WEBVTT

1
00:00:38.079 --> 00:00:42.280
Welcome to mid Rats with sal from
Commander Salamander an Eagle one from Eagle Speak

2
00:00:42.479 --> 00:00:46.880
at Sea or Shore your home for
a discussion of national security issues in all

3
00:00:46.920 --> 00:00:53.679
things maritime. And welcome onboard everybody, and I hope that you had a

4
00:00:53.880 --> 00:00:58.640
great July fourth weekend. And now
that we're plowing in to the to the

5
00:00:58.759 --> 00:01:02.399
heat of summer, we're back and
we're alive. And for those getting the

6
00:01:02.479 --> 00:01:06.719
podcast, we're popping back up into
your feet again and this is a great

7
00:01:06.760 --> 00:01:11.480
opportunity to come out of the heat. And I think unfortunately my illustrious co

8
00:01:11.560 --> 00:01:19.000
hosts had escaped to higher elevations,
but now he's down in the fever swamped

9
00:01:19.120 --> 00:01:22.640
load lands. But it's been a
couple of weeks, Eagle one. Great

10
00:01:22.680 --> 00:01:26.120
to talk to you again. Yeah, thanks for it was I was at

11
00:01:26.120 --> 00:01:32.959
altitude but it wasn't any cooler.
It was really hot, and we came

12
00:01:32.959 --> 00:01:36.200
down here and I thought, that's
actually cooler down here than it wasn't there.

13
00:01:36.239 --> 00:01:38.079
But it's still hot and miserable,
so you know, it's summertime.

14
00:01:38.840 --> 00:01:44.840
Yeah, that's the pricary pay for
not living in in made no offense,

15
00:01:44.879 --> 00:01:48.560
Claude, It's just too damn cold
up there. But that's okay. But

16
00:01:49.760 --> 00:01:53.599
like all good Southerners are before air
conditioning, and we keep our traditions.

17
00:01:53.079 --> 00:02:00.519
Um, you want to kind of
find low impact activities just so you don't

18
00:02:00.560 --> 00:02:02.959
die of heat stroke. I mean, I made the mistake last week of

19
00:02:04.120 --> 00:02:08.240
not following that advice. But uh. And in the in the pre show,

20
00:02:08.520 --> 00:02:10.919
just for the listeners to know,
we're gonna we're gonna take a little

21
00:02:10.960 --> 00:02:15.560
side trip here. UM, my
co host brought up the topic that one

22
00:02:15.599 --> 00:02:22.840
of the best ways, whether you
got HVAC or not, to avoid the

23
00:02:22.919 --> 00:02:27.439
heat is to find a good book. And over the course of years,

24
00:02:27.479 --> 00:02:31.159
we've interviewed a lot of authors here, both fiction non fiction, UM,

25
00:02:31.199 --> 00:02:38.000
most of them involving the military or
the UM and the career of arms,

26
00:02:38.159 --> 00:02:43.360
so to speak. Uh. And
I think that's a great topic. So

27
00:02:43.439 --> 00:02:46.439
we have all the news of the
day, um that we could chat about

28
00:02:46.439 --> 00:02:51.039
on the other end. But and
we're gonna catch up from some of the

29
00:02:51.039 --> 00:02:55.159
things we have started on the pre
show. And I immediately went to um

30
00:02:55.840 --> 00:03:01.520
some some of my recent acquisition that
I haven't got my forty hour day to

31
00:03:01.560 --> 00:03:07.159
be able to read. But my
co host brought up the fact that you

32
00:03:07.199 --> 00:03:10.280
know, it's not just you know, history and non fiction, but there's

33
00:03:10.319 --> 00:03:15.280
also some great fiction out there,
so whether you're a listener or not.

34
00:03:15.439 --> 00:03:20.400
So I figured we just kick off
the show for one minute or sixty minutes

35
00:03:20.439 --> 00:03:23.439
and let's just let's just talk about
some books. Some of the things that

36
00:03:23.479 --> 00:03:27.520
we're thinking about are some of the
things that we've gotten, and how we're

37
00:03:27.560 --> 00:03:30.520
going to kind of grab some books
to avoid the heat. You know,

38
00:03:30.840 --> 00:03:35.680
Mark, you mentioned some great ideas
of some some book recommendations, but also

39
00:03:35.840 --> 00:03:40.039
kind of a philosophical bent that I
thought was really interesting. Yeah, I

40
00:03:40.039 --> 00:03:45.080
don't remember the philosophical event, but
you know, learning about how people think

41
00:03:46.439 --> 00:03:49.479
and why they make the decisions they
do, I think it's really important.

42
00:03:49.520 --> 00:03:53.759
So a lot of these books that
I like are written by Guy's reformer CEOs

43
00:03:54.479 --> 00:03:58.960
and many of the books of either
squadrons or ships, and many of the

44
00:03:59.039 --> 00:04:02.719
books are our fictions. Some of
them are based on real life events and

45
00:04:02.759 --> 00:04:09.479
they've substituted characters in from from uh
from real life. So you know,

46
00:04:09.560 --> 00:04:14.960
when I'm reading or listening to UH
some books by a retired Navy Cafainet Pt.

47
00:04:15.639 --> 00:04:19.879
Dudman, who is a former CEO
of a destroyer, but he's more

48
00:04:19.879 --> 00:04:24.959
of my vintage. So the destroyers
were not that he commanded. We're not

49
00:04:25.360 --> 00:04:30.800
or served on. We're not the
uh, the modern miracle of electronic innovation

50
00:04:30.879 --> 00:04:34.600
that the current ones are. But
you know, he's got a situation where

51
00:04:34.199 --> 00:04:41.759
a destroyer CEOs in in the battles
of the Solomons in the slot, and

52
00:04:41.800 --> 00:04:45.800
the guy's got to decide, uh, where should I be fighting this ship?

53
00:04:46.319 --> 00:04:48.240
And you know the doctrine those days
was the CEO is always on the

54
00:04:48.240 --> 00:04:51.560
bridge and you can run the battle
from there. But what the advent of

55
00:04:51.639 --> 00:04:58.160
radar? Uh, he realizes that
that day is going to die, that

56
00:04:58.279 --> 00:05:01.199
he can't get the picture he could
if he was in combat information center.

57
00:05:01.600 --> 00:05:08.560
And and so you knows, as
you see this change nowadays, the command

58
00:05:08.839 --> 00:05:13.920
commanders of ships are are they're supposed
to be in combat. They're supposed to

59
00:05:13.920 --> 00:05:17.079
be where they can see the big
screens and see the big picture and hear

60
00:05:17.160 --> 00:05:21.439
from the sonar people. But think
what an innovation that simple amount of technology,

61
00:05:21.519 --> 00:05:28.600
What we diday think is simple radar
and sonar had on the on the

62
00:05:28.639 --> 00:05:32.360
waist. The approach to battle was
made. So the attacks of World War

63
00:05:32.399 --> 00:05:35.720
two, if you read about the
battles in the in the in the slot

64
00:05:35.759 --> 00:05:41.120
against the Japanese and the effects of
the long lances torpedoes and when they when

65
00:05:41.120 --> 00:05:46.879
the radar caught on and the people
who were smart enough got the idea of

66
00:05:46.879 --> 00:05:50.279
how to use it to our advantage
and really turned the course in the war

67
00:05:50.319 --> 00:05:57.920
against the Japanese navy and that type
of night action and helped us move move

68
00:05:58.000 --> 00:06:01.959
the battle forward. So if you
start thinking about fiction and you see see

69
00:06:01.959 --> 00:06:05.480
what this character is going through,
and lord knows, I was on a

70
00:06:05.839 --> 00:06:10.240
on an old destroyer. My CEO
had to go to that decision and ended

71
00:06:10.319 --> 00:06:14.800
up looking at and actually went in
to see I see leaving the officer of

72
00:06:14.839 --> 00:06:17.959
the deck uh to to make sure
we weren't going to run into anything.

73
00:06:18.759 --> 00:06:23.040
But you know, that was a
that was a big decision for these for

74
00:06:23.120 --> 00:06:28.839
these officers who have to balance what
the doctrine says with what the reality is

75
00:06:28.879 --> 00:06:33.040
of the situation. So I think
that's important to see how a simple thing

76
00:06:33.120 --> 00:06:38.040
like that can change the way we
view the world. And I think fiction

77
00:06:38.120 --> 00:06:43.800
is a great way to put that
forward. That's exactly the philosophy I was

78
00:06:43.839 --> 00:06:48.839
looking for, and and just the
you know, there's a couple of authors

79
00:06:48.879 --> 00:06:53.600
just to give everybody a preview that
you know sometimes this summer. It really

80
00:06:53.680 --> 00:07:00.519
depends upon their publisher and when they
began the big push. We have a

81
00:07:00.600 --> 00:07:04.680
reporter, John Dunlevy, has a
book coming out. I'll remember the title

82
00:07:04.720 --> 00:07:11.279
here in a little bit. And
a prior guest, Seth Folsom from his

83
00:07:11.519 --> 00:07:15.000
he just recently left active duty last
year. We've had him on before.

84
00:07:15.959 --> 00:07:23.720
Nothing here worth dying for the story
of Task Force Lyon that went after Isis

85
00:07:23.720 --> 00:07:30.040
and Northern Iraq and rolled that up. Just a great piece of nonfiction.

86
00:07:30.560 --> 00:07:35.639
And I think that's the key,
is not only if you're trying to understand

87
00:07:35.759 --> 00:07:43.959
what is happening today, but to
try to get a handle on what options

88
00:07:44.240 --> 00:07:47.279
we may come in the future,
whether as an individual or nation. Studying

89
00:07:47.439 --> 00:07:53.560
the past, our in based upon
the past, or even the recent future.

90
00:07:53.920 --> 00:07:58.199
It's great because it makes makes you
think. I remember the young junior

91
00:07:58.240 --> 00:08:01.720
officer. I ask people, you
know, what should I read? And

92
00:08:01.920 --> 00:08:05.199
I was told biographies, biographies,
biographies. I forget the exact phrase.

93
00:08:05.240 --> 00:08:09.639
I had one of my professors mentioned
to me, he said, don't go

94
00:08:09.680 --> 00:08:15.680
for autobiographies. He had a clever
turn of phrase about autobiographies, He said,

95
00:08:15.720 --> 00:08:20.040
biographies are good if you want to
learn how people think and also get

96
00:08:22.120 --> 00:08:26.920
for especially if you can read more
than one on somebody you really find interesting.

97
00:08:26.720 --> 00:08:33.000
Is a good biographer won't just give
you the the fuzzy view of the

98
00:08:33.039 --> 00:08:39.039
individual, but the complicated view of
the individual where even great people and great

99
00:08:39.200 --> 00:08:45.320
leaders may have faults or may have
weaknesses, but that doesn't attract from their

100
00:08:45.320 --> 00:08:50.320
greatness, which I think is it's
helpful if you're working with or for somebody

101
00:08:50.399 --> 00:08:56.440
who isn't perfect, that you accept
that and you look for the larger,

102
00:08:56.720 --> 00:09:01.080
the larger plus or minus of an
individual, the role that they play.

