Cleared Hot - Powered By BRCC - Evolving at the Speed of War | Full Auto Friday | 7.24.2026

Episode Date: July 24, 2026

Every other Friday it's just me and the inbox. This week the emails came in heavy, so we cover a lot of ground. Two people in law enforcement, both strong personalities, trying to build a relationship that works. Where confidence stops and ego starts, and how to tell you've crossed the line. Why the toughest guy in the room still needs a place to put the shield down. The difference between the Jewish faith and the Israeli government, and why we've lost the ability to talk about either one without painting with a broom. Being able to criticize your own team without getting thrown off it. Moving a family across the country and a 15-year-old who won't sign off on it. When you engage your kids in the decision, and when you just have to be the father and make the call. Twenty years of sustained conflict and what it actually did to our capability. Real reps, the word "sacrifice," and how warfare is changing. Drownproof Conversation Starters: ⁠https://shop.clearedhotpodcast.com/⁠ Take the Operator Code Assessment:  ⁠https://www.theoperatorcode.com⁠ Today's Sponsors: Willie's Remedies:  Order now at ⁠https://www.drinkwillies.com⁠ and use code CLEAREDHOT for 20% off of your first order + free shipping on orders over $95. AG1:  ⁠https://www.drinkag1.com/clearedhot ⁠to get a FREE AG1 Flavor Sampler and AGZ Sampler to try all the flavors, plus FREE Vitamin D3+K2 and AG1 Welcome Kit with your first AG1 subscription order! 

Okay, got the red smoke. So the smoke, I'm looking at danger close now. Well, hello, everybody. Welcome back to another Friday episode, continuing our trend. Every other Friday, it's me by myself answering questions. The next Friday will be with Michael. Some things to talk about before we dive in. I feel like at this point, if you follow the podcast, you know that I wrote a book.

The book is called Drownproof. Please pick up a copy. If you haven't and leave a review. review if you haven't with the book. I didn't want the book to be an end state. I wanted it to be a beginning, a start of the journey. And sometimes with that, especially for me, I do better when I have some tools. So I created conversation starter cards. I was out of these for a long time. I am now back in stock. Here's what you're going to get if you pick up a conversation starter. There are three. It's a deck of cards. 52 cards, two of them. One's the instructions. One tells you a little bit about

the book three categories there's a challenge there is a quote and then there is a reflection here's how i would suggest that you use them here's how i use them first you could shuffle them obviously that would be a good thing to do unless you want to go through those sequentially you live your life how you want to but what i'll do is i'll shuffle them pull a card out for the day this is a reflection are you suffering in silence right now who in your life could you tell what's stopping you this one Wow, can hit pretty hard depending on where you're at. I was having this conversation with somebody on the Jiu-Jitsu mats Sunday. Don't confuse what something may look like on the outside with the reality of what's going on on the inside.

And I'll leave it at that broadly. I was talking about myself in those moments. Nobody ever really knows what you're going through. But you don't need to suffer in silence, especially if you have friends, family, and people that care about you. So you can reach out. Now, obviously, I didn't answer this specifically because, you know, there are not every aspect of my life do I share. And this one is just me continuing to learn business lessons that I wish I should have learned before. Trust, but verify is a very real thing. And I constantly am getting humbled by what I don't know in the business world. So that's what that reflection is about. It's not like personal life falling apart. I don't have cancer or anything like that. What I would recommend is when you pull a card, put it out of the deck. and leave it out of the deck until you work your way all the way through. That way, you won't pull the same card twice.

So if you enjoyed the book, if you're looking for an interesting way to start conversations with friends, families, loved one. I am looking at making one of these for business leaders and for parents as well. Same themes, just a way to open conversations and have them guided. You can go get them. I ordered a bunch this time. So I have a bunch. And now I know that ordering cadence and I can kind of get going and reorder another one.

So I hopefully don't run out again. No promises, though. All righty then. Let's dive into question number one. We're going to go straight into my wheelhouse relationships. Here we go. Alpha females. I have never received an email with that as the subject line, so it got me interested.

Andy, I've been wanting to write this for a while because I think you're one of the few people who might have an honest perspective on it. I don't know if I will. I'll give you my honest opinion on it, which perhaps could be interchangeable with perspective. The only thing I can promise you is that it will be honest. I've spent most of my adult life in a law enforcement career where confidence, decisiveness, and staying calm under pressure weren't just strengths. They were requirements. Those qualities have served me well professionally, but I've realized they can make dating a lot more complicated. People often use the term alpha male or alpha female, I should say.

Sorry, I'm so used to saying alpha male that slipped right out. Alpha female, as with the title of the email. And while I don't love labels, I understand why people would describe me that way. I'm independent, self-sufficient, and not looking for someone to rescue me. At the same time, I still want to feel safe, protected, and feminine in a relationship. All of that totally makes sense to me. Those things don't feel contradictory to me, but they often seem to confuse the men that I meet. I'm curious what dating looks like from your perspective.

How does this strong, confident man build a relationship? relationship with a woman who also has a strong personality. How do you know when one or how do you know when confidence becomes ego? How do two people who are both leaders stop competing and start complimenting each other? I found that a lot of men say they want a strong woman, but what they really seem to want is someone who's independent until it challenges them. Finding someone who is secure enough to appreciate strength without feeling threatened by it has been harder than I expected. I met a great guy and we have been together for almost five months. Everything is going great, but recently we had some issues. I work with mostly men as I am in law enforcement. He is also a

cop from a different agency. Lately he's been asking me if I have been asking or been asked for my number by other cops and other questions, etc. I don't mind questions early on in the relationship. but I don't think it would be tolerable for long term. We've had honest and productive conversations about it. Given the fact that his concerns about my job are beyond my control, what do you recommend? There's quite a bit in here. Let's start with, before getting into the relationship, one, something stuck out here. How do you know when confidence becomes ego?

