Polaris Live Podcasts with Host, Sarwar Kashmeri

Episode 35: Yangmo Ku - Nuclear North Korea

Despite crippling economic hardships and intense international pressure, North Korea has managed to become a nuclear nation. What drove the country to so resolutely prioritize the development of nuclear weapons? What strategies has it used in pursuit of its goals? And what are the broader strategic, geopolitical implications of its nuclear program? The author, Yangmo Ku,  will unpack the complexities of North Korea's nuclear ambitions and achievements and shed light on the conundrum that they pose for both East Asian stability and global security.   --------------------------------- Yangmo Ku Dr. Yangmo Ku is Professor of Political Science and Associate Director of the Peace and War Center (PAWC) at Norwich University. He received his B.A. in German Language and Literature from Sogang University and earned his M.A. in International Affairs and Ph.D. in Political Science from George Washington University.  Prior to joining Norwich University, he taught in the School of International Service at American University. Dr. Ku’s research focuses on North and South Korean politics, East Asian security, U.S. foreign policy, and the politics of memory and reconciliation in East Asia and Europe. His new book, Nuclear North Korea: Strategy and Practice from the Korean War to the New Cold War, was published in April 2026. He is also the coauthor of Politics in North and South Korea: Political Development, Economy, and Foreign Relations (2018). He serves as the founding editor of the peer-reviewed Journal of Peace and War Studies and co-editor of PAWC’s forum, Voices on Peace and War. His research has appeared in numerous academic journals. He has also frequently delivered intensive lectures on North Korean nuclear issues and Korean Peninsula politics to U.S. federal government officials in Washington, DC, and Hawaii.

Episode 34: Bonnie Glaser - The Trump - Xi Jinping meeting accomplished ?

Among the thorniest and most delicate issues that Presidents Xi Jinping and Donald Trump will face is the future of Taiwan given that any question of its being an integral part of China is the ultimate red-line of China's foreign policy. Therefore, the discussion of Taiwan during the two Presidents' Summit May 14/15 2026 is a major topic of conjecture between Taiwan-China relations experts, of which Bonnie Glaser is a leading interlocutor. Her views are sought by leaders throughout Asia, Europe, and the United States. Polaris-Live is fortunate to have Ms. Glaser speak to its global audience immediately after the Presidential Summit to slice through the diplomatic verbiage that will emerge from the Presidential meeting's official press releases and offer her unvarnished view of what if anything was agreed on Taiwan but also on other Asia-Pacific hot buttons such as Japan's rearmament pland, China's claim to most of the South and East China Sea, and whether the U.S. intends to continue being a strong player in Asia-Pacific.  ---------------------------------------------- Bonnie Glaser Ms. Glaser is managing director of GMF’s Indo-Pacific program. She is also a nonresident fellow with the Lowy Institute in Sydney, Australia, and a senior associate with the Pacific Forum. She is a co-author of US-Taiwan Relations: Will China's Challenge Lead to a Crisis (Brookings Press, April 2023). She was previously senior adviser for Asia and the director of the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Glaser has worked at the intersection of Asia-Pacific geopolitics and US policy for more than three decades.

Episode 33: Presidents Trump & Xi Jinping Summit meeting analysis from US & China

Besides Chinese and Americans, the entire world awaits the upcoming Xi-Trump meeting scheduled for May 14/15 2026. President Trump is determined to remake and/or recalibrate America’s trade and security equation with China. Can he? On the other hand, many geopolitical experts believe the American president has been so weakened by the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran that he has few cards to play at the Summit meeting and will do whatever he can to salvage his agenda. However, it is always a mistake to underestimate an American president and that applies ever more to the mercurial Mr. Trump. Regardless of where the chips fall, Polaris-Live, in conjunctions with the Beijing Club for International Dialogue has put together a one hour special program featuring two of the top experts on  U.S. and China financial, trade, and geopolitical relations to offer our viewers the earlies possible analysis of what happened or did not happen at the summit from both a Chinese and American perspectives. The one hour program will be moderated jointly by Ms. Han Hua, co-founder and General Secretary of the Beijing Club and Sarwar Kashmeri, Founder and Host, Polaris-Live.com Another example of why we frequently use the phrase "only on Polaris-Live" to illuminate this channels leadership in bringing early, deep, opinions on U.S.-China relations in a style that non-experts can understand. In this instance through the eyes of Senior Colonel Zhou Bo (ret) and Managing Director Marc Chandler one of Wall Street's most experienced foreign currency and trade specialists. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Guests: ZHOU BO Senior Fellow at the Center for International Security and Strategy at Tsinghua University and a retired Senior Colonel in the Chinese People’s Liberation Army. He has published more than 180 English essays and opinions in leading publications including Foreign Affairs, Financial Times, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and broadcast media including  BBC, NBC, DW, and is a speaker at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore and at Munich Security conference.  His new book is "Should the World Fear China?" Hurst Publishers, Oxford University Press . MARC CHANDLER Managing Director and Chief Market Strategist for Bannockburn Global Forex. He has covered global capital markets for more than 30 years. A prolific writer and speaker, Chandler appears regularly in the financial media including Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Barron’s, Bloomberg, and the Washington Post, among others. Marc also provides his insights and commentary on CNBC, Bloomberg TV, CNN, and Fox Business. His publications include, Making Sense of the Dollar and Political Economy of Tomorrow. Chandler is also an honorary fellow of the Foreign Policy Association, Associate Professor at New York University’s Center for Global Affairs and visiting professor at the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Co-Host: HUA HAN Ms. Han Hua is the co-founder and secretary general of the Beijing Club for International Dialogue. Hua is a veteran journalist, international political scholar and commentator. She was a core member of the press corps covering the state visits of Chinese leaders for six years, and served as vice-president of News Corporation Greater China for nearly a decade. Before the Beijing Club, Hua was the founding board member of the China Forum at Tsinghua University. She holds a BA from Shanghai International Studies University and an MBA from both Beijing University and Fordham University.

