Sea Control - Sea Control 266 - The US Joint Force's Defeat Before Conflict

Episode Date: August 1, 2021

Link:The U.S. Joint Force's Defeat Before Conflict, by Anjanay Kumar, The US Army Mad Scientist Lab, April 19, 2021.

Hey folks, Jared here. I want to thank Walker Mills for holding down the fort the last few weeks. We welcomed a new member of the family on July 4th, and things have been pretty busy since then. But glad to be back, and extremely thankful to the whole SimSec family for helping us press on, putting out quality content every week. Today, John Frerichs is your host, and he's joined by former Army Captain A.J. Kumar to discuss his submission to Army Mad Scientist blog, fictional intelligence article grounded in a historical foundation of Chinese history combined with the believable twist on current events and how a crisis with China could be lost before the conflict ever begins. This episode was produced and edited by Marie Williams. Don't miss everything going on over at the website simsec.org. The final call for articles

for Project Trident is live. We're partnering with Lockheed Martin and Naval Warfare Studies Institute at the Naval Postgraduate School for Emerging Technologies. You can find more information about submissions at simsec.org and we also just announced our end of year fiction contest partnership with usni so check that out too that again that's at simsec.org finally i want to take the opportunity to recommend our partners in the simsec podcast network the bilge pumps you can find alex jamie drack and a pile of iron brew bottles wherever you download your podcasts on that note i'll turn it over to kimber's men you're listening to sea control hosted by the Center for International Maritime Security.

Guten Tag, shipmates, and welcome back. Today we will discuss a future-focused vision published by the MAD Scientist Laboratory called the U.S. Joint Forces Defeat Before Conflict. The MAD Scientist Laboratory is an online publication and forum hosted by the Training and Doctrine Command of the U.S. Army. It's an amazing collection of fictional intelligence writing and podcasts that is a must for security professionals to check out. Today, we are fortunate to be joined by the author of the article, Captain A.J. Kumar. The article was published by the Mad Scientist blog in April of 2021 and will be linked in the show notes on the SimSec website.

Most of the China articles and reports that the Sea Control podcast has covered have primarily focused on the maritime domain. I found A.J.'s article fascinating as it took an alternative approach that was grounded in history and challenged many military planners' assumptions on what the conflict or lack of conflict could look like. A.J.'s writing was a winning submission for a writing contest regarding competition, crisis, conflict, and change. Before we begin, I'll remind the listeners that all opinions expressed are our own and not reflective of any institutions with which we might otherwise be associated. AJ, in addition to a personal introduction, what was the basis of the writing prompt and what drove you to approach it the way you did? Hi, John. Thanks for having me. So a lot of my background in the military has been working with, specifically in regards to this article, is working at the Intelligence Center of Excellence. I was a speechwriter for the commanding general there, Major General Tony Hale.

And at that position, you know, we have a lot of exposure to enterprise level concepts and issues, you know, all the modernization that the U.S. military is currently pursuing. And all that is placed within the larger context of what is our adversary, our pacing threat, China. What are they doing to try to supplant our presence and our capabilities in the Pacific? And, you know, as an intelligent professional, you know, I'm an intelligence officer, I just have a lot of interest in making sure that I understand what our key adversaries are doing and understanding that, you know, there's a larger part the U.S. has to play, not just from a military aspect, but also economically, socioculturally, in a lot of the countries in that region.

You know, I was born in India, so I have a lot of history in that region, so to speak. And then just as an American citizen, it's important to me that I understand this is the same sort of fight that the U.S. has faced before when he first fought fascism in the form of Nazi Germany and imperialist Japan. And then when he fought the USSR and the threats of communism, it's a very ideological fight at the end of the day. And so it all kind of comes back to what the United States, what democracy and the liberal world order, you know, as it's kind of generalized, how that faces off against the threat of the Chinese and what their ideology brings to the table. It's a great background, and I can only imagine that your speechwriting job probably enabled you some interesting peeks behind the curtain within the national security field. you provided a historical framework prior to jumping into the crisis and that really shaped I felt like how the crisis was developed will you discuss some of the key elements that you identified with in the article and why the historical approach was required yeah and you

