In his most recent book, World Order (2014), Henry Kissinger made an observation that serves as a warning. In leading a nation “from where it is to where it has never been,” a maker of foreign policy must first analyze his own nation: where it finds itself, and why. Essential to that analysis, just as it is to an analysis of other nations, Kissinger emphasized, is an understanding of history and geography.
Robert Kaplan, the foreign-policy thinker and journalist, has in his numerous books and dispatches illuminated the historical and geographical forces that shape regions around the world, from the Balkans to the South China Sea. In his book The Revenge of Geography (2012), he took a global view. He explored the past, present, and future of China, Russia, India, the former Ottoman Empire, and other geopolitical hinge points with genuine insight and often with discomfiting implications for U.S. foreign policy. The book remains one of the richest sources of foreign-policy wisdom today.
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