WarTalk: Iran + Randy Schriver on Asian Defense

A

And then.

B

Yeah, you jinxed it. Thanks for that.

A

Twelve hours later, the President sits in Ankara and says, I think there are scum. This is great.

B

When did we get George W. Bush back?

A

Yeah, you don't know. Bush never would have said that. That's the craziest part about it, is we talk about him being, like, not the smartest president, but he never would have said any of that.

C

It was just that nine.

A

Like the. The.

C

On the flaming, like New York. That's the only time he did it is like to the fire hiders with the bullhorn. But aside from that, you know.

D

Well, and then.

A

Yeah. Which you can actually understand because he's a man that's walking through rubble and like, seeing, like, that's. That's an emotional response. Like, you can get that sitting in the NATO summit at Ankara and calling the. The people that were conceivably at a peace agreement with scum.

C

I mean, Brian, you want to. I think you should start. Okay, so.

D

All right.

C

War talk. We got to talk about Iran again. Brian, what's up? What's been happening?

E

Well, it looks like we've started strikes against Iran again in response to Iran deciding that it wanted to exert control over the Strait. Seems like the maybe harder line factions inside of Iran's government, primarily IRGC people, decided they were losing the leverage they had in the negotiations in terms of the traffic through the strait starting to pick up. We got to like a third of the normal level. So 30 or so ships were making through the strait, God forbid. And as a result, the IRGC decided they needed to lock that stuff down. So they attacked a couple of ships. The Mariners obviously run scared. The US Gets mad, does some retaliatory strikes against Iranian missile and drone sites, which apparently there's a bunch of those still in operation, despite the fact that we eliminated their military. And then they. The Iranians responded by attacking Gulf allies, allies and infrastructure, including our base in Bahrain. Again, that poor place has been hammered so many times, and now we are back doing some retaliatory strikes to that. So the back and forth has begun again at a lower level than in previous phases of this conflict. But in a lot of ways, this could be negotiations by other means. It's both sides trying to exert to demonstrate what leverage they have. I think, unfortunately for the US Side, we've got probably less leverage than the Iranians do in the grand scheme of things. But the negotiations continue at some low level. The technical discussions, as they call them, are still underway. We'll see to what degree that yields any benefits. But it could be where this is. What we have for a while is basically limited traffic through the strait down to 10, 15 ships a day, and periodic strikes by both sides as they try to wait each other out essentially and figure out if eventually the Iranians will decide to stop exerting control over the Straits, which, which doesn't seem to be in their interest.

A

There were going to be hardliners in the, in the regime. The question really also becomes like, how, and I think we brought this up a week or two ago. How much more towards hardline has the, the leadership become? That's really going to be tested by these last set of strikes that we did because apparently we bombed some bridges that were on the procession in Mashhad where the Ayatollah was going to be going to his final resting place. And so again, like that. That seems very deliberate and targeted towards the hardliners themselves. I don't know that that's going to send the message to them that we think it's going to.

C

Because it's again, like, sad and petty.

A

Yeah, it is. And then it's also like they like martyrdom. That is, that is something that they have kind of the, the Shia religion is kind of has a very much of the vein, you know, the, the Karbala stance, the death of Ali, the martyrdom mums. Like all of that is like in Shia doctrine, when you start attacking them, when they're going to like shrines and holy places, they, that's. They. This, this is what we've always been, we've always been treated this way. This is a rallying call for the, for the religion again. Maybe it'll work this time.

E

I think, right. To some degree, they were trying to attack some of the senior IRGC leadership that was involved in the, in the funeral activities in the hopes of maybe if you take out individual leaders or you start to make them feel like they're under threat, maybe they get a little bit more conciliatory in the negotiations. I don't know that that really happens. I mean, I think it seems like the only way out of this is for the US to essentially to tacitly agree to Iran and Oman having some control over the strait and then figuring out the most, the least damaging way for that to be managed and imposed on the shipping companies that have to use it.

A

Brian, a question. The fact that both the US and Iran are not actually signatories to. What is it? The 94. UN Freedom of Navigation unclose. Yeah.

E

UN Convention on the Law of the sea.

A

Yeah, yeah. Like, how does that, like, play into our lack or our stance on it? Because, like, obviously we haven't actually ratified that either.

E

Yeah, I mean, I don't know that it really impacts it that much because we had traditionally adhered to the rules that are dictated in the unclose, but we have not signed it because there's people in Congress that still resist the

D

idea that we'd signed but not ratified.

E

Right. Yeah, exactly. So we would not agree to the impact it might have on commercial development in the open ocean, essentially is kind of part of it. But, yeah, I don't think it really impacts our behavior in the Strait, particularly.

C

Jordan, introduce our guest or. Sorry, Tony.

B

Well, I was gonna ask Jordan, just like, you know, you being in New York and having a bunch of, you know, Wall street friends, like, is the market okay with Iran having some control of the straight? Like, what are they most comfortable with?

C

Look, oil is at $70 a barrel,

A

if.81 today or something. But.

C

Okay, but like, if, if clearly, like, what Iran wants to settle at is you pay some tax now, like the tax, whatever, whatever $100 billion that ends up in Iran's coffers is not like a meaningful tax on global commerce. Right. This is a rounding error of a rounding error to make sure that, like, factories don't shut down and we're able to continue to, you know, fly planes and drive trucks. Right. So if that's this, if that's the equilibrium we end at, then, yeah, like, not great for regional balance of power. Not great for prospects of Iran not having a nuclear bomb in five years or new regional war breaking out because they can fund Hamas and Hezbollah more. But like, from a, from a global economic, like, macro standpoint, okay, great, whatever. There becomes a non event if the, if the stuff keeps coming out of the Strait and there's just, you know, a 3% surcharge. Joining us today, Randy Shriver, Chairman of the Indus Institute for Indo Pacific Security and a former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Indo Pacific Security Affairs. We had the only two Indo Pacific Security affairs assistant secretaries back to back. Are you first? Are you, like, mourning the change?