I think first and foremost, you should never try to get yourself to a place or tell yourself that you or anybody else doesn't have an ego. This is something that I bring up when I publicly speak because one of the key leadership characteristics that we are looking for, enlisted and officer leaders in the military, I'll just say broadly, is humility. It is so important. And humility does not mean that you don't have an ego. Humility means that you keep your ego in check. and specifically when it comes to your decision-making process, you do the best you can to remove your ego from that decision-making process so you can maintain your objectivity.

And I always specify when I bring this up, because I've seen people when I say that right down, literally write down in their notes, have no ego. And that is a mistake. And it's just not possible. Anybody ever who tells you that they don't have an ego, all they really did was tell you that their ego is likely very massive. They need a car for themselves and another car to chauffeur their ego right behind them,

or a corner office and the neighboring one for their ego as well. Now, specifically, though, to your question, the difference between confidence and when does confidence become ego? Confidence, to me, is built over small steps and performance repeated over time. That is how you build your confidence in anything. It is working your way through that Dunning cruver. Kruger effect where when you first start off you think you know everything and then you have this realization that you don't know a damn thing and then almost this is actually almost ties into my reflection card when it comes to business this is just my journey of I think I'm doing okay I know

nothing I think I'm doing okay I know nothing all of that is humbling but what I'm getting along the way and this is how I try to reframe it is tuition payments and some of those things are literally very expensive but I'm trying to view it as that because I am trying to build my own confidence when it comes to my understanding of business. And I'm doing so by getting reps in. Confidence is built over reps. I would say ego or an overinflated ego is when there is this detachment between confidence in yourself legitimately tied to the reps you have gotten in over time. And maybe even it's tied to hubris in some way, this overinflated sense of yourself or maybe you're just a little bit earlier in that Dunning, yeah, the Dunning Krueger effect.

where you don't have enough failure in your life to realize that the tuition payment is coming. And so what you think you are far more capable than you are, you can't make a mistake, you know more than other people. That to me, that reeks of ego and hubris in an overinflated sense of self. To me personally, in my opinion, those things are very closely tied, ego and hubris. So I would say when confidence detaches itself from the, the actual ability to look back at your own performance over time or to have your confidence tied to actual actions, success, working your way through issues, however you would want

to define it. As soon as it detaches from that and become something else, becomes toxic in nature, becomes overriding in nature when it becomes your decision-making process, that's when it becomes ego. And we are all susceptible to that. I certainly am. I do my best to keep it in check. And I tell you what, the easiest way and fastest way for it to be kept in check is keep pushing yourself in every area of your life. You will find massive tuition payments. And when you find those tuition payments, wow, they take your ego and they confront you with it or your confidence and they confront you with it both of those. And I think as long as you can accept that and work your way through it, you can build on top of that and probably rebuild your confidence. but man, it is shattering to sense of self and capability when that happens.

It's okay. Just keep going. Build momentum. Build confidence back. So that's my answer of when confidence becomes ego. Today's episode is brought to you by Willie's Remedy. Before I get into this, this is a new category of sponsor for the show. I'll be very clear here.

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and make sure you make a good decision. Back to the show. How does a strong, confident man build a relationship with a woman who also has a strong personality? I'll put this out there. I don't have a huge dating history. I don't. I was married for almost 20 years. I dated Leah after my marriage ended.

I am married to Leah. There was nothing else in between those two. I was young. I had a single girlfriend in high school. I dated a couple people in between high school and meeting my ex-wife. So I don't have a tremendous amount of reps when it comes to the dating scene, which is why I'm fascinated by Michael's responses sometimes when I ask him about dating. But I'm just being honest.

That's the personal optic that I have on dating. I think to me, I am attracted. When I think about Leah, what am I attracted to about Leah? First, just who she is as a person, not what she's able to do, even though she's able to do some really incredible things, but it's who she is as a person. I love her personality. She has a very strong personality.

And we have strong personalities in very different ways. So I think it's totally possible. I think if they're complementary, that's going to work even better. I think if you're strong in exactly the same ways, maybe when people are talking about magnets, I'm not saying that opposites always have to attract and that the same are always going to be polar opposites and go apart.

But having a relationship with somebody who has a complementary personality to yourself as opposed to one that's identical and then becomes competitive, I think would help. So I think a lot of this has to do with who and how you select to spend your time with and to be your partner. Maybe it's a good idea to identify that warning sign of, man, this person has a really strong personality, but it's a lot of the ways that my personality is strong too. Maybe don't disqualify them, but put that in the back of your mind. And if, you know, there are other options and those options are perhaps more complimentary than competitive, maybe go that direction. But like I said, I am saying this with a pretty shallow pool of dating history in my adult life.

So totally possible, though. And I think he would want two people with a strong personality in a relationship. For myself, again, speaking only for myself, I don't think I would be attracted to somebody with a demure or weak personality. I don't mean weak negatively, but a shire personality or even just less of a personality or a little bit more of a sheltered individual. I don't think I would want that. I would want somebody that when you need to, you can lean upon them. And when they need to, they can lean upon you. That would be what I'm looking for in broad terms from personalities in a relationship.

