Latest / Follow the Leighder / Iran, Hezbollah, and China: A Special Ops View | Col. Alex Simmons (Ret.)
Transcript
- Leigh/@followtheleighder: Howdy folks and welcome back to another episode of Follow the Leighder. I'm your host, Leigh Larson, and I am just absolutely honored, humbled, and privileged to bring to y'all today from Williamsburg, Virginia. We have Colonel Simmons, ⁓ now, but has served 18 years ⁓ combat and 25 years total, ⁓ Army Special Operations Officer. Served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Welcome, ⁓ my goodness Colonel, welcome to the studio. Alex: Thanks, Leigh It's an honor to be here. Thank you. Leigh/@followtheleighder: ⁓ my goodness, mean, y'all check out this resume. As I stated, retired Colonel US Army Special Ops served in both Iraq and Afghanistan 1995 West Point graduate. He holds advanced degrees from the Naval Postgraduate School in Counterterrorism and Counterinsurgency and from National Defense University and Joint Strategic Planning. Your primary, his primary academic focus is Middle Eastern history with a deep specialization in Iran and Hezbollah. He currently works as a military contractor providing strategic analysis and planning support. My goodness, have you been busy lately? Alex: In a word, yes. And I know, Leigh I've always got to say this whenever we talk to folks. Everything I say is my own personal opinion. It's not a reflection of my company, or my customer, or the federal government. I always have to say it upfront, but just so we're, it's out the way. Yes, it's been very busy. It's been insanely busy. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Absolutely. talk to us. I mean, thank you first of all for your decades of not only service, but like you said, you are full, you have gone straight through the whole institution with West Point, ⁓ going and retiring as a Colonel. You've gone through these incredible graduate schools and defense universities, all these different trainings to help bolster your Middle Eastern history. ⁓ with that focus and here's the thanks sir. And I know this. I go back and forth between Iran and Iran and I'm so sorry, I'm sure. Can you please settle it for everyone? Is it Iran, Iraq? How should we say it as American citizen? ⁓ that's all right. Alex: Well for second my light fell off. So it's like use the A term like ⁓ not I. Because the Iraq or like Iran is aran, arak. If you look at the actual, look at the Arabic term, the Arabic and the Persian Farsi letter is like ⁓ sound is for the eyes. That's how you know it's a. Leigh/@followtheleighder: I run. Well, thank you for that. That should settle a lot of debates that we have been having since 9-11, unfortunately, perpetuated by, of course, the news. Speaking of news and headlines, you have spent your career studying ⁓ Iran. think you said, ⁓ Iran and Hezbollah specifically. For people who are only just now getting exposed to what's going on, what are they missing from the history that is just not being covered in the headlines? What is driving this conflict? Alex: Well, there's a couple of things. ⁓ Let's start with Iran first, because they're the earlier one. So Iran itself, the Iranians are Persians. And so you're talking about a civilization that's almost 3,000 years old. Very old, very ancient civilization, very proud civilization. And you always have to keep that in mind when you deal with them or when you interact with them, because they're not new at this. They've... If you look throughout your history, the wars they fought, they fought Alexander the Great. They fought Genghis Khan. They fought the Brits and the Russians. This is their history. This is their environment. The land in which they lived has been highly prized, highly valued for centuries. And so they're used to the fight. Going back to, if we go to modern times, the Islamic Republic. One thing to keep in mind with them is that their motivations didn't start in 1979. We Americans, we like to look at 79 as being, my God, that's where everything went really bad and the sour things bad. Their motivations, at least for the modern republic, go back to 53 when the United States and Great Britain overthrew Mohammed Masudek, who was the prime minister of Iran. They overthrew Masudek because he realized that his country was sitting on a great deal of wealth, oil. He wanted to make sure that that wealth actually went to his people because at the time American companies and British companies were trying to seize all of it for themselves. And Musk said, yeah, no, we're not going do that. I'm going to nationalize everything so that what we pull out of the ground, we can actually take care of our people with. Well, the United States and Great Britain weren't very happy about that. And so they overthrew him. He died in prison. That's the problem because Mosaddegh was actually a democratically elected leader. And so from their writing perspective, when their writing perspective is, we went through the whole process of getting rid of a king because there was a shot before him, putting someone, electing someone to take care of us or to lead us. And because you didn't like it, you decided to throw him out. So that led to, that was a level of hostility. And ⁓ by the way, ⁓ Reza Pawlavi, who was a shah that followed him, Muhammad Pawlavi who followed him. true American ally, I loved the United States, but at the same time was immensely harsh towards his people. He instituted a secret police called SAVAK, who is still to this day unknown how many Iranians that were killed or tortured or disappeared during this time. So what you have against is, to go back to beginning, a democratic government that was elected by the people overthrown by United States and Great Britain. The shot was put in his place who proceeded to spend from 1953 to 1978, torturing, killing his own citizens. now enters in the Islamic Republic of East. Khomeini. Khomeini, was a Ayatollah, was a high-ranking religious leader, went into exile in the early 60s. Because, of course, he was speaking for the Islamic, for the clergy, who did not like Pahlavi and said, hey, you need to go. And so he left and was exile in Paris for... I want to say from the mid-60s to about 78. During that time, he would send, he would constantly send sermons and speeches talking about the evils of the Shah and how we need to tell, at some point we need to rise to take over. In that process, he also was able to convince merchants, the common people, the military, everyone else to come on board. There was actually a very large communist element in a run of time. Convince them to come in and say, hey, let's band together. Let's overthrow the Shah. And let's form an Islamic republic. So the communists, the business, everyone else heard the republic peace. And so, yeah, let's go, let's do this. Khomeini was focused on Islamic peace. So once he overthrew, once the Shah fled in February of 79, and Khomeini came back home, came back to the country and came home, they proceeded to establish the Islamic Republic with a much heavier emphasis on the Islamic side. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Mm-hmm. Yes. Alex: The communists were thrown out, the businessmen were repressed. A lot of the things that we in the West don't like about Iran today came into being. But all this started because, again, in the 50s, when Iran tried to create their own government, own people to stand for, we decided, the West decided, yeah, we don't want you to do that. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Mm-hmm. Alex: That's the foundation to everything else follows. Because once you understand that that was where the hostility comes in, now it makes sense. Again, I'm not saying what the Rundans have done since then is right or wrong. But what I am saying is you have to understand why. If that makes sense to you. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Right. ⁓ it absolutely does. And I recently was doing some background research on the creation of the Taliban, which is not necessarily Iran, but it is ⁓ right across the way over a little bit north up in Pakistan, Afghanistan. And the thing that, again, it's a very similar story of ⁓ guerrilla, a lot of farm peasant Islamic guerrilla fighters that became part of a larger use by the United States and other Islamic strategic allies to take on the Soviets. And that whole reason, I don't wanna, I was chopping out the bit to say that because I didn't wanna further confuse people, because so many folks just can see the whole region in like one monolithic and they're different, but they all have very similar creation stories from that era, really. Alex: Yes, it's It's true. Leigh/@followtheleighder: And so there is that transition of Soviet Balkanization and or just all of the that 70s and how that played out. And ⁓ it's it's it's they're not the same. It's not a monolith. That is the hardest part is is ⁓ and even the whole network of Islamic fighters don't all believe the same theology. So it's not you can't chase down one Alex: No, don't. No. Leigh/@followtheleighder: quote unquote denomination and be like, if we just get them, they have this one, and it's just not, and like you said, the hostility is not just coming from this place of, don't like Christianity and the United States for no reason. Right. Alex: No. what you find interesting is that Shia Islam, which is the primary religion in Iraq, how if you actually look at their tenets and how they look at Islam in general, they have a lot more in common with Christianity than Sunni Islam does. And it is not hard to see in a different timeline. in events that happened differently, Iran would be a very, very close ally to the United States. But part of that required, at the time, respecting their beliefs, respecting their traditions, respecting what they wanted, ⁓ you mentioned earlier, Leigh, about talking about Hezbollah. So let's talk about Hezbollah for a minute. Let's switch over there. ⁓ ⁓ the army of God, was formed in Lebanon in 1982. ⁓ Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yes, please. Yeah. Alex: Their cause of creation was when Israel invaded the city of Lomedot. And Israel's intent was because they were dealing with the policy and liberation organization who had fled a of their militia, lot of their groups, used southern Lebanon as a sanctuary. So Israel decided, you know, we're in a sanctuary, so they crossed over the invasions of Lebanon. And they actually were in southern Lebanon for, what, 15, 16 years? And as we've learned, as we learned firsthand in Iraq and Afghanistan, people don't like being occupied. People don't like it when foreign countries have armed soldiers walking the streets on a regular basis and controlling whether they do what they say. Iran saw that as an opportunity and they formed, and because the Shia in Lebanon is roughly a third, maybe 40 % of population, they proceeded to send advisors over and they formed what's called Hezbollah, Hez-a-la, or the army of God. And Hezbollah proceeded to conduct a long-term insurgency against the Akhbanis' relatives until they found Allah. They still in place today. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Got it. Alex: But what made Hezbollah so, made them different, and actually what my thesis at RIMPS actually talked about this, is how instead of just focusing on weapons and killing people, they also said, you know what, if we want to be a true power here, we've got to show that we can actually govern. And so what you'll see, what you see at Hezbollah, they built schools and hospitals. and did social services and took care of the supporters throughout Beirut and Southern Lebanon. And by doing that over time, what it did, it built up a level of political loyalty from the people that now makes them close to impossible to get rid of. Because now it's not only a case of where you just fighters going off shooting, killing people. No, you're also seeing guys that when Israelis bought my house, you're the ones that came in with repair guys and lumber and rebar and concrete, and you helped build my house. When the streets were all torn up, you're the same guys that came here with steam rollers and asphalt and repaired the streets. When the power was out, you're the same guys that brought in engineers to help rebuild transformers, help power back, to help run power through cities. So you're not just shooters, you're governing. And meanwhile, and this became obvious, I'm gonna skip for a little bit. In the 06 war, this is where I really pay attention to this because that short, I think it was six week war, afterwards, the opportunity, there were folks saying, why aren't the Lebanese coming to us? Why aren't the Lebanese letting, how long do they want us to come support you? Well. While we were taking weeks or months to decide whether or we want to send money places, Hezbollah was writing checks. Hezbollah was building houses. Hezbollah was restoring streets. Hezbollah was reopening schools. And so all that support that we would do came from Iran because Iran always continued to funnel money to them and support So that was Hezbollah piece. And that what makes it into this day, even after some highly effective strikes by Israel the past few years against Hezbollah leadership, up to including killing Nasrallah, their former leader, their top local leader. They are still very difficult to get rid of because they built this level of support within the country. And as ⁓ both as an armed unit and as a local unit, they are far more effective than the central Lebanese government. So when we come back and say, why don't you just go support the Lebanese government? The response is, they can actually build things. They actually take care of us. They actually fight for us. Meanwhile, the central government does nothing. So what would you do in that situation? Leigh/@followtheleighder: And that's not unusual. Like we've heard that with South American cartels in certain governments. ⁓ I saw that not with cartels. So I spent two months in Pakistan or last summer