The NXR Podcast - THE LIVESTREAM - Military Service in a Nation That’s Lost Its Way

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00:00:26.800 Dying for your country has always been considered honorable.

00:00:30.000 But what if your country sends you to die not to defend your own homeland, but to keep shipping

00:00:37.000 lanes open for multinational corporations in the Red Sea? See, many Christians still see military 1.00

00:00:44.400 service as a badge of patriotism, a way to protect home and uphold duty. And with Pete Hedgeseth now 0.90

00:00:53.180 scrubbing the ranks of DEI policies, removing rainbow flags from barracks, and halting transgender

00:00:59.660 enlistment, some believe the military is finally turning a corner. But what we need to ask is this,

00:01:07.100 turning toward what? Because beneath the optics of reform, the machinery still grinds forward,

00:01:14.440 sending Christian sons into foreign deserts and oceans to enforce someone else's order, 0.87

00:01:20.740 while our own border remains porous and undefended. Here's our argument. 0.92

00:01:26.860 Defending your homeland is biblical.

00:01:29.480 Dying for your neighbor is noble. 0.73

00:01:32.060 But joining a military that may send your son to fight for diversity slogans or for

00:01:38.120 the GDP of foreign nations is not just a personal choice. 0.81

00:01:42.860 It's a moral and theological question that Christian families can no longer ignore.

00:01:49.260 This episode is brought to you by our premier sponsors Armored Republic and Reese Fund, 0.53

00:01:54.820 as well as our Patreon members and our generous donors. You can join our Patreon by going to

00:02:00.960 patreon.com forward slash right response ministries, or you can make a donation by

00:02:07.460 going to right response ministries.com forward slash donate. So should you encourage your sons

00:02:14.720 to serve or is the current military still too compromised to entrust with their lives? We'll

00:02:21.260 walk through the recent reforms, the foreign entanglements, and what Scripture has to say

00:02:26.900 about loyalty, love of country, and the just use of force.

00:02:40.520 All right. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Happy to see you all. Happy Friday. It is indeed a

00:02:46.280 happy Friday. So this is a topic that I am excited to get into. For one, it has a lot of personal

00:02:52.920 application because my son is 18. And a number of years ago, he expressed a desire to join the

00:02:59.960 Air Force. My father-in-law went to the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. And my son, you know,

00:03:04.900 grew up hearing stories about his time there and just really, really wanted to apply for the Air

00:03:09.940 force academy wanted to go there and uh the air force is not off the table for us but i told him

00:03:16.080 he's graduating this spring i you know we we decided i told him and he agreed um that it's

00:03:22.660 not an option for this fall right so maybe a couple years down the road if things get cleaned

00:03:26.920 up in the military or it looks like the country is is headed in a particular direction uh we will

00:03:31.960 revisit it so i'll tip my hand there um that i think from conversations i've had and research

00:03:37.920 that i've done for this episode and just talking with him i think that it's it's a time to be

00:03:42.660 cautious about sending your son into the military so my cards on the table there from the beginning

00:03:46.920 never my bona fides to that i've been i joined the military 2013 at 18 i was in the marine corps

00:03:52.860 for four years my sister then went in this was like 2018 2019 she did four years and my brother

00:03:59.160 is finishing up his fifth year in the army just this year so we're talking over a decade my dad

00:04:04.520 and my uncle were both Marines, so very familiar with the environment. Same thing, grew up hearing

00:04:08.240 the stories, enlisted myself, and so that's my background as well. Yep, absolutely. So this is

00:04:13.500 a topic that I think really strikes home for a lot of Christians, because number one, based on

00:04:20.080 the research that I was doing, 70% of the military is made up of people who identify as Christians.

00:04:27.020 So predominantly, Christians join the military, or I guess to be technically accurate, the military

00:04:32.820 is made up predominantly of Christians. And as far as the rank and file, the enlisted men,

00:04:37.180 things like that, 70% of the military claims to be Christian, which is a very large minority.

00:04:41.980 It's bigger than the majority. It's bigger than the majority of Christians in the country overall.

00:04:47.800 And so there is something, and there has been something in the Christian perspective,

00:04:53.040 American Christian perspective, that honors and esteems military service. And that has been

00:04:57.860 really from the beginning with the black robed regiment preaching their sermons and then casting 0.95

00:05:03.700 off their their robes of clerical robes and then going off to lead their men into yeah yeah the

00:05:09.840 the military colonial uh uniform you're telling me our military is made up of uh men that are

00:05:15.640 willing to make a difference men generally in good shape and they also happen to be majority

00:05:19.420 christian yep who could have thought the men actually making a difference taking care of

00:05:23.460 themselves shocking on average on the whole and let me say too a lot of that it's uh it's cultural

00:05:28.940 south so there's tons of guys they were talking about a good time with their girlfriend on friday

00:05:32.960 they were going to church on sunday there was certainly a lot of that but by and large on the

00:05:37.280 whole like for sure when i was in the military christian was most certainly the name of the game

00:05:41.640 i can't remember anyone of another faith be it muslim or certainly maybe your share of atheists

00:05:46.460 but that was by and large the majority well to your point the 24 so there's 70 percent of the

00:05:52.300 military are Christian, the 24% that's after that was just undisclosed, right? And then there was a

00:05:58.880 very small minority, like less than 1% of atheist or Jew or Muslim or that sort of thing. So

00:06:06.460 predominantly Christian, and even though it says 70%, probably a lot of those 24% would,

00:06:13.160 if you had pressed them on it, say, well, yeah, I grew up going to church or something like that.

00:06:16.640 So the other thing, the other reason why this has been a compelling option for Christian

00:06:22.420 families is simply just from advancing your sons into life sort of option.

00:06:29.220 There are men that I know, even men that go to our church that did a military career.

00:06:34.420 They got out of the military.

00:06:35.740 You've got connections.

00:06:36.800 You've got a whole post-military industry that you can join.

00:06:40.420 And for a lot of our history, maybe, that actually was quite a good option.

00:06:44.960 path into the middle class or even in some cases beyond that if you if you retire as a as a as a

00:06:51.880 colonel or a general or something like that and you've got connections and you go private like

00:06:55.740 that actually can be quite a profitable move and so a lot of families would look at that and they'd

00:07:00.340 say okay well not only is it honorable to defend your country to die for your neighbor potentially

00:07:06.020 but also it's a way of providing a way for you to get your education to advance financially even and

00:07:12.580 you get a pension. It really has a lot, has had a lot of positives. Wes, I don't know if you want

00:07:20.180 to talk about some of the benefits that you received just from the GI Bill and all of those

00:07:25.400 things. Like it's pretty remarkable. We'll get into the influence in a minute, which is a real

00:07:29.420 question. But to your point about kind of like 18 to 22, you can't think of a better system. It's

00:07:34.800 going to make someone be in shape. It's going to make them get up early. It's going to make them

00:07:37.780 go to a job. I mean, you can't really be fired short of doing something illegal and getting

00:07:42.140 kicked out or leaving yourself so you're talking about four years when a young man is the most

00:07:46.100 prone to be headstrong the most prone to get into trouble the most prone to partying and being

00:07:51.480 irresponsible in many ways that's a great thing for someone's 18 to 22 and it started as a bit

00:07:56.320 of those guardrails during those four years that a young man that could have gone one way or the

00:07:59.740 other it was really actually the military they straightened him out and kept him so that as a guy

00:08:03.440 who could hold a job it's a person who could do a good work guy who could be responsible all of

00:08:07.780 that and so certainly an advantage on that perspective the people you encounter that's

00:08:12.100 another question we'll get into that but for sure the the va home loan so every veteran who serves

00:08:16.980 i think it's 36 months of active duty discharged honorably or might even be like general so honorable

00:08:23.380 or general discharge 36 months active duty you have eligibility to the va home loan as well as

00:08:28.960 the postline 11 gi bill and i mean those two things so home education home education those

00:08:34.440 are some of the hardest things to do financially, especially today. So I took the GI bill and I went

00:08:40.760 and I got my undergraduate degree and my master's degree out of it. And I graduated with zero

00:08:44.860 dollars in debt. And I was supported to do that all the way through all of those years. Eventually

00:08:49.420 towards the end with my master, I was working and doing my master's program. But like guys,

