May 19, 2026 • 11 mins
Washington Post Global Opinions Columnist Josh Rogin joins Jack & Joe following President Trump's overseas trip to China where he meet with President Xi--who's obsession with Taiwan grows more intense with every passing day. Will China invade their island neighbor, and what type of impact would an invasion have on the rest of the world?
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
We're joined by Josh Rogan, global opinions columnist with the
Washington Post, author of a terrific book, Chaos under Heaven,
Trump She in the Battle for the twenty first Century.
Speaking of Trump She and battles, Josha, Welcome, how are you.
Let's talk about it.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Hey, guys, great to be back with you.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
So let's talk about Taiwan and the stakes involved, because
there's been a lot of talk, well for decades and
certainly more recently about does the US defend Taiwan, etc.
What's Chinese China's timetable? Let's start with what would it
look like to the world economy if China made a
serious military move on Taiwan.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Right, Well, it's in the news, of course, because President
Trump went to China, met with Jijingpang and then said,
I'm not so sure I'm going to sell Taiwan the
arms that we promised we were going to sell them.
We're sent to shockwave through the region, especially through Taiwan,
because without those US arms, the chance of deterring, much
less repelling any sort of Chinese invasion for the timeese
(00:55):
goes way way down. So that's not great, okay. But
the question that you ask, is the right one. What
happens if they actually try it? And you know, the
main quite determinant is whether or not we help them.
And you know, would that American president in that moment
press that button and send US troops or US ships
or US bombs to help the time when you stop
(01:17):
the Chinese invasion? And when I asked President Trump about
that when reporting for my book, he was very clear.
He said, We're nine thousand miles away, China's two feet away.
If they attack, there isn't an effing thing we can
do about it. That's what he said. Okay, so he's
not very enthused about the idea of intervening on Taiwanean
(01:37):
and he doesn't say that, but that's the idea, And
what does that mean. That means essentially, if the Chinese attack,
the Taiwanese would get crushed in a second. Without our help,
they would get rushed in a second. And after that
a number of scenarios can play out, all of them bad.
You know, in the best case scenario, China controls not
only that the taiwan straight, we're fifty percent of the
(01:58):
world shipping.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
Goes through it or later, did you say fifty five, Yes.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Fifty percent of the world shipping goes through that when
one way or another needs that depends on the Taiwan
Straight and that's a lot. And then the ninety percent
of the world's most advanced semiconductors are made in Taiwan,
all the Nvidia stuff, all of it. It's actually manufacturing
in Taiwan, most of it. Anyway, that's pretty bad if
China controls that, and then think about the rest of
(02:25):
the region. You've got Japan, think of or South Korea.
All of those countries would immediately realize that they have
no choice but to arm themselves to the Tieths because
America is not coming, and the entire region just becomes
a powder care forever. That's kind of like the best
case scenario. The worst case scenario is there's an actual
war over Taiwan, and that would immediately invelove, the Japanese,
(02:45):
the North Koreans, maybe now we're talking nuclear weapons, and
then it just gets worse and worse.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Well, the best best case scenario, of course, as you know,
is China's too scared to try it because they're so
certain that that we and the rest of the world
would fight on Taiwan's behalf, but not exactly sending that
message right now.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Well, that's right. The whole idea of the policy has
been for many decades is that we make it so
hard that they don't try it. That every day Hugien
Ping wakes up, he looks across this training he says,
not today, it's going to be too difficult today. And
the truth of the matter is that that balance of
power between China and Taiwan and his friends is moving
(03:24):
in the direction of China's advantage every single day. China's
building the largest military build up in the history of
the world. Hundreds of nuclear weapons silos were those for
you know, a massive landing, invasion, cyber warfare, internet warfare,
cognitive warfare. They're messing with Taiwani's politics, They're messing with
their elections, they're messing with their media, they're messing with
(03:45):
their minds on a constant basis all day along. And
that's not good. Okay, We're and so in order for
the United States and its friends and allies to keep
that balance up so that Taiwan teams like too tough
to eat, you know, like too difficult to swallow, you
know whatever, you want to call it, we would have
to do a lot more, and we're not doing a
(04:07):
lot more. So that's what that's really the most worrying
thing is not what would happen on the day of
the attack, but like every single day that China gains
an advantage actually, in my opinion, makes the situation, along
with dangerous interesting.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Talking to Joshua A. Rogan, Global Opinions columnists for The
Washington Post, Josha, I've said that one thing restraining she
is that China is so entirely dependent on exports. A
gigantic shock to the world economy would be enormously damaging
to them too. That's at least helped delay you know
(04:37):
what might be inevitable. Agreed, disagree? Expand on that your thoughts.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Yeah, no, I think that's exactly right. The best scenario
for Jiugien thing is that he takes Taiwan without firing
a shot. You know, look at what happened in Hong Kong.
