EverydaySpy Podcast - The Day That CHANGED The World: Patriots' Day | EverydaySpy Podcast Ep. 12

Episode Date: September 14, 2023

This is not your average 9/11 conversation. Is it respectful - yes. Does it honor the lives lost that sad day - yes. But it is also an honest, open dialogue about the world before and after everything changed. It's full of laughter, love, and more than a few flirtatious exchanges because the 9/11 tragedy is what brought the two of us together. In many ways, it was the place where our love story started. Want to read my lesson on what makes a person become a terrorist? Click here 👉 https://everydayspy.com/the-making-of-a-terrorist/ Find your Spy Superpower: https://everydayspy.com/spyquiz Learn more from Andy: https://everydayspy.com/ Join the SpyTribe: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EverydaySpy/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/everydayspy/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/EverydaySpy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

9-11 is like this exclamation point in history. I told the teacher, I was like, that thing that's happening on that screen is more important than anything we're going to learn today. I can still see the bodies falling from the tops of the Twin Towers, like teardrops. The lesson from 9-11 isn't a lesson about terrorism. It's a lesson about how an enemy unifies. So today is 9-11 and I don't really want to have one of those somber 9-11 conversations. And I don't know if I should feel guilty that I don't want to have a somber 9-11 conversation.

I think it's okay because, you know, it's been 22 years. And I think... 22 years. Is it really? Yeah. Can you believe it? Oh, my gosh. Yeah.

And I think that. I was 21 years old. Mm-hmm. So was I. Oh, my gosh. That really makes me feel my 43 years old right now. Yeah. And I was 22 years ago.

I think that the feeling of, you know, we want to remember, but we don't want to still be in grief is okay. It's because, you know, I lost my grandmother last year. So the experience of working through grief is. like still very like raw for me. And now I realize that, you know, grief is the process of remembering somebody without holding on to those really, really strong feelings of being like, of just being just trapped in the sadness, right? Like the remembrance is the important part. So it's important for all of us to remember 9-11 and to remember all the lives that were lost on that day and through the war on terror. But we don't have to,

cry about it every year, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what's crazy is you're talking about remembrance. There are grown drinking age adults who actually cannot remember 9-11 right now. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. So our... That's crazy.

Our nanny was born in 2003. Born in 2003. Did not know... I graduated college in 2003. She doesn't know what the world was like before. We fly... There was a whole world. before 9-11, oh my gosh, that's so true.

Yeah, we fly with her. And I'm like, do you remember when? And she's like, no, I wasn't born yet. And I was like, oh, my gosh. Like, I've been flying since I was a kid in the 80s. It's come, I mean, life at the airports, for sure, have completely transformed. But life in other ways has completely transformed, too. And our kids will never know.

Drinking age adults will never know. Yeah. And it's wild because the America before 9-11, And I'll be honest, I was a kid. I was like if you consider 18 years old, adulthood, I was really only an adult for three years before 9-11 happened. Yeah. But I was like, I remember the world being pretty fun.

I remember the United States being a cool, fun place. I mean, we had a president who played a saxophone on a late night television show. I remember that, yeah. Could you, like, think about what our life has looked like for the last 20 years? with a war on terror and wars in Syria and Afghanistan and Libya and now this whole Russia-Ukraine conflict. Yeah. Presidents are not cool anymore.

Yeah. Right? Presidents are serious. Yeah. And presidents are important. Like everything in America has to be so focused and so important. Yeah. There was like this levity before 9-11.

Yeah. I don't think we've gotten back since then. And I don't think we ever will because 9-11 brought an awareness to the American people that wasn't there before. So it's not that terrorism wasn't there before. It's not that plane hijackings weren't there before. The awareness of the public wasn't there before. And the terrorism point, I think, is an excellent one because terrorism existed.

Oh, yeah. Before 9-11. Throughout history, terrorism had existed. And it exists still today, even though it's not front and center. Right. And I think that's so interesting because you've, essentially, you've had this evolution of terrorism. There was the pre-9-11 days, which I think were largely informed by like hijackings and

bombings, like plain hijackings and building bombings. Yeah. And then there was the global war on terrorism period, which was like mass attacks. Yeah. And then there's like the period where we're at now, which is the next evolution of terrorism. Yeah. Which is a lot of like coup sponsorships and like caliphate development and ideological growth and permeation.

Yeah. Like you see with ISIS. So there's these different, this different change in what terrorism looks like, but it's always been there. It just happens to be that 9-11 is like this exclamation point in history. And it really is like, it really is shocking to me to think that 2,997 civilians. American civilians died. on that day.

Yeah. 2,997. Now, that number, I hope it sounds like a lot to anybody who hears it. Yeah. But when you consider the entire 20 years of global war on terrorism after that, Afghanistan and Iraq combined, we lost 7,000-ish soldiers. Yeah. So in 20 years, we lost 7,000 soldiers.

But in one day, we lost almost half that number. in innocent American lives on September 11th. And I know I'm not trying to make it sombering or like whatever, but I remember, man, I remember seeing that happen on television, on 24-hour news. Yes. And I think that that's part of what has made it so powerful in the memories of those who were there that day,

who watched it that day. Because who were adult enough to see what was happening that day. So, you know, in Pearl Harbor, a little bit over 2,400 people were killed during that attack. Really? Yeah. 24, more than 2,400 people died in Pearl Harbor? Yeah. I had no idea.