00:08:54.180 we're talking about like some semesters because I went to Columbia for a bit, $60,000 for a given

00:08:59.840 academic year that I had to take on in student loan debt. That would have been, that would have

00:09:03.860 addled me until 35 40 yep paid for same thing then on the home loan side you can get a home loan at

00:09:10.120 a good rate and you don't have to put a down payment down up to it's about 720 000 so you

00:09:15.880 have that much eligibility no home loan required and no pmi so you're two that's big things that

00:09:21.480 you're tackling at 22 years old what am i going to get educated in and that covers technical school

00:09:26.120 covers trade school it covers you want to go be a pilot covers all those different things paid for

00:09:30.800 a stipend even to make it happen and then on the other side getting a home i mean i was able to own

00:09:35.440 a home a lot earlier than my peers and i actually use it i manipulated it well so i got two homes

00:09:40.440 out of that 720 000 and then rent one of them out it was a huge start to my professional life

00:09:45.780 by going to the military yeah yeah yeah absolutely and i i can attest to you know just talking to

00:09:51.240 wes and um sometimes thinking like how can you do that and he's like well i've got the

00:09:54.500 the gi bill or the the home loan oh yeah right yeah i forgot about that yeah and so this has

00:09:59.640 been a really compelling option, both financially and both for the sense of duty and loyalty

00:10:05.180 and patriotism that Christian families want to instill into their sons. 0.99

00:10:08.680 So there's a reason why it's been so popular.

00:10:11.900 Now, couple that with the fact that for the last decade or so, military recruitment has

00:10:18.580 been way, way, way down.

00:10:21.180 And it's been dropping year over year over year.

00:10:24.080 Not just the size of the military, because some people would say, well, we don't need

00:10:27.840 as big of a military anymore because we're not in a war with Russia because our weapon systems are

00:10:33.820 it's a drone warfare yeah it's it's all this kind of more high-tech warfare so we don't need the

00:10:39.300 standing army that we used to have I mean it used to be about three million people and now it's

00:10:43.160 about 1.3 million people but it's not just the size of the military but it's the recruitment

00:10:48.400 numbers that have been dropping steadily over the last little while so Nate maybe you can put up

00:10:52.740 image number one and we'll take a look at some of the details here with the with the drop in

00:10:58.640 recruitment in recruitment yep so this was just the military size okay since 1985 uh the the

00:11:06.100 highest number there was in 1990 that was around three million people and obviously there were

00:11:11.720 reasons for that right like we were in desert storm yep there were actually hot conflict that

00:11:16.740 we were involved with we were coming off the cold war um and so the military numbers were very large

00:11:22.320 And it's dropped, right?

00:11:24.520 But let's look at the next one, Nate.

00:11:26.180 This is the recruitment numbers over time.

00:11:29.340 And so this is a 40-year low in 2020 that we hit.

00:11:35.040 And so this is the number of people who are enlisting in the military year over year from

00:11:40.980 1976 on to right now.

00:11:44.620 And what's crazy about this is, Wes, like you mentioned, the GI Bill is post 9-11.

00:11:52.320 Right. And so this military enlistment number, the peak of it was back in the 70s where the GI Bill did not exist.

00:12:00.240 The VA home loan did, but the GI Bill did not. The VA home loan did, yes, but the GI Bill did not.

00:12:04.680 And so even as seemingly benefits have increased, I think wages have increased.

00:12:10.000 There's been talk about that some, but certainly the post-military benefits have increased.

00:12:15.180 the numbers have decreased of enlisted um well so that begs the question of why that would be

00:12:28.080 and there's lots of reasons for it a lot of a lot of the failure to believe in the american project

00:12:33.060 right that is uh present among youth and and people are more cynical about the country

00:12:38.180 a lot of it the fact that the the nation is more uh mixed with with different peoples here right

00:12:43.700 And they don't have the same, necessarily the same sort of fidelity to the country. 0.97

00:12:48.220 Although I want to be careful there because even coming through World War II, there were

00:12:51.820 people around the nations that did serve in the U.S. military.

00:12:56.580 But a lot of it has been pretty well documented.

00:13:00.520 And Pete Hanks' book was about this, the wokeness and the DEI and just the lack of excellence

00:13:06.080 and zeal for excellence and for battle readiness that the military used to have that they

00:13:13.680 they no longer had so the last thing i want to mention here before we start looking at some of

00:13:19.560 the other um things that pete hegseth has done is this while the military has been declining

00:13:26.380 when trump got elected december was the highest december in like 20 years of recruitment in in

00:13:35.100 the in military history okay um in the last 20 years and trump and hegseth came out and said

00:13:41.480 this is because trump has promised to restore order okay to restore battle readiness to restore

00:13:48.280 um a a spirit of the warrior again we're getting rid of the dei we're getting rid of the woke we're

00:13:55.400 going to stop saluting men wearing dog masks things like that and i believe that's true i

00:14:00.200 believe that's true however as i was researching for this i found a number of articles where people

00:14:05.160 came out and said no no no biden gets credit for this because actually the whole year of 2024

00:14:11.480 the numbers were going up slightly, right?

00:14:14.600 They're saying we had already turned their corner

00:14:16.220 on recruitment and the things that we were trying to do

00:14:19.080 as the military, offering better incentives

00:14:20.640 and all these things, we already saw the fruits of that

00:14:23.380 and January was just the culmination of everything

00:14:25.940 that the Biden administration had been trying to do.

00:14:28.620 Well, here's the black pill for us.

00:14:31.700 It's true that indeed military numbers,

00:14:36.060 recruitment numbers had been increasing through 2024.

00:14:38.540 What they're not saying is most of that

00:14:41.080 was because so many more women were enlisting.

00:14:44.560 So Nate, let's show that third graph.

00:14:46.700 No, don't love that at all.

00:14:48.420 This doesn't show necessarily

00:14:49.980 the percentage of the growth that was from women,

00:14:52.880 but this just shows, even back in 2017,

00:14:56.060 this was already starting,

00:14:57.900 the percentage of each of the branches of the military 1.00

00:15:02.180 that's made up by women. 0.95

00:15:03.800 Okay, so the Air Force, active personnel, 20%, 0.99

00:15:06.740 reserve personnel, 27%,

00:15:09.340 and guard personnel 21 percent obviously the marines is a lot lower um kudos to the marines

00:15:15.460 they are much more physically demanding eight percent of active duty personnel were women

00:15:19.320 and four percent were reserve of the reserve personnel were women i'll point out too on the

00:15:25.340 women's side um something i've been noticing and i've heard other women say this is corporate

00:15:29.660 america is really they're really turning on it like now it's a little bit of a day late a dollar

00:15:34.740 short you know like well we're 40 years into feminism and i actually don't really like that 0.82

00:15:39.300 you know i'm having to work 45 hours under fluorescent lights and pay for my own apartment 0.92

00:15:43.620 and i'm not really protected so they don't really like it but i think a lot of women are being driven

00:15:47.460 to join the military because they have debt so they're like i have tons of debt and i'm struggling

00:15:53.220 to find a job and at the end of the day like i you know i'm in decent shape enough that doesn't sound

00:15:58.420 like too bad of a gig i can go you know live in california i'd have a job that would be stable

00:16:02.980 And so you have to understand that macroeconomic conditions could also influence it too.

00:16:07.020 That it's not necessarily just propaganda.

00:16:09.580 Although most certainly there was propaganda aimed at women to join these different branches,

00:16:13.320 but most certainly also to the macroeconomic conditions that have destroyed women as a whole,

00:16:18.540 that has made them depressed, that has made them anxious, that has made them childless,

00:16:21.480 that has made them in many ways unmarried and not even desiring to be married,

00:16:24.660 has also driven them to the military where they're even less feminine,

00:16:29.160 where they have to march and arrange and go to jobs that are meant for men. 0.60

00:16:35.160 And to that point, Wes, it's really interesting because actually what we find is even active duty women in the military,

00:16:42.660 the numbers show that predominantly they are filling clerical roles in the military.

00:16:48.260 They are doing secretarial roles or management roles or the kind of role that basically they're not getting in corporate America anymore.