103
00:09:01.720 --> 00:09:09.919
I think it's also very interesting to
see where leaders are just plain old individuals

104
00:09:11.960 --> 00:09:18.679
are faced in a situation where they
have no great answers or they have no

105
00:09:18.759 --> 00:09:24.679
great options, but they have to
pick one and you and how you have

106
00:09:24.759 --> 00:09:28.039
to live with that, because I
think we've all seen our lives people,

107
00:09:28.559 --> 00:09:33.639
and regardless of whether you're a military
officer or a mailman or something in between,

108
00:09:35.240 --> 00:09:39.360
that often you have to make a
decision at the moment, or you

109
00:09:39.399 --> 00:09:45.320
make a decision and error, or
you're just a human being and thinking that

110
00:09:45.360 --> 00:09:48.240
you're the only person that's ever come
into that situation. Can wear a lot

111
00:09:48.320 --> 00:09:54.320
on a person's soul, can wear
their feelings of themselves a little thin,

112
00:09:54.399 --> 00:09:58.200
and can paralyze them. But if
you read a lot and you're able to

113
00:09:58.200 --> 00:10:03.279
get a little better perspective on even
you know, great men and women and

114
00:10:03.720 --> 00:10:09.360
some of their mistakes, shortcomings,
or how they came around them, it

115
00:10:09.440 --> 00:10:15.120
can really help you in your everyday
life. And especially if you're a leader

116
00:10:15.279 --> 00:10:18.360
and you've got people that you're responsible
for. When you make yourself better and

117
00:10:18.399 --> 00:10:22.879
you have a little more confidence,
a little more forgiving of yourself, those

118
00:10:22.919 --> 00:10:26.279
people rely on the decisions you make, so it's better for everybody down the

119
00:10:26.360 --> 00:10:33.440
chain. And it's it's it's we
talk about books a lot, and it's

120
00:10:33.480 --> 00:10:39.200
really easy to get caught up in
the immediate dopamine hit of social media and

121
00:10:39.200 --> 00:10:45.480
stuff. But yeah, when it's
ninety eight degrees outside with ninety percent humidity,

122
00:10:45.879 --> 00:10:48.679
and you've got a chair that's right
under event, and you have a

123
00:10:48.679 --> 00:10:54.039
little book next to you, it's
a it's a great way to not create

124
00:10:54.159 --> 00:10:58.279
much internal heat, but to really
build up you're in your mind some great

125
00:10:58.320 --> 00:11:05.080
perspective in a way, it could
be therapeutic. Yeah, I think the

126
00:11:05.120 --> 00:11:09.240
ability to place yourself in some uh, the position of somebody who's got to

127
00:11:09.279 --> 00:11:15.039
confront one of those decisions. And
I think if you read the the uh

128
00:11:15.360 --> 00:11:20.080
Patrick O'Brien novels, that you know, the Audrey matter in books, the

129
00:11:20.080 --> 00:11:24.639
the Dewey Landam books, the Alan
Lurie series, Uh, you know Claude's

130
00:11:26.200 --> 00:11:31.440
Barabies, uh, Connor Stark books. You know, these are people are

131
00:11:31.480 --> 00:11:35.039
constantly in situations where they have to
think of a solution to a problem that

132
00:11:35.120 --> 00:11:39.600
exists. And and of course with
the age of sale, you had a

133
00:11:39.600 --> 00:11:41.840
little more time to deal with it. The nice amount reading some of them

134
00:11:41.840 --> 00:11:46.639
are the more contemporary fiction, the
Kine Mutiny, Herman Wild books or in

135
00:11:46.759 --> 00:11:50.720
Remembrance uh there. You know,
there are a lot of books fictional or

136
00:11:50.759 --> 00:11:54.720
not, about how you know,
the the how we fought World War two

137
00:11:56.200 --> 00:12:01.519
and not always necessarily in the in
the psychology, what goes on when you're

138
00:12:01.600 --> 00:12:05.000
under fire and your your ship is
headed into into a dangerous situation. You

139
00:12:05.000 --> 00:12:09.000
know, how do you address that? And it's it's it's it's really you

140
00:12:09.039 --> 00:12:11.759
know, good to get that and
brand to practice in your own mind.

141
00:12:11.759 --> 00:12:16.480
And this is what we were taught
as Jo's was you know, if you're

142
00:12:16.480 --> 00:12:18.120
out here on one watching, it's
boring. And a lot of time being

143
00:12:18.159 --> 00:12:22.240
on watch is boring, you know. I think of situations where you know,

144
00:12:22.279 --> 00:12:24.600
what if this happened? What would
you do? If? You know?

145
00:12:24.639 --> 00:12:28.759
Those those what if situations are what
makes for great fiction. And the

146
00:12:28.879 --> 00:12:33.639
solutions and the creative ways people come
up to solve the problem are the are

147
00:12:33.639 --> 00:12:37.759
the the should be the focus of
Well, I think a lot of shipboard

148
00:12:37.799 --> 00:12:43.320
conversations or squadron conversations about you know, and and and I don't since I

149
00:12:43.440 --> 00:12:46.279
was never a naval aviator myself,
I've got a couple of close ones to

150
00:12:46.399 --> 00:12:50.879
me. But you know, is
that discussed in the ready room? You

151
00:12:50.919 --> 00:12:52.320
know, here's the situation, How
would you deal with this? I mean,

152
00:12:52.519 --> 00:12:54.559
I think that's part of the training. I think that's part of what

153
00:12:54.919 --> 00:12:58.960
top gun is supposed to help you
do. Send aviators back to each other

154
00:13:00.120 --> 00:13:01.759
people how to think. It's through
those situations. But you know, the

155
00:13:03.080 --> 00:13:07.919
the wardroom discussion of tactics and all
that, that's you know, that's really

156
00:13:07.919 --> 00:13:13.200
where the training goes. We have
all these work colleges and academies and stuff,

157
00:13:13.240 --> 00:13:16.159
but the essential part ought to be
out there. And I think our

158
00:13:16.200 --> 00:13:22.120
friend just was reading his book and
I had to remember this. Um,

159
00:13:24.120 --> 00:13:31.000
it'll come to me another another rotorhead
who has a book called Like the Naval

160
00:13:31.039 --> 00:13:33.960
Mind, Growing the Naval Mind,
Improving the Naval Mind. You know what

161
00:13:33.960 --> 00:13:37.159
I'm talking about. Oh, yeah, I can't put it off my head.

162
00:13:37.159 --> 00:13:41.320
Yeah, I gotta hear somewhere.
We'll make everybody wait for my brain

163
00:13:41.360 --> 00:13:43.399
to work. Well, well,
while you're picking that up, I just

164
00:13:43.440 --> 00:13:50.320
remember Jerry Dunlevy and James Hanson's book
that's coming out pretty soon. It's it's

165
00:13:50.360 --> 00:13:52.879
what a lot of us have been
waiting for, and we talked about here.

166
00:13:52.240 --> 00:13:58.159
It's Kabul, the untold story,
Biden fiasco, and the American warriors

167
00:13:58.159 --> 00:14:00.879
who fought to the end. You
know, maybe talk later on. I

168
00:14:00.919 --> 00:14:03.679
had all my list of things maybe
to talk about. Was the Department of

169
00:14:03.720 --> 00:14:07.960
States data delt right, fourth July, fourth weekend. But yeah, I

170
00:14:07.000 --> 00:14:13.000
think Jerry and James book UM coming
out when it is a couple of years

171
00:14:13.120 --> 00:14:18.000
after UM September and August of twenty
twenty one. I think it's going to

172
00:14:18.000 --> 00:14:22.639
be first in a whole series of
books that are going to be be looking

173
00:14:22.679 --> 00:14:26.519
at that story, which I think
the we would have seen more about it

174
00:14:26.559 --> 00:14:33.240
if the Russia Ukrainian War didn't kick
off. Yeah, you know, I

175
00:14:33.279 --> 00:14:37.240
think that that's the other context is
a lot of times things don't make any

176
00:14:37.320 --> 00:14:43.399
sense unless you have the historical background
to know. Yeah, thank you,

177
00:14:43.559 --> 00:14:48.879
Chris DD Armstrong book Improving the Naval
Mind or whatever it is, just you

178
00:14:48.919 --> 00:14:50.600
know, it's a really good good
way to talk, you know, think

179
00:14:50.639 --> 00:14:56.240
about He has suggestions and items in
there for people to take to their their

180
00:14:56.240 --> 00:14:58.759
ready rooms, in their and their
wardrooms, and and let's you know,

181
00:14:58.799 --> 00:15:03.039
let's talk about these this article and
some of them from proceedings further from other

182
00:15:03.080 --> 00:15:07.360
places. You know. That's that's
a great idea. And I wish more

183
00:15:07.440 --> 00:15:11.840
ships that I've served on had had
done that. And uh, in fact,

184
00:15:11.919 --> 00:15:13.080
I regret that I didn't do more
of that when I was a SEO

185
00:15:13.159 --> 00:15:18.759
of of some units that it could
have used some training like that. But

186
00:15:18.039 --> 00:15:22.000
that's that's that's the kind of thing. And you know, all the all

187
00:15:22.039 --> 00:15:24.600
the books I've got all these books
here that China's Law, to see the

188
00:15:24.639 --> 00:15:28.799
Freedom's Forge. You know, they're
all background into how difficult it is to

189
00:15:28.799 --> 00:15:33.639
get a country ready to go to
war, and uh, and what we're

190
00:15:33.679 --> 00:15:35.960
dealing with when somebody wants to impose
it, there will on on a on

191
00:15:37.000 --> 00:15:39.480
a world that isn't quite ready for
it. And and I'm in a lot

192
00:15:39.519 --> 00:15:43.080
of these books I pick up because
we've talked to people on the show.

193
00:15:43.159 --> 00:15:50.120
So somebody mentioned John Layman's book Uh
Oceans uh Ventured and I, okay,

194
00:15:50.159 --> 00:15:54.519
well that's available on kindall. So
now I've got that on my list.

195
00:15:54.679 --> 00:15:56.559
I got I got too much stuff
to read here, but uh, you

196
00:15:56.600 --> 00:16:00.480
know, and then that led me
somewhere else to the Korean air warn.