They never attacked Hong Kong. They just suffocated it. They
just messed with it, messed with the people there, you know,
clamped down as much as they could and eventually strangled
the democracy and freedom out of Hong Kong and it
worked and they never had to fire a shot. That's
(05:02):
the idea. I think that's what he's going to try
to do first. I don't That's why I don't think
a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is coming in twenty twenty seven.
I think maybe they could be able to do it,
but chi Jin King's going to try best he can
to mess with Taiwan so much that maybe the Taiwanese
get so you know, battered down, that they fold, or
maybe they elect someone who's pro China because he messes
with the other people so much. He's definitely going to
(05:24):
try that. But I think in twenty twenty eight, when
the Taiwanese make their next presidential election, if they choose
someone like they have now, someone who doesn't want the
Chinese to take over Taiwan because gus what most Tiwhanese
don't want the Chinese to take over Taiwan, I think
that's when chi Jin King might realize that the military
and economic risks might be worth it for him.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
Well, I'm glad you're somewhat optimistic and very theory. I'm
glad you're somewhat optimistic. It's not going to happen in
the next year. But are are we not dealing in reality?
At some point I realize that if China takes Taiwan,
we live in a completely different world than all of
us have lived in our whole lives. But yeah, as
China grows into an economic superpower, military superpower, and they
(06:08):
got at island right off their coast, is it realistic
to think that the world's not going to keep them
from taking it?
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Yeah, I mean it's a good question. I think that
twenty three million Taiwanese people are not going to want
to be ruled by the Chinese Communist Party, And if
we let them just get swallowed up by the Chinese
Communist Party, that's really bad for any other country in
the world that lives next to a psychotic dictatorship that
wants to take it over. I mean, look around the world.
(06:34):
You know, the cause of freedom and de oos is
not really doing that well at the moment. You know,
the autocrats are on the marsh now, the Ukrainians are
fighting back. That's great. You know, hopefully someday the Iranian
people will get another chance to throw off their government.
That's great. But right now, yeah, a lot of people
around the country are like, hey, it looks pretty bleek
for the Taiwanese. But here's the thing. You know, people
do not actually want to live on their knees, and
(06:56):
they don't actually subjugate themselves to that kind of rule willingly.
They tend to resist. Now sometimes they lose, but never
discount the fact that people don't want to live on
their knees. And really the only thing that we can
do is to support those people who don't want to
live on their knees. And no, it's not determined yet.
China could win in that country. I don't know if
you've ever been there. It's beautiful, the people are lovely,
(07:17):
the food's amazing. It would be a damn shame if
it fell into Beijing's arms, because that would be a
tragedy for all of those people and for all of
the other people around the world who look at some
sort of evil dictatorship on their border and be like, oh,
I really don't want to get swallowed up by those guys. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
My response to what Jack said, which is one hundred
percent true, would be that you've just got to make
it as expensive or difficult as possible for as long
as possible and hope things change for the better on
one front or another. Which brings us to China's enormous
demographic and economic challenges that are going on right now.
We won't roll all of them out for you, but
(07:56):
they have some serious economic problems going on. How is
that going to a factor in josh any idea.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Yeah, it's important to talk about because China is not
ten feet tall. They do have a lot of problems.
But you know, at the same time, we have to
realize that it's going to be the largest country with
the largest economy and maybe even the largest military in
the region for the rest of our lives. So they're
going to continue to have problems. Their problems don't affect
them the same way our problems affect us because they
(08:23):
don't have things like elections, you know what I mean.
If they have some sort of like crisis in the
banking or real estate sector, they just fudge it all
because it's all a corrupt economy anyway. So, yeah, they
have problems, and we should, my view, try to maximize
our advantages and cause more problems for them, because they're
out to harm us. You know. In the end, China's
goal is not just to take Taiwan, but it's to
(08:44):
become the most powerful country in the world, and that
means our disadvantage. So it's not just about Taiwan. But yeah,
they have real vulnerabilities. To my mind, we should, you know,
exploit those vulnerabilities and then use that to slow their
rise so that we can maintain our leadership in the world,
because that's better for us and better for the world.
