WEBVTT - Full Interview w/ Dexter Filkins - America’s Military is NOT READY For The Next War 0:00:04.280 --> 0:00:08.200 So joining me now is somebody I have I always 0:00:08.200 --> 0:00:10.640 make a priority to read when he has one of 0:00:10.680 --> 0:00:16.000 his big deep dives in whatever news periodical he's working 0:00:16.040 --> 0:00:20.400 for at the time. Currently, Dexter Filkins is with The 0:00:20.440 --> 0:00:24.360 New Yorker these days and has been there for a while. 0:00:24.560 --> 0:00:30.920 He's probably our country's best sort of war correspondent in 0:00:30.960 --> 0:00:34.599 the written word these days. Yeah, I was just going 0:00:34.680 --> 0:00:36.840 to say, I don't think Dexter's going to stop me there, 0:00:38.240 --> 0:00:40.760 and he you know, you do it in such a 0:00:40.800 --> 0:00:46.720 way where it is it is both enlightening illuminating, but 0:00:46.840 --> 0:00:50.400 at the same time it lacks an agenda. And I 0:00:50.440 --> 0:00:52.560 mean that in a positive way. In our era of 0:00:52.640 --> 0:00:56.440 journalism where everybody's assuming there's an agenda behind every story, 0:00:56.800 --> 0:00:59.200 that is not how you work. You work more like 0:00:59.200 --> 0:01:03.680 an anthropologist, I think, in trying to put the puzzle together, 0:01:03.880 --> 0:01:07.039 unpack it, and things like that. And it's your most 0:01:07.040 --> 0:01:10.400 recent piece. Is what sort of drove me to to 0:01:10.000 --> 0:01:12.679 to get you on the pod? Here is America ready 0:01:12.680 --> 0:01:17.399 for the next war, which was really powered It seems 0:01:17.440 --> 0:01:22.440 like by lessons that military planners are learning from Israel 0:01:22.560 --> 0:01:25.720 and Ukraine at the moment. But Dexter welcome. 0:01:26.400 --> 0:01:28.440 Thank you so much, and thanks for the nice intro. 0:01:29.000 --> 0:01:33.000 No, please, it's it's well deserved. And I learned a 0:01:33.000 --> 0:01:35.720 little something extra that you're you got you cut your 0:01:35.760 --> 0:01:37.920 teeth down in Miami back in the day. 0:01:38.319 --> 0:01:40.000 I miss Miami, you know. 0:01:40.440 --> 0:01:42.759 I what I say about Miami and I I love 0:01:42.840 --> 0:01:45.680 visiting and my daughter's a resident now. It's a great 0:01:45.680 --> 0:01:49.440 place to be from It's a it's a weird place 0:01:49.440 --> 0:01:53.960 to live. It's a tough place to live sometimes, but 0:01:54.040 --> 0:01:57.440 it's a Yes, they keep adding people, and they you know, 0:01:57.480 --> 0:02:00.320 you can't widen us one the ocean gets the the way, 0:02:00.560 --> 0:02:04.440 you know, or yeah, yeah, they haven't figured that out, 0:02:05.160 --> 0:02:07.160 but let's start is you know, it was a pretty 0:02:07.160 --> 0:02:10.240 provocative headline, is US Is the US ready for the 0:02:10.280 --> 0:02:12.520 next war? It feels like this is one of those 0:02:12.639 --> 0:02:18.600 where we're a big military superpower that suddenly is vulnerable 0:02:18.680 --> 0:02:22.640 to uh, small tech innovation. Is that the Is that 0:02:22.720 --> 0:02:23.480 the good subhead? 0:02:24.400 --> 0:02:27.800 Yeah? I mean I think it's everything's changing really fast, 0:02:28.600 --> 0:02:31.400 and I think it's been changing kind of under the 0:02:31.440 --> 0:02:34.399 radar for some time. But what's happened in the last 0:02:34.480 --> 0:02:38.160 couple of years is is Ukraine And that's just that's 0:02:38.200 --> 0:02:43.920 like a real time laboratory for for for for war, 0:02:44.200 --> 0:02:47.680 you know, uh, for war as it happens. And so 0:02:48.400 --> 0:02:51.200 everybody's been studying that war. The Pentagon has been studying 0:02:51.200 --> 0:02:53.680 that war. It's kind of unfolded in ways that are 0:02:53.760 --> 0:02:56.200 very very different. And then you have and then you 0:02:56.240 --> 0:02:59.520 have Israel, which is I think somewhat also under the radar, 0:02:59.600 --> 0:03:05.840 but they've made extensive use of