But again, that's just me. So I think that knocks out the middle paragraph there. Let's dive in specifically. I've never spent a second in law enforcement. I do have a bunch of law enforcement buddies. They talk to me sometimes about the inner working of the male, female, dynamic inside of law enforcement. And I think anybody in law enforcement, if you were to ask them if it can get a little bit off the rails at time, and if there is an overlap in personal and professional relationship,

and you guys are often small individual units or elements from time to time, isolated time alone, just point being there is opportunity for it to go. in a non-professional direction. I believe I read an article about two police officers having to call for help because they were banging it out in the back of their cop car and the doors locked. I know I've seen that in a movie. I mean, in Supertrovers, they remove the doors. So this isn't in that scenario.

I'm pretty sure that that is a real thing. Now, that doesn't speak for all law enforcement, but I'm just saying from the people that I know, they will tell you that it can happen. And maybe at a likelihood a little bit higher than a job that doesn't have those unique circumstances. You are a cop. Your boyfriend is a cop. You both know that. I think it has nothing to do with you being a strong woman.

I think it has to do the questions specifically that you are being asked have to do with, your boyfriend understanding the reality. Let's make some assumptions here. Let's make that you are an independently strong, attractive woman. Your boyfriend understands that. He works at a different agency. He probably understands the type of people that you may be around and associated with. Like I said, and I don't need to retill the dirt of the interesting dynamics of that relationship. But if he understands that, he even the strongest of people will question themselves at times. I don't consider myself to be the strongest of people. I struggle with questioning myself often when it comes to terms of my capability,

my knowledge, my worthiness to be in some of the rooms that I'm able to be in, the value that I might bring into those things. It's not an uncommon thing for people to question themselves. I think it's a healthy thing as long as it doesn't get out of control and you can keep it in check. So if he understands the dynamic and he cares about you, at least leave a section of your brain open to the fact or possibility that he's asking this not out of confidence but out of fear. He's worried because of the amount that he cares about you that that may be happening. and whether that's a reasonable fear or an unreasonable fear, and that's you and your assessment of whether or not that fear is reasonable or unreasonable,

it's still real for him. So it sounds like you've had productive conversations about it, which is great. The concerns are about your job and beyond your control. I don't think the concerns are about your job. The concerns based off the questions are about the type of people that you may be around professionally, not of your choosing, because that's just the police department that you work for, and that's they have who they have. But what could come from that as well, too. So I don't think it actually has anything to do with your job because he understands the job. I would say maybe

just keep it in the back of your mind. He's asking this because even though he is a strong person, and maybe he is an alpha male, you would describe him as that. That doesn't mean you don't worry. It doesn't mean you don't care about things. It doesn't mean you don't wake up sometimes. in the morning or have a ridiculous dream that you associate a little bit too much weight to, even though you know it's not reality, but it gets you to think about stuff. And the next thing you know, you can talk yourself into not a mental health spiral, but an unhealthy mental approach to something that may not even be there. You can talk your way into it. So just keep that in there. I think I'll close it up with it may be the best way that I can answer the strong female.

and again, not tips for a better relationship. That's not a good subject line for me giving advice when it comes to this. But maybe just some understanding of the other side of that coin from a strong mail because there is something that jumped out here too, and it was in your second paragraph. I'm independent, self-sufficient, and not looking for someone to rescue me. So I'm going to assume that what you are looking for in a partner is very similar, if not the same. You want somebody who's independent, self-sufficient,

and also not looking to be rescued, right? I think that's a great foundation. That's a team that can mutually support each other. And again, this isn't necessarily personality. This is where you are in life and how you view and approach life. So I think both parties, you and your boyfriend, are probably independent, self-sufficient, and not looking for someone to rescue them.

At the same time, I still want to feel safe, protected, and feminine in a relationship. What I'll give you is the other side of that, coin. And the other side of that coin is even if you are with the strongest guy that has ever walked the face of the earth, they also want to be with somebody where they can take their physical or metaphorical armor off and feel safe, protected, and wanted and cared for in a relationship as well. Not served on hand in foot. That's not what I'm saying because again, two independent people coming together working as a team, that's great.

I'm saying there is a balance. And regardless of how tough somebody may seem on the exterior, I am telling you right now, I think at the end of the day, every man, if they were honest with you, would say is, yeah, they want to have a place where they can feel safe. They want to have a place where they can feel protected. Now, they might be responsible for the protection there, and I'm not talking about physical protection. Again, it's back to that. It's a place where they can unwind and be a more vulnerable version of who they are. And, you know, masculine in a relationship versus feminine in a relationship, I would take the masculinity out that.

I would say loved and appreciated and have somebody who, regardless of how much they are nailing it, just killing it in the outside world, wraps their arm around them and says, words are tough today. I've had a few too many of the earth. Urbamates, wraps their arms around them and says, I appreciate what you're doing. I love you.