But you know, it's just not going that well at
(09:06):
the moment. For being honest.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
So President Trump met with President She last week. President
She's meeting with Vladimir Putin today. And I know you're
aware of this quote. The caught on a hot mic
quote from three years ago when President She was talking
to Vladimir Putin and said, and I think this is
one of the most important quotes of my lifetime. President
She said, there are changes happening, the likes of which
(09:30):
we haven't seen for one hundred years. Let's drive those
changes together. Putin said, I agree. What did that mean?
And do they still believe that? And what do you
think they're going to be talking about today?
Speaker 2 (09:41):
Yeah, I agree with you. It's one of the most
important things that I've heard said in a very long time.
And what he's saying is something that I think is proved,
which is that you know, the international world order or
whatever you want to call it, that maintained relative peace
and security and in my opinion ushered in the greatest
period of prosperity for America and in the world in
history since World War Two is breaking down. That's pretty obvious.
(10:04):
Whatever it is, the multilateral institutions, people were, you know,
disadvantaged by the inequities of globalization. All of the grievances,
some of which contributed to the rise of Trump and
some of which you know are just sort of the
baked into the corruption of the system. All those grievances
are real. But the question is, okay, what do we
do now? And if we're not going to have that
(10:26):
whole system, which you know has some good parts and
some mistakes were made, for sure, and if we're going
to replace that, what are we going to replace it with?
The to my mind, whatever we replace it with probably
shouldn't be decided by jiujungpingg and Vladimir Putin. That's my position.
Call me old fashioned, you know, but if you are
(10:48):
like the new world system is we're going to pick
what it is. I'm against that. I think the Americans
should pick what it is and our allies, maybe Japan
and the Europeans too, and you know whoever else is
on board with us. But if they, I don't think
it would be good for us.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
No, oh my god, Amen to that, brother. Josh Rogan,
Global opinions calumnists for The Washington Post and again author
of Chaos under Heaven Trumpshee in the Battle for the
twenty first Century. Josh, always so thought provoking. Thanks a
million for the time, Really.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
Enjoyed it anytime.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
What a smart guy. And that quote is terrific. That
quote that I've read out how many times on the
show gives me chills. Actually, it is one of the
most important things uttered this.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
I'm glad you made note of that. You can't remember
what you had for lunch yesterday, but man, you've you
have absolutely internalized that one. And it's it is a
block bustle, it's huge. It's an old timer Armstrong and
Getty
We're joined by Josh Rogan, global opinions columnist with the
Washington Post, author of a terrific book, Chaos under Heaven,
Trump She in the Battle for the twenty first Century.
Speaking of Trump She and battles, Josha, Welcome, how are you.
Let's talk about it.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Hey, guys, great to be back with you.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
So let's talk about Taiwan and the stakes involved, because
there's been a lot of talk, well for decades and
certainly more recently about does the US defend Taiwan, etc.
What's Chinese China's timetable? Let's start with what would it
look like to the world economy if China made a
serious military move on Taiwan.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Right, Well, it's in the news, of course, because President
Trump went to China, met with Jijingpang and then said,
I'm not so sure I'm going to sell Taiwan the
arms that we promised we were going to sell them.
We're sent to shockwave through the region, especially through Taiwan,
because without those US arms, the chance of deterring, much
less repelling any sort of Chinese invasion for the timeese
(00:55):
goes way way down. So that's not great, okay. But
the question that you ask, is the right one. What
happens if they actually try it? And you know, the
main quite determinant is whether or not we help them.
And you know, would that American president in that moment
press that button and send US troops or US ships
or US bombs to help the time when you stop
(01:17):
the Chinese invasion? And when I asked President Trump about
that when reporting for my book, he was very clear.
He said, We're nine thousand miles away, China's two feet away.
If they attack, there isn't an effing thing we can
do about it. That's what he said. Okay, so he's
not very enthused about the idea of intervening on Taiwanean
(01:37):
and he doesn't say that, but that's the idea, And
what does that mean. That means essentially, if the Chinese attack,
the Taiwanese would get crushed in a second. Without our help,
they would get rushed in a second. And after that
a number of scenarios can play out, all of them bad.
You know, in the best case scenario, China controls not
only that the taiwan straight, we're fifty percent of the
(01:58):
world shipping.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
Goes through it or later, did you say fifty five, Yes.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Fifty percent of the world shipping goes through that when
one way or another needs that depends on the Taiwan
Straight and that's a lot. And then the ninety percent
of the world's most advanced semiconductors are made in Taiwan,
all the Nvidia stuff, all of it. It's actually manufacturing
in Taiwan, most of it. Anyway, that's pretty bad if
China controls that, and then think about the rest of
(02:25):
the region. You've got Japan, think of or South Korea.
