Episode Transcript
[00:00:14] Speaker A: Hello, welcome to Call It Like I See it presented by Disruption. Now, I'm James Keys and in this episode of Call It Like I See it, we're going to discuss NATO and the role it has played in the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Looking specifically at how what NATO has done and what it's not done has influenced the course of events and how things with NATO are going to look as we move forward.
And later on we're going to discuss how some people do actually seem to need less sleep than most of us in order to operate at full capacity on an ongoing basis. And consider whether these so called elite sleepers are actually better positioned for success. Just have an advantage, a leg up on everybody else.
Joining me today is a man who's been fly so long he fell asleep on the freaking plane. Tunde. Ogonlana Tunde, Are you ready to show the people how you stay right above it?
[00:01:12] Speaker B: All right? Above it, man. I just want to be clear for the audience. Was I a passenger or was I a pilot when I fell asleep?
[00:01:20] Speaker A: No need to be clear at all, man. I think it better vague.
All right, now we're recording this on March 21, 2022.
And today we wanted to take a closer look at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization or NATO, and discuss what's going on with this alliance right now in light of Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine, especially since NATO was kind of put in place a little over 70 years ago, shortly after World War II, in response to the threat posed by the Soviet Union, which is a threat that now is somewhat embodied in Russia, you know, the threat from Russia now. So Tunde, to get us started, what are your thoughts on NATO in 2022 and how it has responded and not responded to Russia's aggression?
[00:02:08] Speaker B: Good question, man.
My thoughts on NATO now, you know, in this modern era is, it's interesting. My thoughts have evolved since this invasion of Ukraine by Russia. I think like many Americans, NATO has been something we've heard about. It's become unfortunately in the last few years more of a, like most other things in our society, a bit of a political football in terms of understanding NATO. But not only, I should say add to that, not only understanding NATO, but let's say understanding our relationships within the member nations. You know, there's been a lot of hand wringing, I think in the last few years about let's say non countries that are not the United States stepping up and spending their fair share of their GDP on defense, for example. So we know that that's been come a Bit political, but in reality, you know, to see the, the, the response of NATO to this current aggression by Russia, I think for me is refreshing.
I would say that specifically in that way because for me, I'm a fan of the post World War II order that was created post 1945. And I would say through the levers of diplomacy that I know we'll get into today. So for me personally, I'm kind of refreshed and reinvigorated to see that our allies have come together and we've all kind of put up this firewall against what Vladimir Putin is doing.
And it's kind of, it looks like it's kind of dragged the rest of the world behind this stance that NATO's taken. So even China last week, you could.
[00:03:57] Speaker A: Look at it as dragging it or embolden it.
[00:03:59] Speaker B: Yeah, one or the other.
The reason I say drag is because I was just mentioning China that last week they kind of came out emphatically saying they do not support what Russia is doing in Ukraine. And my point is, is that I don't think, I don't think, I don't see China as someone that wants necessarily an emboldened NATO for their own reasons. And that's why I say. But, but they look and they see the unity of the Western allies and they made a decision. They. Now we see that they've decided they'd rather take a step back and there's all out support of what Vladimir Putin has been doing up till now and say, and, and they've noticed that the alliance of NATO and, and the Western allies, the kind of Post World War II Allies, is stronger than I think maybe some world leaders thought so.
[00:04:48] Speaker A: Well, I think certainly it's that. And I would agree with you, I think this has brought a level of appreciation for what it is. Because, I mean, if you think about it, NATO and United nations founded around the same time, all Post World War II stuff, trying to prevent another world war. In that sense, NATO, one of the defining characteristics of it is it's a defensive alliance. It's not one that is invoked when you attack someone. It's all. It's invoked when a member nation is attacked. It's treated as an attack on all member nations, and then they can react accordingly.
Now, for me, when I look at it in that sense, the thought process of, okay, we don't want Russia going and picking off small or at the time, Soviet Union going and picking off nations that on its own it could knock them out. You know, it could, it could pick them off and so we're going to bring them into an alliance with us. There's going to be an alliance that if you're attacked, then people will jump in. It does seem to have, over the course of time, like we were speaking just a little bit ago about this offline, it did seem to prevent larger nations, at least in that part of the world, from out and out attacking smaller nations. And it doesn't prevent all conflict, of course, but it does seem to have worked in a way that's intended. And even right now, looking at what they've done, like a NATO, Ukraine is not a part of NATO. Part of the reason there's beef about Ukraine is that Ukraine has indicated it would like to move in that direction, and Russia's like, they don't want Ukraine to. That was one of their demands, is to guarantee they'll never be in NATO.
And so it plays a role there, you know, in terms of that, but also in terms of what NATO represents is that it's this block of countries that you. It changes the calculation of attacking a Poland if it's in NATO. And all of these other nations are going to consider that attack against them. And so, and that worked in 1949 and through the 50s and 60s or whatever, and it still seems to influence the course of events now because this thing has stayed very confined to Ukraine and NATO's provided support and so forth. But they haven't started, you know, they haven't attacked, which I think that that's still consistent with the defensive alliance aspect of it. But it's still a looming juggernaut just sitting there on the sidelines, so to speak. And it almost constrains how aggressively or broadly Russia's aggression will go, at least to date.
[00:07:12] Speaker B: Well, that's, that's, to me, a very important, you know, kind of way to look at what NATO is. And if we look at kind of the history of NATO, NATO was created in 1949, four years after the Second World War, and really, you know, just two years. I think if you look at 1947 as kind of the start of the Cold War with Russia, or, sorry, the Soviet Union between the United States and kind of the east and western second half of the 20th century kind of jockeying for whose system would dominate the world.
[00:07:47] Speaker A: Well, just for clarity, we do distinguish in our verbiage, Russia, Soviet Union.