D

Well, it hadn't. It hasn't changed in statute yet, so it's still the Department of Defense. It's still the Indo Pacific Command. I realize the administration is not always the kind that feels at all bound by statute or law, but. Yeah, so we'll see. I advise my friends out in Honolulu to keep the signage nearby and handy.

A

You don't want to do the Fort Bragg thing. Or Fort Benning thing where they sold off all the signage and then realized like four years later they had to go find it all again.

D

No, I just, I said keep it handy. We'll see. Because some of it is. I mean, we could go down this rabbit hole. But some of the arguments just on their. On its face is inaccurate. They're saying this is a more accurate description of the geography. No, it's not. You know, PACOM is responsible for the Indian. Most of the Indian Ocean and India. And so one of our rationales for changing it was to be more accurate and literal about the area of responsibility.

A

But, you know, I guess when I hexa says, oh, this is getting back to its roots. World War II, Rah, Rah, Rah, Max mentality, whatever. But it was Mattis that had changed it. Like it was under Mattis that it was changed.

D

It was my initiative. There's very little evidence I was ever in the Pentagon, but I can point to a couple things. And that was my initiative with Harry Harris and Harry, when he changed commands with Phil Davidson, that's when we changed the command and then also changed the office in the Pentagon.

B

If we really want to go back to our roots, we need two separate commands. One in the Central Pacific, one in the Southwest Pacific, one run by the army, one run by the Navy.

D

There you go.

A

And constantly in acrimony with each other when they ask for support.

B

Yeah, well, that's never left.

E

But yeah, that would be a natural outgrowth of the.

A

Yeah. Well, do you. I. Could we find another MacArthur in the today's Army? I don't know.

E

I think that's what we're. That's all we're growing. Are the next generation of MacArthur's. We're gonna, we're eliminating anybody that would have a more, you know, enlightened spirit,

A

a willingness to submit to civilian leadership. Any of the things that we feel like watching.

B

Justin Eisenhower was a staff officer and therefore clearly not meant for command.

C

Very true.

A

I mean, he was, he was MacArthur's aide. So what? What does he know?

E

Failed up.

A

Best secretary ever continually failed up or something. Yeah, like, I have no idea what it means.

C

What was her target? All right, maybe let's just zoom out a bit. Like, how worried are you, Randy?

D

Well, I, I take China at their word. You know, some people talk about China being enigmatic, difficult to understand. You know, at my think tank, we have a very sophisticated approach to trying to understand China. We read what they write and we listen to what they say and, you

E

know, let me write that Down.

D

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The way another friend of mine, James Mulvenin, puts it is the first line of encryption for the Chinese is Chinese. And if you can get through that, you know, they're pretty clear about what their ambitions are and their intentions are. I do think they want to win without fighting. And so the August 1, 2027, is a be ready by date, not necessarily a go date. And I suspect there are a number of things, including watching Russia's experience in Ukraine, but also their own internal situation, the massive purges that have been going on in the military, the, you know, the Rumsfeldian lexicon, the known unknowns, how does a military perform that hasn't seen combat since 1970? All of these things probably give them a degree of pause or at least understand that there's risk. So I think they would like to win without fighting and get some sort of political capitulation without having to fire a shot. But even in so called peacetime, if you look at what's happening around Taiwan, the levels of coercion and intimidation are pretty extraordinary. And they integrate lawfare, political warfare, information warfare. I think one of the most significant developments of the last few weeks is the announcement of a persistent coast Guard patrol east of Taiwan. So from a lawfare perspective, this is China exerting through its activities and its actions. They're claiming we are the sovereign power with the sovereign right for law enforcement in this area of what would would be east of Taiwan. Now, they've already queried commercial ships, and Taiwan has said, don't answer those queries. But, you know, if you're, you know, carrying cargo and have to keep your, you know, insurance and all that, the easiest thing to do is to pick up the radio and respond to the query. But imagine, you know, a fisherman in distress, a Chinese Coast Guard vessel, if they're the closest vessel and they make the rescue, you know, everybody's going to say, wow, what a great humanitarian thing they've done. They've actually just physically made manifest their sovereignty claim by doing something like that. So, yeah, I'm worried. And I think, you know, the recent statements by President Trump after his meeting with Xi Jinping in Beijing were not helpful. He seemed to have absorbed a lot of the Chinese narrative. You know, Taiwan's been part of China for thousands of years. Well, no, it hasn't. And it's never been part of the People's Republic of China. We don't want to fight a war 9,500 miles away. Well, I certainly don't want to fight a War with China. But this 9,500 mile thing, you know, look at where our forces are. Guam and Hawaii and Japan and Okinawa. So you know, let's not just absorb everything Xi Jinping has said. And then you know the statement about our arms sales being a bargaining chip, I would submit that puts us firmly out of compliance with the law which Taiwan Relations act says we must provide Taiwan with weapons of a defensive character for sufficient self defense. That to me reads as a must. You must make them available. It's not a choice, it's not a policy option. And we also have a part of the law that says we must maintain the capacity to resist force. My, my commission hat U.S. china Economic and Security Review Commission. Last year we put a recommendation into Congress to say show your homework. Show, do the math. Can you. Do you have the capacity resist force? With everything that's going on in Ukraine and Iran and, and I, everything they're saying about munitions and everything they're saying about logistics and maintenance support and don't, don't you know, look behind the curtain. I'm not sure I'm buying. They're pitching. I'm not catching. I think we've got issues on, on that front. So yeah, there's a lot and say Japan's never been more engaged. They said they were going to double their defense budget in five years. They did it in three. They're giving us access to the south southwest island chain. Yonaguni is the closest island to Taiwan. It's not China, it's not the Philippines. And we're now able to do activities out of there, Phil, with the ECTA sites in Northern Luzon and Palawan, Japan, Philippines cooperation, you know, we're not even in that hyphenated minilateral all the time and all of that to me is very encouraging. So you know, it's a mixed bag. I just hope you know, we keep our eye on the ball.

