Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Joe Wisenthal and I'm Tracy Alloway. Tracy, one of
Speaker 1: the ongoing there are numerous forces that are sort of conspiring,
Speaker 1: so to speak, to create shortages in various commodities, but
Speaker 1: a persistent one clearly is the ongoing war, the invasion
Speaker 1: of Ukraine by Russia. Right, so this is something we've
Speaker 1: spoken about, I guess multiple times at this point. But Ukraine,
Speaker 1: of course sometimes referred to as the bread basket of
Speaker 1: Europe or whatever cliche you want to use, a big
Speaker 1: portion of the world's grains derived from Ukraine. And I
Speaker 1: mean there's also lots of grain growing in Russia as well,
Speaker 1: which is also off limits now. But there's an issue. Obviously,
Speaker 1: Russia is blockading the country. It's hard to get that
Speaker 1: grain out, which means that there's a shortage, which means
Speaker 1: that prices are rising, which means that we've seen pressure,
Speaker 1: I mean particularly in emerging markets, places like Egypt that
Speaker 1: actually got a lot of their food supply from Ukraine. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's right. And so we can look here at a
Speaker 1: chart of say wheat futures, and the price is obviously
Speaker 1: going up. But for the American consumer, there's sort of
Speaker 1: like underlying food commodity prices, they're only a modest contributor
Speaker 1: to food inflation overall, and many emerging markets they're much
Speaker 1: more exposed directly to the price. And what's worse is
Speaker 1: not just the price but outright shortages. So it's one
Speaker 1: thing to say, Okay, the price is up. It's another
Speaker 1: thing to say, you literally cannot get the grade, you
Speaker 1: literally cannot get the wheat. But that is the risk
Speaker 1: that's being faced right now for multiple reasons, but in
Speaker 1: large part due to this war, right, And you can
Speaker 1: imagine that would manifest itself in political pressure in a
Speaker 1: lot of places in the world, Like when people can't eat,
Speaker 1: they tend to get angry, right, I mean rightfully? So, yeah,
Speaker 1: And so then the question is, I guess there's two questions,
Speaker 1: is like, one is what is happening with wheat plantings
Speaker 1: in Ukraine. But then even if plantings were to somehow
Speaker 1: be sustained amid the war, can how much of the
Speaker 1: grain can actually get out? And as you mentioned right now,
Speaker 1: there's very little getting out. Yeah, And this sort of
Speaker 1: goes back to I guess the military tension between Russia
Speaker 1: and Ukraine, But how do you actually get supplies into
Speaker 1: the country and how do you get vital goods out
Speaker 1: because you still want the supply of wheat and food
Speaker 1: to be flowing relatively freely, and you also want Ukraine
Speaker 1: to be able to make some money right at a
Speaker 1: time when it actually needs money and could use that
Speaker 1: to buy weapons and supplies that too, all right, So
Speaker 1: for more we're gonna be talking about some of the
Speaker 1: options to actually do this and whether there's a way
Speaker 1: for the U. S Military Western forces to play a
Speaker 1: positive role in safely getting grain out of the country.
Speaker 1: We're gonna be speaking to Admiral James stanf Revis. He was,
Speaker 1: among other things, the six Supreme Allied Commander of NATO.
