Speaker 1: Ah Beat Force. If it doesn't work, you're just not
Speaker 1: using enough. You're listening to Software a Gradio, Special Operations
Speaker 1: Military News and straight Talk with the guys and the
Speaker 1: community Software Radio on Time on Target. Awesome show. This
Speaker 1: episode I'm really psyched for because we not only have
Speaker 1: Marine Corps Major Fred Galvin back on, but my friend
Speaker 1: Matt Virkan is back on with us. Before we jump
Speaker 1: into anything, this show is brought to you by Crate Club,
Speaker 1: a club four men by men of gear handpicked by
Speaker 1: Special Operations military veterans. Visit Crate Club dot Us for
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Speaker 1: use the coupon codes soft rep s O f R
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Speaker 1: Club dot Us coupon code soft rep for off any gearbox.
Speaker 1: Sign up. Now with that first interview is my friend
Speaker 1: Matt beer Kent, who I really met doing this show.
Speaker 1: US Army veteran served alongside Bobourg Doll and basically the
Speaker 1: reason we're having you on as you listen to the
Speaker 1: recent interview with Mike Michael Aams. I know that originally
Speaker 1: you just said you wrote bullshit, and then I basically said,
Speaker 1: you know, give it a lesson, which you did, and
Speaker 1: there were specific points that you wanted to pick apart. Um.
Speaker 1: So did Cody Follo served with you, who was a
Speaker 1: roommate of burg Doll and he gave me some specific
Speaker 1: things that he said did not happen the way that
Speaker 1: Michael Um reported on them. So we'll get right into everything.
Speaker 1: And I just want to say, someone who did the
Speaker 1: interview with Michael, you know, I definitely think the guy
Speaker 1: did his research. He seems like he did a good
Speaker 1: job going back into the history of everything. However, personally
Speaker 1: that this is just coming from me as for stuff
Speaker 1: that actually happened while he was stationed and while he
Speaker 1: walked off base. I will definitely defer to you and
Speaker 1: Cody because you guys were actually there. I know that
Speaker 1: both of you guys don't have some agenda. You've just
Speaker 1: reported on what actually happened as you were there. So
Speaker 1: I'm looking forward to getting into this. Um. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: guess where you know, where do you want to get
Speaker 1: started because I know yesterday you listened to the interview
Speaker 1: at its entirety and kind of took some notes of
Speaker 1: what you uh, you know, felt was inaccurate. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: did listen to the interview. If that was a good interview.
Speaker 1: I have no agenda against Michael Aames his book. I
Speaker 1: have no agenda against burg Doll. The whole point of
Speaker 1: this was never to politicize anything. We just wanted the
Speaker 1: truth to come out, state the facts and see where
Speaker 1: it falls from there. Um, you know, want to point
Speaker 1: out inconsistencies. Um. So this isn't like us trying to
Speaker 1: do a hit piece on burg Dollar, you know, trying
Speaker 1: to trash him. We're trying to lay out all of
Speaker 1: the facts and see where they actually point to. Um,
Speaker 1: you know what, I just saw a lot of different inconsistency.
Speaker 1: I actually did read about half of his book yesterday.
Speaker 1: UM so I just kind of use through and you know,
Speaker 1: I skipped the history lessons and all that stuff, but
Speaker 1: I went into you know what Bergdal said and um
Speaker 1: how he described things, and one of the major things
Speaker 1: for the podcast and stood out is you know he
Speaker 1: said before he went to Afghanisa and he was sleeping
Speaker 1: on a concrete floor or whatever. Well, no, he was
Speaker 1: sleeping on a mattress in the barracks the whole time.
Speaker 1: I mean, maybe he did that before he joined the army,
Speaker 1: that's great, but I mean he wasn't doing that when
Speaker 1: he was back in Alaska. And you know, just small
Speaker 1: inaccuracies like that. Um, you know, I think he's you know,
Speaker 1: from interviews books, I think he shows, you know, definitely
Speaker 1: his history of embellishing the truth and or lying or
Speaker 1: trying to make himself look more romantic or as an
Speaker 1: action hero than what he actually is. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: I know through his statement and at the trial he
Speaker 1: said that he didn't he didn't realize that anybody would
Speaker 1: go looking from him, But then it is an issue
Speaker 1: statement in two thousand fourteen, in August he told them
Speaker 1: he knew exactly what dust some wand was explained to
Speaker 1: them what dust wand was why it was so important.
Speaker 1: So I don't know why at trial he said he
Speaker 1: had no idea someone would actually go look for him,
Speaker 1: And just there's a lot of different inaccuracies and things
Speaker 1: that he says that don't match up and don't line up,
Speaker 1: and a lot of times I understand that, you know,
Speaker 1: he's been diagnosed with a mental problem and all this stuff,
Speaker 1: but it's like Michael and some of these other people
Speaker 1: use that to be like, oh, nope, he just thought
Speaker 1: that he was doing this. They like use it as
Speaker 1: a crutch sometimes instead of like, well did he actually
Speaker 1: think that, you know, did he make that up? And
Speaker 1: make him believe that that's an actual thing that happened
Speaker 1: or did that actually happen? And even the psychiatrists, um,
Speaker 1: you know, put when they evaluated when he came back
Speaker 1: that we have to be careful because we need to
Speaker 1: make sure that he's recounting facts and not recounting memories
Speaker 1: or dreams or or fiction. So that's where I get
Speaker 1: where I have a hard time believing all the stuff
Speaker 1: that he's saying because he's been diagnosed with that he's
Speaker 1: showing history. You know, when he was back in Idaho,
Speaker 1: he would tell all his friends different stories about how
Speaker 1: he would get cuts or whatever and romanticize different things
Speaker 1: and letters, um and his journal that he wrote back home.
Speaker 1: He lied to his friends about stuff that we're doing.
Speaker 1: And so it's hard for me to believe what he
Speaker 1: says at face value. That bird Doll is an unreliable narrator.
Speaker 1: At the end of the day, Yes, and I mean
Speaker 1: just yesterday, I you know, browsed through a lot of
Speaker 1: different statements, questioning um stuff in the book. You know,
Speaker 1: they're right about stuff from his past. It seems like
Speaker 1: he does have a very long history of making up stories,
Speaker 1: embellishing stories. You know, has this idea that he's gonna
Speaker 1: be Jason Bourne some day or something like that. So
Speaker 1: it's hard for me to try to understand what actually happened,
Speaker 1: what he was actually thinking what, you know, it's just
Speaker 1: I don't feel like it's the full truth. And then
Speaker 1: when you go back and you look, you know, um,
Speaker 1: he said, you know, before he leaves, he writes on Facebook,
Speaker 1: actions may become odd, no red flags, I'm good, but
Speaker 1: plans have begun to form. No time on timeline yet
Speaker 1: I love you bo. And then she's like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: what are you doing. He goes, you know, I plan
Speaker 1: better than that, um, you know, talking about his plan
Speaker 1: or whatever. He writes, writes in you know, cryptic message
Speaker 1: in emails so it doesn't get you know, popped up
Speaker 1: by the government and you know, C I A, N.
Speaker 1: S A or whatever, and uh, you know. Then right
Speaker 1: before he leaves, he writes a message to his best friend,
Speaker 1: how far will a human go to find their complete freedom?
Speaker 1: For onece freedom? Do they have the right to destroy
Speaker 1: the world to gain it? And like there's all these
Speaker 1: different cryptic messages and yeah, some person can interpret that
Speaker 1: as well. He needs to morally do this fucking insane
Speaker 1: plan to run back to the base even though we
Speaker 1: were going there, because somehow that's gonna make somebody listen
Speaker 1: to him by doing an idiotic thing. But then in
Speaker 1: the same breath he says that it would be completely
Speaker 1: idiotic to dessert and walk to Pakistan or India, But
Speaker 1: he doesn't realize that it's still the same idiot idea
Speaker 1: to do what he did, but he thinks it's different.
Speaker 1: So like, I don't just to try to understand the
Speaker 1: whole mindset and everything, it just it's hard. And that's
Speaker 1: why I've just been trying to look at the facts
Speaker 1: a statements and histories and everything to try to understand
Speaker 1: if that's what he was actually trying to do, or
Speaker 1: maybe he was trying to go out there and you know,
Speaker 1: be Jason Bourne and find him and attack him, or
Speaker 1: you know whatever. Maybe he was planning to walk off
Speaker 1: because he was sick of dealing with that unit, you know.
Speaker 1: And then his story about when he did walk off
Speaker 1: and get captured, he said he's walking for hours, He's
Speaker 1: probably eleven kilometers away to the north at like eight
Speaker 1: o'clock in the morning or something. But then he gets
Speaker 1: picked up in ya ya. Hell that's five kilometers to
Speaker 1: the east southeast, So it's a completely different spot. Like,
Speaker 1: there's so many things that just don't line up. I
Speaker 1: just think that there's a lot of things that are
Speaker 1: missing that we're probably never gonna know. And I'm not
Speaker 1: saying that he walked off and his plan was, you know,
Speaker 1: to join the tal Ban or whatever. No, I'm just
Speaker 1: looking at the facts and I'm like, what was the
Speaker 1: actual plan? Was it to run to Sharona? And he's
Speaker 1: been planning this for a long time, But then when
Speaker 1: he goes to actually do it, like it's he didn't
Speaker 1: do it how he actually planned and it all falls apart,
Speaker 1: and then all of a sudden turns into a different plan.
Speaker 1: And I don't know, to me, it seems like he
Speaker 1: may have left off to go do something. I don't
Speaker 1: know why he would go back south to an area
Speaker 1: we had never really been before to look for I
Speaker 1: D S when he could have looked for I d
Speaker 1: S other places. But then again, here was you know,
Speaker 1: um disabilt mental disability, and you know, makes himself believe,
Speaker 1: you know, horrible ideas, I guess. So it's just hard
Speaker 1: to wade through everything and you know, really understand what
Speaker 1: was going on. Matt. Do you think that you know,
Speaker 1: these contradictory and I mean frankly nutty, you know, insane
Speaker 1: statements that Bergdall made. I mean, the only consistency in
Speaker 1: any of it that that I can see from from
Speaker 1: my point of view, is that the consistency is that
Speaker 1: they would all be consistent with schizoid personality disorder, which
Speaker 1: is you know, what he was diagnosed with exactly. And
Speaker 1: that's why like some things are like, oh, nope, that's
Speaker 1: his disorder, about other things like nope, that's effect because
Speaker 1: he told us that. You're like, well, how can you
Speaker 1: you know, just say that about one thing and not
Speaker 1: about the other, Like how can it not all be questioned?
Speaker 1: That's what I don't understand, especially when there's just even
Speaker 1: different things that change, you know, like the dust wine thing.
Speaker 1: Oh I didn't think people would look for me. But
Speaker 1: I explained to you when I got back exactly what
Speaker 1: it was and how big of an issue it was,
Speaker 1: and you know all these other things. It's like things
Speaker 1: just changed on the flight with him about what actually
Speaker 1: is you know, true, well, some of some of the
Speaker 1: statements and preparation that he made. You know, obviously you
Speaker 1: know better than I do that the whole thing was premeditated.
Speaker 1: And it was my my impression from some of the
Speaker 1: questions he was like asking his squad leader and some
Speaker 1: of the things I was doing mail on his stuff home.
Speaker 1: I mean, it gives you every indication that he knew
Speaker 1: what he was doing, and he knew there was some
Speaker 1: consequence that this wasn't like a small thing, that that
Speaker 1: there was going to be fallout from this. Oh, definitely.