So, but that wasn't aired live, right? The American public found out about it through the news, and there wasn't a lot of video. But 9-11, I remember I was. in law school. I was in between classes in the morning. I went into the lounge and on the news was, you know, the first plane had already hit. And, you know, I'm sitting there waiting for my next class to happen. And I watched the second plane fly into the building. And then, and then I had to go to class. And but I was like, as soon as the second plane hit, I turned to the student sitting next to me. And I was like, I don't know who that was, but that was a declaration of war.

Like we are at war now. I don't know what's going on otherwise, but that's what just happened. That's what we just witnessed. And then when we went home, I sat at home and I watched the towers fall. We watched people jumping out of the towers, right? And then after that was the 24-hour news cycle. I was obsessed with Robin Mead at the time. I used to watch headline news, like constantly.

You always say she was the, what do you say? She's the hot one? Oh, yeah, she's such a hot anger. I love her. And then friendly, and she has this accent. I love her. I actually don't remember Robin Mead at all. What a shame.

But I remember watching headline news just nonstop after that, and they kept replaying and replaying. And not just that day, but for so long, like, really essentially, I mean, I'm re-traumatizing the public who had witnessed it. So it makes sense that it's etched in our memories. because we all watched it and then rewatched it and rewatched it and rewatched it, right? It's not like, you know, you see your grandparent pass away and then you start dealing with the grief. You're not reliving that moment, right?

I never thought of that. The fact that the news cycle basically is like a sports replay. Wow. But in a sports game, the replay is the highlights. They very rarely replay like a horrible error. They will replay. it once or twice. Yeah.

Especially like in the moment. Yeah. But nobody like no after game show is going to replay like, like player. Here are the top 10 errors. Yeah. Or breaking his leg or whatever. Exactly. It's all the high points.

Yeah. But you're right. Like when tragedy happens. Yeah. 24 hour news replays that for as long as it's popular. Yeah. And then it does. It just, it keeps that wound fresh.

It keeps that wound sore. Yeah. It doesn't give it a chance to heal. I never thought of that. that would be horrible. Yeah. To replay the death of a family member. Yeah.

Over and over again, or the pain of a family member? Like when our kids, even when our kids skin their knees. Mm-hmm. Right? Seen a skinned his knee recently doing something. Yeah. And my heart broke. Yeah.

He just skinned his knee. But my heart broke for him. Yeah. If I had to like watch that, here's him skinning his knee again and again and again. Like to a certain extent my heart's not going to break the same level each time. Mm-hmm. But it's going to cause. me pain every time without bringing me any net benefit. Exactly, because what can you do about it,

right? Like once that happened, there's, you know, there's all these behind the scenes agencies that are mobilizing. What happened? Why did it happen? What can we do about it? What's our next steps? But for the average American, they're not in a position to do any of that. So you just feel helpless, right? You feel scared. You feel helpless. You are just continually traumatized, right? Like, you want to move through the grieving process, but you're unable to because something keeps bringing you right back to the initial moment. So you said you were in law school? Yeah, I was in law school at the time. You are such a freak. Because that means we're the same age. Oh, I graduated earlier. Yeah. I was a sophomore at the Air Force Academy. That means a normal person,

if like and even technically like if you call me normal and I'm kind of a freak too but I was I was 21 years old I had just turned 21 I was a sophomore in college you were somehow finished with undergrad yeah and in law school so that means you started I started undergrad two weeks after I turned 17 which I don't recommend that's I think it's too young but that's insane hindsight so I I started at 19. And again, that's the birthday thing. Either way. But my point is, so you were in law school and you recognized the attack as a declaration

of war. Yeah. Which is exactly, I think, what Bush said when he got on air, not too long after. And I was going to law school in Tallahassee. And Jeb Bush was the governor of Florida at the time. And, you know, when I went after I saw the second plane hit, and I'm walking to my class, I'm like, they better send us home because I want to get out of here. Like, if I were a terrorist, I would try to bomb his brother too.

And that's the kind of evil villain I would be. They weren't trying to attack George Bush. I didn't know that at the time, though. What's amazing to me is that you were a college graduate in law school. And you literally thought Florida was the most important state of the union. I knew we were under attack. And we, everybody saw the Twin Towers. And then there were reports coming out about the Pentagon or reports coming out about the plane

where that crashed in Pennsylvania. Yep. And I thought, who knows. Coming to a Tallahassee. I thought, who knows what else is out there? Why wouldn't you try to strike at the heart of the president? So, yeah. It's fair.