197
00:16:00.519 --> 00:16:04.000
I go, well, yeah,
that's probably pretty important thing because we did

198
00:16:04.039 --> 00:16:07.279
fight a war there, we I
probably know more about that. So we

199
00:16:07.320 --> 00:16:11.039
had you know, they're one thing
least another end up doing a lot of

200
00:16:11.559 --> 00:16:15.279
a lot of reading. Some of
it is Germaine directly to what you're talking

201
00:16:15.320 --> 00:16:18.960
about, and some of it is
is are thinking about, and some of

202
00:16:18.320 --> 00:16:26.000
is um uh maybe not as directly
related, but it's sortaly it's sort of

203
00:16:26.039 --> 00:16:29.120
like, if you read this is
good, this is going to often the

204
00:16:29.200 --> 00:16:33.480
Navy Con. When when we've had
David Webber at the Navy Con a few

205
00:16:33.559 --> 00:16:36.799
years ago, you know, I'm
reading his books and I'm going, well,

206
00:16:36.840 --> 00:16:41.240
he took this directly from the American
uh so he's got the Safe Old

207
00:16:41.320 --> 00:16:45.360
series, and the Safe Old series
has this planet with out of nowhere where

208
00:16:45.360 --> 00:16:49.000
they the people have gone to hide. But the book is based on the

209
00:16:49.000 --> 00:16:53.440
transition from sail from from uh.
I mean, it's my hand, it's

210
00:16:53.519 --> 00:16:59.639
it is my hand in the science
fiction scheme of things, and it's it's

211
00:16:59.679 --> 00:17:03.480
it's really wonderfully well done. And
then we've we've we've discussed before this concept

212
00:17:03.519 --> 00:17:08.319
of these of these spaceships with what
I've called him by a blog and stuff

213
00:17:08.319 --> 00:17:11.079
missile barges. You know, I
mean, it's a concept that ought to

214
00:17:11.119 --> 00:17:15.920
work anyway, you can't go wrong
by reading this. You can read hind

215
00:17:15.960 --> 00:17:18.559
lines, some of the hind lines
books that involve the you know, I

216
00:17:18.559 --> 00:17:22.319
mean everybody recommends Starship Troopers, but
there are other ones out there that are

217
00:17:23.720 --> 00:17:27.640
designed to help you think about how
how things ought to work. And then

218
00:17:27.720 --> 00:17:30.680
all that led to, well,
if you're going to read books this summer,

219
00:17:30.720 --> 00:17:33.400
and I see everybody's given us great
lists here in the in the chat

220
00:17:33.480 --> 00:17:37.160
room. Um, you know,
then what about movies that are fun?

221
00:17:37.240 --> 00:17:41.640
I mean just good, good,
solid movies to watch. And I thought,

222
00:17:41.640 --> 00:17:44.039
well, okay, let's put down
a list. What have I watched

223
00:17:44.440 --> 00:17:47.559
so far this summer? And well, I watched Gee in Harm's Way,

224
00:17:47.599 --> 00:17:52.240
They were Expendable, Away, All
Boats, Greyhound, The Bridges of Toco

225
00:17:52.319 --> 00:17:56.920
Ree. I mean, The Bridge
of Toco re Is is a great film

226
00:17:56.960 --> 00:18:04.079
and a great book Destination Tokyo.
Um what is that? Uh? I

227
00:18:04.079 --> 00:18:07.519
don't remember. I can't read my
own writing anymore, you know, Top

228
00:18:07.559 --> 00:18:11.200
Gun, Top Guns, whatever the
second movie is. And now I was

229
00:18:11.200 --> 00:18:14.200
looking at going, oh, you
know, well that great funny movie hot

230
00:18:14.240 --> 00:18:19.519
Shots. That's that's kind of a
fun That's a fun one. So uh

231
00:18:19.559 --> 00:18:22.720
you know, they're just I think
we have all kinds of stuff that we

232
00:18:22.720 --> 00:18:26.680
we can you can do in the
summer to get yourself out of the eat

233
00:18:26.720 --> 00:18:29.880
and have a good time. Not
to mention books. I just there's another

234
00:18:29.880 --> 00:18:33.599
one. Stephen Kuntz when he before
he went completely loony about flying saucers.

235
00:18:33.960 --> 00:18:37.920
You know, any of the guy
who wrote The Flight of the Intruder and

236
00:18:37.599 --> 00:18:41.359
yeah and all that, so you
know there and there's always the sand pebbles,

237
00:18:41.960 --> 00:18:45.599
uh you know, and and there
are any number of books on the

238
00:18:45.720 --> 00:18:49.039
on the China Fleet era. Uh. We've mentioned them on our on the

239
00:18:49.480 --> 00:18:52.880
on the show before. But you
know, if you're dealing with China,

240
00:18:52.960 --> 00:18:56.480
part of what you have to understand
is get in the background. What there's

241
00:18:56.480 --> 00:19:03.319
some good books on the Opium War
war and the effect that head on China,

242
00:19:03.440 --> 00:19:07.039
and I think those are you know, a good background understandable at what

243
00:19:07.200 --> 00:19:11.440
excuse they used to be the way
they are and what you know to how

244
00:19:11.480 --> 00:19:18.920
they've their revenge against the culture that
took away their great their great empire.

245
00:19:21.559 --> 00:19:26.200
You know one thing that UM and
I I try and I have like um

246
00:19:26.480 --> 00:19:33.720
uh seths fulsome books I've I've read
all my all my I've had UM and

247
00:19:33.880 --> 00:19:37.599
I do read a fair number,
mostly because I get them from the library

248
00:19:37.640 --> 00:19:42.039
for free. But yeah, that's
one thing that you know, getting books,

249
00:19:42.160 --> 00:19:47.519
uh can can get expensive real fast. And I would offer anybody on

250
00:19:47.559 --> 00:19:53.480
the line. I'm making assumptions here, but if you don't have a library

251
00:19:53.559 --> 00:19:59.640
card, UH, you should get
one for your local library. Also MWR

252
00:19:59.720 --> 00:20:03.000
you can get books through them too
as well. But you be surprised the

253
00:20:03.279 --> 00:20:07.519
really if you're a listener to mid
Rats, you think a certain way the

254
00:20:07.599 --> 00:20:17.240
amount of good books that you can
get on audiobook are also your Kendall ebooks

255
00:20:17.240 --> 00:20:21.279
from the library. You just have
to read them in a timely manner before

256
00:20:21.359 --> 00:20:25.480
the electrons to suck it away.
Depend upon which library you use, but

257
00:20:25.599 --> 00:20:30.519
that's another way that you can get
those books that cost you nothing but the

258
00:20:30.519 --> 00:20:36.519
effort of getting a library card.
And another thing if you're in the A

259
00:20:36.559 --> 00:20:40.519
lot of people in the Navy,
either through in Asked Jacksonville or at Mayport,

260
00:20:41.319 --> 00:20:44.960
are familiar with and the most I
know there's a I can't remember it

261
00:20:45.000 --> 00:20:48.799
in Norfolk what it's called, but
pretty much any town has second hand bookstores

262
00:20:48.799 --> 00:20:55.480
that are pretty extensive. In Northeast
Florida, it's Shamlin's book Mine. And

263
00:20:56.160 --> 00:21:00.640
you know, when we decided that
we were going to talk of books,

264
00:21:00.079 --> 00:21:03.359
I was, you know, I
felt like a kid at Christmas again.

265
00:21:03.359 --> 00:21:06.680
It's like, oh, I canna
show everybody my presence. But you can

266
00:21:06.799 --> 00:21:10.319
go over there and you can get
if you know, what are we going

267
00:21:10.359 --> 00:21:15.119
to do in the future. Everything
kind of cycles and repeats. There are

268
00:21:15.160 --> 00:21:18.920
some great minds, and for instance, I got there's a whole series of

269
00:21:18.960 --> 00:21:22.000
these, but I just picked up
this one, and I think what I'll

270
00:21:22.000 --> 00:21:27.680
do is on the show page,
I'll put up links so people on the

271
00:21:27.720 --> 00:21:33.680
podcast, and maybe if I have
enough room on Spreaker's text, I'll put

272
00:21:33.680 --> 00:21:36.759
a link to as many of the
things that we talk about here for folks

273
00:21:36.799 --> 00:21:41.240
to look at. But John Hopkins
University of Press in nineteen seventy four,

274
00:21:41.480 --> 00:21:48.359
and I can't pronounce his name correctly, Edward what lutt Wak. You can

275
00:21:48.519 --> 00:21:52.319
google him. He's a pretty big
head. It's a little thin little book

276
00:21:52.839 --> 00:21:57.240
that next time I'm at a second
bookstore, I want to see what the

277
00:21:57.279 --> 00:22:03.039
other ones. But they had studies
in International Affairs. Number twenty three was

278
00:22:04.039 --> 00:22:11.599
The Political Uses of Seapower. It's
a RiPP born seventy four page hardcover that

279
00:22:11.680 --> 00:22:15.359
I'm going to take care of next
time. The rain interferes afin ability to

280
00:22:15.720 --> 00:22:22.000
mow the art. But I think
I mentioned this once, if those in

281
00:22:22.079 --> 00:22:26.480
mid rats or online or something.
But there is a series of books that

282
00:22:26.640 --> 00:22:30.720
was put out at the opening of
World War Two, and I had the

283
00:22:30.759 --> 00:22:37.839
copy from nineteen forty one by some
guy who I really don't recognize, with

284
00:22:37.920 --> 00:22:44.559
the last name of Baldwin. But
what the citizens should know about the Navy?

285
00:22:45.200 --> 00:22:48.119
And as I've done the usual I
just want to read a page for

286
00:22:48.200 --> 00:22:53.680
the middle. This has all sorts
of stuff that it's a shame we don't

287
00:22:53.720 --> 00:22:56.039
have some modern way of doing this, but I guess in some ways,

288
00:22:56.279 --> 00:23:00.000
you know, that's what we do
on mid At and what they do at

289
00:23:00.039 --> 00:23:04.480
Simsek, and we're on the Rocks
and other locations online where people are talking

290
00:23:04.519 --> 00:23:11.519
about trying to enhance awareness. Really
neat book. And I want to credit

291
00:23:11.599 --> 00:23:18.400
either salmor Cogliano or John Conrad,
one of the two, but they mission

292
00:23:18.839 --> 00:23:27.400
this book by retired Admiral Henry Eccles. And this improment is from let's see,

293
00:23:27.720 --> 00:23:32.880
this is nineteen fifty nine. It's
a first edition. But this is

294
00:23:33.400 --> 00:23:40.559
Logistics in the National Defense, and
I'll tell you it's there's not much that

295
00:23:40.759 --> 00:23:45.640
changes about sticking stuff in a hall, of getting at west and hoping that

296
00:23:45.680 --> 00:23:52.839
your supplying income incoming is greater than
your expenditures outgoing. And this is one

297
00:23:52.839 --> 00:23:55.440
of those things I think when I
get through reading, I'm gonna beat my

298
00:23:55.480 --> 00:23:59.160
head against the wall for about twenty
minutes. And you're talking about the bridges

299
00:23:59.160 --> 00:24:07.759
of Toker. Read this. I
forgot it. May have Lessio may have

300
00:24:07.799 --> 00:24:11.759
recommended this to me a while ago, but it was right up there on

301
00:24:11.759 --> 00:24:17.440
the shelf and I had to get
it. And it's from nineteen forty two

302
00:24:17.960 --> 00:24:25.160
Random House sue as the Singapore by
the Cecil Brown's story quote grim Warfare in

303
00:24:25.200 --> 00:24:29.200
the Desert and the money jungles,
the sinking of Repulse and Prince of Wales

304
00:24:29.240 --> 00:24:33.880
to follow Singapores in the last day
of the Indias into Australia today. So

305
00:24:33.920 --> 00:24:37.920
the war at least for the Commonwealth
was only halfway done, and they had

306
00:24:37.680 --> 00:24:42.200
already he had already pushed out this
book that's got some great, great maps,

307
00:24:42.359 --> 00:24:47.279
and it's almost six hundred pages long. And a lot of these used

308
00:24:47.279 --> 00:24:52.319
bookstores, some of them will have
a military section, other ones will have

309
00:24:52.359 --> 00:24:56.240
a history section. Somebody them will
have a military history section. He kind

310
00:24:56.240 --> 00:25:00.960
of it's kind of like sifting for
gold. But I got off the whole

311
00:25:00.960 --> 00:25:04.960
stack of stuff that I've picked up
over the course of the last few years,

312
00:25:06.039 --> 00:25:10.400
mouncing into this place. There is
now closed, But back in the

313
00:25:10.440 --> 00:25:14.319
nineteen nineties there was a hole in
the wall used bookstore in Saint Augustine.