know China has such a long rich history you know going back to the Han dynasties and even well before that you know it's always been a very major player in in the world especially its region has been the dominant player uh so when you approach modern day issues and uh and developments you have to put all that you have to consider all that and put it in that context because you know they're used to being uh the richest the the most uh technologically advanced uh it's a lot of cultural richness and that feeds into the mindset now where you know a lot of chinese people or a lot of the propaganda coming out of the ccp the chinese communist party is that china is the center of the world you know the middle kingdom of the world uh so when they

go through some of the things that they've gone through especially uh from 1840 to 1949 what they consider the century of humiliation uh when the english basically occupied them uh and you know there's a there's a lot of history that goes into that a lot of detail but basically between then between 1840 and 1949 the chinese were really subservient to other powers and then they you You know, they went through their civil war where the communists came out on top of Mao Zedong. And even after that, until really about the 80s with Deng Xiaoping, they didn't have the sort of prosperity, strength or influence within their own country and then within the region that they really think that they should have. And, you know, to an extent, you could make the argument that they are historically naturally endowed with. You consider the size that they have, their ties, their control over major waterways on the continent itself.

And so a lot of that feeds into the way they approach other countries, Vietnam, the Philippines, Japan, et cetera, and certainly how they approach the United States and other countries outside that have a lot of interest within the Indo-Pacific region in general. AJ, thank you for the broad kind of expanse of history. If you had to go back and pick a single historical event or a historical incident that happened that really shaped how we got to the conflict that you wrote about, is there a single one that you could identify and expand upon that? Absolutely. So back in the 90s, when Desert Storm happened, everyone across the world was really shocked at the U.S.'s military capabilities. All the offset strategies and characteristics that came from deep strike capability came to bear on the Iraqi army, and it was done phenomenally, almost flawlessly. And kind of a smaller factor, just after that, the U.S. accidentally bombed, while in Bosnia, bombed the Chinese consulate there.

At that time, based off the success in Desert Storm, the Chinese thought, well, there's no way that they did this by accident. And there's a little bit of political backdrop to that. But their idea was, or their conception was, the Americans did this on purpose. And almost nonstop from that point, they've been focused on what they consider really more of a wartime footing against the United States, where they pursued economic, political, social, cultural weaknesses within the U.S. enterprises, so to speak. you know, the United States people, ideology and culture, and they've really tried to undermine the United States and her interests, not only because it's really to make way for the Chinese to reclaim their power and ability in their region, but also because, you know, to an extent there is that personal attack on Chinese personality and on China's sovereignty in Bosnia with that accidental airstrike. AJ, thank you for that response. And you've encourage me to go back and review that incident myself. I'll have to go back and open the history

books. You spent some time focusing on the operational environment of today, specifically within the Indo-Pacific. Most China-oriented writing, I feel like, spends time on this topic, focusing on China's naval advances, such as the long-range anti-ship or carrier-killing missiles. You seem to take a different route. Can you share with our listeners on why you focus on what you did? So the Chinese have always followed the very traditional Soviet approach to countering American trends. You know, the Soviets had a very, very dense and capable anti-access area denial bubble in Eastern Europe by the A2AD bubble. So the Chinese, you know, of course, they took that, they adapted that to their operational environment in the Pacific. That's where, you know, a lot of

focus comes on these ballistic missiles, which can, you know, range, you know, hundreds and thousands of kilometers out to attack and destroy carry strike groups, CSGs. But I think one of the more important parts of what they've done, and this is outlined in Unrestricted Warfare by two PRC colonels written back in 1999, they realized that the U.S. and a lot of Western countries have a lot of technological and economic advantages. And so what the Chinese need to do in order to once subvert that and then to supplant that with their own strengths is to target some of our weaknesses, especially in an economic and a sociocultural realm. So, you know, you think about the kind of the most important resources going forward. One of the greatest ones is the

access to rare earth minerals and metals. And we use those in everything from smartphone to laptops to guidance ships and weapon systems to cars, as we're currently seeing a very massive shortage in ships going to cars because of COVID and the various supply shocks. So because of that, the Chinese sought to achieve an almost unparalleled monopoly, the same sort of monopoly the U.S. had on oil back in the early 1900s, and that set the foundation for the U.S. to get to a point where we have economic control of the world through the dollar

as the major reserve currency. It's not quite that strong a word, so that's something they're really trying to pursue as well. And then, of course, approaching us from the cultural and the political realms, they realize that as a democracy, we have fundamentally different strengths than they do as a very collectivist and Maoist Confucian culture. So all the strengths that we have are their weaknesses and vice versa in a very general sense.

