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How the National Security Council Works · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff Works
0:04
Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark.
0:13
Speaker 1: There's Charles W. Cloak and Dagger Dabby Coleman Bryant. You
0:20
Speaker 1: remember that movie, Yeah, man, that was so good. It
0:23
Speaker 1: was that was a good movie for boys our age.
0:25
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, it was so good. It managed to
0:27
Speaker 1: make the San Antonio Riverwalk look interesting. You've been bagging
0:32
Speaker 1: on that since you walked it. Well, I had. I
0:36
Speaker 1: think it was built up in my mind by that movie,
0:39
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I don't remember that being
0:41
Speaker 1: in the movie, but I haven't. I don't think I've
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Speaker 1: seen that since I was there's a big chase scene
0:45
Speaker 1: that involved the river walk. Well maybe that was a problem.
0:49
Speaker 1: And also, um, there's Jerry Leslie Nielsen Rowland from Spy Heart. Uh.
0:57
Speaker 1: And this is stuff you should know. Yes, this is
1:02
Speaker 1: a This could be a good one. You could also
1:05
Speaker 1: be extraordinarily confusing. Uh huh. Maybe a little dry maybe,
1:11
Speaker 1: um and uh but brother, if you love bureaucracies, you're
1:15
Speaker 1: gonna love this one. Yeah, boy, that really came through. Huh. Yeah.
1:19
Speaker 1: If you're into organs and flow charts and directors but
1:24
Speaker 1: not director. It's you're gonna just love this kind of stuff. Yeah,
1:28
Speaker 1: and I apologize about my squinting. Uh I lost my glasses.
1:33
Speaker 1: Oh no, and it takes and it had become you know,
1:36
Speaker 1: had grown to depend on them. To be honest, you're
1:38
Speaker 1: like velma, I am. That's terrible. I mean like like
1:42
Speaker 1: lost him, lost him, or they're just like on your bedside,
1:45
Speaker 1: you forgot them. You want to know what happened. I
1:48
Speaker 1: was on in my bed on my laptop, wearing my
1:51
Speaker 1: glasses last week. I said I gotta go get something
1:54
Speaker 1: out of the car. I put the laptop down and
1:56
Speaker 1: the glasses down on the bed and went and got
1:59
Speaker 1: something out of my car. Came back and they were gone. Wow,
2:03
Speaker 1: that's bizarre. And I think my new puppy like grabbed
2:06
Speaker 1: them and did something with them. Oh, that's gonna be
2:09
Speaker 1: a treat defined later on. I mean, dude, I've looked
2:12
Speaker 1: everywhere and literally vanished, but the puppy left your laptop. Yeah,
2:20
Speaker 1: well that's weird. I know. Well anyway, I'm waiting, are
2:24
Speaker 1: you getting some new ones? Did you go to Eckard
2:26
Speaker 1: or CVS or Dwayne Read or whatever. I probably should
2:30
Speaker 1: have just gotten some little cheapy readers, because that's kind
2:32
Speaker 1: of all I need them for, you know, or did
2:34
Speaker 1: you use your monocle? Oh? Man, I should have brought
2:37
Speaker 1: my monocle. That's a great idea. All right, well, I'm
2:42
Speaker 1: full of them. I did not, so I'm just waiting
2:45
Speaker 1: for new glasses. And they don't even they don't have
2:46
Speaker 1: the frames that I've had, so I had to pick
2:49
Speaker 1: up new ones, which always thinks because I did just
2:53
Speaker 1: none of them look you know, good? Well, if you
2:56
Speaker 1: can kind of recreate the last ones, they look good. Well.
2:59
Speaker 1: I'm trying. Well, I guess one more quick question on this.
3:02
Speaker 1: How is driving here? Uh reckless dangerous? Oh no, no no, no,
3:08
Speaker 1: I just need him for reading. I'm okay, okay, good, good, good.
3:11
Speaker 1: I don't read while I drive anymore. That's smart too,
3:14
Speaker 1: even though you could with your glasses. That's correct. Uh So, Chuck,
3:19
Speaker 1: we're talking today about the National Security Council, and uh,
3:23
Speaker 1: up until I started researching this, I thought that that
3:26
Speaker 1: was specifically an American thing, But it turns out most
3:28
Speaker 1: countries have their own National Security Council and they fairly
3:32
Speaker 1: closely resemble this kind of thing. I would I would
3:36
Speaker 1: guess that, but I also realized I really had no
3:38
Speaker 1: idea what the National Security Council did. But it's like
3:42
Speaker 1: it's a pretty it's a pretty genius idea, UM. And
3:46
Speaker 1: it was one that was implemented by the US Congress,
3:48
Speaker 1: I should say. The American one was back in nine seven,
3:52
Speaker 1: and it was basically like, hey, you've got competing groups
3:57
Speaker 1: here that are all trying to shape um American foreign policy,
4:03
Speaker 1: whether it's through diplomacy with the State Department, or through
4:06
Speaker 1: military with the Department of Defense, or the military itself UM,
4:10
Speaker 1: or you know by UM yeah, the CIA by snooping
4:15
Speaker 1: UM or even groups as desparate as like the Department
4:20
Speaker 1: of Energy or the Department of the Treasury. All of
4:23
Speaker 1: these groups have their own objectives in shaping policy or
4:27
Speaker 1: responding to a crisis as far as foreign policy goes, right,
4:32
Speaker 1: And if you take all these people and put them
4:35
Speaker 1: in a room together and say fight it out, and
4:38
Speaker 1: the President gets to watch and laugh and then pick
4:42
Speaker 1: what he or eventually she thinks is the best the
4:47
Speaker 1: best option, then you have basically, uh, the best ideal
4:54
Speaker 1: version of UM hashing something out through a group that
4:59
Speaker 1: you could POSSI we hoped for. And that's the point
5:01
Speaker 1: of the National Security Council. Yeah, but one thing, and
5:04
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about the Situation Room specifically, But
5:07
Speaker 1: one thing I learned in researching that part of it
5:11
Speaker 1: was this kind of we'll not chilling quote very sensible quote,
5:15
Speaker 1: but still a little chilling. Is there's always more intelligence
5:19
Speaker 1: information available than there is time for senior decision makers
5:24
Speaker 1: to read. Right, So basically, like you know, there there's
5:29
Speaker 1: more than they even have, so that you need committees
5:33
Speaker 1: and staffs of people that can distill the most important
5:37
Speaker 1: stuff down to its most important core right and and
5:41
Speaker 1: the way to do this they the way that it
5:43
Speaker 1: has generally been done through the National Security Council is
5:47
Speaker 1: by decentralizing UM responsibility for watching over these different things,
5:54
Speaker 1: whether it be like a specific policy like energy policy,
5:57
Speaker 1: and the way it relates to foreign foreign kind trees
6:01
Speaker 1: or UM like territories like say some some groups responsible
6:06
Speaker 1: for the Middle East. You have all these different groups
6:08
Speaker 1: that are responsible for keeping an eye on this stuff.
6:11
Speaker 1: Thinking about American policy, thinking about how state in American
6:15
Speaker 1: policy is changing or evolving as say a situation or
6:19
Speaker 1: a new leader UM emerges in a different area UM
6:23
Speaker 1: and then as crises or needs for decisions arise, then
6:29
Speaker 1: the need to talk about this policy. It bubbles up
6:33
Speaker 1: and up and up through the hierarchy until finally it
6:35
Speaker 1: gets to the point where there's like secretaries, cabinet level
6:40
Speaker 1: secretaries who are saying Mr Again or eventually Madam President, Uh,
6:45
Speaker 1: we need a decision on this. Here are options. It
6:49
Speaker 1: is incredibly complex, Like you said, it's not just like, um,
6:54
Speaker 1: you know what what bad leader in the world is
6:57
Speaker 1: doing something today. It's that plus about a thousand other
7:00
Speaker 1: things from like you know, like you said, it could
7:05
Speaker 1: be is is something as simple as uh, or not
7:08
Speaker 1: as simple but as like non threatening as you know,
7:12
Speaker 1: an energy policy with a country with a new leader.