Russia was the heart of Soviet Union. There were satellite states that were a part of it as well. And then there was the whole Eastern Bloc, the Warsaw Pact and so forth. But we're saying that for historical accuracy, it was called the Soviet Union at that time and it included Russia and then several other nations or places that are nations now, but that were just a part of it then. And now it's the Russian Federation is what it's called, you know, and so that it's not the same landmass, but the heart of it, you know, it's still run through Moscow and you know, all that kind of stuff. The heart of it is, is, is overlapping, so to speak. The Soviet Union was Russia plus stuff.
[00:08:27] Speaker B: And what was the Soviet Union? It was a union of like minded nations at the time, which was only a handful after the 1922 revolution.
You know, the famous patriarch of that was Lenin. But it changed after World War II. So if you go back to the Second World War and in 1945, at the end of the war, Europe literally was a pancake. It had been flattened by everybody, you know, the Germans, the Allies, everybody basically made a mess out of Europe.
So what happened is you had to.
[00:09:03] Speaker A: And during that time, 1945, that was the Soviet Union fought on the same side as at the end of World War II, as the United States and the Allies and so forth because Germany attacked them.
[00:09:14] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:09:15] Speaker A: We don't have to get into how that all unfolded, but ultimately in 1945, Germany was at war with the Soviet Union on its eastern flank and the Allies on its western flank.
[00:09:28] Speaker B: Correct. And so they met in Berlin, the great point in 1945. And basically you had, the whole world was tired of war. Number one, you had 100 plus million people dead in probably a six, seven year period.
And just everyone's tired. So at the end, the three Allies, as you mentioned, Europe, sorry, England, the United States and Russia decided, hey, let's just kind of figure out how to carve up Europe. And both the British and the, and the Americans didn't want to go now fight Russia. Everybody just wanted to kind of chill out. So what happened is they allowed Russia and Stalin to, quote unquote control certain countries that orbited Russia, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, you know, a lot of countries, those are some of the bigger names. Ukraine was one of them.
But what we forget and what's not told, if you're only listening to the Russian side of it, is that those were sovereign nations prior to the Second World War that didn't have governments at the end of the war because they had been occupied by the Nazis and their governments were killed by, you know, their leaders were all killed or scared away by the Nazis. So you had nations that were in rubble and the Soviet Union came and occupied them. Fast forward to today because of just intermigration, you have a lot of Russian speaking ethnic people that live in these countries, but they are, they are sovereign nations themselves. And where NATO came into play was getting back to that is that Soviet Union was, is the right now the largest country on earth in terms of landmass. And it's one of the larger populated countries with over well over 100 million, you know, citizens.
Yeah, Russia. So what happened is the Soviet Union was even bigger because it incorporate and encompassed more countries.
[00:11:16] Speaker A: So you had, including Ukraine, you know.
[00:11:18] Speaker B: Correct. That's what I was saying that, that you know, Hungary, Ukraine, Czechoslovakia, all they got, they got folded under Soviet Union. And so what you had was coming out of the Second World War, you had the allies all worried about the Soviet Union because Stalin was still showing signs of aggressiveness. And remember, like you well said, until for whatever reason Adolf Hitler decided to attack Russia, they were allies with the Nazis and you know, both the Germans and the, and the Russians had, or the Soviets had a plan to carve up Europe and both of them share it under this authoritarian systems.
So the United States and Great Britain form NATO as a way to keep our allies on Western Europe protected.
So they had this treaty called the North Atlantic Treaty organization originally of 12 countries that, that basically that was the Article 5 of that agreement of that treaty, which is if one nation is attacked, we all are here to protect them. And so that's what allowed for the Soviet Union to be held in check. Because the Soviet Union knew that if it tried to go too far into Western Europe, that the United States would be on its doorstep.
[00:12:29] Speaker A: Well, it created a check. It created a check in that, like I said, because it's a defensive alliance. It meant that the calculation for attacking France or for attacking West Germany, I mean this was the Cold War essentially that both sides lived with. Was the calculation for attacking one of these smaller nations that a superpower could overwhelm on its own, was that the other superpower at the time when these two superpowers would be pulled in and they'd be invoked or they were under these treaties that would say they were attacked as well. So it operated as a deterrent against full scale war. At least in Europe there were still conflicts that occurred around the world with proxies, so to speak. And, but at least between the actual two countries, that's what you didn't see and that's what the world was trying to prevent. The UN was formed to do that as well. Now the UN is not an alliance, a defensive alliance that goes about things in a different way. But today we just want to talk about what NATO is doing. And like I said, particularly in light of what's happening right now is the kind of aggression that NATO was created to be a check on and if needs be to repel, and one that it wasn't needed to directly. In that sense, as you pointed out to me earlier, the first time the defensive aspect was invoked was after 9, 11.
And so it worked really well to prevent Europe, which had spent the whole first 45 years of the 20th century at war. It worked to try to keep, to constrain that. And so it's interesting to take note of that model is what. Because I'm going to come back to that later.
And so the other thing I'll point out about this is that what. Because NATO has shown solidarity. I think what's the biggest takeaway here is that NATO has shown a level of solidarity with Russia's aggression, which I don't think Russia necessarily accounted for. There was a lot of pooh, pooh talk about NATO in the United States over the last five years and so forth and really demoralizing to the allies that may be dependent or depending on the United States to be a big part of NATO. And but when this happened and leading up to this, the NATO nation seemed to all get on the same page, which if this was part of a plan to start rolling over several countries as like Domino's, that plan definitely got put on hold. But the other piece about it is it seemed to embolden other nations to come out against Russia's aggression, which is kind of, in a sense, turn a lot of people against this aggression, which I don't think was part of the calculation assets being frozen in Switzerland, which is, you know, like Switzerland is the, the notorious neutral party. And for that reason you, everybody puts their people, put their money there and for them to be taking aside, so to speak, is incredible. But that is because the solidarity NATO showed here and saying, look, no, no, we're not going to. You can't just be, you can't just run around and invade people whenever you want. We're going to stand against that. We're not, you know, you didn't invade us, so we're not coming at you, but we are going to turn up the financial pressure on you, sanctions and so forth. And so that's been interesting how the world has kind of sprung to life almost muscle memory, almost from, oh yeah, world wars are really bad and condemned broadly what's happening with Russia.