artificial intelligence in targeting 0:03:06.280 --> 0:03:10.880 Hamas and Hesbola and Iran and just the most interesting ways. 0:03:11.040 --> 0:03:13.040 And you know, we can discuss that. There's sort of 0:03:13.040 --> 0:03:17.600 pros and cons and ups and downs, but those two things, 0:03:17.680 --> 0:03:22.600 I think kind of drones and unmanned systems, say in 0:03:23.120 --> 0:03:26.200 Ukraine and artificial intelligence in Israel is kind of changing 0:03:26.240 --> 0:03:27.200 everything really fast. 0:03:28.280 --> 0:03:31.519 How where are we on drone warfare? And on one hand, 0:03:31.520 --> 0:03:34.400 it was I remember when Barack Obama was accused of 0:03:34.480 --> 0:03:39.880 over using drones and over relying on drones, and it 0:03:39.960 --> 0:03:41.600 looked like we were ahead of the game. Are we 0:03:41.800 --> 0:03:42.840 no longer ahead of the game. 0:03:43.840 --> 0:03:46.760 I think we do okay with with you know, we're 0:03:47.160 --> 0:03:50.240 I should say we're catching up in kind of drones themselves. 0:03:50.280 --> 0:03:54.080 But I think I think the really big issue that 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:57.560 the Pentagon is grappling with and I think, you know, 0:03:57.680 --> 0:04:01.520 the smart people are kind of panicking, and that is 0:04:01.560 --> 0:04:05.760 that the US military has built. What the US military 0:04:05.800 --> 0:04:10.000 that they've built, it essentially relies on really really expensive 0:04:10.040 --> 0:04:13.360 weapons that they don't build very many of. So like 0:04:13.440 --> 0:04:16.320 we have, you know, we have something like eleven aircraft carriers. 0:04:16.320 --> 0:04:19.240 They cost you know, fifteen billion dollars each, and they 0:04:19.279 --> 0:04:22.040 take it, they take a decade to make. We have 0:04:22.200 --> 0:04:25.000 F thirty fives that cost the fighter jets to cost 0:04:25.080 --> 0:04:27.719 one hundred million dollars each. And you know, just the 0:04:27.760 --> 0:04:31.919 other day in the in the Arabian Sea, two F 0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:35.360 thirty five slid off an aircraft carrier and fell into 0:04:35.360 --> 0:04:36.920 the water, you know, and they and they sank to 0:04:36.960 --> 0:04:38.760 the bottom and there, you know, there's two hundred million 0:04:38.800 --> 0:04:42.159 dollars just down the drain. And and so what's happened. 0:04:42.279 --> 0:04:45.240 That's us. And then what you what you see in 0:04:45.320 --> 0:04:49.520 Ukraine is and where like I visited this factory in 0:04:49.600 --> 0:04:54.240 Ukraine which I write about. They can make really really accurate, 0:04:55.040 --> 0:04:59.920 super lethal drones for five hundred bucks apiece, and they 0:05:00.160 --> 0:05:02.080 crag them out and crag them out and crack them out. 0:05:02.080 --> 0:05:04.360 And so if you're suddenly if you're an aircraft carrier 0:05:04.839 --> 0:05:07.520 that costs ten billion dollars, and what do you do 0:05:07.560 --> 0:05:10.920 if there's a thousand of those coming your way? And 0:05:11.040 --> 0:05:15.560 I think that's kind of that's what has gotten everybody's attention. 0:05:17.640 --> 0:05:21.520 So what's the you know, the infamous military industrial complex, right, 0:05:21.640 --> 0:05:29.640 which which essentially where defense contractors have successfully convinced members 0:05:29.640 --> 0:05:32.240 of Congress of how many jobs are created with all 0:05:32.240 --> 0:05:35.919 of these things, and it becomes all untouchable. But you 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:38.920 it also strikes me is that this is why legacy 0:05:39.240 --> 0:05:44.080 weapons systems stay and never get replaced, and so that 0:05:44.279 --> 0:05:47.239 it gets layered, right, It's it's a total, it's a layering. 0:05:48.279 --> 0:05:50.279 I assume that's where we are at the moment, right. 