June 20, 2025 • 15 mins
ADM James Stavridis is a former NATO Supreme Allied Commander and SouthCom commander. He's a best-selling author of both fiction and non-fiction. We'll discuss his take on the Iran/Israel war and it's place in larger Middle East dynamics.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Former Native Supreme Allied Commander.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
He is recently, although perhaps temporarily, been promoted to chairman
of the board of Two Dudes Consulting.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
And he is a best.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Selling author in both fiction and nonfiction.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
And we have a lot to talk with him about today.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
His most recent book, by the way, which we talked
about a couple of weeks ago, is The Admiral's Bookshelf,
and I still don't have my signed copy, and I
got a lot of things I want to talk to about.
But for first, Admiral, what were your thoughts when you
heard the news that Captain Cook's ship has been found?
Speaker 3 (00:42):
Oh, I was thrilled.
Speaker 4 (00:43):
So to get everyone on the same page. Captain James
Cook one of the most intrepid explorers in history. Around
the period of time the United States becomes independent, so
I think seventeen sixty eight seventeen that range, he discovers Australia,
(01:04):
he discovers the Hawaiian Islands. He's the first European to
set foot on both of those. But his voyages, he
did three distinct voyages of exploration as far north as
the Arctic, as far south as the Antarctic, and his
crew loved him he overcame scurvy, he learned to navigate
(01:26):
laundit one of the first to do it. Really remarkable
science and exploration leader. So his ship, the principal one,
was called the Endeavor, like something you try and do,
the Endeavor. And once he died, and he died under
exploring circumstances, attacked by Hawaiians on Hawaiian on the main
(01:52):
island Hawaii, and died, and then the ship sort of
drifted out of history Ross and it.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
Became a troop transport. It had different name.
Speaker 4 (02:03):
Now it's been discovered at the bottom of the harbor
in Newport, Rhode Island. So to anyone who knows anything
about exploration, finding James Cook's Endeavor is a pretty remarkable moment.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
What has it been long believed that the Endeavor was
in that neighborhood or was it completely lost and could
have been anywhere?
Speaker 4 (02:28):
I think there was a general sense that the British
had repurposed it as perhaps a troop transport at some time.
All this attendant to the American Revolution, as I just mentioned,
But I don't think anybody expected it would turn up
in a routine dredging operation in Newport, Rhode Island, which,
by the way, for listeners in the Denver area may
(02:51):
not know. Newport Rhode Island is the beating heart of
sailing in America. It's where all of our America's cups
voyages are.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
They train there.
Speaker 4 (03:01):
It's also a big navy port, huge navy base, so
kind of fitting that has been If you will, hiding
in plain sight down at the bottom of that harbor,
I think it'll be raised. There'll be an active discussion
about who owns it, who.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Gets to restore it.
Speaker 4 (03:17):
I hope ultimately it goes back to the United Kingdom
and is restored and put in Portsmouth alongside HMS Victory,
the flagship of Lord Nelson. Closed with this the James
Cook's legacy. Captain Cook, his legacy in the world of
exploration and science is as great as that of Lord
(03:40):
Nelson in warfare. Those two ships deserve to be next
to each other.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
All right, Just one last quick comment on this, And
given what you've done for a living and just your
enjoyment of exploration yourself, there are very few things that
I ever happened to mention to you that you haven't
already done.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
And that'll be the case here too.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
But I had the opportunity to go to Cooktown in Australia,
so that was where he like beached his The Endeavor
was the ship on that trip, and they had to
do some repairs there a way up in northern Australia
near the Dane Tree rainforest.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
So that was kind of cool. I imagine you've been there. Yes,
I have.
Speaker 4 (04:22):
I've done that whole coast of Australia, the Gold Coast
they call it. And it's a tribute to James Cook
that it was able to map it and survey it
so precisely that many of the surveys he produced are
still in use today.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
And then the other thing I wanted to mention to you,
and again I imagine you've been there, done that already.