All of those countries would immediately realize that they have
no choice but to arm themselves to the Tieths because
America is not coming, and the entire region just becomes
a powder care forever. That's kind of like the best
case scenario. The worst case scenario is there's an actual
war over Taiwan, and that would immediately invelove, the Japanese,
(02:45):
the North Koreans, maybe now we're talking nuclear weapons, and
then it just gets worse and worse.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Well, the best best case scenario, of course, as you know,
is China's too scared to try it because they're so
certain that that we and the rest of the world
would fight on Taiwan's behalf, but not exactly sending that
message right now.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Well, that's right. The whole idea of the policy has
been for many decades is that we make it so
hard that they don't try it. That every day Hugien
Ping wakes up, he looks across this training he says,
not today, it's going to be too difficult today. And
the truth of the matter is that that balance of
power between China and Taiwan and his friends is moving
(03:24):
in the direction of China's advantage every single day. China's
building the largest military build up in the history of
the world. Hundreds of nuclear weapons silos were those for
you know, a massive landing, invasion, cyber warfare, internet warfare,
cognitive warfare. They're messing with Taiwani's politics, They're messing with
their elections, they're messing with their media, they're messing with
(03:45):
their minds on a constant basis all day along. And
that's not good. Okay, We're and so in order for
the United States and its friends and allies to keep
that balance up so that Taiwan teams like too tough
to eat, you know, like too difficult to swallow, you
know whatever, you want to call it, we would have
to do a lot more, and we're not doing a
(04:07):
lot more. So that's what that's really the most worrying
thing is not what would happen on the day of
the attack, but like every single day that China gains
an advantage actually, in my opinion, makes the situation, along
with dangerous interesting.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Talking to Joshua A. Rogan, Global Opinions columnists for The
Washington Post, Josha, I've said that one thing restraining she
is that China is so entirely dependent on exports. A
gigantic shock to the world economy would be enormously damaging
to them too. That's at least helped delay you know
(04:37):
what might be inevitable. Agreed, disagree? Expand on that your thoughts.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Yeah, no, I think that's exactly right. The best scenario
for Jiugien thing is that he takes Taiwan without firing
a shot. You know, look at what happened in Hong Kong.
They never attacked Hong Kong. They just suffocated it. They
just messed with it, messed with the people there, you know,
clamped down as much as they could and eventually strangled
the democracy and freedom out of Hong Kong and it
worked and they never had to fire a shot. That's
(05:02):
the idea. I think that's what he's going to try
to do first. I don't That's why I don't think
a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is coming in twenty twenty seven.
I think maybe they could be able to do it,
but chi Jin King's going to try best he can
to mess with Taiwan so much that maybe the Taiwanese
get so you know, battered down, that they fold, or
maybe they elect someone who's pro China because he messes
with the other people so much. He's definitely going to
(05:24):
try that. But I think in twenty twenty eight, when
the Taiwanese make their next presidential election, if they choose
someone like they have now, someone who doesn't want the
Chinese to take over Taiwan because gus what most Tiwhanese
don't want the Chinese to take over Taiwan, I think
that's when chi Jin King might realize that the military
and economic risks might be worth it for him.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
Well, I'm glad you're somewhat optimistic and very theory. I'm
glad you're somewhat optimistic. It's not going to happen in
the next year. But are are we not dealing in reality?
At some point I realize that if China takes Taiwan,
we live in a completely different world than all of
us have lived in our whole lives. But yeah, as
China grows into an economic superpower, military superpower, and they
(06:08):
got at island right off their coast, is it realistic
to think that the world's not going to keep them
from taking it?
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Yeah, I mean it's a good question. I think that
twenty three million Taiwanese people are not going to want
to be ruled by the Chinese Communist Party, And if
we let them just get swallowed up by the Chinese
Communist Party, that's really bad for any other country in
the world that lives next to a psychotic dictatorship that
wants to take it over. I mean, look around the world.
(06:34):
You know, the cause of freedom and de oos is
not really doing that well at the moment. You know,
the autocrats are on the marsh now, the Ukrainians are
fighting back. That's great. You know, hopefully someday the Iranian
people will get another chance to throw off their government.
That's great. But right now, yeah, a lot of people
around the country are like, hey, it looks pretty bleek
for the Taiwanese. But here's the thing. You know, people
do not actually want to live on their knees, and
(06:56):
they don't actually subjugate themselves to that kind of rule willingly.