[00:15:43] Speaker B: Yeah. And I think it's a sign, and we've talked about this offline, is that the European continent has still a strong kind of emotional and muscle memory of the Second World War and the aftermath.
And I think that what we saw there was kind of the rest of Europe just saying, we don't want this here. Like, we're not gonna let you start this again.
And I think it's another great example of the quiet diplomacy that we used to hear about, you know, the whole thing of the Teddy Roosevelt talk, talk softly but walk with a big stick. And I think what we've had here in our politics for a generation, you know, post 9 11, there's a lot of bluster, you know, like, oh, you're either with us or you're against us, and we go get them over there so they don't come here. And all this kind of stuff that, you know, I don't remember as a kid watching Ronald Reagan speak against the Soviet menace, for example, did. He didn't use that kind of like machismo bluster, this kind of macho thing.
He used eloquence and kind of carved them up with a scalpel verbally, not just kind of throwing a sledgehammer verbally to everything. And so what I think happens is really a lot of these things get handled behind the scenes. Like when we heard about how the.
We learned years later, I mean, you and I weren't alive, but the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, that a lot of that was handled literally through back channels and diplomacy behind the scenes between Kennedy and Khrushchev. And they came to agreements and certain things. And so they removed their missiles from Cuba and we removed our missiles from Turkey. So we negotiated, you know, and walked each other off the ledge without having a nuclear war. And what I'm. What all I'm saying, James, is we're probably going to learn years from now the same thing, that a lot must have been happening from a diplomatic stance behind the scenes. And people negotiated and certain people got promised things and got. Got favors done and slapped on the back to make sure that this or that happened. And this is why having allies and long term trust matters.
[00:17:52] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:17:52] Speaker B: Because it allows us to deal with a tyrant like someone like Putin in a collective way.
[00:17:59] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I think you're really. And I've actually, that's stood out to me big time here. And that is, this is something that we don't know. We can never play out and compare what's going on now to what could have happened or the way things could have been that weren't. And so a lot of times when things don't go really poorly, we don't necessarily know that that someone actually did some good work behind there to make it so that they didn't go poorly. Like you said, with just the Cuban missile crisis, because there were nuclear warheads so close to us, it was like, okay, there's a relief there that we got that away. But in terms of how bad it could have gotten, Kennedy doesn't get that much credit that he was able to make avert that crisis, so to speak, because nobody knows how bad it could have been. And in this instance, actually, I think that. And I'm no person that is a big Biden person, you know, like, I support the way he goes about his business, but, like, I'm no Biden apologist, but I think that the Biden administration must be doing a good job if the world as we see it right now has been, it feels comfortable getting behind this effort to condemn Russia and not doing so in, you know, flimsy terms. But in no uncertain terms, if I think that that has to be a lot of diplomacy that's going on from the United States, from NATO and so forth. And so I wanted to ask you on that, though. Like, that's my perception on what I see, you know, like, based on what I see and how things are happening, I don't think those type of things just happen. Oh, just dumb luck, you know, Ho hum, hands in your pocket, whistling and then, oh, look, something great happened. You know, like a bunch of money just dropped, dropped in front of us and now we're rich. Like, I don't think that's how it works. Like, these things that are happening clearly look like it's a lot of work that's being done behind the scenes to do that. So how big of a role do you think the Biden administration and their foreign policy approach has played in how the world has responded to this conflict?
[00:19:50] Speaker B: Well, I'm sure it's played a lot into it. I think that, you know, and again, I want to reiterate what you said. You know, this isn't about a commercial for Joe Biden or Democrats or anything like that. It's just looking at, and I'd say this, I think Biden represents and his administration more of a continuation of the diplomacy that we've been discussing. Right. Let's just put it that way. This isn't about political party ideology or anything like that, because I think a lot of Republicans have been comforted with the same things that we say we've been comforted with in terms of watching the NATO response.
[00:20:25] Speaker A: Yeah. To give an example, like, Biden's approach doesn't seem much different to something like a George H.W. bush.
[00:20:31] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:20:32] Speaker A: This isn't a partisan thing. This is kind of an America as the big dog and how we're gonna throw our weight around as the big dog type of an approach. How are you gonna do that? Are you gonna be about talk tough and, you know, do all this other stuff or you're going to be measured and, you know, as you kind of pointed out from Teddy Roosevelt, speak softly, carry a big stick. And that doesn't mean not speak at all. That just means that you're speaking. It doesn't have to be broadcast to everybody, to everything that you're saying, you know, like you're saying things.
[00:20:56] Speaker B: And it's also about, you know, bluster and aggressive speech.
Still doesn't mean results are going to happen that are favorable for, you know, the outcome.
[00:21:05] Speaker A: So even though to some it feels.
[00:21:07] Speaker B: Good, yeah, it feels good to yell and scream and be, you know, a tough guy, but, but it doesn always make a difference. Right. So, so I think it's the, like, I'll put it this way, when I saw the Chinese last week, again, I think I've said it already, come out in public and say, we're not supporting this. We don't agree with what Vladimir Putin did in Ukraine that told me that somebody's been talking to China quietly behind the scenes. They've been, you know, them in the United States have been negotiating their relationship, too. And, you know, Putin, maybe Putin did us a favor, gave us a new negotiating entry with China, saying, hey, you know what, if you do this and that, maybe we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll lay off some of our aggressiveness towards you, or vice versa. This is all part of the, the larger idea of diplomacy. For the Chinese to publicly distance themselves from Russia when they already are in an adversarial stance with us publicly and they're jockeying with us to be the world superpower, that tells you a lot is going on behind the scenes.