But I used to collect tribal art New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Indonesia,
all this stuff. I have a pretty decent little collection,
even some Aboriginal stuff.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
And I was briefly in Auckland.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I was more going to the South Island of New Zealand,
but I had a little time in Auckland, and so
I went to the museum there. And the museum in
Auckland has a collection of James Cook's collection that he
collected when he was traveling that part of the world,
and it is it was one of the greatest things
(05:18):
I've ever seen in my life.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
I couldn't agree with you more. The museum is memorable
in every way. And because I visited at a time
when I was Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, the New
Zealand Armed Forces did that Hakou dance where they come
out and footstomp and welcome you and you have to
(05:42):
pick up a feather without breaking eye contact with the
leader of the warriors, the Maori warriors in front of you.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
So it's doubly memorable for me.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
Hey, book recommendation, now that I know you're a Captain
Cook fan came out last year.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
It's by Hampton Sides.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
It's called The Wide Wide Ocean and it's the story
of Cook's last voyage and his death. It's incredibly well written,
really puts you into the endeavor in that voiage, The
Wide Wide Ocean by Hampton Side.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
All right, because I have the memory of a goldfish.
If you would do me the favor at some point
of sending me that by email, what I'll do, especially
since it's a recent book, is I'll read it and
I'll try to get the author on the show, and
then i'll send you the link to the interview so
you can hear that, and I'll tell you in advance
and you can suggest a question or two. All right, now,
let's get to what's going on in the world. And
we got probably six or seven minutes here, and I'm
(06:38):
going to start with a couple of specific questions rather
than the macro about Iran and Israel, which we might
get to. But what do you make of the fifth
fleet moving out of Bahrain? Do you think this is
protecting them from an Iranian strike? Do you think it's
giving more offensive optionality to the US?
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Do you think it's both.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
I think it's both.
Speaker 4 (06:58):
And you know, and a hurricane is coming toward a port,
you get the ships underway. Ships are always more survivable
at sea than they are tied to appear, so it
is defensive in that regard. But also those ships are
our mind sweepers in case the Iranians decide to mine
the Straight of Four Moves. You don't want them bottled
(07:20):
up and trapped up north. You want them underway, so
they're flexible and they're guided missile destroyers there that can
provide ear cover in case the Iranians lash out against us,
which I think they will if we decide to strike
their nuclear facilities.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
So again I always hesitate a little bit asking you,
you know, what would you do if you were president?
But at the level that you got to, you were
involved in serious policy discussions and you were figuring out
the plans and the orders, not just taking orders. So
if you were still there at that level, advising and
(07:59):
so on, what was your advice to be to the
president about whether we should join in at even a
quote unquote small scale two or three mops to take
out four to H versus well versus what you can
tell me what the alternatives are as well?
Speaker 3 (08:18):
I think there are four options.
Speaker 4 (08:19):
One is do nothing, Let the Israelis handle this, let
them continue to pound away. Problem is they probably can't
really destroy that nuclear program, but certainly that would be
an option. Option two would be let diplomacy play out,
put lots of pressure on the Uranians, set the table
(08:40):
for strikes, then go to the Iranians and say, hey,
it's the last exit before the tunnel. Let's talk, so
give diplomacy a real push. Option three you mentioned it
a surgical participation. Say to Israel, look, we're going to
do one thing, and one thing only. We're gonna take
(09:00):
out four dow and we've got the capability to do
that with the MOP massive ordinance penetrator often called the
bunker busting bomb on the news these days. But take
a surgical and then number four would be all in.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
With the Israelis.
Speaker 4 (09:16):
Participate in massive strikes against the country, try and convince
the people of Iran that their leadership is inadequate, and
hope you get a regime change. Those are four options.
I would advise option two. Set the table, be prepared
to strike, but give diplomacy another chance. I kind of
(09:39):
think that's what President Trump is doing when he says, hey,
let's take a two week pause here.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Okay, So let's just elaborate with me a little bit
on that Option two.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Okay. If option two.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
Doesn't work, is your next choice option three or option four?
Speaker 4 (09:56):
Option three, I think you want to minimize the level
of US participation simply because it will minimize the level
of an Iranian response. And yeah, you don't want the
straight oh hor moves to close. You don't want American
businessmen walking on the streets in the Middle East shot
down by terrorist groups. You don't want a world in
(10:20):
which Iran is ragining a thousand ballistic missiles all pointed
at Tel Aviv.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
You don't want that world.