7:15
Speaker 1: Like you said, you know, there's something that needs attention
7:20
Speaker 1: outside of our borders. And and by making it bubble
7:24
Speaker 1: up through these levels of hierarchy, you have people who
7:28
Speaker 1: have increasing levels of responsibility. And as each level of
7:33
Speaker 1: responsibility starts saying, yeah, this is worth kicking up to
7:37
Speaker 1: the next higher level because we really do need some
7:39
Speaker 1: sort of decision on this, it takes on further and
7:42
Speaker 1: further credence right until it reaches that highest level, the
7:45
Speaker 1: actual what's actually called the National Security Council UM and
7:50
Speaker 1: when when it reaches that level, hopefully a decision will
7:53
Speaker 1: be made. But that's not necessarily the cases we'll see.
7:56
Speaker 1: Should we talk about history. Let's talk history, man, you know.
8:00
Speaker 1: Uh so our article and this was okay, um, and
8:04
Speaker 1: once supple supplemented with other supplemented, I'm gonna I like that.
8:10
Speaker 1: I like it to gonna keep that, once supplemented with
8:14
Speaker 1: other things. I had a friend grown up. He said that, um.
8:21
Speaker 1: And it was one of those things where I would
8:22
Speaker 1: say say spa getty and he would say spuck getty.
8:26
Speaker 1: I would say spaghetti, he'd say basketty. You'd just like
8:30
Speaker 1: pinch the bridge of your nose and shake your hand
8:32
Speaker 1: basically as a four year old. Uh no, was this
8:36
Speaker 1: is like early teens. Um, it's not good. Alright. So
8:39
Speaker 1: throughout history we had not we have not historically had
8:43
Speaker 1: the National Security Council, um, because I think in the
8:47
Speaker 1: earlier days, presidents had their sort of inner circle that
8:51
Speaker 1: kind of acted like what eventually the National Security Council
8:54
Speaker 1: how how they would counsel and advise, but they were
8:58
Speaker 1: just known as sort of like you know, the bros
9:01
Speaker 1: of the president pretty much, you know. Yeah, it was
9:06
Speaker 1: it was like who do you trust or specifically who
9:08
Speaker 1: who has the expertise needed to help guide your decision
9:12
Speaker 1: on this right. And I think one of the reasons
9:14
Speaker 1: why there wasn't a National Security Council for most of
9:17
Speaker 1: histories because most presidents kind of bristle at the idea
9:20
Speaker 1: of having a bureaucracy hoisted or foisted on them, where
9:25
Speaker 1: they're just like, no, no, no, I got this. I
9:26
Speaker 1: just I need to ask who I need to ask
9:28
Speaker 1: at any given point in time. And some presidents were
9:31
Speaker 1: historically known for even even the people that they asked
9:36
Speaker 1: advice from, they'd be like, thank you for your advice,
9:39
Speaker 1: I'm rejecting it outright, like like Lincoln was apparently famous
9:43
Speaker 1: for that. Yeah, I mean Lincoln was a smart fellow.
9:45
Speaker 1: He probably had good ideas on his own, well he did.
9:49
Speaker 1: He also had he was He was famous for having
9:52
Speaker 1: that team of rivals right where not only were people
9:55
Speaker 1: in his cabinet rivals with one another, they were rivals
9:58
Speaker 1: with him as well and really challenged him to keep
10:01
Speaker 1: people in check. Like his Secretary of State Seward, William Seward,
10:06
Speaker 1: he was big time against the Civil War from happening.
10:09
Speaker 1: He did not he didn't want to happen. He was
10:10
Speaker 1: just like, okay, south Sea, it was nice you guys
10:13
Speaker 1: being a part of the Union, but we'll figure it out.
10:15
Speaker 1: We we shouldn't, we shouldn't go to war. And he
10:18
Speaker 1: was like opening lines of communication with the Confederacy, going
10:22
Speaker 1: around Lincoln and trying to subvert Lincoln's basically wishes that
10:26
Speaker 1: that the South not succeed. And Lincoln said, you better
10:30
Speaker 1: watch your step. Yeah, that was a good Daniel Dave Lewis,
10:36
Speaker 1: It wasn't at all. Uh no, but you're right. He
10:39
Speaker 1: famously um kind of you know, would listen to a device,
10:43
Speaker 1: even if seward and and say no, you know, on
10:47
Speaker 1: the president, this is my choice. Yeah, he said, quote
10:50
Speaker 1: if this must be done, I must do it. And
10:53
Speaker 1: and that was kind of the way that the president's
10:55
Speaker 1: I mean, it takes a certain kind of person to
10:57
Speaker 1: be a president, right, and usually if you are elected president,
11:01
Speaker 1: you're not the kind of person who's like, what do
11:03
Speaker 1: you guys think? Hey over there, what's your what's your opinion?
11:06
Speaker 1: What should I do? It's it's like, go do this.
11:09
Speaker 1: I'm the president the end, do it, right. But as
11:13
Speaker 1: the United States grew and the world grew a little
11:16
Speaker 1: more complexities, uh were brought out obviously, especially with in
11:21
Speaker 1: terms of foreign policy and um, especially after World War Two,
11:25
Speaker 1: there were you know, Congress was not thrilled with the
11:29
Speaker 1: way FDR kind of ran things, and they said, you
11:31
Speaker 1: know what I think we need and the president needs help,
11:35
Speaker 1: uh in the form of you know, a body, an
11:38
Speaker 1: official body, sanctioned body surrounding him to help him make decisions. Uh.
11:43
Speaker 1: And so eventually in nine is when the National Security
11:47
Speaker 1: Act was passed and this council was created to quote
11:52
Speaker 1: advise the President with respect to the integration of domestic
11:55
Speaker 1: foreign military policies relating to national security and other off
12:00
Speaker 1: and it's it's again, this is a significant act because
12:04
Speaker 1: it's saying, uh, Mr President, here's the bureaucracy that you
12:08
Speaker 1: didn't ask for and you don't want, but we're putting
12:11
Speaker 1: on you on your shoulders because this stuff is just
12:14
Speaker 1: too big now, Like we're a superpower and we can't
12:18
Speaker 1: just leave it up to you and your formal informal
12:21
Speaker 1: management style of ad hoc working groups that you just
12:24
Speaker 1: pull into the Oval office whenever you need some advice.
