David v Goliath

From impoverishment to global superpower, China’s supremacy happened at a breakneck speed thanks to the visionary strategy of the man who took power in 1978. Over the next decade, under leader Deng Xiaoping’s firm leadership, China flirted with capitalism and transformed its soci ...  Show more

We think of Walmart as ultra-American, but its business relationship with China has fundamentally changed how American retail operates. In this episode, how one retailer helped turn China into the world’s factory, eventually becoming the single largest U.S. importer of Chinese co ...  Show more

Genghis Khan leads his Mongol army into Central Asia. One of his first opponents is the Muslim Khwarezm Shah Empire. This begins the long, bloody, and brutal Mongol invasion of the Muslim world. Download the notes to this episode. Join IHP on Telegram and search for "8-2" 

1260 - The Mongol expansion had reached the Middle East, and their power enabled them to crush the established states up to the Holy Land. The Holy Land was being claimed by an Egyptian Dynasty with Turkic origins, and as such, would also have mastery of horsemanship and arche ...

A massive Muslim Turkish force assaults the most important Christian city of the medieval world, with the future of all Christendom at stake. 

The Mongols were an unstoppable force through the 12th and 13th centuries, with an empire that stretched across huge swathes of land, from China to Europe. But its territory also included much of the Near East, where one aggressive power – the Mamluks – finally put a halt to thei ...  Show more