Speaker 1: He has personal experience in perhaps similar operations, are similar
Speaker 1: situations of moving commodities around the world. Is a really
Speaker 1: deep understanding of this stuff. So, Admiral, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for coming on odd lots. I really appreciate. It's
Speaker 1: great to be with both of you. Thank you absolutely,
Speaker 1: thank you so much. So to start, you give us
Speaker 1: your assessment of the current situation why exporting grain from
Speaker 1: Ukraine right now is so constrained, well, I'm really struck
Speaker 1: by a book I just published called to Risk It
Speaker 1: All Nine Conflicts and the Crucible of Decision, and it's
Speaker 1: about decision making under extreme stress. And so here I
Speaker 1: think we have a pretty good example. Uh, both Vladimir
Speaker 1: Putin on if you will, the dark side of the
Speaker 1: equation and Volodimir Zalinsky on the lighter side on our
Speaker 1: side of the equation. Both of these men are literally
Speaker 1: risking at all. And one of the crucial components of
Speaker 1: it is this ability or not to export grain. I
Speaker 1: think you and Tracy Joe did a nice job laying
Speaker 1: out the challenges globally if it doesn't get out, So
Speaker 1: we come pretty quickly to okay, Admiral, So how would
Speaker 1: you get the grain out? You know, I don't need
Speaker 1: to tell an odd lots audience that um of all
Speaker 1: international trade moves by sea, and grain, of course, is
Speaker 1: a commodity that moves out in in mass, and so
Speaker 1: the idea of trying to truck it out or even
Speaker 1: train it out of Ukraine just it doesn't serve. So
Speaker 1: the problem is Russia has taken their black sea fleet
Speaker 1: about forty warships and effectively they've blockaded the entire coast
Speaker 1: line of Ukraine. They already control on the land side
Speaker 1: about seventy percent of that coastline on the Black Seat,
Speaker 1: but that remaining has Odessa in it. And Odessa is
Speaker 1: like Los Angeles Long Beach in the context of the
Speaker 1: United States. It's dug port. And therefore the key is,
Speaker 1: how can we if you will, open that port. And
Speaker 1: at the moment, it's not only blockaded by Russian worships,
Speaker 1: but it's it's mined in both by the Ukrainians and
Speaker 1: reportedly by the Russian. So it's a very complex maritime
Speaker 1: problem and UH, to very quickly sketch it out. What
Speaker 1: we would do first is get rid of the minds.
Speaker 1: I think that's pretty obvious why I need to do that.
Speaker 1: And maybe some of the listeners can remember back to
Speaker 1: the nineteen eighties when Iran blockaded the Straight of hor Moves.
Speaker 1: What did the s do? Um, we got rid of
Speaker 1: the minds. We certainly have that technology or allies. There's
Speaker 1: a standing NATO mind sweeping task force that could be
Speaker 1: sent up in the Black Sea to do this. We
Speaker 1: got rid of the minds in the nineteen eighties in
Speaker 1: the Arabian Gulf, and then we reflagged Kuwaiti tankers as
Speaker 1: US vessels, and then we escorted them, put a cruiser,
Speaker 1: a destroyer or a frigate alongside every one of them,
Speaker 1: provided air cover and simply drove them in and out
Speaker 1: and told the Iranians, in effect, don't even think about it,
Speaker 1: and that solution could be applied here in Ukraine. And
Speaker 1: if we don't move in that direction pretty quickly, I
Speaker 1: think the consequences of global food security are quite dire.
Speaker 1: So I have a bunch of questions already. But maybe
Speaker 1: let let me start with the most pressing one. But
Speaker 1: would an escort of ships in the manner that you
Speaker 1: just described, would that not be seen as a provocation
Speaker 1: by Russia? Um? I think it would be seen as
Speaker 1: a provocation, And we have to ask ourselves, um, is
Speaker 1: it sufficient the need to do this? Is it sufficient
Speaker 1: to accept the level of risk? Back to the book
Speaker 1: I just published, to Risk at All, That's exactly what
Speaker 1: I examine in the book, in a series of maritime
Speaker 1: case studies, is when are you willing to accept risk?
Speaker 1: And is it justified by your ability to mitigate the risk?
Speaker 1: And again we get rid of the minds. We put
Speaker 1: escorts with all these ships, and we also the marsh
Speaker 1: we publish no tams again. I don't have to tell
Speaker 1: an odd locks audience what that is, um, And we
Speaker 1: tell the Russians yea at each other today overestimated NOIP.
