Profs & Pints DC: Dark Skies over the South China Sea

Profs and Pints DC presents: “Dark Skies over the South China Sea,” on a disputed waterway in the middle of tensions between the United States and China, with John Rennie Short, emeritus professor of geography and public policy at the University of Maryland Baltimore County and author of the new book Hedging and Conflict in the South China Sea.

[Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Available at https://www.ticketleap.events/tickets/profsandpints/south-china-sea .]

President Donald Trump’s eagerness to play hardball with China could have repercussions far beyond the economic consequences of a trade war. The economic competition between the U.S. and China has long been accompanied by a strategic one with the South China Sea at its center and Taiwan as a likely flashpoint.

Gain a sophisticated understanding of a geopolitical hotspot and how conflict between the U.S. and China could play out in that region with John Rennie Short, a scholar of Southeast Asia and national security issues who previously has given excellent Profs and Pints talks.

Drawing from research for his new book, he’ll discuss not just the strategy and tactics of the U.S. and China, but also the role and influence of other regional states wedged between those two superpowers: Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. You’ll learn about the competing and conflicting interests of the region’s nations and the important roles that several have played in disputes over the region.

We’ll look at the possibility of conflict between the U.S. and China as the Trump administration places new tariffs on Chinese goods and reorders relations between the great powers to pivot the U.S. closer to Russia and away from its European allies. (Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. The talk starts 30 minutes later.)

Image: U.S. Navy ships in the South China Sea (U.S. Navy photo / Defense Visual Information Distribution Service).