 people and welcome to figments our imagination season whatever episode quite a few i think this is the 37th episode how'd you like that new graphic with the arrow on target they did that and didn't tell me about it but it's uh important because on december 6th on my figments on reality i predicted that i'm crime was the end of the pandemic guess what looks like i was right uh many are saying that i hope so let's pray for that let's pray for a real return or a real emergence from the pandemic because the norm was going to be different etc i'm very excited about today's show i've got a great friend a wonderful guy and we're both connected with an institution that we care a lot the daniel k and way asia pacific center for security studies in honolulu and now full disclosure if i could yeah i gotta show you the slide that i was actually there and i was that the director dki apc ss from 2012 to 2017 hard to believe five years ago i've got a picture here of me with somebody who's kind of important um he's now the secretary of state secretary blinken but what i want to say that i think my guests will agree with is the most important people who come through there are not the guests not the distinguished visitors they're the participants the alumni they're quite amazing hey pete guzman tout out we're admiral retired welcome to figments the power of imagination you're the director now man yes i am fig thank you so much for actually having me in your show i've always wanted to be part of this and now i'm here i've reached a big time thank you my friend i don't know if it's the big time we're not up to joe rogan or cat video numbers but um but who cares it's it's good to have the amazing friends i've had the opportunity to make over my life on and talk about what they do uh not what i did i i suspect that much of your last four years have been digging skeletons out of the closet and putting them in the ground on work from where i left them um but dki apc ss is a is a unique and remarkable institution that changes the world and that's our theme today is changing the world because they do but before we do that i've got to let our folks know you the the alumni have been through apc ss during your time and my time are no doubt connecting and i say aloha uh to all of you and mahalo for your kakua from tom patikula um but but for everybody else tell us about yourself your roots in guam um and your time in the navy let's start with guam big family kind of big family right yeah so uh thank you for that and i always start uh with looking at a person and where they were raised and how they look because really that kind of shapes their life and their thinking and uh thank you for bringing that up because i am very proud to say that i am from guam where america state begins it's born and raised there and never jumped on a plane figment till i went to the academy uh it was a panam plane do you remember panam airlines right and so you know growing up in guam was five boys my dad was in the navy so i'm second generation right and a little known fact what my father was on uss california when pro harbor was attacked and uh yes sir and so second generation five boys i was the only one of five boys to follow in his footsteps uh my brothers and i grew up in a very loving family so what you should know about me is that what centered my life growing up then that's influenced me throughout my whole life has been the emphasis by my parents of family and god and then they also took everything for what it is never taught us to judge always strive to make us do the best we can nothing is ever given to us so my dad worked his heart on the fields and our ranch taught us how to fish but also taught us how to respect and it started with the family and then the last thing that i would say about growing up in guam is uh you know my mom and dad invested on two things with us education all five boys and love and here in in this beautiful island of hawaii that's aloha taught us to be patient told us to be kind respectful all the things that you should to treat other people and and uh when i think about family i think about my own family of my wife and i and marie who you've met before of course married for over 36 years sir 36 beautiful years thanks and uh she's also from guam but i think uh her roots are deeper in the mariana's her mom is from sidepan i didn't know that roots went to sidepan i've been to sidepan and sidepan and and and her dad's from guam and uh in fact general brian fetton yeah always used to say hey p i'm an honorary sidepanese you know and what about you and and i said i can't claim that title brian yeah you can you're married to sidepanese royalty man yes and then finally about family that you should know about me is that amry and i are very blessed with two awesome kids they're no longer kids kind of the angeline was born here being in the navy we've gone so many places but she was born here and she went eighth grade to twelfth grade graduated at iolani and during that time frame is when i met you fig so if you look at time spans you know i stayed here thinking that would be my last tour but not to be but kaiser is an is an incredible iolani grad and she's doing great and we have her son peter justin who you also met yeah i played with peter yeah he's an awesome young man but those that's our family and that's what uh that's my roots sir so our our connection does go back to indopay com and we're both war fighters you were a surface warfare officer in the navy commanded at several levels um i'm gonna talk a bit about some of the recognition you got for that i was a fighter pilot and i still have something in me that's looking for a fight for my wife i'm really trying to tamp that down okay i don't it's not it's not particularly helpful in the home environment but there's something about me that makes me want to turn to the merge and go kick somebody's butt how did people like that wind up at apc ss and i really think the key is the work you do at the end of pacific command then pacific command because it's so diverse so important and gives you such an appreciation that's the breath of security it isn't just can your ship beat their ship or can my jet beat their jet and so we'll get back to that but but i remember those days and you thought you're on your last legs you're the navy career many of us knew that you weren't dan akins