About this episode
Jon Czin spent years as a top China analyst at the CIA, served as China Director on Biden’s National Security Council, and now works at the Brookings Institution. We discuss what Xi’s fourth-term means for China’s top leadership and military, Taiwan, and the US. We cover:
How Xi’s mafioso-style “decapitation strategy” has kept the PLA in line and why he’s purged more generals than Mao.
Cognitive decline and how end-of-life thinking might be shaping Xi’s succession plans and Taiwan strategy.
Tariffs, rare earths, and China’s appetite for pain vs. America’s.
Beijing’s parochialism and its limits in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict.
What intelligence work on China actually looks like and whether or not Xi’s era is duller than previous generations.
Plus: who might succeed Xi, comparing the Politburo Standing Committee to a frat house, and why chips and TSMC matter much less in Xi’s Taiwan calculus than most think.
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