on competition happens constantly in many forms amongst nations of the world in diplomatic informational military and economic arenas rivals often challenge each other in one of them while they cooperate in a different one well that’s good to know isn’t it isn’t it good to know that we can be competing in one thing and cooperating in something else simultaneously competitors include a wide range of political actors from nation states to groups organized around a single cause while discussion below will often refer to state versus state rivalries in most cases the ideas apply equally to challenges with non-state actors competition in various forms among various different actors is the norm in international relations so that’s great that they’re talking about international relations and we’re talking about these i keep throwing all these percentages out today is that a good thing i don’t think it’s a good thing it’s a little question it’s questionable is anyone going to be able to check me on my 97 fax no all right well i’m gonna estimate that a vast majority of people that are listening to this podcast are not engaged at a policy level with interstate rivalries so what’s important to recognize is that everything that we’re talking about doesn’t only apply to this country versus that country it applies everywhere continuing on the marine corps participates in the competitions of the united states in many ways foremost among them is to fight and win our nation’s battles and be ready to do so at all times and then it says this war itself is a special kind of competition which is a classic line right uh to say that war itself is a special kind of competition so we salute the marine corps for that statement because it certainly is a special type of competition how it fits in the overall continuum will be explored in detail the very existence of the marine corps is a competitive act as it signals to potential rivals that there are vital interests our nations will go to war to protect and that those of a maritime nature are important enough that we have invested in a dedicated naval expeditionary force to protect them so that’s a big statement and and one thing that i love about this entire manual is this entire manual written by the marine corps and i just want you to pay attention to this and you kind of have to know what’s going on between all the different services you’ve got the army navy air force marines and coast guard and all of them are in competition at all times and not just hey our planes are better than yours and our pilots are better not no not that competitive they’re competing for money for money and so that i’m i hate to do this marine corps because i do love the marine corps but there are just so many maneuvers in this book that that if you read it you go well we better take care of the marine corps we better give them a little edge and that’s one of those lines right there vital interest in our nation just in case you care about the ocean just in case you care about the ocean you might want a marine corps they get that in there but what’s interesting about this is the very existence of the marine corps is a competitive act so how many things do you do or have or say that just just being there is a competitive act go a to your point i mean look that’s i think it’s cool the marine corps wrote this i’m stoked that it’s a marine corps pub i was a marine but just like what you said you could change the words marine corps you could put any word you want in there the existence of the military you just made a connection to family this idea of competition so when when i was looking at this at first not knowing what to expect the connection that i was making of when they’re talking about competing the first thing is competition doesn’t have to be a bad thing that word shouldn’t mean oh that means conflict and we’re fighting that that isn’t what it means and it doesn’t have to be about two nations going to war it doesn’t even have to be about the marine corps and the fact that marine corps wrote it is cool that’s not the point and something else that you’ve been talking about a lot lately and i’ve been i’ve been i’ve been stealing it you’ve been talking a lot about alignment and when there’s conflict in organization we see this at companies we work with all the time what you need to do is find alignment and the thing i was just thinking in that first couple of sentences is competition the more aligned you and i are the healthier the competition is meaning the less likely the outcome is going to be some sort of conflict or a fight if we’re aligned really aligned we might be competing all the time just to make each other better just do a better job for our clients whatever it is and the likelihood of you and i competing and we might be competing every day the likelihood of you and i competing turning it into a conflict is almost zero now if we are highly misaligned misaligned then that competition has the potential of the outcome being much different but competition by itself where it applies and what it means five minutes into it you’re talking family so there’s a connection here that is way deeper than it that first couple of sentences at face values i’m looking oh the marine corps public competition is going to be cool there’s a lot more to it it doesn’t have to be about the marine corps as you’re listening to it either yeah one of the notes that i that i took down um early on where i started talking about 99 the note that i took down when i was reading it for the first time was 99 of the time you don’t have to resort to violence because you can find alignment because as long as you can find and you’ve heard me say that on ef online if you can find alignment well then we can work together if you and i are aligned if you and i are not aligned on 48 different things that are lower level things but we’re aligned at the most important thing we’re good we’re good and the example that what i bring up with companies is hey you know jocko and dave can’t get along oh okay well they can’t get along about what well dave wants to invest in that jocko wants to invest in that dave wants to move here jocko wants to move there okay so they can’t get along okay well let’s ask this question do dave and jocko who work at the same company do they want the company to make money yes do they want to be able to serve their customers yes if we can get aligned on those things then the rest of it is just figuring out the details and the if if we if you do what you were just talking about if the more you think in decentralized command the more you think in in commander’s intent the more you think strategically the less you care about those details you go oh wait oh you want the same thing dude go do whatever you want let me know how i can help because then i think oh none of those details matter at all because you want what i want and if i can just check my ego and go oh oh you know what dude yeah go do that can i back you up give me a call if i can help you the competition part or the conflict part goes away and it allows you to accomplish so many more things if you think in decentralized command rather than just the action of oh well i’m a leader i have to push some decisions down to my next layer down that’s the the actions of decentralized command you were talking about thinking a decentralized command that’s what lets you not worry about all those details yeah and by the way if i want dave to be at point a and d i know that dave knows to go to point a i don’t care how he gets there but what’s important is that allows me to look forward to look to the next point to look to point b or c or d because i’m not worried about how dave’s gonna get there he’s gonna get there and if he needs some help he knows to call me cool no factor
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