I'm teasing you. I'm teasing you on a somber day. But it was scary. I get it. Yeah, yeah. So for me, I was at the military. I was at the Air Force Academy. And it's a super poignant moment for me

because I was going into a course called MSS, military strategic sciences. That was the course, literal, the class I was walking into, like you walk into math, you walk into science, I was walking into MSS. And I was a sophomore. I was not a good cadet, right? I was a bad student by most measures,

but I was actually pretty decent at MSS. Like, I actually enjoyed it. Like you study warfare and you study the history. of military sciences and strategies and it was my kind of my kind of gig and we had a our teacher was an Air Force captain and I was an Air Force cadet which is a nothing but we walked in and every morning in that specific course we would have the big screen on and we would be watching current events so of course the big screen was on and the current event was the bombing or the plane crashing into the towers and it

was it was mountain time so we were behind East Coast time But so the second plane had already hit, I'm pretty sure. The second plane had already hit. So two towers both smoking. Yes. And we sat down and for the first like seven minutes before class started while all the students were coming in, we're watching this. And then class starts and the captain walks in and he turns off the TV. Yeah.

And I was not a good student. I was not a courageous student. I was nothing important, right? But that day I was like, that what's happening? I told the teacher, I was like, that thing that's happening on that screen. is more important than anything we're going to learn today. Yeah. And he looked at me and he was like, if we watch this,

we're doing exactly what the terrorists want us to do. Interesting. And I disagreed with him one more time. And I was like, there's nothing that we're going to learn in a book that has any relevance more than watching what's happening right now. Yeah. And then he exercised his military power. He's like, this is my classroom.

And I demand discipline and order. But all that to say, that like I felt proud of myself. I still feel very proud of myself for pushing back, but still for acknowledging my role as a military nobody. Because it was like four days later, that same MSS teacher pulled me aside after class and told me I was right.

Yeah. And he was like, hey, cadet Greg, my last name was Greg at the time. Cadet Greg, you were right. And I should have taken your suggestion on to advisement and we should have stayed with the current events because by the time that course was over and he turned the TV on for the next class, both towers were gone.

Really? Wow. So it's just insane to think that like history was truly made for the United States. Yeah. On that day in those hours. That's amazing. It's amazing. It's amazing.

And you saw it and I saw it and I will never forget. I mean, even as I talk to you right now, it's still etched in my mind. knowing what the towers, the twin towers look like, I can still see the bodies falling from the tops of the twin towers, like teardrops. Yeah. I can see them. Yeah. And it was so hard to watch that happen. It didn't feel like real life.

Yeah. It felt like some sort of special effect in a movie because they're human bodies. Yeah. They were falling, reflected in the mirror of glass. Like it was, it was insane. It didn't feel real, but it was happening. Yeah. And it was, I.

Yeah. And we've never been the same. Yeah. And I just, I remember, I have exactly the same visuals etched in my memory. And I remember feeling so helpless. So helpless, so small. Yeah. And so pissed.

Yeah. Like, I remember, like, oh my gosh. the whole country just came together after that. I was just joking a few minutes ago about how we were like cool and lackadaisical and we were a fun country until 2000. Holy shit, we became serious. Like we became focused. We became serious.

It's the whole World War II Japanese imperial like what was the emperor said, I fear we've woken a sleeping dragon. A bear, I believe we were. Something like that. Yeah. But that's exactly what it felt like. It felt like we came to life. We woke up that the world's a dangerous place.

And boom, let's go do something about it. And it was a crazy experience. Yeah. And an amazing thing to have witnessed through adult eyes, not through five-year-old eyes or seven-year-old eyes, not to experience two years after it happened. Yeah. Like there are some drinking age adults who can. Right? But to actually be an adult there.

than in the moment. Yeah, and I do think it's, you know, it's this really powerful example of how an outside threat can bring people together because I do remember, you know, I would say in the years afterwards, you know, that being, it was so, so raw and so fresh and so powerful of an event that it really brought

the people in the country together, which is how we ended up taking the steps and the president had the support. had to enter the war on terror. The problem with the war on terror is that, you know, at the time, it was specific, right? We went into Iraq. We went into Afghanistan. We were looking for specific people. We were... Looking for al-Qaeda. Right. We were, we had very specific missions. But then afterwards, the war on terror is so broad, right? And you, the war on terror is, it's terrorism is so broad that you can't really win the war on terror with hard power. It really, I am my opinion,

needs to be won with soft power. And winning the war on terror with soft power is going to take a long time. I mean, 20 years is a long time. How are you defining hard power and soft power? So hard power is by military means, right? You go in with the military. You blow shit up. You blow shit up, right? You capture kill, you take out the leaders of terrorist organizations. Because the warrant, I mean, the reason I say it's so broad is because there are many, many terrorist organizations. Some are, you know, the ones we think about when we say war and terror is Islamist militants, right? But there are other terrorist organizations, too, that could attack for various reasons. Wow, there are. There are Christian militants. There are Buddhist militants. There are. There's also,

extremists everywhere. Yeah, there are narco-trafficking organizations that can also act as terrorists, right? So, and they're all very different in the motivations. I mean, they don't even agree with each other. It's not like they're a unit of terrorists. Right. So getting in the end, they are ideologically based for the most part. I think, you know, I think in reality, leadership, it's possible that the leadership, you know, is ideologically based.

so, you know, ego motivated, reward motivated. But the people that they're recruiting, they're recruiting through ideology. And you can't combat ideology with military means. You have to combat ideology with something softer. So how do you define soft power then? Through education, through aid, through making those people's lives better. Because somebody who is recruited into terrorism, they're angry.