A

Yeah, I think the Japan, Philippines and then tying that back into your discussion of the, you know, the eastern patrols is interesting because that's obviously what their fear of encirclement. When you couple that like what are you seeing like with the launch of the Chinese ballistic missile earlier in the week and like the, you know, now we've got some of the islands in the Micronesia and in some in the Pacific islands that are starting to raise, you know, concerns about the, the Chinese threat. Outside of that direct sphere. What are you starting to see or hear machinations about about like the way that they're starting to view or is it changing on how they're viewing China, given how they're starting to act towards some of their larger partners.

D

I think for the most part, I would say China has overplayed its hand and its provocations have tipped some of these countries toward actions that they might not otherwise have taken. I mean, look at the defense treaty that was just signed by Prime Minister Albanese and Fijian Prime Minister Rebuka. That's the first ever defense treaty that Fiji has signed and it's only the fourth for Australia, us, New Zealand, Papua New guinea, another island that was moved to take such an action. And that was two years ago. So within the last two years, you've got PNG and Fiji saying they want to be treaty allies. Defense treaty allies with Australia. You know, the compact states are in a bit of a different category. But I was recently in Palau where they are refurbishing the airstrip at Peleliu, which, you know, quite a history there. Fought an extremely bloody battle there for that over that airstrip. Turned out we didn't need it for the invasion of Japan after all. But the fact of the matter is the geography is still quite important. Palau is obviously has the greatest proximity to the Western Pacific where potential conflict contingencies might happen. But there's activities in the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of Marshall Islands. So I think for the most part we're seeing sort of the second order effects of a overplay, overreach on the part of the Chinese when their face and their activities are in the economic domain and they're seen as providing investment and development assistance, set aside that a lot of that is predatory and has debt trap features to it. Countries in the Pacific are much more open to that and welcoming of that because they've got such extraordinary needs. But when they see the pla, even the Coast Guard or the maritime militia, enabling illegal fishing in their territories, other kinds of illegally illicit activities, and you see activities like the submarine launch of a JL2 or 3, I don't think we know yet. That's getting people to, again to really sort of consider their defense needs and take steps that they might not otherwise take.

B

So when Eli was on the show, we talked about, you know, kind of what we called the bullshit detente, which is like this whole, like we're not really talking about China from the strategic level for the United States because of Iran, everything else, and because the president kind of sort of wants to be friends with Xi Jinping. But then all of this is going on in Westpac Right. So, you know, as that gap widens, I mean, is there a point of no return where it's, it's, there's just so much of a difference between what our friends in WESTPAC are doing and what we expect to the point to where either they go it alone or they just decide it's not worth it because the US Isn't going to show up?

D

Well, I suppose theoretically there is. I. The interesting thing to me in terms of where we are now is most of these countries are doing things that we have long encouraged, even if they're doing it as a hedge, even if they're doing it because they're concerned about the reliability of the United States, the credibility of the United States. These are nonetheless things that we've long wanted to see. Japan, in terms of doubling its defense budget, in terms of reinterpreting Article 9 of the Constitution, in terms of introducing counter strike, which to the untrained eye looks a lot like strike in terms of the command and control, creating a joint operating center and the like. Korea, you know, in terms of their defense spending and their preparedness, all these things are things that we've long encouraged. So as this goes forward, if it's, you know, still the result of a hedge and starts to accelerate because they don't believe in the credibility of the alliance, the United States, then, you know, we tip into another, another era, I guess. And you know, there are a couple things that are talked about now that I think would be, you know, indicators of that if, if South Korea goes nuclear and look, popular sentiment in South Korea is over 70%. They want an independent autonomous nuclear capability. That's extraordinary. I don't know that that's a very well informed view when it comes to what it would require and you know, what, what all that necessarily means. But it's extraordinary in Japan, you know, taboo subject for a long time for very understandable reasons, openly discussed and talked about now. So I mean, that would be, that would be a step sort of beyond the minor hedging and, and outreach that we're seeing right now.

C

Can we talk about that world?

A

So let's say we have a bunch of equal nations, no leadership. This is kind of what the carny envisionment of Europe, you know, sans the United States, where the EU and France and all these countries would vie for levels of influence and power. There's no overarching like first among equals. Let's say that we apply that exact same approach to the, to the Seoul, Japan, even Australia with regard to China. What prevents that from turning into the, you know, Chris Clark's book Sleep the Sleepwalkers, where you, because there's no one that's there to like pull the reins or set conditions and actually make a strategic move. We just get into all these different countries are slowly making moves for their own best interest, but those own best interests just slowly nudge us towards what ends up being a cataclysmic war.