Speaker 1: I'm sure the audience gets it. It's the hosts in
Speaker 1: this case you need to explain it, okay. Indeed, for
Speaker 1: our hosts, note TAM is a notice to mariners, and
Speaker 1: it is it can be published about a floating object
Speaker 1: that's become an obstruction, about newly discovered underwater formations UM,
Speaker 1: or about a missile shoot or a gun shoot that
Speaker 1: enable worship is going to conduct. It's really just the
Speaker 1: equivalent of posting public notice of operations. So we would
Speaker 1: we would the marsh the Russians. What that means is
Speaker 1: go diplomat to diplomat, and we would issue no tams
Speaker 1: noticed mariners, which goes, if you will, mariner to mariner,
Speaker 1: worships to worships. The calculus then shifts over to the Russians.
Speaker 1: And here you just have to put yourself in the
Speaker 1: shoes of the Russians and ask yourself, um, you know,
Speaker 1: in in the words of Clint Eastwood, are you feeling
Speaker 1: lucky today. I don't think the Russians would take a
Speaker 1: shot at a merchant ship escorted by a US warship,
Speaker 1: therefore highly defended doing a humanitarian mission taking grain to
Speaker 1: a starving world. I just don't see Russia taking that shot.
Speaker 1: You know, there is obviously an incredible amount of hesitance
Speaker 1: about committing any sort of US anything that would resemble
Speaker 1: sort of like direct US military involvement. We're willing to
Speaker 1: send weapons and of course money to Ukraine, obviously, all
Speaker 1: of native well short of actually anything beyond that. But
Speaker 1: in your view, something like escorting a ship through the
Speaker 1: Black Sea or demining the area does not compose to
Speaker 1: that at all. In your view, it does not. As follows,
Speaker 1: where we have drawn the red line as to US
Speaker 1: involvement is on the soil of the Ukrainian land or
Speaker 1: Russian soil. But here we're talking about neither of those.
Speaker 1: We're talking about international waters, so these ships would not
Speaker 1: be passing through Russian claimed waters at all. These would
Speaker 1: be international high seas. So I think that's a crucial
Speaker 1: difference and one that we would certainly articulate and be
Speaker 1: very clear with the Russians. Look, we're not entering your
Speaker 1: territorial waters to conduct this mission. We're going into a
Speaker 1: Ukrainian port, but through international waters and of course through
Speaker 1: the Ukrainian territorial sea, with their permission. So I think
Speaker 1: this passes the risk test. But I will also say,
Speaker 1: at this point, do we really need to worry about
Speaker 1: provoking Russia in the sense that they're the ones who
Speaker 1: have invaded this country with two hundred thousand troops, committed
Speaker 1: hideous war crimes, are refusing negotiations, and are blocking food
Speaker 1: from the rest of the world. I mean, at some
Speaker 1: point you just have to look a bully in the
Speaker 1: eye and say, no, your behavior is unacceptable. Here's what
Speaker 1: we're gonna do about it. I think we've hit that
Speaker 1: point in this particular course of action. So one thing
Speaker 1: you mentioned in your writings on this topic is the
Speaker 1: idea of having to reflag the Ukrainian carriers to something else.
Speaker 1: Can you explain why that would need to be done.
Speaker 1: I actually don't think that is a crucial step. I
Speaker 1: think it ups the anti for Russia. But let's face it,
Speaker 1: as as this audience will know, um, there are many,
Speaker 1: many flags of convenience all around the seas of the world.
Speaker 1: Many of these grain tankers are non Ukrainian. But it
Speaker 1: does alleviate one aspect of this, which is that, um,
Speaker 1: it would be Russia conceivably could say well, we're engaged
Speaker 1: in the special military operation. We're attacking Ukrainian targets. So
Speaker 1: we would say, okay, we'll take down the Ukrainian flag
Speaker 1: and put up really wouldn't have to be a U. S. Flag.
Speaker 1: It could be Panamanian, it could be Greek, it could
Speaker 1: be any nation willing to participate, could be any of
Speaker 1: the NATO nations. If NATO signed up to it. It
Speaker 1: would just be quite streamlined. And this was the case
Speaker 1: in the operation Earnest Will in the nineteen eighties and
Speaker 1: the Arabian See. Um, it's just quicker you can put
Speaker 1: a U. S. Flag on it because the US government says, yep,
Speaker 1: we'll take that ship. Um. But is that crucial now?