12:27
Speaker 1: We need something far more structured than that. So we're
12:30
Speaker 1: going to pass a Congressional Act that we're going to
12:32
Speaker 1: force you to sign into law. And Truman actually signed
12:35
Speaker 1: it into law in ninety seven, and from that point
12:38
Speaker 1: on there was a structure that the president was expected
12:41
Speaker 1: to use when making foreign policy decisions, so that he
12:44
Speaker 1: would have all of the um, all of the options,
12:48
Speaker 1: all of the opinions, all of the varying um factors
12:52
Speaker 1: in any any given situation before him, so that he
12:55
Speaker 1: can say option D, I like it. Yeah, And like
12:59
Speaker 1: you said before, you know, different presidents over the years
13:03
Speaker 1: have had different Uh, there's a lot of leeway within
13:06
Speaker 1: how you want to run your National Security Council, how
13:09
Speaker 1: it structured. It's not completely set in stone, as we've
13:12
Speaker 1: seen recently. And we'll we'll talk a little bit about
13:14
Speaker 1: what's going on now, but you know, throughout since ninety seven,
13:18
Speaker 1: basically each president has sort of had their own reasons
13:23
Speaker 1: for leaning on it a lot or not leaning on
13:27
Speaker 1: it that much. Initially, Truman, after kind of right after
13:30
Speaker 1: it was passed through, was kind of uh, you know,
13:34
Speaker 1: he didn't go to meetings a lot until after the
13:36
Speaker 1: Korean War, and then he was like, oh, wait a minute,
13:38
Speaker 1: I think there's a lot of value here. Um, Eisenhower,
13:42
Speaker 1: being former military, was sort of used to that, uh
13:46
Speaker 1: that system of committees and bureaucracy, and uh he he
13:52
Speaker 1: kind of took to it right away and was like, no,
13:53
Speaker 1: this is great. I'm gonna even kind of expand the
13:55
Speaker 1: NFC and create you know, these uh these special or boards,
14:00
Speaker 1: and I'm actually going to create someone called the National
14:02
Speaker 1: Security Advisor. Yeah, which is a huge thing, huge contribution
14:07
Speaker 1: to the National Security Council that Eisenhower made. And yeah,
14:11
Speaker 1: since he was used to the military, he's like, yeah,
14:12
Speaker 1: let's make this even more regimented than Congress wanted. And
14:16
Speaker 1: he put it to good work. But since then it's been,
14:19
Speaker 1: um typically more pared down than what Eisenhower had. I
14:23
Speaker 1: think he had like probably the most hierarchical and decentralized
14:27
Speaker 1: and spread out National Security Council of any president ethan
14:31
Speaker 1: more than Obama even Yeah, Obama had I think a
14:35
Speaker 1: huge bloated one, but I think it didn't have as
14:38
Speaker 1: many say like departments or committees or um. That kind
14:42
Speaker 1: of thing is Eisenhower's. Because Obama received a lot of
14:45
Speaker 1: criticism for that, and from what I read right rightly
14:49
Speaker 1: so that that it was basically a it was a
14:52
Speaker 1: huge stalling mechanism that Obama used to to put off
14:59
Speaker 1: form policy decisions or to make them outside of his
15:03
Speaker 1: own cabinet. Well, and even if it wasn't purposeful, it's just,
15:08
Speaker 1: you know how it is with bureaucracy. The more bloated
15:12
Speaker 1: an organization gets, just the slower everything is gonna move,
15:15
Speaker 1: and the harder it's gonna be to get anything done.
15:18
Speaker 1: Uh that's just kind of how it works. Um So,
15:21
Speaker 1: Kennedy comes along and uh had a had a kind
15:25
Speaker 1: of a disaster on his hands with the Bay of Pigs,
15:28
Speaker 1: kind of which we should do a show on at
15:30
Speaker 1: some point. And uh so he he looked to his
15:33
Speaker 1: um national Security adviser, MC George Bundy, the man with
15:37
Speaker 1: two last names, and said, uh, we need a chill
15:43
Speaker 1: room to hang out and make decisions. And how about
15:48
Speaker 1: that bowling alley? Yeah it was FDRs bowling alley, and
15:53
Speaker 1: FDR side up from his grave and said, not my
15:55
Speaker 1: bowling alley, right, And that's when the situation Room was created, which, um,
16:02
Speaker 1: I thought this was really neat. I didn't know much
16:04
Speaker 1: about the situation Room. I thought it was the room.
16:07
Speaker 1: Um I didn't know that it was five thousand square
16:10
Speaker 1: feet of different rooms on the ground floor of the
16:14
Speaker 1: west wing. Yeah. The wood shed. Yeah, that's the nickname
16:18
Speaker 1: for which I didn't get why they call it that,
16:21
Speaker 1: because you know here in the States the woodsheds typically
16:25
Speaker 1: used and take them out behind the wood shed. Usually
16:28
Speaker 1: that means getting a spanking. Well maybe that's you know
16:34
Speaker 1: what happens in the woods In the situation room, they
16:38
Speaker 1: watched they watched people get spanked. I guess on closed
16:41
Speaker 1: circuit TV. I guarantee they do. Uh. Should we take
16:45
Speaker 1: a break and then talk about the situation room a
16:47
Speaker 1: little more? Yeah? Yeahs So Chuck, we're talking about situation room.
17:15
Speaker 1: Uh and not with Wolf Flitzer, No, never, And um,
17:20
Speaker 1: it was started with Kennedy, right, And uh, did you
17:25
Speaker 1: see the picture in that one of the articles you
17:28
Speaker 1: sent me of the situation where I think it was
17:30
Speaker 1: the wood shed One one of them had like dozens
17:32
Speaker 1: and dozens of pictures, which kind of surprised me that one,
17:35
Speaker 1: that one, But there was a picture in there, and
17:37
Speaker 1: I think it was the original situation room that they
17:40
Speaker 1: that Kennedy had set up. And basically it was a
17:42
Speaker 1: bunch of chairs and like a huge map of the
17:44
Speaker 1: world on the wall. There was some situation room like
17:48
Speaker 1: the war room from Strange Love. They call in like
17:51
Speaker 1: a nine year old civil servant to come in and
17:54
Speaker 1: move attack from you know, Ecuador to Guatemala, and then
17:59
Speaker 1: he just show full back out. Uh. This thing apparently
18:05
Speaker 1: used to be I mean, it went under a big
18:07
Speaker 1: renovation in two thousand six, and apparently before that was
18:09
Speaker 1: a UM. I don't get the idea that it was
18:13
Speaker 1: necessarily um antiquated, but it wasn't certainly up to the
18:19
Speaker 1: kind of modern technological uh level that it needed to be.
18:23
Speaker 1: Let's just say that. Yeah. I also have the impression
18:26
Speaker 1: that it was um a lot more luxurious originally, but
18:31
Speaker 1: that things like the mahogany paneling actually made it hard
18:34
Speaker 1: to hear people on speaker phone, right. Um, So they
18:38
Speaker 1: kind of just updated it to probably much more in
18:41
Speaker 1: line of what people thought it looked like all along. Yeah.
18:46
Speaker 1: That that main room, where you know you've probably seen
18:48
Speaker 1: the most photos of, has six flat screens. UM. Very
18:52
Speaker 1: secure obviously for video conferencing with whoever you want around
18:56
Speaker 1: the world. Uh. Links directly to Air Force one, which
18:59
Speaker 1: is kind a neat. Uh. They have you know, private
19:03
Speaker 1: meeting rooms, private phone booth rooms. Uh. Secure video rooms.
19:09
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, it's kind of like what you
19:11
Speaker 1: would expect. Um, you can't text from there, you can't
19:15
Speaker 1: like you know, they don't want things leaking out of there.
19:18
Speaker 1: So it's just and it is not a bunker like
19:21
Speaker 1: a lot of people might think. But yeah, there's some
19:23
Speaker 1: windows to the exterior of the White House. Yeah, but
19:25
Speaker 1: it feels like a bunker and that all these you know,
19:29
Speaker 1: kind of very private and secure areas, but it's not
19:31
Speaker 1: like deep underground or anything like that, right right. Yeah.
19:33
Speaker 1: I think the room where there's that famous photo of
19:37
Speaker 1: everybody in the Obama National Security Council watching the ben
19:41
Speaker 1: Laden raid ben Laden spanking. Yeah, yeah, behind the wood shed,
19:45
Speaker 1: um and they that that, I think that that is
19:49
Speaker 1: a it's an enclosed, windowless room that's that is cut off,
19:53
Speaker 1: has kind of bunker like qualities, but it's the the
19:57
Speaker 1: whole the whole interior itself is not a bunker. It's
20:01
Speaker 1: not underground like you said. Correct. Uh. They have a staff,
20:04
Speaker 1: the situation room staff. It's about thirty people in general,
20:08
Speaker 1: and there are they're organized into what's called watch teams.
20:11
Speaker 1: And these watch teams do uh well, they don't take
20:15
Speaker 1: the night off seven monitoring of everything basically. Um. And
20:20
Speaker 1: it says there's usually three duty officers, a communications assistant,
20:24
Speaker 1: and an intelligence analyst on each watch team. And um,
20:30
Speaker 1: you know, presidents throughout the years have used the situation
20:32
Speaker 1: room sparingly sometimes. Uh. I think in the case of Kennedy,
20:36
Speaker 1: he liked to be in the Oval office a little more. Um.
