily, economically, geopolitically, etc.—are indicators of the beginning of their demise. I had to stop and think about it, and you should, too, but follow the logic. China’s demography and child bearing policies have created a society in which declining birth rates could with an aging population will outstrip its ability to support. China has extended loans to fund its Belt and Road Initiative to the tune of $1.2T to countries who can’t even get an investment rating. When those debts come due in the early 2030s they will default silly, further exacerbating a controlled society’s anger. Coupled with an autocratically-run society, the environment will be rife for opposition and outright revolution. Internally, because of China’s hurried rush to grow militarily, economically, culturally springs from their awareness of some of these facts and their understanding will leave them no choice at this moment in time than to expend the power and capital they have now before their rise begins to dim. Because they are autocratic, their reach is regional geopolitically, which puts those around the 9-dashed tongue in near-term jeopardy. Beckley and Brands argue that if America and the democratic world are to weather this dramatic rise, they will continue to need a sustainable long-term competitor approach and strategy to navigate the danger zone.

[Jason Chan · Rating 1 out of 5]

A pathetic book through and through by pathetic authors, totally political-motivated, full of cold-war mindset and white supremacy. America this, America that, do you think the rest of the world will stay stagnant while you devise and put into practice your so-called danger zone strategy, if any. America has no moral grounds to criticize others, what have you done to black folks in the plantations and even now? What UFC has done in Latin America? How did you get your territory? Ever heard of Alfred Mahan? Now who is aggressive and expansionist? You poached Mexico land, grab irrigation water from them, now you want a border wall. What about human rights in Saudi, all you care is oil, you can wage wars for it, how typical, what about Israeli killing of innocent people, you only want a henchman in Mideast, what about gender inequality in India and its persecution of Muslims, all you care is Quad, did you take any action for Rohingya people, did you stop the junta, what have you done in Afghanistan, haven't you seen the chaos you brought to people all over the world? What have you done to French conglomerate in the 60s, and to Japanese semiconductor manufacturers like Toshiba Hitachi in the 80s, is that how you treat allies? What have you done to Huawei, HTC, who is the bully? And you are even more unscrupulous talking about losing millions of manufacture jobs to China, you get rid of the labour-intensive, highly-polluted and low value-added textiles and apparel industry to developing countries, and impose quotas to them (where is your free trade) while you're busy rigging institutions like world bank and IMF maintaining your dollar dominance, you grasp the pricing power of oil, then others are forced to borrow, you and your fellas enjoy a relentless lending spree, till they default, sounds familiar to you? now tell me what is debt trap, don't pretend to be the savior of the free world, we don't want your messy democracy in the first place, don't try to impose it on us, you hypocrite. Stop being the world police, police your own country, cause you desperately need it after the Jan 6 riot and since gun violence has gone rampant. The world is full of China-hater and communist-hater due to your government-funded incessant propaganda, why don't you do the world a favor, write sth else, anything but this cheap best-seller. How about peace and love. Oh, do forget to return the cultural treasures you and your cronies stolen from all over the world before you move on to peace.

[Haris · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book “Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China” challenges what most people think about the growing rivalry between China and the United States. Many experts think that America and China are running a “marathon” that will last for decades, with China slowly becoming stronger while America gradually declines. The authors disagree. They state that the most menacing period of U.S.-China competition is not in the future but right now, specifically during the decade of 2020s.

The first chapter explains what China’s leaders are aiming to attain under President Xi Jinping. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is not satisfied with simply protecting China, instead it wants to structurally transform how power works in Asia and eventually in the world. The name of the chapter is “Chinese Dream” which has numerous parts, keeping the Communist Party in total control inside China through surveillance and illiberal order, while at the same time confronting the leadership of the United States. The authors point out four main objectives in Beijing’s strategy, at first is maintaining party power at home, the second is making such an Asia where china will be the supreme power, the third is controlling important territories and sea routes including Taiwan and the last is replacing America as the world’s sole superpower. Taiwan is especially important in this regard. For CCP leaders, Taiwan represents an unfinished business of China’s historical mission, not just a small island with a small population.

The second chapter presents the most shocking argument, that is, the way for Chinese continuous rise is not paved in fact the country is heading towards serious problems. The authors say that after mentioning how a huge working age population have helped china for many years in the 1990s, now china’s population is aging quickly. This is because of the “one child policy” the country imposed for decades. The authors call this situation a “slow motion demographic catastrophe”. This creates a sense of desperation among the leaders and the public that China might not get the desire rise. Eventually, each year a big number of millionaires leave the country.

