Geopolitics in Late Antiquity

Hyun Jin Kim is Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Melbourne, Australia. He took his DPhil from the University of Oxford, UK, and is the author of multiple books on Greece-Rome and China comparative studies, the Huns and Inner Asia and the historical implications of China’s contemporary rise.

'Hyun Jin Kim is a true global historian. Able to exploit Chinese and classical sources directly, he has transformed our understanding of steppe history in Late Antiquity. The challenge posed by the Huns (Xiongnu for the Chinese) to the established great powers was serious. After surveying the varied responses of the Han empire, the two halves of the Roman empire, and the Sassanian Persian empire, and their varied outcomes, he offers sound advice to contemporary policy-makers in China and the USA.'- James Howard-Johnston, Oxford University, UK

• Acknowledgements; 1 Introduction; 1.1 The great geopolitical dilemma, theoretical approaches; 1.2 Territorial disputes and retrenchment, the re-emergence of policymaking; 1.3 Summary; 2 The geopolitical situation: the superpowers and the Huns; 2.1 Han China and the Huns; 2.2. Rome and the Huns; 2.3 Sassanian Persia and the Huns; 3 The superpower reaction; 3.1 China strikes back; 3.2 Rome falters; 3.3 Persian collapse; 4 Conclusion: the geostrategic choices for the future; 4.1 China as the geopolitical equivalent of the great Turco-Mongol Empires of Eurasia; 4.2 The geostrategic options for the US; Select bibliography; Index