20:39
Speaker 1: And they say Lyndon Johnson was in the situation room
20:42
Speaker 1: so much that he even moved his Oval office chair
20:44
Speaker 1: down there. Yeah. Nixon and Ford apparently never used the room.
20:49
Speaker 1: Uh h w Bush and Clinton use it a lot. Uh.
20:54
Speaker 1: And in that two thousand six expansion they included UM
20:59
Speaker 1: offices for Homeland Security Council now in the White House
21:02
Speaker 1: Chief of Staffs offices down there now, which is pretty interesting.
21:06
Speaker 1: But um, apparently you get nominated to be part of
21:10
Speaker 1: the personnel. Oh yeah, I'm quite sure. It is a
21:14
Speaker 1: highly prestigious tour, their two year tours, and I'm sure
21:18
Speaker 1: it's just absolutely grueling because basically, they make you watch
21:23
Speaker 1: cable news from around the world all day long. There's
21:26
Speaker 1: also tons of cables coming in from the from various
21:31
Speaker 1: embassies around the country. All of the intelligence, raw intelligence
21:36
Speaker 1: gets coming through um this room. Right. So apparently after
21:40
Speaker 1: the Bay of Pigs, Kennedy was like, I think he
21:43
Speaker 1: felt cut off from actual raw intelligence and he hadn't
21:46
Speaker 1: been presented with the correct actual intelligence. So he created
21:51
Speaker 1: this Situation Room to basically circumvent the the intelligence community
21:58
Speaker 1: and to have his ends on raw intelligence. Right. So
22:04
Speaker 1: you've got intelligence coming from around the world going to
22:06
Speaker 1: the various intelligence agencies, but each intelligence agency is also
22:11
Speaker 1: commanded to send their raw intelligence to the Situation Room,
22:15
Speaker 1: and then it's up to this Situation Room staff to say, uh,
22:19
Speaker 1: this seems important, This isn't the important, this is pretty important,
22:24
Speaker 1: and they compile it all into different briefings that the
22:26
Speaker 1: president gets daily, usually in the morning and in the
22:30
Speaker 1: evening as well. Yeah, and if you're part of this staff,
22:33
Speaker 1: you're you're like, we said, handpicked for that to year thing,
22:36
Speaker 1: and you're they said, you know, it's it's a very
22:39
Speaker 1: big deal. You have to have an even temperament um.
22:41
Speaker 1: You have to be cool under pressure. You have to
22:44
Speaker 1: be able to have these spur of the moment coherent
22:47
Speaker 1: intelligent conversations like with the President on a moment's notice.
22:51
Speaker 1: You can't be like President I can believe it's you. Uh.
22:55
Speaker 1: And apparently, um, this article said you know, I think
22:58
Speaker 1: this from the CIA had said, you know, you need
23:00
Speaker 1: to check your ego at the door at this job.
23:02
Speaker 1: One director situation room director said to an incoming duty officer,
23:07
Speaker 1: just remember there are many important people who work in
23:09
Speaker 1: the White House, and you're not one of them. I
23:12
Speaker 1: love that quote. Uh. So you know, the it varies
23:16
Speaker 1: with the presidents. But basically every day the watch team
23:20
Speaker 1: puts together something called the morning Book, uh for the President,
23:24
Speaker 1: the Vice president and you know whoever on the White
23:27
Speaker 1: House staff is I guess authorized to get this. Uh.
23:31
Speaker 1: And in this morning book is the well, it's a
23:36
Speaker 1: daily affirmation. That's the first thing. The National Intelligence Daily
23:42
Speaker 1: is in there. The State Department's Morning Summary is in there,
23:45
Speaker 1: any kind of intelligence reports, um. And then I think
23:50
Speaker 1: a family circus cartoon, right, just to keep things light
23:53
Speaker 1: right and in it in it pgs, says PASQUETI. Uh.
23:59
Speaker 1: And then the morning book is this is in the
24:01
Speaker 1: car the National Security Advisor when they're picked up. And
24:04
Speaker 1: they also had the President's Daily brief that's the CIA's
24:07
Speaker 1: daily prepared briefing basically, and like this is every day.
24:12
Speaker 1: These are these briefs and reports that these senior people
24:17
Speaker 1: and staff get every single morning of every single day
24:21
Speaker 1: of every year, right and and just to give you
24:24
Speaker 1: kind of in an an idea of how how much
24:29
Speaker 1: information is coming into these poor SAPs twenty four hours
24:32
Speaker 1: a day. If something does happen, right, if there's like
24:35
Speaker 1: a crisis somewhere around the world, there's like a revolution
24:39
Speaker 1: breaking out, um, you would have all of the people
24:43
Speaker 1: who are involved in that crisis, say that area or
24:47
Speaker 1: it's related to again energy, or say it's like an
24:50
Speaker 1: a bola outbreak that's suddenly like sweeping. So you'd have
24:53
Speaker 1: all the people involved in that coming into the situation room,
24:57
Speaker 1: right and just being like, we give us all the information.
25:00
Speaker 1: You gotta keep us updated, tell us what's going on,
25:02
Speaker 1: like every five seconds. But if you're the situation room staff,
25:06
Speaker 1: you're like, that's great, I understand you're having a crisis
25:09
Speaker 1: right now, but we're still trying to pay attention to
25:11
Speaker 1: the rest of the world to like a crisis is
25:15
Speaker 1: it's obviously it's not meaningless to these people, but it's
25:18
Speaker 1: all it's all relative because they can't just stop paying
25:21
Speaker 1: attention to China because there's an Ambola outbreak in Africa, correct,
25:26
Speaker 1: you know, yeah, so that they I my hats off
25:31
Speaker 1: to them for being able to keep up with all
25:33
Speaker 1: of this stuff. Yeah, and and you know, obviously certain
25:36
Speaker 1: times are a little more calm relatively speaking than others.
25:42
Speaker 1: But yeah, I don't think I'd be very good at that.
25:44
Speaker 1: But there's never a day where there's not something going
25:48
Speaker 1: on in the world that at least whoever in that
25:52
Speaker 1: region is going to feel is super important to catch
25:56
Speaker 1: the President's eye. You know, you gotta put something in
25:59
Speaker 1: those into telligence briefings, like you know, there's a Russian
26:03
Speaker 1: plane in this airspace and we don't know why, right.
26:07
Speaker 1: You know. If there's one thing I've learned from researching
26:10
Speaker 1: this episode, Chuck, it's that the United States is very nosy. Yeah. Yeah,
26:18
Speaker 1: so that's the situation room, Chucking. It's almost kind of
26:20
Speaker 1: like its own thing, right. It's like one of those
26:24
Speaker 1: old timey tenement clotheslines directly between and the president if
26:28
Speaker 1: the President so chooses, or at least the National Security
26:31
Speaker 1: Council staff, which makes the National Security Council kind of
26:35
Speaker 1: its own thing, you know what I mean, Like it's
26:38
Speaker 1: its own It definitely is its own agency. But if
26:41
Speaker 1: you look back at the original congressional mandate, the the
26:45
Speaker 1: the point of it was it was supposed to be
26:47
Speaker 1: a forum, a place where the different um heads of
26:52
Speaker 1: departments and cabinet members came together and said, this is
26:55
Speaker 1: what we need to do. No, this is what we
26:56
Speaker 1: need to do. Mr President choose right. But with this, this,
27:01
Speaker 1: the addition of the Situation Room and some other, um,
27:04
Speaker 1: some other moves that presidents have made, like creating the
27:06
Speaker 1: position of the National Security Advisor, it has become its
27:10
Speaker 1: own party, its own thing to where yes, it's responsible
27:14
Speaker 1: for coordinating policy and calling meetings and getting everybody to
27:17
Speaker 1: the table, but it also it's bringing its own views
27:21
Speaker 1: and policies on policies now, whereas before it was just
27:24
Speaker 1: supposed to be a place where the existing cabinet members
27:29
Speaker 1: came and talked about policy. So that was a big change.