Speaker 1: And I don't I just don't understand how. I don't know,
Speaker 1: you don't. I don't feel like they really tried to
Speaker 1: investigate it too hard. I mean, when they went to
Speaker 1: pre tail trial, they immediately tried to throw out people
Speaker 1: were killed or wounded, and then they come back for
Speaker 1: trial and then they have people test if I when
Speaker 1: they were wounded. They didn't even really try to look
Speaker 1: into it. The army or whatever, like, oh, well, we
Speaker 1: found no evidence. We're just gonna pass this by, you know,
Speaker 1: hatched the maybe see the guy shot in the leg
Speaker 1: and his dog got killing He's like, oh wait a second, Um,
Speaker 1: I got wounded. And it's like it's just there's a
Speaker 1: lot of weird things about this, Like they're just trying
Speaker 1: to push it along and get out of the way
Speaker 1: and move on. And I get that, but I just
Speaker 1: feel like it wasn't handled the best. I know you
Speaker 1: don't want to. I mean, from what I take away,
Speaker 1: it sounds like you don't want to speculate too much
Speaker 1: on things you know you don't know for sure, which
Speaker 1: I respect, um, But what do you think is being
Speaker 1: missed in this story? Um? And Michael Lame's book and
Speaker 1: and you know the information that he collected. It sounds
Speaker 1: like you're obviously not satisfied with the narrative. That you
Speaker 1: feel that there are other there's additional information, there's something
Speaker 1: that's being overlooked here. I mean, could you would you
Speaker 1: be willing to put your thumb on that a little
Speaker 1: bit and share what you think is being swept under
Speaker 1: the rug? I think personally, I mean, they're not looking
Speaker 1: into you know, what he actually um his reasoning for going.
Speaker 1: They're taking it, Okay, we're gonna ask you the same questions.
Speaker 1: You come up with the same stories again. Again, they're plausible,
Speaker 1: they match up, they match up with you know, your
Speaker 1: mental disorder and everything. But it doesn't feel like they're
Speaker 1: like really diving in and trying to find Okay, where
Speaker 1: was he at this time? Was he actually at this spot?
Speaker 1: And it's also hard to do that because there's nobody
Speaker 1: to really talk to you. So it's just I don't
Speaker 1: know exactly what's missing. I I don't believe that his
Speaker 1: story of why he left is the true story. I
Speaker 1: think there's something else to it, and he changed his
Speaker 1: story either right when he left or changed his plan
Speaker 1: or whatever. I don't believe that was his original intent.
Speaker 1: Just to the emails and the planning and everything like that.
Speaker 1: It just to me, it doesn't excess and it sounds
Speaker 1: like one of the big things that you don't buy
Speaker 1: into that Aims is saying is that people didn't die
Speaker 1: or get wounded in searching for burg Doll. You believe
Speaker 1: they did. I definitely know that, you know, Hatch got
Speaker 1: wounded servicemember dog died. Did has anyone even looked into
Speaker 1: if you know, Afghanis had died looking for him, nobody
Speaker 1: cares about that. I mean, was the Afghan police, was
Speaker 1: the Afghan military? Did they even look into that? Because
Speaker 1: they hardly even looked into Americans that were wounded, you know,
Speaker 1: looking for him, and um, you know, maybe maybe there
Speaker 1: wasn't any Afghans that were killed, but I don't think
Speaker 1: anybody really looked into it. And I don't know if
Speaker 1: there were people on direct missions looking for burg Doll
Speaker 1: that killed. But I do, in my heart feel that
Speaker 1: he contributed to the situation which led to people being
Speaker 1: hurt and killed later on after he left, without a doubt.
Speaker 1: And if that's you know, everything you want to get to.
Speaker 1: I I will also mention the stuff that Cody wrote,
Speaker 1: just so to make sure that we cover everything. Um,
Speaker 1: because he said he he wrote to me on Instagram
Speaker 1: on Socware radio. Um, he just said as his former roommate,
Speaker 1: I look forward to mats or bottle, especially about him
Speaker 1: not sleeping on a mattress, which he covered. Um. And
Speaker 1: then he you know, I said that Cody could come
Speaker 1: on and everything and he's just kind of busy today
Speaker 1: as other commitments. He was like, I appreciate the offer, though, uh.
Speaker 1: And I said to him that we're not trying to
Speaker 1: push any narrative or agenda. We were happy to have
Speaker 1: everybody on from all sides. So what do you wrote back?
Speaker 1: This was the biggest thing he wrote back, was I know, y'all,
Speaker 1: aren't I appreciate any form of media that allows two
Speaker 1: sides to tell their own Just something's in his book
Speaker 1: about him sleeping on the floor, no, and having bottle
Speaker 1: caps thrown at him. Uh, question Mark L O L what? No,
Speaker 1: the book is well written, but I don't think it's objective.
Speaker 1: What is anymore? And then he writes in quotes Bow
Speaker 1: was crazy and should have never been in the army,
Speaker 1: but he is a total, truthful, incredible witness. Here's what
Speaker 1: he says that just doesn't pass the smell tests with me,
Speaker 1: which you you you allso pretty much said, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: definitely think. Um, I mean, the book was pretty decent.
Speaker 1: Havn't I'm gonna go back through and read it cover
Speaker 1: to cover because you know, I didn't have time to
Speaker 1: do that, but I did read. I would say about it,
Speaker 1: and I do think that you know, the book was
Speaker 1: non objective. It was definitely for Birg Doll's side. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of things that he didn't put in the
Speaker 1: book of other letters that he wrote home unless I
Speaker 1: missed him, um, you know, saying that we ran over
Speaker 1: a kid and killed a kid, which was a complete
Speaker 1: lie that he wrote to his friend or family whatever
Speaker 1: it was in his journal, you know, just other lies
Speaker 1: and different things. I felt like they could have gotten
Speaker 1: more in depth to show, you know, the more strange
Speaker 1: things about boh and like the lies about him and
Speaker 1: the lies that he would tell other people like that,
Speaker 1: and show more. I don't know. To me, it just
Speaker 1: it felt like it was more were geared towards you know,
Speaker 1: showing yeah, he messed up, he made a mistake. He's
Speaker 1: not a trader. But I don't know, I just felt
Speaker 1: like it it wasn't a two side book. It was
Speaker 1: mostly just bird Doll's side. You know. One of the
Speaker 1: one of the claims that apparently was made that had
Speaker 1: that bird Doll had made that it's upset him, was
Speaker 1: that your guy's command or had kicked over a tombstone.
Speaker 1: Was there had you witnessed that or was there any
Speaker 1: truth to that well, and what he thinks was a
Speaker 1: tombstone isn't a tombstone. It was a pile of rocks
Speaker 1: that was by an old grave side that we weren't
Speaker 1: even necessarily on but next to so, I mean, we
Speaker 1: weren't there to like try to desecrate graves or whatever.
Speaker 1: Um Colonel Baker or whatever. He didn't go and kick
Speaker 1: rocks or whatever because he knew it was a headstone.
Speaker 1: He wasn't trying to He wasn't trying to disrespect a grave.
Speaker 1: He wasn't trying to do anything. I don't even know
Speaker 1: if it was a grave. The Piloroxi kick. You see
Speaker 1: rock piles stacked up all the time in random spots.
Speaker 1: So I think there's a lot of things like that.
Speaker 1: They are twisted, taking out of context to make people
Speaker 1: are situations portrayed in a different light than what they
Speaker 1: actually were, And there's a lot of twisting of things. It's, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, like that one book, you know, A Wilderness
Speaker 1: of Mirrors. It feels like, you know, bow is a
Speaker 1: is an unreliable narrator, and as you said yourself, it's
Speaker 1: like some of these, some of these questions, we're never
Speaker 1: going to get the answers too, because the only person
Speaker 1: who can tell us is you know, not necessarily heathered
Speaker 1: to reality exactly. And you know, I don't know if
Speaker 1: he's on medication now, what they're doing to help him,
Speaker 1: treat him or whatever. But you know, I completely imagined
Speaker 1: that there's still always gonna be questions unless he comes
Speaker 1: out and changes his tune later on. I mean I've
Speaker 1: read a lot of different things he's helping, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: some serious schools out in Washington State and doing some talks,
Speaker 1: and you know, hopefully something it does come out of this,
Speaker 1: because there was a lot of shitty things that happened. Um,
Speaker 1: So I guess the only silver lining could be is
Speaker 1: whatever information knowledge she gained by being a prisoner for
Speaker 1: you know, five years, hopefully it comes back and helps
Speaker 1: somebody in the future so that they can either do
Speaker 1: better than he did, or a vague capture or you
Speaker 1: know something. Um, that's the only thing that could count
Speaker 1: of this that would be a good resolution. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: a good, good outlook to have on it. With everything considered,
Speaker 1: I just assumed, and I think you've talked about it
Speaker 1: to you guys really had to go through a lot
Speaker 1: because of this guy walking off base and doing something
Speaker 1: completely irresponsible. Oh yeah, definitely. I mean the whole military
Speaker 1: in Afghanistan, Dad, during that time period, you know, for
Speaker 1: a solid month straight, especially for US, you know, used
Speaker 1: a ton of assets, resources, spent a ton of money.
Speaker 1: I'm sure millions and millions of dollars. I mean, there's
Speaker 1: still questions about how we got them back and the
Speaker 1: whole trade if we even you know, we give them
Speaker 1: more than just five prisoners, was their money exchange. I
Speaker 1: think there's just so many different questions that are still
Speaker 1: un answered. The you know, maybe we'll find out fifty
Speaker 1: years from now, hopefully so. And I think you're being
Speaker 1: as objective as you can about the situation because obviously
Speaker 1: none of you guys have a good opinion about dollar
Speaker 1: with good reason. Yeah, none of us blame you for it, man. Um. Anyway,
Speaker 1: thanks for coming on. It's been quite a bit like
Speaker 1: two years since I saw you in South Dakota. We
Speaker 1: had an awesome time seeing Doc and I'm actually my
Speaker 1: dock and hoodie behind me. Yeah, and it I had
Speaker 1: a South Dakota was awesome, man, for people who have
Speaker 1: never been there, And it does suck though that venue
Speaker 1: I went to bad Lands National Park. But the venue
Speaker 1: bad Lands got shut down because where else in the
Speaker 1: world is there a venue that was this was this
Speaker 1: was the venue where we saw docking. It's you know
Speaker 1: concert arena or you know a smaller arena venue. Um.
Speaker 1: You know there's some seeding in the balcony. But I
Speaker 1: should say like bigger quab babe. Uh, a radio station,
Speaker 1: a tattoo shop. They have slot machines, and a pun shop. Yes,
Speaker 1: a punch shot. It had an epistol range, shooting range,
Speaker 1: and it was a gun store right all in one place.
Speaker 1: Where else are you going to find that America? Baby?
Speaker 1: That place truly is like as America as a guest.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's insane. So what it just wasn't profitable
Speaker 1: and they had to shut it down. Uh the owner
Speaker 1: who had it, um, he gotten some legal problems or whatever,
Speaker 1: and then he just pretty much cut ties. Oh that's
Speaker 1: what happened to Um. He owned a bunch of those
Speaker 1: payday lenders, and South Dakota changed some laws that made
Speaker 1: it so would be a lot harder him make money
Speaker 1: or whatever. So he pretty much pulled out all of
Speaker 1: his businesses and assets I think out of South Dakota
Speaker 1: for the most part. So he just left that sucks man,
Speaker 1: because it was such a cool place, and Dokin wasn't
Speaker 1: like the only type of exclusive show that they had there.
Speaker 1: That was like a place to go to for a
Speaker 1: lot of events that were like a one time thing,
Speaker 1: like Kiss never does acoustic shows, and I know Kiss
Speaker 1: did an acoustics show. They're like, when are you ever
Speaker 1: gonna see Kiss in a venue of like a couple
Speaker 1: of thousand people. However, big at Holds, you know, that
Speaker 1: must have been awesome to see. So it's just when
Speaker 1: I when I heard that Document was doing one show
Speaker 1: in South Dakota, was like, why South Dakota, But I'm going,
Speaker 1: And then when I went to the venue, it was
Speaker 1: like I kind of get it. This is a really
Speaker 1: cool spot to do something exclusive. Oh yeah, it was awesome.