They come from a hard life. Right? They are unhappy, they are angry, they are sad, they are grieving for something, right? So if we can start putting things into place that make in general people's lives better, here's a social worker, me, right? You know, it's a type of influence soft power. And I believe that you can, over time, doing the right things, influence people. I'm not saying you have to change people's religions or change people's beliefs,

But make them have a better life so that they're not so angry and they feel like they have to lash out. Yeah, what's really interesting is, I mean, what you're talking about social worker or not, we learned about it, the agency. And it's called the radicalization ladder. Yes. How you radicalize. Yes. Right? It's more like a stair step, but they call it a ladder, right?

And the very first step is to basically find people who feel like they have been violent. or unjustly treated. Yes. So you have to find that group first. That's the first step in a radicalization ladder. Find someone who feels like they've been unjustly treated. Yeah. And then validate the unjust treatment that they've experienced.

Yeah. What happens for social workers and for most healthy therapists, you find someone who feels like they've been violated or unjustly treated. And you do not validate it. You get them to question it and you get them to see it through a different light. Because as soon as you validate the injustice or the injustice, now you've just cemented the injustice. Right. And that's what takes you to the next step, being able to then validate it, being able to then put that person in a group of other people who have felt injustice.

Right? And now you see how the latter grows. You go from being in a group that feels outraged to then being in a group that feels like they create a common enemy and an actual. common enemy group decides on ways to lash out against the person who caused their injustice, and the latter just keeps on going. Yeah. And I think that, you know, validating people's feelings, validating somebody's experience, you know, is okay.

It's what you do with that validation afterwards. You know, you validate, like, I know you've been wrong. I know you've been mistreated. But instead of being like, but you can move past it in these positive ways, Right. You know, terrorist organizations are like, but you can get back at all those people that committed this injustice.

Correct. It's which way you swing that pendulum, you know, and they're just, they're vulnerable to vulnerable population. Yeah. Yeah, it's really interesting. It's fascinating to me to think that

in one year, and essentially one day, the whole world changed. At least for Americans, the entire world changed. Right? A simple example. prior to 2000, prior to September 11th, 2001, there was no TSA.

Yeah, it was. TSA didn't even exist. It's just the FAA that controlled everything. I mean, think about that. You go to the airport right now and you can't, like, you can't trip over your shoelaces without seeing five TSA officers. Yeah. All those jobs, that whole government sector, didn't even exist prior to 2001.

Yeah. I remember flying as a kid. So this dates me. So I remember when I was a kid, we would fly. Smoking was allowed on the plane in the back. Wow. I don't know if you remember that. I didn't start.

The first flight I took was in 95. I was 15. Oh, I think they'd outlawed it by them. Yeah, I remember being. You were on a plane with smokers? Multiple times. Yeah. It was not because they were the cheap seats too.

So we were always stuck back there with these people smoking. It was incredible. And it's not like you can't smell it in the front of the plane. That's just incredible. I can't imagine being on. Yeah. being in that tube, and there's just somebody like, were there ashtrays? Yeah.

Where? So there were. They were in the... Do you remember that before they started making, before the new planes kind of, you know, replaced the old planes, there used to always be ashtrays in the bathroom? Oh, I don't remember that. Oh, yeah. I feel like I remember ashtrays in the handrest.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Because they... Then they had like a little door that would open on them. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And then, you know, when they, when they banned the smoking, they put the signs up that said no smoking, but they couldn't refit the planes right away, right?

So it's still the legacy. But, you know, you used to be able to walk people all the way to their gate. We always met people at the gate. People met us at the gate. It was, you know, this fun, personal thing that you got to go to the airport. You got to wave at them as the plane backed out, right? You know, and it's interesting because I, even when I was a kid, kid, there were metal detectors and x-ray machines because in the 60s and 70s, there were a number of plane hijackings, too. I mean, it's not, plane hijackings aren't new. Ever since planes have existed, people have hijacked them. But they were, you know, the difference was that they used to be to get to a location, right? Like in the 60s and 70s, oftentimes American planes were hijacked to go to Cuba, which is such a fascinating history.

or they would be hijacked for extortions, for somebody to get something they wanted. I remember when hijackings, I can't say that they were common, but I remember when they were a topic of conversation. Yes. Airplanes being hijacked. They're not a topic of conversation since 9-11. No. They probably still happen, but they don't happen with anywhere near the frequency or anywhere

near the importance of what it was like before 9-11. Exactly. Yeah. They still happen, but it's not, not, you know, they're usually like smaller flights, not these, you know, not the big commercial airlines. And, you know, so it's been incredible to watch the, you know, when before I was reading about the, you know, when did metal detectors come into play? And they were saying that, you know, the FAA in the beginning, because there was no TSA,

the FAA in the beginning, when the hijacking started to happen in the 60s, they were like, well, we have to do something about this. And there was a senator that suggested putting in metal detectors. And the airlines were like, no, no, no. Like you're going to scare away the passengers. You know, there was this no, no awareness in the public that this was, you know, that flying might be dangerous and they wanted to keep it that way. So they started doing profiling.