Speaker 1: I don't think so. Um, So you and I don't
Speaker 1: think it would change the calculus. Particularly so you were
Speaker 1: part of that operation just Will in the late nineties
Speaker 1: eighties to get oil out of the street of Hermus.
Speaker 1: Why do you describe your role in that operation and
Speaker 1: what made it successful? Um? My role was obviously that
Speaker 1: was many years ago, I was a very young lieutenant commander.
Speaker 1: I suppose I was in my late twenties, maybe thirty,
Speaker 1: and I was the operations officer on an Aegis cruiser
Speaker 1: USS Valley Forge, and and as the ops boss um,
Speaker 1: my job was to participate in all the planning that
Speaker 1: went into the operation, alongside the Admiral's flag staff and
Speaker 1: my equivalence from all the other ships that were in
Speaker 1: the task force. So we would get together on the
Speaker 1: carrier and kind of sketch out the whole operation, would
Speaker 1: send it up the chain of command, it would get
Speaker 1: approved and come back. So step one for me was
Speaker 1: planning process, very deeply involved. And then in the execution phase,
Speaker 1: I was the tactical action officer on board the Valley Forge,
Speaker 1: effectively the officer on watch with the firing key. So
Speaker 1: if we were overflown by Iranian combat aircraft, I had
Speaker 1: permission to shoot them down. If the Iranian small boats
Speaker 1: were to attack the tanker, I could engage them with
Speaker 1: our gun systems um Naturally, if if a situation like
Speaker 1: that developed, the Captain would come very quickly into the
Speaker 1: combat information center to make sure Lieutenant Commander Staffordis didn't
Speaker 1: do anything foolish. But as as I described it, we
Speaker 1: would just sail right up through the straight of her
Speaker 1: moves and up the center of the Arabian golf and
Speaker 1: go up, and the tankers would load load oil up
Speaker 1: at the ports in Kuwait, and then would turn around
Speaker 1: and take them back down. And when we got him
Speaker 1: into the Indian Ocean and out of range of Iranian
Speaker 1: aircraft Iranian warships, we were able to uh cut the
Speaker 1: loose enough they would go. This was actually gonna be
Speaker 1: my next question. So how far would a military escort
Speaker 1: for ships normally go to? You take them all the
Speaker 1: way to well, presumably you wouldn't take them all the
Speaker 1: way to their destination, but how do you decide when
Speaker 1: they're out of you know, the danger zone? Yeah, in
Speaker 1: in that particular situation, um, it was relatively easy to
Speaker 1: calculate by looking at Iranian military capability. Um, how far
Speaker 1: could their attack aircraft fly? How far did they typically
Speaker 1: operate warships? Answer? In both cases not very far. In
Speaker 1: the case of Russia, I think safely speaking, we would
Speaker 1: escort them down through the Bosphorus and out the out
Speaker 1: of the Black Sea and into the A G and C.
Speaker 1: I think that's where you're gonna cut them loose. Again,
Speaker 1: highly unlikely in my view that Russia is going to
Speaker 1: come after commercial shipping. Frankly, whether it's Ukrainian flag or not,
Speaker 1: but safe for sake of argument, we've reflagged UM and
Speaker 1: they're flying a U. S flag or a Danish flag
Speaker 1: from a NATO member, very unlikely Rush is gonna go
Speaker 1: any anywhere outside their zone of control, which is really
Speaker 1: the Northern Black Sea. More broadly, today, what are the
Speaker 1: existing either US or NATO resources that either have the
Speaker 1: best equipment or the best experience in working with the
Speaker 1: safety and securing of commercial fleet. All of the NATO
Speaker 1: navies do this quite well, and most of the NATO
Speaker 1: nations have very capable coastguards, including obviously our own and
Speaker 1: again and odd lots. Audience will know well the close
Speaker 1: working relationship of the U. S. Coast Guard to merchant shipping. UM.