[00:22:03] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's, that's, that's huge. And I think that, I mean, you look at that, that's one. And that's where, where you can see, see this type of stuff. You can't, you don't know what's being said because again, it's talking softly. But what you can see it is in the results. And like I look at it, for example, NATO or the US could have been too aggressive in response here and that made things worse. But we, because that didn't play out, we, you know, we don't weigh that. We can't weigh that properly. They could have been not united enough for too weak in their response and this thing could have inflated beyond what it is right now for all like and again but that didn't happen. So again, it's hard to account for that and our evaluation of what's going on. But I think that one of the biggest things that I'll say, well, the biggest thing in the moment was the way that the administration and it didn't just start with Russia's attack, but from the moment Biden got in, he made it a point to try to reassure NATO and the NATO allies that US was all in and ready to lead again. Like, I think that was one of his phrases, ready to lead again and all of those things like, and so when something like you don't, he didn't know that this was going to come up when that happened. But when this comes up and the US has already said before any of this stuff happened, like, no, no, no, we're all in, we're here, we're with you guys. I think that emboldened everyone else to then put on their tough guy kind of mode and be like, yeah, yeah, sanctions, we're with it or all of that stuff. And so more of a collective response. Whereas if NATO was fractured like they were or like they appeared to be some years ago and you know, NATO being different, NATO states being turned against each other and all that other stuff, we don't know that NATO would have responded this way and, or if we don't know what would have happened. But there could a lot of scenarios that could have been much worse. The other thing I'll mention and then we, you know, we can keep keep moving, but is getting out of Afghanistan should not also be overlooked here as well because that is something that allows us at a time like this to be able to focus our energy, focus our diplomacy on this one thing. We without this, our this other vulnerability we have without us being spread over there as well. And so that's again, you don't know that this is going to happen, but making that tough decision when you did made it. So when something came up that was something we didn't know was going to happen, we're better able to deal with that. So that's another decision that was people gave them hell for that. But at the time, and, you know, you and I weren't overly critical of it. We were critical that, hey, you kind of need to plan it out a little bit better. But we did look at that like, hey, you know, we don't know what's coming in the future, and we need to be prepared to move on things that happen in the future. And so that's another thing that you won't hear talked about necessarily. You won't hear those dots connected. But that's another thing that has us in a better position now that. To be able to deal with something like this. And so, I mean, I would say that the approach, even if the approach isn't reinventing the wheel, it's just kind of going back to the way that, at least with respect to this type of stuff, we had been doing things in the past, that's fine. It has us in a solid position as far as to be able to deal with this. And. And the way we've been behaving, the way the administration has been behaving, is one that clearly has more than I would have expected. The world on the same page as far as condemning this stuff and sanctioning these actions by Russia.
[00:25:07] Speaker B: Yeah, man. And you stole my thunder, man. I was going to give you props. I had it written down in my notes to say that you were the only person, to this point of me recording this show who's mentioned Afghanistan and that how much of a better position we're in.
[00:25:21] Speaker A: Yeah, I told you that a week ago.
[00:25:22] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, exactly. And I haven't seen anyone on the news talk about it. So I was like, you stole my thunder to kiss your butt.
[00:25:28] Speaker A: But no.
[00:25:30] Speaker B: And just to finish off this section of the topic about this administration's diplomacy, and that's why I want to be clear.
We're so tribal in this cultural war BS in this country now that I can't say anything positive about one side without the other side thinking that you're kind of baked in the cake, so.
[00:25:46] Speaker A: Or for that side saying that you should be with them on everything.
Like, it's like. Like if you say something nice about somebody, then you. The expectation is you're going to say something nice about them every time and something bad about, like, it's never.
People are almost hesitant to allow you to just be a critical thinker and judge things as just. Just call it like you see it.
[00:26:05] Speaker B: Well, that's why you named the podcast that. And that's why. That's why it's lonely at the top. But anyway, no, but, but because what I'm getting at is like I'm saying I'm refreshed to see this style of diplomacy from this administration. That doesn't mean that I'm saying I love Joe Biden personally and he's a king to me and he should never be out of power and that I hate all Republicans. That's why I say the point is I think George W. Bush would have behaved this way. I think Mitt Romney, you know, he was right in 2012 when he got made fun of saying how dangerous Russia was, you know, all that kind of stuff. So this is to me, well, I.
[00:26:38] Speaker A: Mean, I don't know that you say that. I don't know that any, I don't know that any Republican or any Democrat, you know, would have, would behave this way. But we know that Biden would. I'll give you that somebody like Romney probably would. But I don't know that we go around and oh, George W. Bush, like we don't know. We don't know.
[00:26:51] Speaker B: Well, I would say this because here's where I'm getting at. Not to pick on names and all that, but just this idea that, and that's why I bring back Ronald Reagan, who was the kind of the father of the moment when the Soviet collapse, because he was president at the time, Right. And he kind of led that final push to get them to collapse. And so my point is, though, is that we're so fractured in this country that things like international diplomacy up until about 10 years ago, 15 years ago, used to be the realm off limits of domestic politics. We all generally agreed that in the post World War II order, I'm not saying that stuff shouldn't be looked at or tweaked ever. I'm just saying that we generally agreed on that somewhere in the last decade that changed. And so what I'm getting at here.
[00:27:36] Speaker A: Is, you know, well, hold on, just for clarity. I think what you're saying more so is that there was a mainstream position that was not a partisan position that people from the bulk of both parties could sign up for, so to speak. Whereas now there doesn't seem to be mainstream positions that the bulk of both parties like, because there were always still people that were more hawkish or people that were more like we shouldn't be at war at all or we shouldn't be doing these operations in Central America. There always have been these other camps of domestic policy, but they weren't partisan, so to speak. They were like worldview camps, but the mainstream all pretty much was in a similar kind of lockstep.
[00:28:18] Speaker B: Yeah. And so the thing is that what that said is now that's what's happened this last decade or so. We run the risk because of the domestic politics controlling everything, in a sense that what I just said earlier in our discussion about NATO's ability to have kind of a collective strength against a big bully. And I think that because we had such a long, I guess maybe barely anyone alive anymore who was an adult and really remembers how World War II got started with this same type of bully and authoritarian in Europe trying to just put his stamp over everybody.
[00:28:55] Speaker A: Yeah. Just deciding. History says I get to invade this country and take it over.
[00:28:58] Speaker B: Yeah.