Speaker 4 (10:28):
And so from a US perspective, I think doing the
least you can and substituting for whatever the Israelis can't
do makes the most sense.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
So I'm with you on both of those.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
I'm with you on number two being the right first choice,
number three being the right fallback. The one place where
I would quibble not with you, but with Trump. And
you can tell me whether you agree with me or not.
I think two weeks is too long. Yeah, I agree completely.
Speaker 4 (10:59):
I'll take two weeks as someone who is open to
see diplomatic resolution. By the way, most of the polling
I see indicate seventy percent of Americans are against the
US being involved militarily. And that's because our nation correctly
has enormous scar tissue concerning long forever wars in the
Middle East. And frankly, this idea that you can just
(11:21):
do a surgical strike and you know they'll probably just
back down and it'll be a one and done, I
don't think so. Look at the Japanese on Pearl Harbor.
I think they hope to shock in awe the United States.
That's not what happened. They awoke a sleeping giant and
ended up in a big time war.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
I think it could happen here quite easily.
Speaker 4 (11:44):
We don't want to be involved in another war in
the Middle East.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
And yet you still chose three rather than four because
you think three has a lower opportunity of dragging us
into a larger conflagration than four.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
That's correct.
Speaker 4 (11:58):
And I think that if if you're willing to let
diplomacy play out over a couple of months, which is
not an unreasonable amount of time, then you've got a
better chance at landing that. And frankly Ford Dow is
not going anywhere, and the Iranians are not going to
suddenly reconstitute their ear defenses, so you've got time here.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
I think.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
Having said all that, I think President Trump's tactic, and
he's the master negotiator, is to pressurize the situation. Given
two weeks, he likes to do that anyway, maybe that'll
elicit a response, and if it doesn't, he can extend
the time, or he can go to option three.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
As we've been discussing a surgical strike.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
All right, So just real quick, I think you misheard
me because then you said you agreed, because you said
you agree with me, But then what you said afterwards
is you're actually disagreeing with me. I said, I think
two weeks is too long, and you think two weeks
is too short.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
Oh, I'm sorry, I do. I'm sorry I misheard you.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:59):
I think in the real world, where.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
It takes time to make decisions and Iran leadership or
dodgy missiles, I think two weeks is almost the minimum
amount of sensible time you could offer. And I think,
more realistically, if they don't take two weeks, but you
could get.
Speaker 3 (13:18):
Them on a track toward diplomacy. I'd take that. Again.
It's not like they're.
Speaker 4 (13:24):
Strengthening by the minute or going to build a bomb
in the next two weeks.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
Not going to happen.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Okay, let's do two more things in about ninety seconds. First,
when is the sequel to a Restless Wave coming out?
Speaker 4 (13:39):
The sequel is going to be called The Turning Tide,
and it concludes the story of the characters in The
Restless Wave, historical fiction about the first half of World
War two second half of World War two. The Turning
Tide will come out in about a year, one year
from now.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
I loved that book. I love the Wave, the Restless Wave.
I'm looking forward to it. All right.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
We could probably do an hour on this next thing,
but give me literally one minute on it. You wrote
a piece for Bloomberg entitled the US is making the
world a more dangerous place. So do your admirble thing
where you kind of summarize for us quickly.
Speaker 4 (14:17):
My concern about our foreign policy at the moment is
that it trends isolation, is so kind of moving away
from the international order, which has done a lot of
good for us, the international order. International trade, I think
number two, it's too erratic. We slap big tariffs on people,
then we take them off, then we give a ninety
(14:39):
day pause. Then it's on auto's, then it's on steel.
It's just too many changes, too many moving parts. And thirdly,
we're not sufficiently aligning with our allies. We're in a
real standoff with European Union right now about trade disagreements.
We really need the EU on board right now if
(14:59):
we're going to solve the Middle East, solve what's going
on in Ukraine and ultimately faced China in the Pacific.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
So those are my three concerns.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
NATO Supreme Allied Commander retired Navy Admiral James tavritas vice
chair at the Carlisle Group as well currently chairman of
Two Dudes Consulting, probably his most important position. It's always
so good to have you, Admiral. Thanks so much for
making time. I know you're very in demand these days.
Really appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Thanks, dude, talk later all h seea bye. All right,
So I always love talking to him. I bet you
a rod.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
I bet you I'm the only person in the world
who calls the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander dude. You
called him dude first, Yeah, and then he just called
me dude.