00:16:56.180 They're basically, a lot of them, even the active duty ones,

00:16:58.760 they're not necessarily the combat troops, right?

00:17:01.680 They're sitting in the general's office, filing his paperwork for him.

00:17:05.720 That's exactly how in the Marine Corps, your squadron have different shops, 0.98

00:17:08.780 they're called like S-shops, your S-1 is admin, your S-3 is gear, all women. 0.99

00:17:12.860 That would just basically run these things and do the admin for it. 1.00

00:17:15.120 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:17:16.960 So that is the situation as it has been.

00:17:20.220 And, you know, when Trump got elected, a lot of men, young men joined the military on the spot.

00:17:27.380 And a lot of Christian families are now thinking, can we go again?

00:17:30.360 Can we join again? 0.94

00:17:31.640 I wanted to mention a couple of the things that Pete Hegseth has done, even just now since coming into his role as a secretary of defense, because he has been trying to turn the tide.

00:17:45.660 A lot of people want it instantly.

00:17:47.780 They want it now.

00:17:48.560 I get it. Things like this take time, especially when it's so entrenched.

00:17:52.480 So here are a couple of just bullet points of things that Hegseth has been able to do since coming into his position.

00:18:00.540 So Executive Order 14-151 was that they were going to, he oversaw the widespread removal of DEI-related content across military branches.

00:18:13.160 right so really um going after a lot of the dei quotas and um requirements um so so that executive

00:18:24.060 order is being carried out by hagseth um they he has or trump has under him through him dismissed

00:18:31.000 actually quite a few of the senior military officials uh there's no more oh what's that

00:18:35.600 cut you off no more four-star uh women generals anymore yes yes i might cut you off and jumped

00:18:40.280 ahead but no you're okay um well that's exactly the case and um they let go of some of the the

00:18:45.900 really woke um like the admirals things like that um uh lisa frenchetti is is one of those that

00:18:53.960 you're talking about um and so the the dismissals that they have achieved were part of a broader

00:19:00.800 effort to replace leaders associated with dei initiatives and so that that absolutely has

00:19:05.740 happened. They have suspended transgender policies, but this is a thing that's gone back and forth in

00:19:12.540 the courts. Trump's executive order to disallow transgender, so-called transgender people from

00:19:19.440 military service, currently they are still serving. The most recent court of appeals did not allow

00:19:26.020 a stay on a lower court judge's ruling that Trump is not allowed to. So it's going to end up in the

00:19:34.820 Supreme Court until it's decided. The executive order to ban transgender people from the military

00:19:41.760 is not able to be carried out. But it is going to the Supreme Court. We'll see. That can be a bit

00:19:47.880 of a long process, too. And then there has been just a public tenor. This matters, a public tenor

00:19:56.000 where they have publicly denounced these DEI principles. And so even though, for instance,

00:20:00.680 the transgender executive order has been blocked um there has just trump and the white house and 0.88

00:20:07.020 hegseth and all of them have said look they they they qualified as people with a mental

00:20:14.460 disability or mental derangement just a couple of years ago they're not combat ready they don't

00:20:20.400 belong in the military even just that public discourse has been very helpful in pushing the

00:20:25.640 overton and the military i would i would think uh back towards reason and battle readiness so

00:20:31.280 that's kind of where we stand right now that's that's where we've been and where the state of

00:20:35.840 the military is right now we're going to hit our first commercial break here and when we come back

00:20:41.020 we're going to talk about um some of the brewing international conflicts and the reality that if

00:20:49.120 you send your son to the military right now there is a there's a non-zero chance that he would be

00:20:56.160 shipped overseas to die in some proxy war of some sort so that's another consideration we're going

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00:22:43.460 all right welcome back the so a lot of groundwork that we're laying there i wanted to lay just a

00:22:50.680 little bit more groundwork i guess before the actual discussion happens and that is this you

00:22:55.620 know it's funny i when i was younger i didn't totally understand the outrage about the vietnam

00:23:01.980 war right um and the older i get and the more that i see how so many of america's conflicts

00:23:07.660 that we get involved in are really not about defending our soil they're about defending

00:23:13.280 something else now at least with the vietnam war you could say it was about fending off communism

00:23:18.420 right at least there was that but now the the conflict that's brewing i mean which conflict

00:23:23.760 there's ukraine still there's china brewing but the one conflict that i wanted to mention what's

00:23:28.420 that iran iran that's the one that i wanted to mention and so the conflict that's brewing with

00:23:33.300 iran is interesting it starts with the um a terrorist group an islamic group in yemen

00:23:40.540 um and this is the houthi group they've been labeled as a terrorist organization which you

00:23:47.740 know if you haven't been labeled by a terrorist as a terrorist organization by the u.s government

00:23:51.460 what are you doing what are you doing stuff laying around no uh in this case you know they

00:23:56.440 they really do seem to be serious about uh blowing things up and so they are in yemen

00:24:00.940 And Nate, maybe you can pull up image number four here.

00:24:05.080 So this shows the, yep, there it is.

00:24:08.140 The Red Sea is the blue in the middle there.

00:24:09.920 And this is an incredibly important body of water globally

00:24:14.140 because that Red Sea goes all the way up into Egypt.

00:24:19.020 And we have the Suez Canal there,

00:24:21.240 which has made it possible for goods to be transported

00:24:24.080 from Europe over to Asia and even over to the US

00:24:28.060 by going through the Red Sea at a much shorter time.

00:24:32.240 In a minute, not yet, Nate,

00:24:33.320 but in a minute, I'll show some graphs to illustrate that.

00:24:35.400 I know this geography so well

00:24:36.560 because I remember growing up playing Risk

00:24:38.000 and I lost a game one time

00:24:39.560 because in Risk, there is no port across that.

00:24:42.840 And I was so mad, I went back with a pen after the game

00:24:45.120 and I drew the little dashes.

00:24:46.740 So next time it came up, I could cross.

00:24:49.140 I was like, I know there's a canal there.

00:24:50.780 I should be able to do it.

00:24:52.160 It's so much more strategic.

00:24:53.680 But bringing that up was just PTSD.

00:24:56.140 I thought you were going to say,

00:24:57.540 Because, you know, I went overseas and I was in the sand.

00:24:59.340 Well, no, that's true.

00:25:00.000 I was actually there, not by the Red Sea, but over in Kuwait.

00:25:02.920 Yep.

00:25:03.460 Anyway, so this is a tribal group.

00:25:06.060 They're not officially the government of Yemen, as far as I know.

00:25:08.960 And back in 2023, they began from, you saw there on the screen, they have a prominent

00:25:17.220 position on the southeastern edge of the Red Sea.

00:25:21.060 And they began launching rockets at ships that were sailing in to the Red Sea.

00:25:26.360 in particular, they started out by bombing and threatening Israeli ships. But the reality is

00:25:33.300 they quickly started threatening and attacking U.S. ships and ships that were allied with U.S.

00:25:42.200 training partners. Well, the reason why all of this matters is the Houthi are supported by Iran,

00:25:48.320 who are for them because Iran is opposed to Israel. And so the Houthi kind of became the

00:25:54.020 proxy those who were able to take direct action against israel because they're not officially a

00:25:58.800 state they don't have a government they're not in any way allied with any official countries

00:26:04.680 because they've been branded a terrorist organization well the u.s has decided that

00:26:11.040 it is our role to keep shipping lanes open in the red sea and so actually just within the last week

00:26:16.740 we've been launching drone strikes at the huti who are in that that part of the world and this 0.94

00:26:22.580 has kind of just emboldened them and made them entrench themselves even deeper. And the conflict 0.99

00:26:27.640 there is picking up. Now, this is something that really does actually have the potential

00:26:33.800 to boil over into some conflict. Nate, let's show the next image, image number five.

00:26:40.480 The reason why this is so important is because you see there the Suez Canal kind of towards the

00:26:46.180 middle of the screen. This is how long shipping takes from Europe and from other parts of the

00:26:52.640 world if the Red Sea and the Suez Canal are not options. So from Rotterdam in Europe, it would

00:26:59.320 take, for instance, 19 days to get to India. But if they have to go around, it's a 34-day trip

00:27:07.220 by oil tanker, whatever those large ships are called.