0:05:50.760 --> 0:05:54.760 Yeah, So depending on itself is like an aircraft carrier, 0:05:55.279 --> 0:05:58.200 and so it's you know, sailing steadily in one direction 0:05:59.040 --> 0:06:02.000 and it's not easy to turn and it's certainly not 0:06:02.040 --> 0:06:04.160 easy to turn around, which is what they need to do. 0:06:04.760 --> 0:06:06.880 And and that, I mean, you hit the nail on 0:06:06.920 --> 0:06:10.920 the head. You can't suddenly wake up one morning and say, 0:06:10.920 --> 0:06:13.080 you know what, we're not going to build aircraft carriers anymore. 0:06:13.640 --> 0:06:17.599 That's thousands and thousands of jobs spread, you know, very 0:06:17.600 --> 0:06:21.200 precisely to factories all around the country, and so all 0:06:21.279 --> 0:06:24.919 the all the members of Congress wake up and say, no, 0:06:25.000 --> 0:06:26.800 hang on, hang on, hang out. We got to have 0:06:26.880 --> 0:06:31.080 that and so and so that's kind of that that's 0:06:31.120 --> 0:06:33.880 a big part of the problem, which is you've got 0:06:33.880 --> 0:06:36.080 the you've got some very smart people in the Pentagon, 0:06:36.080 --> 0:06:37.520 and they're saying, look, we need to change, we need 0:06:37.560 --> 0:06:38.719 to change really fast. 0:06:38.920 --> 0:06:40.719 Or do we still have smart people at the Pentagon? 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:43.560 Dexter like that, there's a creature. 0:06:43.680 --> 0:06:45.720 So there are creatures. Many of them are creatures of 0:06:45.839 --> 0:06:48.800 kind of group think, but but there's a lot there's 0:06:48.800 --> 0:06:50.599 a lot of right people who realize what's going on, 0:06:50.680 --> 0:06:52.599 but they can't be heard and that and that's the 0:06:52.640 --> 0:06:55.680 problem because it gets drowned out by what we're talking about, 0:06:55.680 --> 0:06:59.080 which is, let's carry on with the status quo. Because 0:06:59.120 --> 0:07:02.640 the status quo, you know, employees five thousand people in 0:07:02.680 --> 0:07:06.520 my district and so that's hard to change. And it's 0:07:06.600 --> 0:07:10.160 and that's kind of like that's exactly what the Pentagon 0:07:10.680 --> 0:07:12.720 is kind of grappling with in Congress. 0:07:12.960 --> 0:07:15.480 I feel like you wrote a similar story fifteen years 0:07:15.520 --> 0:07:19.360 ago about the transition from conventional military to counter terrorism 0:07:20.400 --> 0:07:22.680 and in some ways that and that we were in 0:07:22.720 --> 0:07:25.760 a similar place. Then this belief that hey, we're not. 0:07:26.680 --> 0:07:31.840 We don't have the military. We don't have the military 0:07:31.880 --> 0:07:33.880 that we need to deal with the threats of today. 0:07:34.680 --> 0:07:37.880 And it is this has this not been a sort 0:07:37.920 --> 0:07:39.679 of a twenty five year problem. 0:07:40.080 --> 0:07:43.240 Yeah, that's a good point. I think we did. We 0:07:43.280 --> 0:07:45.520 woke up, you know, we woke up on September eleventh 0:07:45.560 --> 0:07:49.960 and said, oh my god, what do we do? Yeah, 0:07:49.960 --> 0:07:53.040 the military doesn't turn on a dime, it just doesn't, 0:07:53.080 --> 0:07:55.000 and so and so so we spend you know, the 0:07:55.040 --> 0:07:57.880 country spends nearly a trillion dollars a year. I mean 0:07:57.880 --> 0:08:00.480 it's like whatever, eight hundred and fifty billion dollar, which 0:08:00.520 --> 0:08:01.960 is unbelievable amount of money. 0:08:02.160 --> 0:08:04.480 Look, there is the reason why this zip code that 0:08:04.560 --> 0:08:07.920 I live in, Okay, in Arlington County. Yeah, yeah, it's 0:08:07.920 --> 0:08:10.280 like it's surrounded. I mean I sit here. In the 0:08:10.320 --> 0:08:12.600 thirty five years that I've lived here, this has become 0:08:13.240 --> 0:08:16.400 one of the you know, these counties in Northern Virginia 0:08:16.480 --> 0:08:19.120 become three of the wealthiest counties in America, and they 0:08:19.160 --> 0:08:21.320 were not that way thirty five years ago. And it's 0:08:21.320 --> 0:08:24.880 all defense contractors. It is all depends contractors. 