Speaker 1: God I wish it was still around, but I'm in
Speaker 1: Denver now, that's right, But yeah, I know it was.
Speaker 1: It was amazing place. A lot of people are really
Speaker 1: disappointed when it got closed down. Yeah, and I know
Speaker 1: you got to go to Red Rocks in Colorado, which
Speaker 1: is another amazing venue. I love that place. I saw
Speaker 1: def Tones and Incubis there had a great time. Um,
Speaker 1: that's like one of the coolest venues in America, I
Speaker 1: would say. But yeah, man, well we have um Fred
Speaker 1: Galvin ready to go next. So is there anything you're
Speaker 1: plugging or anything like that before we wrap this up?
Speaker 1: Not really. I mean I'd just like to say, you know,
Speaker 1: the reason why we came out out and spoke out
Speaker 1: about this because there's a lot of disinformation the media,
Speaker 1: especially when he first got back, you know, presenting him
Speaker 1: at the Rose Garden, you know, not giving the full story.
Speaker 1: And then we try to give the full story, the
Speaker 1: government the media come and do a backlash on us
Speaker 1: when we're just trying to you know, say facts, call
Speaker 1: us liars or whatever. It was never political. It was
Speaker 1: never to destroy bird dolls. Trying to get the facts
Speaker 1: out there and figure out where they lead. It wasn't
Speaker 1: well we want the narrative to do this, so we'll
Speaker 1: you know, make the facts look like this. Knows here
Speaker 1: are the facts, which way do they go? All we
Speaker 1: want is the truth and some fucking closure. Well, I said, man, yeah,
Speaker 1: thank you, Matt, Thank you guys. Thanks dude, talk to
Speaker 1: you soon and keep you talking away. Man Back on
Speaker 1: the show. Second Guess, this show is Marine Corps Major
Speaker 1: Fred Galvin always applies you're having yawn And it's funny
Speaker 1: because the last time we had you on, uh, you
Speaker 1: said that you wanted to come on for a China discussion,
Speaker 1: and so many things kind of happened with this show
Speaker 1: that it was something that kind of slipped my mind
Speaker 1: for a while. And then we started getting emails from
Speaker 1: listeners that have Major Galvin back on for that China discussion,
Speaker 1: and I was glad they said it because it was like,
Speaker 1: all right, this is a good reminder that we gotta
Speaker 1: do it, and we're glad to finally do this. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: Thank you very much for coming on today, Fred, and
Speaker 1: and have I think, from my perspective, this is a
Speaker 1: really important conversation to have, UM. And I think that
Speaker 1: the issue of the rise of China is the issue
Speaker 1: of the twenty one century. UM. And I know listeners
Speaker 1: have probably heard me go on about this subject in
Speaker 1: the past, but really I'm interested to bring you into
Speaker 1: that conversation and hear what you have to say. UM.
Speaker 1: I feel that everyone's pretty much familiar with you know,
Speaker 1: your background as a as a Marsac raider, as a
Speaker 1: Marine Corps officer, and your story and the many things
Speaker 1: that you went through to clear the names of yourself
Speaker 1: and your men um. Could you talk a little bit though,
Speaker 1: also about your study of this particular issue and how
Speaker 1: you got involved in it. Yes, so I had a
Speaker 1: securitist route to and I'm not a you know, a
Speaker 1: Gordon Shang alleged Chinese expert or Michael Pillsbury. I Gordon,
Speaker 1: by the way, great guy. I've always said, love to
Speaker 1: have him, monkst he he really knows his stuff with China,
Speaker 1: he does. And Jack, what you said just a minute
Speaker 1: ago about China in the twenty one century, we are
Speaker 1: seeing here in the Pacific Area of Operation what is
Speaker 1: very scary, what looks like what happened, you know, in
Speaker 1: the twentieth century when Japan was starting to build their powers.
Speaker 1: And even Saul you know, Smedley Butler, he was, you know,
Speaker 1: before he died, he was writing in his book War
Speaker 1: as a Racket. He was predicting things that, you know,
Speaker 1: we are going to have problems because what we're is
Speaker 1: the US was doing off the Japanese coast was viewed
Speaker 1: very provocative really, and we were trying to counterbalance what
Speaker 1: the Japanese were doing and as we saw later, did
Speaker 1: across the not just here in Hawaii, but across the
Speaker 1: entire Pacific rim right after the similar seventh attacks here.
Speaker 1: But this same thing you can see right now as
Speaker 1: we speak. It's I'm not being a harbinger, but this
Speaker 1: is going on across the Pacific with the Chinese. And
Speaker 1: you know, we have a little distraction as everybody's talking
Speaker 1: about Russia and that is that is a big threat.
Speaker 1: But we're seeing this military modernization with China slowly creep creep,
Speaker 1: not just with their weapons and espionage, but we're talking
Speaker 1: you know, the Spratley and Shinkaku Islands where they were
Speaker 1: taking these you know, contested islands of the Japanese and
Speaker 1: the Philippines and they're they're using them to project power
Speaker 1: so that just like here in Hawaii, we were the
Speaker 1: United States was this was strategic to us because back
Speaker 1: then coal was needed to project our naval power across
Speaker 1: the whole Pacific region. But China is slowly doing this
Speaker 1: and it's not catching headlines because it's it's just this
Speaker 1: little drip, drip drip as they build another you know,
Speaker 1: they they just commissioned their second aircraft carrier and they're
Speaker 1: they're building their third and this is just very slow.
Speaker 1: It doesn't catch a whole lot of headlines on mainstream media,
Speaker 1: but those who followed China see that this is very,
Speaker 1: very alarming. And you know, studying history, I remember this
Speaker 1: lady and Anne Winslow. She made a comment to the
Speaker 1: press here in Honolulu that she was saying that this
Speaker 1: was back in nineteen eleven. And I'll tell you why
Speaker 1: it's important. She's like, she went down to Fort command
Speaker 1: May that guarded the entrance of Pearl Harbor, and we
Speaker 1: knew that there's going to be a surface attack, just
Speaker 1: like the French knew that the Germans were building back up,
Speaker 1: and there's likely going to be another World War or
Speaker 1: an incursion, you know, in the Eastern Front. Uh So,
Speaker 1: what this lady in Winslow said, she saw these naval
Speaker 1: guns fire. They thought they were going to come across
Speaker 1: at sea, possibly do an amphibious assault into Hawaii, which
Speaker 1: is very vulnerable being so far out of the Pacific.
Speaker 1: And she said, Japanese can come at any time, because
Speaker 1: I've seen these four teenage guns fire today. So she
Speaker 1: made that statement to the press, and what happened thirty
Speaker 1: years later well, we all know what happened thirty years later.
Speaker 1: And the reason I bring that point up, gentlemen, is
Speaker 1: there's pillboxes all around Hawaii. I mean that it was
Speaker 1: in we were We were prepared for an attack. We
Speaker 1: didn't know it was going to be, you know, an
Speaker 1: aerial assault, just like the French didn't expect somebody to
Speaker 1: come over that that line. But that's exactly what they did,
Speaker 1: and we had time to prepare for it. We we
Speaker 1: knew there was There was many researchers, analysts, people predicting this,
Speaker 1: and that's what's going on right now. Everybody realizes that
Speaker 1: China is you know, I mean this this gal Jong
Speaker 1: who you know, got into marraw Lago just over a
Speaker 1: month ago. I mean, we can go into that, but
Speaker 1: I mean they are and I do want to talk
Speaker 1: a little bit about what's led me here. So you know,
Speaker 1: growing up, my mother, she was a travel planner. She
Speaker 1: eventually worked for a company that was the largest travel
Speaker 1: agency group travel agency in the United States, and as
Speaker 1: she was the vice president, we started going all over
Speaker 1: the world. That led to you know, her taking some
Speaker 1: of us kids on a lot of these trips. I
Speaker 1: went with my mom on several of these trips to
Speaker 1: include trips to China and Japan, and it sparked my
Speaker 1: interest in this whole area. Uh, just stating fact, but
Speaker 1: that's lad to. I've been to seventy one of these countries,
Speaker 1: most of them multiple times, especially in in the Pacific realm.
Speaker 1: I've I've lived in Japan for six and a half years.
Speaker 1: I've traveled to China and Japan and Korea numerous occasions.
Speaker 1: I've worked in that area professionally as a reigned for
Speaker 1: fourteen years and doing a countless number of exercises and
Speaker 1: going in on on ships three years at sea, and
Speaker 1: five of those six deployments were going to different countries
Speaker 1: in here. And I see this as very strategic. As
Speaker 1: you know, we the United States have a strategy that
Speaker 1: works well, but is it able to keep pace? I
Speaker 1: mean China with their their financing And I'd like to
Speaker 1: get into a little that here in a bit as
Speaker 1: as far as how they're trying to leverage against us,
Speaker 1: because we are mainly giving financial aid in legal ways
Speaker 1: and then we're doing military training not just with conventional
Speaker 1: but our special operations forces and that has worked well,
Speaker 1: but now we see the Chinese using some some tactics
Speaker 1: that are really really corrupt, with leveraging aid in the
Speaker 1: form of setting up hotels, casinos, bringing human trafficking that
Speaker 1: comes in with importation of drugs, and it really ruins
Speaker 1: a lot of these economies. But and this is what's
Speaker 1: interesting there, Fred, and I think what you're alluding to
Speaker 1: is that there are a lot of things that we
Speaker 1: might read in the papers that we see as a
Speaker 1: single action, you know, a single thing happening. But the
Speaker 1: reality is that behind the scenes, that this is all
Speaker 1: part of a concerted strategy being advanced by the Chinese
Speaker 1: Communist Party. It completely is. And you know, it's not
Speaker 1: just the strategy that you know, like Sunsue, he was
Speaker 1: a genius and he was always talking about, you know,
Speaker 1: the best strategy is to defeat your enemy without even
Speaker 1: drawing the sword. And he's always mentioning to not attack
Speaker 1: the strong point, but to to go after the path
Speaker 1: at least resistance. And so China is not doing things
Speaker 1: where we read about in the mainland. That gets everybody's
Speaker 1: attention because you know, they're they're not aiming anything right
Speaker 1: now at New York City or Washington, d C. Directly,
Speaker 1: but there you look at what they're doing in the
Speaker 1: Inkaku Islands. You know, right off, this is a contested
Speaker 1: territory northeast of Taiwan, right next to a the Japanese
Speaker 1: roy Kiu Islands, and the Japanese actually you know, purchased
Speaker 1: these in two thousand twelve. But uh, you know, the
Speaker 1: Chinese have put an aerial designation ZONO that is the
Speaker 1: same thing down off the Palawan and the west side
Speaker 1: of the Philippines. You have the Spratley Islands there and
Speaker 1: we've had a couple of incursions between the USS pre
Speaker 1: Bowl and the Decatur uh here even recently in this
Speaker 1: last month, all the way back to September as well,
Speaker 1: there's some little at sea challenges in China doesn't look
Speaker 1: at this as a game. They want to build up
Speaker 1: these you know, plateaus and use the laws and uh.