Chapter three highlights that how China utilized the strategic holiday in their favor. Strategic holiday was a period when Beijing got a special treatment from the United States and other western countries during the Cold War and even after that. In 1990s, China was seemed as a perfect opportunity, due to its gigantic population and a long coastline in the heart of east Asia, for western business as the west assumed that helping Beijing, would make them convert their values and norms, democratic. Then after the incident of 9/11, the United States was busy against terrorism in the Middle East and Afghanistan. The strategic holiday ended in the early 2010s, when the West realized that China has expended its military and territory. Consequently, the United States shifted its strategic focus towards Asia to counter Chinese expansion in Asia pacific region. The authors argue that Chinese the time period of Chinese peaceful rise has ended because Beijing has made several enemies. This strategic encirclement of China has pressurized the leadership of CCP that might pushed them for aggressive actions.

The fourth chapter explores the historical pattern of declining powers that started wars. The idea of the well-known “Thucydides Trap” given by Graham Allison, which suggests war becomes likely when a rising power threatens an established power, is challenged. Brands and Beckley argue that the most vicious moment did not come not during the rise but during the decline. They review famous historical cases through this standpoint. Athens in the Peloponnesian War started wars to prevent its decline. Germany in 1914 is one another clear example, it faced economic problems and surrounded by adversary alliances, German leaders chose to fight World War I even though they knew the risks were bloody, because they believed accepting their downfall would be worse. Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, came from similar fears of economic decline.

The fifth chapter applies these historical lessons to the contemporary China. The authors give a detailed account of how Beijing shifted its behavior in 2010s.The Chinese president Xi Jinping has adopted Mercantilist expansion abroad by increasing trade barriers to protect its local industry, through Belt and Road Initiative he has trapped many countries in debt, he has massively expanded his military, particularly in navy buildup at a high speed, faster than any country since World War II. Chinese dream of reunification with Taiwan has clearly failed, because the Taiwanese people want to live independent of Chinese control. As the options for the peace fade away, Beijing seems more and more dangerous in course of time. China has the ability to seriously challenge the United States led International order in Asia but it is not confident enough to accept that waiting will improve its position.

In the sixth chapter, the authors state the possible lessons that can be extracted from the early Cold War scenario. The Soviet Union in the late 1940s is same like today’s China, the level of anxiety is common on both sides. Choose your battle wisely is one of the important lessons the authors teach in the chapter. They emphasized how the American leaders made a network of alliance, position military forces near the enemy, invested in rebuilding allies’ economies and held crucial diplomacy to make USSR disintegrate eventually. If American leadership navigates the 2020s without a major bloody conflict with China, Chinese internal challenges and strategic vulnerability would become visible and the balance of power would shift in the US favor.

In the last two chapters, the authors emphasize on the circumstances in the 2030s, if the United States successfully handled the Chinese challenges throughout the decade, then the world would become more contentious because there would be two blocks, the US and its democratic allies and China, Russia and autocratic governments. According to the authors, there would be no trade between the two ideologically different blocks. It would affect every citizen of the world; our phones would cease to operate if we move from one block to another and our favorite apps may become deactivated. East Asia would be heavily armed specially Taiwan, Japan and South Korea. China might interfere in the US general election and US might expose Chinese internal environment. Military coup in the South America and a democratic election in Africa can become a US-China crisis. China would have serious challenges in 2030s; the population loss, the pending loans on many countries and the succession crisis.

Despite thought provoking arguments, the book has a few weaknesses. The authors mostly relate events from the 21st century (World Wars and Cold War) to modern-day China. Today, we live in the world, with several nuclear armed states. The countries are deeply connected through economic ties. In addition, some of the policies recommended in the book, especially those policies that limits Chinese influence in Taiwan, can escalate tensions.

Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China is a comprehensive treatise that challenges the idea of peaceful rise of China. It offers different viewpoints on Chinese intentions and possibilities. For anyone who wants to comprehend the great power competition in the 21st century, this book would be a crucial yet questionable read.

[InspireSeattle · Rating 4 out of 5]

The American Enterprise Institute (AEI) is a right-wing think tank, and not the place I typically go for political opinion or policy guidance. But in looking for a book about the potential threats China poses to a peaceful world, I picked up Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China, by Hal Brands and Michael Beckley, both professors and both AEI fellows. I found it an interesting read.