But it was up to the agents, like the airline agents to profile somebody and be like, that guy looks pretty shifty and they'd send them into secondary. So when that didn't work, then they finally put in the metal. detectors and the X-ray machines, which really did cut down the hijackings, but still the American public wasn't as aware as 9-11, right? And the 9-11 plane hijackings were completely different beast because it wasn't to go to a location. It wasn't to extort anything. Like traditionally suicide missions. Yes, traditionally, anytime, you know, hijackers, like people would get hurt and killed, but that wasn't the intent, right? That was just a byproduct of the hijacking where

9-11, the hijackings themselves were meant to kill. Like, that was the sole purpose. Well, they were, and what's interesting is they were meant for terrorist purposes. Yeah. The hijackings of the 70s and 80s, like you said, extortion, ransom, theft. That was the goal. You need a plane to be intact, and you needed to land in a certain place for any of those goals to happen.

Right. Whereas for 9-11, the goal was to send a terrorist message. Mm-hmm. Right? And again, what did we learn about terrorism? Terrorism is anytime you carry out an action designed to cause a terror response. Yeah. Like maybe you kill, maybe you don't.

But when you kill people, you create a sense of fear. Yeah. And that was something you mentioned earlier today. Like the fear that people felt on 9-11, the fear that you and I felt, the fear that you and I felt, the fear that you felt made you want to flee Tallahassee, Florida. Yeah. Like that's a very acute fear. And that's really what terrorism can do to you.

It can make you feel fear in your bones that's completely irrational where you lose all sense of logic and you just get scared because you feel violated. You feel afraid. And there's so much power that people can derive when they make you feel that level of fear. Yeah. And what was really inspiring to me was that in the outside. hours after 9-11, we as a country transitioned from fear to courage to response. You and I weren't the only adults that watched people fall to their death in search of escape. We weren't the only ones who saw that.

And when we saw that, we had our moment to grieve and our moment of sadness. And then we rallied together and we came up with a plan. And I'm not saying the plan was the best plan. I'm not saying we did everything right. Yeah. But we did something instead of just cowering and fear. Yeah. Right.

So also prior to 9-11, some interesting things that I discovered recently. There was no iPod before 9-11. Oh yeah. The whole world looked different back then. There are people, there are adults right now who don't even know what an iPod is. Which is so sad. I'm so sad about the iPod, honestly. So the iPad, which basically,

basically everybody knows, also didn't exist before 2001. Google existed, but it was like the 15th most popular search engine. It was like experimental. You're like, what is that? There was no Facebook. There was no YouTube, right, prior to 9-11. There was, of course, no Twitter. Social media didn't exist.

Yeah, I think MySpace may have existed. I think it might be right. Or maybe it was a couple years later. But it's just incredible. Like streaming television didn't exist. Yeah. 3G mobile networks didn't exist. Yeah.

I think 24-hour news was fairly. recent. 24-hour news. I think that started in the Gulf War, actually, technically. I'm pretty sure that's when CNN, or was it Turner News broadcasting, somebody started the 24-hour news cycle, but I'm pretty sure that started in the Gulf War. I must have picked up on it in my 20s because I was in law school. So, yeah, so I really do. It's amazing to see how the world shifted in 2001. And you made a comment recently about how we didn't meet on 9-11. No. But 9-9-11. is what brought you and me together. Yeah.

And it's interesting. Can you expand on that? Yeah, because I think that it's fair to say that I know a lot of people after 9-11 sought to join the FBI and the CIA and the NSA and the military, right? There was a huge rush of people like, I want to serve and resolve and resolve this, right? Like I want to get back of the people who got us. I don't think that was the driving force for you and I to join the CIA. I was in the military already.

Well, yeah, you were in the military. That's true. I was joining the Air Force through the Air Force Academy in 1999, right? I was going into military service during a time of peace just because I believed in our country and I believed in what we were trying to do. Right. So when 9-11 happened, I was already on that path, right, into military service. Yeah, that's right.

And so, but. You were still a bleeding-hearted. I was. I was going to, I mean, I was still saving the trees and the babies. And the refugees, because there were refugees in times of war. So, you know, but 9-11, there was a hiring search for many, many years at CIA to support the war on terror. And it wasn't just a surge to support the war on terror. It was a surge that came out of the 9-11 commission.

Yeah. Right? So in 2003, the Congress came back to the IC. because what we haven't, what we haven't disclosed here openly is that 9-11 was very different, very different from Pearl Harbor because Pearl Harbor was a sneak attack, right? The Japanese imperial forces successfully kept hidden their plans to attack. 9-11 was an intelligence failure. All of the information was there for us to know the attack was coming.

But our intelligence community, our IC, failed, right? The FBI, the CIA specifically did not talk and coordinate at the level they should have to put the threads together to identify that the attack was coming. That's completely different than Pearl Harbor. 9-11 was an intelligence failure. Pearl Harbor was a successful strategic sneak attack by the Japanese. 2003, the U.S. Congress comes out and says, hey, CIA, FBI, you fucked up. Yeah.

We now can't trust you to do your job on your own. So we're going to step in. And that's where they filled out the 9-11 commission. And part of that commission was creating this huge, robust intelligence service. Yeah. That falls under the Director of National Intelligence. Again, DNI, Director of National Intelligence, didn't exist before 2001. Yep.