D

Yeah, I mean, that's a possibility. That's a pretty dark outcome. And I think there's a reason our alliances have been so resilient for so long. I mean, World War II was by my measure quite some time ago. And yet here we still have this strong alliance with Japan and the popular support is notwithstanding America first rhetoric and questions about credibility, the alliance is still held in very high regard. And Philippines, I think we poll at over 80% popularity as an alliance. Australia over 70% popularity as an alliance. So there's a reason that they've been enduring, it's been interest based, but also the track record of stability and security. So, you know, it's, you sort of have this notion of, of a trapeze artist. You know, you really don't want to let go of one thing that's been pretty good to you until you get your hand on the other thing. And there are scenarios where there's a degree of stability if, if South Korea and Japan have nuclear weapons and you know, nobody's going to mess with them and all that. But South Korea would be facing not only North Korea, but look at the growing axis of autocracy. And my Chinese friends will tell you up and down like, well, it's not a thing, it's not an alliance. There's no secretariat. We don't have coordinating meetings where we coordinate activities. And I mean, my response is, well, first of all, that's not a, that's not a weakness, that's a preference. China doesn't like binding alliances where they're sort of bound to do certain things and support countries in certain ways. Number two, even if you have limited cooperation, it can sure be consequential. Look at what's happening in Ukraine, where North Korea is providing forces, artillery, ammunition to Russia. China's providing material support in terms of a lot of the components and technology for drones and so on and so forth. So if North Korea gets even that sort of minimum support, Russian troops, Chinese material support, in a conflict with South Korea, that's a much more difficult conflict for South Korea to deal with, let alone if they're dealing with it without U.S. assistance. So you could kind of, you know, pull this thread. Would US Forces stay on the peninsula? We've had two presidents try to pull them off. Jimmy Carter and President Trump in his first term. Just pull this thread. And are we in a more stable, secure world? I sort of doubt it.

E

So it seems like the war in Ukraine has been a real benefit for China and for North Korea. They're both getting experience and learning from modern warfare. I mean, I think China, even though their efforts at autonomous systems were actually not that aggressive previously, it seems like they're learning a lot now and maybe taking advantage of the opportunity to put their systems into the field, or at least their technology into the field, in the hands of Russia, Russians, and see what happens. And then North Koreans are obviously getting combat experience. They're dying in the process, but it's still redounding to the benefit of folks back home, if that war were to reach some kind of conclusion. Do you think this sort of relationship starts to break up as these countries all pursue their own interests? Is this compact driven by the war in Ukraine being opportunistic for all of them or a good opportunity for all of them?

D

Yeah, it's a good question, and I don't think any of us can answer with full confidence that we know the future on this, but I suspect it'd be a little more sticky than we just all go our separate ways. Clearly, the Xi Jinping Putin relationship is a close one I don't know if anybody took note of. After President Trump's visit, Xi Jinping immediately got together with not only Putin, but Kim Jong Un shortly thereafter in a trip to Pyongyang. So the. The leadership level, personal relationships, the interactions seem to be quite close. But also, you know, as you know, when you put together particular cooperative programs, North Korea is getting assistance on a potential submarine ballistic missile launch, submarine program, if they're getting other tech technological assistance from Russia. You know, there's a stickiness there, too, when you create habits of cooperation and programs where you're having advisors on the ground, et cetera. So, you know, it may not have the same battle rhythm, so to speak, no pun intended, but I think it would be stickier than some people think.

A

Yeah, I mean, I tend to look at it, and I think. So that conversation I had with one of the Estonian commanders a couple weeks ago, one of the things he expressed concern about was Even after the 2014, the fighting in Crimea, there had been a rise in violence of people who had been on the front lines of fighting and had gone back and had done things like knock over banks using Kalashnikovs and bombs and stuff. So you fast forward to now and you've had four years of war and you have people who are one, they're a nerd to the warfare but then also they're making 10 times the salary per month that they were making at their construction jobs. We were talking strictly about that from the lens of Ukraine and worries about, you know, Ukraine stability and into the future. I have to think that that exact same plays into Russia and China. If they don't want Russia to collapse post a conflict has to be starting to do some of the machinations of okay, how do we start looking at what is rebuilding look like? What are those 99 year leases look like where we try to help re energize or rebuild? Has there been or have you seen any of those type of waves or is that just something that like we think is going to be below the surface or won't come out until it actually happens?

D

I haven't seen any evidence of could very well be happening. I think at the leader level, I suspect they're, they're unwilling to speak that frankly to, to Putin who still puts on the, you know, the, the uniform and at least speaks with high degree of confidence that they're going to prevail. But you're right, it could be happening below the surface and there could be some planning going on. I mean the, the other interesting thing is, you know, the impact on North Korea. As you said, they're getting battlefield experience. There's also a segment of society that is, that is being traumatized by this. Given the casualties, you know, in the early phases of the North Korean involvement in the campaign. I don't know if this is still the case, but with casualties came rounding up the families, they didn't want them to speak to their neighbors. They didn't want them to speak to anyone in North Korea about the loss of their son. And so for a population that is traumatized in many ways all the time, this is sort of next level. And the casualties have been pretty significant for North Korea, particularly in the early phases where it was just absolute slaughter for people that were unprepared and in many cases, at least according to the reporting, even unaware where they were being deployed.

B

So just on the casualties note, there's a lot of commentary around is China willing to accept casualties and invasion of Taiwan because of the one child policy, et cetera. China watching Russia being able to sustain a war this long with that many casualties, does that give the Chinese greater Confidence that they can buy down time if they do have to take casualties, or does it, the number of casualties make them more concerned?