27:32
Speaker 1: And um, I think that that took place beginning with
27:36
Speaker 1: Eisenhower and the the creation of the National Security Advisor,
27:41
Speaker 1: but definitely also the creation of the Situation Room and
27:44
Speaker 1: this direct pipeline to the president for raw intelligence as well. Yeah,
27:48
Speaker 1: and like we said earlier, like each president can kind
27:50
Speaker 1: of organize things how they like, you know, how they
27:54
Speaker 1: prefer to have things organized and um, you know, Johnson,
27:58
Speaker 1: he would have Lyndon john and apparently had regular Tuesday
28:02
Speaker 1: working lunches where he brought together the CIA director, Chairman
28:06
Speaker 1: of Joint Chiefs of Staff, Secretary of State in Defense
28:09
Speaker 1: and they all had you know, uh, salad wraps every
28:13
Speaker 1: Tuesday and chatted about what was going on. Tid Basil
28:17
Speaker 1: was Johnson's favorite under Nixon. Apparently he you know, he
28:22
Speaker 1: obviously worked so closely with Kissinger that I get the
28:27
Speaker 1: feeling that he didn't he didn't like meetings with a
28:30
Speaker 1: large amount of people. I don't think he trusted very
28:33
Speaker 1: many people. That NIXT is probably a good way to
28:35
Speaker 1: say it. And then of course Ford did exactly what
28:38
Speaker 1: Nixon did. Surprise. Uh. And then I don't I think
28:42
Speaker 1: you said Carter didn't use it very much. Uh, Well,
28:45
Speaker 1: this art, I mean, our article at least says um
28:47
Speaker 1: that Carter. It said that he kind of had his
28:51
Speaker 1: own ideas and the um the NFC was not as
28:55
Speaker 1: much of behind the scenes managers what they called it
28:59
Speaker 1: is maybe with other administrations. Yeah, he used the National
29:02
Speaker 1: Security Advisors kind of uh policy mouthpiece to the country
29:07
Speaker 1: and said there this is the way the president feels.
29:10
Speaker 1: It was like a spokesperson, um. And that that that
29:14
Speaker 1: kind of made the National Security Advisor a lot more prominent,
29:18
Speaker 1: which is actually something that had been started under the
29:21
Speaker 1: Nixon administration when he appointed Henry Kissinger or when he
29:25
Speaker 1: had Henry Kissinger's his National Security advisor. UM. Because Kissener
29:30
Speaker 1: Kissinger buck the trend and that the National Security Advisor
29:34
Speaker 1: went from somebody who's in charge of coordinating policy, getting
29:38
Speaker 1: everybody at the table figuring out, you know, what the
29:41
Speaker 1: president needed to know to actually formulating foreign policy, UM,
29:46
Speaker 1: which I think is another thing that some presidents have
29:49
Speaker 1: tasked or if not tasked successive national security advisors with.
29:54
Speaker 1: But that was a big change because that you know,
29:57
Speaker 1: Kissinger was saying, this is this is how the US
30:00
Speaker 1: needs to um respond to this kind of thing, or
30:03
Speaker 1: this this is the way our energy policy should be.
30:05
Speaker 1: I keep going back to that. Well, but it's a
30:07
Speaker 1: it's a great well. Yeah, um, you know Reagan comes
30:11
Speaker 1: along and uh after Carter and really changes things with
30:16
Speaker 1: the n s c uh to the point where we
30:19
Speaker 1: decided just to do an entirely new podcast and not
30:22
Speaker 1: talk about this much on Iran Contra. Yeah, but to
30:25
Speaker 1: say that there was overreach going on under his n
30:28
Speaker 1: sc IS is probably a bit of an understatement. Yeah,
30:31
Speaker 1: he turned it into like a clandestine covert operations agency.
30:34
Speaker 1: It's nuts what he did with it. It is um.
30:37
Speaker 1: H W. Bish came along and kind of restored order
30:40
Speaker 1: a bit and apparently set up a really good system,
30:44
Speaker 1: like a good a working system, um with his his
30:48
Speaker 1: flow chart and all these committees that were going on,
30:50
Speaker 1: and apparently he was so successful and sort of just
30:53
Speaker 1: kind of making it a um, a truly functioning body.
30:58
Speaker 1: That uh, that Bill Clinton, his his little uh, his
31:03
Speaker 1: little buddy, almost said, a little buddy, George W. Bush.
31:08
Speaker 1: I guess his son. I guess there were buddies. They're
31:10
Speaker 1: buddies at Davos and stuff like that. Uh. And then
31:14
Speaker 1: together and then Obama they all kind of followed suit
31:17
Speaker 1: following H. W. Bush's um uh sort of organization organizational
31:22
Speaker 1: flow yeah, because it works so well. Yeah, and it's basically, um, well,
31:28
Speaker 1: I guess we should talk about it. Huh. You want
31:31
Speaker 1: to take a break first, yeah, and talk about these
31:33
Speaker 1: committees yeah or charts coming up right after this, So chuck, um,
32:02
Speaker 1: let's break down the National Security Council. All right, let's
32:06
Speaker 1: break it down for him, fella. They're committees now, um,
32:10
Speaker 1: within the NFC. Are we going from bottom to top? Sure? Okay,
32:15
Speaker 1: go ahead, start at the bottom. Okay, Fine, So you've
32:19
Speaker 1: got policy coordinating Committees the PCC. So the policy coordinating committees, right,
32:25
Speaker 1: They basically are they have a focus of specific focus,
32:30
Speaker 1: whether it's on a region or a a a particular
32:35
Speaker 1: interest maybe energy and Um. These these committees are made
32:42
Speaker 1: up of people from different agencies, whether it's you know,
32:46
Speaker 1: the Intelligence community or the Department of Energy or who
32:50
Speaker 1: whoever has a stake in that region or that particular policy.
32:56
Speaker 1: And they're made up of experts on them. But you know,
32:58
Speaker 1: they're I don't want to say the low level well
33:00
Speaker 1: there within their actual agency, they're they're probably pretty high up, um.
33:05
Speaker 1: And they come together and they're keeping an eye on
33:07
Speaker 1: stuff right there, monitoring changes. There may be saying we're bored,
33:12
Speaker 1: we need to come up with a brand new policy
33:14
Speaker 1: for America to undertake in this regard or in this region. Right.
33:19
Speaker 1: And UM, let's say a crisis comes along, and let's
33:22
Speaker 1: say that this is the Middle East Policy Coordinating Committee
33:26
Speaker 1: something happens. Oh, I don't know, there's a gas attack
33:29
Speaker 1: in Syria right this this Policy Committee is obviously there's
33:35
Speaker 1: so there will be some other parallel thing from the
33:37
Speaker 1: raw intelligence going through the Situation Room. But this committee
33:42
Speaker 1: would also spring into action and it would start bubbling up. Um,
33:47
Speaker 1: it would start writing policy papers. They would um dust
33:50
Speaker 1: off old theories and hypotheses, and they would go to
33:53
Speaker 1: the people directly above them, the Deputies Committee, and they
33:57
Speaker 1: would say, we need to get the President moving on
34:00
Speaker 1: this whatever this is. Yeah, And the Deputies Committee is
34:04
Speaker 1: headed by the Deputy National Security Advisor, and um, things
34:08
Speaker 1: are getting kind of serious at this point. Um. All
34:12
Speaker 1: the deputy heads of the departments, um are included on
34:15
Speaker 1: this committee. And I get the feeling that I get
34:20
Speaker 1: the feeling that this is just the next level of
34:23
Speaker 1: of weeding out things. And um, eventually if it makes
34:27
Speaker 1: it way to the Principles Committee that's just below the
34:31
Speaker 1: actual NSC and that is headed by the National or
34:34
Speaker 1: I guess convened is what they say, by the National
34:37
Speaker 1: Security Advisor him or herself. And the National Security Council
34:42
Speaker 1: is actually made up of the President, the Vice President,
34:45
Speaker 1: the Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Secretary of Energy,
34:50
Speaker 1: I believe, uh, and the National Security Advisor. And then
34:54
Speaker 1: there's other what are called observers or advisors, specifically the
35:01
Speaker 1: Director of National Intelligence, who is the person who's in
35:05
Speaker 1: charge of the entire intelligence community, from the n s
35:08
Speaker 1: A and the c i A to Coast Guard intelligence,
35:11
Speaker 1: everybody who's snooping on behalf of the United States. This
35:15
Speaker 1: person is the top of that whole community. And the
35:18
Speaker 1: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who is the
35:22
Speaker 1: um representative of the all armed forces of the military,
35:27
Speaker 1: so it's the military's voice in the National Security Council.