So now there's a DNI and then a huge new restructured intelligence community. and forced cooperation from the Congress. And part of that surge was like tripling the number of people in the IC. So FBI was hiring, NSA was hiring, CIA was hiring, DIA was hiring, NRO was hiring, NRA was hiring, NGA was hiring. So I just wanted to clarify that. But yes, you're right. There was a huge surge. Yeah.

Not because people wanted to join that helped, but because it was dictated by the Congress. Because they needed people. And you and I came in as a part of that surge, I believe it was towards the end. But I remember when we came in, we knew we were expected to go to a war zone. We knew we were expected to participate in the war on terror. Yep, everybody was going to do a counterterrorism tour.

Everybody. So, yeah, it was a really powerful time to be coming into the agency and meeting the people who had been serving. I mean, some of the people, you know, we met who, you know, right after 9-11 had joined They had been serving all that time and to be able to learn from them was really amazing. Yeah.

I remember the mood at CIA. And this was 2007, 2008 when you and I joined. I mean, that's still four years after the 9-11 commission and six years after 9-11 itself. It was still very, we were all very focused on the global war on terror. Yeah. Like there were whisperings about future threats. Russia was a whisper. China was a whisper.

Iran was a whisper, right? North Korea was a whisper. Nuclear weapons were a whisper. Everybody was extremely focused on terrorism. Yeah. And it was really like that, even still when we left CIA in 2014. Right. So, I mean, 2014 was 13 years after 9-11,

but we were still very much engaged in a war on terror, a global war on terror in Iraq and Afghanistan. And then I think part of the reason that you and I were so struck when Obama, I think, was, I'm pretty sure it was Obama, who started downsizing our troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. And then I think Trump was the one that finally actually like signed the paperwork that we were done in Afghanistan. And then it was Biden who actually coordinated the withdrawal. And we all know how that turned out. But I mean, even still, That war on terror, which is still very much happening.

Yeah. That 20 year, 22 year war on terror, it took three presidents to actually end it. And even when we say end it, they didn't end it. Right. But that's how long it takes. Yeah, we just extricated American troops from. It's like six years, yeah, six years of work between three presidents to actually pull us back and end our occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq, which technically isn't still fully ended. Right. And I think, you know, that one of the most important lessons in my minds from 9-11 is this idea that I have believed in since I worked with refugees. And it's this concept that, you know, a lot of people think that can never happen here. And after I started working with refugees and asylum seekers, I realized anything can happen anywhere. Like you, a person thinking that could never happen.

happen here is the biggest mistake because it makes you complacent and it makes you unaware of the threats that are all around you. And I'm certain that makes me sound like the most paranoid person. But, you know, I'm not saying that the world is full of evil, but evil is out there, right? And you can never think that we are, yet you are fully safe. The world is full of evil. I will tell you that right now. It's not full of evil. The world is full of evil. It's not full of evil. full of evil and there are pockets of goodness. It is not the other way around, my love. It is not the other way around.

I have more faith than you. You are so weird because you are so paranoid and also so hopeful. I am. It doesn't make any sense. Like it's very difficult to be married to you sometimes because I don't know if I'm stepping into like rosy, rosy, like, happy Jehe where everything's daisies or if I'm walking into like fire and brimstone, gee-he, where everything is death. So it's very hard to even just like say good morning to you in the morning because I don't

know which of the two people is rolling over. Well, it's funny because I have these sayings like, don't ever think it can't happen here. Yeah. And people steal. Yes. You're like, why are you locking the car door? People steal, babe. Yes.

We have to lock every door in our house before we go to sleep because people steal. And I'm like, no, I'm pretty sure. Have you seen our TV? Our TV is like 12 years old. No one's going to stay. I hope someone steals this because I don't know how we're going to move this thing, right? But you are like, it's insane. But I also have this very firm belief in the goodness of people.

How do you do that? How do you have those beliefs? Because you know what? We have children, right? Anybody who has children can see your child isn't born evil. They're not, right? They're a pocket of goodness. And it's through life experiences that people develop,

develop which way they're going to go, that people make their decisions, right? It's through experiences they have and influences they have in their life. So if we can create enough positive influences, then we should be able to keep everybody on the positive side. We're not. You just, you just referenced the Deadpool 2 movie without even realizing it. I know. And how bad is it that I caught this reference to an obscure sequel, Deadpool 2? Right? But Deadpool's so great. So here, In this movie, you have this 14-year-old mutant kid who can start fire with his hands. And then you have this, and he is coming out of an orphanage that's abusing him. And he's angry and he's hurt.

So he starts hurting other people. And then you've got this future warrior, a guy named Cable, who comes back in time specifically to kill the 14-year-old kid before the 14-year-old kid becomes an adult who kills Cable's family. And the hero of the story who has faith in people is Deadpool. Well, really, it's Deadpool's wife influencing Deadpool. Soft power. Soft power. There it is right there.

Right there. And then you have like this smart-assed, perfect casting. Whoever cast Ryan Reynolds is Deadpool. Yeah. That person needs an Academy Award or something because that's like the perfect casting. Ryan Reynolds is just, I actually wonder what Ryan Reynolds is. Ryan, if you're watching this. I would love to have dinner with you just to see what you're actually like in person.