D

Yeah, I think they're watching, absorbing and learning from all of this. I mean, another report I saw about Russia is that those that have had casualties in their families, in order for them to accept compensation from the Russian government for the loss of their son, mostly sons, they have to basically the equivalent of an NDA. We won't talk about it. And if they don't agree to that, they don't get the compensation, they don't get the money. So I think the Chinese are kind of looking at all of this and thinking about how they might apply it to their own situation. It's an interesting point, though, about, you know, an army that is comprised almost entirely of only children and what that would mean because, you know, how often do we talk about Taiwan's will to fight? I mean, it's like all the time, you know, will they fight?

A

And when you're on the island, that's like every third conversation. Right.

D

But very few people talk about, you know, China's will to fight. And I get it, it's an author authoritarian system and it's a more professional military than in the past. But how many Chinese mothers want to sacrifice the only child they were allowed to have legally for a Xi Jinping vanity project? And I think we don't do the information warfare thing very well, if at all anymore. In fact, just the opposite. We're shuddering. We've long ago shuttered U.S. information Agency. But even, you know, even more recent, I think they're back to shape the information environment, whether that be Radio Free Asia or whatever, we're kind of out of that. But I think we should be messaging this like crazy that there's a. There's even. Even if they prevail on the battlefield, the losses of the only children they're allowed to have.

E

You know, hey, so Randy, the, you know, go talking about Taiwan and we talk about the other allies in a second. But, you know, so Taiwan obviously will to fight is, you know, a question, but in a lot of ways they're building systems that are going to make it almost, you know, automatic that they're going to fight. Right. This Hellscape thing that paycom and into PAYCOM now, paycom is pursuing. Yeah, indopacom is pursuing. Right. So the Hellscape robots are going to basically, they're going to attack whatever's coming at them like a, you know, a bunch of rabid dogs, essentially. So. And then, you know, Coastal defense, cruise missiles. I mean, all the stuff that they would do, which is in a lot of ways sort of automatic, it's just going to impose a lot of casualties, you know. So to what degree though does Taiwan also need to invest in the kind of stuff that would help them to break a blockade? Right. Because one thing, you know, I mean, if China's worried about casualties and they're worried about the risks of an invasion being successful, seems like just squeezing the, you know, make, getting them so they can't make 12 days of LNG imports. That seems like an easier road to, to get the regime to capitulate. Is Taiwan preparing for that contingency in their force development?

D

They are. And at times that has put them at odds with the United States. I think the last administration and Eli and I, you know, Republican, Democrat, we probably agree on 99% of things and you'd be hard pressed to get us to debate something. But I would say the previous administration chose to look almost exclusively at the counter invasion capabilities. And I sort of get it. Limited resources. Where are you going to put limited resources? Well, it's not necessarily the most likely but the most dangerous scenario. Okay. But I think a far more likely scenario is a blockade or a soft blockade. And that's part of deterrence too. In fact, the two are related. I would say you would actually make the invasion more likely if there's no pushback in the gray zone, or so they are. I think we could be doing more in terms of the sort of networking, the sensor and networking piece with Japan, the Philippines and Taiwan. And we should be exercising with the Japanese and the Filipinos. I think we should be exercising. What would it take to have a corridor from the northern port of Geelong to Yonaguni and demonstrate it.

C

Right.

D

And show that we're willing to do that. I think that would be both prudent in terms of being prepared, but also have some deterrent impact.

E

Sure. And you could use some of the stuff that they're putting in Yonaguni to support that even.

D

Absolutely. And I think you, you have a window with the Japanese. I mean, I again, irony after irony after irony when when Prime Minister Takeichi said the quiet part out loud about Taiwan being a survival threatening situation. Awkward English. But it's actually the Japanese that is the perception firm that's in the Diet legislation. Right. And to be rebuked by the Trump administration, I just, I mean, I can't. Blew my mind for decades. We wanted Japan.

E

Exactly.

A

Yeah, that's, that's the hard part. Is like in some ways the administration has been right because I, I was in Taiwan during the middle bits of the Biden administration and I was, you know, it was kind of verboten to bring up invasion and defense with your Taiwanese, your Taiwan's counterparts unless it was in specific settings because there was a fear that you, you're going to scare them. And then Taiwan makes a, or a company in Taiwan produces an amazing seven part docudrama that is the invasion. Great show. But it shows that hey, they actually are willing to talk about it and they actually do understand the neighborhood they live in and the society is willing to watch something like this and understand the problems. The inverse being that then we changed the administration and we switch from not wanting to talk to the Taiwan's to now all of a sudden not backing up our allies when they're doing things and just making like the exact same step changes that we were making that were incorrect with you know, Australia pushing to investigate the origins of COVID China cuts off their supply, cuts off their imports. What the United States doesn't do is go hey, we'll buy your wine or whatever instead of backing them up.

D

I stepped up on that front.

A

I just, yeah, personally send all the yellow tail you got. I'll take it all.

B

So there was a interesting comparison here because during Biden administration, right there was the freak out from the executive over Pelosi going to Taiwan. And then I think in this latest spat between Mike Rogers and Bridge Colby, it came out that allegedly Bridge had blocked a Republican congressional delegation to Taiwan. That is such a reverse course from what all the messaging was over the last few years. I mean it does somewhat kind of align with, with Bridges book and what he talks about focusing on stability rather than. But I'm just curious about like how like that seems to be more indicative of how this admin views the conflict more than anything else.