Speaker 1: And I go back to, you know what, what's kind
Speaker 1: of led to my interests and you know, when I
Speaker 1: was pursuing my m b A, I was at a
Speaker 1: the university and talking to several of the Chinese students
Speaker 1: there and that that was really the first time I
Speaker 1: saw and started having a lot of interaction with with
Speaker 1: Chinese students in America and this is this is a
Speaker 1: big issue with their strategy. But they they're studying law,
Speaker 1: had a lot of interaction with their their law students
Speaker 1: and some their PhD students in business. Very very interesting
Speaker 1: that they kind of used the law to say, hey,
Speaker 1: this is why we have the rights to this, and
Speaker 1: it's going to cause a lot of problems, just like
Speaker 1: it did last century with the Japanese like Hawaii claiming
Speaker 1: that we're hiolating their constitutional freedoms by banning their devices
Speaker 1: and US government systems. Yes, and they that is a
Speaker 1: total roost that you know, this is a private company,
Speaker 1: but you're seeing more and more of this. When I
Speaker 1: first retired from the Marines and it started, uh you
Speaker 1: know business school, they it was just flooded with the
Speaker 1: Chinese international students. And although we didn't have any in
Speaker 1: and our Executive NBA class, I did have a lot
Speaker 1: of interaction at the university just asking them questions. Prior
Speaker 1: to so our Executive NBA class had a residency in
Speaker 1: Shanghai and Beijing, and we need to start talking about, like,
Speaker 1: you know, what some of these companies are doing. It's
Speaker 1: it starts with this tech transfer, I P theft and
Speaker 1: that was the topic of our team. But the particular
Speaker 1: team I was with in our NBA residency to China's
Speaker 1: some of this IP theft and as you dig into
Speaker 1: the laws, and then you'll go to these markets, big
Speaker 1: signs that say, you know, there's no no allowance for
Speaker 1: any kind of intellectual property theft. And you go there
Speaker 1: and you see any type of electric or garment merchandise,
Speaker 1: it's all just knockoffs, and the people selling it will
Speaker 1: tell you like, hey, they're trying to haggle with you,
Speaker 1: and they had fully admit. Uh, you know, the Chinese
Speaker 1: government bottom line is just allowing that to happen. You know,
Speaker 1: the students. When I went to go get my PhD,
Speaker 1: I was kind of underestimating the Chinese students and literally
Speaker 1: because mainly I was, you know, short selling them because
Speaker 1: of their language barriers. And immediately after the second week
Speaker 1: after we finished her first dose of readings, not a
Speaker 1: single American was even contributing to discussions. I mean, they
Speaker 1: are they are very intelligent and shrewd, and uh, they
Speaker 1: have a singular focus, just just like Sun Sue. You know,
Speaker 1: I was talking about massing his forces and it's it's
Speaker 1: really amazing to see how focused that government is, and
Speaker 1: traveling to especially Beijing and speaking with a lot of
Speaker 1: their their leaders there, it is amazing that they will
Speaker 1: take control of a region like we saw just south
Speaker 1: of Beijing. They will kick everybody out of there. You
Speaker 1: probably can't even imagine this in the United States, but
Speaker 1: like every think of kicking everybody out of Connecticut because
Speaker 1: they want to build infrastructure so they can provide services.
Speaker 1: And you know, they're talking with the development leaders are
Speaker 1: like these farmers were so unreasonable. We told them we'd
Speaker 1: give them a condominium, allow them to be retrained and
Speaker 1: you know, a simple job like a waiter. But you
Speaker 1: know the point I make in you all, this is
Speaker 1: when the Chinese government decides they are you know, they
Speaker 1: don't have a balance of powers. It's this is how
Speaker 1: this will work, and they move forward with it. Where
Speaker 1: right now and the United States were we're fighting each
Speaker 1: other trying to figure out which way to go border
Speaker 1: walled this or that, and we're at each other's next
Speaker 1: and they are developing a military capability that we are
Speaker 1: going to contend with, and most of us expect the
Speaker 1: next fifteen years this is going to be something beyond
Speaker 1: the coin fight we've seen in the last eighteen years,
Speaker 1: and just a few data points to add in there
Speaker 1: is the Chinese see society is something to harmonize, that
Speaker 1: they want to harmonize the one of society altogether. And
Speaker 1: there is an ethno nationalist meant to this for them,
Speaker 1: because they see that harmony as being for the Han
Speaker 1: Chinese um and there's over a billion of these people.
Speaker 1: They're not an oppressed minority group as they sometimes pretend,
Speaker 1: especially in their relations with the United States, and that's
Speaker 1: why you see things happening in Chinchean where Muslims are
Speaker 1: being herded into internment camps and things like this, because
Speaker 1: from their point of view, there's nothing wrong with harmonizing
Speaker 1: society into a homogeneous one. You know that. And I'm
Speaker 1: not some Chinese language experts, I don't speaking of Mandarin,
Speaker 1: but you know the the Marine Corps, you know, centur
Speaker 1: Ago was they had Chinese Marines. They occupied garrisons to
Speaker 1: protect the U S interests, mainly around Shanghai Port City
Speaker 1: and so they were garrison there for years and one
Speaker 1: of their leaders, who went on to be the commander
Speaker 1: of the original second Marine Writer Battalion, was Lieutenant Colonel
Speaker 1: Evans Carlson, and interesting you bring up, you know, the
Speaker 1: the harmony because he adopted a phrase, the Chinese phrase
Speaker 1: called gung ho and most people who've heard of that
Speaker 1: think that that means something with motivation or yeah, I
Speaker 1: thought it was Korean. No, it's actually Mandarin and it
Speaker 1: means work together. So it has nothing to do with
Speaker 1: you know, energy or motivation or some kind of a spree.
Speaker 1: Well indirectly, yes, it's spree to corps. But it's so
Speaker 1: the reason that Evans Carlson, it was very interested in
Speaker 1: that he's he's talking to these rebels in China, and
Speaker 1: he was very interested in how they could as a
Speaker 1: smaller force attack and destroy larger forces. And it was
Speaker 1: you know, he understood this concept from the Chinese. We
Speaker 1: use gung hole. We have to harmonize these smaller elements
Speaker 1: two go after the big elements. And we have seen
Speaker 1: that resurgence in China. Where like the very first time
Speaker 1: I went to China, I remember, just like in Hong
Speaker 1: Kong before it went from British back to a back
Speaker 1: to the BRC, they would used to have a different
Speaker 1: classes of people and there were there was this class
Speaker 1: that would live on these junks out there, and in
Speaker 1: Hong Kong the harbor, they were not even allowed on land.
Speaker 1: And then once now after repetitive trips to Hong Kong
Speaker 1: into mainland China. You see, that's such a I know,
Speaker 1: all you go into that there's no more junks, similar
Speaker 1: to Shanghai that they didn't just clean their are similar
Speaker 1: to Singapore, they didn't just clean their act up. But
Speaker 1: now you see these massive superstructures when you fly or
Speaker 1: sail into Hong Kong. Every year that I see this,
Speaker 1: you just see literally more and more miles of sea
Speaker 1: land containers. It's so impressive when they get so organized,
Speaker 1: like you say, whether it's what they have recently done
Speaker 1: against what they call minor problem with their Muslims and
Speaker 1: how they're handling that, or hey, we're going to clean
Speaker 1: this area up, We're going to get rid of these junks,
Speaker 1: we're gonna we're gonna build this city to care for
Speaker 1: the people. You know, traveling and talking to their leaders
Speaker 1: in Beijing, they just think that every if, if you're
Speaker 1: a party member, we have to have our government control everything.
Speaker 1: And when they do, I mean, they make decisions and
Speaker 1: they're moving forward. And why that's important to us in
Speaker 1: the United States is you know, they're they're organizing a
Speaker 1: military force right now to develop an amphibious capability. Again
Speaker 1: trip trip real slowly. But you see all the stuff
Speaker 1: in the headlines about Taiwan, and as you start to wonder, now,
Speaker 1: Taiwan it's self governed state, but China wants to control it.
Speaker 1: In the United States has a treaty to defended if China,
Speaker 1: China has aggression against it, so likely that will be
Speaker 1: something you know, we'll see happen unfortunately in the future. Fred,
Speaker 1: one of the things I was hoping I could get
Speaker 1: you to explain to the listeners today was I often
Speaker 1: hear people say in regards to China and the rise
Speaker 1: of China and the military threat that it presents. They'll say, well, look,
Speaker 1: China doesn't have any troop transport capability, they don't have
Speaker 1: any heavy lift, they don't have the same fighter jets
Speaker 1: were as many as we have. Um they they a
Speaker 1: lot of people I feel don't understand that China's strategy
Speaker 1: is not to match US tank for tank or fighter
Speaker 1: jet to fighter jet. Like that is profoundly not their strategy.
Speaker 1: You're you're exactly right, they are they're using you know
Speaker 1: that their Chinese philosophy in a in a couple of ways,
Speaker 1: and I don't want to talk right now. And you
Speaker 1: know they're they're Belt and Road initiative. How they're doing
Speaker 1: this economically with alliances. But let's talk military for a second. First. Um,
Speaker 1: it's just like in Europe after the First World War.
Speaker 1: You know, they thought it was going to be you know,
Speaker 1: this tank to tank battle until the Germans realized, you know,
Speaker 1: they can do they can cross us, they can go
Speaker 1: over these lines and use aviation too. Now that Chinese,
Speaker 1: you know, a hundred years after that, you are looking
Speaker 1: at do we want to build a massive aircraft carrier
Speaker 1: force And they're slowly building that. They know it's a capability,
Speaker 1: but they're really investing in more nuclear submarines. They don't technically,
Speaker 1: per se have a triad with the air surface in
Speaker 1: nuclear missile ballistic missile capability. That's but that's coming. And
Speaker 1: what we fear is what they are investing in is
Speaker 1: these long range bombers, the signate capability we've seen recently.
Speaker 1: They're looking for all this information operations, how to how
Speaker 1: to combine this and work and do operations across a
Speaker 1: region much the way that you know we do here
Speaker 1: and in the United States. But they are slowly building
Speaker 1: this a phobeous capability. We realized in the United States
Speaker 1: it's a deficit, and but they're slowly multidmain looking at
Speaker 1: the technology as far as communication, jamming and uh you know,
Speaker 1: antisubmarine warfare. So they are developing on the high tech.
Speaker 1: But there they are slowly building this amphibious forces. As
Speaker 1: we've recently seen it really started to get aggressive in building.
Speaker 1: The People's Liberation Army has a branch just like our
Speaker 1: Marine Corps, and that is growing. And just like our
Speaker 1: National Defense Strategy that was released in two thousand and
Speaker 1: eighteen that came out, well, Secretary Madisters still there. It
Speaker 1: talks about and this is how we've kind of tie
Speaker 1: it back into these other countries, but it talks about
Speaker 1: these resurgent nations such as China and Russia. And one
Speaker 1: thing they're doing is as far as to fund a
Speaker 1: lot of their high tech weapons. You know Chinese really
Speaker 1: and you look at their students, they're they're massively getting
Speaker 1: into the high tech and putting into their military modernization.
Speaker 1: And we're seeing what it says in the National Defense
Speaker 1: strategy released last year that to finance this, they're selling
Speaker 1: them to all kinds of countries. And that's what we've
Speaker 1: seen happen with with North Korea. You look at all
Speaker 1: the kanji that's on those missiles in the North Korean parade.
Speaker 1: That's not Hungule, that is that is Chinese h and
Speaker 1: it's it's really it's you know, we saw the same
Speaker 1: thing going on in Turkey with you know, they want
Speaker 1: to buy some S four triple A weapons from the Russians.