And so one of the things that they seek to do is, it's kind of the cliche of culture of go versus chess. They want to surround their opponents. They want to make sure that when they finally engage with us, in whatever sense that may be, their success is inevitable. Yes, weapon development is important, and it's actually kind of funny. I think a lot of it may unintentionally attack the weaknesses in American psychology. You think about the military-industrial complex we've had for decades now and the strength of that and the influence that has on our politics. So building these big carry-on-killing missiles is important in that sense.

You're triggering the American weakness, making us spend all this money on defenses and laser close-in weapon systems, et cetera. But while they're doing that, they've got this deep monopoly on very important resources. They've started to attack us politically and then push us out of important regions. You look at all our influence in countries like the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, et cetera,

all those countries have very different relationships now than we did back in the 80s and the 90s. A large part of that is the result of what the Chinese have pursued and what they've accomplished through their wolf warriors and their tiger diplomacy and their very aggressive approach to subservienting some of these countries economically and culturally. I think one of the very last points on this is they go out of their way to really hone in on, you know, as an American culture with, you know, very individual ideology

and a lot of issues, you know, handling social media. They've really done a lot, I think, behind the scenes, along with, you know, other players such as Russia and, you know, Internet Research Association or, you know, the different groups in Russia that are targeting us through social media to kind of undermine our cohesion as the country, you know, to undermine our ability to conduct or to fix problems that we have. You know, we've always had problems, but now versus before, our problem-solving mechanisms are slightly broken. So all this kind of comes together in that, you know, that go, that deep strategy game

where they want to encircle us and make sure that when they finally do come to blows or when they, you know, in the scenario kind of laid out, get to a point just short of blows, then there's no question about their success. Thank you, AJ. And I think your analogy of the go with regards to Chinese strategy is very compelling. I really appreciated how you shaped the operational environment to not be just focused on the military aspects, but also some of those socioeconomic aspects as well. The first half of your paper was really a fantastic historical foundation, but the second half I would call a great piece of fictional intelligence can you give a synopsis of your road to war and the transition from competition to

crisis as you described it yeah and you know a lot of it was actually just inspired by looking at current events uh you know by writing in uh you know early uh 2021 obviously a lot is going on in hong kong uh where you know on almost on a daily basis they're eroding rights uh they're more activists and people with conflicting views to the traditional party line who are being imprisoned, who are being detained, who are being suppressed and oppressed in different ways. And so the scenario layout is kind of just an extension of that. And we've already seen the beginning of this start to happen in the last couple of weeks. But you start to see the political and economic elite flee Taiwan, fearing the kind of trends that they're seeing in their

city, the total loss of special status of Hong Kong for the Chinese, and then over time that these people go to Taiwan and they kind of see the same effects starting to affect Taiwan as they have been. And that's the stated goal of the Chinese to reintegrate Taiwan over time in a peaceful way. But in the scenario, lay out the possibility of these refugees, these political refugees from Hong Kong radicalizing Taiwanese politics. And so eventually the red line that the PRC has repeatedly put down, Declaration of Taiwanese Independence, is crossed. and the Chinese realize that their peaceful reintegration is not possible and that they have to pursue military means to do so.

And so a lot of this goes back to some very old politics of the U.S. when we still had ties with Taiwan, but essentially the United States would be expected to act in some way to support Taiwan if there was in fact an invasion by the mainland. And the Chinese would understand that, and they definitely put that into their operational planning. What they don't want, or I don't think they want, is to have a large engagement to the U.S. There's some really great books about how this could go down. I remember one of them envisions a Chinese invasion of Hawaii.