35:31
Speaker 1: And once these these people are talking about an issue
35:35
Speaker 1: or a policy, it's a that's about as high level
35:39
Speaker 1: as it gets. And and the point of it reaching
35:41
Speaker 1: this committee is that these people are all saying, this
35:45
Speaker 1: is the best option. No, no, this is the best option.
35:48
Speaker 1: We need to talk some more. No, we need to
35:50
Speaker 1: shoot some missiles off, and then the president has to decide. Yeah.
35:54
Speaker 1: And um, you know, like we said that it can
35:57
Speaker 1: be organized within certain bounds of the law as the
36:00
Speaker 1: presidency's fit. And um, you know, anyone who follows the
36:04
Speaker 1: news in the United States um or abroad about the
36:08
Speaker 1: United States. Um, there was quite a shakeup. And you
36:11
Speaker 1: know earlier this year when our current president excluded the
36:16
Speaker 1: chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Director
36:18
Speaker 1: of National Intelligence from UM. They weren't like banned from
36:22
Speaker 1: the NSC, but they weren't on the list of like, hey,
36:25
Speaker 1: you you need to be at all these meetings all
36:27
Speaker 1: the time. It was more like you uh, I think
36:30
Speaker 1: the direct quote was you shell attend where issues pertaining
36:33
Speaker 1: to your responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed. And UM.
36:37
Speaker 1: There was a big uproar in the press, and the
36:39
Speaker 1: White House down played it and said, you know, this
36:41
Speaker 1: is not a real change Like in past administrations, the Chairman,
36:46
Speaker 1: the Joint chiefs of Staff and Director of National Intelligence
36:48
Speaker 1: aren't at all the meetings either. They're usually at the
36:51
Speaker 1: ones that pertained to them. So, UM, what's what gives?
36:55
Speaker 1: What's the deal? Yeah, like, quit making a big deal
36:57
Speaker 1: about this. And also this, UM, this guy Steve Bannon,
37:02
Speaker 1: my my political strategist, is a is a full fledged member.
37:06
Speaker 1: That was a big deal for a little while because
37:10
Speaker 1: just this week, as we're recording in real time, Mr
37:15
Speaker 1: Bannon has been excused and of course he UM, the
37:18
Speaker 1: White House, and Bannon tried to play it up like,
37:20
Speaker 1: you know what, he was never going to be on
37:21
Speaker 1: there permanently. He was in there too undo the work
37:24
Speaker 1: of Susan Rice, who was Obama's National security advisor. Um,
37:28
Speaker 1: is what Bannon said, And then officials said no, he
37:32
Speaker 1: was actually there to monitor Michael Flynn, the first national
37:35
Speaker 1: security advisor, who is already gone. And now that he's gone,
37:38
Speaker 1: we don't really need Bannon. His work has done. That's
37:41
Speaker 1: really all we kind of wanted him in there for
37:43
Speaker 1: to begin with. Just crazy to watch this. Yeah, and um,
37:49
Speaker 1: I don't think anyone bought that. I don't even think
37:51
Speaker 1: Republicans bought that's been Um, there was clearly a and
37:57
Speaker 1: is currently clearly there's an internal struggle going on with
38:01
Speaker 1: with apparently Steve Bannon and the President's son in law,
38:06
Speaker 1: Jared Kushner, and um, to the point where the President
38:09
Speaker 1: was like, you know, you guys worked this stuff out,
38:12
Speaker 1: or I'm gonna solve it and family matters to Donald Trump,
38:17
Speaker 1: and I think Bannon understands that. Yeah, it definitely looks
38:21
Speaker 1: like the knives are out for Bannon. He doesn't have
38:23
Speaker 1: a lot of friends elsewhere in the White House. So
38:27
Speaker 1: if the president is turning on him, then it's that's
38:31
Speaker 1: not good news for Steve Bannon. Yeah. I mean, we'll
38:33
Speaker 1: see how this plays out. But just today where you know, um,
38:36
Speaker 1: Donald Trump was quoted as kind of the quotes were
38:40
Speaker 1: very cool on his support for Bannon today. Cool cool
38:44
Speaker 1: as in um, he was kind of like, Hey, I
38:47
Speaker 1: think the quote was something like, you know, he's a
38:49
Speaker 1: good guy, but you know he didn't hook up with
38:51
Speaker 1: me until kind of recently. Yeah, I saw that that
38:54
Speaker 1: that's that's not a ringing endorsement, you know. So so
38:58
Speaker 1: when he put Bannon on, like he gave him a
39:01
Speaker 1: permanent seat on the National Security Council, that was a
39:03
Speaker 1: big deal because presidents have had political advisors on their
39:08
Speaker 1: National Security Council. That's been done before, but never like
39:13
Speaker 1: a permanent reserve seat at all the meetings, and it
39:16
Speaker 1: sent like a really big message, And the message was
39:19
Speaker 1: the political ramifications of a decision or a policy outcome
39:25
Speaker 1: are just as important as say, like the military or
39:29
Speaker 1: diplomatic ramifications of they're gonna be it's gonna be taken
39:32
Speaker 1: into account just as much. And I think that's why
39:35
Speaker 1: a lot of people were chilled by that because you
39:37
Speaker 1: you don't want it to be political. You don't want
39:39
Speaker 1: your decisions to be you know, well, what how will
39:42
Speaker 1: this affect my vote or something like that down the road.
39:45
Speaker 1: And that's how a lot of people took Bannon's appointment
39:47
Speaker 1: to the National Security Council. This new guy who came
39:51
Speaker 1: in after Flynn, hr McMaster has apparently alleviated a lot
39:58
Speaker 1: of worry by a lot of people. He's he's a
40:00
Speaker 1: three star general. He's only one of three active duty
40:05
Speaker 1: military to serve as National Security Advisor. Um. So he's
40:10
Speaker 1: an active duty military guy. And he um, he's apparently
40:15
Speaker 1: well respected inside and outside of the military. Didn't he
40:19
Speaker 1: I think he didn't restore the Chairman of the Joint
40:21
Speaker 1: Chiefs of Staff and uh Director of National Intelligence. Yes
40:24
Speaker 1: he did, and and the reason why that was a
40:27
Speaker 1: bizarre move, um, And apparently it's it's that's George W.
40:32
Speaker 1: Bush did the same thing. But the since two thousand one,
40:38
Speaker 1: there's not any American foreign policy issue or crisis that
40:43
Speaker 1: doesn't involve the intelligence community and the military. It's just
40:47
Speaker 1: the direction America's gone. So, I mean that kind of
40:52
Speaker 1: falls in line with trump stated policy of isolationism. Just
40:56
Speaker 1: kind of saying, no, we're gonna rein that back in.