314
00:25:15.039 --> 00:25:23.160
I was there for a romantic weekend
with my wife and yeah, ladies,

315
00:25:23.160 --> 00:25:26.240
you're lucky didn't marry me. On
this romantic weekend, I found an English

316
00:25:26.240 --> 00:25:33.240
translation of Mussolini's treaties from the nineteen
twenties, which I don't think many were

317
00:25:33.240 --> 00:25:38.640
made, but I have a copy
of Mussolini's what was it titled The Impact

318
00:25:38.680 --> 00:25:42.599
of Fascism on History from the nineteen
twenty So it was a romantic weekend for

319
00:25:42.720 --> 00:25:48.400
me. But you can find them
almost anywhere, and especially in historical towns,

320
00:25:48.559 --> 00:25:55.440
whether you find yourself and I don't
know bat Maine or up there in

321
00:25:55.519 --> 00:25:57.759
Monterey, any town that's been there
for a while. I'm sure in San

322
00:25:57.759 --> 00:26:03.359
Diego because a lot of people in
these estate sales, they'll clear out the

323
00:26:03.400 --> 00:26:08.319
libraries and you have a lot of
retired I know in DC there are spell

324
00:26:08.400 --> 00:26:12.759
as well, but they're picked clean
pretty fast. You have these retired people

325
00:26:12.759 --> 00:26:17.519
who their their kids, are their
heirs or whoever. They don't care about

326
00:26:17.519 --> 00:26:21.240
the library, and so they'll get
rid of their books by the pound.

327
00:26:22.000 --> 00:26:26.799
And there are some really incredible opportunities
there, but you've got to go to

328
00:26:26.799 --> 00:26:30.720
these bookstore and pick through them.
But that's kind of fun anyway. The

329
00:26:30.039 --> 00:26:33.400
smell or the use bookstore, I
don't know what the smell is, but

330
00:26:33.720 --> 00:26:37.160
I don't have allergy, so it
doesn't bother me. But that's a great

331
00:26:37.200 --> 00:26:42.559
way to lose happen afternoon, to
get books that can take up weeks of

332
00:26:42.640 --> 00:26:48.119
your time in a good way.
Yeah, I would recommend that the Naval

333
00:26:48.160 --> 00:26:56.440
Astituite has a thirteen book series called
The Studies and Naval History and Seapower.

334
00:26:57.079 --> 00:27:02.640
And you know, I've got have
been three of these books I've been currently

335
00:27:02.680 --> 00:27:07.079
reading. But you know, the
titles are A Ceaseless Watch, Australia's third

336
00:27:07.079 --> 00:27:11.200
party Naval Defense Emil Johnis, became
in the Triumph of Naval Airpower, Kirchill's

337
00:27:11.200 --> 00:27:18.160
Phony War Studies and Folly, A
Study and Folly and Frustration Cossack, which

338
00:27:18.200 --> 00:27:25.839
is the story of the of the
the the man who actually managed the organization

339
00:27:25.880 --> 00:27:32.359
of Operation Overlord the D Day Invasion, Lieutenant General Sir Frederick Morgan. And

340
00:27:32.359 --> 00:27:36.119
then there's the you know, the
emergence of American amphibious warfare, rise and

341
00:27:36.119 --> 00:27:41.160
fall of French seapower, genesis of
the Grand Fleet, the Admiralty, Germany

342
00:27:41.279 --> 00:27:45.599
Home Fleet, Learning War, evolution
of the Fighting Doctor in the Navy eight

343
00:27:45.240 --> 00:27:48.319
nineteen forty five. I mean,
you know, we were talking about how

344
00:27:48.400 --> 00:27:52.920
important is to remember we are learning. The Navy is a learning organization and

345
00:27:53.079 --> 00:27:57.559
even if you get stuck as behind
tradition, then you have to wait for

346
00:27:57.759 --> 00:28:04.759
somebody like um to come along and
turn to blind eye to people who are

347
00:28:04.799 --> 00:28:10.200
being dune. So that's not always
you know, working their benefit, but

348
00:28:10.240 --> 00:28:14.160
it helps everybody else anyway, my
hand, Corbett. Uh, there's a

349
00:28:14.160 --> 00:28:17.759
whole list in the USNI web page. I highly recommend you take a look

350
00:28:17.799 --> 00:28:19.759
at that. It includes, you
know, books by U boat commanders,

351
00:28:21.880 --> 00:28:26.000
Victory without Peace, the US and
the European Waters in nineteen nineteen, nineteen

352
00:28:26.000 --> 00:28:30.359
twenty four, and then a little
Study of Worships. So if most of

353
00:28:30.359 --> 00:28:33.359
these as as salis, and many
of these are available on the on the

354
00:28:33.559 --> 00:28:41.680
DoD library system which you can go
through nowadays through Libby and sometimes your local

355
00:28:41.720 --> 00:28:45.400
library can get inter library loans from
your note nearby colleges and universities, and

356
00:28:45.519 --> 00:28:48.519
a lot of these books are available
there. But gosh, I've got the

357
00:28:48.640 --> 00:28:55.200
you know, the sit here hard
copies of the Abandoned Notion, which is

358
00:28:55.200 --> 00:29:00.559
about the decline of the US maritime
World Operation in Sweep, which is about

359
00:29:00.599 --> 00:29:08.440
the mine operation d mine operation after
after Vietnam, China and Russia. China

360
00:29:08.480 --> 00:29:15.319
and Russia, their their their great
game thing. Somebody sent us years ago

361
00:29:15.400 --> 00:29:18.079
to I was supposed to review it. I guess at some point Health and

362
00:29:18.119 --> 00:29:25.319
the Heavens about the u USS laughy
unsung Heroes once again about the merchant Mariners.

363
00:29:25.559 --> 00:29:29.680
That's a US Naval Institute book,
by the way. And then I

364
00:29:29.720 --> 00:29:33.240
just bought Folwell's Rules the Nautical Road
because I'm gonna Rusty and some of that

365
00:29:33.319 --> 00:29:44.799
stuff. So I got a little
yeah, I want to everybody will know

366
00:29:44.839 --> 00:29:47.039
when it comes out, well,
it might not get published. If not,

367
00:29:47.079 --> 00:29:49.519
I want to ask him if I
can publish it. But a friend

368
00:29:49.519 --> 00:29:55.079
of the show who remained nameless is
submitted an article for publication. You talk

369
00:29:55.119 --> 00:29:59.559
about Rules of the Road, and
when I first thought, I was pissed

370
00:29:59.599 --> 00:30:02.240
off. Why was that pissed off? Because I didn't think of it.

371
00:30:02.240 --> 00:30:04.200
I was like, come on,
and as far as I know, nobody

372
00:30:04.200 --> 00:30:08.960
else has written about it. But
and I've made some snarky comments because that's

373
00:30:10.039 --> 00:30:15.000
just kind of my role in the
ecosystem comma. However, irrespective of my

374
00:30:15.359 --> 00:30:26.279
snarky comments, he identified a a
gap in the Rules of the Road,

375
00:30:26.599 --> 00:30:30.160
and you know Red over, Red
Captain is dead. Everybody has their lights

376
00:30:30.279 --> 00:30:34.440
in their day shapes and what those
mean. You know, do we really

377
00:30:36.400 --> 00:30:42.599
have what we need in the in
the era of let me use the term

378
00:30:42.640 --> 00:30:52.240
of the day, uncrewed surface vessels
that can really advertise the fact because it's

379
00:30:52.240 --> 00:30:55.880
some of these things are obviously they
don't have any people on them, but

380
00:30:55.920 --> 00:31:00.759
when you're talking, they're really large
ones. And if a couple of the

381
00:31:00.759 --> 00:31:03.599
theories play out over the course of
the next few decades, there's going to

382
00:31:03.640 --> 00:31:06.400
be more and more of them going
from point A to point B that are

383
00:31:06.440 --> 00:31:11.400
own crude. You know, how
do you identify to somebody who might be

384
00:31:11.400 --> 00:31:15.839
coming up on Channel sixteen and trying
to talk to that three hundred and twenty

385
00:31:15.839 --> 00:31:19.200
five foot merchant vessel next to them
that they're not sure whether there's anybody on

386
00:31:19.240 --> 00:31:22.319
board or not. How do you
have signals like that? But yeah,

387
00:31:22.359 --> 00:31:27.759
the rules of the road. I
think it is something everybody could brush up

388
00:31:27.799 --> 00:31:30.839
on, especially if you were on
the water over July fourth weekend like I

389
00:31:32.000 --> 00:31:33.440
was. It was crazy. I
don't think I'm ever going on the water

390
00:31:33.599 --> 00:31:44.240
another major holiday again makes me itchy, But I also liked the observation that

391
00:31:44.319 --> 00:31:51.759
you made a little bit earlier came
back in my mind about the missile barges

392
00:31:51.880 --> 00:31:56.799
and a lot of the stuff in
a series of fiction books that you and

393
00:31:56.839 --> 00:31:59.240
you read it, you go,
hey, this is my hand, or

394
00:31:59.279 --> 00:32:01.839
hey this is they're just put it
you know, it's it's Mahan in space

395
00:32:01.920 --> 00:32:09.039
or whatever. But by reading these
books, one thing that it really gets

396
00:32:09.440 --> 00:32:14.920
ingrained into you is one of the
things that really was ingrained at me at

397
00:32:14.920 --> 00:32:15.960
an early age. And the more
I read, the more I go,

398
00:32:16.039 --> 00:32:20.319
Yep, there's another example. Yep, there's another example. It's not that

399
00:32:20.400 --> 00:32:22.599
there is anything new under the sun. There is, there's some great things,

400
00:32:22.599 --> 00:32:30.480
there's some really exciting things, But
generally speaking, no. The first

401
00:32:30.519 --> 00:32:34.759
of all, people are the same. People's motivations are the same. They