But think about it. Like, I appreciate that a lot of Americans didn't appreciate the role of organizations like NATO. Right. And so what happened is people became more focused and were allowed, let me put this. Led to believe that our allies in NATO did not deserve defense because they did not, for example, spend 2% of their GDP on their. On defense. Right.
Now, that might be. That's why I said, I'm not saying we shouldn't tweak things. Hey, I'm happy to look at making sure the NATO partners pay their fair share. There's nothing wrong with that. But I think what this moment, I think, and hopefully maybe I'm more hopeful than I knowing, but would show Americans that we shouldn't jettison the whole experiment of kind of Western liberal democracy just because we don't like our domestic political opponent. This is what is really. This is what I'm saying.
Russia under Vladimir Putin's leadership is reminding us that there are not only authoritarian regimes like a China or North Korea, but unlike those two, more so Russia is an exploratory authoritarian regime. They really want to go out and plunder and really have a conquest on their neighbors to bring back some sort of fantasy of an empire. And so because these type of leaders exist, it's reminding us that we do need to have allies that trust us and who we can trust. And that's where I was getting at with this is the issue we've had and why I think that people weren't sure, maybe even Vladimir Putin, that NATO would come together like this is because in recent years, we've had, just prior to Biden administration that created distrust within NATO because of the way they behaved and approached NATO. And I would say this, the reason why I was uncomfortable with that style of diplomacy from recent years is because what did that leave us with?
And we've talked about this. Russia ended up gaining more traction in the world affairs. Number one, they got back in bed with Cuba economically after we were in lockstep to open up Cuba more. Now Cuba's less open.
Venezuela now has nuclear capability for Russia and is a puppet regime of Russia. Now, that's the first time 2019 was the first time since 1962 that the Russians had nuclear capabilities in the Western hemisphere on our continents.
Number three, Syria. Syria. It took a lot of diplomacy and fighting and the 1973 war between Israel and its neighbors for us to finally get Russia out of the Middle east again. In 2019, we gave up on a tweet. Remember the president at the time tweeted we were pulling out of Russia. I'm sorry, Syria.
And we gave up for the first time a country to Russia in the Middle east. And we gave Russia a Mediterranean port country.
So now since 2016, Russia has nuclear capabilities in our continent and they have their first port since 1973 in the Mediterranean. They have in 2013, 2014, we know, expanded into Crimea and all this stuff. So their behavior is showing us how aggressive they are. And I would say that's why I just go back to saying I'm refreshed with this style of diplomacy because it seems to want to stop Russia now from doing all this excursions around the world.
[00:32:30] Speaker A: Well, in doing so, without trying to start a war every five minutes as well, like doing so by the incentive structure, negative incentive structure, of countries banding together to try to make. Change the calculation, so to speak, on aggressive behavior or other types of behavior that ends up being things that lead to these kind of conflicts. And so one thing I wanted to take a look at as well, though, as we get ready to wrap this up, is just kind of looking forward, this kind of NATO model. Is that something you think that we can expand or replicate out in other parts of the world in order to isolate aggressors, aggressor states or whatever that are looking to.
[00:33:10] Speaker B: No, it's interesting you asked that because, I mean, just preparing for today, right. I learned, like I said earlier, that NATO began in 49, 1949, with 12 member nations. It's up to 30 now, and there's more that are wanting to come in and all that kind of stuff. So that's what tells me that, okay, in the large kind of scheme of things, the style of diplomacy that we, we have done generally seems to have been the more successful one in terms of keeping populations happy. That doesn't mean that we don't have problems.
[00:33:43] Speaker A: No, of course, of Course, I mean, I think that NATO, the NATO model is one that we should look at that we should look at in other places. I don't think you want to grow any of these too large, though. Like, I will say that because ultimately I think the regional aspect of it works better because people have skin in the game, so to speak, who are like, if you have NATO members and, you know, they're on the other side of the world, it's good for solidarity standpoint. But that to me is more of like a UN type of thing, which is, you know, a similar type of thing. But it's not the same thing. Because, because the UN is not necessarily a, it's not a military alliance that is, you know, countries and having their government. The UN is its own kind of a body that has, that does things to try to prevent conflict or to help where there is conflict and so forth. But I think regional alliances, so to speak, defensive alliances, that's the other the two things I would think if you're going to do something like this, it needs to be regional, it needs to be defensive. You know, you don't want alliances of attacking and so forth. And they can be militaristic alliances or they can be more economic. You know, that's the other thing about it is when you, when countries start tying their fortunes together economically, more expressly and directly, then a lot of times they do start seeing things in a similar way because as we said, war is for 99% of the people. Unless you're building bricks or you're building bombs, war is not good for business. And so the bulk people who want to grow an economy and so forth, and prosperity, by and large, war is bad for that. And so that's something that even, even from an economic alliance standpoint. And so because I think what it's done is it, it this has demonstrated that it does change the calculus for aggressors. And so, and that's what you want to do, you know, the aggress there are going to be aggressors no matter what, you know, and, and I mean, you can look, if you look critically throughout history, you can point to times when the US has been an aggressor, but in general, that's not the role it's taken on through the vast, through, through, as by and large, and so forth. So from my standpoint, if you're looking at something regional and then you look at something where it's defensive or even economic, that's where you want to build this out. But it does increase it does appear to increase stability and allow for growth. And so that's. And that's what I think we should be trying to do in various places in the world.
[00:35:50] Speaker B: Yeah, man. No, I agree. And it's interesting because I think the idea of diplomacy is not something new, but it's something that I think is going to be more and more more important. If to your point about economic growth and stability being best during times of peace. And I want to be clear because a lot of people have heard that saying that, oh, you know, economies always. War is always good for economies and all that. That's a very short term. That's true because there is a lot of economic spending. Usually the central bank will start giving contracts, defense companies that hire people to help build tanks and bombs.
[00:36:24] Speaker A: Well, it's not sustainable.
[00:36:25] Speaker B: Correct. That's what I was going to say.
Yeah, you could boom for five to 10 years max. But then, yeah, at some point.