I'm proud of you. I am telling you right now, I haven't asked what I would consider to be the toughest people that I know in my life, but I'm pretty sure I can speak for most guys, regardless of how tough you are, regardless of the gnarliness of your blue collar job or whatever it is, you're a coal miner who spends their time trying to get to the bottom of, you know, planet Earth or a military contractor or whatever it may be having somebody who can come home to

and take a deep breath and unwrap and unwind and know that they have your back and that they love you for who you are and not what you do and that they can wrap their arms around you and be affectionate to you and you can put down the shield and the layers that you have to have to protect yourself from the rest of the world. That is the other side of the coin of what you are looking for. And if you can do that, I think you can have two wildly, independent, mutually supporting people in a relationship and it can crush. I think when it gets out of skew, it's 80, I mean, I don't even want to put a ratio up,

but we'll call it 80, 20, 70, 30, and it's starting to lean more in one direction. Or someone, somebody starts to feel like what they do isn't. noticed anymore or isn't seen or they're not appreciated. A lot of this stuff is communication, but I am here to tell you the physical aspect of that and to be there and have that environment where you feel safe, protected, and feminine, and he feel safe, protected, desired, appreciated, and affection is man. When you can find that, it means the world. And I think that's how you find harmony in a relationship between two, maybe even headstrong or just really independent people. One other thing. How do two people who are both leaders stop competing and start complimenting each other?

Compete at work if you need to. You guys aren't competing because you're in different agencies. There should be no competition at home. That would be the best advice that I can give you. Be leaders at work. Be leaders in who you are as a person in your relationship. But don't try to dominate the other person. Be complimentary, not competitive. leave the measuring tape back at work. Leave it somewhere else. Don't bring it into the relationship. There's nothing beneficial that's going to come from that.

If you start to feel that that's getting a skew, have a conversation about it. If that's not helping, bring a third party in to have the conversation with them to get some objectivity. It's great that you're both leaders. But don't try to be overbearing or overlead or take control of the relationship. because again, complimentary, not competing. Leave that shit at the job. And that's all I have for number one. I know I rambled a bit, but hopefully I got you an answer that you were looking for.

Question number two. I like this one. It brings up two very different topics. But the first one I'm going to address when we get to it. Second one is a total divergence from that topic. Hey, Andy, I listen to almost every episode, except for some of the negligent discharge ones because Michael won't bring up skydiving, and I think that's criminal.

That, and he stuck in the Jews are bad sphere, period. Stop right here. Hard pause. This is an important one. And this goes far beyond Michael. I was listening to a conversation, a podcast conversation between John Kariaku and Andrew Bustwante. And they both came from the agency.

It appears that they did similar jobs, but different. one I think was there for much longer than the other and if they did do the same job he got much farther down the road but the point being is the host asked them about their thoughts on the influence of Israel in the United States specifically the political system and John said something to begin with and when Andrew spoke he brought up a very important point and I'm going to repeat what he said. So this is not my creation, but I think this is important to remember because somehow this has gotten lost not only in United States society, in our own political divisiveness, but specifically when it comes to Israel in Judaism. Andrew said this, there is a difference between the Jewish faith and the Israeli government.

And when he said that, that completely rang true to me. And he went on to talk a little bit more about how the separation of the two and that it is not only possible, but should be totally acceptable to talk about the actions of the Israeli government in the terms that you feel are appropriate and not have that somehow associated with anti-Semitism. because the Israeli government and the Jewish faith are very different things. I agree with that statement. Now, I'm not an expert on geopolitics, but I also do know a fair amount of Jewish people. Some of my closest friends are Jewish and they're fantastic people. Not all of them support the actions of the Israeli government the same to the same level or at all. And the reason I said this is beyond just Israel and Judaism, you could change a few words in that sentence when talking about the Jewish faith in the Israeli government and talk about the current administration and the Republican Party or the previous administration and the Democratic Party.

There is a range of people who would call themselves a conservative or call themselves a liberal. there are a lot of people in that range. Let's go back at one administration when Joe Biden was president. I knew a lot of people that although externally they were being called libtards or whatever the vernacular of the day was because they aligned more to the left than to the right. But they did not agree what was happening in the current administration largely. They'd be able to point at things that they appreciated, but the vast majority of things they were very, very critical of. Almost as if there was a difference between the administration in office and the larger pool of people that may, in a degree, more than 50%, align with the left. The right is the same thing.

The MAGA movement, which I don't even know how to quantify in size, scope and scale. The volume level is definitely high, but everything I just said about the left is true of the right. as well. There are a range of people. There are some people, I'll use myself as an example. The way the immigration policy was executed, oh, I have some suggestions. I'm not ever asked for my suggestions by the administration, probably rightfully so, because I don't really know anything about it, the mechanics of how it works. But the how actually matters. I believe deeply that we have to have immigration policy and enforcement. The how of you do, the how you do that, I do believe actually matters. That would be, though, if I were to look at something the current

administration is doing, I'm going to point to that as a success. What we are doing in administration is more successful than the previous administration, in my opinion. Now, if we move forward to the war in Iran, if you have listened to me talk about this, I have very publicly talked about that I don't understand what it is we're trying to accomplish. I'm still waiting for metrics that we're going to be used to be clearly and concisely defined. I'm starting to hear regime change again. It went from nuclear. All of these things. And I'm also incredibly hesitant of using military force and action because I understand the cost of it. And I'll be the first person to tell you that we need to be ready to do so, prepared to do so and willing to do so. But we should do so judiciously.

I am very critical of both the left and right administrations, even though I might get categorized as somebody who is more on the right. The reality is my politics are super purple. I'm damn near in the middle on almost everything, which isn't necessarily germane to this point. But we have lost the ability to have a conversation without, instead of drawing with a fine tooth pen, it's a marker that has an ink tip the size of the bottom of this cup.

And we've lost the ability to have a conversation to be critical of the things that we think could be done better from a party that we might actually support any level of criticality. It's like, boom, you're a traitor. Same thing on the left. Any level of criticality, you can tell there's fear on both sides to say anything negative about anything because this team aspect has become so overwhelmingly powerful. Again, I open this specifically when it comes to the Israeli government and the Jewish faith.