Speaker 1 (15:46):
We are signing off. There's way less cool. He called
you dude. I think you just reciprocated
Former Native Supreme Allied Commander.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
He is recently, although perhaps temporarily, been promoted to chairman
of the board of Two Dudes Consulting.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
And he is a best.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Selling author in both fiction and nonfiction.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
And we have a lot to talk with him about today.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
His most recent book, by the way, which we talked
about a couple of weeks ago, is The Admiral's Bookshelf,
and I still don't have my signed copy, and I
got a lot of things I want to talk to about.
But for first, Admiral, what were your thoughts when you
heard the news that Captain Cook's ship has been found?
Speaker 3 (00:42):
Oh, I was thrilled.
Speaker 4 (00:43):
So to get everyone on the same page. Captain James
Cook one of the most intrepid explorers in history. Around
the period of time the United States becomes independent, so
I think seventeen sixty eight seventeen that range, he discovers Australia,
(01:04):
he discovers the Hawaiian Islands. He's the first European to
set foot on both of those. But his voyages, he
did three distinct voyages of exploration as far north as
the Arctic, as far south as the Antarctic, and his
crew loved him he overcame scurvy, he learned to navigate
(01:26):
laundit one of the first to do it. Really remarkable
science and exploration leader. So his ship, the principal one,
was called the Endeavor, like something you try and do,
the Endeavor. And once he died, and he died under
exploring circumstances, attacked by Hawaiians on Hawaiian on the main
(01:52):
island Hawaii, and died, and then the ship sort of
drifted out of history Ross and it.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
Became a troop transport. It had different name.
Speaker 4 (02:03):
Now it's been discovered at the bottom of the harbor
in Newport, Rhode Island. So to anyone who knows anything
about exploration, finding James Cook's Endeavor is a pretty remarkable moment.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
What has it been long believed that the Endeavor was
in that neighborhood or was it completely lost and could
have been anywhere?
Speaker 4 (02:28):
I think there was a general sense that the British
had repurposed it as perhaps a troop transport at some time.
All this attendant to the American Revolution, as I just mentioned,
But I don't think anybody expected it would turn up
in a routine dredging operation in Newport, Rhode Island, which,
by the way, for listeners in the Denver area may
(02:51):
not know. Newport Rhode Island is the beating heart of
sailing in America. It's where all of our America's cups
voyages are.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
They train there.
Speaker 4 (03:01):
It's also a big navy port, huge navy base, so
kind of fitting that has been If you will, hiding
in plain sight down at the bottom of that harbor,
I think it'll be raised. There'll be an active discussion
about who owns it, who.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Gets to restore it.
Speaker 4 (03:17):
I hope ultimately it goes back to the United Kingdom
and is restored and put in Portsmouth alongside HMS Victory,
the flagship of Lord Nelson. Closed with this the James
Cook's legacy. Captain Cook, his legacy in the world of
exploration and science is as great as that of Lord
(03:40):
Nelson in warfare. Those two ships deserve to be next
to each other.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
All right, Just one last quick comment on this, And
given what you've done for a living and just your
enjoyment of exploration yourself, there are very few things that
I ever happened to mention to you that you haven't
already done.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
And that'll be the case here too.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
But I had the opportunity to go to Cooktown in Australia,
so that was where he like beached his The Endeavor
was the ship on that trip, and they had to
do some repairs there a way up in northern Australia
near the Dane Tree rainforest.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
So that was kind of cool. I imagine you've been there. Yes,
I have.
Speaker 4 (04:22):
I've done that whole coast of Australia, the Gold Coast
they call it. And it's a tribute to James Cook
that it was able to map it and survey it
so precisely that many of the surveys he produced are
still in use today.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
And then the other thing I wanted to mention to you,
and again I imagine you've been there, done that already.