00:27:14.220 From the U.S., it adds significant amount of time also,

00:27:20.220 not being able to go through there 0.93

00:27:21.360 and having to go around the bottom of Africa.

00:27:23.960 Nate, next graph, our next image there.

00:27:28.300 So this just shows it a little more simply, I think.

00:27:31.560 Same idea.

00:27:32.800 So really what we're dealing with is we can cut

00:27:34.540 kind of through the continent,

00:27:35.840 through the Mediterranean Sea

00:27:37.220 rather than going around the bottom of Africa.

00:27:40.200 So this raises the question of

00:27:42.400 is it the U.S.'s job

00:27:44.460 to get involved in armed conflict

00:27:46.840 with the Houthi who are allied with Iran

00:27:49.300 who see our allegiance with

00:27:52.340 or our allyship, is it allegiance? 0.59

00:27:55.480 I guess it is allegiance with Israel.

00:27:58.400 The Israel question notwithstanding

00:28:00.120 because we tackled that some already this week earlier

00:28:02.760 But the question of we could be involved in actual conflict with Iran and with the Houthi, sending battle carriers over, over shipping lanes, right, over shipping lanes.

00:28:16.120 Now, shipping lanes are important.

00:28:17.880 Commerce is important.

00:28:18.940 I don't deny that that's a real significant cost increase.

00:28:23.960 It is massively more expensive to ship around the bottom of Africa than going through the Mediterranean and the Suez Canal.

00:28:32.760 I get it, but what we have to understand

00:28:35.660 is the calculus of what determines

00:28:38.300 whether your sons are involved in combat

00:28:40.780 sometimes comes down to,

00:28:43.000 is the US gonna step in and enforce shipping lanes

00:28:45.820 in the Red Sea, or is it gonna step in

00:28:48.400 and defend Ukraine, right?

00:28:54.840 Or all these things that really are,

00:28:57.180 at the end of the day, not any of our business, okay?

00:29:00.260 What products are typically shipped through those lanes?

00:29:02.440 are you aware that's what i was gonna say well 17 of global shipping goes through there

00:29:06.440 but i don't know durable goods you're talking do you know if oil for example probably probably

00:29:12.540 yeah yep yep i don't i didn't i didn't do that research why what's your what's your thinking

00:29:16.560 there i just there's a difference between and that's what's so tough is when you become

00:29:20.020 interconnected yeah and dependent upon different nations like it's one thing with china like what

00:29:24.260 are we dependent on china for like well plastic slot right like we is a lot of merchandise a lot

00:29:28.780 of consumer goods that come from there but then you could have strategic shipments we

00:29:32.220 yep we discover this during covid like a lot of our medicines are made overseas so we're talking

00:29:36.520 a whole different calculus which is oil and medicine we need to make medicine here we need

00:29:40.980 to make chips here and we need to we need to drill we need to drill and uh and be able to have you

00:29:47.100 know all of our energy here if it was if we could do those things here which we can it's just a

00:29:53.200 matter of will and right you know getting rid of all the red tape if we can do those things here

00:29:57.780 then but i guess what i'm trying to say is that it seems like part of the reason you know that

00:30:02.620 our sons potentially would have to go and die for defending shipping lanes is because um because of

00:30:09.900 globalism because we've become so dependent on the rest of the world and so it's not even just

00:30:14.440 we're doing this for other countries it does benefit other countries but we're the ones who

00:30:18.300 always contribute the most so every country benefits by you know by free trade global free

00:30:24.020 trade every every country is having its benefits but we're the ones who make it happen that's

00:30:27.760 right we're the ones that make it you know that make sure that you know like we're the police

00:30:31.440 of the sea you know like with a global navy that makes sure that you know pirating doesn't take

00:30:36.000 over every single you know tanker that's going through this straight so if if that's the case

00:30:41.120 um that you know we're doing all of this everybody's benefiting from it but but nobody's

00:30:45.920 contributing to you know to the degree that we are um it'd be one thing if we're getting like

00:30:50.480 some kind of you know lithium or like some some unique you know rare mineral that god and his

00:30:55.840 sovereignty only placed in one part of the world and it doesn't happen to be here but if we're

00:30:59.840 going to send our sons to war to die for shipping lanes not to protect our homeland but shipping

00:31:05.260 lanes to ship plastic slot from china well here's a breakdown actually or things that matter but

00:31:10.200 things that we could do here at home then we should just start doing them here at home that's

00:31:14.360 my point but nathan pulled this up for us go ahead west okay uh the suez canal for global trade it

00:31:20.080 moves the most of these types of products crude oil petroleum liquefied natural gas containerized

00:31:25.660 goods that's electronics clothing machinery all that dry bowl commodities toys yep uh chemicals

00:31:31.860 and petrochemicals that's stuff used in like plastics production vehicles ag and military

00:31:36.760 cargo so you have a wide variety of things going through them yeah but a lot of that doesn't need

00:31:40.460 to be exactly it only is because it was cheaper on the dollar that's right to make it or to buy

00:31:45.620 it or to import it yeah cheaper on the dollar but then all of our sons can't get a livable wage

00:31:49.900 right correct because we got rid of all the gdp went up you're not looking on the bright side

00:31:54.920 yeah the gdp went up uh so yeah so that that's that was my only point and contribution to the

00:31:59.940 conversation was just to say um i'm with you 100 michael that's a great distinction like are we

00:32:04.840 fighting to protect our homeland and our neighbor and and our families um or are we fighting for

00:32:10.680 the gdp by protecting shipping lanes and that benefits the entire world but the u.s is

00:32:16.600 contributing you know 80 of that defense and every other country does jack squat yeah and the very

00:32:23.080 that we're protecting is like well yeah you know everybody else is getting a free ride but we have

00:32:27.100 to do it because we need it too and nobody else will do it okay but we need what what is it that

00:32:31.860 we're shipping and that's you know and if it turns out what we're shipping is medicine well yeah we

00:32:36.540 need medicine why don't we make medicine here right why don't we make chips here why don't we

00:32:41.300 drill for you know for oil here yeah um we have you know we have incredible resources in this

00:32:47.600 continent that's part of america's incredible success right so like i i believe you know like

00:32:52.380 that a big part of our success, that the quintessential factor is our Christian

00:32:58.660 foundation. I believe that. So like when I look at Christendom and I look at what God did in Europe

00:33:04.040 and then also with, you know, with Western Europeans predominantly coming to America and 0.72

00:33:09.140 what he did here, I'm going to attribute the lion's share of the credit to Christianity,

00:33:17.260 Christian faith. However, I will also admit that part of the reason that America has been so 0.62

00:33:23.460 prosperous is its natural resources and also its geography. We're flanked both on the east and the

00:33:30.840 west by large oceans. There's not a whole lot of military threat. To our north, there's a pretend

00:33:40.060 country. A frozen pretend country. A frozen pretend country. The freezer aisle. Right, with a bunch of

00:33:46.560 libtards that like i mean seriously like canada canada is a joke and it's sad you see that that 1.00

00:33:51.680 their prime minister came out and said that uh they're they're no longer going to be friends 0.99

00:33:56.120 with america yeah i saw that yeah we're gonna have if america will no longer lead the world 0.78

00:34:00.220 you know with you know economically then we're gonna lead the world you're a joke you're not a

00:34:04.860 real country you're a joke the people i think are precious many of the people yeah um but uh the

00:34:10.440 country and its leaders are a joke and so there's no threat from canada whatsoever and then beneath 0.90

00:34:16.480 us there actually are some threats like fentanyl and these kinds of things that are like killing

00:34:20.420 our citizens um but below you don't have a country either you have a cartel so you have you have 0.95

00:34:26.540 frozen libtards and then you have you know jose and his gangs um and that you know and then you 1.00

00:34:33.100 build a big wall and keep them out that's right you build a big wall and keep them out and then 0.99

00:34:37.580 with the north um they're they're so dumb they wouldn't you know they won't even come out of 0.99

00:34:41.780 the snow to freedom even if it was open to them they're like no we love tyranny some of them would 1.00

00:34:45.920 some of them have some of them have and those those individuals are in our church that's right

00:34:50.260 you know and god bless them we love them but a lot of them are like you know give me communism

00:34:54.740 or and snow yeah and uh you know give me half of india please yeah and here in india that's right