You need to be able to separate those two things. I don't know what level the Israeli government has influence over the United States. It would seem from the outside, from somebody who is not read in on anything that is a curiously high amount. Does that mean that they are behind the levers throwing of everything evil that is going on in the world that some people would tell you? No, I don't believe that. Do I think that they have an outstripped or outside level of influence? Probably. Does that mean I have any issue with somebody of,

of the Jewish faith. No. And we need to be able to have that nuanced conversation. You should be able to call balls and strikes. You should be able to be critical of your own political party without being thrown out of it because I would hope that people realize the feedback you might be giving that sounds critical probably comes from a place of wanting to improve that party. So we need to find some nuance in this. Michael is not stuck in the phase of Jews are bad. he doesn't like or he perceives that the Israeli government has more influence than it should. And I think a lot of people are feeling that way. That's anecdotal.

I don't have proof of that. People are very vocal about that, but it's easy to be vocal in an outsized capacity, even with social media. So I'm just saying, let's not lose the forest for the trees. And let's take a step back and stop, you know, painting with a broom. Let's paint with a scalpel. be critical and specific as opposed to broad and non-specific. Because when people do that, all they're trying to do is shut down your conversation or shut down your argument. Oh, you're an anti-Semite.

No, two very different things, at least in my opinion. So I'll get off my soapbox on that one. I would just love to see the return of a little bit more nuanced conversation. To the question. Anyway, I have three children, 17, 15, and 10. We live in Maine and have had enough of the BS in the, in the state. Lived here 40 of my 43 years. My wife, who I met when I lived in Charlotte, has family in Tennessee. We are moving there. I'm in a rut up here, and it's time to see a

different side of the pasture. Now, I know the grass is probably the same color down there, but the blade of grass will be a different angle. What a beautiful way to put that. I love that. That said, the fight I'm having with my 15-year-old is really tough. He's a super bright kid, always getting awards for his grades. Any interest he picks up, he dives ahead. head first into, then learns to damn near master the thing. The human body at age seven, he could tell you what every organ did and why it was there, then engines, then guns, now gardens. We made maple syrup this spring. Anyway, how do I convince this kid that moving will be a good thing for him? It will suck at first, and I'm 43, and I'm going to start over. I've even told him

to do the pros versus cons list. He won't because he told me, I would be right. What do I do? He's got a touch of the tis. Apparently, as do we all, based off feedback from my wife. As do I, I'm not what you would call a hugger, just kind of lost. It's a great question. And the simplest answer I can give you is this. Your son sounds incredibly capable. It sounds like when he finds things that he likes or that engage him, he crushes them. He is doing that where you live now. But that isn't working for you. And it's not allowing you to be the best version of yourself as a father or as a husband. There is a reason that we have ages for certain things in this country when it comes to driving, owning a firearm, joining the military, voting, drinking

alcohol. Why do we have those things? Well, age is generally associated with, I mean, I have, I wonder what the specific answer would be with that. Probably maturity. I'm not going to say wisdom, but maybe wisdom, better decision making. Point being in that is, as the numbers go up, you have more context on life. With that context, you can make decisions that could be considered more complex, like where to move your family. The point I'm getting to is this. You are in the role of being his father. You can explain to him as much as you want to the why, and he may not have the ability, the contextual ability yet, to understand that it will be a net benefit. And that's okay. That's why you are the father and he is your son. And that's why you are the one who is

making this decision versus turning it over to your children and allowing them to make that decision with their far reduced level of optic and context on the world. What I just said is simple. It's not easy. He may not like that. And that's okay. As a parent, sometimes you have to make decisions that your children aren't going to like in their best interest because you understand the downstream cascading difference that it can make. They may not even have the ability to understand that.

It doesn't mean you shouldn't try to explain it. It doesn't mean you shouldn't talk to them about that. Engage them in the decision-making process to a degree. I don't think you should ever get into a place where the 15-year-old thinks that they are ruling the roost and that you are working for them. Because I have actually seen people get to that place and it, oh, it did not turn out well. And actually later in life for that 15-year-old who thought they were ruling the roost at that age, it didn't work out well later in their life either. It was a very skewed perspective of the way the world worked. you are the father you are the husband if you and your wife come to a place where you realize that this is the best decision for your family at some point in time you need to pull the trigger on it so take the time as it would seem you have and he's already acknowledged if you do the pro versus con list example it's going to win meaning it's not going to win it will land in the pro column as opposed to the con he doesn't like that because he doesn't like that because he's going to win he doesn't like that because he's going to win he doesn't like that because

because he likes where he is now. One of the beauties of being older and traveling more is that you realize there is more to the world than where you are right now. It's a beautiful thing. It has probably grounded me more than anything is being able to see the world and recognizing, although I think I'm the center of the universe,

and although I think what we have is the best ever, and it can never get better. I'm not saying I believe all these things, but it's easy to, you know, where I am is the best. and it can't be better. The more you travel, the more you realize, man, there is some awesome stuff out there. And my life would be less fulfilled if I didn't get out there and experience some of it. You know that. It is impossible for him to know this because this is his whole world at this point.

You are getting ready to make a decision that is going to expand his knowledge of the world. And the reality is you don't know how it's going to go. could he hate it? Yes, he absolutely could. 15-year-olds sometimes hate everything, though. So that might not have anything to do with the move. The move certainly wouldn't help, but he might have hated anything or everything anyway. Could he love it? Yes, he absolutely could.