402
00:32:34.799 --> 00:32:38.920
may vary from culture to culture,
and the clothes they wear might be slightly

403
00:32:38.920 --> 00:32:45.400
different, their longevity might be different. But people are people, human weaknesses,

404
00:32:45.759 --> 00:32:52.200
you know, fallen whatever. Those
patterns repeat themselves. But also geography

405
00:32:52.240 --> 00:33:00.279
doesn't change, and intake and exhaust
doesn't change. And how you can respond

406
00:33:00.480 --> 00:33:12.039
to unexpected circumstances or to hedge against
the unexpected, other people have done it

407
00:33:12.720 --> 00:33:16.039
and have done it really, really, really well, and whether you're reading

408
00:33:16.039 --> 00:33:19.880
the fiction, you can point it
out. But when you start reading up

409
00:33:19.880 --> 00:33:27.039
in the past, when you have
a pretty important whether it's a politician or

410
00:33:27.039 --> 00:33:32.680
a think think tank person or somebody
in Congress, or an influential writer or

411
00:33:32.759 --> 00:33:39.559
speaker, our educator, when they're
talking about something that is just breaking news

412
00:33:39.680 --> 00:33:45.920
or is happening today, or you
know its just recently come up, it

413
00:33:45.039 --> 00:33:51.200
gives you a chance to hear things
it have already been spoken before, and

414
00:33:51.279 --> 00:33:55.519
challenges people have already experienced. And
it it really I think empowers the listener

415
00:33:55.799 --> 00:34:02.079
as other people start to come up
with their original ideas. And I just

416
00:34:02.119 --> 00:34:07.000
realized my coach has to step out
for a minute. And for those that

417
00:34:07.079 --> 00:34:09.400
are with us live, if you're
not in the chat room, I'd go

418
00:34:09.480 --> 00:34:15.800
there because as we've been talking about
certain books here over in the chat room,

419
00:34:15.559 --> 00:34:20.320
guys are really starting to roll in
with some other other items. I've

420
00:34:20.320 --> 00:34:24.840
started writing down early on some of
the books that we talked, talked we're

421
00:34:24.880 --> 00:34:28.639
talking about, so I could add
it to the show page. I don't

422
00:34:28.639 --> 00:34:30.000
know whether I want to be able
to do that, because we have really

423
00:34:30.320 --> 00:34:36.559
talked a lot about it. Someday, I think we might have to do

424
00:34:36.840 --> 00:34:44.239
a discussion about other podcasts that are
out there as well. But I think

425
00:34:44.480 --> 00:34:49.840
in the summertime there's there's something about
a book, especially if you have one

426
00:34:49.920 --> 00:34:58.159
in your hand, that can really
be a different experience than either listening to

427
00:34:58.239 --> 00:35:02.159
something, whether it's a book or
it's a podcast or something else. And

428
00:35:02.199 --> 00:35:07.639
the hard copies are the better,
I think, if for no other reasons,

429
00:35:07.719 --> 00:35:14.239
you can pack it and move it. I full out to the West

430
00:35:14.239 --> 00:35:16.159
Coast a while ago, and I'll
be flying out there again in a couple

431
00:35:16.199 --> 00:35:20.880
of months. Well the mountains,
not quite the West Coast. And it's

432
00:35:20.920 --> 00:35:23.559
funny I had I had a book
that a matter of fact, I pull

433
00:35:23.719 --> 00:35:30.119
had another chapter to go me reading
three books at one time. That was

434
00:35:30.400 --> 00:35:39.760
written in the nineteen twenties about the
war in Ukraine between the Russian Whites,

435
00:35:39.920 --> 00:35:47.119
the Germans, the Reds, the
indigenous, for lack of a better phrase,

436
00:35:47.760 --> 00:35:52.679
Ukrainian forces in the back and forth. It's it's all the interplays and

437
00:35:52.760 --> 00:35:55.280
the locations are just what we're looking
at today. But I'm reading that book

438
00:35:55.599 --> 00:36:00.599
and as everybody else is up on
the phone scroll and I caught the caught

439
00:36:00.639 --> 00:36:05.159
the eye of a gentleman probably in
his mid thirties who's read a book too.

440
00:36:05.159 --> 00:36:07.400
We just kind of gave each other
a little little head nod about,

441
00:36:07.400 --> 00:36:10.159
oh, you read a book too. We were like the only people who

442
00:36:10.199 --> 00:36:15.199
actually had had books, so that
was a nice little retro thing. But

443
00:36:15.280 --> 00:36:21.960
I also do like to read on
that iPad. And I guess I'm not

444
00:36:22.000 --> 00:36:24.159
sure when my co host will come
back, but I've talked about all the

445
00:36:24.159 --> 00:36:29.000
books that I wanted to talk in
and we don't have a caller, so

446
00:36:29.480 --> 00:36:34.079
um, let's just go ahead.
I mentioned, oh you're back. I

447
00:36:34.159 --> 00:36:37.159
was just about to go into the
news of the day, so ut going

448
00:36:37.199 --> 00:36:40.639
to the news to day. I'm
sorry I had to leave. My my

449
00:36:40.639 --> 00:36:44.400
neighbor did me a big favor of
the weekend, and I wanted to give

450
00:36:44.400 --> 00:36:47.239
my bottle of wine before he before
he left for he's going. So that's

451
00:36:47.239 --> 00:36:52.199
a good name of my poy.
I was just I'll just mention into him

452
00:36:52.239 --> 00:36:55.679
that one of the fun things about
a book. So when I was traveling

453
00:36:55.719 --> 00:37:00.639
to the West Coast last I was
sitting there, everybody's everybody's on their phone

454
00:37:00.719 --> 00:37:05.000
or on their iPads or on their
laptop two and work and I was going

455
00:37:05.039 --> 00:37:07.679
through the book. I still have
a chapter the left to finish. UM

456
00:37:07.719 --> 00:37:12.559
and I caught the eye with another
traveler across the way. We got into

457
00:37:12.559 --> 00:37:15.960
the little head Dog to each other
because we're the words reading books with everybody

458
00:37:15.960 --> 00:37:19.119
else's electric. So there's a little
bit of a retro thing with a book

459
00:37:19.119 --> 00:37:25.440
too that you can't get with anything
else. Yeah. I read a lot

460
00:37:25.519 --> 00:37:29.880
on the on the iPad and sometimes
on my phone, but yeah, I've

461
00:37:29.880 --> 00:37:37.320
got these heavy things weigh me down. Yeah. I also I subscribe to

462
00:37:37.320 --> 00:37:40.119
too many magazines, so when I
travel, I get the two months worth

463
00:37:40.119 --> 00:37:45.760
of magazine I haven't read, and
my pack gets lighter as the as the

464
00:37:45.840 --> 00:37:49.480
day goes forward because I read throw
it in Recycling, read throw it in

465
00:37:49.519 --> 00:37:58.920
Recycling. But yeah, it is, and I think, uh, you

466
00:37:59.000 --> 00:38:02.079
know, i've been talking to it
too. Done. Let me for a

467
00:38:02.079 --> 00:38:07.559
while about it, waiting for an
opportunity to um talk to him about his

468
00:38:08.000 --> 00:38:13.800
book that Jerry, that Jerry did
with James Hampson about Kyle bull Is.

469
00:38:13.880 --> 00:38:16.280
I think the time is pretty good
because I don't know if you had a

470
00:38:16.360 --> 00:38:20.400
chance to look at, if not
the document, but at least some of

471
00:38:20.440 --> 00:38:25.639
the commentary of the State Department report
on the Fall of Afghanistan that they accidentally,

472
00:38:25.679 --> 00:38:31.079
I'm sure dumped right on the uh
the friday before the July fourth weekend.

473
00:38:34.360 --> 00:38:37.440
I'm scanning it now as a matter
of fact, so do you you'll

474
00:38:37.480 --> 00:38:44.559
tell me all about it. What's
the executive what's the executive summary? Well,

475
00:38:44.639 --> 00:38:46.400
the executive summary is well, if
you want, two, folks,

476
00:38:46.440 --> 00:38:54.440
you can find it just google um
after action review on again dan h January

477
00:38:54.480 --> 00:38:59.079
twenty twenty to August twenty twenty one. And you know, just some of

478
00:38:59.079 --> 00:39:02.159
the notes that I took while while
reading it. Let me scroll back here.

479
00:39:02.239 --> 00:39:07.880
Everybody can hear my my paper being
suffers. Yeah, that's uh,

480
00:39:08.039 --> 00:39:13.880
that's here we go. Um.
You know it's interesting. One of my

481
00:39:14.039 --> 00:39:17.400
one of my favorite favorite people,
Victoria Coats, after she got through reading

482
00:39:17.400 --> 00:39:22.000
it, she had she had a
comment that I think is it was pretty

483
00:39:22.000 --> 00:39:27.119
spot on if the State Department was
shifting the blame to the DoD and basically

484
00:39:27.159 --> 00:39:30.480
no one wanted to be left holding
the bag. That's what I got reading

485
00:39:30.519 --> 00:39:35.119
it from the Department of State.
And first of all, I give I

486
00:39:35.119 --> 00:39:37.679
give the State Department credit. You
know, the first person to tell the

487
00:39:37.760 --> 00:39:43.199
story is going to drive the narrative, and so they got out in front

488
00:39:43.239 --> 00:39:46.000
and they're gonna make their excuses and
that's just all fine and Danny. But

489
00:39:46.079 --> 00:39:50.360
what I wanted to point everybody too, if you if you haven't pulled it

490
00:39:50.519 --> 00:39:55.039
up, um, for those that
are catching the podcast, I'll definitely have

491
00:39:55.159 --> 00:39:59.760
this link on the show. Pat
I've got the link here. Yeah,

492
00:39:59.760 --> 00:40:04.480
if you go to page eleven,
it's not that long. It's not that

493
00:40:04.559 --> 00:40:14.119
long ago a document really twenty four
pages. Yeah. The the whole thing

494
00:40:14.239 --> 00:40:20.880
is it's kind of making excuses like
like, nobody, we didn't have enough

495
00:40:20.920 --> 00:40:23.199
people, we didn't have enough time. You know, my feet hurt.

496
00:40:23.400 --> 00:40:29.119
Now it's all sorts of series.
But embedded in that though, are some

497
00:40:29.880 --> 00:40:35.199
some pretty pretty good points. For
instance, points one, seven, nine,

498
00:40:35.320 --> 00:40:39.000
and twenty eight and I've got to
move my microphone a little bit to

499
00:40:39.039 --> 00:40:45.079
make this happen. But if you
look at point one, it's the decision

500
00:40:45.119 --> 00:40:50.159
of President trop the President Biden to
end the military mission in Afghanistan had serious

501
00:40:50.159 --> 00:40:54.400
consequences for the viability of Afghan government
and their security. The decisions are beyond

502
00:40:54.400 --> 00:41:00.599
the scope of this review, but
the AAR found items from both administrations that

503
00:41:00.679 --> 00:41:09.119
were insufficient senior level consideration of worst
case scenarios and how quickly those might follow.