working alongside women's rights and girls education type services. that was one of the things, thank you, that was one of the things I... ⁓ Alex: Awesome. Leigh/@followtheleighder: noticed was that's a how I learned that Islam is not monolithic. It is a mass. is a the whole region also just like you said is so old. They've been doing this for so long. The history it's it's ⁓ the knowledge the wisdom there. I was just like That is not how it is marketed in the United States to Americans outside of the world. I got there and I was like, ⁓ my gosh, this is so rich. Like this is in terms of resources and history. mean, and I can imagine like you spent, don't have to tell you, you spent your whole career doing this. You're like, yes, you are preaching to the choir. Thank you. But ⁓ I did, that was the complication. that folks in Islamabad or wherever I was were talking about with the Taliban is like, no, they don't agree with it theologically. They don't like how violent it can be. But there's also this whole level of they are the government in those places. And now it's officially the government in Afghanistan. But as it was growing, ⁓ it was who took care of the people. And that's not a perspective that I think a lot of Americans know about these very ⁓ Alex: the Leigh/@followtheleighder: know, oppositional groups in our media that is like, how did these, they purely evil? Like, where's the motivation? It's like, no, here's actually, they're human beings. Here's their culture. Here's the context. And it's, it's so powerful. Can you talk about, ⁓ you have your counterterrorism and counterinsurgency background from NPS. How does that lens change the way that you read what's happening in the Middle East right now? speaking of headlines versus how it's being framed. What things are you studying that you're like, the message is interesting on this. Alex: Well, there's so many things that can go wrong with that. I'll go with that first comment you made when you were in Pakistan. You talked about how Taliban control specific areas and how they're deeply embedded both in the Pakistani side of the border and on the Afghan side with the Pashtun. How they have this level of legitimacy and support. Well, because they're fighting. They're part of the culture. ⁓ When you're in kind of insurgency theory, there's this concept called ungoverned spaces. As an insurgent group, what you want to be able to do is you want to break control of a space from central government. And it's often known, and when you talk control, I'll just use, but this is very bluntly here. Control is basically monopoly on ballots. in the most basic concept, the ability of a governing force to impose violence in an area. So what an insurgent group wants to do is they want to break that monopoly of violence from the central government. What does that do? It now tells the people that live in this area, okay, ⁓ The government won't necessarily, can't necessarily come after me, but who can? Well, the insurgent group wants to be able to say, now control this space. We now have a monopoly of violence in this area. Now there's two ways I can go. Let's talk bad way. A bad way can go, you can look at the Islamic State, which were in Iraq back during the early 2010s, which came from al-Qaeda in Iraq. That's a bad example of monopoly of violence because all they did was say, you know, we're in charge, we control and if you don't like it, we're gonna kill you. And they did. That works for a while, but eventually people can get too upset, too angry and say, you know what, I'm gonna risk it to take you out. I'm not gonna sit here and let you kill my family, rape my daughters and take all my money and just say nothing. At some point I'm gonna rise up and I'm gonna come after you. A positive way of looking at monopoly of violence is, We'll get them to look at the Taliban and we're okay. We own this space. The central Afghan government cannot do what they want to here, but we can. So we'll establish courts. We'll establish schools. We'll make sure that things are happening. We'll make sure that the economy is running. We'll make sure all these things take place. Now you on the outside might not like it. You might think it's horrible, case in point, the Taliban permanently used Papi and opium to make money during the war. Not good. A large amount of the Afghans that are currently addicted to opium is primarily tied to those years in which the Taliban are growing popular. But by doing that, they're able to provide money and resources and people are able to make a living. And it was reliable and it was stable. The Afghan government had a very hard time with that because the Afghan response, supported by us, no, we're going to do popular eradication because drugs are bad. You're right, drugs are horrible. So what are you going to place it with? Well, you know, you can grow saffron or you can grow wheat. What was it? 2006 when I was in Afghanistan, think the hectare of poppy would get you about 15 to $20,000. A hectare of saffron would get you 150. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Whoa. Alex: make that make sense. Now saffron is great, it's a great spice, it's wonderful, but make that make sense. You can't. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah. Right, right, right. Right. No. Alex: So that's the monopoly of violence. Why in that ungoverned space? Why am I, why did I talk about that? Because that's the key part of insurgency doctrine, counterinsurgency doctrine, or how you want to fight other places, fight others. If you take that insurgency, counterinsurgency concept, or you take the ungoverned space concept and apply it to what's going on Iran, now. Where is the ungoverned space where an insurgent group can rise up and actually fight against the central government? Here's the hint, it doesn't exist. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Right. Alex: Why? Because one, the control that central government has had across the country overall has been so heavy that there's been no air to breathe or space to create a non-government space. Now that we know anyone else, have provided support or training or any type of help to help build an insurgent force large enough or capable enough to create a non-government space. And so now, there's no place where the central government's monopoly of violence is broken, it is going to be incredibly difficult to build up a massive people of support necessary to try to overtake them, overthrow it. Because if it pops up, you're seeing tons of protests, you're seeing these protests, you're seeing these marches, these are all good, wonderful things. But there's not the financial support, the military support, the arms, weapons, money necessary to actually turn that march into something that can actually counter the government. Because as you also saw before this latest war, the Islamic Republic has no qualms about killing its own citizens the same way. That's monopoly and violence. And until you break that, until you create a space where that no longer exists, Leigh/@followtheleighder: All Alex: I hate to say we're wasting our time. But if what we want is the quote unquote, if the policy objective is regime change, it's not going to happen. Ever. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Right, yeah. So is that kind of as you've done, navigated, well, actually I wanna pause on that, cause you talk about not having any external resources or having the support to protest back. Alex: Mm. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Pushback, when I was in South Africa and then when I was in Pakistan, I saw the friendship and relationship between China and these countries in so far as building clinics, building schools, building these things. You're a Colonel with your nodding. So you're saying, okay, so I'm onto something. You know where I'm going with this. What can you talk about? We're seeing that in the very, that civic humanitarian China can go in in six months. Alex: Mmm. Mm-hmm. You answered it. Yes. Leigh/@followtheleighder: change a rural community overnight sewage internet buildings etc. ⁓ What does that look like in the strategic war space? Should we be concerned? Are these allies ships of armies that they're building also as they're doing this or what is it purely financial? What's going on with China and the way they operate? Alex: Mm-hmm. Yes. from all indications at this particular point in time as of today's what, April 30th, 2026. There are no indications at this time that China is working to establish military presence outside of the Western Pacific. What they have been doing now for almost 30 years, really been picking up since roughly 2005, 2006, is using money to gain influence. We're united and for the record, who was their example, who did they get it from? They got it from us. President Kennedy established USAID in the 60s with the express purpose of being able to use humanitarian assistance, money, aid to gain access and influence in foreign countries. So, as a two part one, yeah, we're providing this food, we're providing this aid, we're helping to rebuild these schools, we're helping to do these things. Does that benefit you, the country, the host nation? Yes. Does it benefit us? Yes. We now have access to you. We now have ability to reach out to you. We now have ability if we need things from you, we need assistance from you, work with you on any number of problems, issues, challenges. We now are can because guess what? We now have a relationship, a positive relationship. China saw that and when they finally got to the point where they could do it, say, hey, we can do that too. The difference being is that over the decades, it became hard and hard for us to give aid, lot more obstacles, a lot more problems, a lot more hoops we had to jump through. And the Chinese are like, no, we don't need that, we can just do it. And so it's not just in Pakistan or Iran or in India, it's all over Africa. It's all over South America. of where they were able to, all of Central South America, where they were able to come in and provide economic aid, infrastructure aid, anything that the host nation needed. And all they say in exchange, hey, you know what? At some point, you know what? We might want to buy something here. We might want to establish a presence here. Can we do that? Well, sure, absolutely. You're our friend. You can come on. Please, come. And so that's why if you look at the world map, you'll see across Africa, across South America, across areas of Asia, where China's influence has grown insignificant because they've taken the time. to give money, give resources, give assets, so they can actually be there. And what have we done? We've been absent. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Absent or one of kind of like what you were saying the giving obstacles and whatever that looks like one of the things that they named when I was over in Pakistan was feeling that the US money was going to the corrupt leaders and stayed at the top and the people didn't see the effects of it But when China came in did these real world you could see the tangible outcomes that Pakistan people then felt Alex: Mm-hmm. Yes. Leigh/@followtheleighder: loyalty to China like they were like why saw what China did like it's it's on the ground it's not even at a political level it is boots on the ground where Here I am coming as an American China has always been demonized forever grow it you know coming over and they're like ⁓ China Pakistan friendship museum come on like and I was like what and ⁓ They're like no we love China like we go to China like in the Himalayas are right there. You know, it's just like I was like Alex: Mm-hmm. Leigh/@followtheleighder: how is this happening? And here you are explaining it, this is what they do. And to your point, it's slow, it's patient, it's long ball. It doesn't feel as aggressive or domineering or as imperial as what is coming out of Washington DC right now. And I know we're not gonna go down policy, but there are styles of negotiation in things. There are ways of doing things, there's cultural things. ⁓ And it just, sometimes you look at things, you're like, that is straight out of a New York City, you know, boardroom. That is not a cultural diplomatic meeting at all. Like where, and ⁓ I'm sure that whichever administration, you just see that and you're like, throughout the years and that's. Alex: Yes. Something you bring out there, Leigh, and it's also true, is that the ability to be patient, the stubborn goal is to be patient. ⁓ One of the challenges, one of the problems we've had for a while now is that... We as a country, and this is about as far as the policy I want to talk about on this, we can go into a little bit more, this is about this, comfortable saying this, is that throughout the Cold War years, we had a focus. And because we had to focus, it was easy to establish long-term strategic goals and objectives to work towards. We haven't had that in a while now. And the problem of it now is that because we as a country are not getting our strategic focus, it's hard to do long-term planning. It's hard to do long-term assistance, long-term aid. Because if we were a, if we did have that in mind, we would not do things that would undermine our ability to establish long-term partnerships over And we have done that. even that more specific, and I'm talking about USAID in this case, even when I talk about AID, even before that, the direction, purpose, what was matter of what was important to the United States would swing wildly based on whoever, whatever political party was in charge. That's hard. Again, in during the Cold War years, yeah, parties were different. They had different goals and objectives, but you know, there's still a central goal. We need to defeat the communism. We need communism. So because we have to do that, that's the focus. How we do it might change based on who's in charge, but everyone's still walking the same direction. Now, it hurts me to say this. We might be walking this way