0:08:24.680 --> 0:08:28.240 Yep, and that those are like vested interests. But but 0:08:28.280 --> 0:08:32.600 that's the irony, which is, we spend so much money 0:08:32.679 --> 0:08:34.720 and we're not really getting a lot of bang for 0:08:34.800 --> 0:08:38.440 our bucket anymore. We're really not. And so all these 0:08:38.440 --> 0:08:41.040 efforts to kind of say, well, we gotta we gotta 0:08:41.400 --> 0:08:45.319 do something different, it's really hard, even though even though 0:08:45.320 --> 0:08:48.200 there's like a mountain of cash to draw from, you know, 0:08:48.280 --> 0:08:50.160 it's it's basically it's all tied up. 0:08:51.040 --> 0:08:53.880 Is there Is there a little initiatives or is a 0:08:53.920 --> 0:08:54.560 starting to work? 0:08:55.360 --> 0:09:00.400 Yes, yes, And they're little, they're little, give me little, 0:09:00.440 --> 0:09:03.440 you know, little relatives of the Pentagon budget is like 0:09:03.520 --> 0:09:04.760 can actually be pretty big. 0:09:04.880 --> 0:09:08.040 So it's a ten billion dollar program, right, yeah, And. 0:09:07.920 --> 0:09:10.480 It's you know, you talk to people to Pentagon, and 0:09:10.520 --> 0:09:12.160 it's it's hard to you know, it's hard to get 0:09:12.320 --> 0:09:14.160 to the Pentagon. It's hard to get inside of it. 0:09:14.679 --> 0:09:17.560 It's hard to find the right people. I mean, it's 0:09:17.559 --> 0:09:20.840 just such a vast place. But like you talk to 0:09:20.880 --> 0:09:23.199 them and they they talk about these kind of tiny 0:09:23.200 --> 0:09:25.880 initiatives and they're you know, they're very kind of rightly 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:28.440 proud of them. But like you think, boy, that ain't 0:09:28.440 --> 0:09:32.320 that much, but they're doing it. There's a thing. There's 0:09:32.320 --> 0:09:36.200 a thing. For instance, there's a program called the Replicator Initiative, 0:09:36.520 --> 0:09:40.880 and it's basically the Pentagon making drones, you know, the 0:09:40.920 --> 0:09:44.480 Pentagon making cheap accurate Do. 0:09:44.559 --> 0:09:46.760 We have factories that make drones in this country. 0:09:47.640 --> 0:09:51.720 Yes, we do, not not enough. They're like the company 0:09:52.280 --> 0:09:56.280 that I wrote about, which is called androill Uh and 0:09:56.280 --> 0:09:59.640 they're they're a very interesting company run by the one 0:09:59.679 --> 0:10:02.960 by this very interesting kind of mad scientists. They're building. 0:10:03.040 --> 0:10:07.760 They're building a big factory outside of Columbus, Ohio, for instance. 0:10:07.800 --> 0:10:11.000 So and I because I think one of the things 0:10:11.040 --> 0:10:14.600 that one of the things that's also become clear is 0:10:14.640 --> 0:10:19.320 that our defense industrial base, you know, along with the 0:10:19.360 --> 0:10:23.160 rest of our industrial base, but particularly with defense, it's 0:10:23.280 --> 0:10:25.760 just been thinned out. There's not that much there. Like 0:10:25.800 --> 0:10:28.320 there's a I mentioned this way down in the story, 0:10:28.400 --> 0:10:31.760 and it's a long story, so everybody will be forgiven 0:10:31.840 --> 0:10:34.400 for not making it to the end. But there's a 0:10:34.440 --> 0:10:37.960 company called Govini, and Govini is a software company, and 0:10:38.000 --> 0:10:41.280 the Pentagon came to them and they said, look, find 0:10:41.320 --> 0:10:44.160 out trace all of our supply lines for all of 0:10:44.200 --> 0:10:46.240 our weapons systems and tell us come back and tell 0:10:46.320 --> 0:10:51.439 us where they came from. Fifty thousand supply lines go 0:10:51.480 --> 0:10:56.720 to China for and everything from you know, B one bombers, 0:10:56.800 --> 0:11:02.040 B two bombers, F thirty fives, microchip everything. Fifty thousand 0:11:02.120 --> 0:11:05.800 supply chains go to China for our weapons. And so 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:08.360 we just don't make this stuff here, you know, we 0:11:08.400 --> 0:11:12.960 still't make it. And so again, like like these conversations 0:11:13.000 --> 0:11:15.400 are happening, but you know, like change is very slow, 0:11:15.640 --> 0:11:18.920 but everybody's kind of there is a kind of collective 0:11:19.160 --> 0:11:22.440 awakening like, oh my god, this. 0:11:22.320 --> 0:11:24.880 Is the leverage China has over this in these trade disputes. 