They tend to resist. Now sometimes they lose, but never
discount the fact that people don't want to live on
their knees. And really the only thing that we can
do is to support those people who don't want to
live on their knees. And no, it's not determined yet.
China could win in that country. I don't know if
you've ever been there. It's beautiful, the people are lovely,
(07:17):
the food's amazing. It would be a damn shame if
it fell into Beijing's arms, because that would be a
tragedy for all of those people and for all of
the other people around the world who look at some
sort of evil dictatorship on their border and be like, oh,
I really don't want to get swallowed up by those guys. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
My response to what Jack said, which is one hundred
percent true, would be that you've just got to make
it as expensive or difficult as possible for as long
as possible and hope things change for the better on
one front or another. Which brings us to China's enormous
demographic and economic challenges that are going on right now.
We won't roll all of them out for you, but
(07:56):
they have some serious economic problems going on. How is
that going to a factor in josh any idea.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Yeah, it's important to talk about because China is not
ten feet tall. They do have a lot of problems.
But you know, at the same time, we have to
realize that it's going to be the largest country with
the largest economy and maybe even the largest military in
the region for the rest of our lives. So they're
going to continue to have problems. Their problems don't affect
them the same way our problems affect us because they
(08:23):
don't have things like elections, you know what I mean.
If they have some sort of like crisis in the
banking or real estate sector, they just fudge it all
because it's all a corrupt economy anyway. So, yeah, they
have problems, and we should, my view, try to maximize
our advantages and cause more problems for them, because they're
out to harm us. You know. In the end, China's
goal is not just to take Taiwan, but it's to
(08:44):
become the most powerful country in the world, and that
means our disadvantage. So it's not just about Taiwan. But yeah,
they have real vulnerabilities. To my mind, we should, you know,
exploit those vulnerabilities and then use that to slow their
rise so that we can maintain our leadership in the world,
because that's better for us and better for the world.
But you know, it's just not going that well at
(09:06):
the moment. For being honest.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
So President Trump met with President She last week. President
She's meeting with Vladimir Putin today. And I know you're
aware of this quote. The caught on a hot mic
quote from three years ago when President She was talking
to Vladimir Putin and said, and I think this is
one of the most important quotes of my lifetime. President
She said, there are changes happening, the likes of which
(09:30):
we haven't seen for one hundred years. Let's drive those
changes together. Putin said, I agree. What did that mean?
And do they still believe that? And what do you
think they're going to be talking about today?
Speaker 2 (09:41):
Yeah, I agree with you. It's one of the most
important things that I've heard said in a very long time.
And what he's saying is something that I think is proved,
which is that you know, the international world order or
whatever you want to call it, that maintained relative peace
and security and in my opinion ushered in the greatest
period of prosperity for America and in the world in
history since World War Two is breaking down. That's pretty obvious.
(10:04):
Whatever it is, the multilateral institutions, people were, you know,
disadvantaged by the inequities of globalization. All of the grievances,
some of which contributed to the rise of Trump and
some of which you know are just sort of the
baked into the corruption of the system. All those grievances
are real. But the question is, okay, what do we
do now? And if we're not going to have that
(10:26):
whole system, which you know has some good parts and
some mistakes were made, for sure, and if we're going
to replace that, what are we going to replace it with?
The to my mind, whatever we replace it with probably
shouldn't be decided by jiujungpingg and Vladimir Putin. That's my position.
Call me old fashioned, you know, but if you are
(10:48):
like the new world system is we're going to pick
what it is. I'm against that. I think the Americans
should pick what it is and our allies, maybe Japan
and the Europeans too, and you know whoever else is
on board with us. But if they, I don't think
it would be good for us.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
No, oh my god, Amen to that, brother. Josh Rogan,
Global opinions calumnists for The Washington Post and again author
of Chaos under Heaven Trumpshee in the Battle for the
twenty first Century. Josh, always so thought provoking. Thanks a
million for the time, Really.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
Enjoyed it anytime.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
What a smart guy. And that quote is terrific. That
quote that I've read out how many times on the
show gives me chills. Actually, it is one of the
most important things uttered this.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
I'm glad you made note of that. You can't remember
what you had for lunch yesterday, but man, you've you
have absolutely internalized that one. And it's it is a
block bustle, it's huge. It's an old timer Armstrong and
Getty
Hosts And Creators
Joe Getty
Jack Armstrong
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