So please, everybody, comment on this, tag Ryan Reynolds, because I absolutely want to meet this guy. Because I want to know if Ryan, are you as snarky and smart-ass in person? Are you kind of like a quiet, reserved, Thespian artist who just puts on the dramatic persona of being a smart-ass? And I really want to know it because this is basically me, dude. I'm a giant, I'm a giant dad geek. That's what I am. If you don't think I'm a giant dad geek, thank you. You are probably also a giant dad geek right along with me.

But my point is that the hope that people are good is a beautiful thing. But like even according to my foundation faith, the world is a fallen place. we had our chance where everything was great and we failed and now we live in a fallen world and when I look around I see signs of a fallen world everywhere yeah like yes our children are pockets of goodness and still even then like we do terrible things to children children turn into terrible adults sometimes. Children do terrible things to other children. Yeah.

By default. That is not a good world. That is a world where it takes effort and focus and energy to make things good. Right. But isn't that not to get into a religious conversation, but... Just a philosophical discussion even. Isn't that the point of free will? the choice, right? And like you said, it's an effort, right? Human beings aren't here to just live an

easy life. Life isn't easy. It's not meant to be easy. So in Buddhism, we talk about, we have the concept of personal responsibility, right? In Christianity, I'm kind of mentally equating that to free will, right? Like you make the choice on what you are going to do to another person, right? Hold on. Boom, I'm going to win this. Oh, you guys get to watch me win this. Here we go. Here we go. This is the replay of the, this is the replay of the show. This is the sports replay. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Christianity. Yes. My faith. Yes. Believes that we come from a fallen world and that we have to put energy and effort to emulate and to show honor and glory to God in order to make sense of this world. You are Buddhist. Yes.

As I recall learning recently, there are seven levels to Buddhahood. And all humans start at the base levels. Is that correct? Yes, there are multiple sects of Buddhism. And we all live in these 10 worlds, these emotional worlds. What are the first three worlds? Anger, greed, and stupidity. Yes!

So we all live there until... You rise up. How do you rise up? through your own actions. So we all start in, what was it, greed, anger, anger, greed, stupidity. Anger, greed, and stupidity. That doesn't sound like a good place.

But it's up to us to rise, right? And why did Jesus, why did Jesus come to earth? Why did, was the Buddha here, right? To act as mentors, to act as as guides. As guides. In a fallen world. world. We, but there's hope there. That's the whole point. Yeah, there's hope. I'm not saying there's no hope. I'm saying your hope is a beautiful thing. I'm saying that we have to start with the

fact that evil is everywhere. That's where this whole thing started. Evil is everywhere. There are pockets of goodness. The Buddha, Jesus, pockets of goodness. And the pockets turn into other pockets. They're like hot pockets. Who doesn't like a good hot pocket? I'm 43 years old. They're still gross, but I like them. I wouldn't say no to them. But the rest of the world is not hot pockets. The world is a fallen, nasty, terrible place. Evil is everywhere.

It takes effort and energy to improve the world. Yes. I agree with that. Oh, it feels so good to hear those words. You know, me and green doesn't mean that you win. In my brain, it's the same. And I can live in my reality. I just heard you say, Andy, you're right, and you're handsome, and you're so smart, and you're just as sexy as you were when I met you.

Well, that's a fact right there. That's very sweet. Those are all the things I'm hearing. I don't really know what you just said, but those are the things I'm hearing. It's the beauty of marriage. So knowing that, you know, 9-11, the events of 9-11, has brought this awareness to the American public. in particular and change the way the IC community work, the intelligence community works.

I mean, over the last 20 years has changed the experience of our military and our veterans and our active duty soldiers. You know, how do you think, you know, moving forward that, you know, this war on terror, you know, now that the official war on terror is done, but terrorism still exists. Like, how do you think,

think moving forward the American public and those who serve, those who serve in our military, those who serve in our government, you know, what is that going to look like? What is that fight going to look like? Because I don't think that military, I don't think that hard power is really the way to go here personally. So what do you think about that? I think the war on terror is going out very much like the war on drugs. Oh, interesting. Which is still going on. Yeah. Right? You can't win that war. It's an ideological war that lives in blisters. Right? Little pockets of rot. So then how do you, how do you address it?

Are you constantly on the defensive then? Or is there an offensive to be had? I think that there is an offensive to be had, but it's always going to be limited by other priorities. Instead, what I would say, what I would say to our children and what I would say to anybody who's our friend. Yeah. Is that the lesson from 9-11 isn't a lesson about terrorism. it's a lesson about how an enemy unifies us. And I think that is a poignant lesson right now

because we are a divided country right now. Yeah. And we have been increasing in our division for probably the last seven years. Meanwhile, growing powers out there and who I believe geopolitically is our biggest rival is China. China is sitting there across the ocean and they're watching us.

And they're students of history. China has been around for more than 5,000 years. And they exist and they continue to exist because they learn from what they see in their enemies. Right? If you read the art of war, it's all about observing your enemy. Yes. They've been watching us.

