No One is Ready for This Coming War - Navy SEAL Andy Stumpf - #1089

Modern Wisdom

Chris Williamson

Society & Culture, Health & Fitness

4.6 • 5.9K Ratings

🗓️ 25 April 2026

⏱️ 125 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Andy Stumpf is a former U.S. Navy SEAL, extreme sports enthusiast, public speaker, podcaster, and author. What will the future of war actually look like? As AI accelerates and warfare rapidly evolves, the stakes feel higher than ever, but how worried should we really be? Sponsors: See discounts for all the products I use and recommend: ⁠⁠⁠https://chriswillx.com/deals⁠⁠⁠ Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period from Shopify at ⁠https://shopify.com/modernwisdom⁠ Get 10% discount on all Gymshark products at ⁠https://gym.sh/modernwisdom⁠ (use code MODERNWISDOM10) Get a free bottle of D3K2, an AG1 Welcome Kit, and more when you first subscribe at ⁠https://ag1.info/modernwisdom⁠ Get 160+ lab tests for just $365 and save an extra $25 at ⁠https://functionhealth.com/modernwisdom⁠ Get ChatGPT to explore ideas, solve problems, and learn faster at ⁠⁠⁠https://chatgpt.com⁠⁠ Timestamps: (0:00) The Surprising Danger of Fighting Under a Full Moon (0:51) Is Technology Making Warfare More Dangerous? (2:46) Can We Predict Where Warfare Is Going? (5:00) Should AI Make Life and Death Decisions? (7:18) Is Ghost Murmur Technology Just a Myth? (10:28) What Really Happens When You Eject From an Aircraft (14:51) How Soldiers Are Trained to Survive Capture (18:51) Is Pulling the Trigger Harder Than It Looks? (23:20) The Dark Virality of Charlie Kirk’s Death (26:00) Are Special Operations Glorified By the Public? (29:48) The Unique Learning Points of a Special Operations Instructor (37:20) How Much Does Failure Cost You? (38:27) The Most Expensive Lessons of Andy’s Career (41:46) Why Walking Away is So Difficult (44:21) Don’t Make Yourself the Victim of Your Own Life (46:41) The Reality of Marrying a Special Operator (51:07) Was Bin Laden’s Raid Truly a Success? (57:40) How America Really Sees Its Military Today (01:08:32) The Dangerous Divide Inside the US (01:13:20) Is Guns For Hire the Way Forward? (01:17:01) Why Do People Quit? (01:29:12) The Most Important Traits in Life or Death Situations (01:31:08) The Brutal Truth About Drownproofing (01:34:40) The Top Scaring Tactics Used in Training (01:40:05) Are Deaths in Training Necessary? (01:41:40) Why the Grind Is Everything (01:44:24) The One SEAL Lesson Everyone Should Learn (01:48:48) Why You’re Never Truly Alone (01:52:22) The Truth About Making a Real Impact (02:02:45) Andy’s End Goal Extra Stuff: Get my free reading list of 100 books to read before you die: ⁠⁠https://chriswillx.com/books⁠⁠ Try my productivity energy drink Neutonic: ⁠⁠https://neutonic.com/modernwisdom⁠⁠ Episodes You Might Enjoy: #577 - David Goggins - This Is How To Master Your Life: ⁠⁠lnkfi.re/SN-Goggins⁠⁠ #712 - Dr Jordan Peterson - How To Destroy Your Negative Beliefs: ⁠⁠lnkfi.re/SN-Peterson⁠⁠ #700 - Dr Andrew Huberman - The Secret Tools To Hack Your Brain: ⁠⁠lnkfi.re/SN-Huberman⁠⁠ - Get In Touch: Instagram: ⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx⁠⁠ Twitter: ⁠⁠https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx⁠⁠ YouTube: ⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/modernwisdompodcast⁠⁠ Email: ⁠⁠https://chriswillx.com/contact⁠⁠ - Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm going to play a little trick for the first time ever in this studio to make you feel a little bit more at home.
0:05.8	So you're a man who operated largely in the dark when you are doing raids, when you would have been operating, I imagine.
0:13.6	Some stuff would have been by day, but other stuff would have been by night.
0:16.0	Unless there was an extremely compelling reason to do so exclusively at night.
0:23.2	Oh, nice. Here we go, transitioning,
0:30.3	evening. And now we're in a blood moon. We usually didn't go out at full moon. Okay, because there's too much visibility. Elimination. So, you know, even though you can see at night with night vision
0:34.5	goggles, we constantly were looking at the illumination, the external illumination,
0:38.7	because at some point people can almost see you as well as you can see them with the technological
0:43.4	advantage. So we would avoid the high illumination nights and obviously aviators and things that
0:48.2	fly that could be backlit against those, they try to avoid it as well.
0:52.2	What are you surprised by what's happening with warfare over the last few years?
0:57.3	Like, I can't work out whether technology is making things more humane or more dangerous.
1:02.5	I think an equal measure of both.
1:03.9	I've had a lot of conversations about this with guys during the time period that I served.
1:08.3	I'd never for a single second thought about the danger of
1:12.4	drone warfare. And I don't mean drones to us was predators or reapers or overhead surveillance
1:18.0	platforms that had great, you know, sensor pause and they could pipe stuff down and you can have the
1:22.4	ability to look at what they could see. It was great for situational awareness. I never once was
1:27.2	concerned about somebody
1:28.2	essentially ordering a drone on the internet, not that that's how it's being built or made in
1:33.7	Ukraine, specifically in Iran, has some smaller ones as well. But having that be a kinetic
1:39.6	option on the battlefield, didn't think about it a single time. And I am glad that I am not a part of that.
	...

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