41:00
Speaker 1: I think that's probably what he was doing, but I
41:02
Speaker 1: don't know that a lot of elites in Washington have
41:05
Speaker 1: um faith that he has an actual plan rather than
41:09
Speaker 1: was just sending a message, you know what I mean. Yeah,
41:14
Speaker 1: So this McMaster guy though he um, he actually made
41:17
Speaker 1: his name by writing a dissertation criticizing Lyndon Johnson's UM
41:24
Speaker 1: military advisors on the National Security Council during Vietnam. He uh.
41:29
Speaker 1: He wrote his thesis and it got turned into a
41:31
Speaker 1: bestselling book called Dereliction of Duty, and a lot of
41:35
Speaker 1: people are like, um, man, this guy is great. He's
41:38
Speaker 1: all about being open and upfront and honest with the president.
41:42
Speaker 1: And then other people read the book and said, oh,
41:44
Speaker 1: this guy is a is a military guy who's who's
41:47
Speaker 1: saying that you shouldn't listen to the president's wishes and
41:50
Speaker 1: the military should just act on its own. So I
41:53
Speaker 1: think most people subscribe to the former reading of it
41:57
Speaker 1: that that he actually is a pretty pretty um smart
42:01
Speaker 1: guy and is not is not calling for the military
42:04
Speaker 1: to act independently of the president's which is more that
42:09
Speaker 1: he was indicting UM the president's advisors for not being
42:14
Speaker 1: forthright and upfront and clear. Uh, and was just kind
42:17
Speaker 1: of going along with Johnson and telling him what he
42:20
Speaker 1: wanted to hear as far as Vietnam went. And it's
42:23
Speaker 1: interesting stuff. That guy's an interesting dude. McMaster is, Yeah,
42:27
Speaker 1: it really is. UM. The the NFC themselves, like you know,
42:30
Speaker 1: obviously we've kind of talked to nausea about the meetings
42:34
Speaker 1: in the bureaucracy. But aside from this, UM, one of
42:39
Speaker 1: the one of the other things that they do is,
42:41
Speaker 1: you know, if the president has a call with a
42:43
Speaker 1: foreign leader, Um, there's gonna be a senior staff member
42:47
Speaker 1: from the NFC there with them. They're gonna brief him
42:49
Speaker 1: beforehand and say, hey, you're gonna you're about to get
42:53
Speaker 1: on a call with let's say the leader of North Korea,
42:58
Speaker 1: and yeah, that's called happened all the time. And they, uh,
43:02
Speaker 1: they will probably talk want to talk about this and
43:04
Speaker 1: this is sort of the important things that we need
43:07
Speaker 1: to cover. And they may mention this and you may
43:11
Speaker 1: want to respond this way. Don't talk about how much
43:14
Speaker 1: you like that Seth Rogan movie the interview. Avoid that
43:17
Speaker 1: at all, call avoid that. Did you see that? Yeah?
43:20
Speaker 1: Was it any good. Oh you didn't see it. Nah,
43:23
Speaker 1: that's pretty good. That's pretty funny. Yeah, yeah, I was. Um,
43:28
Speaker 1: I mean it's a Seth Rogan James Franco taking on
43:31
Speaker 1: really pronounced opinion on a specific policy matter. But it
43:36
Speaker 1: was pretty funny. I liked it. I was about to say,
43:39
Speaker 1: maybe I'll see it, but I know I won't. Uh.
43:42
Speaker 1: I I would recommend if you're sitting around watch it
43:46
Speaker 1: all right, you know. So, um, you know this phone
43:49
Speaker 1: call take place in the and that NFC staffer is
43:51
Speaker 1: generally there through the call and taking notes, and then
43:55
Speaker 1: that then is super useful information to take back down
43:58
Speaker 1: to their minie or subcommittee. Um. So that's just like
44:03
Speaker 1: another one of their duties basically is what making sure
44:05
Speaker 1: the president as all the information on basically any meeting
44:09
Speaker 1: or call that they're going to take with any foreign leader.
44:12
Speaker 1: And so what I I think you can sum up
44:15
Speaker 1: the National Security Council like this, right, somebody has an idea.
44:20
Speaker 1: Let's say that they decided that, um, it would be
44:23
Speaker 1: great for America's position in the world if we dedicated
44:29
Speaker 1: UM June one as National Flower Power Day. And it
44:34
Speaker 1: comes up from a committee and keeps bubbling up and
44:36
Speaker 1: bubbling up and bubbling up, and each time that passes
44:39
Speaker 1: from one committee another, somebody saying, yes, I think this
44:42
Speaker 1: is a good idea, and we're gonna put my reputation
44:45
Speaker 1: on the line by saying it should be taken to
44:46
Speaker 1: the president. And finally goes all the way of the
44:48
Speaker 1: National security advisor, who is the gatekeeper to the president
44:52
Speaker 1: on all matters of foreign policy and national security, and
44:56
Speaker 1: he or she decides what's worth taking to the PRESI
45:00
Speaker 1: in it, and specifically what's worth waking the president up
45:03
Speaker 1: at three am? Have you ever heard that story about
45:08
Speaker 1: Um Carter, Jimmy Carter's national security advisor? Are you ready
45:13
Speaker 1: to hear me? Drone on? Okay? So, back in November
45:18
Speaker 1: of nine, at three am around then, Um Big New Brasinski,
45:26
Speaker 1: who was the national security advisor to Carter, um got
45:31
Speaker 1: a call from NORAD that showed that the Soviet Union
45:36
Speaker 1: had launched nuclear missiles at the United States and they
45:39
Speaker 1: were on their way. And it was up to Prasinski
45:43
Speaker 1: to decide whether this was a fluke and a glitch
45:48
Speaker 1: in Norah's system or first just a teenager in the
45:51
Speaker 1: Pacific Northwest exactly trying to change his grades right. So
45:54
Speaker 1: this guy in the middle of the night had the
45:57
Speaker 1: terrible job of do I kick this up to the
46:00
Speaker 1: president and let the person who could launch a nuclear
46:04
Speaker 1: counter attack on the Soviet Union make that decision? Or
46:08
Speaker 1: do I sit on this and say this is not real,
46:12
Speaker 1: this is a fluke, this is a Norag glitch. And uh,
46:16
Speaker 1: he had to decide it, and he decided, no, it's
46:19
Speaker 1: a glitch. And he was right, it was a glitch.
46:21
Speaker 1: And apparently that happened a number of times. Uh, we
46:25
Speaker 1: came very close to launching a counter attack against a
46:28
Speaker 1: phantom strike that hadn't actually been launched during the Cold War,
46:32
Speaker 1: and Brazilski apparently had nerves of steel when it came
46:35
Speaker 1: to stuff like that. But that's a pretty good example
46:38
Speaker 1: of what a national security advisors meant to do. Like
46:41
Speaker 1: you're the person, the last person to decide whether to
46:43
Speaker 1: take it to the president and escalate it or not. Wow.
46:48
Speaker 1: I say wow as well. Well, And uh, because I
46:51
Speaker 1: know people the of Keen I of pop culture history
46:55
Speaker 1: will point this out, We'll beat you to the punch.
46:57
Speaker 1: And note that that is the second Dabney Coleman reference
47:00
Speaker 1: in the show. Oh yeah, nice was not expecting that
47:04
Speaker 1: I forgot. He was great in both movies. So if
47:07
Speaker 1: we can just work in a nine to five reference
47:09
Speaker 1: before it's all out, I think he's just man. He
47:13
Speaker 1: was great, really loved love Dabney Coleman. Uh is he
47:18
Speaker 1: still around? I think he's still alive and doesn't act much? Oh? Well,
47:24
Speaker 1: good for him. He's enjoying life unless he's uh, unless
47:28
Speaker 1: he's unless he's recently passed on. Yeah, I don't know.