Episode 32: Dean & Professor WANG Wen - Expectation from Donald Trump/Xi Jinping Summit Meeting

President Xi Jinping and President Donald Trump are scheduled to meet in Beijing on May 14 and 15 for a summit meeting that is expected to cover a number outstanding issues including trade, security, Artificial Intelligence guardrails, Taiwan, and cross investment. Trump’s meeting with Xi has been anticipated for weeks as the two economic powers work to reduce trade tensions and new tariffs.  Some analysts believe there is a chance for grand bargain between the leaders of the two most powerful countries in the world while other believe the gap between the two is so wide that a grand bargain is sheer wistful thinking. Dean Wang Wen will help sort through this complicated road-map and give Polaris-Live audiences around the world his opinion about what China will want to get out of this critically important meeting and where there is the likelihood of room for compromise by China. Taiwan and the Iran war will loom large over the 2 leaders negotiations and Dean Wang Wen's view on how this thorny issue will be handled are eagerly awaited. ----------------------------------------------- WANG Wen is Dean & Professor of Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University of China (RDCY). He is also the Deputy Dean of Silk Road School, Distinguished Professor, Executive Director of China-US People-to-People Exchange Research Center at Renmin University of China. He works as the Secretary-General of the Green Finance Committee of China Society for Finance and Banking, a Research Fellow of the Financial Research Center of the Counsellor Office of the China’s State Council, and also serves as a visiting professor at more than 10 universities around the world. Prof. WANG has led RDCY for 13 years and remains the youngest principal among Chinese major think tanks.  He is the author of more than 30 books, among which "Profound Changes Unseen in Centuries", "Great Power’s Long March Road: The views of China's rejuvenation and the future of the world after hundred countries’ visit", etc. are all best-sellers. Prof. WANG has visited nearly 100 countries and conducted extensive researches and field investigations. He is an advisory consultant for several important Chinese ministries and commissions and has won many honors.  In 2016, General Secretary Xi Jinping presided over a symposium on philosophy and social science, and Prof. Wang Wen was one of the ten scholars who spoke. View the original broadcast at Polaris-live.com [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1kehBCvxnA&list=PL4yyTisSNeBUnk7ntj2ewvD8Vi7ofp5Ni&index=5] Subscribe to the Polaris-Live Substack Channel [https://sarwarkashmeri.substack.com/subscribe] .. Includes an Executive Summary of broadcasts sent directly to your inbox!

Episode 31: Pamela Crossley - Xi Jinping, Donald Trump, China, U.S. and the World

Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping are scheduled to have a summit meeting in Beijing on the 14 and 15 of May 2026. China seems to loom over the United States in its perpetually calm ascendency to the global leadership position. Polaris-Live founder and host Sarwar Kashmeri visited China a few days ago and found himself in country devoid of wars and killing. A modern country of trains that run at 345 km/hour, a digital economy, with confident and forward looking people. One of the world's most recognized China historians Pamela Crossley caught up with Sarwar as Polaris-Live begins an in depth coverage of the Trump-Xi Summit to ask him about his visit and set the stage for analyzing the Summit meeting. ---------------------------------------------- Pamela Crossley Professor Pamela Crossley is one of the world's leading historians of modern China, northern Asia, and global history. She is a specialist in the history of China's last empire, the Qing, but has written books on early modern and modern Chinese history, Central Asian history, and global history. Her work is widely published both in scholarly journals and in newspapers, and magazines for the general public. Crossley is author of The Wobbling Pivot: China since 1800: An Interpretive History (2010), as well as influential studies of the Qing dynasty (1644–1911) and leading textbooks in global history.  Her forthcoming book is China's Global Empire: Qing, 1636-1912, from Cambridge University Press. She is freshly retired from Dartmouth College.