for example who was your boss is the j3 but we knew you and that you had a lot to offer what you offered most was heart um so as i read your biography i didn't know this and it happened before you got paycom but before we take a quick break i do want to ask about this in 2001 you received the first emerald zoom wall award for visionary leadership holy cow what's that about hey i uh look sir i am not a 10 foot john you know that if i can only five foot ten and uh i was very humbled by that sir i would i mean that was the first award of the emerald zoom wall and many other great americans have received that but that particular leadership award um comes from the deck played up in other words and i didn't even notice this this nomination occurred after i left the uss the cater uh one of the ships that i commanded it was a it was an arlie berg destroyer if you're not familiar with that name uh tdg yeah right and so when i left i was notified by the bureau that a uh my people back on the ship has saw this award uh for inspirational leadership and put my name in that hat and then the rest was history but i i take no credit for it because that success of that command was really about the shipmates and the crew and the officers and the chiefs and i was very blessed sir that's really their award not mine because they really inspired me i understand that i am as you may know i may have told you i'm writing my memoirs which is going to be a long endeavor i only have till the end of the year to get it done for a locally imposed deadline if you will here in the house um but it it has given me a lot of time to reflect on what those things mean and what those are an award like that pete correct me if i'm wrong is not a popularity contest no they're not putting it forward because you're the nicest smiley friend like you guy it's because they want to succeed as a team and you help their success that's how i see it you agree i i couldn't agree with you more and in fact a question that's asked about me you know for being in the nate for 37 years because i joined in 1976 and i wasn't enlisted because i went to naps yep the question i had last academy preparatory school for those who don't speak acronym thank you and they always asked me you know why did you stay in it was definitely not for the money right say although i know you uh i know you aviators got a bonus not like whatever whatever whatever because you had gravity on your side generally as long as you kept the wet water on the outside of the boat and for the record even though i give aviators both navy air force and anybody else that flies even army i do have a lot of respect for you i through the years and seeing what you all do up there i mean it takes a certain kind of a jib to be crazy enough to go in that cockpit and do what you guys do but i digress so back to what i was talking about you know when people talk about this leadership award i mean it makes sense across the board for anyone that stayed in the military because it is hard there's a lot of sacrifice but we stayed in i believe that i found as a unifying theme is that you know i really gravitated and i grew as a person and i was really inspired i don't know how many countless times by the spirit of team camaraderie and nobody everyone's looking after each other you know how you always talk about the sense about the military sometimes could be the social experimenting ground you know why because it's fertile to be able to accept and absorb these challenges that we have and say well i look at you as an individual but you're part of a bigger thing part of a bigger effort and value and that's where i think the uss to cater really really manifested itself in terms of leadership right when you give your people a safe environment to do their best not worry about failing as an individual but succeeding as a team my god those guys were pumped up they were they were mortared up sir they were like wow sign me up so we learned that at the tactical level pete and then got a chance to come to apc ss and see it on a truly global scale let me talk about that after a quick break so if we could let me tell you what i'm going to talk about next in two weeks on uh february 22nd 21st sorry uh same bat time same bat channel 2 p.m. why standard time later on vimeo and youtube i'm going to talk about imagining north korea's motives shooting a lot of missiles now doing a lot of north korea like stuff i'm not sure there's been a good discussion why what is the central motivation for their activities and spoiler alert here it comes i believe that the relationship with the united states is central to most things north korea does not the are okay not china not sanctions not news and i'll tell you why then hopefully i'll have my good buddy simon lee who if he's watching this show just found out i'm going to ask him to be on the dart us diplomat but i'll see you in two weeks for that show okay pete back to apc ss um it is well let me first disclose the public will be amazed by this hidden deep in the heart of wikiki and folks don't notice it but it's right at the corner of kala kala and ala moana and by the hill in the hawaiian village and and it's the most awesome location ever tell me tell me about the the the edifice the place the building a little bit how you see it i know well i'll tell you though you could answer that question better than i do since you preceded me in this awesome like most awesome job in the world as the director of this great institution but the the the center started actually not in the corner of uh of ala moana and kala kala it actually the first one was in the wikiki trade center as you know back in 1995 so this this awesome center which is a world-class institution started about 26 or 26 years ago and and it went from that idea of bringing folks together to where we're at now where we are at 2058 malohia malohia in hawaiian means a haven for peace which is perfect for this place because if you think about apc says if somebody asked me hey what is this place i'll go first of all it's a world-class institution so it is at that level and that this institution aspires a free and and and prosperous in the pacific region promoting transparency inclusiveness and just a collaborative way of approach to solving issues and somebody goes what and you go really and this is not a think tank and so i tell people yeah