Hal Brands, the Henry A. Kissinger Distinguished Professor of Global Affairs at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, joins the show to discuss the Cold War's lessons for great-power rivalry today.

Times

01:24 - Introduction

02:47 - Halford Mackinder and how Eurasian geopolitics framed the Cold War

05:37 - Mackinder's theory of the heartland

07:47 - China's Belt and Road Initiative as an application of Mackinder's theory

09:07 - Comparing the United States' approaches to the USSR and China

13:04 - Nuclear power during the Cold War

17:24 - How Cold War-era nuclear logic applies today

21:02 - No first use policy

26:56 - The Nixon administration's critique of containment strategy

29:58 - The collapse of the Soviet Union

32:15 - Theories of victory that led to the Vietnam War

35:08 - End of the Cold War

39:17 - Infrastructure needed to fight the Soviets in the United States, and what the U.S. needs to take on China today

44:02 - China's moves to decouple economically from the United States

46:47 - The United States' harrowing responsibility to take on adversarial powers