[00:36:30] Speaker A: But then everything put all that money on is blown up or it's gone, like, so it's not like you spend a bunch of money and build a bridge and then now you can carry goods over these, over, over larger spaces, you know, and that bridge will still be there after five years. Like you put all that money into building planes and bombs and so forth, then you blow it up and then so it's. But so you're correct in that it's a short term.
[00:36:50] Speaker B: And so because I know a lot of people have heard that, that's why I want to make the point that, you know, and that's where I'm getting at in terms of if we look at the 20 20th century as a kind of fight between two ideas of how to run large societies of people, right, like the Soviet way or the American way.
One of the benefits of NATO was that it kept, like we've talked about already, it kept the Soviets at bay. So think about it. The Western European economies that were flattened after World War II were allowed to grow.
And that's what I mean, the history of diplomacy is going to be.
Or, or I say the future of diplomacy. Let me restate that was going to be more important because we have so many people on the planet. So in reading and preparing for today about the history of diplomacy, of course I read stuff that went back to, you know, the Egyptians in the 14th century BCE and you know, how the Chinese were. There's records going back to a thousand BCE of the Chinese and the Indians doing diplomacy. And you know, they were saying it was interesting how women were often used as Envoys, because they were seen as non threatening or, and, or you know, the sexual kind of exploits that they could give to the other side. And just all these interesting things about how different human tribes and cultures dealt with each other. And, but all of that stuff is.
[00:38:11] Speaker A: Ramped up though, because people just didn't bump into each other as much.
[00:38:14] Speaker B: That's what I was going to say. It reminded me, I think James I about was talking, was telling you, just an offline conversation like a few weeks ago that I was reading somewhere that around the time of Jesus, around the time of 2000 years ago, it's estimated that the world population was 180 million. Yeah, so that's what I was thinking, like, wow, that's less than the whole United States right now. So you're right, the competition for resources, as much as we read about, you know, battles in the Bible and all that, there was still a big wide open world with a lot of fresh water and a lot of, you know, just things. I mean, I think as, as we have more and more billions of people sucking on the same resources, we run the risk of if, if diplomacy isn't appreciated and approached in certain ways, we could really hurt ourselves in infighting.
[00:39:01] Speaker A: So, but no, I mean, and that's. So ideally the, you don't necessarily need wars in order to crystallize that, the need for things like this. But a lot of times, I mean, that's kind of what you talk about with the living memory stuff like when things are out of the living memory or when things enter the living memory for the people that are adults at a moment, then that's the kind of, these are the times when we see and it's like, oh yeah, this is why this stuff is helpful. And so, yeah, I mean, it's not good that we have Putin out there, there's people dying, so forth doing all this types of stuff. But if we can learn the right lessons as a society and prioritize the right things in terms of how we're going to deal with this from a geopolitical standpoint, then what we can do, we're better equipped to deal with the future and to set up things and to do things, like I said, giving credit to the Biden administration, do certain things so that if something bad happens or something that's unexpected happens, we'll be in a better position to deal with it. And so.
[00:39:56] Speaker B: Hold on, can I say something?
[00:39:57] Speaker A: Oh yeah, go ahead.
[00:39:58] Speaker B: Because at the Helsinki summit, remember that was a big diplomatic meeting, we were told that Putin was very strong and that he said things strongly. So I think that.
Oh, I guess that was a diplomacy that wasn't that successful. Right.
Sorry.
[00:40:14] Speaker A: No, it's all good. But I do want to jump to this next topic.
When I saw this, I wanted to get to it with you because I'm not a person that can operate on four hours of sleep or five hours of sleep on an ongoing basis. Like, I need a solid amount of sleep for me to access my brain power. And so reading this just fascinates me. And what it is, basically, is now everybody's seen, like, the sleep guidance that, oh, you know, seven to eight hours is what an adult needs, or, you know, a teen or a preteen needs nine hours, and. And that's what you need and so forth. So those are rules of thumb. But for, as we know with human beings, everything. There's some variance, and there's. Anytime there's variance, there's extremes. And so apparently. And this is something that's being. That's been studied, there are people who. Who need only four or five hours of sleep every day or less and can function just fine on an ongoing basis, like decades. And those people don't even have. Well, if they're truly like, that won't even have the same kind of negative effects that come from sleep deprivation where, like, the tendency for Alzheimer's and so forth. And so I was. This was. While conceptually it didn't blow my mind, my jaw was on the ground. It's like, oh, man. To me, that seems like quite an advantage to go about doing business if you're just like, yeah, I don't need a lot. I can. I can. I can be doing stuff while you're asleep, baby, and getting it in. And I'm like, oh, my goodness. So what was your take on this?
We got these people walking among us that have this superpower.
[00:41:38] Speaker B: Well, I'm with you. That, unfortunately, I don't have this one.
You know, I can. I can fly and shoot laser beams out of my eyes when no one's looking. But I can't. I can't sleep three, four hours a night and be okay. Yeah, for sure.
[00:41:52] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:41:52] Speaker B: Remember, the laser beams is only when no one's looking.
[00:41:54] Speaker A: No, only when no one's looking. I've never seen it.
That's how I know it's true.
[00:41:59] Speaker B: You just got to believe me. Yeah, exactly.
I said it strong. That's why.
And so no, but. But it's. Look, it's fascinating. And it's another example of all this kind of, how should I Put it this kind of cool blend that we've had of like science and technology. Right. I think with all these, the advance in computer technology over the last generation or two has really allowed for then the science part to really look into us internally, like what makes us up as humans, what makes us tick and all this.
So it's just interesting because I feel like I've known people like this personally.
[00:42:41] Speaker A: That was gonna be my next question.
[00:42:44] Speaker B: That's what I was gonna say.
So I'm thinking about it like, it's another. What I'm getting at is another example where we tend to think that we're so special and we give ourselves credit for things as individuals.
But like, like it's the article saying it's a lot of red. This is our biological makeup.