you take uh yes sir you it's a do tank and and uh you talk about change agents you mentioned the changing the world but changing in the world from from a really specific whole society view because here's the miss nomer about apc ss when you see the word do d on it department of defense or even when you get up to the glass door you remember that big the entrance is my bad usually worked yeah you see tourists peering in going hey what's in this building then they see it's a do d institution they almost think oh there must be soldiers airmen so marines tell fighters whatever but it's not because we bring in to understand this complex security environment we bring in a whole society group of professionals civilian military to provide their insights in this very complex world so what you're seeing is a comprehensive view a comprehensive lens of our world today and that's very important because you know some people will say well you're just a military you see things a certain way well you're absolutely right and so the only way we can solve this is pausing for a moment and go well this is what we're thinking what are you thinking and the last thing i'll say about the center it's really awesome because when i came in here they said hey sir the guiding principles about the center and what we live by and what we ask our guests to live by is transparency mutual respect and inclusion and if you think of those three words how powerful are they in in terms of what people relationships so it ain't about the each is here fig you know this there's nothing trans there's nothing trans-actional about this place in fact you don't even give a degree you get an awesome lanyard who whose idea was that the relationships liner was my idea but but you're right and i hadn't thought of it in those terms that's the beauty of it it's not transactional the us department of defense is the host for a couple reasons one connection with the command and the the convening power that it has is being related to paycom to money frankly money but it's it also is at the at the sharpest edge of security but with access to the softest softest edge and if the state department ran it me and i both you know i know we understand the value importance the power of diplomacy and some of that great diplomats but but dod is the right place for it so i i have a slide that you provided me i'm always i don't usually ask for them but i gotta give you credit pete this is this is a pretty good slide about what apc ss does so let's show that talk quickly through it you kind of have already is there anything you want to add about the educate connect and empower that apc ss does in terms of what people might take away from this session and have an attentive program right and you know we could have we could have added even more as a powerful statement of collage of interaction between people because that's what this is right this you bring these professionals together they're not new at this right so you're not looking at somebody trying to get their bachelors or even understand it yeah they're thick they're thick in the mud or they're thick in the pond and if 911 is called they are the people that will be answering the call for their respective countries of organization so what you do is you think about these guys if you want to relate it in Hawaiian terms these guys are awesome fishermen okay some are good in marlin some are good in mahi mahi some are good in paquio whatever but they come together they go hey here's my lure hey did you know that and then everybody starts to share and not just build the understanding but build the network of fishermen right fishermen to do what as i said to promote a free and prosperous and collaborative environment that is very inclusive could you imagine that and so if i can imagine i was sure i know and if if if i could share this because i know a lot of our alumni are there and i hope you're saying yeah you go p you go fig because we're talking about you and i always say to this this center is not the is not the center of gravity but it is a catalyst a change agent for practitioners to go you know what we're not alone and you know what fig when i greet you know this is pre-covid right when i greet the practitioners that come in i say to them hey look you're all accomplished you've all moved out in your in your own respective professions but just know this and you know this better than i do if you want to go somewhere fast go at a low but if you want to go far what do you do you look around you if you want to go far and make it an enduring journey do it together as a team and that's what i want to say to all the alumni that are out there it does matter to leverage the network you've established here and then there's one more thing i want to say right because there's a big so what to this this is not just coming over there and high-fiving going hey i got a lanyard and i went to apcss nope there's a big big expectation that you go out there and help realize this vision we talked about i have one anecdote and i know fig you got hundreds more than i do one person this one person came up to me and this is a non-attribution world which means we can't quote you by name by person by country or organization without your permission so i can't tell this person's name but this person came up to me right before graduation of a five week course and said director i just want to let you know totally unsolicited fig she said oops i shouldn't have said she but the person said i had a very adverse view of the united states before coming to this course very adverse and she goes but this five weeks turned my view around 180 degrees and i said really and he goes no you don't understand 180 degrees he goes i had to see that myself i had to feel that myself i thought you guys were going i was going to come here and you were going to feed me with all these policies and the us this and the us that but you actually listened to us and we all grew collectively so she goes i'm going home i'm a senior policy advisor to my president and i'm going to bring that inclusive respectful transparent attitude that you shared with me here so thank you very much so you know when you think about apcss it's transformational it is and i'm going to hijack the next two or three minutes so that we get to our 30 minute point covering what we need to and i'd like you to close