They see that we're divided. They know that if they become a clear and present threat to the United States, they will unify us again. And then we will become unpredictable. They learned after watching Japan. They learned after watching al-Qaeda. They learned. So they're stuck in this position

where they have to somehow be a competitor without being a direct threat that unifies the United States. And they've played it fairly well so far. But they're looking at Taiwan the same way we are. What happens here with Taiwan? How do we make it so that the Taiwan conflict doesn't turn into China becoming the bad guy that unifies the United States?

Yeah. And they're, I mean, in my opinion, they're playing that geopolitical game very well. And we are not really helping them. You know, it's really interesting. If you look, we subscribe to the Economist magazine. If you look at the last few weeks worth of the Economist magazine, the covers are ridiculous. Because one cover will say why Biden is failing against China. And then the next cover will say, why Xi Jinping is failing inside China.

And like, they just, everybody seems to think they have China, figured out. And I don't have China figured out. But they're doing, they're living in a very adaptive space where they are adapting to the geopolitical waves of the world week by week. Yeah. And they can do that because they're authoritarian. It's harder for us in the United States. We're like a giant ocean liner going through the ocean and waves are crashing against us and storms are pounding us, whereas they're very agile. And part of it, that agility comes from the fact that only one person makes all the calls. Yeah, and I think it's a fantastic point that division creates weakness. And, you know, looking back at 9-11, the division was within the I-C

community, right? And that's where we were weak. And that's where we were weak. And so we've remedied that. But now our government and, you know, the popular, I mean, our government is divided for certain. You know, the population of nation, it's hard because all you really hear are the two most extreme. The loudest voices? Yeah, the loudest voices, which are the most extreme sides. I don't think we're population-wise. I don't think we're nearly as divided as what you see on television and what you read in Twitter.

Exactly. But if the government itself is divided in its decision-making power, that creates a weakness for our country, right? I'm not saying that we should be authoritarian. I think we've had this conversation before about what form of government is best. But, you know, it's, it's,

this really is a red flag, I think, that we need to be paying attention to because if anything happens, how will we, you know, we, along the lines of it can happen here, we shouldn't need an external threat to unify us. We shouldn't. We shouldn't. But we live in a fallen world.

Or back to that again. I agree with you, my love. I really do. I really do agree with you. And I am hopeful that we will find a way to unify without needing that external force. Yeah. I don't know how it will happen. I am hopeful it will happen.

Or I am hopeful that the quiet voices in the middle will become louder. Yes. Because we're all being silenced by the extremes, right? It's just, it's obnoxious. I am so happy to hear you say that you're hopeful. I'm always hopeful. I just know not to put a whole lot of stock in hope. I had an instructor at the farm.

Yeah. I had an instructor at CIA in my field training course who used to say hope in one hand. And shit in the other. My mom used to say that all the time. And see which one fills up first. Yep. Right? Your mom used to say that?

Oh, yeah. I hated that instructor. That instructor was a dick. I have to try so. And I was like, what a horrible saying. And here I am quoting it. I can't believe your mom used to say that. It's one of those things that, you know how when you become a parent and you're trying

to like, you know, every parent I feel like is trying to do better than, you know, their parent who did their best, whatever. But it's one of those things where I have to try not to say it to the kids. Really? Oh, yeah, because it's so ingrained. I'm like, well, hope on one hand and shit in the other. Please don't say that's our children. I know.

But I catch the thought, and I'm like, oh, that's not good. Folks, thank you so much for joining us today. If this 9-11 is officially called Patriots Day. And it doesn't feel right to say happy Patriots Day because it's not a happy day. But it is Patriots Day. Wherever you were on 9-11, I hope you get a chance. to remember that moment in a bit of quiet reflection for yourself. I hope that you enjoyed our conversation today.

We had never, we never intended to do anything but bring honor to you and to everybody who served in the War on Terror and to everybody who was touched on 9-11 because we were touched, most certainly, on that day. But at the same time, I think we both agree, my wife and I, that moving forward, we need to see that 9-11 is a moment in history that has done. led to a different America. And it's in America that we get to decide what that America looks like. And that's a responsibility that I think we should take very seriously because of the 2,997 people who died on that day against their will without volunteering to fight for any reason. All they did

was go to work that day. And to all the heroes who helped to keep that number limited to 2,997. and I have a number of heroes that I know from my world who were there on that day as first responders. So thank you very much for being part of the conversation. Thank you for anyone who shares this conversation with someone else today. Shares it via email, shares it via social media, shares it in any way. Thank you to everybody who continues to support and be part of the everyday spy family, the spy tribe that we call ourselves. I'm including in the description below a link to an article that I wrote about the extremism ladder

and about how people are turned from hurt individuals into religious extremists. So if you want to take a look at that article, you'll find it in the description below. And then, of course, come over and visit us anytime at Everydayspy.com or take the spy quiz also included below in the description. If you want to see where you would have fit in to the spy world,

what kind of spy would you have been, what do your skills and your natural talents kind of destined you to do in the spy world? But thanks again for joining us. We can't wait to see you next time. your comments leave your questions below make sure you click on some of the links in the description so you get additional information and some additional tools to take you with today all right take care