Obviously, Alaska's right there, other allies, South Korea, Japan. And the issue in my eyes with doing any of that to invade Hawaii, even to in any serious number or in terms of casualties, attack American forces, is that has a very galvanizing effect on the U.S. You know, you think about Pearl Harbor. Maybe that's one of the strongest reasons we were able to compete so effectively and were able to win World War II because the American public was inflamed. Before that, there was a lot of opposition to join the war, even though it is at that point pretty clear that at some point we're going to get drawn into it. And even the Japanese back then realized after the fact that they had this military victory, but then long term they galvanized the U.S. into acting against them to a point of complete victory. And regardless of whether that victory on the U.S. side happens or not against China, there's a massive cost to the U.S. and China going into an all-out war. The same happens if China attacks Japan or South Korea because of our defense treaties with them. A lot of non-kinetic operations are going to be going off, and all the kinetic will be entirely focused at Taiwan.

you know i kind of gave a you know when when hostilities between the taiwanese and the prc start i gave about a 72 hour time time frame for them to get to it get to the island uh and secure it i i think it'd probably be much less than that but just to uh just to kind of make it easy on them uh so to speak uh you know for three days uh they would as soon as they begin operations they would try to stop any information getting out of taiwan out of the prc even uh using a very very dense uh and uh broad uh internet apparatus that they've created so you know it's you know you think about the the access the average chinese person has uh from the mainland uh to you know different websites it's it's pretty it's pretty hard for them to get to you know open source media

or to, you know, just especially in the case of this, to get to, you know, public events are currently ongoing. Other countries also see a pretty broad degradation of information coming out of Taiwan, that region in general. While they're doing that, you know, they're probably launching distributed denial of service attacks, DDoS, against pro-Taiwanese websites, pro-Taiwanese pages on social media. At the same time, they'd probably go out of their way to kind of emphasize the benefits of reintegration and pro-Chinese sentiment wherever they could find that on social media and elsewhere. At the same time, they'd launch cyber attacks against really any sort of infrastructure in the U.S. and or allies that they could find

uh with a special emphasis on intelligence uh infrastructure so you know just i think just the other week uh a major pipeline on the east coast was was hacked by uh an eastern european uh cyber crime gang uh and you know that kind of highlights that you know we've known about this for uh for years you know there i think like four or five years ago there's a dam that was hacked in uh in upstate New York. And I think that was the first time it really came up on the public level that, oh, wow, this is something that happens and can happen. And it's such a hard problem for us to fix and to address, especially in such a large country with aging infrastructure. And it's something that I don't expect to have addressed by the time we get to a point where this sort

of conflict may happen. So we'll see a lot of infrastructure, power grids, internet service providers, everything kind of get attacked simultaneously. So that's all the strategic level. That's all the large scale stuff that's going on. On operational level, thinking about the carrier strike groups that are out in the Pacific, they'd experience a lot of stuff that we've already seen. So there have been a couple of notable cases of the hacking of GPS systems of U.S. Navy ships in the Pacific that have caused collisions between themselves and actually like a tanker, you know, one of those ultra-large tankers. I mean, I think that's a pretty hard thing to happen,

but it's because everything is so dependent on GPS now. When you hack these capabilities and these services to ships, then it becomes very hard for them to effectively maneuver, much less conduct defensive or offensive operations to get to PRC. so you know we've already talked about the a2ad bubbles so that's kind of the starting point for all of our all the u.s navy ships you know they're outside this area or just on the the fringes on it on the east east of the philippines uh so to move in to get to a point where they can support taiwan they have to go a considerable distance uh and all the time uh you know they're going to be

high stress situation uh they're being constantly braved with signals from uh the the blue water navy and the militia ships you know all the all the sailing ships that the uh the prc is outfitted with military radars and sensors uh so all that all that information is going to be going to the personnel on these ships and this uh in the csgs at the same time as this is happening they're going to be facing a lot of personal issues you know another paper uh on the mad scientist blog talked about you know micro targeting uh and i kind of mentioned that as well but you know people are going to start hearing uh that you know their families were killed or that you know their house was being foreclosed or uh on the domestic front families

