Ian 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.