[00:43:02] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:43:03] Speaker B: So the way you were born, that was totally out of your control in your brain chemistry or your hormone makeup, whatever it is that this 3% of the human population can really get four to five hours. Four to six hours, let's say.
[00:43:15] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:43:15] Speaker B: The way they say it with really, you know, go to bed at midnight, wake up at six with no alarm clock and be fine all day, no coffee needed, no nothing.
And you're 100% right, Jay. Me and you need to be in bed by 9, 30, 10. Right. And that example. So if you just look at all things being equal, you know, hypothetically, a competitor of ours, right. In our industry.
[00:43:34] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:43:34] Speaker B: They were born the same day as us, graduated school the same year, started the industry the same, they would have already had a leg up of you and I because over. After 20 years of doing the same thing, they would have had an extra two, three hours a day to kind of put in more work.
[00:43:48] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:43:48] Speaker B: And naturally they're going to excel more. I mean, that's just, you know. Right. And so if all else.
But my point is. But like all humans, right. They all think they're better than the rest of us because, you know, just like I'm 6 foot 4, that was out of my control.
[00:44:03] Speaker A: Well, that was actually. That was. Oh, man. You anticipated every spot I was going to go because that was what I was going to compare.
[00:44:07] Speaker B: Maybe we spent too much time doing a podcast together. That's why we got to. You got to find a new partner for the next six months.
[00:44:13] Speaker A: Must be because I was going to go to height and do the height example. And like. Yeah, if you. Well, but it applies for you. Either you're 6 4, but if you were 6 10, your life would have been different, you know, like you and so I'm 6ft, and if I was 6, my life would be different. Same kind of thing, like.
[00:44:28] Speaker B: And that's all I'm saying is it's another example where science and this research is helping us unpack all that. Like, wow, maybe Elon Musk isn't that much smarter or better than me.
[00:44:38] Speaker A: It just.
[00:44:38] Speaker B: A guy's wired that he sleeps three hours a night and he just had all this time to keep tinkering stuff. Seriously.
[00:44:43] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I know.
[00:44:45] Speaker B: I'm having fun. I'm a curious guy. I just get sleepy.
But, you know, it's one interesting thing that I noticed at least this is from my personal. Now this is anecdotal, because this is. I know, because I'm in the business world. And it's interesting because the article did say around 90 to 95% of elite sleepers studied have what psychologists will describe as type A personalities, high on ambition and optimism. So because of the type of industry I'm in, it attracts a lot of people like that. And I see it, you know, and then the private equity world, and you have. And I'd say entrepreneurs. A lot of entrepreneurs, I think, fit that type where they don't sleep. They. And I kind of, you know, it's par for the course. Right. I guess to be an entrepreneur and take that kind of risk, you kind of. I think it does pay to be a little bit, you know, optimistic. More optimistic than others. Right. And. And. And more like a driver type A, because you're taking a risk and you need other people to believe in you and all that. So it's. It's understandable that that personality trait might be more seen in. In areas of business and entrepreneurship and finance.
But, like, knowing people like this personally, what I found is there's. There's never. Is never perfect.
[00:45:56] Speaker A: No. No.
[00:45:56] Speaker B: So you and I.
I'm gonna say this.
You and I, I'll say for you. From the outside, it appears that we both have good, solid marriages and relationship with our spouse. Right. Our wives are good friends of ours. Right?
[00:46:10] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:46:10] Speaker B: We have a nice thing, you know, nice, you know, family thing. We take time to be with our kids and all that.
[00:46:15] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:46:15] Speaker B: Unfortunately, I would say the majority of men, I don't know about women, but men that I know who have this specific personality traits that I know of, all of them have horrendous personal relationships. When it comes to the intimate relationship, I'm not saying they don't have good friends, and some of them I consider good friends of mine, but I'd say At least one divorce, if not more, I'd say at least the kind of guys that don't show up all the time for their kids events and all that and creates that maybe resentment in their kids as they grow older.
[00:46:48] Speaker A: So what I'm saying is I don't have that same experience to be able to make that correlation as far as what you're saying. But on the negative side, but what.
[00:46:56] Speaker B: I thought, you still got a good wife and marriage.
[00:46:58] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, I know.
[00:46:59] Speaker B: I'll vouch for that.
[00:47:00] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure, for sure. But what I will say, though, on that piece is when you said that they would have an extra three hours to be more productive, what popped into my head at that moment was, oh, yeah, but that's also another three hours to get, to get in trouble with. Like, it's not always because you have extra time. A lot of times idle time is. I'm trying to get rid of my idle time because idle time can get you in a lot of trouble. And so maybe it's a gift and a curse from that standpoint.
[00:47:25] Speaker B: There's a lot of Bernie Madoffs. That's what I'm saying. A lot of guys in prison that got that personality traits, if they would.
[00:47:30] Speaker A: Have just went to bed two hours before, it wouldn't have had good. And so. But they didn't need it. But they didn't need it. And so, yeah, that's, that's. And that's with everything in life, though. I mean, everything in life, there's pros, there's cons, like, oh, you have this extra ability then, you know, like. But also that, you know, it comes with a cost. And if you're not able to either, you know, take steps to minimize the downside or whatever, then there can be negative implications. So, I mean, your point is well taken. Like I said, I everybody, you know, people, I've, I've known people like that. And it's typically, though, kind of like you said, it's always in more of a business context, like just, I know the, I know attorneys that. Or even when I was in school that do that. And what I don't know, though, because I don't sit with someone for 50 years, so I don't know if they're really wired like that and they can just do that on an ongoing basis or if they're just used to a sleep deprivation state, you know, because I can function on five hours of sleep for a week, two weeks through. I haven't tried to see how long I can do it. So. But what it is, is that I can just feel that I'm functioning at 85% or 80%. And you know what? I could make it through life like that, but I wouldn't be able to maximize. And so, you know, I'm trying to, I'm constantly trying to listen, listen to my body as far as what can I do to, to make my body work better. And so that's the part. So I, what I'm saying here is that I don't dispute or try to. I'm not trying to question whether there are people like this because I definitely buy that because that's varying. Anytime there's variances or people there's variance, anytime there's variance, there's going to be extreme. But I want to know how many people are actually or of the people I've met are truly like this where they don't get a reduction in performance or they're just okay with the reduction in performance. And that's what anecdotally I can't make out because if I'm going on five hours of sleep myself, I'm a grump. And you know what my personal relationships will probably be.