0:11:25.040 --> 0:11:26.400 Oh my god. It's like all you have to do 0:11:26.400 --> 0:11:28.560 is turn it off, you know, which they would do, 0:11:28.679 --> 0:11:31.840 of course, I mean, of course they would turn it off. So, yeah, 0:11:31.880 --> 0:11:33.079 we're in a lot of trouble. 0:11:36.120 --> 0:11:39.200 Obviously, there's been rhetoric that we're trying to reverse this. 0:11:40.160 --> 0:11:43.320 Have you seen much evidence yet, Yeah. 0:11:43.080 --> 0:11:46.920 There's some, there's some. It's just again it's like, I mean, 0:11:46.960 --> 0:11:50.720 you know this as a denizen of Washington, but change 0:11:50.760 --> 0:11:55.280 comes very slowly, and particularly to a bureaucracy the size 0:11:55.320 --> 0:11:58.040 of the Pentagon. You know, you know, the famous story 0:11:58.040 --> 0:12:01.160 of the Pentagon is you know, like the did you 0:12:01.200 --> 0:12:03.640 hear the one about the kid that went in as 0:12:03.640 --> 0:12:05.520 a private you know, when he got lost in the 0:12:05.520 --> 0:12:08.200 Pentagon he emerged like ten years later as like a 0:12:08.240 --> 0:12:12.720 bird colonel, you know. But it's like and it's true, 0:12:13.120 --> 0:12:14.960 but it's like that is kind of it's a good 0:12:15.000 --> 0:12:20.480 metaphor because the place is so gigantic and unwieldly it's 0:12:20.520 --> 0:12:23.280 hard to tell what goes on inside. You can't get 0:12:23.320 --> 0:12:26.839 your arms around it, and it doesn't move, you know that, 0:12:26.960 --> 0:12:30.520 And that's kind of that's basically what everybody's waken up 0:12:30.559 --> 0:12:32.680 to right now. And I think that you know that 0:12:33.280 --> 0:12:36.800 the danger is the danger is like we don't move 0:12:36.840 --> 0:12:40.040 fast enough, you know, and and something bad happens, you know, 0:12:40.120 --> 0:12:44.000 something bad, like you know Taiwan, say. 0:12:44.000 --> 0:12:47.200 Well, let's tuck Taiwan. Because you referenced a war game, 0:12:47.280 --> 0:12:50.800 I actually held a war game. I convened one on 0:12:51.000 --> 0:12:53.839 China and Taiwan about three years ago as a as 0:12:54.120 --> 0:12:58.280 a little streaming special report that we did Who won? 0:13:00.200 --> 0:13:03.880 Who wins every Time? Right? China? You know it was 0:13:04.760 --> 0:13:07.520 they even used a nuclear weapon sort of they didn't 0:13:07.600 --> 0:13:10.560 launch it anywhere, but they exploded one just to show 0:13:10.559 --> 0:13:13.520 that they could off the coast of the Pacific well 0:13:13.760 --> 0:13:19.640 in this war game. But what was clear was it's 0:13:19.679 --> 0:13:23.839 a huge logistics challenge, right to turn Taiwan, to do 0:13:23.920 --> 0:13:27.680 for Taiwan what we did for Ukraine. You know, we 0:13:27.760 --> 0:13:33.160 had seventy years of NATO to essentially streamline supply lines 0:13:33.200 --> 0:13:36.160 and coordination and all of that. There is no Asian NATO, 0:13:36.679 --> 0:13:42.680 right and you just see that. You know, if this 0:13:43.000 --> 0:13:45.480 is a hot war in twenty twenty seven, which is 0:13:45.559 --> 0:13:49.840 what some generals have predicted, is America ready to help 0:13:49.920 --> 0:13:50.880 Taiwan survive it? 0:13:52.800 --> 0:13:56.320 We're not ready. We're not ready. I don't know what 0:13:57.000 --> 0:14:00.079 you know. And you you know, for this, as so 0:14:00.160 --> 0:14:02.880 many other issues, we have to peer into the mind 0:14:02.920 --> 0:14:06.200 of Donald Trump and wonder, uh, you know, what would 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:07.960 