The Return of Marco Polo’s World

A Conversation with Robert D. Kaplan

As Europe disappears, Asia coheres. The supercontinent is becoming one fluid unit of trade and conflict, as the Westphalian system of states weakens and older, imperial legacies – Russian, Chinese, Iranian, Turkish – become paramount. Matthew P. Goodman and Robert D. Kaplan explore how Eurasia’s coherence impacts the U.S. ability to influence the power balance in Eurasia in a discussion of Kaplan’s new book The Return of Marco Polo’s World: War, Strategy, and American Interests in the Twenty-first Century