D

Yeah, I consider Bridge a friend. I actually took him to Taiwan for his very first visit there with a think tank delegation and then I took him again the spring before the 2024 election where at least on one occasion he and I debated one another in front of Lai Ching Da, which was kind of interesting. Yeah, I think the, the story on the congressional delegation, if I, if I understand it correctly, was he wasn't going to provide an airplane because most congressional delegations get mil air. And I mean how in the world you have a department where you have your two authorizing committees in the Senate and the House chairs that are the same party saying you're not telling the truth and criticizing you, how you got to that point. I just, it again is a little mind boggling because it's not hard. You just, you go and you tell these guys that, you know, you care what they think, they're important, please, anytime you want to speak, you know, and, and that's it, you know, and, and it's how, how they got to that point is just remarkable. But on the, on the differences, you know, I think the, the, the problem with the Pelosi visit wasn't the visit per se. It was the Biden administration being publicly against it and the Chinese, as sophisticated as they are. And as you know, there's so much savvier in terms of understanding our decision making process, the role of Congress versus the administration. I think the Chinese thought, oh, we can stop this. The Biden administration doesn't want her to go. Now that certainly ignores any understanding of how Nancy Pelosi operates and things. But I think that's how we got into the trouble. I think if the Biden administration had just said separate branch of government, we're not going to intervene one way or the other and she has a right to make her own travel decisions, I think it would have been a little bit different. Maybe not. Maybe not, but I think it would have been different. Yeah. I think my issue with where the Trump administration is now is number one, if you read Secretary Hegseth's Shangri La speech from a year ago and his Shangri La speech from this year, it looks like two entirely different administrations. And that's the course of a year. If you look at a national security strategy that talks more about Taiwan than any NSS I've ever seen and then an NDS that has an omission doesn't mention it at all, that looks like a disconnect. And so when Secretary Hegseth says we want to be, what is it? Quiet, strong. What's his formula? The quiet part, I think doesn't quite capture how deterrence works in the Chinese mindset. When you're quiet, you won't have lai Ching the transit the United States. You knock the Monterey military talks down to a lower level and hold it to Alaska. What the Chinese see is are the Americans really willing to fight for this? Sure, it'd look like so some of this symbology actually matters in the deterrence equation. Whereas Bridge would say nothing else matters other than are you militarily capable?

E

Correlation to forces.

D

And that reverts to the previous point I made about readiness. I would have said I was worried about munitions and Contested logistics before Ukraine, before Iran. Are we better now? Surely we're not. So the quiet part debatable. The strong part extremely debatable if we're there. So I think there's a lot more work to be done here and I'm glad allies and partners are stepping up. The part about Secretary of Defense, excess speech I did like was he kind of went through each ally and was complimentary, which was not only James, certainly not the case if you're in NATO. Right. But, but praising Korea and Japan and Australia and India. That's good. Omission of Taiwan, not so good.

E

Japan's obviously, you said investing a lot more in military. They're doubling defense budget. We've been doing some work with Japan on its force design. It seems like that they're still looking at trying to build a military that complements the United States military, assuming that the US Is doing a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of Japan's defense. They're not really looking to, to feel the kind of capabilities you would field if you were thinking you're going to have to defend yourself for some number of weeks. Same with Australia. Right. Australia obviously not increasing their defense spending very much, if at all. But they're investing the kind of stuff that makes them complementary to the US Rather than an independent actor. Do they need to be investing differently?

D

I think it's a very fair point that our allies are investing in ways that are complementary to the US in support of alliance coalition operations. And I think we should be grateful for that. I think if there's a radical departure from that, that's another one of these potential mile posts that suggest that they've sort of given up and don't regard us as reliable or credible. I think there's a large portion of this that is also sort of fungible. Japan needs to invest in integrated missile and air defense in southern Japan to include the southwest island chain, whether or not the US Forces are going to operate out of there. Right. So it's, I think we're not at a point to say, first of all, we should be grateful they're doing it. And secondly, I don't think we're at a point where we're saying this investment pattern is somehow off would be my take on it.

A

Yeah, I mean, that's, that's, to me, where the issue that runs in with the way that we've talked about defense and the challenge, the way that we've gone about challenging our allies and partners is like, I think, I don't know that Japan is going to be in a position where they could do we're just going to have a self sustaining military that could conduct operations on its own. Nor do we really want that. Same with South Korea, same with Australia. But if they start moving that direction and we start having, you know, instead of complimenting our capabilities, they are replicating our capabilities that we are supposed to bring into a fight because they're afraid we're not going to be there. You're really just lowering the defense posture of everybody because that replication, we're not talking about replicating production capability, we're just talking about replicating some of the like niche, you know, design a tank, design an, an fib, whatever that you know the US says that we're going to bring into the fight when it comes into the Pacific.

D

Yeah. And if you look at certain aspects of this it's, it would really be years and years like Japan is investing in counter strike. Looks like strike but the kill chain is still very reliant on US sensing and track. And to, for Japan to say we're going to have a completely autonomous kill chain, you know that's space, that's other airborne sensors. That's a lot of integration of data that they just. That's going to be years.

A

Yeah, I mean there's, I can't remember the new acronym. It used to be C2 and then it's permeated. It's probably like C7 is 4T something squared now. But whatever the new letter added when somebody, one of the C's is computer. I don't understand how that matters and why we need to make that differentiation.

B

But yeah, so yeah, so back to the deterrence part. There's a lot of tea leaf reading that goes into reading how the CCP and the PLA operate like and I've heard a lot of things from folks in government of what the CCP really cares about these days in terms of messaging. What are the actual deterrence activities we can undertake that actually can impact CCP decision making?