Speaker 1: That's replicated by the French Coastguard, the German Coastguard, the
Speaker 1: Danish Coastguard, and I think that UM, you could certainly
Speaker 1: draw on that expertise. Finally, Tracy and Joe, I would
Speaker 1: say that UM, we have experienced doing this much more
Speaker 1: recently during the period of time when I was Supreme
Speaker 1: Allied Commander of NATO from two thousand nine and two thirteen,
Speaker 1: we were facing pirates off the coast of East Africa.
Speaker 1: This of course is the time of Captain Phillips who
Speaker 1: is captured from the Mayorsclabama, rescued by a very heroic
Speaker 1: navy operation. Frankly, one of the case studies in my book,
Speaker 1: To Risk at All is about that operation. In that
Speaker 1: period of time, all of our navies worked very closely
Speaker 1: with the international shipping community, if you will, and I
Speaker 1: would go every few months to London to the International
Speaker 1: Maritime Organization, which functioned as a kind of umbrella over
Speaker 1: both the major shipping companies. So we had represented is
Speaker 1: there from all of them in the major navies that
Speaker 1: were part of the counterpiracy. So we've got very recent
Speaker 1: experience working alongside our merchant marine colleagues, and frankly, that
Speaker 1: relationship is generally pretty comfortable. So can you actually talk
Speaker 1: a little bit more about these sort of day to
Speaker 1: day relationship between the military and merchant carriers. And you know,
Speaker 1: I'm thinking Tracy to like about even some of these
Speaker 1: conversations that we had with Salton post already talked about
Speaker 1: this exactly where it's like, you know, what the FED
Speaker 1: was to the financial crisis, the military is going to
Speaker 1: have to be the sort of global commodity crisis. But
Speaker 1: even before the sort of current acute tension, what is
Speaker 1: the sort of normal role that the U. S. Military
Speaker 1: or the Navy plays in just sort of the securing
Speaker 1: of the of the global trade that I guess we
Speaker 1: all take for grant. Yeah, I think the key phrase there,
Speaker 1: Joe is take for granted. And and we all of us,
Speaker 1: the global population kind of just feels as though there's
Speaker 1: no problems out there. And yet as again as recently
Speaker 1: as within the decade, we saw organized, uh strongly land
Speaker 1: based pirate operations coming out of Somalia. Um we continue
Speaker 1: to see pretty vicious piracy in the Straits of Malacca,
Speaker 1: We see it off the coast of West Africa. We
Speaker 1: see kind of hints of it in and around the
Speaker 1: Caribbean at times. Um So piracy continues a second zone,
Speaker 1: and I always say the oceans in many ways of
Speaker 1: the world's largest crime syne another major challenge. And you know,
Speaker 1: we tend to think of this as merchant ships, tankers,
Speaker 1: break bolt container ships, but how about the thousands and
Speaker 1: thousands of thousands of significant fishing craft that are out there.
Speaker 1: They are commercial and they are under assault. Frequently a
Speaker 1: lot of the pirates se is directed against them, and
Speaker 1: by the way, a lot of them are conducting illegal
Speaker 1: fishery activities, and some of that is state sponsored, by
Speaker 1: the way. So that's a long way of saying there
Speaker 1: are many problems out there, and that's before we get
Speaker 1: into illegal dumping and pollution. Again, that's commercial activity that's
Speaker 1: going on out there, albeit illegal. So all of the
Speaker 1: world's navies and coast guards are are very focused on
Speaker 1: this and are working very closely both ashore with conferences
Speaker 1: and symposia and exchanging information and data sharing. UM we
Speaker 1: share immense amounts of data from US maritime centers, for example,
Speaker 1: with commercial shipping companies, and they reciprocate. UM. It's a
Speaker 1: it's a very close and positive relationship. UM As as
Speaker 1: we all know, the coast guard has a bit of
Speaker 1: a different role, more law enforcement, so you know they're
Speaker 1: going to have a perhaps less of a warm and
Speaker 1: cozy relationship. UM. I think navies and commercial shipping are
Speaker 1: quite close and frankly had been back to the time
Speaker 1: of the ancient Greeks. So I knew your expertise is
Speaker 1: on the shipping aspect for obvious reasons. But is there
Speaker 1: anything that we need to be done on the land
Speaker 1: side in order to get more grains to the ports
Speaker 1: so that they could then be escorted and exported to
Speaker 1: the rest of the world. Um, great question, Tracy. Um. First,
Speaker 1: we need to ensure that we're efficiently moving containers and
Speaker 1: cargoes in and out of these ports. And let's face it,
Speaker 1: we have a bit of a double whammy here in
Speaker 1: the sense that we're still just coming off COVID in
Speaker 1: many places, we also are seeing very high inflation. It's
Speaker 1: impacting labor forces. We're facing a major strike. Los Angeles
Speaker 1: long Beaches were recording this and that's replicated around the world.