with where apcss is going here in 2022 because you've been through a couple years of the old normal a couple years of pandemic abnormal and now we're moving you're moving out save that if you would beat and let me talk a little bit about what you said and what i learned in my five years there and and i got to say to our alumni if you're out there 14 000 of them 10 percent of whom became generals and admirals but half of them were civilians and they're supreme court judges and senior disaster relief officials and and they do change the world and uh you know when i had the opportunity to go through my tenure without pandemic i'd stand up at the beginning and the end of the course and say i expect you to change the world that's that's why you're here not for me not for the united states but for you and your country and they did and i could go on and on but i won't um so as we get to where you're headed let me talk about what i took away from and then if you could add that into your going forward what you've taken away so far here's what i've taken away from apcss for my five beautiful years there one the power of aloha which sounds to the steely eyed killer which i was still got that in me sounds like baloney the aloha is so powerful the idea of welcoming people into your home broadly and specifically in treating them with respect it's incredibly powerful dropping pretense it's all done out of uniform without titles that's awesome the second thing that i learned was that we have so much in common that isn't trivial it's easy to say oh we we all have a lot in common kumbaya for the security professionals who attend apcss gotta hope there are a lot of alumni watching because i got chicken skin remembering you and i'm married to one we have so much in common about doing well for our people a serious sense of responsibility to our countries to our duties and i don't care if you're a prison official in fiji or a disaster relief official and because i can name that because i'm not really naming anybody in napaul or Bangladesh or an army colonel and name a country we are the same because we've chosen to serve something bigger than ourselves and to be around that in such diversity was beautiful inspiring encouraging and this is kind of a crappy time in the world and i'm not really encouraged about a lot of stuff but i think back to that and i know you're out there and it gives me hope and the last thing i learned there that you know became my top priority peak and that is the role of women in for a variety of reasons women peace and security was my my top priority there and i'm not a politically correct guy so don't look at me like that audience this isn't about allowing something because the power comes to the whole and if you don't have half your society represented in the making and implementing a security policy guess what you're going to screw up it's not going to go well there is a very hard edge a fighter pod i like what works what doesn't work will kill you into it and involving the whole of society folks done women in my case but more generally is what matters most holy crap the engineers are telling us pete that we're almost done so i gotta i gotta go to you and apologize for going on and on but you know what a labor of passion this is um what's next for apcss we're gonna run a little over talking about csc i think yeah what's what's next is is where we've been to and and where we've come uh ain't gonna get us where we're gonna go we need to open up the aperture in terms of dialogue and all that and so we're using a lot of the hybrid version but we're also trying to bring back our main batteries to come back and so in this complex world fake we're coming up with a new course called the comprehensive security cooperation that's more adaptable and flexible versus just talking about crisis management or terrorism or maritime security or whatever i'm bringing in different disciplines of practitioners to be able to cross-pollinate give them critical think and then ask the question when they leave as a group and a network what is in the realm of possible because my last point is this okay the 20 the Indo-Pacific is coined as the region of consequence in the 21st century but that's not a given thing we can really screw this up if we don't if we don't talk about being collaborative and inclusive to include women the role women piece of security we can really screw this up right in the we're in the red zone if you ask me when i say we're in the red zone we are the generation and we are about to hand it to the the next generation to score the touchdown and what is the touchdown anything your heart desires your dreams your figments what is in the realm of possible and that's why i want to close it with this i really do want to thank everyone out there that have their oars in the water and they're rolling hard and just know you're not alone and then when you come to the center you're coming for a haven of peace to be able to build on that momentum that you are all generating and we're here for you and if you ever want to see fig come over here let me know i can get fig over here in the center how to find me yeah hey that's awesome we we could go on because uh because the center so amazing our alumni so great alumni if you want to connect connect with me find me on facebook linkedin whatever you know how to find pete through the through the apcss website and through john gastron everybody else who you remember there uh i might have you back maybe in a year or so to talk about csc and how it went and about your next figment which i know about hey folks i have to close with and thanks pete aloha brother we gotta go let me close with what would fig do fig would certainly not do anything different than be the director at apcss that day okay anyway asia pacific center for security studies for five years because i've learned so much from all of you um so what would fig do think about that look for what we have in common commit to public service and be a patriot but be a thoughtful patriot so uh aloha uh i feel good all day uh having connected with the center and with pete gument how to wear animal retired us navy on figments the power of imagination and i will see you in two weeks thanks to think tech that enables us citizen journalists to bring our message messages thoughts to you and share them so aloha see you in two weeks