Speaker 1: We're starting to box say you're never going to get
Speaker 1: our F thirty five. So Russia comes back and says, hey,
Speaker 1: we'll sell your st flankers. So but this, just like
Speaker 1: Mattis had put in that National Defense strategy, these countries, Russian, China,
Speaker 1: they're going to be financing and underwriting these things so
Speaker 1: that they're selling these high tech weapons to other countries,
Speaker 1: which you know we saw you a e they can
Speaker 1: buy pretty much anything, and they've they've recently been acquiring
Speaker 1: a lot of these Chinese drones. Why is that important, Well,
Speaker 1: we have a lot of aid with military training and
Speaker 1: finance going to a lot of these countries, and in
Speaker 1: China's is competing you know, we have friends like Singapore
Speaker 1: and they're like, oh, well, you know they're buying our
Speaker 1: fifth generation fighters. Well, they also did just look at
Speaker 1: the J twenty, you know that the Chinese weapons, and
Speaker 1: they were looking at the Russian before they bought the
Speaker 1: German invincible submarines. So they're choosing their partners wisely. And
Speaker 1: that's where it all ties into. They're not just looking
Speaker 1: at confronting us face to face. They're using these legal
Speaker 1: and international alliances with UH and kind of enslaving a
Speaker 1: lot of these client state countries. There's been sixty of
Speaker 1: them that they've been doing this with. And President Jijing
Speaker 1: being is very smart with this silk economic belt that
Speaker 1: he is developing both maritime and overland to jump on
Speaker 1: all these resources. Like we're in Afghanistan slugging it out
Speaker 1: toe to toe with Taliban, you know they're in They're
Speaker 1: harvesting all these minerals and resources, and that's their goal
Speaker 1: with this silk economic belt is to get these alliances
Speaker 1: harvest this, especially in the routes as their strategy is
Speaker 1: that the United States cannot impact, but they are. They're
Speaker 1: also even looking at Polar Silk route. While we're getting
Speaker 1: you know, hamstrung and these long drawn out, expensive wars. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I uh, it's interesting you mentioned that because I actually
Speaker 1: wrote a novel, kind of a military thriller about that,
Speaker 1: about how this polar Arctic route was opening up and
Speaker 1: how that changes things from a security standpoint. But um,
Speaker 1: also with the Belt and Road initiative, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: very interesting and your you're a marine, of course you
Speaker 1: understand that there is this theory, um, or maybe we
Speaker 1: can call it a fact even that whoever controls the
Speaker 1: high seas is going to be able to control the
Speaker 1: world because they you can control, uh, not just from
Speaker 1: a military perspective, but as far as international shipping and
Speaker 1: maintaining norms on the high seas, and so they relate
Speaker 1: to things like innocent passage. Um. But the Belton Road
Speaker 1: Initiative goes around that, and it it subverts our naval power.
Speaker 1: They China has got these fifty economic zones with sixty
Speaker 1: different nations. That's like two thirds of the world's population.
Speaker 1: And while we've been focusing, you know, with several administrations
Speaker 1: over the last nearly two decades on on things that
Speaker 1: have taken us in a non strategic direction, they have
Speaker 1: been capitalizing on these resources. They've been you know that
Speaker 1: Belton Road initiatives, you know, to develop their system of
Speaker 1: pipelines and roads and railways to seize this so that
Speaker 1: they have power, you know, for the next hundred years
Speaker 1: and if they close down, you know, putting these little
Speaker 1: islands out there and having power to control the sea
Speaker 1: lanes and shut down our lines. Communication is a serious issue,
Speaker 1: not just in Northeast Asia, but as they're doing. I
Speaker 1: mean it's Spratley Islands off there and the Philippines. They
Speaker 1: and we're trying to do it. We're trying to countermeasure them,
Speaker 1: so we we put things in different areas in Asian.
Speaker 1: We're seeing this encouragement across the whole world. It's not
Speaker 1: just that you know, they've if we move marines down
Speaker 1: to Harwin, Australian, what are the Chinese they buy the
Speaker 1: porp down there. You know, we even here in this
Speaker 1: hemisphere we had to you know, they bought both sides
Speaker 1: of the Panama Canal. They're collecting on us right out
Speaker 1: of Cuba. But there you look at Belarus, Sri Lanka,
Speaker 1: Maldives that they they're going everywhere. When when I travel
Speaker 1: seen just massive Chinese construction in the Philippines, Indonesia, Africa.
Speaker 1: It's I mean, you see it down in Venezuela. So
Speaker 1: a lot of this is that, you know, one point
Speaker 1: three trillion dollars of China has just been recently pumping
Speaker 1: to a lot of these countries on these quote unquote
Speaker 1: no strings, low interest loans. In some countries are smart
Speaker 1: enough to you know, pull back and say, hey, we're
Speaker 1: gonna and mainly are strong allies like India Japan like, hey,
Speaker 1: we don't, we don't want to take this money and
Speaker 1: become one of your client states. But again it goes
Speaker 1: back to you know, a communist regime where the leadership
Speaker 1: is so centralized when they make a decision and they're
Speaker 1: really moving forward with that. It's it's a threat that
Speaker 1: we are going to like like and Ann Winslow thought, oh,
Speaker 1: you know we have this she was focused micro. You know,
Speaker 1: we have this power to blast these Japanese ships out
Speaker 1: of the water if they come and tack us a
Speaker 1: pearl harbor. But you know, we are very vulnerable as
Speaker 1: we have all these U S territories and protectorate's not
Speaker 1: just a state like the Hawaiian Islands, but we have
Speaker 1: in the Marshall Islands, the Marianas all the way out
Speaker 1: to allow that are just tiny little islands, very vulnerable.
Speaker 1: The Chinese know that they're building military build up on
Speaker 1: these other islands. And meanwhile they have alliances that will
Speaker 1: shut us down and with a lot of trade routes,
Speaker 1: and they're building or military very aggressively right now. And
Speaker 1: you can see how getting us kicked out of Japan,
Speaker 1: the Philippines in South Korea would be a huge boon
Speaker 1: for the Chinese to get us just right out of
Speaker 1: the Pacific rim. Yes, and and they're smart about it there,
Speaker 1: you know, them selling all these weapons, them challenging us
Speaker 1: in the seas. Some of these countries are wondering who
Speaker 1: decide with you know, well, they side with, you know,
Speaker 1: the Americans, because you know, the Chinese aren't exactly nor
Speaker 1: nor were the Japanese exactly kind when they take control
Speaker 1: of some things, and you know, like we saw in
Speaker 1: Thailand and they built this massive, huge they so they've
Speaker 1: given these loans, they build all this instruction. They get
Speaker 1: this train that goes down there built with Chinese labor,
Speaker 1: and you know, the main the main beneficiary is not
Speaker 1: you know the country that gets the loan, but it's
Speaker 1: it's always China, and it's on their terms, and if
Speaker 1: they can't make payments, then there's terms and conditions with
Speaker 1: collateral assess to it. In it it further ties them
Speaker 1: to being a client state and a separates you know,
Speaker 1: that country from what the United States is doing. And so,
Speaker 1: you know, we really have and we started seeing this
Speaker 1: with some of the you know, they're building these casinos
Speaker 1: bringing in the human trafficking. It's hard when we just
Speaker 1: do military training and put some financial aid out there
Speaker 1: to compete with things that bring in massive jobs, massive tourism,
Speaker 1: and but that leads to something else that you know,
Speaker 1: we started to see a lot here in the United
Speaker 1: States of the importation not just narcotics from south of
Speaker 1: the border, although there's a lot of China and he's
Speaker 1: fent in all that is coming south of the border,
Speaker 1: but it's a it's a massive problem that's affecting United
Speaker 1: States with the importation of Chinese fent in al, which
Speaker 1: is you know, had a recent examine they you know,
Speaker 1: that was one of the anesthetic drugs that they used
Speaker 1: to on myself. But fin in all that, what the
Speaker 1: Chinese are doing is I mean they're drugs that they
Speaker 1: put in here are really not just causing addiction, causing deaths.
Speaker 1: And you've seen that Fenton al death from about ten
Speaker 1: years ago. It was three thousand overdoses. Now it's twenty
Speaker 1: eight thousands. So we've seen the six and the Chinese no,
Speaker 1: and they've had their opium wars. You go into any
Speaker 1: Chinese airport, drugs will be punished by death. I mean
Speaker 1: they are serious. All the precursor chemicals for the opiates
Speaker 1: are produced in China and then brought I believe that
Speaker 1: a lot of them are brought into Mexico and then
Speaker 1: smuggled north. Yes, and they're a lot of these islands
Speaker 1: chains here in the Pacific. We've seen you know what it's.
Speaker 1: I mean, you can if you travel repetitively small little
Speaker 1: islands out here and you see, like, wow, this used
Speaker 1: to beautiful. They used to have a robust economy. You know,
Speaker 1: you bring in a little casino. Human trafficking falls with
Speaker 1: the drugs. I mean, the Chinese new this. That's why
Speaker 1: they outlawed opium and they're very strict. You know, it
Speaker 1: is punishable by death. And you know the Chinese they
Speaker 1: have these when you're targeted for termination. They do have
Speaker 1: this little van. You can see it if you travel
Speaker 1: to China and they euthanize you right there. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's so they are very centralized, control, very severe, just
Speaker 1: like you see in some Middle Eastern countries with some
Speaker 1: of their death penalty bays. When you control the press,
Speaker 1: like our grad students when we went over to China's
Speaker 1: they were freaking out like, man, we can't you know
Speaker 1: on Facebook, But it's yeah, they they controlled the narrative,
Speaker 1: so like I'm controlling. So what do you make of
Speaker 1: claims then that President g has overstepped his bounds, that
Speaker 1: he has lost his patients, that making himself president for
Speaker 1: life was a strategic miscalculation. Um claims that the Chinese
Speaker 1: government can no longer produce GDP growth per year. I mean,
Speaker 1: do you think that there's any any truth to this,
Speaker 1: that that the their their reach has gone beyond their
Speaker 1: grasp at this point. I think that's very So like
Speaker 1: when President Trump says we're in economically when we raise
Speaker 1: the price of soybeans, people in China that depend on
Speaker 1: that as a statement, a lot of people think like
Speaker 1: China is depending on us. Yes, so for certain things.
Speaker 1: So what that does is, you know, certain people start
Speaker 1: to starve when we when we go tow to tow
Speaker 1: economically with you know, some of these trade issues, and
Speaker 1: that is exactly what we're talking about. People are fearing
Speaker 1: g Ping and his regime. They you know, when when
Speaker 1: people start to protest, the last thing they want. You know,
Speaker 1: when we travel as gratitudents, you have to major cities,
Speaker 1: you know, it's people cannot assemble, they don't have freedom
Speaker 1: of speech there. But they have these underground little internets
Speaker 1: and people do socialize, but they're they're very fearful of
Speaker 1: that that the actual individuals you know talking about it
Speaker 1: and but but they will but it's not something on
Speaker 1: a macro level. That but that is exactly what the
Speaker 1: Chinese fear, and they will utilize you know, there law
Speaker 1: enforcement to go after any any group anywhere, especially religious,
Speaker 1: anything that's organized that can upset that power because they
Speaker 1: try to control the communication, control the population. And uh,
Speaker 1: he's starting to see a little that in the United
Speaker 1: States with with some of our freedoms of you know,
Speaker 1: people trying to shut down discourse by insulting and calling
Speaker 1: people names. So you have to have like this group
Speaker 1: thing but the Chinese, they definitely have that and they
Speaker 1: want to maintain that ability to control the narrative, not
Speaker 1: allow everybody to know what's going on, pushing out a
Speaker 1: state sponsored you know, narrative. That's jes being is smart.
Speaker 1: And when you think that they over extend himself. Well,
Speaker 1: I think in the future is more people come to
Speaker 1: the West, they understand this. It's just like when a
Speaker 1: lot of people from you know, Jihada Muslim extremists come
Speaker 1: to the United States and they they want to tackle
Speaker 1: a lot of those have had their minds, you know,
Speaker 1: wrapped around what freedom is all about. And it's not
Speaker 1: a bad thing. And that's what I think j Ping
Speaker 1: realizes is you know, you can say the narrative the
Speaker 1: lies so much, but you know, having people, you know,
Speaker 1: this information highway that is out there. You can go
Speaker 1: into these Western hotels in China and and get connected
Speaker 1: to the internet. But it's a it's for Westerners, but people.
Speaker 1: People are starting to become you know, like the T
Speaker 1: one thousand, they self self aware of, you know, so
Speaker 1: cyber and system. In my opinion, people will know more
Speaker 1: and more in China what's going on around the world
Speaker 1: with immigration and repatriation. There's that's a big fear of
Speaker 1: the government. Though. It seems really that there are competing
Speaker 1: visions of the future. And you know, America has always
Speaker 1: to do to improve, but the Chinese version of the future,
Speaker 1: what they seem to envision with the social credit schemes
Speaker 1: and so forth, it's just horrifying. It's like something out
Speaker 1: of you know, an oldest Huxley novel. Yeah, and you know,
Speaker 1: I see that similar ways here in the United States.