Brands and Beckley state that the US vs China is the “geopolitical test of our era.” They claim that China wants to be the world’s only superpower, and that the US is the main obstacle standing in their way. They also claim that the point of maximum rivalry between the US and China, and the danger of war, is the 2020s, I.E., within the next few years. Why? “China has reached the most treacherous state in the lifecycle of a rising power – the point where it is strong enough to aggressively disrupt the existing order but is losing confidence that time is on its side.” The authors write that geopolitical disasters occur at the “intersection of ambition and desperation,” and that China has large amounts of both.

China’s desire to become a dominant global force is obvious. But what is China so desperate about? Brands and Beckley state that we are currently in a time of “Peak China,” not a forever rising China. Thus, the time for China to reorder the world is running out. China is in more trouble than people realize, and this makes them more dangerous. The US is at a key moment in its competition with China, with the risk of war at its highest, and “decisions made or not made” shaping the world for decades to come.

Western countries, led by the US, were actually happily helping China grow since the 1970s, investing heavily into China and providing them key technologies. After 9/11, the US and the rest of the world were distracted in the Middle East. Effectively, China was given a “grace period” for much of the past fifty years, which they exploited to the fullest. But now, China is facing an array of crises, which the authors believe have led China to its “peak.”

China is facing a “demographic catastrophe,” with a huge aging population without sufficient young workers to support them. Spending in support of China’s aging population will need to increase dramatically, stressing China’s already stagnating economy. A stagnant economy will shatter China’s superpower goals. China is also facing an environmental catastrophe from its past intensive growth without environmental protections. China already lacks safe drinking water and food security. China also lacks key resources. China’s leader, Xi Jinping, has made himself “chairman of everything,” I.E., a dictator for life who prioritizes political control over effective policies, which has resulted in massive debt and excess capacity. Covid further wrecked China’s economy. The authors state that a poor economy will likely lead to civil unrest and revolt against Xi’s autocratic control. China is also threatened by their geographical location, surrounded by “historic rivals in every direction.”

Brands and Beckley present multiple historic examples that show this combination of deteriorating conditions combined with high ambitions as a “danger zone.” “The record is clear: When China feels vulnerable, it gets violent.” This is where wars start. China’s decades-long preparation for this war has dramatically accelerated in recent years. China now has the world’s largest military, with a massive ship-building program and military buildup, including anti-ship ballistic missiles and quiet attack submarines to eliminate the US Navy in the western Pacific. China has been building artificial islands in key locations, then placing military bases on them. And China will rival the US as a nuclear power by the 2030s.

Outside of their military buildup, China has been engaging in many other tactics to position itself for global dominance, with a special focus on dominating high-tech industries to “generate economic and military power.” Striving for technological supremacy, China regularly engages in extensive illegal activities, including “intellectual property theft, forced technology transfer, and commercial espionage,” which cost US companies between $225 billion and $600 billion annually. China is making massive investments in key technologies, including artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and efforts to control the internet. China is also eager to provide dictators throughout the world with new technologies to enable them to suppress their citizens and keep autocratic rule, such as “millions of unblinking cameras.” Through their “Belt Road Initiative,” China has invested a trillion dollars to dominate Eurasia and secure resources, markets and influence. China is the world’s largest overseas lender, and trades with more countries than the US.

Going forward, the authors see China working to expand their efforts to create an economic empire across Eurasia and Africa, and to continue their race to global technological dominance. China will keep investing intensely in their military buildup, and will continue attacking democracies and freedom, as well as helping to suppress anti-authoritarian revolts in other countries. China will also continue preparing to attack Taiwan. China has been outspending Taiwan 25 to 1 on military defense. “Xi has staked his legitimacy on liberating Taiwan.” China could blockade Taiwan, or just pummel Taiwan with missiles. The US will have to decide whether to accept defeat in Taiwan, or respond with nuclear weapons. At a minimum, the authors see us entering a new Cold War. China believes that the US “threatens nearly everything” that China desires.