D

Yeah. So I mean the military piece is not insignificant. So I do think continuing robust security assistance to Taiwan. I think the posture initiatives and Eli was terrific on that. The opportunities for a potential for diversification and dispersal during a contingency. All that is really important. But I think if you reverse engineer what do the Chinese really fear? It's the alliance piece and it's the cohesion among like minded countries with shared interests and concerns and the thought that if there was a move against Taiwan that this would bring in a very powerful coalition of Countries both on the military side, which would likely be limited, but also when it comes to economic cost imposition, sanctions and so forth. I mean, the thought that we're telling the Europeans, again, decades of trying to get Europe interested in Asia now to tell them you're not needed, you're not wanted, take care of your own backyard, is extremely counterproductive from my point of view when it comes to deterrence. You want the Chinese to believe they can't fight an isolated war in the Taiwan Strait, that the potential for the Malacca Strait to be closed is very real. Remember, it was the Chinese, Hu Jintao that came up with the phrase Malacca dilemma. It wasn't the United States. You want them to think that there could be multiple fronts with the potential for India. You want them to think that the EU is going to act swiftly and in unison when it comes to sanctions. That has always been our asymmetric advantage is the ally and partner piece and our ability to hold that together in a meaningful and credible way. So that's where I think the work needs to be done. And again, I think some of the rhetoric is suggesting otherwise. And certainly the trip to NATO where evidently we're not only ending the ceasefire with Iran, we're also threatening Greenland again. And by the way, this American remembers that Denmark lost more people per capita in Afghanistan coming to our defense than any other country outside the United States. So, you know, the fact that we'd be threatening them is unconscionable.

A

I've had the same, when I have to talk to people about like having been in like dangerous situations, especially in Syria, like I had the Dutch pilots were the pilots that if it wasn't an American pilot that I was talking to, that's the people that I most wanted flying above me. And then probably the hairiest day that I was ever in, in Syria, it was, it was two Dutch pilots that were dropping bombs for me through a dust storm to help me break contact. So again, like, I say that to say like 100. The, the lack of acknowledgment of kind of like where we are and what we've done and the, the length and dep alliances is really, it's one of the things that feels the grimiest whenever we have these conversations, whenever we start saying like, because yes, there are countries in NATO that need to spend more money. Yes, there are countries in NATO that have been self interested and like Angela Merkel where, you know, the Rimthal CEO comes out and says, well, so, you know, I was having a conversation with Merkel and I said she needed to invest more, and she was like, well, we'll just call on the Americans for Defense. Yes, we made it easy for some companies to not, or some countries to not invest in their own defensive apparatus. But what that in turn did was invested in our defensive apparatus, which is jobs and, you know, technology and things that went into the US Ecosystem that is now changing. Do we want to shepherd that change or do we want to allow it to be driven by Mark Carney and, you know, Emmanuel Macron and, you know, other people outside of or that may not have the best interest of the US at heart? Yeah, yeah.

D

Couldn't agree more.

B

Well, I think also on the NATO part, right. Of the issue of how do we get our allies in Asia to build militaries that work for a collective defense? I mean, we've seen what goes wrong there is that you end up with 30 different defense industries in Europe. You end up with none of them that are capable of expeditionary fighting. And they all have different battle plans and the ability to surge forces quickly in a conflict. Like, none of them really had that capability. So I, I, I think that, you know, Eli, when he was on the show, kind of, maybe it was after the show, he talked a little bit about the need for, like, a collective, some sort of collective defense arrangement. Is there a way without, you know, kind of disrupting the cultural restrictions on a collective defense agreement in Asia that we can get all of the, you know, countries together and, like, talk about complementary defense planning?

D

Yeah, there is, but we have to embrace it ourselves and endorse it and be the leader of such an effort. I mean, Eli literally wrote the article about an Asian NATO. Right. And there are people in Asia who, former Defense Minister of Japan Ishiba has long called for an Asian NATO. So it's not taboo, but it's, it would be very difficult to operationalize and make it meaningful. But not impossible. It is impossible without the United States.

A

Yeah. One of the things that I think that's always kind of left is even the US India has always been a very tough country to bring in politically and things like that. And if you're going to have a NATO in Asia, you're going to want India in it because you want to ball work on the each side, basically. How would that, how is the administration's approach to India from what you've been able to see? How has that changed or morphed over the last year or two? When you look at issues like the Himalayans, the line of actual control, things like that, like where Are they putting the right emphasis and the wrong emphasis on that engagement as a counterweight to some of the things that China is doing?

D

I think if I were to rack and stack all the own goals I've seen over the last two years, the management of the US India relations ship is near the top, if not at the top. Our future is not Pakistan, it's with India. And for years I was going to Delhi and hearing about the Chinese and the growing threat and the long term threat and you'd never hear about Pakistan anymore. Now it's back and we've put Pakistan in the center of our negotiations with Iran. We've, you know, President Trump hosted the chief of their forces and praised him as a brilliant general. In the Oval, we've tariffed and criticized the Indians. The timing of hosting the Pakistanis in the Oval Office so soon after the dust up between Pakistan and India was extraordinarily bad. Look, I think in my time in office we got a lot of help from the Chinese, you know, dust up in Doklam and Ladakh. Two pretty big dust ups in two or three year time frame. I think that pushed the Indians to more fully embrace the Quad. It allowed us to move forward on the defense relationship in ways they might have otherwise been reluctant. We might get help from the Chinese in the future and hopefully we will leverage that for all the benefit we can. But I think right now there's a great deal of mismanagement. So Prime Minister Modi, he's going to do his hedging. Certainly there's virtually nothing we can do to peel them away from Russia. But the fact that he's, you know, they're little things that are actually pretty important. They've lifted the restrictions on Chinese FDI in India. Maybe not, maybe not a little thing at all, but actually a pretty significant thing and you know, signs that I think we're moving in the wrong direction. So.

