Latest / The Dutch Investors / #44 | The soldiers who didn't shoot | A story of war, humanity, and the cost of pessimism

Transcript

#44 | The soldiers who didn't shoot | A story of war, humanity, and the cost of pessimism · The Dutch Investors

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to a brand new episode by the Dutch investors.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host Siem and today I want to tell you a story about one of the books I recently read in the library.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's called Most People Are Good from Rutge Brechmann.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: And although it's a non-investing book, I think it has many useful lessons we can learn from as investors.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: So let's jump right into the episode.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: I go there every now and then just to find and read some new books and find some new material.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: Walking through those quiet aisles where the smell of old paper and wood somehow slows down time.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: I can just sit back, grab a coffee, and read.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: And there it was, a book, one of my favorite non-investing books, sitting on the shelf like an old friend waiting to be rediscovered.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: The book is called Most People Are Good by Rutge Brechmann, a Dutch author.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: I've read this book before, but um I was intrigued to read it again.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: This isn't a book about businesses or stocks or even the economy, it's about human nature.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: And if you ask me, it's just as important for investors, maybe even more so.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's perhaps the only edge we still have as individual investors.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: Because what we believe about people shapes how we think about the future, and how we think about the future shapes every single investment decision we ever make.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: So let me tell you this story.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: A story I come back to often, especially in tough markets, or when the world just feels a little too dark.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's called The Soldiers Who Didn't Fire.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: Let's rewind the clock to the night of November 22nd, 1943.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: We're in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: American troops are preparing to land on Macon Island to fight the Japanese.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's brutal.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: The air is thick with fear, adrenaline, and deafening roar of battle.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: After the fight, a man named Colonel Samuel Marshall does something unusual.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: He gathers soldiers into groups.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: Not for discipline, not for storytelling, not for awards, but for a conversation.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: Every single person, from the highest ranking officer to the greenest private, is allowed to speak freely.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: And what he discovers is astonishing.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: Only 15 to 25% of the soldiers had actually fired their weapons.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: Let that sink in.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: In the heat of battle, during World War II, with lives on the line, three-quarters of the soldiers chose to not pull the trigger.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: After the war, Marshall writes a book.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's called Men Against Fire, published in 1947, and it still required reading in many military academies today.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Marshall says, and I quote, the average and healthy individual has such an inner and usually unconscious resistance to killing a fellow human being that he will not take another life of his own free will.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Now sure, you could argue this is a one-time thing, but it wasn't.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: Rutge Brechmann, the author of Most People Are Good, dug deeper and found more examples.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: One of the most striking is the Battle of Gettysburg in 1863.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: After the dust settled, they recovered nearly 28,000 muskets.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: And here's the crazy part.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: 90% of those muskets were still loaded.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: Which is weird, because back then loading your weapon was slow and manual.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: It took time and effort.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: So you'd think empty muskets would outnumber the loaded ones.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: But it gets even more bizarre.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: Over 12,000 muskets were double loaded.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Some had three bullets packed in, and there was one musket that had 23 bullets loaded.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Turns out most soldiers kept reloading just to avoid firing the gun.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: Loading was their excuse, their way out, maybe their silent rebellion against the horror of war.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: So what does this have to do with investing?
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, quite a lot.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: Look, the world today feels cruel.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: Injustice.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not new.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: Human history is filled with bloodshed and betrayal.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: So it's easy, tempting even to think that people are inherently bad.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: And here's the dangerous part for you as an investor.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: That kind of thinking leads to pessimism.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: And pessimism is a trap.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: It convinces you to stay out of the market.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: It tells you, this time it's different.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: It says, things are just going to keep getting worse from here.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: But that mindset is going to cost you, not just emotionally, but also financially, because the one long-term investing requires, demands even, is optimism.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: The belief that a hundred years from now, the world will be economically better off than it is today.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: And that belief isn't naive, it's rooted in history.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: Our track record through wars, recessions, pandemics, and everything in between has been one of rebuilding, innovating, adapting, and growing.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: So yes, care about the world, be aware.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: But please, for your own future, do not give in to pessimism.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever I feel down or overwhelmed, I return to this story of the soldiers.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because if most people, even in the middle of war, instinctively don't want to hurt others, maybe we're not so broken after all.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: And that gives me hope.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: Hope in humanity?
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, but also in markets.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: Because markets are basically people.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: Businesses are people.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: Growth, innovation, resilience, they're all human behavior.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: But there's another lesson hidden within those stories.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: Think about those soldiers spending 95% of their time loading their weapons, only 5% actually firing the gun.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: And as an investor, you want to be that soldier.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: Spend 95% of your time researching, studying businesses, reading, listening, learning, and only 5% making the actual move, which is buying, selling, reallocating your capital.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: The beauty is, unlike those soldiers, your accuracy actually improves the more you wait.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: Time is your ally, not your enemy.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're feeling pressure to do something every time the market dips or the news screams red, take a breath, step back, don't shoot and think of the stories I just told you.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's the lesson for today.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it applies just as much to light as it does to investing.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: If you have the option to not shoot, do not shoot.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: Let patience be your strategy and let optimism be your edge.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: Because investing is emotional, it's psychological, it's human, and if you can better understand humans, you're already way ahead of the game.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, stay curious, keep learning, and happy investing.