Brands and Beckley stress that the US should strive to not provoke war, but believe that the US and China are on a “collision course,” and thus the US should be aggressively preparing for this upcoming conflict. They again look to history, and state the US should learn from the previous Cold War, which provides “strategic insights about what crossing a danger zone requires.” These insights include clear prioritization and objectives, assembling a free-world coalition, moving with urgency but not stupidity, not being afraid to go on the offense in measured steps, taking calculated risks, and focusing on the “long game.” The US should give up on trying to get China to play by the rules. They won’t. Instead, the US should form strong alliances that exclude and outcompetes China, and establish a free-world economic bloc aimed at China. The authors close with providing ten principles for long-term strategic objectives.

Today, with human population racing towards ten billion, and climate change already beginning to devastate our planet, humans need to somehow learn to work together to avoid global catastrophe. Yet, history shows that humans are far too eager to go to war. Danger Zone seems a fair assessment of a another possible, if not likely, upcoming global war. And so it goes.

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

Seeing the True Colors Behind the Red and Gold

This is an exceptional and timely book that shines a spotlight on China's aggressive and coercive behavior on the global stage. This gripping read offers valuable insights into China's multifaceted strategies, highlighting their adeptness in employing both hard and soft power to achieve their goals.

Brands' analysis is meticulous and enlightening, providing readers with a comprehensive understanding of China's tactics. The book delves deep into the realm of soft power, revealing how China skillfully wields tools like social media, resource manipulation, sanctions, and other tactics to advance its interests. This critical examination of China's foreign policy offers readers a nuanced perspective on the complexities and challenges of dealing with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Danger Zone is an essential resource for anyone seeking to grasp the intricacies of foreign policy and the strategic plans of the CCP. Brands' expertise shines through as he navigates the complex landscape of international relations, equipping readers with the knowledge needed to comprehend China's ambitions and their potential consequences for global stability.
The book's emphasis on the cruciality of Taiwan adds another layer of urgency, serving as a stark reminder of the high stakes involved in the region.

The book's exceptional content and Brands' insightful analysis make it an invaluable resource for understanding the challenges posed by China's rise. This thought-provoking work is an important contribution to the field of foreign policy and serves as a compelling warning of the potential conflicts on the horizon.

Prepare to be enlightened and empowered as you delve into the pages of Danger Zone. This book serves as a clarion call, urging readers to confront the realities of China's aggressive behavior and the impact it could have on the global order - and what you can do about it.

4.7/5

[Maurice Gilbert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great insight into how each power is thinking about competition with the other. Neither side appears to want war, but it seems the laws of human history are dictating a confrontation of sorts in the future. Can we escape what appears to be the natural order of things? Hal Brands touches on this question, including how each sides attempt to dissuade the other into conflict could be leading to an increased likelihood of that very conflict occurring.

[Evangelos · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is an embarrassingly bad ideological screed written by two neoconservative hawks linked to the far-right American Enterprise Institute. If what you're looking for is free-market evangelism wrapped up as geopolitical strategy you've come to the right place.

There are endless problems here:

-overall an us/them Cold War mentality that doesn't show even the faintest awareness of the history of American foreign policy and its complicity with war, domination, and violence. At one point they claim that the CCP is only capable of thinking in binary--"You-Die, I-Live" but this ironically ends up functioning as the slogan for their own way of thinking. Critical thinking here is entirely absent. China is a "brutal authoritarian regime" and America is simply trying to "defend a liberal international order it has anchored for generations". America, we're told, is a nation founded on slaying autocrats. "Even when the United States has no conscious design to undermine dictators , it cannot help but threaten them. America's very existence serves as a beacon of hope to dissidents." This nonsense obscures not only America's own wretched history of human rights violations and useless wars, but its unwavering support for neoliberal and conservative autocracies abroad across the whole of the 20th C. The authors either simply don't know this history--Indonesia, Chile, Argentina, etc.--or see the tens of millions murdered directly and indirectly by American (and NATO) power as collateral damage in the war against communist evil.
-they produce no evidence for the "grand strategy" for world domination they claim is at the heart of Beijing's policy making. But wait: the fact we don't have proof isn't a problem! What if it's just deeply, deeply hidden?! So the fact we have no proof is in fact the only proof we need! Watch for a trick that they and their ilk love: the collapsing of a desire for a position of dominance (one which would protect the geopolitical interests of the Chinese) with a desire for hegemony (the assumption that this would involve the imposition of authoritarianism or "Chinese values" on the rest of the world). Let's say it together: "The desire on the part of the Chinese for regional dominance/authority/security is not the same thing as a desire for (historically American) world hegemony".
-the CCP "has historically gone to enormous lengths to protect its own power". One example they use is the Cultural Revolution. But this simply a ridiculous example given that the CCP was unleashed by Mao behind the back of the party and aimed precisely at the entrenched, bureaucratic tendencies of the party itself! If anything the Cultural Revolution was a product of a revolutionary desire to undo the entrenched power of the party in the name of a misguided and voluntaristic concept of permanent revolution. But because they are ideologically-blinded policy wonks and not historians they simply lack all nuance here.
-they think about things through aprioristic, unchanging political categories rather than empirically precise conjectural analysis. "The CCP has the eternal ambition of every autocratic regime--to maintain its own power". Ok? But hasn't this also been the political logic of diarchy in America? And can't there be forms of good-governance, creative policy innovation, and sound planning enmeshed with this desire for power? Power this isn't the ONLY thing that motivates the CCP and an endless number of books--from Bruce Dickson to And Yuen Yuen--have laid out just what motivates the political class in a far more nuanced and thoughtful way. These motivations, believe it or not, include ideals of good governance and service provision to their people.
-the book is intellectually dishonest. One can certainly make the claim that a world ruled by China might be safer for autocracies (though this assumes the world we live in presided over by America wasn't itself one made up of fully-supported autocracies). One can argue this, but one cannot write as if this weren't itself an object of wide-ranging debate. Rather than saying that this might be the case and including counter point (for example Jessica Chen Weiss's research) they draw in their sourcing from Trump's favorite "sinologist" Michal Pillsbury. Imagine writing the following sentence and expecting to be taken seriously as scholars: "...Xi's top priority since assuming power has been to imprison, execute, or disappear anyone that conceivably could become a political rival. Since 2012, authorities have investigated nearly 3 million officials and punished more than 1.5 million others". Astoundingly, there's no mention here that this is a product of an anti-corruption campaign! These kinds of elision ensure that this book never reaches the lowest possible criterion of real scholarship.
-the authors don't even consider the possibility that the same criteria they use to describe China's situation--a rising power suddenly met by new limits--could equally explain the very origins of the kind of discourse they themselves are participating in. In other words, rather than exploring the ways America's own decline has led it to a place where it needs threat inflation--a key part of any working military keyensianism--they assume that the security apparatus/state department relate to China through an ideologically neutral lens of competition. There's no sense here at all that the authors themselves are caught up in an ideological lure nor that they themselves might be laying down the conditions of the kind of totalitarian expansionism they claim to be fighting. Had they been less ideologically blinded they'd have connected the rise of Trump to similar anxieties within America itself about decline and the need to decisively act. That the "pivot to Asia" is less an act of strategic clarity than it is a dangerous, expansionist form of war-mongering never once crosses their minds.
-they accuse China of allowing security to dominate other policy problems. This is hilarious coming from two Americans living in a state that has been at war against terror near continuously for 20 years and which has virtually abandoned progressive social policy in the wake of its own neoliberalization. Again, as right-wing free market ideologues, they don't even bother trying to sort out how the drive to marketization has undercut American democracy nor discredited American solutions abroad (the Washington consensus is today laughed at by economists of development and even the IMF has come to see it as a mistake).
-the authors come very close to an authoritarian neoliberal position in which whether or not a state is liberal is elevated over whether or not it is a democracy. And so they report--without any moral qualms--that the CIA bought an Italian election in which the Italian people came close to voting into power communists. What they are saying is clear: we want democracy but only on the condition that it remains capitalist; we want liberalism and we'll fight for it even if we're forced to use illiberal means to do so. The logic here is that of Pinochet. They also side step the ease with which America post-war entered into arrangements with fascist states they'd just beaten--states that were never fully de-nazified--to fight communism. They call this: "not allowing the to be the enemy of the perfect" but they can't see that its these--and hundreds of other lapses--that have effectively negated the moral legitimacy of the liberalism/autocracy binary that grounds their work.
-the most sublime stupidity is saved for the end. They call for a "collective anti-imperialism" aimed at China and led by America. Um, what? Basically this is about ensuring that imperialism--the rule of approximately 20% of the world's population, housed in the advanced Western economies and including Japan and Australia--continues to get to rule and economically exploit the rest. To dress up this continuing imperialism, this restoration, as revolution, is a rhetorical stroke of genius, but it is nevertheless laughable to anyone with a shred of historical knowledge. Instead, one could very well frame the ascendence of china as anti-imperialist! Though I myself would have worries about this framing one can read Carlos Martinez's The East is Still Red to get a sense for how that argument might work.