00:35:00.940 right and so so my point is so that's the protections that we have and then in terms of

00:35:05.960 the resources just i forget the author but like i think it's 17 000 navigable um miles of rivers

00:35:13.280 that we have whereas i think the whole world combined is like just a shade above 30 so it's

00:35:19.900 like like 30 to 35 000 rivers that like you can actually drive a tiny amount of actual rivers

00:35:26.360 and a tiny amount of accessible coasts yeah exactly all of our coasts they don't have the

00:35:31.460 same kind of like deep harbors like like god put an abundance of whether it's uh so your your

00:35:38.900 ability to you know be on the mississippi or this and ship by waterways in the united states there's

00:35:45.020 not a single other country that has that ability the protections with the coast and and you know

00:35:51.020 and snow above and you know jose and his gangs below like that that is uh very unique um and

00:35:57.220 then also you know to be fair even if mexico became a powerhouse which i don't see happening

00:36:00.780 in the near future but even if it did it's geographic it's a very small country we have

00:36:05.480 this big country and then it quite literally bottlenecks this is a big gulf of america right

00:36:11.220 there amen um but then also of oil too all the timber and and wood and then oil we have with

00:36:18.620 alaska the gulf of america and texas and texas has enough oil i think it'd be 250 years we could

00:36:24.980 supply ourselves just with east texas oil alone i remember when they kept saying you know we're

00:36:29.640 going to be out of oil in 100 years and they would discover a new reserve this actually will

00:36:33.760 keep us going for another dream like and i think oil is being made i don't think it's a bunch of

00:36:39.760 dinosaur bones from millions and millions years ago i think it's a renewable um resource that

00:36:45.160 the earth is actually continuing to produce and don't get me started on primary water so

00:36:49.200 primary water primary oil primary oil theory both i think first i think both so my point is i think

00:36:56.440 yes america has been incredibly prosperous because of the christian faith but also in god's providence

00:37:02.040 It's also been incredibly prosperous because of its natural, geographically built-in defense

00:37:10.220 and protections and isolation and also all the resources that God has given us.

00:37:16.980 So that said, we should use them.

00:37:19.580 We should use them.

00:37:20.740 We don't actually have to police the world.

00:37:23.740 Right now, we're policing the world.

00:37:25.460 And it's always in the name of some humanitarian, virtuous motivation of like,

00:37:29.400 oh well we care about you know this poor little country like like push on that a little bit

00:37:34.140 because a lot of our our protectionism and our intervention comes from communism so you had

00:37:38.700 world war one in contrast to communism yes like communism and you have to have sympathy for

00:37:43.440 vietnam and korea these tiny little countries as eastern asia is becoming largely communist

00:37:49.020 these little tiny peninsulas that are isolated and alone that the u.s at some level said like

00:37:53.740 well what are we for what is our military for we didn't get shackled the way world war one and

00:37:58.180 world war ii did to the rest of europe so we adopted this type of interventionalist mindset

00:38:02.140 but i mean communism is done by the late 1980s the berlin wall falls down it's no longer the

00:38:07.200 force that it was china itself has to adopt some capitalist systems some capitalist parts

00:38:11.940 into its economy so what we should have done is taken that thing that did have a time and place

00:38:16.220 perhaps there's a discussion about it but it's at least a viable point perhaps it had a point but

00:38:21.740 it's not it had a place but it hasn't been for 40 years yeah the way that communism was threatening

00:38:26.560 to take over quite literally the entire half of the globe right there was a time where we saw that

00:38:31.320 as a real possibility and for better or worse fought against it but that hasn't happened in

00:38:35.440 40 50 years and we still keep that system for today right it's a trope today so that that's

00:38:40.380 my point is it like maybe there were some virtuous like moral reasons um but there haven't been for

00:38:45.300 a very long time we still we'll still you know uh parade out all those virtuous reasons and say oh

00:38:51.280 well it's just because i care about this and i care you know we care about this and we care about

00:38:55.120 that and what are the oil exports of that country again exactly yeah that's what it always is you

00:38:59.460 know like it's like uh oh uh oil was discovered in greenland time to export some democracy in kuwait

00:39:05.340 let's go democracy for greenland all of these bases and stuff in this little place called kuwait

00:39:10.740 it's a terrible place to be and it's so clear our strategic interest in that region

00:39:14.980 is the oil it's not better if we just came out and said we're here for the oil yeah and just

00:39:20.560 and just conquest yeah but here's the thing i'm not actually inherently like for moral reasons

00:39:26.480 against empires um in a timeless sense of like like there can be no time and no place in history

00:39:33.400 where you could ever have an empire it's always immoral inherently immoral um that's that's

00:39:39.360 actually not my position but what i will say is i don't think you can have both you can have a

00:39:44.460 nation or you can have an empire you can have a country or an empire there actually are i think

00:39:48.540 virtuous reasons. I think it's rare and it needs to be providential within what God's doing in

00:39:53.560 history. There could be times and places where empires are actually fitting. But I don't believe

00:39:59.600 that we're in one of those times. I think we have been trying to straddle between having a nation,

00:40:06.440 having an empire. All the virtuous reasons for an empirical strategy like communism are all

00:40:14.420 receding that's that's not on the forefront anymore um and all so then it just leaves all

00:40:20.160 right we're going to die for for shipping lanes for resources and here's the thing um if you just 0.82

00:40:25.640 quit being ridiculous liberals all those resources are here they're all here it's literally just we're 0.86

00:40:32.260 literally just uh it's just you know because we're gonna lower our carbon footprint but here's the 0.94

00:40:37.880 thing uh the carbon footprint in kuwait and all these other places is raised by us as we go and

00:40:43.580 drills somewhere else but then we can so like we're literally doing it so just so that we um

00:40:48.680 just so that greta thunberg won't be mad at us like really is that is that u.s policy is is

00:40:54.820 trying to please a 14 year old girl like because because in in the big scheme of things even from 0.97

00:40:59.880 an objective level and i you know would push back on all the you know environmental stuff

00:41:04.620 in a lot of ways but objectively it's like it's the same carbon footprint and it's the same country

00:41:10.680 doing it they're just doing it somewhere else it's actually worse because because now all the 0.93

00:41:15.540 shipping all the shipping and you know like china wouldn't keep its um whatever you think about them

00:41:23.740 china would not keep its word on the green initiatives right it would just pollute and 0.94

00:41:27.920 pollute and pollute right so when we would do it in the u.s we were even if you grant the idea that 1.00

00:41:33.100 this is greener or better we were doing it better than those countries that are that are not right

00:41:39.540 so all that being said i i think that right now yes america first and and i'm you know i'm a

00:41:46.740 nationalist i think we need nationhood we need america to view itself as a nation come home

00:41:53.640 get get out of you know no more ukraine stuff no more israel stuff um and and that doesn't mean we

00:42:00.120 can't be sympathetic but there's not a moral obligation in scripture for us to go and and

00:42:04.300 defend these other nations so like for instance we when we had ron dotson like taiwan um is it's

00:42:10.860 probably a matter of when rather than if taiwan is probably going to fold back into china

00:42:15.880 geographically it makes sense um even in terms of customs and culture and i understand that the 0.99

00:42:21.540 taiwanese people are like no like we want to be independent because you know nobody likes china 0.93

00:42:25.860 the people in china don't like china like nobody likes china because it's it's you know the leaders 0.93

00:42:30.880 are terrible they're absolute terrible people but um i get that it's like no save us save us

00:42:36.160 america i'm sorry i'm sorry wait like no it's not you you uh in terms of language customs culture

00:42:43.380 all these different things um you are historically it's it's kind of like the same similar to like

00:42:49.020 putin and saying well these are historic you know russian lands you know or or you know a guy with

00:42:55.400 belgium you know once upon a time like you know but like they're like they're you know it's it's

00:43:00.080 that and and when those things happen like god has set up geographic boundaries and they can only be

00:43:05.220 manipulated i i think for a time temporarily eventually nations go back to a default setting

00:43:11.480 they do for better or for worse it's like no this actually belongs with this this continent is a part 0.98

00:43:16.880 of that like um you can't you can't have oh there's a a sea of muslims and then we're going to have 1.00