He could find a totally different social circle, maybe someone who becomes his best friend for the rest of his life. He thrives in that new environment. Both are possible. I think the latter is a lot more possible than the former because 15-year-olds are actually really resilient. I moved a good amount when I was a kid. Most of it is local, but sometimes in the military, you know, you move around and the unknown, the fear of the unknown can be crippling at times or it can be scary at times. But it doesn't have to cripple you and it doesn't have to scare you into a place of paralysis. So the best advice I can give you is this.

Continue doing what you're doing, reinforcing to your son that you're making a decision with his best interest in mind. and then do what your job is. Be the father, make the decision. And if your son gets mad at you, that's okay. Don't shun him away. Don't turn him off. Give him some time. Give him some time to get comfortable.

And again, this is not you like sitting in the corner and just waiting. Still continue to have your normal relationship. But give him time to get a foundation in his feet underneath him. And then when he starts showing interest, or has a desire to go try something new, hang out with somebody new, whatever it may be, support that, and your relationship will be better. My suspicion is for this move. Could it still be great even if you didn't move?

Of course it could be. But I get where you're coming from. Nobody wants to make a decision that they think is going to hurt their children. But not making any decision will also hurt your children as well. I think it's actually really empowering and important to show your kids that you can make change. That just because we did it yesterday or for the last 10 years, we have to do this for the rest of our life. I'm not saying make drastic life changes just because you feel like making drastic like changes. But if the opportunity presents itself or you're forced to do so, show your young children that regardless of what happens, you're going to figure it out.

You'll get to a new place. You'll start over. You'll rebuild from a social perspective, from an economic perspective. from an economic perspective, and you'll figure your way through it because you have the tools necessary. I can't think of a more powerful lesson to show your kids. So you're on the right track. I wish I could say something to you. We're like, oh, yeah, just say this and it's going to be easy.

It's not going to be. Being a parent isn't easy. But that's why it's important because these decisions can have long-term, lifelong impact for your kids. So stay the course. You're doing the right thing. Today's episode is brought to you by AG1. There is no right time for better health. There's just now.

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All right, probably the last question for today. Andy, I'm curious about your thoughts on how the last 20 years of sustained conflict have helped sharpen the United States capabilities for war. You have mentioned several times how our tactics were Vietnam based at the start of the GWAT, Global War on Terror. So I'm going to stop there and say I only and specifically can talk about the tactics in the SEAL community. They weren't completely based on Vietnam because even pre-9-11, we were doing urban warfare training scenarios.

We were out in the desert doing desert training scenarios. The emphasis was very, very heavily on maritime. And the real world combat experience that that emphasis was drawn from specifically came from Vietnam. There was a little bit of exposure to real world activity in Panama in Grenada. And a couple of guys were in Mogadishu as snipers during the Black Hawk Down incident. But that is it that I am aware. of post-Vietnam. There was some Piffwick or personnel indicted for war crime type stuff going over on in the

Bosnia area. I wasn't involved in any of that. I don't know if that would have been considered semi-permissive, non-permissive, whatever it may be, but very niche, I would say. So when you say our tactics, I can only, I just want to correct and make sure people understand what I say that. I try to always say the seal community because that's all I can speak for. It weren't 100% based, but that is where the real world experience came from.

And we were still doing heavy river and stream crossing. OTH over the horizon, over the beach, long blocks of training. We were still doing surveys of beaches, heavy combat swimmer operation. I mean, multiple weeks at a time. It was still a very amphibious maritime force, which it should always be. and we'll always have one foot in that, you know, bucket, no pun intended, because it is the Navy's component of special operation. So it makes sense, but I don't want people to think that that was all it was, and we were still wearing Tiger Stripe, and we were only out in the jungle.

I actually didn't go train in the jungle until after 9-11. So I don't know how that necessarily ties in. That probably was just more of a timing thing. To continue, we quickly evolved tactics and equipment to increase our proficiency at war and learned at the speed of war. That is very true. even though I would say our tactics were a few decades behind, meaning the era that they were drawn from, lessons were learned very quickly. Things did modify very quickly. One of the biggest things I think most people would agree with that changed rapidly at an individual level was the amount of things that we carried. I remember, I must have looked like, the Michelin Man the first time I ever loaded out my kit for real. I don't even know how many M4

magazines I had, but I know it was too many. But I didn't know what I didn't know. And once you know better, you can do better. My gear in comparison, my last day gear in comparison to my first day gear, holy cow. If I could, if I would ever, of course, I don't have either of them. But if I could put them side by side, it would be the perfect example of evolution at the speed of war. And that happened with tactics. It happened with equipment, electronics, all of those things. So we certainly did evolve at the speed of war. I know it's a poor optic, but did the last couple of decades prepare us for a more secure future? Even the recent war with Iran is allowing us to test our munitions and air superiority. All lessons learned help deter opponents and sharpen our skills. I don't know how much our air superiority is being sharpened. I was never an aviator, so I can't specifically tell you the last time that the United States military's air superiority was actually challenged. I know we lost a lot of aviators in Vietnam, rotary wing and fixed wing. That might have been due, though, not air-to-air superiority, but just the type of mission that they were conducting, whether it was Kazavak, inserting troops, close air support at a lower altitude.

So it might have been more given the mechanics of the operations that they were conducting when it comes to actual air superiority. So I would have to defer to an aviator as to when the air superiority has actually been challenged. I'm sure if we went to war with a near peer adversary, that would be a different story. But I don't think anyone is considering Iran to be so. Testing munitions, sure, I guess. And I'm sure munitions are continuing to evolve. It used to be all dumb bombs and air quotes, and that just means gravity guided, essentially. I'm sure on the aircraft there was some sort of targeting an optic that you could line up.