Speaker 1: You know, you protest too much against your boss. You know, hey,
Speaker 1: this is screwed up. I'm gonna keep it real and
Speaker 1: I'm gonna launch a little insurgency at your your work. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, you can get your pink slip. And and
Speaker 1: that's that fear is. I mean, in China, everybody's working.
Speaker 1: You don't see homeless people there, but you know when
Speaker 1: almost everything is provided by the state, and that's how
Speaker 1: a large majority everybody's really thinking that this is how
Speaker 1: it has to come. There's people that object, but they
Speaker 1: don't protest too much. They whether it's with their own
Speaker 1: people or these other countries that they've had these economic
Speaker 1: zones established. I mean, when you inject that kind of
Speaker 1: money into Central Asia and all the stands, and they're
Speaker 1: bringing all these natural resources through. I mean, that's that
Speaker 1: is real. It is life changing for these countries, and
Speaker 1: it starts off very positive and it gets people and
Speaker 1: a lot of these countries elected and re elected. And
Speaker 1: but it's not always it's not good for them. Oftentimes
Speaker 1: in long term it's it's definitely not good for the
Speaker 1: United States. Is all these countries are starting to now
Speaker 1: align with China as they build up their military, and
Speaker 1: you know, our our National Defense Strategy calls it out
Speaker 1: in that two document that they're a threat. China is
Speaker 1: a threat, and we realize that, our our national leaders
Speaker 1: realize that's our number one threat. And but but if
Speaker 1: you look at what do they talk about mainstream media,
Speaker 1: you don't you don't hear so much about China. Hear
Speaker 1: about the presidential politics is all of Trump and whoever
Speaker 1: is going to run against him, the border wall. But
Speaker 1: China is something that is going to impact, you know,
Speaker 1: our safety in the quality of life that we can
Speaker 1: do it with what they're doing economically and militarily too.
Speaker 1: By the way, what you said just a little bit
Speaker 1: ago about the US kind of having that social credit
Speaker 1: system on obviously a much you know, a minute scale
Speaker 1: of what's over there and looking at things objectively, it
Speaker 1: is true. I think we feel like with Twitter and
Speaker 1: with Facebook, we have more free speech than ever. And
Speaker 1: and it is technically free speech because you're not going
Speaker 1: to get jailed for things that you say. But as
Speaker 1: you said, you certainly could lose a job for things
Speaker 1: that you say. I know people who wrote something that
Speaker 1: they thought was harmless and then the next thing they know,
Speaker 1: they're out of a job. And I think that that's
Speaker 1: almost the appeal for a lot of people of Trump
Speaker 1: is that he could be critical of the press. He
Speaker 1: could be critical of the media. He's even been critical
Speaker 1: of people in his own administration, and as the president
Speaker 1: he could do that, he could write whatever he wants.
Speaker 1: But as a private citizen, you do that, you might
Speaker 1: find yourself out of a job. So it's uh. The
Speaker 1: social credit thing, I think is kind of interesting on
Speaker 1: a global scale, but it's much unlike China, where you're
Speaker 1: you're not gonna be jailed for it. Well, yeah, and
Speaker 1: also understand that President Trump wants to start these like
Speaker 1: food fights with his own administration. He wants to fight
Speaker 1: the c I A. He wants to fight you know,
Speaker 1: his Department of Justice. Let me tell you, you don't
Speaker 1: see that in the People's Republic of China, but vertically integrated.
Speaker 1: And the point being though that he could do that.
Speaker 1: If you as a member of the administration it's something
Speaker 1: critical of another part of the administration, they'd be like,
Speaker 1: you're out of here. But it's almost like when you're
Speaker 1: the president, or when you have all this money, you're
Speaker 1: the you know, head of some corporation, you could do
Speaker 1: things that the average citizen just can't do. And that'scize today. Uh,
Speaker 1: there is, it is truth. There is a such thing
Speaker 1: as fuck you money. You know, in the US, it's
Speaker 1: it's it's it's just a fact. I mean that we
Speaker 1: do like to always say that that we're a free
Speaker 1: country or free to say whatever we want. But especially
Speaker 1: with social media stuff, we've learned that you know, uh
Speaker 1: learned especially I mean this, this is a whole discussion
Speaker 1: about free speech. We've talked about before. But people find
Speaker 1: out that someone who's in a job that has nothing
Speaker 1: to do with anything like this is a member of
Speaker 1: let's say some like white supremacist group. All right, you
Speaker 1: will very likely lose your job. For something like that.
Speaker 1: Now rightfully, rightfully or wrongfully, we could have that debate.
Speaker 1: But it's true, the more that you're kind of putting
Speaker 1: out there, you you could have it could have you know,
Speaker 1: detrimental effects. Well, what we're talking about as the dark
Speaker 1: sides of two opposing systems, communism and capitalism. And you're
Speaker 1: talking about the dark sides of capitalism where these big
Speaker 1: companies and corporations come to have more power than an
Speaker 1: individual than they overshadow your individual civil rights. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: and I will say, by the way, it's two very
Speaker 1: different things too, because one is a actual free speech
Speaker 1: issue where in China you will be jailed for saying
Speaker 1: certain things, where as Friends says, you will be youth
Speaker 1: euthanized to buy the black van if Yeah. The other
Speaker 1: is where if you're voluntarily putting out putting stuff out there,
Speaker 1: a private or public sector job could say hey, we
Speaker 1: don't want an employee UM representing you know us in
Speaker 1: that way. And when you're out in public, the the
Speaker 1: wine has basically been blurred between um, when what you're
Speaker 1: doing as a private citizen and what you're doing representing
Speaker 1: your company or even your government. You know, it's interesting
Speaker 1: you talk about this this control um. I was just
Speaker 1: flying back this last weekend from Washington, d C. Through
Speaker 1: Los Angeles, stopped for the weekend talking to a friend
Speaker 1: of mine. He's a movie producer and uh, he's making films.
Speaker 1: I won't mention the name because this could demonstrate just
Speaker 1: what you're saying. But he's like, hey, you know he's
Speaker 1: trying to get financing. And guess what. You know the
Speaker 1: the Chinese who are financing and the same thing, he says,
Speaker 1: this is very strongly with the Middle Eastern financers as well,
Speaker 1: but specifically with Chinese, like they put terms and conditions
Speaker 1: in that. And I'll give example of this too. He's like,
Speaker 1: you have to have some Chinese actors in their China
Speaker 1: is not allowed to be portrayed anything Chinese, a person
Speaker 1: or anything related. China cannot be portrayed any kind of
Speaker 1: negative skew at all, or they'll lose all fundings. So
Speaker 1: you know, I've done a little extra work here in
Speaker 1: the last year and there's a sign a nondisclosures. I
Speaker 1: can't say what film it is, but you're gonna see
Speaker 1: the thing that used to have this main The main
Speaker 1: role is a classic American film the main actress was
Speaker 1: an American, and so she'll she'll be Asian, sh'll be
Speaker 1: Chinese when it's released next year. That's all I can say.
Speaker 1: But that kind of control is is actual, is real,
Speaker 1: And you take that at a at a macro level
Speaker 1: inside a theater, and you know, we're like, hey, I
Speaker 1: thought I thought Kim Jong n was like warming up
Speaker 1: to us and everything. Well he's he's on the payroll
Speaker 1: to you know, China is watching, you know, Kim Jong
Speaker 1: He's watching the United States do this little waltz with
Speaker 1: Kim Jong un because that's what they're going to do.
Speaker 1: They're seeing how we react, which is it just going
Speaker 1: to be through trade embargoes or are we going to
Speaker 1: use military power? So you know, is Kim Jong owns
Speaker 1: starts to do another missile launches, we just woke up
Speaker 1: to that today. That's a North Korea shooting missiles at
Speaker 1: South Korea. Yeah, and people wonder like, hey, what's what's
Speaker 1: going to will the finance here? Who's really the puppeteer
Speaker 1: pull in the strings is pain and he's using you know,
Speaker 1: as surrogate through North Korea. Like I said, all that
Speaker 1: Kanji on those military trades that that's Chinese that they
Speaker 1: are supplying the technology, the weapons, and they want to
Speaker 1: return on their investment, and they're going to control and
Speaker 1: they're gonna they're using him as a beta test to
Speaker 1: see where that's going to go and what they can do.
Speaker 1: Their studying us, and I'll tell you you know, studying
Speaker 1: at the university, Chinese students are just they're They're smarter,
Speaker 1: harder working, and they look to the future. They have
Speaker 1: no desire to to solve anything for themselves or they
Speaker 1: here right now. They are thinking longer down the road,
Speaker 1: and they literally academically left us in the dust. Just Um.
Speaker 1: One thing I just like to add real quick, fred Um.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people are aware about the
Speaker 1: some of the stuff in Hollywood, Um, some of the
Speaker 1: stuff with our films. You'll see almost no critique of
Speaker 1: China anywhere in our media, anywhere in fiction at all,
Speaker 1: as you mentioned, Um. But there's one thing I'd like
Speaker 1: to add to that that I think a lot of
Speaker 1: people don't realize is that a lot of our books,
Speaker 1: a lot of our English language books are printed in China,
Speaker 1: and the Chinese will go there will be like government
Speaker 1: censors or quasi government censors who will go through English
Speaker 1: language books and they will tell you that they won't
Speaker 1: they won't let you print your book if there's something
Speaker 1: in there they don't like UM, and it could be
Speaker 1: obviously a book that's negative on China they won't publish,
Speaker 1: or they won't they won't print it for us. But
Speaker 1: sometimes it's even like really like obscure stuff, like I
Speaker 1: had a friend who wrote a book about UM. It's
Speaker 1: a photo book that involves Ice this and the Kurds
Speaker 1: and things like that, and the Chinese censors went through
Speaker 1: that and like we're like, Nope, not publishing it. I
Speaker 1: guess because they thought it might promote as long Islamic
Speaker 1: extremism or something like that. I really don't know, but
Speaker 1: there was stuff they didn't like in the book, Um
Speaker 1: photographs they didn't look like, so they wouldn't they wouldn't
Speaker 1: print it. It all gets scrubbed. And as the labor
Speaker 1: number one thing they were saying about that topic when
Speaker 1: we're in China, you know, they're constantly saying. You know,
Speaker 1: there's big companies, they're American companies like Apple or their
Speaker 1: their surrogate and forward, but they have to also go
Speaker 1: along with the system, which leads to other things like
Speaker 1: intellectual property theft, not just with merchandise. But you know,
Speaker 1: these big companies are are losing billions of dollars, but
Speaker 1: they can't even say anything about it. They may have
Speaker 1: some leaked memos here or there, but because they're making
Speaker 1: so much money in the long term, they know they're
Speaker 1: they're losing. There's all these knockoffs. You guys have seen
Speaker 1: them when you travel around you other stuff, especially in
Speaker 1: the Asia. You see all this stuff being sold in
Speaker 1: People think black markets is something shady and subterranean, but no,
Speaker 1: it's it's open on the streets. But you know, these
Speaker 1: big companies can't say anything because you know China will
Speaker 1: shut them down. And now what China is doing is
Speaker 1: in our travels there they everybody's saying, you know, the
Speaker 1: Chinese labor is now over price compared to you know
Speaker 1: what's going on in Vietnam and in the Philippines and India.
