Gen. Berger on Leadership in a Turbulent Era

War on the Rocks

News, Politics

4.6 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 1 May 2025

⏱️ 24 minutes

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Summary

In today's world, turbulence isn't temporary — it's the new normal. In this episode, Gen. (ret.) David Berger, former commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps, shares why adaptability, resilience, and grit are not just desirable but essential traits for leaders in an uncertain and unpredictable age. Successful leaders must embrace disruption rather than waiting for stability to return, he tells Ryan. And after offering insights from his career as a Marine officer, including his experience planning and leading Force Design 2030, Gen. Berger shares what life has been like after hanging up the uniform.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You are listening to the War on the Rocks podcast on Strategy, Defense, and Foreign Affairs.
0:14.1	My name's Ryan Evans. I'm the founder of War on the Rocks.
0:16.7	In this episode, I had back on the show one of my favorite guests, I believe this was his third time on the show, General David Berger, former commandant of the Marine Corps.
0:26.0	General Berger wanted to come on the show to talk about what he views as the permanence of turbulence and what that means for military leaders specifically.
0:34.4	He argues we aren't going back to this normal period where everything is more
0:37.8	predictable and as it was, but that things are in flux and they're going to stay that way, and that has
0:42.5	real implications for the military. Hope you enjoy the show as much as I enjoyed the conversation.
0:48.0	So I was really pleased when I heard you wanted to come on the show again and was surprised, but then very pleasantly surprised
0:55.8	when I learned more what you wanted to talk about. And it all started with this speech that you gave,
0:59.5	and I'd like you to tell the audience a little bit about what that speech was and what led to it.
1:04.5	The Marine Corps asked me to speak this morning at the modern day Marine, which is an annual, similar to the Army Air and Space, it's their
1:13.1	annual symposium conference. And they at first wanted to me to talk about an effort that
1:19.6	Mr. Bloomberg asked me to head up. But then I thought after working on it a little bit with
1:25.4	some others that it wasn't far enough. Actually, the main point, probably worth discussing in that audience, is the environment that we're in right now and is it unique or is it short or brief or whatever.
1:36.7	And then if it's not, how do we develop the leaders?
1:39.3	How do we change the way we're working to get ready for that?
1:43.2	That was the genesis.
1:44.0	You sort of describe the environment as this perman to get ready for that. That was the genesis. You sort of described the
1:45.7	environment as this permanence of disruption and that this isn't sort of a short-term turbulence that
1:51.9	we're in this permanence of turbulence. Is that fair? Fair. I think amplified by this administration
1:57.8	coming in with a clear agenda, there was a very different approach. The media
2:02.8	certainly captured that. And I think just historically and the public wise, they naturally are
	...

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