On March 12, 2034, US Navy Commodore Sarah Hunt is on the bridge of her flagship, the guided missile destroyer USS John Paul Jones, conducting a routine freedom of navigation patrol in the South China Sea when her ship detects an unflagged trawler in clear distress, smoke billowing from its bridge. On that same day, US Marine aviator Major Chris "Wedge" Mitchell is flying an F35E Lightning over the Strait of Hormuz, testing a new stealth technology as he flirts with Iranian airspace. By the end of that day, Wedge will be an Iranian prisoner, and Sarah Hunt's destroyer will lie at the bottom of the sea, sunk by the Chinese Navy. Iran and China have clearly coordinated their moves, which involve the use of powerful new forms of cyber weaponry that render US ships and planes defenseless. In a single day, America's faith in its military's strategic pre-eminence is …
On March 12, 2034, US Navy Commodore Sarah Hunt is on the bridge of her flagship, the guided missile destroyer USS John Paul Jones, conducting a routine freedom of navigation patrol in the South China Sea when her ship detects an unflagged trawler in clear distress, smoke billowing from its bridge. On that same day, US Marine aviator Major Chris "Wedge" Mitchell is flying an F35E Lightning over the Strait of Hormuz, testing a new stealth technology as he flirts with Iranian airspace. By the end of that day, Wedge will be an Iranian prisoner, and Sarah Hunt's destroyer will lie at the bottom of the sea, sunk by the Chinese Navy. Iran and China have clearly coordinated their moves, which involve the use of powerful new forms of cyber weaponry that render US ships and planes defenseless. In a single day, America's faith in its military's strategic pre-eminence is in tatters. A new, terrifying era is at hand.
So begins a disturbingly plausible work of speculative fiction, co-authored by an award-winning novelist and decorated Marine veteran and the former commander of NATO, a legendary admiral who has spent much of his career strategically outmaneuvering America's most tenacious adversaries. Written with a powerful blend of geopolitical sophistication and human empathy, 2034 takes us inside the minds of a global cast of characters--Americans, Chinese, Iranians, Russians, Indians--as a series of arrogant miscalculations on all sides leads the world into an intensifying international storm. In the end, China and the United States will have paid a staggering cost, one that forever alters the global balance of power.
Everything in 2034 is an imaginative extrapolation from present-day facts on the ground combined with the authors' years working at the highest and most classified levels of national security. Sometimes it takes a brilliant work of fiction to illuminate the most dire of warnings: 2034 is all too close at hand, and this cautionary tale presents the reader a dark yet possible future that we must do all we can to avoid.
Out of the gate, this book is a page-turner. I would definitely not rank it as a bubblegum read, but a fast one for sure.
However, after a critical event halfway through, the book kinda starts to drag. I think the authors had a clear plan of the crisis point they wanted to hit, but once they got there they lost the momentum that had propelled the shape of their story; the possibilities fan out, a river expanding into its delta, and we slowly pick through the pieces.
I understand that this was written as a cautionary tale, but they really lay on the moralizing at the end; even with that relative weakness, it was an excellent read and definitely serves its cautionary purpose.
I enjoyed this book about a possible next world war between the USA and China. It serves as a warning how things can go wrong, very wrong.
It's also an interesting thought exercise on how things could play out in such a war. It's only a bit annoying that he had to "invent" some bizar tech to give the Chinese the upper hand. Although wars are won with new tech it feels still a bit fantastic.
I love these near-future stories as they open my mind to possibilities of a future. If you;re the same, go read it. If not, read someone else.
I enjoyed this book about a possible next world war between the USA and China. It serves as a warning how things can go wrong, very wrong.
It's also an interesting thought exercise on how things could play out in such a war. It's only a bit annoying that he had to "invent" some bizar tech to give the Chinese the upper hand. Although wars are won with new tech it feels still a bit fantastic.
I love these near-future stories as they open my mind to possibilities of a future. If you;re the same, go read it. If not, read someone else.