Speaker 1: So what are the China is really trying to use
Speaker 1: these silk routes to tie in these clients, states, control them,
Speaker 1: build these rail systems to connect them, get them involved
Speaker 1: in these loans, and exploit labor natural resources. You know,
Speaker 1: they don't have to contend with like our legal system
Speaker 1: that pays tension to environmental issues just human rights. Uh. So,
Speaker 1: you know, we're seeing some shifts from China being everything
Speaker 1: produced there in their GDP internal to the country. But
Speaker 1: that's also like back to what you said before, it
Speaker 1: destabilizes is you know, some of these people aren't working
Speaker 1: some of these jobs. Go go to see some of
Speaker 1: these things in your stores where they're made. It's it's
Speaker 1: not always China now. But that's so that's going to change,
Speaker 1: and that's a vulnerability. And in the United States is
Speaker 1: is very you know, we've got expert analysts looking at
Speaker 1: how we're going to try to count on this, but
Speaker 1: it's just hard sometimes when you have morals and ethics
Speaker 1: and that's what you're our laws are geared towards to
Speaker 1: counter what the Chinese are doing that's not so in
Speaker 1: our Western sense moral and ethically right. And as much
Speaker 1: as I've riffed on our president and some of the
Speaker 1: things he does that I don't like, one thing I
Speaker 1: have to say that I am happy about the Trump
Speaker 1: administration is they've begun to take on just the beginning,
Speaker 1: the very beginning of taking on China, I feel um
Speaker 1: with some of these trade deals. Um, I think it
Speaker 1: was a mistake to pull out of the Trans Pacific Partnership.
Speaker 1: But aside from that, I'm happy with some of the
Speaker 1: things his administration has done, including putting Chinese propaganda outlets
Speaker 1: in the United States on the on the foreign Agents
Speaker 1: list and making them register. Yes, and you know he
Speaker 1: saw recently, you know, this administration, they had the two
Speaker 1: by two administ meetings, had had a Secretary of Pompeo
Speaker 1: from the Great State of Kansas and you know, acting
Speaker 1: Sectaf Shanahan. You know, they're over there with the Japanese,
Speaker 1: and the Japanese are fully where fully aligned with US.
Speaker 1: But that is something that the Japanese are improving their
Speaker 1: defenses very and they realize like, hey, we can't have
Speaker 1: Yankee go home so fast. You need to be we
Speaker 1: have to be aligned with the United States. And it's
Speaker 1: so it's starting to you know, these recent talks last month,
Speaker 1: it's that has been very strategic and hopefully other countries
Speaker 1: can see that. Okay, a strong country in Asia like Japan,
Speaker 1: not just economically, but you know, they're regrowing their military.
Speaker 1: They are countering a lot of these incursions from the Chinese.
Speaker 1: We were threatened, you know, some of these Asian countries
Speaker 1: with their Chinese cyber and electronic attacks. And you know,
Speaker 1: we have the big outside partner in the United States
Speaker 1: aligning with these countries. And hopefully that's what here in
Speaker 1: the Indo Paycalm area, that there can be more of
Speaker 1: more alignment with partnerships. As a Japan the Chinese have
Speaker 1: just you know, they've they've already gone deep in the pup.
Speaker 1: Everybody else has gone deep in the box of the Chinese.
Speaker 1: We need to counterbalance that. One of the thinks about
Speaker 1: are how different our cultures are from one another, between
Speaker 1: America and well China, but also much of the world.
Speaker 1: Honestly is you know, as Americans, we kind of put
Speaker 1: our past in the past and we just kind of
Speaker 1: put it there and leave it there. Um But you
Speaker 1: go talk to a lot of foreign cultures and they
Speaker 1: talk about nine eighteen like it was yesterday. Um. So,
Speaker 1: between Japan and China, all that stuff that went down
Speaker 1: in Manchure you during the war isn't exactly forgotten. Don't
Speaker 1: forget about it at all. No, it's it's weird because
Speaker 1: like in America, we can hardly think about what happened
Speaker 1: prior to the turn of the millennial. And you talked
Speaker 1: to when I lived in Japan. It's uh, you talked
Speaker 1: a lot of the Japanese and I lived in this
Speaker 1: village and they talked about, Hey, you guys deserved Pearl Harbor.
Speaker 1: You deserved it. And this isn't some radical thought, but
Speaker 1: it's what Chesti Poler is right. Not Chessiel, but Smedley
Speaker 1: Butler was writing about in his book, you know the
Speaker 1: Wars Iraqet. He was saying, why do we have our
Speaker 1: seventh fleet off the coast probing these Japanese territorial waters.
Speaker 1: We're provoking Chinese see the same thing, like why are
Speaker 1: you out? You know these are contested waters and you
Speaker 1: know the Spratley Islands, but it's a you know, they've
Speaker 1: they've got like these three little areas. You know that
Speaker 1: they're the Chinese and Americans are doing this dance, and
Speaker 1: that's going to lead to not just confrontation, it's going
Speaker 1: to lead to a direct conflict. I mean, we almost
Speaker 1: had a ship, the Decayedur run in with the Chinese
Speaker 1: ship and one of these days, just like it did
Speaker 1: a hundred years ago. You know, it's leading to a
Speaker 1: military build up and just like and Winslow inaccurately predicted it, like, oh,
Speaker 1: you can come and attack us and then they just
Speaker 1: hit us top down instead of you know, beak to beak,
Speaker 1: And I think that's what China is going to do.
Speaker 1: It's not going to be you know, just with some
Speaker 1: you know, big military bomb. It's going to be a
Speaker 1: multidermain fight where you know, cyber electronic attack is going
Speaker 1: to hit some brmal and then we have to you know,
Speaker 1: that could be could start with Taiwan as we've read
Speaker 1: a lot about the Chinese or wanting to exert their
Speaker 1: authority over you know, traditionally PRC their their Chinese and
Speaker 1: it's kind of like how they want to reunify the
Speaker 1: Korean peninsula. That's how China feels about Taiwan. And we
Speaker 1: have a treaty to defend them, and I think that's
Speaker 1: going to be exercised, unfortunately with losing a lot of
Speaker 1: American a lot of American blood. Another historical example, and
Speaker 1: this is another maybe more pertinent one to our discussion,
Speaker 1: is you know the Boxer Rebellion and that you know,
Speaker 1: there were American Marines in China, and this is a
Speaker 1: conflict we don't know. Americans don't know anything about. They
Speaker 1: don't care at all about this. But the Chinese right
Speaker 1: about suffering humiliation at the hands of the West, and
Speaker 1: this is a conflict we could give a damn about.
Speaker 1: Some is that it's not mainstream and those that don't
Speaker 1: and I'm not you know, some somebody that's deep into
Speaker 1: living in China have some you know, crazy fetish or something.
Speaker 1: But I mean if you do, if you travel and
Speaker 1: do business, you see this that you know, they don't
Speaker 1: forget that. Some people will talk about it, especially if
Speaker 1: you can get them in American university. But yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean it goes back to what we're mentioning with miss Young,
Speaker 1: Like what was this woman doing with multiple passports, cell
Speaker 1: phone and USB drives and this cash in her hotel?
Speaker 1: I mean debts? That is espionage. I mean it's not
Speaker 1: a lot of public information is out about what's going on,
Speaker 1: but you know, she's just happened to make making her
Speaker 1: way into the presidents a personal mar Lago compound. It's
Speaker 1: with USB drive with malware. I mean, this is something
Speaker 1: and there's there's been little discussion in some of the
Speaker 1: mainstream media about you know, the massive pushed to have
Speaker 1: espionage in our American universities by the Chinese. I think
Speaker 1: that's that is something that's not just for tech transfer,
Speaker 1: and I p the purposes, but that's a I think
Speaker 1: that's the way of the future because again it's a
Speaker 1: it's a country that's able to mobilize a population of
Speaker 1: a billion people and they see everybody of Chinese descent
Speaker 1: as belonging to China in their minds, very homogeneous culture,
Speaker 1: like one mind harmony as their mindset is. So, I
Speaker 1: mean I encountered it when I went to Colombia and
Speaker 1: I wrote an article about it, and it was it
Speaker 1: was before really I mean not to like pat myself
Speaker 1: on the back, but I think I was kind of
Speaker 1: the first person are really right about it, um openly
Speaker 1: and um or at least in like a mainstream outlet,
Speaker 1: and um I got some pushback for it. You know,
Speaker 1: it's interesting to see people come out of the woodwork
Speaker 1: and say this is racist. You can't say that. It's
Speaker 1: interesting you say that, Jack, because you know, we in
Speaker 1: America we talked about freedom of speech, but we don't
Speaker 1: really you know, you if you sit there and like
Speaker 1: wave our flags, some people think that's on patriotic. Some
Speaker 1: people pose the flag thing is its oppressive. I remember
Speaker 1: working with the Australian Commandos example, the counter that here
Speaker 1: in the Pacific. They say they were we're finishing our trainer.
Speaker 1: Say what they didn't have this piece of technology And
Speaker 1: I said, what if you can't link back up with
Speaker 1: your you know, HQ And they said, no warriors, mate,
Speaker 1: you just want to get off the ship and anyway
Speaker 1: we'll be in Australia. You know, they have this solidarity
Speaker 1: and the Chinese definitely have that. It'll be interesting to
Speaker 1: see is a military force, how they employed at if
Speaker 1: that can be something that they grow, and is America
Speaker 1: in the West even some of these other countries, they're
Speaker 1: not as hard as they once were. They do have
Speaker 1: some very good elite units in the in Northeast Asia
Speaker 1: and across Asia. But it's a China is building their
Speaker 1: force out. And one of the things we did when
Speaker 1: I was still in the uniforms work with their the
Speaker 1: Hong Kong Special Duties Unit. It's like a swat team,
Speaker 1: but it's a military component right there in Hong Kong.
Speaker 1: And it's kind of weird because we're tasked to go
Speaker 1: in there and do this. But you know there's there's
Speaker 1: a p l A, you know, headquarters down there and
Speaker 1: you know, Hong Kong and here we're training their elite units.
Speaker 1: But I will say this, they were very good. They
Speaker 1: impressed me to where I would put them on par
Speaker 1: with any unit that I've ever seen in the United States.
Speaker 1: They were shar fit. It could kit they you know,
Speaker 1: their tactics were first class. And sometimes we just underestimate
Speaker 1: our enemies. And that's I think we've been criticized by
Speaker 1: the Germans in the past by so many military We
Speaker 1: don't follow a lot of doctrine, were unpredictable because we're
Speaker 1: kind of a little bit too fly by the seat
Speaker 1: of our pants entrepreneurial. I know, as an army guy,
Speaker 1: you think like, wow, we have a lot of doctrine,
Speaker 1: but you know, we kind of go in and we
Speaker 1: don't follow a strategy, you know, lock lockstep in. In
Speaker 1: many ways, that's good, but I will say this that
Speaker 1: these countries they're not messing around. You get a lot
Speaker 1: of thought put into it, with a lot of financing,
Speaker 1: they're procuring a lot of technology. It's a I mean,
Speaker 1: if you look at that, you know J twenty kind
Speaker 1: of looks like the F twenty two. You start thinking
Speaker 1: a little bit wherein Yeah, it's a it's strange and
Speaker 1: you know, just like we saw a hundred years ago
Speaker 1: when or after the where I should say, Um, you
Speaker 1: know a lot of these Japanese cars strangely started to
Speaker 1: resemble American cars. And like you see when you're driving
Speaker 1: around in China. You know, we have Ford Motor Company
Speaker 1: over there, and some of the Chinese cars strangely like
Speaker 1: these Fords. They don't look like the Japanese. They look
Speaker 1: like what America has everything. You know, this I P
Speaker 1: theft is real. Uh, They're just taking it and they're
Speaker 1: going to continue to steal it and develop it. And
Speaker 1: just like the Japanese we're doing after World War Two,
Speaker 1: they're going to perfect it and they're gonna, you know,
Speaker 1: take it to the next level. Fred, this is a
Speaker 1: a massive conversation. As as you know, I kind of
Speaker 1: tried to open this this with is that you know,
Speaker 1: this is the question of our century, Um, And I
Speaker 1: really thank you for coming on the show and um
Speaker 1: talking about this today. And I feel like this is
Speaker 1: a beginning of the conversation. This kind of like sets
Speaker 1: the basis, I think for the listener to go and
Speaker 1: do some more research on their own. UM, but I
Speaker 1: wanted to give you the opportunity to, you know, um
Speaker 1: finished with any concluding thoughts or anything else you think
Speaker 1: it's important to mention. UM. Yeah, real quick, plug. Two
Speaker 1: things is as as we have been talking, and your
Speaker 1: listeners really should key in on. You know, there's a
Speaker 1: this b r I this these silk roots that there.