today. In four years, we might be walking that way. And then four years later, we might be walking this way again. I'll as a partner see that. It doesn't make us look strong, makes us look unreliable. But the Chinese say, hey, you know what, bro, we're with you. How long it gonna take? Well, 10 years, I got you. What you need? You railroads, you need roads, you need railroads, you need schools, you need a harbor, got you. All this is gonna take six years, no worries, I'm with you. don't have that anymore. That hurts. Leigh/@followtheleighder: You know what? It does, it hurts us and it's spooky. You say that one of my coworkers that I worked alongside with in Islamabad, her husband, so it was, you did the office stuff in Islamabad and then you went out into the rural communities. But when I was in Islamabad, everybody I worked with had a college degree and a lot of them were women, all of them were Muslim of some sect. Alex: Mm-hmm. Leigh/@followtheleighder: For folks who aren't too familiar, English, particularly in Pakistan, that's one of their official languages. That's a holdover from the British history. So their courts, their education, predominantly in English. So I had no problem communicating over there. I went out to dinner with one of my coworkers and her husband who worked in consulting. And that was what he was talking about. He did some political consulting work. And that was a story he told me was. it's his words, was that China approached Pakistan and a couple of these other countries and used exactly that story you're talking about is one day, American politicians, their leadership is going to change and they're going to pull that USAID money and then what happens? And that was like a tactic that China used in negotiation rooms and then look what happened. That's exactly what happened. ⁓ I didn't... Alex: Good. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Because everyone's studying each other's geopolitical strategies. it's like China didn't have to even guess on that one. That was a very obvious thing that, like you said, was coming up as a pattern since the Cold War. This kind of different directions and we simply don't have it. there like, you said Cold War and you said recently, is this going back into the 80s? When do you see kind of a stark foreign policy shift? Alex: on 9-11. Leigh/@followtheleighder: 9-11, yeah. Alex: without question. And looking back, there was a season of where we could have done so much. when we had so many, we had so many people on our side. I was in Germany when that love happened. And the love and support the Germans gave us and were expressed to us afterwards was just, it was touching. And it was sincere. as you know, if you know your history, NATO has only invoked Article 5 once. Article 5 says an attack on one is an attack on all. They've only invoked it once in its entire history. After 9-11, for us. And we proceeded to take that goodwill and honestly throw it away. And that has been, and since that time, it has been this constant back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. folks, again, other countries see it. Other countries see it. They look at it, they're like, wait a minute, what? And it does not, and are we still a very, are we a very strong country still? Absolutely. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah. Alex: There's no one on this planet who thinks, oh yeah, I'm gonna fight in the United States so can beat you guys head to head. Said no one ever. But power comes more than just from military arms. And we have our inability to use that power correctly or properly use our influence correctly as open doors for others to walk in. And China's the one that's walked in. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Mm-hmm. Alex: and the challenge now is going to be they've walked in, they've established a space, they've established where they are. What is going take to push them out of it? What will convince your friends in Pakistan, convince them that, yeah, we should abandon what the Chinese are doing and we should just go with the Americans? What will convince them to do that? What have we done to make them think, oh yeah, I'd rather be with the Americans than the Chinese because why? Leigh/@followtheleighder: And how, yeah. Alex: It hurts my heart to say that. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Well, and it's, especially when you have stuff coming out, know, certain rhetoric coming out about cultural or religious things about those regions of the world that you're like, Whoa, you are furthering all of this. ⁓ You know, there is a reason why we didn't use religious rhetoric for war, for conflict. Alex: Mm-hmm. Leigh/@followtheleighder: coming out really since the Treaty of Westphalia. I feel like I'm telling people what you should be telling people, but like there's, and it's because religious rhetoric can catch like wildfires so quickly and it can just turn in a different way and it can have so many different outcomes that you can't control. Cause you are, you're now speaking to deep core human things and that aren't just gonna be handled in the boardroom. They're not negotiatable. Alex: Mm-hmm. Yes. Leigh/@followtheleighder: terms and it's a lot. Alex: There's a reason why the First Amendment set freedom of speech. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah. Alex: freedom of religion and it's not necessarily, and it's because the founders knew European history. They knew about the 30 years war. They knew about the English revolution. They knew about all these different wars that took place across Europe where millions of people died over the cause of religion. They understood and saw when if, the persecution that took place when there's a state religion. And if you don't follow that state religion, then you're going to be a second class citizen or worse. The founders understood that. And so that's why, again, freedom of religion is the very first amendment because the goal is that we are now going to establish a state religion. Whatever you believe, whatever it is, fine. Worshippers you see fit. But what we're not gonna do is we're not gonna say this is the state religion of the United States, and therefore you must believe like this or else. It's called the Church of England. That's, you see that in other places. We decided we're not going to do that. And so, know I told you that's the subject I necessarily want to talk about, but it burns. It burns me when I see it because it's just, it's a lack of knowledge or lack of understanding. Leigh/@followtheleighder: you Yes, it is. Alex: And it's not, it's not. Leigh/@followtheleighder: and it's. Alex: secret is not unreadable. Just take them in to look and read and understand what it means and understand why it matters. But, sorry, this... Leigh/@followtheleighder: No, no, It's well, because you're also speaking to you're speaking to leadership. I mean, I know that's your whole background is strategic planning and counterterrorism, but in special ops, but you're talking about what does an institutional leadership look like? What does genuine leadership look like? And ⁓ I'm curious what if you can talk to us. Alex: Mm-hmm. Leigh/@followtheleighder: What you would argue is your ideal. And then what you think is absent right now from genuine leadership. that's not, it could be American, but it could also be world. could just be like, it does feel like a lot of us are leaderless and, or just things are so chaotic and there's too many. So can you talk about what's going on and why to feel things, A, people feel a little tribalized and then What does good leadership look Alex: Okay. So. I'm dating myself. 