Former Navy SEAL Jack Carr on His New Book, The Iran War & US Military Strategy | NEW INTERVIEW

Añadido: 2026-05-10

[00:00:00]Jack, I don't know what I have to do to get, you know, uh, a copy before the book comes out. I I pre-ordered your, uh, new book. I can't wait for it to come out. I love I love your I love your work. Love your work.

[00:00:16]>> Um, welcome to the show.

[00:00:18]>> Thank you. You are the best. I love that uh, bumper music, that that the intro music is fires me up. I'm sitting here in my hotel room in New York doing media in the in the leadup to book publication and I just listened to that and watched that intro. It just fired me up. So, thank you. And you should have a book, by the way. You should have a book. I sent Hopefully I didn't send it to the wrong address. I never know exactly where you are. I probably should have asked you before I sent it. But a you have a blade that's coming that's supposed to help open the second package that comes, which is the book in a very interesting new package.

[00:00:49]>> I can't wait. I can't wait. It's on its way to you. No, I don't mean I'd pay for the book. I'd pay for the book. I just want to know the book before I talk to you because I I just I just love your books. Um, so tell me why. I mean, you're known for, you know, some of the best characters, you know, in fiction today. You know, James Reese is just a iconic character. Now, why start a new series and all new characters? What What are you accomplishing here? What what what's driving this?

[00:01:19]Well, from the fan perspective, I was very aware as a kid that Tom Clancy started with Hunt for Red October, moved on to Red Storm Rising, then went to Patriot Games, then Cardinal of the Kremlin, then Clear and Present Danger, and then the early 90s he branches out into both non-fiction with a study in command series and a guided tour series, and then he also starts with a co-written thriller series to expand that audience, to broaden that base, more offerings out rather than, and for him it was every couple years a book now is for me it's every year but still the same type of uh type of model. So I saw that and of course he's doing video games and he has the movies and of course now after he's passed on there's the television show for him but uh as a kid reading all those books from the fan perspective I saw that expansion and so I knew I had a ton of stories to tell.

[00:02:04]This was one that I wrote down in December of 2014 when I wrote a bunch of different ideas down as I was getting ready to leave the military. Decided on the terminal list, which I think was a good decision, but I kept coming back to this one called The Fourth. And it's uh it's really based on Have Gun Will Travel, which is an old well, first it was a radio show in the 1950s, then it became a TV in the late 50s into the 60s and I used to watch those with my dad growing up. So, uh really that's the foundation for this. But instead of uh a hero in the Old West getting on his horse and riding into a new town as that stranger comes to town type of a narrative, now I have Chris Walker, former SEAL, former CIA operative, uh a student of philosophy. These philosophers are battling for control of his soul. But he gets in his Volkswagen bus pop top camper from the mid 80s with his Belgian Malininoa dog next to him.

[00:02:50]And for his first city, he rides in to New Orleans. And that's a place that uh has always stood out to me. A place I always wanted to set a novel because it's just such a colorful city. A lot to work with is terms of corruption with the uh uh police force with the government government officials, that sort of thing. So it's very ripe as far as a background for a novel like this.

[00:03:10]So uh this is another offering outside the James Reese Terminalist universe.

[00:03:14]And I'm just I'm fired up with how it how it came out. And for those who are fans of let's say a Pale Rider or a Shane or a High Plains Drifter or a Magnificent 7, there'll be little drops of that in there too. But it's my modern interpretation stranger comes to town narrative.

[00:03:27]>> So tell me because uh Walker, if I'm not mistaken, is haunted by a loss of a friend in Afghanistan.

[00:03:36]>> And you wrote this down, you said in 2014. Did did you how did the how did the withdrawal from Afghanistan play into this or did it that shameful ending of Afghanistan.

[00:03:51]>> Right. Right. So James Reese Terminalist series those books started well before our departure from Afghanistan. So that's not part of James Reese's experience. Chris Walker a little younger he's there. He's a former SEAL, but now he's in the CIA and he's in Afghanistan as we're starting to withdraw. And the CIA wants to leave an asset behind that they've recruited to report on what happens after we're gone.

[00:04:14]And Chris Walker and his his buddy John Stop, they know that this guy's going to get killed. His family's going to get killed. He's too associated with the Americans. So, they go off the books and try to get him across the border into Pakistan so he can go get to Islamabad and claim asylum. And of course, that goes horribly wrong. And this isn't too much of a spoiler, but Chris Walker's best friend is is killed in that uh in that attempt to get their asset across the border here. But uh watching that, and you don't have to be a veteran of Iraq or Afghanistan uh to be horrified with the way that we left Afghanistan in August of 2021, you don't.

[00:04:46]>> And neither do you have to have any sort of touch points with the military or degrees in military history. You don't need to have studied tactics or strategy to know that there was a better way to go about. All you have to do is apply common sense and apply logic to that problem set. Uh and anyone could have done it so much better if they had just done that. So it was very painful to watch not just for for veterans but for any for just citizens to see our our country.

[00:05:13]>> It was that is our best effort after 20 years. Come on. So but that what that also did and how it ties into Iran now is that it taught our enemies a lesson and it taught them that Americans one are tired of of war. uh and two the Americans do not know how to effectively their military to get a desired political end. Uh so that's the lesson they walked away from uh our withdrawal from Afghanistan with direct line between Russia invading Ukraine and of course now China is watching what we're doing in Iran. So really now that we're engaged there we have no choice but to win that thing because it's not regional. It's not just energy prices.

