You are listening to Warren the Rocks, a podcast on strategy, defense, and foreign affairs. My name is Ryan Evans, I'm the CEO of War on the Rocks.

A few years ago I recorded a boosy interview with Max Brooks, and then never released it. I don't remember why we didn't release it, we just didn't. I found the recording and I thought, hey, this is some solid unreleased footage, and since it's a holiday week I thought you all might like

something a little different so here it is. Max is most famous as the author of World War Z

but he has a remarkably diverse collection of works from the Harlem Hellfighters to some unusual

episodes of GI Joe. We talked about some of these as well as his work with the

U.S. military which he continues to this day. We also talked about his love

of rum and being a part of a famous family.

Since this episode was first recorded, Max has been a busy guy.

He's one of the editors of Strategy Strikes Back how Star Wars explains modern military

conflict.

He has a new horror novel coming out next year

called Devolution, a firsthand account of the Renier Sasquatch Massacre which you can pre-order

on Amazon.

Thank you.

It's good to be here.

Good to be here.

Cheers.

So Max let's um let's start with the first visit that um the reason that you're actually here in town on this particular visit, which is you were just

at the Marine Corps War Fighting Labs.

What were you doing there?

I was there as part of the Atlantic Council's program on the Art of Future Warfare.

Basically what we're trying to do is find interesting and engaging ways of explaining really crazy concepts,

...