[00:49:11] Speaker B: That's what I was going to get at actually. It's funny. Well, first of all I was going to say be careful with that word variant, bro.
After this two years of COVID we're all a little bit sensitive. You start thinking of big, big words like that.
[00:49:22] Speaker A: You got me all I said varian, so it sounds the same man.
[00:49:27] Speaker B: I got you. So you know, I'm worried you're about to tell me I can't go to work for a week.
Shoot, it's a trigger word. Now I gotta put the face diaper on, dude.
No, but, but it's interesting because you beat me to it is, is because that's what I was gonna joke and say. Well, maybe if you did go on a sleep deprivation because you felt like you needed to crank it out to make more money, you might be divorced in three years. Because you're right, maybe you being a zombie and literally being cranky and miserable personality wise and, and again, it's a good point you make because I mean they didn't even get into that kind of detail about the background of how they do this research in the article. But yeah, I wonder how they account for that in the article like in when they're doing the research because you know, in fairness to my friends that I've known that I mentioned until you said that, I didn't think that you're right. I don't know which one of them naturally might be wired like this, because my gut feeling, and, you know, some people I'm thinking of right now who remain nameless for sure, is that they may not have that natural state of this elite sleeper thing where they chemically are made up to function like that. I think theirs is more of an anxiety and insecurity about not either keeping up with the Joneses or not meeting what they've been taught to believe is success, like a material success.
[00:50:50] Speaker A: So, I mean, and they could have learned that behavior, that sleeping like that is necessary for, you know, for the things that they want. Like, you're. To the point, to your point. That's what I'm saying.
[00:50:59] Speaker B: And that's why I say maybe in that example, if I can be fair to people, maybe some of the guys I know that have unfortunately gone that route where their families have broken up and, you know, kind of all that, maybe it's not because of the fact they didn't, you know, that they are. That they. Maybe it's that they didn't sleep enough for themselves.
[00:51:17] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:51:17] Speaker B: And it created other offshoots in their personality that over the years, the person that married them eventually couldn't be around them anymore because they also, like. The people I know, also would have changed because of the psychological state of constantly being under sleep deprived for years. I mean, like you said, you and I can do that for a couple days and get through it, be cranky. But yeah, I'm sure if you did this for years, which I know some people that do this for years, I'm pretty sure you. You get into a deep personality switch.
[00:51:48] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:51:49] Speaker B: Switches in your.
[00:51:50] Speaker A: I can tell the difference in my own personality after a couple of days and I'm like, oh, I don't like the way I'm treating my kids, or I don't like the way I'm treating my wife, you know, and so, yeah, I mean, it's something that. From my standpoint, you know, like, I. You don't know from the research standpoint, but I'm glad that they're looking at it. I mean, again, it's one of those things, like you said, with our technology and, you know, we got people, we have scientists that have stipends that are just like, hey, study something. And it's. It's great. It's the ability to learn more about ourselves as human beings as a species, and then how we individually fit into that stuff. It's just interesting. So, you know, it was a good conversation. It was something to, or a good conversation piece, you know, like to talk about.
[00:52:25] Speaker B: Hold on, let's do this.
[00:52:25] Speaker A: We all know different types of people.
[00:52:27] Speaker B: But you gotta tell the wife that if you go like four or five days, you start acting funny, just tell her to call me and I'll, I'll do my like temperature check on you. I'll just be like, hey, dude, how much you sleep this last week?
[00:52:38] Speaker A: There you go. Yeah, that'll be the alarm.
[00:52:40] Speaker B: The alarm would be like, all right, you know, and I'll like, I'll like text her back. I'll be like, well, he's not an permanently. You just got to make sure he sleeps two nights in a row and then he'll reset.
But if you let him go another week, then he might be an a hole for the longest.
[00:52:55] Speaker A: Basically what you're saying is it's user error.
[00:52:58] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:52:59] Speaker A: I'm not using the body right. So there you go.
[00:53:01] Speaker B: No, but you know what, just to end it real quick, this is interesting. A friend of mine who was in the NBA years ago, because what happens, it's interesting is, you know, when you're at that level of, of athletics and sports, you know that everything is, is about the little edge to be better. So yeah, he told me once that they had a sleep expert from Harvard University come and talk to the team one pre, pre season just, you know, as they give these educational things about your health and wellness and you know, we all look at NBA players and they make a lot of money and all that, but you forget, man, these guys, 6, 8, 6 10, trying to sleep on a plane seat, you know, or something all the time. Yeah, they finish a game in some city and they're one o', clock, they're at the airport flying to the next city and there's jet lag, you know, if they're flying, you know, from east to west coast. So these guys do get, you know, they're sleep disrupted and all that. And so I remember him telling me that what he learned in that conversation was that you can go about two weeks with your sleep out of whack like that, as long as within like that two week window you make sure you sleep at least nine hours back to back two nights in a row. And then your body will, will somewhat reset itself enough a bit for you to kind of function somewhat normally. And for those of us that aren't elite sleepers, you know, as normal folks. Yeah, so that was. I found, I always remembered that after he told me that I was. If I get two, three nights of bad sleep. I'm like. I look at my wife, I'm like, all right, I need nine hours tonight. And tomorrow night, I'll be a human being again to you.
[00:54:29] Speaker A: Hey, technique, man. Technique. There you go. There you go. So that's good. Well, now we appreciate everybody for joining us on this episode of Call It Like I See it. Subscribe to the podcast, rate it, review us, tell us what you think, and until next time, I'm James Keys.
[00:54:44] Speaker B: I'm Tunde Gonlana.
[00:54:45] Speaker A: All right. And we'll talk to you next time.
[00:54:51] Speaker B: I.