Speaker 1: As longshoreman, for example, are looking at rising inflation, they
Speaker 1: want to organize, they want to get more understandably so
Speaker 1: they can keep up with inflation. So we have to
Speaker 1: have efficient, well run ports that offer good compensation for
Speaker 1: the kind of quality work we need in those ports.
Speaker 1: Uh Number two, we need to make sure the ports
Speaker 1: are safe and secure. We worked very hard in the
Speaker 1: during the period after nine eleven to create much more
Speaker 1: security around ports globally, and a lot of that is
Speaker 1: still in place, not unlike the implementation of the t
Speaker 1: s A regime in all the airports. Um we need
Speaker 1: to go back and relook at that security, I think,
Speaker 1: and make sure that it meets today's needs. And then
Speaker 1: third we need uh to ensure that logistically we can
Speaker 1: go from these ports quickly and efficiently into the nations
Speaker 1: that are receiving. So in the military context we would
Speaker 1: say this is from port to fort, those railheads, those
Speaker 1: trucking systems, whatever, the means of cargo delivery is a
Speaker 1: whole secondary back office, if you will, where we at
Speaker 1: least here in the United States have some well documented
Speaker 1: challenges as well. Like everything else in today's world, it's
Speaker 1: a big, complicated global supply chain, and when a portion
Speaker 1: of it is distended as it is now by the
Speaker 1: events in Ukraine on top of post COVID let's let's
Speaker 1: hope post COVID, on top of staggeringly high inflation, it's
Speaker 1: a very difficult moment for global shipping and it will
Speaker 1: have impact on on the grain in particular, and that
Speaker 1: I think is needs to be a key focus, very
Speaker 1: minor aside question is the military dealing also seeing a
Speaker 1: labor shortage right now, like every like other entities are,
Speaker 1: we are seeing some pressure on our recruiting. Yes, and
Speaker 1: so for the first time in a long while. For example,
Speaker 1: the Army has extended the tours of its recruiters. Those
Speaker 1: are the men and women who you know are out
Speaker 1: in the field trying to convince high school seniors to
Speaker 1: come join the military. And the reason they're doing that
Speaker 1: is because they're facing pressure meeting their targets for all
Speaker 1: the reasons we've talked about. And by the way, as
Speaker 1: in a side, it's important to know and this may
Speaker 1: surprise many people you know who tend to think, oh, well,
Speaker 1: you know, if I if I can't go to college
Speaker 1: or I don't want to go to college, I guess
Speaker 1: I'll just join the military. Um, it's hard to be
Speaker 1: accepted as a volunteer in the US military. Only about
Speaker 1: of high school seniors are eligible for military service. You've
Speaker 1: got to be a graduate. You've gotta have reasonably high grades,
Speaker 1: you've got to be in essentially perfect health. You've got
Speaker 1: to have no drug use, no arrests. Going back to
Speaker 1: the challenge right now and Ukraine demining the water around
Speaker 1: Odessa or demining any water sounds extreme, sounds difficult. What
Speaker 1: does it take to do that? And what is the
Speaker 1: time frame for just that part to make it uh
Speaker 1: safe to move it? All? Right? So these are not
Speaker 1: floating minds. In other words, these are not minds that
Speaker 1: are just drifting all around. That's a much harder problem.