he decide to defend Taiwan or not? 0:14:09.280 --> 0:14:11.440 Yeah, I think would be shocked. I look, and I 0:14:11.480 --> 0:14:15.080 say this, forget Donald Trump, dexter. I always say this. 0:14:15.360 --> 0:14:18.160 If I put that on a poll question and I 0:14:18.160 --> 0:14:21.520 asked the American people whether our sons and daughters should 0:14:21.560 --> 0:14:25.200 be sent to defend this island, you know, I don't 0:14:25.240 --> 0:14:27.520 think you'd get the majority. I mean it isn't This 0:14:27.600 --> 0:14:30.360 isn't something that I think America would be signed up for. 0:14:30.720 --> 0:14:33.240 They'd sign up for a direct war with China, but 0:14:33.480 --> 0:14:34.840 not not a proxy one. 0:14:35.000 --> 0:14:38.000 Well, I agree, I agree with you on the on 0:14:38.040 --> 0:14:41.280 the politics of it. I think I think when you 0:14:41.640 --> 0:14:47.200 when you start to contemplate, say, a successful Chinese capture 0:14:47.200 --> 0:14:50.560 of Taiwan, it would be catastrophic for the United States, 0:14:50.720 --> 0:14:55.120 and and and that takes I mean, I think that's true. 0:14:55.200 --> 0:14:59.640 And I think if you just start with it's crazy Taiwan, 0:14:59.760 --> 0:15:02.320 I mean, who knew I didn't know this. Taiwan makes 0:15:03.440 --> 0:15:08.680 ninety percent of the world's advanced microchips, and so what 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:10.840 that means effectively is that, I mean they're all made 0:15:10.880 --> 0:15:13.200 in one place. They're all made in one factory called 0:15:13.320 --> 0:15:15.200 TSMC in Taiwan. 0:15:15.720 --> 0:15:19.280 Talk about another like head scratcher, Why did you do that? 0:15:19.320 --> 0:15:23.520 Happen for this long? And you know who who gave 0:15:23.560 --> 0:15:28.840 Taiwan the resources to do this? The United States of America? Right, yeah, yeah, And. 0:15:28.760 --> 0:15:31.239 It's a you know, it's a it's a super enterprising 0:15:31.320 --> 0:15:36.800 country and people work incredibly hard, and but like the. 0:15:36.840 --> 0:15:39.520 Necessity is the mother of invention, right A innovention? 0:15:39.960 --> 0:15:43.880 Yes, and the and the but the advanced industrial economies, 0:15:44.040 --> 0:15:46.480 I think it's fair to say would be they would 0:15:46.480 --> 0:15:48.600 come to a halt. I mean, if not, and if 0:15:48.600 --> 0:15:52.200 not a halt, they would be severely constricted. If Taiwan, 0:15:52.840 --> 0:15:54.960 if the micro chips of Taiwan makes suddenly were no 0:15:55.040 --> 0:15:58.720 longer available, And that's just you can't, like, if you're 0:15:58.760 --> 0:16:00.840 the president of United States, you have go God, like, what, 0:16:01.080 --> 0:16:03.600 you know, what are we going to do? And in fact, 0:16:03.640 --> 0:16:06.640 I remember I was in Taiwan a few years ago 0:16:07.080 --> 0:16:10.239 and and the joke was, you know, if the Chinese invade, 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:13.200 what's the safest place going to be in Taiwan? And 0:16:13.240 --> 0:16:15.560 they said, well, it's the basement of TSMC. 0:16:16.080 --> 0:16:19.440 Yeah, okay, nobody's going to on the Chinese can't afford 0:16:20.000 --> 0:16:22.520 to lose access to that either, right, Yeah, and like, 0:16:22.720 --> 0:16:23.080 but but. 0:16:23.160 --> 0:16:27.840 Just to answer your question more fully, I think, you know, 0:16:27.880 --> 0:16:30.840 I think that if if the Chinese were to capture Taiwan, 0:16:31.600 --> 0:16:33.760 I mean, their their goal pretty clearly, they've made it 0:16:33.840 --> 0:16:37.320 very clear, is to basically push the United States out 0:16:37.360 --> 0:16:38.520 of the Western Pacific. 0:16:39.000 --> 0:16:39.160 Right. 