00:43:23.320 like a little voice like or hong kong you know like oh like uh this is going to be a bastion of 1.00

00:43:28.240 freedom and capitalism and democracy and like um no it's that's it maybe for a while but it's not

00:43:35.560 going to last because it's it's smack dab in the middle of china you know it's and so i just think

00:43:40.740 that the world right now i think the world is snapping back into a natural order that follows

00:43:47.660 geographic boundaries that god in his sovereignty and providence put into place it's reverting back

00:43:52.980 to nationalism globalism is becoming um by conviction i think people are moving away from

00:43:58.860 it but even aside from conviction or any morals i think it's becoming just less and less plausible

00:44:04.040 it's it's just not doable in in a way that previously was uh there aren't the virtuous

00:44:08.440 reasons uh in order to defend it anymore people are wising up and they're like yeah i'm not going

00:44:12.920 to go and die for shipping lanes and i'm not going to die for israel and i'm not going to die

00:44:16.960 for ukraine um and so i i think they're not going to die for a condo and uber eats right like think

00:44:22.440 about like the men that went to fight for their homes in the american revolution and in the civil

00:44:25.980 war and even into world war one and world war two insofar as they felt there was a threat when they

00:44:30.540 fought when they're on those front lines what they're thinking back to they're thinking back

00:44:33.880 to a wonderful woman they're thinking back to their children they're thinking back to a home

00:44:37.580 with land and dirt and soil and that's what's in their mind an american ethos a flag our freedom

00:44:42.720 that's what they fought and died for even in vietnam at some level it was communism is

00:44:47.180 threatening us and these freedoms that we love so much in america right we're protecting them

00:44:51.840 right people don't die for a 700 square foot condo in denver where they can uber eats all day

00:44:57.100 like those things don't motivate a man to then join the military to buffet his body and to go

00:45:01.380 overseas and to be willing to lay his life down he says okay maybe china does own it but like

00:45:07.620 do i still have netflix like they won't die for those things so you have to have a return to 0.80

00:45:12.180 of people in a place worth dying for.

00:45:14.840 Yeah, right.

00:45:15.260 That's right.

00:45:15.940 Let's go to our last commercial break

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00:46:17.520 All right, welcome back.

00:46:19.060 So here in this last segment, what we want to do is just actually have kind of a conversation

00:46:24.780 about what would be some good advice and principles for you as a Christian father, Christian family,

00:46:31.680 a Christian young man to think about when it comes to this question.

00:46:34.520 And I'm certainly not going to say if you join the military right now, it's a sinful decision, right?

00:46:40.300 Like we would never bind your conscience in that way.

00:46:42.280 I actually know people who are graduating from high school this year, joining the Marine Corps.

00:46:48.300 You know, fantastic.

00:46:49.480 Pray for them.

00:46:50.040 I pray that it would work out.

00:46:51.540 But we do just kind of want to give some perspective and principles and advice that maybe would help guide your decision.

00:46:58.420 And Wes, I was hoping you could share a little bit about just the condition of the military.

00:47:03.100 Is it a suitable place for a Christian young man?

00:47:05.620 Because I've heard both.

00:47:06.900 I've heard from people in certain branches of the military who say, I went, the chaplain

00:47:11.980 that we had on base was fantastic.

00:47:14.020 We had Bible study every week, and he was actually a solid Christian chaplain.

00:47:18.480 And it was really a fantastic environment for me to grow as a Christian or demonstrate

00:47:23.360 my faith as a Christian.

00:47:24.400 And I've heard the exact opposite.

00:47:25.740 I've had friends who went into the military and said, man, after I got out, it took me

00:47:29.380 10 years to kind of come back to my faith and really get my life straight from some of the

00:47:35.040 decisions, the bad sinful decisions that I had made while I was in the military. So Wes, you're

00:47:40.020 the resident expert here on this topic and I think would offer a valuable perspective. Sure.

00:47:45.220 Your module will vary. Of course, you're looking at about 1.2 million individuals and then 20 to

00:47:50.660 30 bases, big ones, as well as tons of other embassies and everything that you could be spread

00:47:54.920 out at and the most difficult thing is that your experience is going to depend greatly not even

00:48:00.320 necessarily on the base you go to or the job you pick but your individual unit and even down to

00:48:05.980 your unit your shop so that that's the five to ten people that's your corporal that's your sergeant

00:48:11.440 that's your commanding officer those kind of people are going to make your life very difficult

00:48:16.340 difficult to be a christian difficult to hold your faith difficult to just succeed or they're

00:48:21.240 going to be honestly some of your best friends like that's legitimately some guys go in and those

00:48:25.120 are their brothers for life especially in special forces where it's smaller there's more training to

00:48:29.880 go through it there's a higher selection process i mean some of those units those men just for life

00:48:34.580 their families and everything they stay together and so i can never tell you well you'll go here

00:48:38.380 and it'll be great you go here and it'll be bad but be aware that you could go to a unit where a

00:48:42.900 young man is going to have to fight for his faith where he's going to have to make a conscious

00:48:46.340 decision to say i mean many times i was invited to strip clubs i'll come to the strip club out

00:48:50.220 with us didn't do it that is 100 going to be some of the influence right influence towards drinking

00:48:55.000 influence towards uh just reckless behavior you'll always have those elements they're going to be

00:49:00.460 worse in some units and and particularly here's the balance with kind of like the marine corps

00:49:05.340 versus the other ones when you kind of like go down the list that the air force is one of the

00:49:09.700 softest branches as far as physical discipline as far as the standards that they hold as far as just 1.00

00:49:14.680 the people that are allowed in i mean some of the gayest stuff we're seeing out of the military 1.00

00:49:18.160 it was the air force uh as far as transitions and all of that you got air force in the bottom 1.00

00:49:23.700 the navy navy's pretty bad army next the marine corps even just that graph you showed has lowest 0.87

00:49:29.380 proportion of women for example right it's the hardest one to get into so the marine corps

00:49:33.280 experience for example it's going to be different on the whole from the air force experience so

00:49:37.700 calculating what branch am i going in what job am i going into infantry you're going to be around a

00:49:43.200 lot of men and in many ways they're going to be the good men like a man who's just looking to go

00:49:47.260 to a glorified kind of desk job in admin, get a free college ride and a VA home loan,

00:49:55.560 he's not going to be in the Army.

00:49:56.760 There's going to be some bad dudes there, but kind of bad in that they're hardcore.

00:50:00.380 They're masculine. 0.80

00:50:01.200 They're aggressive.

00:50:01.860 They're disciplined.

00:50:02.880 So going into infantry, you'll be surrounded by those guys for better or for worse versus

00:50:08.420 going to admin. 1.00

00:50:09.180 You can be surrounded by a lot of women and a lot of freeloaders. 1.00

00:50:12.320 So all those variables, I can't tell you what one will happen.

00:50:15.600 But, I mean, for me, I could say, like, I met Joel through the military.

00:50:19.300 I went to the on-base church.

00:50:20.660 There was a navigator's Bible study ministry there that picked up young men.

00:50:24.400 And he said, hey, on Sunday nights, we go to this place called the Response Church.

00:50:27.800 The rest is history, as they say.

00:50:29.420 So 100% at big bases, there are Bible studies, there are men, there are people that are typically

00:50:34.980 former veterans.

00:50:36.300 They're veterans of the military.

00:50:37.560 They have a passion for young men.

00:50:39.140 Help them out, invite them into their home, invite them to church.

00:50:41.820 So 100% always is that, even on deployment, every Sunday.

00:50:45.600 it was pretty cheesy.

00:50:47.140 We had church out there in Kuwait, in the Middle East.

00:50:49.660 We had a chaplain come in Sunday morning,

00:50:51.240 and we would sing, and we would worship,

00:50:53.020 I think even take the Lord's Supper.

00:50:54.400 And so there is for sure a Christian presence.

00:50:56.500 Whether a young man will gravitate towards that 0.99

00:50:58.660 or to the negative influence that's going to be around him

00:51:01.160 is up to the soul of the young man.

00:51:03.100 Last thing I'll say on this,

00:51:04.320 and this is something to consider with the military,

00:51:06.800 we talk a lot about the importance of home and place,

00:51:10.940 and in the military, changing around,

00:51:12.680 especially if you enlist for multiple enlistments.