are going to hear that you know their their service member who is abroad uh was killed in an accident or you know whatever the case may be so a lot of this is really just to paralyze and slow down the u.s joint force on a tactical and an operational level but they've already got that that standoff created by the a280 they've you know attacked the personnel so to speak they've attacked our systems uh and then kind of within all of this you know this jumble of all these capabilities is the assassin's mace family weaponry and this is kind of a you know a wild card in all this because it's something we really don't know much about uh and that's very purposeful it's uh you know i i expect that the chinese have developed uh some very very advanced technologies

you know they uh it's kind of like the the case of you know third world countries who are able to get 5g whereas you know countries like the u.s still are you know having issues uh putting those in because they don't have to get all the you know 3g 4g lte they can go straight to the most advanced technologies they don't have to invest in everything along the way and that's what the prc has really done the what i think they've uh sought to do with the assassin's base uh so these are all weapons meant to purposely target and offset american tactical and operational advantages technological advantages more than anything else uh here one example is a rail gun uh you know there are indications that by 2025 they'll have a rail gun that is able to precisely target uh

small quick targets at ranges exceeding 200 kilometers you know they've got a very extensive uh satellite network over the pacific that's uh you know uh ready to provide real-time intelligence so that adds a different style a different flavor of threat that the u.s isn't prepared or hasn't practiced facing before uh and so while the personnel in the pacific are getting all this information this data they're getting these personal issues now they're also facing something they haven't trained for uh and haven't been prepared to uh to handle and so all that's meant to come together to you know give them that that time so that they're able to consolidate a foothold on Taiwan, you know, secure the island in 72 hours, I think that's pretty feasible.

And when the death startles, you know, there's a lot of issues that come out of it. Probably the biggest one, yes, you know, they get Taiwan, they get the very massive semiconductor manufacturing, the chip manufacturing industry on Taiwan, ideally very secure and intact from their invasion. but american deterrence takes the biggest hit you know because we have such a strong commitment uh in language to protect taiwan in case of a major intrusion by the prc like in this situation uh the other countries you know japan south korea you know other allies like new zealand australia uh they all see that we're not able to protect them the way that uh the world has assumed we've been able to uh so there's not just the you know the military loss uh which you know

we we don't lose any personnel but really as a military we lose that fight by not being able to take part in it uh we also lose you know the clout and influence in the region uh which would you know lead the third order effect of that would be you know china has economic dominion over that region now you know they've already started to put in these kind of brettonwood-esque institutions You know, Bretton Woods referring to institutions like the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization, the World Bank, things that have cemented U.S. economic power and influence across the world. The PRC will be able to start putting those in place and saying, you know, if you want to be protected as a country, you need to be part of our trading bloc. You need to be part of our bank, et cetera. And when the reserve currency for all of that is going to be their currency, the renminbi, that starts to undermine U.S. economic strength as well.

That's something that – another part of this that already by – I think by 2028, the Chinese will overtake us economically. But, you know, in this situation where they also have, you know, these institutions that really just supplant us entirely within the Pacific region, then we lose almost all of our ability to influence that region. And they've achieved their hegemony on a level that no country has had except the United States and Britain before. So, you know, that goes into larger global reaction. you know it's it's not going to be as distinct uh it's going to be more subtle you know in terms of relations with uh with europe with africa which already has a very large uh chinese presence but it's going to impact and kind of shade all our discussions that happen uh until there's something else to happen to reverse that uh that sort of momentum away from the chinese

uh and so you know that kind of uh that's kind of what the i think the chinese would view as you know the best possible outcome uh you know of course they don't want to go to war uh over taiwan uh they want it to be a peaceful reintegration but at the end of the day if they need to uh they're able to and they really their loans that would uh gain anything uh in this sort of situation aj thank you for your uh recap of your story and really hopefully what is the worst case prediction of current events and how they could unfold as i read your your article i found there's a lot of similarities to the novel 2034 by Admiral Stavridis and Elliot Ackerman. And while their book is more character driven, and I think novel based, I was impressed in your short article