40 years ago I was in Army, I was in Junior RRTC in high school. I'm that old. And I still remember the first lesson I got on leadership as ⁓ a first year in Junior RRTC. The definition of leadership is the ability to influence men to accomplish a mission. And through all the years of leadership schools and training I've taken over here, there's always been one that's stuck. And it's expanded and it's grown over time. So let's expand that definition a bit. Building influence and then accomplish the mission. What's the mission? The mission is based on values, norms, and standards. Values, one of those things that are most important to you, that no matter what, this is what we believe. Standards, however you do this, this is how it must be done. This is what right looks like all the time. Norms. Here's how we deal with each other, how we, this is how we act, this is how we perform, here's how we carry ourselves on day-to-day basis. You can also say mores, which are kind of like the unwritten rules and regulations and requirements how we do business. So, the building and flow of people to accomplish a mission based on values, morals, ethics, and standards. Take us up further. What are these things? What are these values and norms, ethics, standards that we all follow and Good question. There might have been a time once where we thought that's what we all believe, these things. ⁓ I don't know necessarily if that's true anymore. And if there's not a agreed upon norm standard value ethic that we want to follow. then what are we doing? Or worse, the norms, values, standards, and ethics that are being displayed or set example by our leadership goes fundamentally counter to everything we believe. In the Army there's the Army values. It goes leadership, loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity, personal courage. The Air Force has similar values, the Navy has similar values, the Marine Corps has similar values. They're all there. I'm going focus on one. And I think you understand why, honor. Why does honor matter? Honor matters because if I say something to you, You have to believe that it's true. You can't question it. You can't second guess it. And as ⁓ a combat veteran, if I'm in trouble and I'm saying, I need you to come help me because if you don't, me and my men are going to die. So I'm asking you to risk your life or to risk your safety, risk your well-being, you and your men and your troops, to come help me do this. to take out this enemy, to take out this objective, whatever. And you're doing it without question because you believe what I'm telling you is true. and come back to get a lot of ones. If I commit something to you and I find that you lied to me, that's it, you're dead to me. I'm not going to kill you on the battlefield, but you know what? You're to me. You're done. You need go home. when it comes to the chief's relationship, particularly if you want to talk about us for a minute here in United States. Where's the honor now? Can I truly believe when you speak? Can I truly accept that what you're saying is true? Can I risk my, as the founder said, a life of living in our sacred honor? Can I risk that based on what you say? The answer to that is no. Then what are we doing? How can you expect to lead? How can you expect, more importantly, how do you expect people to follow you to accomplish a mission if I can't trust you? That's a problem we have. That's a huge problem we have. And because you just said trust, now this other point comes to mind. Admiral McRaven, Bill McRaven was my, was the SOCOM commander when I took battalion command in 2013. When you go through the Army Command Sequence, one thing you do is you go visit your different places and you spend time with senior leaders to talk about all sorts of things that are very important. Me and a group of Lieutenant Colonels, Colonels, Sergeant Majors, Master Chiefs, we got to spend four hours with Admiral McRaven. He talked to us about speed of trust. And a lot of speed of trust goes back to what we just talked about here about my ability to lead, my effectiveness of leadership is based on speed of trust. If I say something, you've got to trust what I'm saying is true. You've got to believe what I'm doing is true. You've got to believe that what it is is most important and most valuable. That I care about you, care about your mission, I care about what takes place. There can't be doubt. There can't be, I don't know, maybe double check. I don't know. Maybe, let me talk to someone else first that can't exist. It has to be unquestionable. Units that have a high level of trust, organizations that have a high level of trust are highly effective. They get things done. Units, organizations that have a low level of trust, don't. Because I can't accept your word. I have to check and double check and triple check and quadruple check to make sure that what you're saying is actually right. That's time. We're missing that. The speed of trust necessary for us and ⁓ to lead at strategic level to be highly effective isn't there. And it's not there because we've squandered it. And it hurts. It is the out of the many things that I've dealt with since retirement in 2020. That's probably been one of the most painful things to see. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah. And it's because it's it's your life's work, too. It's like these are core principles. I had the I am just so that is an incredible opportunity to get real leadership time from Admiral McRaven. He served as the my University of Texas at Austin. He was our chancellor and I got to have coffee with him on graduation morning and I was just like. Wow, download into my brain what I need to, and of course he's done the graduation speeches, he's done the books, he's done what he's gonna do, but ⁓ when you... Alex: And it's amazing. it's and it's the, and you can't fake that. That's not something you can put on as a front or you can try to say, you have to live that and you see it and you understand it. when you, the term we often use, tell me I have more graven is that men will follow him to gates of hell because he knows that no matter what happens, he's gonna take care of him look out for him. end. Leigh/@followtheleighder: And I want to talk about that part that that taking care of that trust in the unit because just like you were saying people will go far when they feel