Discussion on China’s military ambitions with Isaac B. Kardon

MERICS in cooperation with the U.S. Embassy in Berlin hosted a discussion on China’s military ambitions with Isaac B. Kardon, Senior Fellow for China studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, on Wednesday, September 4.

Kardon provided his analysis of China’s role as a maritime power, including its maritime disputes in the Indo-Pacific region, its push to develop a network of ports with dual civilian and military functions, and its ambitions to become a dominant player in the “new strategic frontiers” of the deep seabed, polar regions and outer space. He also discussed the challenges this poses to the US, Europe and the fundamental rules governing the world’s oceans, and shared his expectations for the future of geopolitical competition in the maritime domain.

Isaac B. Kardon is the author of “China’s Law of the Sea: The New Rules of Maritime Order” (Yale, 2023), in which he analyzes how China tries to establish new rules for the regional and global order. He is Senior Fellow for China studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington D.C.  and concurrently Adjunct Professor at Johns Hopkins SAIS. Kardon was formerly Assistant Professor at the U.S. Naval War College (NWC). His research centers on China’s maritime power, with specialization in maritime disputes and the international law of the sea, PRC global port development, PLA overseas basing, and China-Pakistan relations.