In sum, this is basically a handbook for psychopaths. It is a guidebook written to enable America--in cahoots with advanced capitalist states--to maintain their grip on power forever. Here they are openly declaring their desire to test, prod, and disrupt Beijing; they openly celebrate their desire to bait it into costly blunders. They at one point openly call for the disruption of chinese industry up to and including the spread of disinformation about it and the injection of malware and bugs into their software and media platforms. These fools, who can't see the way their every word increases the power and influence over domestic policy of the pentagon, will inadvertently trigger world war 3. When this book isn't busy being philosophically and empirically bankrupt, it takes shape as a clear symptom of the worst kind of zero-sum national security thinking. Read it, if only to widely denounce, mock and resist the people who in 20 years will have pulled the world into complete conflagration.

[Robert Jeens · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of the large numbers of books that has come out recently warning of the dangers of the American-Chinese rivalry from the American side. The book sums up the main problems concisely and offers policy prescriptions for winning over the short and long terms.
The book opens with a war that starts over Taiwan in January 2025, so get ready! The main thesis of the book is that China is not a rising power, but a peaking power. Because of the authoritarian nature of the regime and its demographics, China is stagnating and will decline both economically and militarily. On the other hand, the United States and its allies have only recently become aware of the real danger that the Chinese government is, and so are now playing catch-up, trying to isolate it economically and technologically and re-arming slowly. Thus, China’s best chance to try to upend the international system generally and take Taiwan specifically is sometime in the next five years or so.
It is easy to string together the most belligerent quotes from Chinese leaders into an argument, but then again, they said it, so maybe they believe it. I am not a China expert at all, but I know what I read in the newspapers, and so it seems like the phrase “authoritarian regime” fits well, that President Xi has made things worse, and that they really want to take Taiwan and turn the South China Sea into a Chinese lake. What exactly are they going to do? It is difficult to really know. It seems to me that if they meet hard targets they are less likely to do anything rash, but that weakness invites them in. It is to the Chinese advantage that the USA has interests in other places, particularly Europe and the Middle East, and it has been sidetracked, while the Chinese are only really concerned about their neighborhood. Their disadvantage is that the USA has allies, particularly, in this case, Japan.
I note that the Economist has just announced that the liberal international order is falling apart. This is further proof to all the people who used to spout off about American hegemony that the people who will replace the Americans are worse.
The author's policy prescriptions mostly made sense to me, but I had a couple of quibbles. They say that if China invades Taiwan, China gets Taiwan’s semiconductor industry. I disagree. That industry will be destroyed. Further, they are quite hawkish (maybe with some justification), but I think that the Americans and Japanese pre-emptively setting up missile bases in the Ryukyu Islands would be as likely to start a war as anything else. Further, with President Trump in office, economic engagement with America's allies is unlikely. The authors consider the possibility of a surprise attack on Taiwan and American military bases in Asia, but not the possibility of a Chinese blockade of the island. Would the Americans try to break the blockade? Would they be able to break the blockade? Would the Chinese be willing to shoot down American airplanes trying to land in Taiwan? Then the Chinese might get the Taiwanese semiconductor industry whole.
On a somewhat off-topic but related topic, I live in South Korea, and I think that there is a better than 0% chance that by the time Trump leaves office, all the American forces are out of South Korea and South Korea has nuclear bombs. That will keep the North Koreans and Chinese at bay, but will it be a better world?
Anyway, if you want to read a book that tells you a worst-case scenario and then offers solutions, this is as good as any I know of. I found it illuminating, scary and reassuring at various different times.

[Rich Binder · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am giving this book a 3. I learned some new things, like the fact that China has a lot of problems, demographically and economically, and their power has probably peaked. But that means they are more likely to do something disruptive while they still can, like invade Taiwan. I also found the chapters on Imperial Germany's fear of encirclement, and Imperial Japan's fear of losing their oil supply, instructive. Although it seems that Communist China is not in quite as desperate a situation as the previous cases, if an ideological system feels that it deserves to be pre-eminent in the world, then those leaders would want to force the rest of the world to do things their way, any way that they can. I also learned new things from the chapter on what the U.S. and its allies did to deal with the Soviet Union after World War 2 and during the Cold War.

