China believes that the U.S.’s longtime One China policy is evolving into a One China, One Taiwan policy. That’s not an accurate reading of the American view on Taiwan, argues Kevin Rudd, but it explains why China is now signaling more clearly than ever its willingness to attack. I have long argued that the geopolitical disaster of a war between the U.S. and China need not be inevitable. That remains my view, Rudd writes—if both sides adopt some basic strategic guardrails. But for the foreseeable future, it’s time for all of us to fasten our seat belts.

In his new book, The Avoidable War?, former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd demystifies the actions of the U.S. and China, explaining and translating them for the benefit of the other. Geopolitical disaster is still avoidable, but only if these two giants can find a way to coexist without betraying their core interests through what Rudd calls “managed strategic competition.” Should they fail, down that path lies the possibility of a war that could rewrite the future of both countries, and the world.

Australia has become the complacent country. Complacent about its future economic competitiveness. Complacent about climate change. Complacent about how to navigate our future in the region given China’s rise, America’s response and a neighbourhood increasingly torn between the two. Complacent too about the gradual erosion of our democracy itself through a growing “pay for play” culture from financial donations to political parties, an increasing assault on the independence of the public service and the abuse of monopolistic media power.

The future relationship between China and the United States is one of the mega-changes and mega-challenges of our age. China’s rise is the geopolitical equivalent of the melting polar ice caps – gradual change on a massive scale that can suddenly lead to dramatic turns of events.

In this Summary Report of a longer forthcoming work, former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, a senior fellow at the Belfer Center, asks if this defining trend of the 21^st century can be managed peacefully? He argues that it can – if Washington and Beijing commit to placing their relationship on a stable, long-term footing.

Rudd's findings emerge from a major study he led at the Center on the possibilities and impacts of a new strategic relationship between China and the United States.