0:16:39.480 --> 0:16:43.080 Uh, that's Japan, that's the Philippines. Those are our friends 0:16:43.200 --> 0:16:46.440 and allies and fellow democracies and so and. 0:16:46.440 --> 0:16:48.440 Hopefully we've seen in a lot of trouble are in 0:16:48.480 --> 0:16:53.200 there too, right, Yeah, I mean that was the question 0:16:53.280 --> 0:16:55.840 I remember in this war game with the Assi sign on, 0:16:56.320 --> 0:16:58.840 with the South Koreans work with the Japanese to do this, 0:16:59.000 --> 0:17:03.240 like there isn't this isn't like the alliance that the 0:17:03.360 --> 0:17:06.920 US would need isn't necessarily rock solid yet? Right? 0:17:07.520 --> 0:17:10.040 No? No, not at all, not at all. And that 0:17:10.200 --> 0:17:12.960 in fact that I wrote about in the piece there's 0:17:13.000 --> 0:17:15.760 a little bit I went to a wargame. God, it 0:17:15.840 --> 0:17:20.120 was like really scary, as was probably the one you did. Yeah, 0:17:21.440 --> 0:17:24.280 a lot of people died, They got out of control 0:17:24.480 --> 0:17:26.880 very very quickly. But one of those one of those 0:17:26.960 --> 0:17:30.240 questions was like what are the Japanese going to do? 0:17:30.280 --> 0:17:31.680 Are they going to jump in on our side? 0:17:32.320 --> 0:17:32.480 You know? 0:17:32.520 --> 0:17:35.000 What's the Philippines going to do? What are the Chinese 0:17:35.080 --> 0:17:37.280 going to do? Are the Chinese gonna Are they going 0:17:37.320 --> 0:17:41.160 to strike the American mainland? Which they can do? They 0:17:41.200 --> 0:17:43.439 didn't in this in this war game. They did not. 0:17:44.160 --> 0:17:46.199 Did they get I'm curious in your wargame, did the 0:17:46.200 --> 0:17:47.360 North Koreans get involved? 0:17:47.920 --> 0:17:49.760 No? No, But that was. 0:17:49.720 --> 0:17:52.399 Another fear in our war game that the Chinese. 0:17:52.680 --> 0:17:55.960 Interesting that the guy who's running the war game this 0:17:56.040 --> 0:17:59.600 is at the think tank Center for Strategic International Studies, 0:17:59.840 --> 0:18:04.720 he said, okay, no no nuclear weapons today. No, so. 0:18:06.400 --> 0:18:07.800 Okay then, but they do. 0:18:07.720 --> 0:18:11.679 Like I know, they just ran one with nukes available 0:18:11.800 --> 0:18:14.440 if you wanted to use them. But as it happened 0:18:15.080 --> 0:18:18.000 the wargame that that I went to, and it it 0:18:18.040 --> 0:18:20.879 didn't start with an invasion of Taiwan. It started started 0:18:20.960 --> 0:18:24.040 very slowly. It was a blockade. It was a Chinese blockade. 0:18:24.400 --> 0:18:31.440 Some American planes got shot down. Well I mean the 0:18:31.440 --> 0:18:35.199 they blockaded and then blockaded Taiwan. But then once the 0:18:35.240 --> 0:18:38.520 shooting started, it just took off, you know, it just 0:18:38.560 --> 0:18:42.160 took off. And so you know, we were striking China 0:18:42.520 --> 0:18:46.800 and they they didn't strike the mainland, but but they 0:18:46.840 --> 0:18:50.240 they destroyed like a quarter of the American air force. Uh, 0:18:50.560 --> 0:18:53.800 thousands of people died on each side, you know. According 0:18:53.840 --> 0:18:56.800 to this, I thought, pretty pretty realistic wargame. We stopped 0:18:56.840 --> 0:19:01.719 the war game after like four go rounds. Like it 0:19:01.800 --> 0:19:06.200 was ugly, ugly, you know, hideous, not something you want 0:19:06.359 --> 0:19:13.800 to ever happen in real life. 0:19:17.640 --> 0:19:22.960 Another fear factor that I've heard about that that that 0:19:23.119 --> 0:19:27.360 we haven't brought up yet is low orbit space and satellites, 0:19:28.280 --> 0:19:31.520 and that are we that that would be among the 0:19:31.560 --> 0:19:36.000 first things China might do and whether you know which 0:19:36.040 --> 0:19:38.240 is the impetus of the space force. You know, people 0:19:38.320 --> 0:19:40.359 laughed at it at the time, but this is a 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:45.240 serious issue, security in low orbit space and and and 0:19:45.400 --> 0:19:50.160 our satellites. I know this was a big concern about 0:19:50.160 --> 0:19:53.520 five or six years ago. Have things gotten better? Do 0:19:53.600 --> 0:19:58.320 we feel more confident that we could have security and 0:19:58.400 --> 0:19:59.800 superiority in low orbit? 