I think it will take China until roughly 2034, just over a decade from now, not exactly way out into the future,

but I think it'll take a decade for them to consolidate their maritime capability, their carrier capability, their stealth approach, their artificial intelligence, and to bring quantum computing forward. On this podcast series and in many other discussions and debates and think tanks and in the

media and even in Congress, people are often speculating about the

likelihood of a kinetic conflict with China. Is it inevitable or is it

highly unlikely or does it lie somewhere in between. But today we want to

consider how a war would actually start. Sounds grim, but how would the bullets actually start flying? It's often hard to visualize what the tripwires would be.

Well, my friend Admiral James DeVrities co-authored an entire book on this subject, but unlike the other 10 books he's

written, this one is fiction or maybe predictive fiction. It certainly feels

very real. It's called 2034, 2034, a novel of the next world war. This is call me back.

Admiral James DeVrites is a retired four-star U.S. Naval officer.

He's currently Vice Chair of Global Affairs and he's managing director of the

Carlisle Group. He's also chair of the Rockefeller

Foundation and he served for five years as the Dean of the Fletcher School of

Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. Most relevant for this conversation, he led the NATO alliance.

He was Supreme Allied commander from 2009 to 2013 with responsibility for Afghanistan, Libya,

the Balkans, Syria, and he oversaw a lot of cyber security and he also served as

commander of the US Southern Command with responsibility for all of our military operations in Latin America from 2006 and 2009.

He's earned more than 50 medals, including 28 from foreign nations in his, he served I think around 37 years.

He has a PhD, so he's like a warrior scholar if you will.

Jim Stavridis, thanks for joining the conversation.

Dan, what a pleasure to be with you and by the way in that litany of shopping list of NATO missions,

you left out the one nautical one.

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