how you explore in depth some of the strategic and operational factors, and specifically the operations in the information environment, and how the conflict could unfold. So I really appreciate how you pulled that thread through. As great authors do, you didn't simply identify a problem, though. You provided some conclusions and opportunities to prevent the joint forces defeat before conflict ever begins towards the end of your article. Can you share some of these opportunities with the listeners? Yeah, and I kind of alluded to some of them, you know, but the biggest one really is approaching the Chinese from a multilateral perspective. You know, the U.S. doesn't have the economic power on its own to harm China. I think, you know,

under the Trump administration, with the tariffs that were put in place, the trade war, yes, there were some effects, but not nearly what the United States is accustomed to seeing. You think about what we're able to do against Russia when they invaded Crimea and Ukraine. There's a massive drop in their GDP and their output, their trade, as a result of sanctions that the U.S. took against them. We can't do that with China. What we can do is coordinate an international response of other like-minded countries, notably the Quad. It's an ongoing security dialogue between the U.S., India, Australia, and Japan. So these are all of the major players in the region. India is kind of the one that has the most power, I think, or the most potential to add value to

the United States' foreign policy. A lot of that goes back to our involvement in Afghanistan, which has a very complicated relationship with Pakistan, and both of them have a very complicated relationship with India that goes back hundreds and thousands of years. So as a result of our, at the time this was written at least, our ongoing operation in Afghanistan, we had to maintain a certain diplomatic footing with Pakistan. Now that we're drawing down from Afghanistan,

it kind of opens up our options to be friendly with India. And you think India is the largest democracy in the world with the only population that can really manage to meet or beat the Chinese population. And where that comes a lot of strength, there have already been a number of border skirmishes. And these go back decades as well over different areas on the border with formerly Tibet. And so there's a lot of potential in India to be an ally against Chinese expansion of influence in the region. And of course, you know, drawing in Japan and Australia, already two key allies in the region, two powerful allies with their economic strength and their, at least with Japan's placement,

with their ability to influence the region that we're talking about from a military perspective, and especially with the possibility that they might build a wartime rather than a self-defense force. So all that is a big part of it, being able to build a strong anti-PRC pole in the region and to align countries around that. And then the other part of this, I think this is also a very unique weakness or point of emphasis for the Chinese because they have so much belief in their own cultural superiority drawn from thousands of years of history and success. That's something we can target as well. So, you know, looking at the oppression of the Uyghurs in the southwestern regions, looking at their subversion of human rights there in Hong Kong, you know, the one child policy and the impact that's had, you know, the spread of COVID from a Chinese center. All these things are things that you can build or put into a large, cohesive campaign to undermine Chinese influence, Chinese prestige, legitimacy, and credibility.

And then, of course, you want to target the way that they've demonstrated they're willing to do against American politicians, thinking back to Representative Swalwell of California who had someone on his staff turn out to be a Chinese spy more or less, or rather not a staff, but someone closely aligned with his office. so you you look at you know the fact that had and that's something we can do to the chinese as well you know targeting their individual politicians units and one of the key issues uh key weaknesses in their current political structure is that xi jinping has built a very strong cultural personality and he's really de-institutionalized succession so you know we don't know who the next person will be after him whereas you know previous instances uh previous chinese administration so to speak we've had a fairly rough idea you know there may be two or three people who are the top players uh to be next on line after the current premiere uh that's not the case anymore um so

that's something that's targetable as well you know if we if we get a sense of who the next person may be after uh xi jinping then you target that person you try to find weaknesses in there uh that might be embarrassing the same way that they target our politicians or uh businessmen uh and then of course you know going back to uh social media you know having a very broad and consistent campaign against chinese influences chinese uh issues you know human rights violations etc all that kind of comes together to undermine and target you know those weaknesses it really you want to trigger them uh and force them to to be on the defensive you know make sure that they're uh they don't have momentum because they're always responding to your jabs and your uh

your uh actions and then you know at the end of the day also we have to kind of be lucky uh because they've they've been operating under one national goal you know uniting all elements of national power including you know their cultural power uh their economic power uh and that's been to undermine the united states supremacy in the region uh and then uh united states superpower status uh as a whole across the world uh and you know again like like i said earlier that's not something we've seen since uh since the soviet union and you know a key difference between the chinese and soviet union is the chinese are competent you know the the soviet union never had a gdp more than 40 percent of the united states is uh and so you know we're facing an