0:20:01.560 --> 0:20:04.320 Nobody, nobody could answer that question for me, and I 0:20:04.359 --> 0:20:08.919 think everybody's really nervous about that. But would I mean, 0:20:08.960 --> 0:20:10.800 I think it's a it's a huge issue because when 0:20:10.800 --> 0:20:14.399 you think about it, let's say the worst starts and 0:20:14.440 --> 0:20:17.480 suddenly either you know, either we shoot down their satellites 0:20:17.560 --> 0:20:20.439 or they shoot down ours. You know, the lights go 0:20:20.520 --> 0:20:22.879 out right like you're done, you know. 0:20:23.000 --> 0:20:26.880 But it's like, we're so reliant on these lowerbit satellites 0:20:26.920 --> 0:20:29.960 now we haven't fully realized that. Yeah, we used to 0:20:30.000 --> 0:20:31.879 keep the lights on without satellites, but that isn't how 0:20:31.920 --> 0:20:32.640 it works anymore. 0:20:32.840 --> 0:20:35.720 No, Like we would be dead in the water, as 0:20:35.720 --> 0:20:37.840 would they. And so in a way, it's kind of 0:20:37.920 --> 0:20:42.000 mutual assured destruction. In fact, the one answer I did 0:20:42.040 --> 0:20:45.199 get from a couple of people was nobody wants to 0:20:45.240 --> 0:20:49.240 go there because if you if you ended up shooting 0:20:49.280 --> 0:20:52.520 a lot of satellites, low orbit satellites, it would make 0:20:52.680 --> 0:20:56.200 essentially it would make a band around the Earth kind 0:20:56.240 --> 0:21:01.560 of uninhabitable to other satellites for years and years and years. 0:21:01.880 --> 0:21:03.160 And no, and nobody wants to go. 0:21:03.200 --> 0:21:05.080 The entire planet goes into the dark ages. 0:21:05.440 --> 0:21:07.400 Yeah, I mean it's like, yeah, yeah, I mean, it's 0:21:07.400 --> 0:21:09.840 like a science fiction movie. But but I think the 0:21:09.840 --> 0:21:15.920 short answer is everybody's trying to figure that out, you know, militarily, 0:21:16.280 --> 0:21:18.520 like how do we destroy their satellites? But they're doing 0:21:18.560 --> 0:21:20.680 the same to us, And so I think everybody's trying 0:21:20.720 --> 0:21:23.040 to be like kind of you know, reasonable about it. 0:21:23.520 --> 0:21:25.240 What do we think the Chinese have learned from the 0:21:25.359 --> 0:21:29.080 Ukraine War? Right, we're learning something from the Ukrainians. One 0:21:29.080 --> 0:21:32.240 would assume, you know, they've never tested their military. 0:21:33.119 --> 0:21:35.240 That's right. I mean, I think they have that tiny 0:21:35.280 --> 0:21:38.840 little war with nasty little war Vietnam that lasted a 0:21:39.000 --> 0:21:43.720 couple of months, you know, like in the seventies. But 0:21:43.760 --> 0:21:46.680 they're watching the war. Yeah, well, I think I think 0:21:46.720 --> 0:21:49.920 that's pretty clear that the Chinese are watching the war 0:21:49.920 --> 0:21:54.520 in Ukraine, but they're they're watching us, you know, they 0:21:54.520 --> 0:21:57.280 want to see what we do. And I think I 0:21:57.280 --> 0:21:59.840 think what I mean by that is, you know, are 0:21:59.840 --> 0:22:02.280 the Americans is going to tough it out here or 0:22:02.280 --> 0:22:03.800 are they going to are they going to get bored 0:22:03.840 --> 0:22:05.440 and give up and go home? 0:22:05.800 --> 0:22:08.560 And the signal that hey, go grab Taiwan, you might 0:22:08.600 --> 0:22:10.240 be able to get it without firing. 0:22:09.960 --> 0:22:12.480 A shot exactly. And so so there's one of the 0:22:12.520 --> 0:22:15.880 debates that's going on inside the White House. I mean, 0:22:15.920 --> 0:22:17.800 it's like happening as we speak. 0:22:18.000 --> 0:22:19.879 And I say that, and it's funny. I'm glad you 0:22:19.920 --> 0:22:22.560 put up. Look, there's a lot of debates that don't 0:22:22.560 --> 0:22:25.320 happen that should happen in this White House. On this 0:22:25.480 --> 0:22:28.400