47:33
Speaker 1: I could be thinking of that movie Short Time where
47:35
Speaker 1: he was dying and tried to get himself killed so
47:39
Speaker 1: his family could get his pension. That was a good
47:42
Speaker 1: movie too, which one Short Time. I don't think i've
47:46
Speaker 1: seen that one either. Oh, check it out. You need
47:48
Speaker 1: to do a double feature short Time in the interview,
47:51
Speaker 1: Hey he's still alive. Confirmed. Hey Dabney Coleman. Are you
47:56
Speaker 1: got anything else? Um? I don't think so. Um. I
48:02
Speaker 1: have one more movie recommendation. It's a documentary called The
48:06
Speaker 1: Fog of War. That was a good one. Oh, and
48:11
Speaker 1: I have a reading recommendation to fortune to anyone, of course,
48:16
Speaker 1: But have you ever read have you seen Zero Dark thirty? Okay,
48:20
Speaker 1: so apparently as far as um Seymour Hirsch, the great
48:24
Speaker 1: investigative journalists, says that is all bs it's government propaganda
48:30
Speaker 1: and that whole official Mark Bowden zero Dark thirty account
48:34
Speaker 1: of how bin Laden was found not necessarily the rate itself,
48:37
Speaker 1: but how he was found in everything leading up to
48:39
Speaker 1: the raids is just spin, and that it actually was
48:43
Speaker 1: much simpler and less glamorous than that. Um and he
48:46
Speaker 1: wrote a series of essays for the London Review of
48:50
Speaker 1: Books and specifically the killing of Osama bin Laden. That
48:53
Speaker 1: one um kind of lays out the whole thing behind it.
48:57
Speaker 1: It's pretty interesting to how it really went down. Was
48:59
Speaker 1: they were like, we need to find where Osama bin
49:01
Speaker 1: ladnez And someone called in and said he's right over there.
49:04
Speaker 1: I see him. He's in a McDonald's. It went almost
49:08
Speaker 1: like that, except the first part where they said we
49:10
Speaker 1: need to find out where he is didn't happen. Somebody
49:13
Speaker 1: just walked in and then said, hey, he's a McDonald's
49:16
Speaker 1: and they said we should spank him. Yeah. Remember the
49:19
Speaker 1: time I saw John Cryer at McDonald's and Los Angeles.
49:22
Speaker 1: You remember that the day after this Charlie Sheen freak
49:24
Speaker 1: out was going on. Man, that was what a day
49:28
Speaker 1: to see John Cryer. Yeah, is he elated or was
49:32
Speaker 1: he he was stress stress eating McDonald's breakfast because his
49:38
Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollar Mercedes. Yeah, his um, his cash cow
49:41
Speaker 1: of a TV show, was being threatened by his cookie
49:44
Speaker 1: co star. Didn't he pay money to go see Charlie Sheen?
49:49
Speaker 1: Did I? Yeah? No, no, no, Mike Tyson Okay, no,
49:52
Speaker 1: I've never seen remember when he went on tour for
49:55
Speaker 1: some reason, I thought you went to that. No, but
49:58
Speaker 1: I have more respect for you than to think that
50:00
Speaker 1: you actually would have paid money for that. Right, I've
50:02
Speaker 1: gotten in free maybe right. Uh, if you want to
50:06
Speaker 1: know more about the National Security Council, just go to
50:08
Speaker 1: the White House and knock on the front door and
50:10
Speaker 1: ask him to give you a tour, right, yep. Uh.
50:14
Speaker 1: In the meantime, actually probably shouldn't do that. Uh, it's
50:18
Speaker 1: just type national Security Counsel in the search bar how
50:20
Speaker 1: stuff works, and it'll bring up this article. And since
50:23
Speaker 1: I said that, it's time for listening. Mate. Uh, my
50:27
Speaker 1: friend Tracy called Steeve Ann and she said he looks
50:32
Speaker 1: like a beach bar drunk. Yeah, yeah, I can see that. Actually, Yeah,
50:38
Speaker 1: like he looks like he should be wearing flip flops
50:41
Speaker 1: in every photo. Well, he used to. And then somebody said,
50:44
Speaker 1: you need to start wearing suits, right, Um, all right,
50:49
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call this um empathy response. Hey, guys, listened
50:54
Speaker 1: to empathy today. I had a good laugh at Chuck's
50:56
Speaker 1: impression of a doctor falling to pieces because something similar
50:59
Speaker 1: happened to me when I was routine. I was junior
51:01
Speaker 1: in high school. Summer between junior and senior year, my
51:04
Speaker 1: parents sent me to scout camp. A few days in
51:06
Speaker 1: the trip, when the other kids cast a fishing line
51:09
Speaker 1: without any bait, and uh, I walked right behind him,
51:12
Speaker 1: and the hook lodged right into my eyeball, not the
51:15
Speaker 1: skin around my eye, the eyeball. A few hours later,
51:18
Speaker 1: I was at Valley Children's near Fresno and for emergency surgery,
51:22
Speaker 1: waiting for them to prepare an operating room, and the
51:24
Speaker 1: antistisiologists came in and looked at my eye and shouted, Oh,
51:28
Speaker 1: my god, his eye is going to collapse. I'm transgender,
51:34
Speaker 1: so calling me he made sense at the time, by
51:36
Speaker 1: the way, hearing a doctor say something like that about
51:39
Speaker 1: my eyeball would probably have freaked me out in any
51:41
Speaker 1: other circumstance, But they had me drugged up pretty good
51:44
Speaker 1: at the time. Um Still, I remember thinking that the
51:47
Speaker 1: reaction was probably not how a doctor should react the
51:50
Speaker 1: things that they want to keep their patients calm. Unfortunately,
51:53
Speaker 1: I had a happy ending. The talented surgeon who took
51:56
Speaker 1: care of me, got the hook out without any damage
51:57
Speaker 1: to my sight, and well married every The only evidence
52:01
Speaker 1: that ever happened is a very faint scar on the
52:05
Speaker 1: white of my eye. And people that this doesn't close
52:10
Speaker 1: quite as much as the one in the other eye,
52:12
Speaker 1: aren't your mirror neurons is going preserve right now in
52:15
Speaker 1: the worst way. Well it's funny, um because she said
52:19
Speaker 1: I didn't read that part, but she said get ready
52:21
Speaker 1: for your mirror neurons to fire at the beginning. Anyhow,
52:25
Speaker 1: thanks for all the laughs and knowledge you guys drop
52:27
Speaker 1: on me during my commute. Started my job new job
52:29
Speaker 1: as a science writer for cal Tech last week, and
52:33
Speaker 1: I've been recommending stuff you should know to my very
52:35
Speaker 1: smart new coworkers. And that is from Emily Blasco. Thanks
52:39
Speaker 1: a lot, Emily, great one. That was terrible and horrible,
52:43
Speaker 1: but great. Yes, I'm glad it all worked out for you,
52:45
Speaker 1: and good luck is a science writer send us all
52:47
Speaker 1: of your interesting articles please. If you have some interesting
52:52
Speaker 1: articles you want us to read, maybe we'll turn it
52:54
Speaker 1: into a Stuff you Should Know episode Who Knows Uh.
52:57
Speaker 1: You can tweet them to us at s y s
52:59
Speaker 1: K podcast. You can also hang out with me on
53:01
Speaker 1: Twitter at Josh Underscore um Underscore Clark. You can hang
53:05
Speaker 1: out with Chuck on Facebook at Charles W. Chuck Bryant,
53:09
Speaker 1: or you can hang out with us at Stuff you
53:11
Speaker 1: Should Know on Facebook two. You can send us both
53:13
Speaker 1: and Jerry an email to Stuff Podcast at how stuff
53:16
Speaker 1: Works dot com, and as always, you can come hang
53:19
Speaker 1: out with us at a luxurious home on the web
53:22
Speaker 1: stuff you Should Know dot com. For more on this
53:28
Speaker 1: and thousands of other topics, is it how stuff Works
53:31
Speaker 1: dot com