Speaker 1: These are minds that are fixed to the bottom, and
Speaker 1: therefore you don't have to take them all out. You
Speaker 1: just got to take out enough so that you can
Speaker 1: drive a tanker up a channel. So you've got to
Speaker 1: d mine the channels. And that's a finite space that
Speaker 1: you have to do. Now, could could Russia do some
Speaker 1: dirty tricks and throw some floating minds in their conceivable,
Speaker 1: particularly if they felt they could do it without us
Speaker 1: knowing it. But we're watching for that. They know we're
Speaker 1: watching for that. So let's let's take as an entering
Speaker 1: argument that you have to clear the channels. You have
Speaker 1: mind sweepers, and there are several classes of these, but
Speaker 1: there are ships that are devoted to this task and
Speaker 1: they're quite capable there. Uh. They have a very good
Speaker 1: sonar that can look into the water and find the
Speaker 1: mines and then they have a remotely operated apparatus that
Speaker 1: can go and neutralize it. I don't want to go
Speaker 1: into more detail than that, but our capability in this
Speaker 1: regard is quite good. Um. We practice constantly. To clear
Speaker 1: a channel from Odessa into clear waters of the Black
Speaker 1: Sea would be a matter of some weeks. It certainly
Speaker 1: wouldn't be months and months. So one thing we've been
Speaker 1: talking about on all thoughts for the past couple of
Speaker 1: years now our supply chains and logistics, And it feels
Speaker 1: like the pandemic has really thrown into very sharp relief
Speaker 1: just how much those matter and how much they are
Speaker 1: often taken for granted in the modern economy. And my
Speaker 1: understanding is that in military conflict there has always been
Speaker 1: an emphasis on supply chains and logistics because those are
Speaker 1: the things that can win or lose you wars. Can
Speaker 1: you talk a little bit more, just in general about
Speaker 1: the importance of supply chains to military conflict, I can
Speaker 1: Tracy um. An old saying in the military is that
Speaker 1: amateurs focus on the strategy. The professionals are looking at
Speaker 1: the logistics. That the business equivalent of that expression is
Speaker 1: execution eats strategy for lunch, meaning logistics, right, and you
Speaker 1: know again, odd lots audience. UM, that's what we all
Speaker 1: do for a living, moving through these global supply chains
Speaker 1: and what we've discovered. And our logisticians are the very
Speaker 1: best in the world, full stop military logisticians. But they've
Speaker 1: got a pretty controlled environment. And that sounds funny to say,
Speaker 1: right because they're they're dealing with war, but they're also
Speaker 1: dealing from stockpiles. They have UM, they have endless training,
Speaker 1: they constantly conduct, they have exquisite intelligence, UM, they can
Speaker 1: mitigate the combat risk quite effectively. The military logisticians do
Speaker 1: not have to face the big challenge that the global
Speaker 1: supply chains face, which is that it's kind of it's
Speaker 1: all open source. It's it's in many ways it's market driven.
Speaker 1: It's not like these global shipping firms are getting together
Speaker 1: and training together and practicing together and our right a
Speaker 1: schedule that they're going to follow for the next ten years,
Speaker 1: which the military could do that because it has control
Speaker 1: over all these inputs in a way that big shipping
Speaker 1: companies just don't have control over the inputs. And as
Speaker 1: a result of that, the kind of supply chain issues
Speaker 1: hurt badly because they hit a system that had already
Speaker 1: moved so far to the just in time principle that
Speaker 1: it was very vulnerable to these kind of distortions. And again,
Speaker 1: first it's COVID, then it's the war, and then now
Speaker 1: it's this rampant inflation. All that is severely distending these
Speaker 1: global systems. It's going to require pre significant rewiring. I think,
Speaker 1: is there anything that private industry could learn from the
Speaker 1: military when it comes to managing supply chains. Well, I
Speaker 1: mentioned a couple of things. One is training. Another, there
Speaker 1: is information sharing with each other and with the government,
Speaker 1: and of course you know they're in competition and that's hard.