00:51:14.660 It's like every two years, right?

00:51:15.600 it's about every three so basically you'll go to your training you'll get a job if you have a

00:51:19.980 four-year enlistment you'll do about two to three years and then when you're looking at re-enlisting

00:51:23.880 you're shipped halfway across the country you could be i know tons of guys like they stayed

00:51:27.940 for example in san diego for 10 years and then they came in and like we know you have a house

00:51:31.800 we know you have a church we know your wife has a job here but we're going to take you and we're

00:51:35.320 going to send you to japan if you re-enlist you know and they had to get out here's here's the

00:51:39.800 thing what do you do if you're 32 years old and all you've known is being an airfield technician

00:51:44.720 There's not a lot of $150,000 jobs in San Diego, California

00:51:48.500 that will support a man with four kids

00:51:50.240 if all of a sudden you have to move to Japan.

00:51:52.820 And so you have a lot of families, and it leads to a lot of divorce.

00:51:55.860 I've watched my different buddies through the Marine Corps,

00:51:58.020 the ones that stayed in, the ones that got out,

00:52:00.140 a lot of divorce, a lot of dads with their kids.

00:52:03.160 They couldn't be near them.

00:52:04.080 The wife took the kids, a lot of alcoholism.

00:52:07.060 And so the military on the whole, especially as a career,

00:52:10.300 it's one thing if you're in it, you've got to make the best of it.

00:52:12.320 but as a whole, it is not conducive to family formation 1.00

00:52:16.680 because any military base, all the women around there,

00:52:19.680 even the ones in church, they've had 20 military guys

00:52:22.240 try to ask them out already.

00:52:23.780 They are very much so turned off the idea of dating a military man.

00:52:26.940 So tough dating market, tough to start a family.

00:52:29.220 If you start a family, congratulations.

00:52:31.200 I hope you enjoy taking your six-month-old

00:52:32.820 and moving across the country

00:52:33.960 and then taking them again when they're two years old

00:52:36.020 and moving to Japan and back and forth

00:52:37.880 for literally 20, 30 years.

00:52:39.920 That's some of what you're looking at,

00:52:41.180 especially if you make a career out of it yeah so wes are you saying that um a lot of the divorce

00:52:46.280 would happen just because the wife would get tired of all the moves or is it because the man maybe

00:52:51.140 would be deployed for long periods and actually wouldn't wouldn't be home at all like the wife

00:52:55.140 would stay wherever they were located san diego in this case the the guy goes to japan for two

00:52:59.800 years like like what do both of those dynamics happen or like how often do families travel and

00:53:06.500 and deploy with the husband to a base obviously not in a time of war yeah but there's two tours

00:53:11.240 there's accompanied and unaccompanied tours so a man could be sent to okinawa for example for

00:53:15.300 an unaccompanied tour which could be two years or something like that without his family as in

00:53:19.800 they're not giving him base housing they're also accompanied so you're going to germany and we're

00:53:24.000 allowing for you to take your family and all of that typically as you get more senior those are

00:53:27.860 accompanied tours a deployment six seven eight months those are very much so unaccompanied your

00:53:33.140 family's not coming with you a lot of the divorces that i saw in the military was it was certainly

00:53:38.180 sometimes the caliber of the man that he was just a man that was not a good leader good husband good

00:53:42.360 father faithful but a lot of times too the caliber of wife like you're talking about long hours and

00:53:47.580 you're living in a military community again not rooted and grounded so you're not living in this

00:53:51.820 military community where you just moved to north carolina and i got grandparents around i got

00:53:56.020 church community it's a bunch of people i didn't know i didn't grow up with i don't have ties to

00:54:00.900 And so I'm trying to raise two or three kids.

00:54:02.540 My husband works 50 hours a week.

00:54:03.900 He's going on deployment next month.

00:54:05.880 And this is miserable.

00:54:06.900 I want to be back home.

00:54:08.080 I don't know this life.

00:54:09.200 I'm not familiar with that life.

00:54:10.840 So that definitely, if we're not talking about the character of the individuals,

00:54:13.780 she was a gold digger, this, that, or the other,

00:54:15.860 even just the family circumstances from moving around

00:54:18.740 led to a lot of family dysfunction.

00:54:21.260 Yep.

00:54:22.200 The last thing I wanted to ask you about, Wes,

00:54:24.080 I know that even under Biden,

00:54:26.620 the COVID vaccine requirement for military service was rescinded. But I did want to ask you a little

00:54:32.520 bit about just like the, I know that there's a sense where the military disciplines you,

00:54:37.060 makes you fit, makes you have to be strong and even combat ready. What about just the health

00:54:45.780 of enlisted soldiers as far as being taken care of? You know, if you're a mom or a dad who has

00:54:55.460 fed your son well insisted on you know good eating exercise all of those things is a military

00:55:02.460 career even a four-year tour going to be in line with some of those things that you've done

00:55:07.620 or is that is it going to be with the vaccines or even just diet health care all of those things

00:55:14.400 any thoughts or comments on that especially sorry especially in light of the fact that you are

00:55:19.220 entering the age where you're going to be getting married having your children and we've talked a

00:55:23.580 lot about how especially for men um that fitness leading up to um conceiving your children is

00:55:31.600 really really critical yeah yeah it is an uphill battle for sure that's funny my wife she's like

00:55:36.840 i don't want our son going into the military because he'd have to get vaccines he hasn't

00:55:40.020 had any vaccines and she's like you have to get a lot i mean like i was fully vaccinated and uh i

00:55:45.340 went to the military and boot camp i had to get a bunch of them so for sure that's a factor there

00:55:49.160 are religious exemptions but that's a lot of paperwork that you have to jump to jump through

00:55:53.300 for sure the problem with the lifestyle so like you're talking about field adventures like going

00:55:57.800 out in the field and doing expeditions there you're most certainly talking about deployment

00:56:01.020 you're talking about the people that surround you you are talking about most certainly not

00:56:04.940 being surrounded by people that are probably the way you're kind of referencing it going to be

00:56:09.420 thinking about health diet fitness and all of that i mean in the marine corps it was just notorious

00:56:13.920 like oh we got a five mile run tomorrow morning but who cares we're pounding beer tonight like

00:56:18.920 literally and people they're running they're throwing up on the side of the road yeah but

00:56:22.180 you're because you're 20 years old yeah like you're 20 years old you're practically invincible

00:56:25.480 and so all that being said if you're a young man you're going in yeah the diet's not great it's

00:56:29.760 full of seed oils you're going to be peer pressured to smoke cigarettes and drink and all of that

00:56:33.640 doesn't really affect you necessarily earlier on right but i will say people's bodies fall

00:56:39.080 apart i was literally just today and my other job was talking to a guy he threw out his knee years

00:56:43.720 ago throwing something over his shoulder slipped his knee out of place but dealing with that

00:56:48.720 injury ever since. They take young men that are strong and motivated and disciplined and they use

00:56:53.740 them to do manual labor, you know, to run trucks, to fly in planes, to serve as air crew. And so it

00:56:58.860 is a toll on the body 100%. Now, there's a good cause there, like fidelity to the fatherland,

00:57:05.400 patriotism, patria, patrias, it's a term of love for the father, the lineage, the ancestry

00:57:15.380 that made your country so it's a good thing to say hey i'm young and especially i think of special

00:57:20.180 forces guys that have dedicated their life to being fit they could go compete in crossfit they

00:57:24.220 could go do this and say no i'm going to go in this and i'm going to be willing to make the

00:57:27.520 ultimate sacrifice for the sake of my nation giving up my body giving up my health giving up

00:57:32.300 my youth for all of this so that's not a it's probably not going to be the best for your health

00:57:36.720 between the vaccines between the diet between the deployment between the sleepless nights between

00:57:40.180 all that it's probably not going to be the best for your health but that isn't necessarily

00:57:43.500 and it's a bad thing and you shouldn't do it.

00:57:46.140 But be aware, you're going to have to make a conscious effort

00:57:48.240 and it gets easier as you get more senior.

00:57:50.300 As you get more senior, you're going to have more time.

00:57:51.780 You're going to have more money.