Speaker 1: It started off to two fold maritime and land, but
Speaker 1: then they're looking at this polar silk root. That's that's
Speaker 1: something that's gonna cut us off in that area. And
Speaker 1: your your listeners really do need to understand, you know,
Speaker 1: America and the whole Western way of life, it does
Speaker 1: revolve if we get drawn into something, whether it's an
Speaker 1: actor like North Korea provoking us or the Chinese. They
Speaker 1: don't have the capability right now to do this amphibious assault,
Speaker 1: but I believe Taiwan and our treaty with them to
Speaker 1: defend them and what the Chinese want to do because
Speaker 1: of their you know, homogene is tied to Taiwan. This
Speaker 1: this is gonna be something that America is going to
Speaker 1: spend a lot of time, blood and if you look
Speaker 1: at what we've done in the last eighteen years, you know,
Speaker 1: the struggles we've had, fighting guys wearing bed sheets. This
Speaker 1: is this is the real deal China is. That's varsity
Speaker 1: team here, and you know we have to just like
Speaker 1: if you get hit with an I D. You have
Speaker 1: to do that self assessment, like, hey, I'm my good
Speaker 1: is my junk still here in my own peace? We
Speaker 1: need to do this with China is like, hey, let's
Speaker 1: be honest, we need an assessment. Are we capable not
Speaker 1: a fighting? We can't drain our economy and that's what
Speaker 1: Chinese are really doing by you know, putting buying a
Speaker 1: little asset in Africa, buying this down in Australia doing
Speaker 1: all They're bleeding us like we bled Russia dry and
Speaker 1: led to their collapse. The Chinese can we sustain this?
Speaker 1: So we really do, Like you said, this is the
Speaker 1: fight of the century. You know, this is you know, uh,
Speaker 1: like a big, massive UFC fight that you know, we
Speaker 1: got to get ourselves in shape for. So it's time
Speaker 1: to hit training camp. And some ways sounds uh, I
Speaker 1: hate to make this comparison, but I mean we have
Speaker 1: faced some some aspects of this before when the USSR
Speaker 1: wedge the so called you know, Third World War, where
Speaker 1: they realized they weren't going to take us on directly,
Speaker 1: but what they could do was flip every country, you know,
Speaker 1: smaller third World countries communist and they'd be able to
Speaker 1: essentially box us in. Yes, and that's that's what China's doing.
Speaker 1: There's just death by a thousand cuts all around the globe.
Speaker 1: And now we have to think, you know, globally, and
Speaker 1: we are going to be off set. And the scariest thing,
Speaker 1: in my opinion is if they hit so many of
Speaker 1: these countries that affect the global GDP of you here
Speaker 1: on Earth and they switch from you know, the U
Speaker 1: S standard of currency is a base too, you know,
Speaker 1: the Chinese and worm you know, going to be second place.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be a big shift in countries. I think
Speaker 1: we'll start to around the globe, we'll start to align
Speaker 1: and seeing that China is the big dog, they're the
Speaker 1: ones that control the fight in the future, and we'll
Speaker 1: probably go more into tough till totalitarian state and control. Awesome, Fred,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for coming on and talking to
Speaker 1: us about this today. Yeah, thanks, guys, I really appreciate
Speaker 1: and h have a great weekend Pact show today. There's
Speaker 1: still a few things I want to get to, but
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Speaker 1: can see our full archive of shows. As always, keep
Speaker 1: up with us at SOFTWAREP Radio as well. UH with that,
Speaker 1: wanted to get into a few other quick things. Uh.
Speaker 1: I know. One thing you wanted to mention is an
Speaker 1: update with General McMasters. Oh Man. I was just bringing
Speaker 1: it up because I saw an article about a speech
Speaker 1: McMaster had given and I was just like, is this
Speaker 1: dude on drugs? He was talking about how we were
Speaker 1: you know, we have this narrative that the public is
Speaker 1: war weary, and it's just the featist mentality regarding the
Speaker 1: war in Afghanistan. It's like, dude, what are you talking about? Like,
Speaker 1: so your big plan is to just deploy troops they're
Speaker 1: into infinity, Like that's not a strategy, bro, Like I
Speaker 1: swear to god. I was like, I was like, this
Speaker 1: is this guy in a battle haze? Do we need
Speaker 1: to have him like take a knee, face out and
Speaker 1: drink water? Like what is wrong with this dude? I
Speaker 1: mean I think I think it was a Military Times article.
Speaker 1: You can go and read it for yourself. I was
Speaker 1: just like, it made my head hurt. What is wrong
Speaker 1: with this dude? Yeah, So give that a look. Um.
Speaker 1: I wanted to mention a kind of in some lighter
Speaker 1: news that there's a new Ghost Recon game out today,
Speaker 1: and I remember we had one of the guys from
Speaker 1: the Ghost Recon game on a while back, and I
Speaker 1: just figured I bring it up because it appeals to
Speaker 1: this audience. A out of this audience are gamers, and
Speaker 1: they love which game is it? It's a new Ghost
Speaker 1: reconcause I might I might have consulted on that game.
Speaker 1: Actually really yeah, I did, like some like low level
Speaker 1: I guess you could say consulting. It wasn't like I
Speaker 1: was there tech advisor or anything. But um, they they
Speaker 1: talked to me, interviewed me about special operations, asked me
Speaker 1: some like um, that's awesome, I guess like pot type
Speaker 1: questions like with this interest to you, what do you
Speaker 1: think of this? And then they showed me some concept
Speaker 1: art and I gave them some feedback on that, and
Speaker 1: that's all right, yeah, because I know people have been
Speaker 1: a fan of that series in general, and I saw
Speaker 1: that there's a new game out today and when we
Speaker 1: had that guy on, a lot of people are excited
Speaker 1: about this game. So uh, like I said, a lot
Speaker 1: of people in this audience love war video games as
Speaker 1: much as they get criticized in the media and say that,
Speaker 1: you know, you're gonna become a psychopath, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: serial killer if you play war games. Uh and that's
Speaker 1: I guess that's really it for now, UM, because we
Speaker 1: covered a lot here. Next show, however, I know you're
Speaker 1: going to be in Europe. Yeah, I'm gonna be gone
Speaker 1: for a few days. UM. But my my old Eric Burlson,
Speaker 1: he's gonna be on the podcast. He'll be in studio,
Speaker 1: retired green beret. UM. Me and uh Me and Eric
Speaker 1: were in the same company in fifth Group. UM and
Speaker 1: we were never on the same O D A, but
Speaker 1: we were on the O D B. We're on the
Speaker 1: B team together for a little while. The only O
Speaker 1: dB I think of is the member of LU Thank
Speaker 1: old dirty Bastard Baby. I like it little. Uh. You
Speaker 1: know that the B team is like the support element
Speaker 1: for the company. UM And I was there the last
Speaker 1: couple of months before I got out of the Army
Speaker 1: doing Uh. I was. I was the a ops guy,
Speaker 1: which is it just means I maintained a series of
Speaker 1: three ring binders about parachute jumps. It wasn't that exciting.
Speaker 1: But that's where I know Burlson from. And I'm sorry
Speaker 1: I won't be here for that interview. I'm gonna try
Speaker 1: to meet with him the day after. UM. Really good guy.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen him in years. Yeah, i'll meet him.
Speaker 1: I'll let you know that you're too cool and you're
Speaker 1: in Europe now, I mean, you've got things to do,
Speaker 1: so um, I look forward to meeting him. But also
Speaker 1: I did texture the sporning and the only reason I
Speaker 1: moved it to Tuesday was because you know, Matt already
Speaker 1: confirmed he was coming on. But Vicky Behanna will be on,
Speaker 1: as I mentioned to discuss President Trump partning Michael, uh,
Speaker 1: possibly Vicky with Michael Behanna, but I know Vicky will
Speaker 1: be on, so you know, it'd be great to talk about.
Speaker 1: I thought it was great news. I'm very excited for Michael.
Speaker 1: It was the story I followed for a long time. Uh,
Speaker 1: that's it for for now. As you guys know, I'm
Speaker 1: on my last run of shows here. We have someone
Speaker 1: else coming into engineer the show on Tuesday, but you
Speaker 1: know I'm gonna continue here until uh my run at
Speaker 1: the second last week this month. And how's the male
Speaker 1: prostitutes and going? And I am not put some put
Speaker 1: some ads in back page? Well there is no backpage anymore, right,
Speaker 1: I'm sure that they've moved to something else though. But
Speaker 1: I did actually want to mention. You know, I brought
Speaker 1: it up last episode that I am doing a lot
Speaker 1: of voice over. Now I've always been doing voiceover, but
Speaker 1: I'm kind of stepping up my game here. Uh. And
Speaker 1: for those that that are you know, are just kind
Speaker 1: of just getting started on doing ads. I've been doing
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff where I'm doing all of the imaging.
Speaker 1: So let's say you want to run like a fifteen
Speaker 1: thirties sixty second radio ad podcast add uh, and you
Speaker 1: want me to create, you know, get the music on there,
Speaker 1: get the sound effects, like have it ready to go
Speaker 1: for radio for a podcast, I will gladly do that
Speaker 1: for you. I don't do video editing, however, if you
Speaker 1: have a video ready to go and you need me
Speaker 1: to sync up the audio to the video. Um, in
Speaker 1: terms of like narrating what's on the actual screen, I
Speaker 1: did one of those for someone recently. Um, it's a
Speaker 1: little bit tougher to do to get the audio exactly
Speaker 1: on points. That's a little bit more pricey, but I've
Speaker 1: been very reasonable with my prices. So if you need
Speaker 1: a voice over done, I will gladly do it, and
Speaker 1: I will give out my email address strictly for that.
Speaker 1: Don't email me for other stuff. Rates are very reasonable.
Speaker 1: But it's uh, Ian Scotto Radio at gmail dot com
Speaker 1: for serious inquiries because I know that you know people
Speaker 1: are gonna email me about the show. This is my
Speaker 1: personal email, So if it's about the show, I'm honestly
Speaker 1: gonna deleted. I'm not uh answering that type of stuff
Speaker 1: for that email. That's all soft rep dot radio at
Speaker 1: soft rep dot com. But if you own a business,
Speaker 1: you want me to do voice over for you and
Speaker 1: and give you a rate, uh with what you're looking at.
Speaker 1: Ian's got a radio at gmail dot com. That's it
Speaker 1: for me. Yeah, that's it. Um, Murphy's Law still out there.
Speaker 1: My own my own book is still out there. Um,
Speaker 1: go and pick it up. By my book. It's a
Speaker 1: great book. Uh. Well, thank you Matt, thank you Fred.
Speaker 1: And uh that's a hell of a good show. Yep.
Speaker 1: And a lot of great guests on the horizon, as
Speaker 1: you see from these books stacked up in front of you. Um. Yeah, man,
Speaker 1: we have some people coming on. I'm I'm excited. They're
Speaker 1: gonna be really good interviews. Yeah. Um, that guy right there,
Speaker 1: David Richardson, he'll be in studio next week. He's a
Speaker 1: former marine now working as an artist. That's some of
Speaker 1: his art on the front cover, um and goes into
Speaker 1: his story. So I'm excited for that one, very cool,
Speaker 1: excited for all these shows before I get ready to
Speaker 1: get out of here. But you know, I just said
Speaker 1: your new engineer coming in, so I assume you will
Speaker 1: be continuing, uh and I leave. Yeah, it's gonna be
Speaker 1: like a one man man that weeks for a little while. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all right, well stay subscribed and and we'll see what
Speaker 1: we have on the horizon. Thanks guys, you've been listening
Speaker 1: to self red Radio. New episodes up every Wednesday and Friday.
Speaker 1: Follow the show on Instagram and Twitter at self red Radio.