Speaker 1: But you know, look at the airlines on the issue
Speaker 1: of maintenance and safety. They constantly work together and share information. Thirdly,
Speaker 1: and we talked about it already, work with the various governments,
Speaker 1: build those relationships. Fourthly, international organizations being part of shipping
Speaker 1: professional associations with which many of these are part of already,
Speaker 1: but also with the International Maritime Organization, for example in London,
Speaker 1: be part of that kind of effort. Um, there's four
Speaker 1: or five ideas for you, Admirald James stever Is this
Speaker 1: was a real treat to hear your perspective in this
Speaker 1: sort of like deep knowledge that you have in this
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for coming on odd lots. It's
Speaker 1: my pleasure, and I'll just mention it one more time.
Speaker 1: New book out, a maritime book that I think this
Speaker 1: audience would really like to risk at all nine conflicts
Speaker 1: and the cruciabil of decision about making decisions under extreme
Speaker 1: pressure in real risk. I definitely want to read it
Speaker 1: now because just hearing you sort of like walk through
Speaker 1: the sort of you know, the operation risk and the
Speaker 1: decision making and the difficulties really fascinating. And I'm definitely
Speaker 1: going to check out the mar Thank you for coming out,
Speaker 1: you know, Tracy. Just even beyond the acute crisis that
Speaker 1: we're facing with the war in Ukraine and the commodity
Speaker 1: shortage in particular food, the role that the U. S
Speaker 1: Military or that military plays in normal times just sort
Speaker 1: of keeping the global trade operations going is definitely something
Speaker 1: that we haven't discussed much, oh totally. So I think
Speaker 1: when someone says, oh, We're going to have a military
Speaker 1: escort for a bunch of ships carrying grain out of Ukraine,
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people their knee jerk reaction
Speaker 1: is like, oh, this is a big you know, departure
Speaker 1: or what the military normally does. But actually a lot
Speaker 1: of policing on the seas is done by the military,
Speaker 1: like someone has to keep those trade routes safe, and
Speaker 1: typically it's the military. Yeah. No, And obviously, you know,
Speaker 1: as he mentioned, there's piracy or criminality or his line
Speaker 1: is that the oceans are the biggest primacy in the world.
Speaker 1: So this is always going on. And now, of course
Speaker 1: there's this acute issue of can we get grain out
Speaker 1: of Ukraine? Can the blockade be broken? Can it be
Speaker 1: broken in a way such that it doesn't dangerously escalate conflict?
Speaker 1: And I have to say I still have some reservations
Speaker 1: about whether you could do that without provoking a response
Speaker 1: from Russia. But you know, I also appreciate the admiral's
Speaker 1: statement that, well, you know, they're the aggressor, so maybe
Speaker 1: we shouldn't worry so much about the response. There are
Speaker 1: the aggressor, and it's an international waters and it's not
Speaker 1: necessarily an offensive operation to simply escort a ship carrying grain.
Speaker 1: So it's an interesting idea. And of course, as you know,
Speaker 1: he it's a it is a crisis, the global food crisis,
Speaker 1: and it's been done before or at least something analoguess,
Speaker 1: such as the operation that he was part of. All right,
Speaker 1: shall we leave it there, Let's leave it there. This
Speaker 1: has been another episode of the All Thoughts podcast. I'm
Speaker 1: Tracy Alloway. You can follow me on Twitter at Tracy
Speaker 1: Alloway and I'm Joe Wisn'tal. You can follow me on
Speaker 1: Twitter at the Stalwart. Follow our guest, Admiral James Steve
Speaker 1: ritz He's at Steve Rita's JA. He's also the author
Speaker 1: of the new book To Risk at All, Nine Conflicts
Speaker 1: in the Cruci Bold of Decision. Follow our producer Kerman
Speaker 1: Rodriguez at Carmen Armann. Followed the Bloomberg head of podcast,
Speaker 1: Francesca Leavy at Francisco Today. And check out all of
Speaker 1: our podcasts Bloomberg under the handle at podcasts. Thanks for
Speaker 1: listening to