504
00:41:09.719 --> 00:41:15.679
That is I think fair, because
I think we've we've talked here over

505
00:41:15.719 --> 00:41:19.239
the course of the last two years. One thing that, for lack of

506
00:41:19.320 --> 00:41:25.840
a professional phrase to describe it,
I call the multi layered optimism filter is

507
00:41:25.880 --> 00:41:30.840
you can see that of all the
different courses of action that were briefed up

508
00:41:30.840 --> 00:41:34.360
the chain, and I know everybody
wants to dump this in the lap of

509
00:41:34.480 --> 00:41:37.320
one person. Ultimately the commander in
chief is responsible. But you know,

510
00:41:38.360 --> 00:41:42.199
in a busy world, a leader
is really only good as the staff.

511
00:41:42.440 --> 00:41:49.760
That you could see where this was
just not necessarily the worst case scenario,

512
00:41:50.079 --> 00:41:54.400
but the most likely scenario kept getting
through an optimism filter. Make it when

513
00:41:54.400 --> 00:41:59.199
we're optimistic, take out these problems, takes off the issues, so that

514
00:41:59.599 --> 00:42:08.880
a maying couple of clips from the
Chairman of the Joint chiefs of Staff going

515
00:42:09.199 --> 00:42:14.199
nobody told me, I didn't know. I don't buy it. A lot

516
00:42:14.280 --> 00:42:16.079
of people were warning of it,
it just never briefed up. Then he

517
00:42:16.119 --> 00:42:23.000
had Item seven to nine Department placed
Embassy Cobble on order departure status at the

518
00:42:23.079 --> 00:42:27.599
end of April. In the wake
of President by his decision, but that

519
00:42:27.719 --> 00:42:32.239
did not result in a notable immediate
reduction of the embassy's footprint, most of

520
00:42:32.280 --> 00:42:37.320
which involves security and life support,
in part because of the need to take

521
00:42:37.400 --> 00:42:45.719
additional roles and responsibilities given the withdrawal
of the US Military, trying to roll

522
00:42:45.800 --> 00:42:49.400
the problem to d D and the
focus I talked to who are actually on

523
00:42:49.400 --> 00:42:55.480
the ground, the problem was mostly
State given their direction and guidance. The

524
00:42:55.559 --> 00:43:00.920
military did what they could do given
the square foot and the D and G

525
00:43:01.159 --> 00:43:07.320
they were given, but everywhere they
turned when it was trying to get our

526
00:43:07.440 --> 00:43:15.000
people the State Department, Yeah,
you kind of cut out on that last

527
00:43:15.000 --> 00:43:21.079
per Oh, sorry about us talking
about And then there was item let's see

528
00:43:21.199 --> 00:43:30.039
Item number nine was US military planning
for possible UNEO, which is non combatant

529
00:43:30.039 --> 00:43:37.119
evacuation operation had been underway quite some
time, but the department participation in NEO

530
00:43:37.239 --> 00:43:42.639
planning process was hindered by the fact
that it was unclear who in the department

531
00:43:43.079 --> 00:43:49.599
had the lead, which department had
the lead. Coordination with DoD worked better

532
00:43:49.880 --> 00:43:54.199
on the ground in Kyle Bull.
That is a long standing problem with the

533
00:43:54.199 --> 00:44:00.559
State Department that I experienced myself.
Um working in Afghanistan, and it's and

534
00:44:00.639 --> 00:44:05.639
again it's a whole series of comments. I won't read it, but I

535
00:44:05.679 --> 00:44:09.400
think comment point number twenty eight I
kind of agree with as well. But

536
00:44:09.480 --> 00:44:13.119
he is one of the frustratings for
me is a lot of it is they're

537
00:44:13.119 --> 00:44:17.719
talking about a lack of capacity.
And I did a little research and this

538
00:44:17.880 --> 00:44:24.320
is the State Department owned numbers.
Is the US State Department has an overall

539
00:44:25.760 --> 00:44:32.480
number of employees seventy seven thousand,
eight hundred and eighty thirteen thousand, six

540
00:44:32.599 --> 00:44:37.840
hundred and thirty seven or Foreign service
eleven thousand, seven hundred ninety nine are

541
00:44:37.960 --> 00:44:43.239
civil service. That gives you a
total of foreign service and civil service of

542
00:44:43.360 --> 00:44:46.880
twenty five thousand, four hundred and
thirty six. They also have forty nine

543
00:44:46.920 --> 00:44:52.119
thousand, nine hundred and seventy three
roughly fifty thousand local employees, which I

544
00:44:52.119 --> 00:44:55.800
think are you of the host nation
so to speak, employees that they have.

545
00:44:57.800 --> 00:45:01.199
So for every one US person,
they have two employees that are local.

546
00:45:01.920 --> 00:45:07.440
But when you look at the foreign
service and the civil service that twenty

547
00:45:07.480 --> 00:45:13.880
five forty thirty six. We talk
State Department, we think overseas, all

548
00:45:13.920 --> 00:45:17.400
the embassies, all the things we
do only eight thousand, nine hundred and

549
00:45:17.440 --> 00:45:24.480
ten are overseas. Sixteen thousand,
five hundred and twenty six are domestic employees,

550
00:45:24.639 --> 00:45:30.840
IE, mostly inside the Beltway area. And when you consider the amount

551
00:45:30.960 --> 00:45:36.920
of blood and treasure that we invested
in Afghanistan, and all you had to

552
00:45:36.960 --> 00:45:42.400
do is to ask anybody who had
done any type of tour there, especially

553
00:45:42.440 --> 00:45:47.480
at a staff level, what was
going to happen? The fact that they

554
00:45:47.480 --> 00:45:52.159
were surprised, understaffed to have enough
people to do it. If there's not

555
00:45:52.480 --> 00:46:00.559
another data point to the need to
do a root and branch restructuring department,

556
00:46:00.599 --> 00:46:04.360
I don't know what it is.
And I will grant them the eight thousand,

557
00:46:04.440 --> 00:46:08.039
nine hundred and ten that were already
overseas, maybe you could only repurpose

558
00:46:08.159 --> 00:46:13.119
one percent of them, I'll be
nice. But the sixteen thousand, five

559
00:46:13.239 --> 00:46:19.320
hundred twenty six domestic employees department state
they had no way to tap into that

560
00:46:20.400 --> 00:46:25.000
human resource to make that go better. No, no, I don't accept

561
00:46:25.039 --> 00:46:31.280
it. I think that they they
hammered it on point one and everything else

562
00:46:31.320 --> 00:46:37.159
that happened to them after that.
You know, when you say that we

563
00:46:37.239 --> 00:46:43.199
didn't know that this rapid decision was
going to flow the way it did.

564
00:46:44.199 --> 00:46:47.719
I mean that they were surprised,
and surprise is never good to any agency

565
00:46:47.719 --> 00:46:52.960
in government. But to have it
happened at the way it happened, you

566
00:46:53.000 --> 00:46:57.119
know, they're left, as you
say, they're trying to they're trying to

567
00:46:57.320 --> 00:47:00.239
shift the blame slightly deal D,
but d O D didn't know. You

568
00:47:00.280 --> 00:47:06.800
know, we were getting the announcement
to get the US out of Afghanistan without,

569
00:47:07.679 --> 00:47:12.559
as they said, sufficient senior level
consideration and worst case scenarios and how

570
00:47:12.639 --> 00:47:16.400
quickly they might flow that that says
it all. They somebody screwed the pooch

571
00:47:16.480 --> 00:47:22.880
and uh, you know, they
left a lot of people in a very

572
00:47:22.920 --> 00:47:25.400
bad place and trying to cover themselves
as much as they can. I don't

573
00:47:25.400 --> 00:47:30.000
think they have to. They just
have to hammer that that number one point

574
00:47:30.079 --> 00:47:34.440
over and over and over. You
know, we we we had insufficient planning

575
00:47:34.480 --> 00:47:40.159
and there was no worst case scenario
planning. Boom and I and again,

576
00:47:40.239 --> 00:47:45.239
history hopefully will hopefully won't be fifty
years until they declassify the stuff because I

577
00:47:45.280 --> 00:47:52.559
will not be here. Um,
history will show eventually what that decision making

578
00:47:52.639 --> 00:47:57.719
process is, and I don't think
it's going to look good. On anybody.

579
00:47:57.760 --> 00:48:00.679
There's a lot of wreckoning to be
done, and we'll we'll revisit this

580
00:48:00.800 --> 00:48:07.440
topic when when Jerry was here.
I just think that that State Department report,

581
00:48:08.840 --> 00:48:12.639
and again I get full credit to
the State Department. They're the first

582
00:48:12.639 --> 00:48:19.519
out of the box. Bad on
the Secretary Defense and the Joint Chiefs that

583
00:48:19.599 --> 00:48:22.679
they haven't pushed something. I don't
think they've pushed out anything. And maybe

584
00:48:22.679 --> 00:48:24.280
I'm wrong, maybe I missed it, which is probably a bad thing too,

585
00:48:24.679 --> 00:48:28.719
if they pushed something out and I
haven't seen it yet and we haven't

586
00:48:28.760 --> 00:48:32.920
talked about it. But the State
Department there, they got their message out

587
00:48:32.920 --> 00:48:37.960
first, which was when you look
at it, internal politics. It was

588
00:48:37.000 --> 00:48:45.360
probably smart on their part. Well
yeah, it's always as you said,

589
00:48:45.360 --> 00:48:50.719
it's always good to be first.
But they've laid the groundwork for other people

590
00:48:50.840 --> 00:48:53.599
too. If they haven't gotten their
reports out yet to go, you know,

591
00:48:53.679 --> 00:48:58.159
we we'd like to note that,
you know, we didn't have any

592
00:48:58.199 --> 00:49:05.480
better um information about what was going
to happen. We had a little chance

593
00:49:05.519 --> 00:49:12.320
to plan this way it should so
I think it'll be interesting to see what

594
00:49:12.360 --> 00:49:21.159
they actually say or has this report
becomes more widely known, and I think

595
00:49:21.480 --> 00:49:25.400
there are a lot of people who
I think in the public space, not

596
00:49:25.480 --> 00:49:30.719
just on this issue, but on
a lot of issues, and I think

597
00:49:30.760 --> 00:49:34.920
Congress is getting a little better than
on this. I haven't seen quite enough

598
00:49:35.039 --> 00:49:40.280
out of the think tank world for
whatever reason. But I don't really care

599
00:49:40.400 --> 00:49:46.519
what your political persuasion is is when
it comes to foreign policy and the image

600
00:49:46.519 --> 00:49:52.599
of our nation. I don't think
we can just defer to certain people simply

601
00:49:52.639 --> 00:49:59.599
because they are the Secretary of the
State or the Secretary of Defense, or

602
00:50:00.039 --> 00:50:02.599
the director of the CIA, or
the Secretary of the Treasury or anything else

603
00:50:04.239 --> 00:50:13.840
that when they through either acts of
commission omission are intellectual failure. People need