However, I'm not as optimistic as the authors are about the prospects for a new alliance of liberal democracies' ability to safely contain Communist China in the next decade or so (the Danger Zone). What they present as policies are reasonable as far as they go, but I think there is too much fragmentation in the world order now. Especially, big corporations tend to be laws unto themselves when they consider their own interests (profits) and are actually indifferent to the good of democracy, which many neoliberals consider a detriment to the functioning of markets. Part of the reason China has been able to grow its economy so fast and advance to its present state of strength is that business was so mesmerized with the prospect of billions of Chinese cusomers, that it was willing to tolerate theft of intellectual property and unbalanced deals that didn't even allow them full access to the Chinese market.

Nevertheless, I agree that the US and its allies have to confront China now if there is any hope of preserving some semblance of democratic freedom in the world system. I don't agree with some of the other reviewers here that this would be dangerously belligerent; China is the one that is being aggressive and unreasonable. I was born the year the Korean War began and lived through most of the Cold War. Nobody knew for sure what would ultimately happen. We got lucky once, and hopefully we can get lucky again.

[Sami Nourse · Rating 5 out of 5]

While the previous book I read on the impending China threat focused primarily on the tactical level of war, this book was refreshingly strategic. The authors argue, with many illuminating historical examples, that the most precarious moment in a country’s rapid ascension is when it faces an inevitable slump. This is exactly what we see now. Despite its impressive rise to become a formidable global power, China now simultaneously faces a looming demographic crisis, dubious overseas investments in the Belt Road Initiative, and an aging leader with no apparent replacement plan. So how can the liberal free order navigate this “Danger Zone”?

Reading this book made me think about the balance of global power in a totally different way. It also gave me huge respect for the Truman era of international policy development. I think that the world in the 1940’s-50’s was much more willing to invest in global stability with WWII fresh in the collective memory. Today’s leaders face a world with more competing priorities, and a global population that has largely been insulated from war, and never known great power conflict. It may be more challenging to get people to care.

It is also interesting to reflect on recent global changes. This book was published in 2022, and I read it at the beginning of 2025. Democracies globally are shifting towards far-right regimes. Canada’s liberal icon of the past ten years has just stepped down amid low public confidence. The German government is facing collapse and sweeping reelections. Not to mention, the 2023 eruption of a major regional conflict between Israel and Hamas still rages on. While many major democratic allies are undergoing seismic shifts, the U.S. has also chosen to reelect Donald Trump, a far-right and unpredictable leader who has already threatened sweeping tariffs as well as the desire to absorb Greenland, the Panama Canal, and even Canada. The global landscape is shifting rapidly. This book left me a lot to think about, and helped me better contextualize our current state of affairs in the scope of history. Highly recommend!

[Anton Korbut · Rating 4 out of 5]

Michael Beckley and Hal Brands’ Danger Zone offers a stark and thought-provoking analysis of the U.S.-China rivalry, arguing that the world is entering a perilous period as China reaches what they describe as a “danger zone” in its trajectory. The authors posit that Beijing’s ambitions, combined with internal pressures and slowing economic growth, make the coming decade critical for global stability.

The book’s primary strength is its clarity and urgency. Beckley and Brands succinctly outline why China’s relative decline could make it more dangerous, not less. The authors draw on historical parallels, such as rising powers feeling compelled to act before their momentum wanes, to underscore the risk of conflict over Taiwan and other flashpoints. Their argument is supported by a mix of historical analysis, economic trends, and military strategy.

What sets Danger Zone apart is its focus on the immediacy of the challenge. Unlike works that project China’s rise far into the future, Beckley and Brands contend that the greatest risks lie in the present moment, as the window for China to assert its dominance narrows. Their policy recommendations are pragmatic, urging the United States and its allies to prepare for deterrence while avoiding unnecessary provocations.

However, the book’s alarmist tone may not sit well with all readers. Critics might argue that it oversimplifies the complexities of U.S.-China relations or underestimates China’s resilience. The brevity of the text—while making it accessible—leaves some areas underexplored, particularly the perspectives of other regional actors like Japan, South Korea, and ASEAN nations.

Danger Zone is a concise and compelling call to action, urging policymakers and readers alike to recognize the risks of complacency in the face of an increasingly assertive China. It is an essential read for those seeking to understand the dynamics of great power competition and the challenges of managing peace in an era of rising tensions.