apart and a part of the unit is when I mean not apart separate, but you talked about norms shared norms values You talked about the speed of trust. I know that we've we're not we know that we kind of mentioned How religious rhetoric impacts things but what is leadership? Alex: Mm-hmm. Leigh/@followtheleighder: In the United States military, we have a Chaplain Corps. What does the Chaplain Corps and where do they serve a role in terms of supporting the command or supporting the unit? What is that supposed to look like? What have you seen? What are some concerns there? Alex: Haram. As a tank commander, had him on chaplain. He was one of my most valued members of myself. and for a couple reasons. Excuse me. I gave him guidance from the beginning that his religious background belief was different than mine, different than many folks in my battalion. But I told him, this battalion of 605 soldiers is your flock. I want you to look out for them, take care of them, listen to them. ⁓ A good chaplain will be someone that soldiers just come and talk to about everything. I trust you to when things, when you, I like to think that I'm deeply involved in my unit. I know everything's going on, but reality is I didn't, couldn't. It's too many people, too many, too much, too much happening. I had folks scattered in multiple countries throughout my entire community. So I can't know it all. But when you see and hear things, I trust you to come tell me so I can know and I can understand and I can help fix and resolve problems. And he did. He was able to, ⁓ during the command, he came forward and said, hey, sir, I think we need to start establishing regular ⁓ family retreats. Why? ⁓ Guys would come back from these deployments, six, eight, nine month deployments. They're smoked, they're burned out, they're tired. Some of the stress is really coming out. And you know, just taking the abilities to take the soldiers out, take them for, take them and the families like for a weekend, a long weekend, just breathe, relax. Like we should, we did one in Morro Beach, we did one in Hilton Head, we did one out in Wilmington on the coast, Carolina Beach. And he would just, he would get the resources and he would take a bunch of soldiers and their families and he would spend. a long weekend. Actually, I did. My last retreat before I left was Command. I actually went. And it was just case of where, know, there was the, yeah, to meet the requirements, you had to have like a couple lectures and classes, and you did that. But a lot of it was just, know what? There's a real nice place. There's beautiful water. There's pools. There's horseback riding. There's things for your kids. There's a chance, you know, we'll have events so that, you know what, we'll take the kids, we'll go out, we'll do stuff so you and the spouse can have like hours to yourselves, just relax, breathe. And it was a wonderful thing. But it came from his ability to talk to the soldiers, listen to them, understand what's going on and share that with command, share that with leadership. That is where, and we talk about chapel corps, that's where they're most valuable. And the other thing about them as well is they're, and this particular chaplain who was great, he did regular battlefield rotations, had soldiers in Afghanistan through my entire two years of command. I rotated a company of roughly 200 soldiers every six to months. He would go twice during a rotation, spend 10 days with soldiers. Not back in the main headquarters on the air base, He'd actually get up and he'd go out and he'd walk patrol with the teams. Why? Because I need to hear what you're saying. He'd spend time in the team houses with them and sit there and talk to them and listen to them. And many times, because he was such a good guy, he just sit back, he wouldn't even talk, just sat there and listened. He'd just sit back in the corner and listen to guys talk. See what's going on with them. See what they're thinking. And he'd come back and say, hey. He'd come back and say, sir, hey, just spend some time with the guys. I'm seeing these things. Leigh/@followtheleighder: All right. Alex: So that's long answer. But the goal of a chaplain in the military aspect is that ability to connect with the soldiers, listen to the soldiers. And regardless of your religious beliefs, because not just besides having religious, I had a friend number of soldiers who did not have any belief. The goal is that what you believe, what you believe doesn't matter. What matters is you're part of my organization, you're part of this flock. As long as you're part of this flock, my job is to make sure you're taken care of, make sure you're looked out for, make sure your needs are met, make sure that I can do whatever I can to help you be the best soldier you can be. That's how the, for, think for, Chamelec for us, that was good. And one thing about the bad. And you heard me the whole time when I'm talking about my chaplain, that I never mentioned it. You notice I never mentioned what his belief was. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Right. I have no idea. It doesn't. Alex: And guess what? It shouldn't matter. It doesn't matter. If a chaplain is standing in front of soldiers outside of their pastoral setting, like if they actually have a regular preaching role in an actual chapel. Outside of that, when you're with the unit, cares? Doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter. Because I remember there were times where I had that apiocyn, that agnostics, that wiccans, they would talk to my child. Hey, you got a minute. Yo, what's up? Hey, I got to you a question about something. And he talked to them. Leigh/@followtheleighder: All Alex: And it didn't matter that their belief structures were fundamentally different. but you're my flock. I'm gonna take care of you. I'm gonna help do my best for you. if and when, and if when a chaplain decides to go outside of that path, when they decide to say that, you know, ⁓ what I believe is what matters. And if you don't believe this, you're going to hell. Or if you don't believe this, then I cannot take care of you because you don't, you're gonna align with my belief. Then you're a preacher and That's okay, nothing wrong with that. But please take the uniform off and go to the church or the place you choose to worship and proceed to preach and evangelize and to proselytize there. Feel free. But if you're in the uniform, don't do that. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Thank you for that. I know we are pushing up right at that time. have one more question that kind of doubles as sort of your ending notes. ⁓ you have, obviously, thank you for giving your entire career to the military service. You are now doing contract work. You're on the other side. There's some distance now between you and the institution. Does that give you more clarity or more anxiety? And what? Alex: Mm-hmm. Leigh/@followtheleighder: between these two perspectives, what do you have to say to the listener as they look ahead? Alex: Well, think it does give me some perspective separating the more years I spent out of uniform, the... On one hand, I can see the mistakes I've made. And at the same time, I can see where people are coming up and things they're doing. So part of my job is to help teach coach-mentor. Because I can see when a staff officer is, hey, I'm working on one, two, or three. And I'm able to say, think about this. Hmm, OK, that looks good. Have you considered this? Give me a perspective. given the perspective it's ⁓ And by doing that, what you're able to do is help them to... Learn, grow, understand. Because I think as a retiree, what I want to do is I want the service to be better. I want the folks that come out to grow and learn and do better. And if there's things I can do to help or assist that's helpful, I want to do that. And I've been able to. So I'm fortunate where I work now, I'm able to really help in mentoring and coaching. It's received well. That's a good thing. And it's not a, ⁓ like I said, I you said from the beginning, called me a colonel. I never use my rank at work. And most people don't even realize it because you know the long hair, the goatee. ⁓ Most folks don't look at it I'm blessed because my wife takes care of me. I don't look like I'm in my mid-50s. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah. Alex: And so it doesn't look like I did 25 plus years of service. So I'm able to help and assist and advise and it's, I'm able to give back, if that makes sense. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Absolutely. Well, as folks look ahead at whatever this direction all of this could go, ⁓ what are some things that you could encourage them to help keep in mind as they look at the news and conceive? What are just some just general things that we should know as we watch the news over the next few months? Alex: Okay. Remember what's important. what is important to. yourself, to your family, to your community. The problem with today's, particularly with the news, the purpose seems to create conflict all the time. and to make you feel alone, isolated, and afraid. The way you get around that is remembering what matters. ⁓ Family matters. Your friendships matter. Your relationships matter. Your community matters. Keeping that person foremost. And then once you've done that... Remember, what are the actions I can do that can help my family, help my community, help close? And that matters because of the last thing. There are certain things that are really out of our control. Regardless of what you feel about this administration or any administration, likelihood of you telling, of you yelling and screaming, you better do this or else, it could work, maybe. It might have an influence, maybe. But you know what will have an influence? How you help your community. I hope those are closest to you. How you make sure they're taken care of, how you make sure they're reaching their goals. That, you can absolutely have an impact there. And by doing that... by helping your own, helping your local, what's grow, Life doesn't look so bad. So if there was any recommendation, that's what I would say. Just keep that focus on the things, the people you can touch, the people you can see, the people you can hold, the people you can actually impact. Because the crazy on the screen is always gonna be there. Leigh/@followtheleighder: No, that was. Alex: You can scream and holler at that if you want to, or you can just focus almost close. I personally think that's more rewarding. Leigh/@followtheleighder: That was, thank you for that advice. Thank you so much for that insight, guys. Listeners, I know that we flew through that. I I looked up and I was like, ⁓ my gosh, we have flew through this call. But I really hope that you'll come back. We can do a deeper dive on any, literally, we covered so much ground today. I'm kind of looking back and thinking, we did, we went to China at one point, we were in Pakistan, we were in Lebanon, we were, and we just, that was a really great conversation. And I have so much respect. Thank you for your service and thank you for your mentorship outside of the service now in the position that you're in. Can you tell listeners, because you just, I'm sure you educated and informed them quite a bit, where can they find you if they want to learn more? Alex: Alex V. Simm is my call sign on threats. That's where I am for now. I've thought about starting a subsec at one point and I probably will. I've got a son that is a freshman in college right now. So we're trying to get him moving, getting him in. I've got a daughter who's graduating. I've got a son who's finishing up his freshman year. Getting him running, getting him going is the motivation for my wife and I. So once he's actually, he's fully flying, he's branching, think that's something I think I'd like to do. So yeah, I like to be similar threats is where you can find me. And if you go there, I talk about all sorts of things. And my motto is. Leigh/@followtheleighder: ⁓ yeah. Alex: Respectful disagreement. We don't have to agree on things. Let's just be respectful. Let's be respectful when we talk about it. And I'll work to do that with everyone I interact with. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah. Well, when that comes, respectful disagreement also comes from years of looking at different strategies to move forward and respectfully disagreeing about which way to go. You know, it comes from like, we are all on the same team, guys. We're just looking to figure out which way to go. Alex: Yes. Leigh/@followtheleighder: So just thank you so much. didn't even get, I had two other questions I didn't even get to. I mean, there is so much we can talk about and please do like when you do find that time in your life where the season has calmed down and you have a little bit more time and breathing room, ⁓ your wisdom and knowledge is just so unique. I don't want to call it rare, like, then, but it's valuable. We need more voices like you on these mediums, just. sharing facts, sharing insights. They're like, ⁓ I didn't even know that perspective. I didn't even know that knowledge. So yeah, absolutely. It ⁓ was an excellent conversation, sir. Thank you. Alex: It was an honor. Thank you so much. I'll love to talk to you again sometime. You tell me when you're available. I would love to come back on and hopefully I can, maybe I can be a little more focused. We can focus a little bit. We can focus on some more stuff. Leigh/@followtheleighder: No, you did great. No, no, no, you did. You crushed it. Absolutely. Well, folks, I want to hear what your thoughts are about this talk. Let me know in the comments. Don't forget to like, follow, subscribe. You know the drill. We've done this a few times before. But folks, don't forget to, like I said, Alex V. Sim on threads for now, be on the lookout for as he expands or what that looks like. My name is Leigh Larson. I'm your host. This has been another week of Follow the Leighder. Until next time, see ya. Alex: Bye.