And even back to the AH6s, the little birds with rockets and machine guns on them, I would watch these aviators put a grease pen mark and go and do a flight. They'd fire some stuff off and they'd erase the grease pen and move it over. I mean, that's an aiming optic. And then there's the Apache gun ship, right, that has. the little thing that comes in front of your eye and from my understanding, if you move your head, it moves the turret. Same principle, different technology for sure. I tell you what, though, grease pen, you never need batteries, but I digress. So bombs went from gravity to GPS guided to,

I don't even know at this point, maybe even optically guided. I'm not in the no. I'm not on the leading edge of what's available, but I know they're using, you know, the question goes on to Ukraine and Russia here in a bit, and I know that they're using over there just purely optically guided drones because that way it can't be GPS jammed. I'd have to assume that that's being used to some degree in other types of ordinance. So from what I understand on the targets that we're hitting in Iran, I'm not so sure how much of a test per se it actually is. Is it allowing us to rotate through our stock of munitions so that we can build more and it's, you know, the older ones are being used where the newer ones are being brought into service? Sure. Do we need to attack them?

another country just for the purpose of doing that. I mean, that's a conversation that should be had for sure. So to the statement of all lessons learned, help deter opponents and sharpen our skills. Maybe. They could. Unless you assume that all of your enemies aren't paying attention and evolving as well, whether they're directly involved in the conflict or not.

It is a huge mistake to underestimate your competition or your enemy. And it happens sometimes in the military. And you can get away with it sometimes. And other times, it's going to absolutely eat your lunch. It is a mistake to do so. Although many of our, again, near peer adversaries, there's the tacit or implicit support from China and Russia in Iran itself,

North Korea. the direct involvement, I mean, I think that they're supporting with material. I think they're supporting with technology, but they're not directly involved in the kinetic exchange in that area. That doesn't mean that they're not paying attention. So if we are deterring our opponents and sharpening our skills, that's great. As long as we assume that our adversary or our enemies are paying attention and they are also evolving at the speed of war, whether directly or indirectly evolved.

And I think that the U.S. is a good example of watching what's happening in Ukraine and Russia and the drone warfare and just this explosion of that drone warfare. No pun intended on that, by the way. Moving to the forefront of humans fighting one another. Not in the military. Haven't been in the military for 13 years. The people that I talk to who are still in, there is a heavy emphasis on drone warfare. That is from us paying attention to what is going on elsewhere. Let's just make sure that we apply. that to our adversaries and assume that they are doing the same as well. The question here, would we have been better off staying out of the conflicts but keeping our tactics based on the last major war 50 years ago? Just look at Russia in Ukraine. Everyone thought they had better tactics than they appear to have. I don't know, I think the premise of that sentence might be slightly incorrect. I don't know if everyone thought that they had better tactics. I think what people thought is that they had far, far superior numbers, a much greater developed military infrastructure and a willingness to do whatever was necessary

to crush Ukraine. They did have a bigger military. From my understanding of the conflict zone from an Air Force perspective, Navy perspective, Army perspective, Russia, far, and this is at the beginning, far outnumbered Ukraine. And they probably thought, much like I am worried our decision makers now when it comes to Iran, thought, oh yeah, 30 to 60 days, maybe 90 on the tail end, we'll have this thing wrapped up. It's not going that way. So I don't know if they, if everybody thought that they had better tactics. I think what everybody was, everybody assumed was because they had superiority in numbers that they were just going to steamroll Ukraine. And I think what it has shown, it's shown many things. But pure math of 1V1 no longer seems to

hold true if you go 2V1, then therefore you are guaranteed to win. If there's a conflict zone that's showing that that isn't necessarily the case, I don't know what to tell you. Because even the the rough estimates of the loss of Russian soldiers, I have heard it into the millions. Now, I'm not sure about the veracity of those statements, but even if it's not in the millions and is approaching that, my goodness. So, we have been better off staying out of the conflicts

but keeping our tactics based on the last major war 50 years ago. No, I don't think that Korean War or World War II, even though I know that's more than 50 years ago, era tactics would have served us well. But that's also not a justification to get into conflicts. And I don't think you should ever be, not that it is being used as a justification. I just don't think that it ever should even be. Well, how do we know we're even any good anymore? Let's just go, you know, let's go pick somebody off here. And who do we not like and who doesn't like us? Let's go pick a fight with them. That's, no, I'm not a fan of that. So sitting on the side,

line if you can, and there is a reason for it, I think you should. But I think the stark reality is that our military is a lot more lethal now, a lot more surgical, a lot more precise, a lot more disaggregate as well, and not in a bad way, in a good way, the ability to operate in smaller elements throughout the globe. That is, to me, a direct result of the 20 years of sustained conflict. I don't know if we would have been able to get to that point absent those two theaters, but I do think, kinetically, we are at a better place for it or a capability-wise, we are in a better place than we were 50 years ago, just the technological advancements alone. Or to continue, or are we better off having sacrificed smaller numbers over a long period of time to help secure our place

as the world's superpower. I don't know if, I mean, sacrifice is a tough word. It would be hard for any service member to look back and ask themselves or question where the losses, were they just purely sacrifice? That's a tough one. I would have to sit with that one for a bit. I don't inherently believe that it was a sacrifice. People serviced their loss of life.