opponent we've never really faced before and you know in order to to beat them we have to be able to do the same thing that they're doing you know with unity of government unity of command a unity of effort uh from every american uh at some point it's going to be a point where you know Every American has a role to play in a fight to prove not only that America is still the preeminent world power, which I think I've always thought is something that's good for the world. with the United States is stable and effective, then the world is a safer place. But we also have to make the case that democracy and the things that a democracy stands for are also more powerful than the things that a government like the PRC stands for. I think that there's a moral arc in history towards freedom, liberty, and increased safety. And a lot of things that the Chinese

government does undermines that. And so we have to play the long game. We have to think from an infinite mindset that we're not just fighting for ourselves. We're also fighting for really at some point in the course of where the world goes. AJ, thank you for that. And I want to put you on the spot and come back militarily. If you were the chairman of the Joint Chiefs right now, what changes would you implement and why? Honestly, I think that right now our military is in a pretty decent spot. You know, we're undertaking the most broad and ambitious modernization efforts since the 80s

when we came up with the Big Five, you know, the technologies that would have overwhelmed the Soviets and did overwhelm the Iraqis and their very formidable army in Desert Storm. So, you know, as a director of the Joint Chiefs, my focus would not be on the military itself and kind of getting around your question here, But it would really be on our civilian leadership and making sure they understand the depth and the breadth of the problem that's facing us.

You know, I actually have a story from when I was in Afghanistan with the Joint Task Force. General Milley, then the chief of staff of the Army, came down to take a briefing from us on ISIS, on ISIS-K. and you know we conducted the briefing and at the end of the we had a conversation about the relationship between afghanistan pakistan and india like you know kind of alluded to this earlier but the key takeaway for me uh in that conversation was you know mel millie is a guy that that gets it uh he gets it you know the way we fight and win in a region where there's such deep and uh and rich cultural history something united states doesn't really have you have to understand that and then you have to use that to your advantage so i think that the

military's biggest play in all this is to inform our civilian leaders uh to you know inform the public at large this is what we're doing this is why we're doing it and this is why it matters that we win this fight and this is why it matters that uh that every american understands that they're part of this fight thank you for that and finally aj i'm going to put you on the spot as a as an army officer, transitioning army officer, as all the guests come on the program with different views and backgrounds, I ask you to help expand my own perspective. How would you define maritime security? The single phrase that comes to mind when I think about maritime security is freedom of navigation. You know, the ability for a state to secure its own borders, to conduct

lawful commerce, to protect and secure personal interests or private interests in their space. And, you know, I think that there's a right and a wrong side of history. And there's a very large cost of being on the wrong side of history. And you look at, you know, some of the stuff in terms of this problem set, what China is doing to undermine freedom of navigation, especially in the South China Sea, you know, you just think that at the end of the day, you know, they can't keep this up forever. and the seas aren't going away, people aren't going away. And if you undermine the security and the freedom of others, eventually at some point that's going to come back to bite you in the back. And I just think that maritime security is something that every country has a part to play in, has a role to play. And if you're undermining the freedom of navigation,

the freedom of others to do what they need to do or what they want to do within, you know, a reasonable extent, then you're on the wrong side of history. AJ, thank you for that. And what are you working on now? And can listeners find you anywhere online? Yeah, so I'm transitioning off active duty, and I'll be going to Harvard Kennedy School to get my master's in public policy. But if anyone has any, you know, thoughts or anything else they'd like to talk about, you know, you can feel free to reach out to me by email. It's R-E-P-E-T-E-R 955 at gmail.com. It's repeater 955. Hey, Jay, thank you for that. And I wish you the best in your next academic adventures. And I look forward to seeing what you do with that public policy

degree. My sincere appreciation for coming on the podcast today to discuss your article. To the listeners, highly recommend that you check out his article as it offers an alternative vision of what conflict with China could look like. It's both grounded in history but provides a believable fictional intelligence outlook in terms of what that conflict could look like. It's a very compelling story. Thank you for listening, and until next time, guten tag. Thank you.

We'll be right back.