604
00:50:13.880 --> 00:50:19.920
to call him out. And if
it doesn't elicit change in those individuals which

605
00:50:19.920 --> 00:50:24.559
have probably won't, at least will
set some boundaries for whoever follows, if

606
00:50:24.679 --> 00:50:29.960
enough people will raise holy hell.
You know, I remember back in the

607
00:50:30.960 --> 00:50:34.960
Baba administration one of the things that
gave me an eye twitch, because you

608
00:50:35.000 --> 00:50:39.280
know, you and I, as
Jo's we kind of saw Asia from two

609
00:50:39.320 --> 00:50:46.079
different ends. You saw Asia from
the International Dateline to the coast of Vietnam,

610
00:50:46.679 --> 00:50:52.400
and when I was a young Jo, I saw Asia through the lens

611
00:50:52.400 --> 00:50:57.159
of the Middle East, Bahrain,
Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia, all

612
00:50:57.199 --> 00:51:04.159
that stuff. And one thing that
true, whether you're talking about the Southwest

613
00:51:04.159 --> 00:51:10.519
Asian culture or the East Asian culture
is image matters. Actions matter where you

614
00:51:10.719 --> 00:51:15.639
are in the messages you send by
not just what you do, but your

615
00:51:15.679 --> 00:51:24.639
body, what your conversation points are, it's critically important. And when I

616
00:51:24.639 --> 00:51:29.760
don't know if you had a chance
to see while you were enjoying the mountains,

617
00:51:30.039 --> 00:51:34.639
but there's a little bit flashback to
that time that and again I guess

618
00:51:34.679 --> 00:51:39.719
maybe we should fire all protocol officers
or start hiring protocol officers with different backgrounds

619
00:51:40.320 --> 00:51:46.920
academically our views. But you know, when President Obama bowed to the Saudi

620
00:51:47.039 --> 00:51:52.119
royals, that really was not sending
the right message. And then we had

621
00:51:52.440 --> 00:51:58.800
over the weekend the Secretary of the
Treasury yelling, and the Chinese media is

622
00:51:58.880 --> 00:52:02.480
making hay out of it. If
he had to see her multiple bowels that

623
00:52:02.599 --> 00:52:07.079
she made to her counterpart who did
not return the bowel, it never should

624
00:52:07.119 --> 00:52:12.960
have been made to begin with.
Just yeah I did catch that. Yeah

625
00:52:10.800 --> 00:52:15.800
she didn't bow all the way to
the floor. Now it was it was

626
00:52:15.840 --> 00:52:20.480
like bow, bow, bow,
bow, And he's extended in his hand

627
00:52:20.480 --> 00:52:24.880
to shake his hand. I I
don't, I don't. I don't understand

628
00:52:25.400 --> 00:52:30.119
the damage that that does to our
image in line of all the other things

629
00:52:30.159 --> 00:52:34.880
that are very real with the with
the Chinese image. I just don't understand.

630
00:52:35.199 --> 00:52:38.800
And then we have the director of
the CIA, who's, to his

631
00:52:38.960 --> 00:52:45.880
credit um hasn't his high profile of
some recent ones, but he uh submitted

632
00:52:45.880 --> 00:52:53.039
a lecture at the Ditchley Foundation Lecture
at Oxfordshire, which evidently is a big

633
00:52:53.079 --> 00:52:58.960
thing. But I could not believe
some of the things that I was reading

634
00:52:59.280 --> 00:53:04.280
that this is what the priority of
our CIA has, which again is something

635
00:53:04.280 --> 00:53:07.079
we've talked about here and I wrote
about earlier this year that the failures of

636
00:53:07.159 --> 00:53:12.480
the institutions, that people need to
not be complacent about our institutions and who

637
00:53:12.519 --> 00:53:15.679
they are. You need to look
at what they're saying and doing. But

638
00:53:15.880 --> 00:53:22.440
he in this essay, I'm just
going to quote him quote in nineteen ninety

639
00:53:22.440 --> 00:53:25.000
two, and this is when to
break from my equipper. Second, this

640
00:53:25.039 --> 00:53:29.679
is when he worked at State.
We see a recurrent theme here, and

641
00:53:29.760 --> 00:53:34.000
he's worked for both parties because he
was talking about how he worked for when

642
00:53:34.800 --> 00:53:38.000
Baker was Secretary State but he said
in nineteen ninety two, I tried as

643
00:53:38.000 --> 00:53:45.400
best I could to sketch the shared
global threat of climate change insecurities, especially

644
00:53:45.440 --> 00:53:51.679
the raging HIV AIDS epidemic. I
spent much of the last two decades trying

645
00:53:51.679 --> 00:53:58.280
to understand encounter the combustible combination of
grievance, ambition, and insecurity that Putin

646
00:53:59.159 --> 00:54:08.360
embodies. The climate crisis possesses today's
most clear and present danger unquote. That's

647
00:54:08.400 --> 00:54:14.920
the mindset in the background of the
worldview of our CIA director. You and

648
00:54:14.960 --> 00:54:17.519
I were both around in nineteen ninety
two and the immediate Cold War era,

649
00:54:19.239 --> 00:54:24.519
and not going into too much details, I'm fully briefbu In Hiva since the

650
00:54:24.559 --> 00:54:34.000
mid eighties in a very personal way. And I don't understand why somebody at

651
00:54:34.039 --> 00:54:38.800
that much of a senior level could
take two decades to try and understand the

652
00:54:38.960 --> 00:54:46.559
combination of Greece, ambition and insecurity
that Putin has right now, when all

653
00:54:46.599 --> 00:54:50.239
you have to do is going back
to the beginning of the show is read

654
00:54:51.599 --> 00:54:54.079
as best as much as you can
to try to understand Russian history and just

655
00:54:54.199 --> 00:55:00.119
understand how human minds work. And
I don't know. I remember the climate

656
00:55:00.159 --> 00:55:02.599
in nineteen ninety two. It was
hot then, it's hot now. I

657
00:55:02.599 --> 00:55:07.599
don't want to get into that,
but it's just amazing at this point in

658
00:55:07.639 --> 00:55:10.840
time, in the summer of twenty
twenty three, with all the challenges it's

659
00:55:10.920 --> 00:55:15.840
beset not just the United States but
its allies, and you have an opportunity

660
00:55:15.960 --> 00:55:19.280
to speak to your peers. And
maybe that's why he wrote about what he

661
00:55:19.320 --> 00:55:24.920
did, that these are the topics
that the director of the CIA thinks he

662
00:55:25.039 --> 00:55:30.280
needs to be most invested in,
and the world needs to be invested in

663
00:55:30.320 --> 00:55:35.800
thinking about you know, I would
expect something like this from I don't know,

664
00:55:35.800 --> 00:55:40.880
the head of an NGO or maybe
a member of Congress representing certain congressional

665
00:55:40.920 --> 00:55:45.719
districts with an academic background. But
you know, people are all relying on

666
00:55:47.599 --> 00:55:53.159
institutions and leaders to constantly do the
right thing. You don't have to read

667
00:55:53.239 --> 00:55:57.000
history. You can just read what
comes across the news wire in the last

668
00:55:57.000 --> 00:56:04.000
week. Yeah, I think you
underestimate vastly, and it's too easy to

669
00:56:04.000 --> 00:56:09.039
do vastly underestimate the influence of the
We're All going to Die climate change group

670
00:56:09.119 --> 00:56:15.280
in this particular administration. And you
know, whether it's you know, I

671
00:56:15.679 --> 00:56:17.320
do a lot of reading that area, and there are a lot of people

672
00:56:17.320 --> 00:56:24.760
out there questioning the the amount of
effort being put in to push this particular

673
00:56:24.840 --> 00:56:31.280
line and UM, but it is
something you know, that is very strong,

674
00:56:31.360 --> 00:56:37.519
and people are being chosen for their
positions who are who have never spoken

675
00:56:37.559 --> 00:56:43.440
out against UM. Let's not make
this the major focus of our all our

676
00:56:43.480 --> 00:56:45.880
efforts. But the people who are
saying this is the major focus of all

677
00:56:45.880 --> 00:56:51.480
our efforts, whether they're in defense
or in the intelligence business, or you

678
00:56:51.519 --> 00:56:57.039
know, you name the part of
government, they're the ones who are who

679
00:56:57.079 --> 00:57:01.119
are getting promoted. And that is
you know, I don't think that's a

680
00:57:01.159 --> 00:57:04.920
dirty secret anywhere. I just think
that's the way it is. So if

681
00:57:04.960 --> 00:57:07.760
you you know you don't, it
is no longer a matter of not saying

682
00:57:07.800 --> 00:57:14.519
anything. Is a matter you have
to be outspokenly in favor of these various

683
00:57:15.920 --> 00:57:20.159
things that have been rolled out during
especially during this administration, but which begin

684
00:57:20.199 --> 00:57:25.559
in past administrations. UM. So
that you know that these things are constantly

685
00:57:25.559 --> 00:57:30.960
in the forefront, whether or not
they are based in reality or science,

686
00:57:30.079 --> 00:57:35.559
you know, that is a question
which I think we need much more investigation

687
00:57:35.639 --> 00:57:38.760
on, and not just you know, some of the opinions that are expressed

688
00:57:38.800 --> 00:57:43.239
on the next time I see the
word hockey stick, for example, I

689
00:57:43.280 --> 00:57:46.559
want to put point people to the
to a lot of other books which question

690
00:57:46.679 --> 00:57:52.000
the methodology of the of the hockey
stick and the and the people behind it.

691
00:57:52.119 --> 00:57:59.400
So, um, it is a
it is a challenging problem, and

692
00:57:59.559 --> 00:58:02.800
we need to get a grip on
it by some by more than just political

693
00:58:02.920 --> 00:58:07.360
people and people I don't care if
they're intelligence or not. They're you know,

694
00:58:07.400 --> 00:58:12.239
they're not any better informed than than
a well read public. And that

695
00:58:12.400 --> 00:58:16.119
is that is one more reason to
be reading the the the accounter arguments.

696
00:58:16.119 --> 00:58:20.039
And you not agree with the accounter
arguments. You may you may agree with

697
00:58:20.079 --> 00:58:23.039
the with the with this, with
this particular outlook that you know, we're

698
00:58:23.039 --> 00:58:29.199
all we're all going to Uh,
there's immediate concerned over this climate change,

699
00:58:29.239 --> 00:58:32.639
but uh, you know the the
there are other views and they need to

700
00:58:32.679 --> 00:58:36.719
be looked at carefully, and we
need to have I think, a real

701
00:58:36.840 --> 00:58:44.880
national conversation about this that isn't driven
by what I see essences of religious fervor

702
00:58:44.960 --> 00:58:49.960
and rather than any real science bind
it. I think you've fought on there.

