Mearsheimer may well be regarded as a master of prediction-time and again he has "foreseen" major international trends. But your in-depth analysis is truly unprecedented in revealing the flaws where he simply cannot stand his ground.

I've never had contact with Mearsheimer, but one thing left a deep impression on me. Nine years ago, just after I returned to work in China, I served as an alumni interviewer for Cornell University for several years. I had the privilege of meeting some of the brightest high school students in Beijing at the time and discussing with them the possibility of studying at Cornell, as well as broader intellectual topics.

The one who impressed me the most happened to be a student who applied to Cornell's Government program, one of my own majors at Cornell. Naturally, I felt quite close to her. She had a touch of arrogance, which admittedly made me a bit uncomfortable, but her talent was beyond question. I asked her how she viewed the future of the world, and she said, "Many people say the world is becoming multipolar. I believe the ultimate fate of the world is zero-polarity."

Without a doubt, I gave her a very strong recommendation, and she was accepted. But she didn't choose Cornell-because she was also admitted to the University of Chicago, and without hesitation, she kicked Cornell aside and went there. I later heard that Mearsheimer became her advisor.

Interestingly, although I greatly admired her at the time, she almost completely cut off contact with me afterward, while many of the other students have remained in long-term communication. Perhaps, her decision wasn't just a choice of schools, but a choice of intellectual trajectory.

Mearsheimer has turned "realism" into "Americanism." And this is not right. If American strategic thinking cannot break out of its self-referential loop, it may ultimately lose the ability to engage in meaningful dialogue with other civilizations.