[00:05:49]This is global in nature. Meaning after World War II, we had we could deter we could deter our enemies because of our strength. Following World War II, we ushered in an unparalleled era of um uh of economic >> stabilization stabil stabilization but prosperity across the globe. We took that burden on taxpayers. Our military took that especially the Navy took that on in terms of uh uh providing security across the globe. Then we lost that deterrence especially with what happened in August of 2021. We lost that deterrence, that hard-earned deterrence that really provided stability across the entire globe. So, the stakes are much more than regional.

[00:06:29]>> So, how how does the world perceive us?

[00:06:32]Cuz I look at I look at people who are enemies now and I got to believe they're just like they're just thinking, hold on. Just hold on till 2028 because he's going to be out and the American people are tired of all of this and they're just they're going to go back. And so all of our enemies, you know, they're kind of they're kind of just holding out and you and and if it does go back the other way, we'll see all of this stuff roar back. But I'm trying to square this here with I thought for sure we we I know we were a laughingstock. Our military had become an absolute laughing stock and we just gutted all of our credibility with with, you know, a big stick. Then Donald Trump comes in and boy, I've never seen a bigger stick. And I've never seen a an an operation like our military. I've never seen it this effective, you know, and and the question is still out on Iran. Um but still, it's been pretty effective. Um how how do they perceive our military? Is this just all based on Trump and don't worry, they'll go back to being, you know, a joke? How do they perceive us? Well, I think that that jury's out right now. So, after Venezuela, of course, it's a they can say, "Oh, wow. Look, the same types of uh let's say early warning systems that we have are the same ones that did nothing to stop the Americans going into Venezuela in January." Um, okay, we need to re-evaluate our defense systems here because we have the exact same ones made by Russia, made by China, perhaps. Um, but that was a that was a message right there. And if we had stopped right there, I think we were on some pretty secure footing when it comes to what our capabilities are as a military. And then we try a similar thing with Iran. And it hasn't quite worked out, I don't think, the way that uh the administration um anticipated uh based off our performance in in Venezuela. It's a different part of the world. It is a puzzle.

[00:08:27]>> Um and we and when we comes to negotiations, when we think about that, we make this mistake in the United States. If you're sitting across the table from another American doing that mirror image and thinking that that person across the table from you in this negotiation has the same values as you do, has the same concerns as you do. Um, then you amplify that by 10, 20, 100 times when you sit across the table from someone with a tradition who uh having grown up in Iran. That is a very different person or people to be uh negotiating with. And you cannot certainly can't if you doesn't work in the United States, American citizen, it's certainly not going to work across the table from somebody from Iran. So we tend to do that. We tend to make that mistake of mirror imaging uh what's important to us and putting that on the other person that we're talking to. Um so maybe we have gotten down to a level of leadership that is uh more more uh more more receptive to uh to negotiation, but >> hopefully >> I'm not sure.

[00:09:25]Yeah, I'm not sure either. So, how does how does this end, Jack? I mean, as a fiction writer, I'm just asking you write the write the most logical ending for me on this.

[00:09:40]>> Well, thanks for not putting me on the spot. Um, but uh how is it?

[00:09:44]>> I mean, just as fiction, I know I'm not asking you for prediction. I'm asking you because this is what you do for a living. you look at things and say, "Okay, if I had to do this, >> you know, what what would I say would be believable?" I'm not asking you to predict, but what what would what do you think is believable that could happen?

[00:09:59]>> I was kidding. So, I mean, most uh conflicts need to get to that uh negotiation table. Eventually, Russia will get there with Ukraine. It's just a matter of how much time. Um so, for for us, I think we we definitely underestimated the impacts and we we tend to do this over and over again. I don't know why because there's history here that we can go back to to look at.

[00:10:19]We look at, let's say, 1972, 1973. We look at the oil embargos there. The reverberations of that were not just during the embargo. They went all the way through the rest of the '7s. Um, and I don't know why we don't go back and see that and anticipate that as being the outcome here with these uh global energy markets. Um, very similar to the early '7s. Um, but now even we're even more dependent on that area of the world. So, we tend not to do that. So that's a that's a very long way of me saying that there are so many factors here and eventually it'll get to the negotiation table eventually. It's just how much pressure uh that the United States can put on through violence um in order to get them there. And they're willing to sacrifice a lot. They will sacrifice their their entire country, their countrymen there. Um it it we're almost giving them an opportunity to uh to to make it up to their version of Nirvana or heaven. um and uh and they're willing to sacrifice all those people under them uh to get there. So, it's a it's a very different part of the world to negotiate with. So, I would say it's going to take uh a lot of pressure, a lot of violence to get them to where we want them uh which is getting those those things that we were negotiating for before the war. So, now there's that. But now we have we've added to that destruction of a navy, destruction of a ballistic missile capability, drone capability, destruction of an air force, and the straight of her muz, which is very odd to me that that wasn't secured right out out of the gate. Um, and you know, I will go back and look when someone writes books about it 5 10 years from now about uh what that problem set entailed, what those discussions were, and uh and why we didn't secure that right out of the gate.

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