703
00:58:51.000 --> 00:58:57.559
There is a religious nature to this, and uh, and in the

704
00:58:57.639 --> 00:59:04.039
show notes, I'll link to that
lecture from director Burns, and in it,

705
00:59:04.159 --> 00:59:07.199
I don't know whether it came across
the microphone. And I laughed when

706
00:59:07.199 --> 00:59:10.119
he said hockey sticks because he and
one of the things you know, we

707
00:59:10.159 --> 00:59:15.119
talk about when you read biographies,
when you read about leaders, when you

708
00:59:15.199 --> 00:59:19.440
lead about you know, you're talking
about books about certain commanding officers. One

709
00:59:19.440 --> 00:59:22.760
of the things that you see consistently
is the important thing for a leader is

710
00:59:22.800 --> 00:59:28.000
to be calmed, regardless of what's
happening around you. You have to be

711
00:59:28.079 --> 00:59:32.519
the most calm person on the bridge, on ci in cic or on the

712
00:59:32.559 --> 00:59:37.519
firing line. You've got to be
the calmst person there. And he was

713
00:59:37.679 --> 00:59:40.320
hyperbolic. And one of the points
he says, and there's this not just

714
00:59:40.440 --> 00:59:45.880
about about climate, but he said, there's a whole series of hockey sticks

715
00:59:45.920 --> 00:59:50.400
out there, and you talk about
don't really know too much. There's another

716
00:59:50.440 --> 00:59:54.320
comment that you'll appreciate that somebody who's
been online as long as I had,

717
00:59:54.320 --> 01:00:00.440
if not longer, is He also
says he was talking about one of the

718
01:00:00.480 --> 01:00:07.880
things they're doing to counter Russian misinformation
is to put videos on online like on

719
01:00:07.960 --> 01:00:12.400
Telegram and stuff, and he said, our first video had two and a

720
01:00:12.440 --> 01:00:19.960
half million views in its first week. That's nothing. I mean between mid

721
01:00:20.039 --> 01:00:27.880
rats, between my blog, your
blog, our twitter feeds, and just

722
01:00:27.960 --> 01:00:35.119
to be nice are at point five
million. Let's roll in Salmercagliano, who

723
01:00:35.159 --> 01:00:38.639
just went over one hundred thousand subscribers
on his YouTube channel. Let's throw him

724
01:00:38.639 --> 01:00:43.719
in there. The three of us
could do two and a half million views

725
01:00:44.000 --> 01:00:50.239
in a week. That's not a
big deal. So he doesn't understand the

726
01:00:50.360 --> 01:00:55.159
CIA director the modern information space.
That in itself was just gobsmacking to me.

727
01:00:55.280 --> 01:01:00.920
But you know, that's that's where
we are. Well, the audience

728
01:01:01.000 --> 01:01:07.239
is telling us that we've we've gone
silent. Well, what do you not

729
01:01:07.320 --> 01:01:08.719
pay for that? Did you not? Did you not pay for that extra

730
01:01:08.760 --> 01:01:15.559
half hour? I did pay for
that extra half hour. Unfortunately, Um

731
01:01:15.880 --> 01:01:21.039
arn't I just minimize what I needed? Here? Ah wherever here we go?

732
01:01:21.840 --> 01:01:27.639
We are in theory still recording.
So what I must have done is

733
01:01:27.960 --> 01:01:31.480
instead of selecting ninety minutes, I
selected sixty minutes live. But we are

734
01:01:31.800 --> 01:01:38.320
still recording. Yeah, yeah,
we have extra recording times. So this

735
01:01:38.400 --> 01:01:43.639
is a podcast for those of the
podcast. Don't mention anything for those that

736
01:01:43.679 --> 01:01:47.320
are listening, Why sorry about that. That's my fault. I made an

737
01:01:47.400 --> 01:01:51.760
error. I can't do anything right. I blamed the heat. Um,

738
01:01:52.000 --> 01:01:55.239
well, if you want to,
it's the hockey stick. Hockey stick,

739
01:01:55.320 --> 01:02:00.920
God, let's say that the stay
part. I blame the DoD for me

740
01:02:01.039 --> 01:02:06.840
not selecting ninety bedits. I'll just
just work off that. Here's one thing,

741
01:02:08.280 --> 01:02:12.360
one other thing about China. I
know we both have a list of

742
01:02:12.400 --> 01:02:14.880
stuff. That's okay. If we
can't get a guest for next week,

743
01:02:14.920 --> 01:02:19.559
we'll just pick up where we left
off. But um, one thing I

744
01:02:19.559 --> 01:02:27.320
wanted I wanted to bring up because
as I was um going down a Chinese

745
01:02:27.360 --> 01:02:30.159
rabbit hole because I uh, one
thing I was gonna bring up. Maybe

746
01:02:30.199 --> 01:02:36.119
we can talk about it next time. But the whole Belton Road in China's

747
01:02:36.480 --> 01:02:42.639
uh. Tom Shugart also for those
at follow on Twitter, retired m Navy

748
01:02:42.639 --> 01:02:47.840
submarine or captain. Um, he's
he's pretty good with the satellite pictures and

749
01:02:47.880 --> 01:02:53.320
stuff. But anyway he noticed it
as well. Is that Chinese naval base

750
01:02:53.400 --> 01:03:00.199
that we've talked about on previous shows
in Cambodia has been expanded and there right

751
01:03:00.199 --> 01:03:07.559
there is no Chinese naval base in
Cambodia. It's a facility exactly well,

752
01:03:07.119 --> 01:03:13.000
there was. As I was googling
it, this link came up that I

753
01:03:13.079 --> 01:03:15.239
knew this intrinsically by didn't have the
hard numbers here. You know, we

754
01:03:15.280 --> 01:03:17.880
talk about five eyes and so people
want to make it six eyes, but

755
01:03:19.039 --> 01:03:21.960
throw in Japan in there. But
we talked about the anglosphere. We're talking

756
01:03:22.239 --> 01:03:28.039
we say five eyes. It's the
UK, the US, Australia, Canada

757
01:03:28.039 --> 01:03:36.199
and New Zealand. And New Zealand
is my opinion of New Zealand is biprocated

758
01:03:36.199 --> 01:03:39.800
because they were there force right after
nine to eleven. They've been with us,

759
01:03:40.039 --> 01:03:50.039
including in Vietnam, almost every time. But they're they had an anti

760
01:03:50.119 --> 01:03:52.920
nuclear policy that told us to beat
feet, even though they still had at

761
01:03:52.960 --> 01:03:57.760
that time the occasional echo to lurking
off their coast. They would expect us

762
01:03:57.800 --> 01:04:02.079
to go after. They have been
a little problematic on the stage and they've

763
01:04:02.119 --> 01:04:06.840
definitely been getting closer to the People's
Republic of China. And here are the

764
01:04:06.920 --> 01:04:13.760
numbers that I found. In two
thousand and eight, they signed a free

765
01:04:13.800 --> 01:04:19.199
trade agreement with the People's Republic of
China. Since then, which two thousand

766
01:04:19.239 --> 01:04:24.679
and eight for me, then it
seems like yesterday. Exports to China have

767
01:04:25.039 --> 01:04:29.960
increased eightfold, to the point that
last year in twenty twenty two, China

768
01:04:30.039 --> 01:04:38.039
surpassed Australia as the largest export mina
market. And that's reached the point with

769
01:04:38.119 --> 01:04:43.239
a lot of the economists as the
pressure is coming for everybody's d couple like

770
01:04:43.519 --> 01:04:46.159
the Chinese designed, and again you
got to get full credit to the Chinese.

771
01:04:46.199 --> 01:04:53.280
They're very good at this. The
New Zealand economy isn't diversified enough that

772
01:04:53.320 --> 01:04:58.480
they can dcouple from the PRC right
now. They are just so embedded in

773
01:04:58.559 --> 01:05:05.519
Their economy has adjusted so much,
and the influence in Wellington from the People's

774
01:05:05.559 --> 01:05:15.119
Republic of China is so great that
even though their defense and security experts and

775
01:05:15.239 --> 01:05:19.559
even some of their economists say they
want to decouple, their political structure and

776
01:05:19.599 --> 01:05:25.079
a lot of their business interests can't
slash. Won't you know? There's a

777
01:05:25.119 --> 01:05:31.719
warning sign for everybody like Germany and
energy in Russia is the weak sister or

778
01:05:31.719 --> 01:05:34.800
the five Eyes that on occasion can
just trying to compete with New Zealand.

779
01:05:36.360 --> 01:05:43.039
That economic tie in that the PRC
has done with one of the members of

780
01:05:43.039 --> 01:05:46.639
the five eyes that I don't know, scary is too much of an alarmist

781
01:05:46.679 --> 01:05:51.039
word. But you know, what's
the old cliche. Sometimes you exist in

782
01:05:51.119 --> 01:05:56.039
life simply to be an example to
others of what not to do. That's

783
01:05:56.079 --> 01:06:04.800
impressive, that is, and it's
well. Um, New Zealand has always

784
01:06:04.800 --> 01:06:12.719
had a slightly more leftist bent than
a lot of the h That's hard to

785
01:06:12.760 --> 01:06:18.320
say, since both both Britain and
Australia have dabbled that direction quite a bit.

786
01:06:18.760 --> 01:06:23.400
But you know, they they were, but they got into a trend

787
01:06:23.480 --> 01:06:30.159
later on it being more conservative if
you will, economically. But I don't

788
01:06:30.199 --> 01:06:33.239
I don't you know, they've I
don't know what they see in the world,

789
01:06:33.280 --> 01:06:36.599
but I guess as far as the
way they are from everything else except

790
01:06:36.719 --> 01:06:41.840
Australia's Western shore, and even that's
pretty far away, they just they just

791
01:06:41.920 --> 01:06:46.760
have their own little spin on things. Yea, and yeah, in a

792
01:06:46.840 --> 01:06:53.480
way you can, you can talk
yourself into that they are they are blessed

793
01:06:53.639 --> 01:06:58.480
with geography and all you gotta do
is look at the map and see what

794
01:06:58.559 --> 01:07:01.400
that looks like. But anyway we
have that that rest of the list,

795
01:07:01.440 --> 01:07:05.559
I guess we'll just have to get
to it next time. That's the way

796
01:07:05.599 --> 01:07:10.440
it should work sometimes. Okay,
well, hey, we'll catch our times.

797
01:07:10.599 --> 01:07:15.199
And uh sorry to everybody who were
with us live and it died at

798
01:07:15.199 --> 01:07:16.960
the top of the hour, but
you'll get it on the podcast, and

799
01:07:17.400 --> 01:07:21.760
for everybody else who is with the
podcast, we appreciate you. Join us

800
01:07:21.760 --> 01:07:26.679
for another edition of Midrats and until
next time, I hope everybody has a

801
01:07:26.800 --> 01:08:00.360
great Navy day. Cheers, read
books and blame me holding them. It's

802
01:08:00.400 --> 01:08:08.679
a long way to go, it's
a long way to differ many to the

803
01:08:08.800 --> 01:08:18.319
greenest I know. I don't b
Becodell. Well, let's talk Swell.

804
01:08:19.640 --> 01:08:27.479
It's a long long way to Dipperland. But my life m