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Description
Did you know the United States almost invaded Taiwan in World War II? Had it gone forward, Operation Causeway would have rivaled the Normandy D-Day landings in scale and complexity. And it would have been the largest combined air-sea-land engagement in world history.
Lecture 3: Operation Causeway: Taiwan's Wartime History and Implications for the Current Strategic Environment. In this lecture, Professor Ian Easton tells the untold story of U.S. plans and preparations to invade Taiwan in early 1945, examines why the operation was called off, and explores the enduring lessons of history for the defense of Taiwan in the current strategic context.
Easton is an associate professor in the U.S. Naval War College’s China Maritime Studies Institute and is the author of "The Final Struggle: Inside China’s Global Strategy" and "The Chinese Invasion Threat: Taiwan's Defense and American Strategy in Asia." He previously served as a senior director at the Project 2049 Institute in Virginia and a visiting fellow at the Japan Institute for International Affairs in Tokyo. He holds an M.A. in China Studies from National Chengchi University in Taiwan and a B.A. in International Studies from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He studied Mandarin Chinese at Fudan University in Shanghai and National Taiwan Normal University in Taipei.
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Episode Length
56:54
File Size
42.2 MB
File Format
MP3
Publication Date
10-9-2026
Publisher
China Maritime Studies Institute, U.S Naval War College
City
Newport, Rhode Island
Keywords
China Maritime Studies Institute, CMSI, Taiwan, World War II, WWII, Invasion
Recommended Citation
Easton, Ian, "Issues in National Security 2026 Lecture 3: "Operation Causeway"" (2026). CMSI Multimedia. 7.
https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cmsi-multimedia/7
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