A

Yeah, I mean the FDI one was a big one I think especially too when you look at like Indian, like tariffing India after we spent more than a decade trying to like beat down the tariffs that India had already put to, to the country to try to like open it up to, you know, be more capitalistic, be more modern, more integrated into the global economy. Like you said, like the, the own, the own golds are, are not limited to just military or just strategic cooperation. They're like they, we've just racked them and stacked them up and then knocked them all down.

D

So yeah, yeah, I, I don't think the damage is Permanent, particularly in the case of India, because I think our strategic interests will continue to be largely aligned and will compel us to cooperate. And really, even at one of the low points after the Pakistan engagement in the Oval, we renewed a 10 year defense framework agreement with the Indians and a lot of that work is actually advancing. So I've participated in some track two dialogues where I'm the only optimist in the room. I mean it's, you know, you deal with the Indians, they're not subtle or shy about. No, they're not telling you their opinion. And I think a lot of Americans were absorbing that and reacting to that. And I said, look, I think we're going to be at a better place a year from now and an even better place five years from now. And I am optimistic. But you know, when you're. What's the rule of being in a hole? The first order of business is to stop digging.

A

Stop digging.

D

I don't think we've stopped digging quite yet.

A

Yeah, yeah. I went to the Indo Pacific late in my career. I spent the overwhelming majority of my career being Iran and Middle east focused. And I think, and I was telling Tony and Jordan this, that I think it was just sheerly by luck that I didn't fall into read the 100 year marathon and then that be my viewpoint on China like into the future. So mid career and early career people that are coming up and that need to, what is the, the, the base level of knowledge they need about India and the Indo Pacific that you want that like you would say if you had to read five books. These are the five books that I'd say you need to read. This is the media you need to be consuming to be at least at a good jumping off point to have these conversations.

D

Well, I, I welcome the opportunity for a little self promotion and self advertising here. I'm the chair this cycle of the US China Economic Security Review Commission and I think our annual reports are phenomenal. I sort of liken it to the old Encyclopedia Britannica, which maybe some younger people won't know what that is, but you kind of, it's a thick book that when it arrives, you look at it and you say there's no way I'm getting through all that. But it's on the shelf and it's a great resource and if you want to know something, chances are it's in there. And we do, I think a really good job of looking beyond the inbox. We kind of take pride in that being part of our writ that we look at emerging issues and we are calling on Congress to do things that are not necessarily a this year priority, but better look at it and better get on it in the not too distant future. And then my think tank, the Institute for Indo Pacific Security, we've been China watchers from the start. We're the successor brand to Project 2049. Project 2049 was, you know, we were sort of early adopters to this idea of read what they write, listen to what they say and document it. And so we've got a product line that I think is very strong in terms of understanding the Chinese. You know, there's a ton of really good books out there. I tend to, I think history is still very important in this region and understanding history because everybody's trying to manipulate it, you know, and, and again, I've mentioned several ironies along the way in this conversation. The Chinese used to always accuse the Japanese of forgetting history, manipulating history. The Chinese are masters at it. Right. And if you go through the museum of the history of the Communist Party near the Forbidden City on Tiananmen Square, you'll notice some portraits missing from the general secretaries of the Communist Party. You won't find Jiang Ziyang there. Right. So they're master manipulators of history. And so I would look at. There was a book called the Generalissimo by a retired foreign service officer. About it is a biography of Chiang Kai Shek. But it's a lot of the history of the conflict, the Civil War and the aftermath of that. And I think it debunks a lot of things. For example, the Kuomintang Nationalist forces probably took about 90% of the casualties in the war with Japan. And the CCP basically was able to husband its forces and its resources to fight the civil war after the end of World War II. I think that's very well documented in this book and I think that's a very important part of history is the Chinese now try to co opt the Flying Tigers and things like that. It's just outrageous. And then on I just read a good book on George Marshall's mission written by Dan F. And Kurz, which is, is really extraordinary history when it comes to understanding China, Taiwan today. You know, you can kind of get a, a very in depth and very, I think, sophisticated look at, at how these differences emerged, evolved and how it sort of explains where we are today. I'm less well read on Indian history, but I, but I learned from Indian friends that you can't have a conversation that goes on too long. Before they start talking about partition. It all goes back to partition. And so. Oh, gosh, what was that book I read something. Midnight.

C

Midnight's Furies.

D

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Yeah, yeah. Extraordinary book about partition and how that sort of explains a good, to a great extent, what South Asia continues to experience through this day. And, oh, one other book, Book that I thought was extraordinary was the Blood Telegram. The former Council General in Dhaka, Arthur Blood, who wrote a dissent cable about the genocide going on in what was then eastern Pakistan, which became Bangladesh in 1971, which was interesting. They created the Dissent channel at State Department because of some of the reporting that was being suppressed during the Vietnam War. So they create this dissent channel and the first guy to use it is then summarily fired by Henry Kissinger because he said there was a genocide going on. You know, God forbid somebody report on that. So, yeah, I'm a big fan of history, and I think both the probably frustrating and maybe somewhat endearing part of dealing with Americans is we're very ahistorical, so we come to a lot of conversations. Extremely ignorant, but when you come with a little bit of knowledge about what these countries have gone through and experienced and why we're where we are today, I think it gives you a leg up.

C

Amazing. I think we'll end with that. Randy, thank you so much. Next time, we'll bring you on with eli. Have you two guys find that 1% to throw some haymakers at each other.