But I used to collect tribal art New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Indonesia,
all this stuff. I have a pretty decent little collection,
even some Aboriginal stuff.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
And I was briefly in Auckland.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I was more going to the South Island of New Zealand,
but I had a little time in Auckland, and so
I went to the museum there. And the museum in
Auckland has a collection of James Cook's collection that he
collected when he was traveling that part of the world,
and it is it was one of the greatest things
(05:18):
I've ever seen in my life.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
I couldn't agree with you more. The museum is memorable
in every way. And because I visited at a time
when I was Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, the New
Zealand Armed Forces did that Hakou dance where they come
out and footstomp and welcome you and you have to
(05:42):
pick up a feather without breaking eye contact with the
leader of the warriors, the Maori warriors in front of you.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
So it's doubly memorable for me.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
Hey, book recommendation, now that I know you're a Captain
Cook fan came out last year.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
It's by Hampton Sides.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
It's called The Wide Wide Ocean and it's the story
of Cook's last voyage and his death. It's incredibly well written,
really puts you into the endeavor in that voiage, The
Wide Wide Ocean by Hampton Side.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
All right, because I have the memory of a goldfish.
If you would do me the favor at some point
of sending me that by email, what I'll do, especially
since it's a recent book, is I'll read it and
I'll try to get the author on the show, and
then i'll send you the link to the interview so
you can hear that, and I'll tell you in advance
and you can suggest a question or two. All right, now,
let's get to what's going on in the world. And
we got probably six or seven minutes here, and I'm
(06:38):
going to start with a couple of specific questions rather
than the macro about Iran and Israel, which we might
get to. But what do you make of the fifth
fleet moving out of Bahrain? Do you think this is
protecting them from an Iranian strike? Do you think it's
giving more offensive optionality to the US?
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Do you think it's both.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
I think it's both.
Speaker 4 (06:58):
And you know, and a hurricane is coming toward a port,
you get the ships underway. Ships are always more survivable
at sea than they are tied to appear, so it
is defensive in that regard. But also those ships are
our mind sweepers in case the Iranians decide to mine
the Straight of Four Moves. You don't want them bottled
(07:20):
up and trapped up north. You want them underway, so
they're flexible and they're guided missile destroyers there that can
provide ear cover in case the Iranians lash out against us,
which I think they will if we decide to strike
their nuclear facilities.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
So again I always hesitate a little bit asking you,
you know, what would you do if you were president?
But at the level that you got to, you were
involved in serious policy discussions and you were figuring out
the plans and the orders, not just taking orders. So
if you were still there at that level, advising and
(07:59):
so on, what was your advice to be to the
president about whether we should join in at even a
quote unquote small scale two or three mops to take
out four to H versus well versus what you can
tell me what the alternatives are as well?
Speaker 3 (08:18):
I think there are four options.
Speaker 4 (08:19):
One is do nothing, Let the Israelis handle this, let
them continue to pound away. Problem is they probably can't
really destroy that nuclear program, but certainly that would be
an option. Option two would be let diplomacy play out,
put lots of pressure on the Uranians, set the table
(08:40):
for strikes, then go to the Iranians and say, hey,
it's the last exit before the tunnel. Let's talk, so
give diplomacy a real push. Option three you mentioned it
a surgical participation. Say to Israel, look, we're going to
do one thing, and one thing only. We're gonna take
(09:00):
out four dow and we've got the capability to do
that with the MOP massive ordinance penetrator often called the
bunker busting bomb on the news these days. But take
a surgical and then number four would be all in.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
With the Israelis.
Speaker 4 (09:16):
Participate in massive strikes against the country, try and convince
the people of Iran that their leadership is inadequate, and
hope you get a regime change. Those are four options.
I would advise option two. Set the table, be prepared
to strike, but give diplomacy another chance. I kind of
(09:39):
think that's what President Trump is doing when he says, hey,
let's take a two week pause here.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Okay, So let's just elaborate with me a little bit
on that Option two.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Okay. If option two.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
Doesn't work, is your next choice option three or option four?
Speaker 4 (09:56):
Option three, I think you want to minimize the level
of US participation simply because it will minimize the level
of an Iranian response. And yeah, you don't want the
straight oh hor moves to close. You don't want American
businessmen walking on the streets in the Middle East shot
down by terrorist groups. You don't want a world in
(10:20):
which Iran is ragining a thousand ballistic missiles all pointed
at Tel Aviv.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
You don't want that world.
Speaker 4 (10:28):
And so from a US perspective, I think doing the
least you can and substituting for whatever the Israelis can't
do makes the most sense.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
So I'm with you on both of those.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
I'm with you on number two being the right first choice,
number three being the right fallback. The one place where
I would quibble not with you, but with Trump. And
you can tell me whether you agree with me or not.