Yes, they sacrificed themselves. I just, I don't like the connotation of that. term. And in real time, in this moment, I can't identify exactly what it is. I almost feel like the term sacrifice would be devoid of meaning. And maybe that's my misconception of the word again in real time as I'm thinking through this reading this email. The service I do believe was meaningful, especially from the people out there executing their service to the best of their ability. And what gets lost is shit leadership and decision making, erroneous. that selfless service and then it turns it into that word sacrifice.

And maybe that's where my resistance to that word comes from. And again, maybe five minutes after recording this, I'll feel completely different. But once I hit the record button, it's over and I'll upload it. That's how I'm feeling about that word sacrifice right now. I would say the 20 years of the global war on terror was a net positive on capability. But it came at a tremendous cost. The loss of life. Back to the email. The loss of life is sad. The sacrifice our men and women make does not go unnoticed,

but is it necessary to keep our war skills fresh? I appreciate your viewpoint on this. Is it necessary? Well, let's pull the necessary part out of this. The more reps that you get, the more capable you are likely going to be, especially when those reps are in real time. And this is true of sports. I could switch this over to any. traditional football. If you only practice with your own team for 20 years based off of what you think your enemy may do, limited by the boundaries of your own imagination, or not your enemy. In this case, it would be your competition. And then 20 years down the road, after only playing pickup football against each other, you go and you get one real world. You go and you get one

real world rep against a team you have never seen before. That is going to be a way rougher onboarding than an organization that practices internally for a week, but every weekend goes and plays a real opponent. The real reps give you real pressure testing and feedback. So I can't say that the real reps over the real reps over. overseas are not impactful. They are. You are pressure testing what can sometimes be hypothetical. Tactics until pressed against an actual enemy are just that. It's a hypothetical, theoretical tactic. When you go and you engage with somebody who is equally as committed as you are and maybe

not even as tactically or technologically savvy and you employ a tactic and it. And it employ a tactic and it doesn't have the result that you thought it would based off of your practice in an artificial environment, that's a really important piece of feedback. Now, the other way it could go is it could go exactly as you thought it would, which is also a really important piece of feedback. You're taking it from the conceptual and hypothetical world and putting it over into the practical world. It doesn't mean it should never be tested again. Actually, the reality is every time that it is tested, you need to have that feedback loop. And if it's not having the desired effect, maybe you should shift it a little bit.

I don't know how you do that from a lethality perspective without getting in real world reps. Now, to put the necessary word back into that, is it necessary to keep our war skills fresh? Again, I firmly believe that we need to have the most capable and competent military on planet Earth. And we need to be prepared to use it. But I also think we need to be very, very diligent and intelligent in our, approach and employment because of the impact that it will have on those that we are asking to do those things. So I don't know where I land on this term necessary. I can't sit here and say that we would be as capable today if we hadn't engaged in those combat actions. But I don't know

how you have one without the other. I think the reality of the world that we live in is this, though. we the first world the western world not not that all of the first world is the western world but western world ideologies are not valued the same throughout the rest of the world we are living in a time and maybe we have always lived in a time but we're a little bit more interconnected now or you know we have the ability to reach out and touch someone in a different way metaphorically and physically where I don't think we're short on people, entities, organizations that would like to see the downfall of, we'll just bring it to the United States, the downfall of the United States. I won't speak for any other country, the Western world, any of that stuff.

So whether it's necessary or not to engage in combat operations to sharpen that edge, I don't know if that's even the right way to phrase it. I think we live in a world right now where I don't know if we're ever going to have tanks lined up going off against other tanks or naval barrages where battleships, we don't even have any battleships anymore, but I think you get the point of naval fleets hammering it out or huge air campaigns. I think the reality is going forward. It's going to be smaller geographically isolated actions, which will give us the opportunity to keep the razor blade sharp and to keep testing these things. So it's not a matter of necessity that we go out and are constantly looking for them. I think we

just live in a world where we are going to be presented with them. So I think the problem solves itself. I don't know if that answer made sense. And again, this is the complexity of trying to answer these emails in real time. This is a tough question. I understand the premise of your question. And like I said, I can't sit here and say that our military sitting on the sidelines for the last 50 years had we done that would be as capable as we are now. We absolutely would not be. But is it necessary for us to go pick a fight? I actually think that that premise doesn't even hold true anymore because the fight is out there and looking for us or looking for U.S. citizens. So I think it sorts itself naturally. I do think warfare is evolving. And I say that based off of, you can see it in the military recruiting videos. I remember the videos that I saw early in my career that's usually based off to some degree special operations and they're folding down their night vision goggles.

And it used to be green and now they're white, white phosphorus. And now you're starting to see it instead of the night vision goggle coming down. It's the FPV goggle coming down. And we're using dog type. I don't know the name for the dog type robots, but I think everybody knows what I'm talking about, the Halliburton ones, I think. It's evolving. and I don't think it's going to stop because our enemy is evolving as well. So what I know is necessary for us to remain as a country as we are is that we continue to have

people who are willing to put it all in the line for what this country stands for. And I know our expression of that throughout the world isn't always perfect. But I still believe and I think I will always believe that we can do. be a beacon to everybody else in the world. Sometimes we do a better job of it than others. Those beacon, though, or that beacon is comprised of people who are wearing their nation's flag issued, not rented or not bought, but issued to them in service of that country. What's the necessity is that we can still find those people and that we are still a country that people feel is worth serving.

That's the real challenge, in my opinion. And that's all I have for this Friday. See you Monday.