John J. Mearsheimer
American professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago.
This self-defeating behavior, so the argument goes, must be the result of warped domestic politics.
Offensive realism predicts that the United States will send its army across the Atlantic when there is a potential hegemon in Europe that the local great powers cannot contain by themselves.
When World War II started on September 1, 1939, the German army contained 3.74 million soldiers and 103 divisions.
The most dangerous states in the international system are continental powers with large armies.
States care about relative wealth, because economic might is the foundation of military might.
Decapitation is a fanciful strategy.
The liberal tradition has its roots in the Enlightenment, that period in the eighteenth-century Europe when intellectuals and political leaders had a powerful sense that reason could be employed to make the world a better place.
The sad fact is that international politics has always been a ruthless and dangerous business, and it is likely to remain that way.
Simply put, the most powerful state is the one that prevails in a dispute.
China, in short has the potential to be considerably more powerful than even the United States.
Specifically, the presence of oceans on much of the earth's surface makes it impossible for any state to achieve global hegemony.
A state's potential power is based on the size of its population and the level of its wealth.
In the anarchic world of international politics, it is better to be Godzilla than Bambi.
A potential hegemon, as emphasized throughout this book, must be wealthier than any of its regional rivals and must possess the most powerful army in the area.
The cycle of violence will continue far into the new millennium. Hopes for peace will probably not be realized, because the great that shape the international system fear each other and compete for power as a result. Indeed, their ultimate aim is to gain a position of dominant power over others, because having dominant power is the best means to ensure one's own survival.
The Soviet Union and its empire disappeared in large part because its smokestack economy could no longer keep up with the technological progress of the world's major economic powers.
Bandwagoning is a strategy for the weak.
Great powers must be forever vigilant and never subordinate survival to any other goal, including prosperity.
I believe that the existing power structures in Europe and Northeast Asia are not sustainable through 2020.
When an aggressor comes on the scene, at least one other state will eventually take direct responsibility for checking it.