00:57:52.800 As you get married, you're not just stuck with,

00:57:54.780 because what they'll do is they'll give you money

00:57:56.120 if you live off base, but if you live on base in the barracks,

00:57:59.020 you just have a car to go to the chow hall.

00:58:00.900 So you're talking like hundreds of dollars if you're married 0.69

00:58:02.580 to help you eat better, but if you're eating at the chow hall, 0.94

00:58:05.360 it's whatever slop they happen to give you.

00:58:07.760 Same thing for like MREs when you're out in the field.

00:58:10.160 So it is an uphill battle.

00:58:11.760 It gets easier as you get older.

00:58:13.500 But it's not the best for health, at least right now.

00:58:16.660 Do RFK, do Pete Hegseth, does that make a difference?

00:58:18.980 Possibly.

00:58:19.680 But even still, it's going to be difficult. 0.98

00:58:21.360 With RFK Jr., there'll be a kosher option. 0.94

00:58:27.580 Yep, no fear. 0.92

00:58:29.880 I'll be honest, let me say this, though. 0.85

00:58:31.800 There's a lot of fat people still in the military.

00:58:33.620 You would think it would be impossible.

00:58:35.480 There was tons of guys, and for whatever reason they were able to run,

00:58:39.640 but they were still skinny fat.

00:58:41.380 Nothing is going to do it for you.

00:58:43.500 You have to be disciplined.

00:58:44.820 You have to take care of your body.

00:58:46.460 And it's like, well, the military helped you do that.

00:58:48.040 Like, I remember guys in boot camp, like, they were like, well, I'll just do this and they'll make me do it.

00:58:51.360 They dropped out.

00:58:52.000 They didn't have it in them.

00:58:53.380 That's interesting.

00:58:54.500 Yep.

00:58:58.700 Well, okay, I was going to say something, but now that last comment's got me rethinking this.

00:59:03.380 I was going to say, if your son is the kind who you just see the writing on the wall and he's probably just going to work a 20-hour-a-week job

00:59:12.620 and um video games with the rest of his time like maybe maybe kick him in the pants a little bit and

00:59:19.180 sign him up you know but it sounds like wes you're also saying that's not necessarily a guaranteed

00:59:24.480 um fix as it were right well it depends younger or older at 28 i remember this man like an old

00:59:32.360 like literally a video game guy who was like i'm gonna do it i'm just gonna sign up for the marine

00:59:35.580 corps they'll make me disciplined he dropped out but he was also 28 got it 20 is different yeah

00:59:40.760 You know, like you can put on a little weight and your body will adapt much better.

00:59:45.160 It's much harder to change those habits, though, the older that you get.

00:59:48.940 And so totally to your point, an 18 year old man, even if he's lived a mostly sedentary

00:59:52.980 lifestyle for a long time, I'm confident if he's, you know, relatively good health,

00:59:57.680 he could do it.

00:59:58.680 And it would be, you know, it'd be hard and he would change a lot, but he can make it

01:00:03.480 happen versus, all right, you're 25, time to fly, son, let's make it happen.

01:00:07.700 No, actually, he might not have that left in him anymore.

01:00:09.880 Gotcha, yep.

01:00:10.500 gotcha all right well joel any pastoral perspective on this from you you know if a

01:00:16.140 family in our church were to say what do you think you don't you're not making the decision

01:00:20.540 for them but anything beyond we've added a lot of caveats but anything beyond this that that you

01:00:25.040 would want to make sure they're thinking about i would have strongly dissuaded them um in the

01:00:30.600 previous four years in the previous administration um just because of what the military stood for

01:00:37.380 like yeah like you don't you don't want to risk the lives of your sons um to go and and you know 0.90

01:00:44.500 expand and preserve gay race communism you know on the other side of the world like so that you 0.94

01:00:49.880 know so that ukraine can have you know wave gay flags you know like we just got to make sure that 0.97

01:00:57.460 those poor pakistanis are you know being taught about transgenderism you know those i mean those

01:01:02.120 are the things that we that's what we're doing that's what we're fighting for um so now

01:01:07.300 that you know we have a change in administration my calculus is different um so that wouldn't be

01:01:13.820 as much of a hesitation with pete hedgseth and with trump um but now i have kind of a new hesitation

01:01:21.840 um which is just i i still would really want to see how things shake out with um with israel and

01:01:30.260 iran i don't i don't think we're going to be going to save taiwan right i mean i think that

01:01:35.260 that decision is is just so foolish that even the worst leaders in government still wouldn't make it

01:01:42.000 maybe like sorry taiwan i'll tell you i'll tell you where it could happen you know part of the 0.94

01:01:47.020 reason is because i don't think tai taiwan has a bunch of uh dirt on the sitting president yeah

01:01:53.920 fair enough like ukraine ukraine is literally just kind of like the purse of of the whole world

01:02:01.380 and had blackmail on everybody especially the bidens and so that's true i think that that you 0.58

01:02:07.180 know whereas taiwan it's just it's not our people not our problem and i don't i don't think taiwan

01:02:12.440 has a whole bunch of you know those are our chips puppet strings yeah you need them no we need a

01:02:17.820 manufacturer i'll tell you the only the only reason why i could see it happening is because

01:02:21.420 i actually think the first um nation to get involved defending taiwan possibly would be japan

01:02:27.580 because they are in the area and then if we then ended up feeling like we needed to support japan

01:02:33.100 because trying to attack japan that's the scenario where i could see it happen not necessarily for

01:02:37.640 taiwan's sake but because of japan maybe so i personally i don't see the taiwan there's like

01:02:44.220 three main potential conflicts like you know china taiwan russia ukraine and then like israel

01:02:49.560 iran yeah and so um ukraine i think you know i think we're done with that um especially under

01:02:55.520 this administration and i don't think we're going to go back to it um taiwan i don't really think

01:03:00.160 that that's going to happen but israel and iran that would be my one big hesitancy uh so the last

01:03:06.840 four years i would have been you know very very um you know i would just would have given i wouldn't

01:03:14.680 have commanded anybody but i would have given a lot of cautions because of just exporting you know

01:03:19.840 rainbow flags and with this administration um my hesitancy would be just i don't know what's

01:03:26.640 going to happen with iran and israel i do think that there's there's a potential to escalate and

01:03:32.880 ramping up towards war and whether or not we're involved i don't know but but it doesn't it doesn't

01:03:38.800 look great yeah and that's where i've settled too i mentioned at the beginning that this is personal

01:03:43.280 for my family and with my son my oldest son he's um getting lord willing he's he's been accepted

01:03:50.560 for a two-year technical degree in the field so aircraft mechanic um and we've said okay in two

01:03:57.360 years we're going to evaluate and see what the situation is that's not too late for him to go

01:04:01.760 and still join um but i think it will be enough time to maybe provide some clarity to see what

01:04:08.160 the situation is in a couple years and that's that's also the decision the calculus that we've

01:04:12.800 made as well yep i agree yeah and for the record it's not just we've already said it but to say it

01:04:18.540 one last time it's not um oh why be hesitant because um at this particular time if your son

01:04:24.420 signs up you know he might actually have to fight i'm it's not that i'm inherently against fighting

01:04:28.480 that's literally the purpose of the military it is right but um but the fight that i'm particularly

01:04:33.280 talking about is it shouldn't be our fight yeah so i i would not want um if it was if it was like

01:04:40.660 a fight is coming to our shores

01:04:42.420 a new crusade

01:04:44.320 I'd be back in

01:04:45.840 it would be an honorable thing

01:04:47.880 but a fight somewhere else

01:04:51.000 especially

01:04:52.680 with those particular two countries

01:04:54.540 of Israel and Iran

01:04:55.940 alright well 0.99

01:04:58.640 I think that's it

01:05:00.140 good episode

01:05:01.060 good practical advice and hopefully helpful

01:05:04.600 for the listener

01:05:05.180 that's it for this week and Lord willing we'll see you again

01:05:08.420 Easter on Sunday

01:05:09.140 have a very blessed yeah that's right amen good friday and then yeah and then easter and then uh

01:05:15.320 we will see uh hopefully um see you guys next monday yep

The NXR Podcast - April 18, 2025

THE LIVESTREAM - Military Service in a Nation That’s Lost Its Way

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