I think two weeks is too long. Yeah, I agree completely.
Speaker 4 (10:59):
I'll take two weeks as someone who is open to
see diplomatic resolution. By the way, most of the polling
I see indicate seventy percent of Americans are against the
US being involved militarily. And that's because our nation correctly
has enormous scar tissue concerning long forever wars in the
Middle East. And frankly, this idea that you can just
(11:21):
do a surgical strike and you know they'll probably just
back down and it'll be a one and done, I
don't think so. Look at the Japanese on Pearl Harbor.
I think they hope to shock in awe the United States.
That's not what happened. They awoke a sleeping giant and
ended up in a big time war.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
I think it could happen here quite easily.
Speaker 4 (11:44):
We don't want to be involved in another war in
the Middle East.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
And yet you still chose three rather than four because
you think three has a lower opportunity of dragging us
into a larger conflagration than four.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
That's correct.
Speaker 4 (11:58):
And I think that if if you're willing to let
diplomacy play out over a couple of months, which is
not an unreasonable amount of time, then you've got a
better chance at landing that. And frankly Ford Dow is
not going anywhere, and the Iranians are not going to
suddenly reconstitute their ear defenses, so you've got time here.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
I think.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
Having said all that, I think President Trump's tactic, and
he's the master negotiator, is to pressurize the situation. Given
two weeks, he likes to do that anyway, maybe that'll
elicit a response, and if it doesn't, he can extend
the time, or he can go to option three.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
As we've been discussing a surgical strike.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
All right, So just real quick, I think you misheard
me because then you said you agreed, because you said
you agree with me, But then what you said afterwards
is you're actually disagreeing with me. I said, I think
two weeks is too long, and you think two weeks
is too short.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
Oh, I'm sorry, I do. I'm sorry I misheard you.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:59):
I think in the real world, where.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
It takes time to make decisions and Iran leadership or
dodgy missiles, I think two weeks is almost the minimum
amount of sensible time you could offer. And I think,
more realistically, if they don't take two weeks, but you
could get.
Speaker 3 (13:18):
Them on a track toward diplomacy. I'd take that. Again.
It's not like they're.
Speaker 4 (13:24):
Strengthening by the minute or going to build a bomb
in the next two weeks.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
Not going to happen.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Okay, let's do two more things in about ninety seconds. First,
when is the sequel to a Restless Wave coming out?
Speaker 4 (13:39):
The sequel is going to be called The Turning Tide,
and it concludes the story of the characters in The
Restless Wave, historical fiction about the first half of World
War two second half of World War two. The Turning
Tide will come out in about a year, one year
from now.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
I loved that book. I love the Wave, the Restless Wave.
I'm looking forward to it. All right.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
We could probably do an hour on this next thing,
but give me literally one minute on it. You wrote
a piece for Bloomberg entitled the US is making the
world a more dangerous place. So do your admirble thing
where you kind of summarize for us quickly.
Speaker 4 (14:17):
My concern about our foreign policy at the moment is
that it trends isolation, is so kind of moving away
from the international order, which has done a lot of
good for us, the international order. International trade, I think
number two, it's too erratic. We slap big tariffs on people,
then we take them off, then we give a ninety
(14:39):
day pause. Then it's on auto's, then it's on steel.
It's just too many changes, too many moving parts. And thirdly,
we're not sufficiently aligning with our allies. We're in a
real standoff with European Union right now about trade disagreements.
We really need the EU on board right now if
(14:59):
we're going to solve the Middle East, solve what's going
on in Ukraine and ultimately faced China in the Pacific.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
So those are my three concerns.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
NATO Supreme Allied Commander retired Navy Admiral James tavritas vice
chair at the Carlisle Group as well currently chairman of
Two Dudes Consulting, probably his most important position. It's always
so good to have you, Admiral. Thanks so much for
making time. I know you're very in demand these days.
Really appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Thanks, dude, talk later all h seea bye. All right,
So I always love talking to him. I bet you
a rod.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
I bet you I'm the only person in the world
who calls the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander dude. You
called him dude first, Yeah, and then he just called
me dude.
Speaker 1 (15:46):
We are signing off. There's way less cool. He called
you dude. I think you just reciprocated
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