Geopolitics, Strategy, Realpolitik, AI, Nukes, Tech Cold War | History (Rome → Cold War) | Nixon/Kissinger Realist | Conservative | Order First | Views My Own
Joined November 2008
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I think about this every day.
A 🧵
#Kissinger #History #Philosophy
"History knows no resting places and no plateaus. All societies of which history informs us went through periods of decline; most of them eventually collapsed.
SCOOP: President Trump authorized a crackdown on companies suspected of diverting Nvidia's advanced AI chips to China on Thursday, but one administration official repeatedly stood in the way: Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. axios.com/2026/11/11/trump-l…
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The fallout from the espionage scandal surrounding Jensen Huang and the total compromise of Nvidia’s core IP has abruptly accelerated the US-China conflict timeline. In an AI Cold War where compute architecture and advanced silicon represent the enriched uranium of the 21st century, any illicit leap toward hardware parity shreds Washington’s containment strategy…. shifting the confrontation from managed export controls to an existential, zero-sum clash far ahead of schedule.
Previously, I just could not see a conflict within 20+ years between the two. Today, I am not longer so sure.
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#Napoleon was a voracious reader & an incredible policy mind alongside his military brilliance.
When Napoleon lost his empire, he took another empire with him: books.
He brought a huge personal library into exile—perhaps more than 600 books to St. Helena. Over the years, his collection grew to more than 3,000 volumes, covering history, geography, mathematics, military science, politics, literature and more.
Stripped of an empire, his life on St. Helena became almost painfully ordinary: meals, riding, reading, dictating his memories, chess, cards and long conversations.
But his mind never stopped working.
Napoleon was an extraordinary oral worker. Madame de Rémusat described how easily he dictated, speaking to his subordinates in a remarkably familiar tone. He could dictate for hours without writing.
And then there was Betsy Balcombe.
When Napoleon arrived at St. Helena, Longwood was not ready, so he temporarily stayed with the Balcombe family. Their 14-year-old daughter Betsy was initially terrified of him.
Soon, however, the former Emperor of the French was teasing her, stealing her ballgown, quizzing her about the burning of Moscow and joking about her English pronunciation.
A great review of Robert D. Kaplan 's new book on America's "#China whisperers" from the always solid Francis P. Sempa in @ModAgeJournal.
Rightly, Sempa notes the greatest China policymakers were #Nixon & #Kissinger, though I believe Nixon was greater.
modernagejournal.com/what-ex…
Nixon, at the end of his life understood that we may have created a "Frankenstein" with China. He would have rebalanced our policy after the original strategic rationale, triangulation with the Soviet Union during the Cold War, evaporated.
Kissinger tried too hard to keep the relationship too close.
I think he did so for multiple reasons including his own legacy, financial gain, & legitimate historical fear of world war.
But Nixon was clearer-eyed.
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Clearly the US needs to move beyond a denuclearization policy towards #NorthKorea. We aren't going to make them give them up & all maintaining the policy does is freeze flexible US diplomacy at a time when maximum flexibility is essential. @ForeignAffairs
foreignaffairs.com/north-kor…
#Tech leaders need to be aware they are targets in #China for all sorts of spying, including honeypots.
Just another facet if the #AI race & #TechColdWar.
washingtonpost.com/opinions/…
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#Nihilism, the malady of modernity as prophesied by both #Dostoevsky & #Nietzsche has eroded meaning for too many.
The West is learning that gaining the world while losing its soul is an anguishing tradeoff.
Good piece in @ModAgeJournal on this...
modernagejournal.com/beyond-…
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This is absolutely the right way to view the #Nixon/#Kissinger policy towarda #China.
Correct in the Cold War context with the Soviet Union as the great power competitor.
Bad after the Soviet Union collapsed & that strategic rationale evaporated, our academic, business, & political elites should have changed the policy.
They did not & welcomed China with open arms into the global economy even though China remained an obvious, & dangerous, geopolitical competitor rather than shifting to become like the United States.
#History
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I have read two of the books in the below 🧵:
Sea Power & The Tragedy of Great Power Politics.
But I would suggest a # of Robert D. Kaplan books instead of the others on this list, starting with the Revenge of Geography & The Return of Marco Polo's World.
Then Asia's Cauldron & Monsoon.
#Geopolitics #Realism
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On the #Iran war @vp @JDVance was right.
Many of those in the Right attacking him for essentially saying so are not sufficiently taking care to look out for what are really America's core interests.
The below is what a coherent grand strategy in an era of domestic turmoil, debt accumulation, industrial base atrophy, global power diffusion & the rise of peer adversary in #China:
* Focus on China in East Asia;
* Make #Europe take the lead balancing #Russia in their backyard;
* Let #Israel & Arab nations take the lead & "mow.the grass" with #Iran;
* Shore up our economic & military dominance in the Western hemisphere.
That puts America First & does not conflate the interests of others with our own.
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Greg R. Lawson retweeted
There are only a handful of people trying to keep the ship afloat.
JD Vance is one of them.
Nvidia board should say they are halting all sales to Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia and distributors in the region while they investigate and improve compliance process. Get ahead of congress, if they find problems find scapegoats like legal and sales people, but protect Jensen Huang. They can’t do nothing and they can’t say they have had no compliance issues. But I doubt they will; even after all these revelations they still have not said they have suspended business with Megaspeed
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The #JensenHuang scandal is fascinating.
Many layers.
Whether Huang really believes his arguments for allowing sales to #China are good for American national security or there is something more self-interested at play, at the end of the day, any tech CEO has to be very careful now.
We are win the middle of an #AI race & #TechColdWar with #China.
That fundamental reality will shape everything to come.
This was:
1) a massive conflict of interest with a major customer, which
2) seems to have motivated the company to take certain actions it otherwise would not have to protect that customer, and
3) the customer is alleged to be an asset of Chinese intelligence.
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