How America can Thrive in the Emerging New World Order #45

Podcast
Written by Nick Halaris

Hi Everyone and Welcome Back!

This week on The Nick Halaris Show we are featuring Dee Smith, the Founder and CEO of the Strategic Insight Group, a global intelligence firm with a decades long track record investigating the most important issues in the world.  Dee is a geopolitical expert, author, educator, and entrepreneur and spends his time advising some of the world’s most influential investors and business leaders.  He’s also one of the most fascinating people I’ve ever met and a very kind and humble individual.

Ready to dive in? Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music and YouTube or on your favorite podcast platform.

I wanted to have Dee on the show to get his perspectives on a whole bunch of big issues.  With the US election drawing ever closer, the wars raging in Ukraine and Gaza, and tensions escalating throughout the world, this is the perfect time to start getting serious about understanding the geopolitical situation and considering what we should do about it all.  Tune-in to this fascinating, timely, and rather important episode to learn:

  • Why Putin may be more vulnerable than he’d like to admit and why it’s absolutely critical for the West to continue to support Ukraine

  • What we are learning in Ukraine about the frightening realities of modern warfare

  • How technology has unleashed scary new potentials for asymmetric warfare

  • Why the situation in Gaza is so complex and a solution so intractable

  • How the global migration crisis around the world is stressing systems of power and challenging political leaders in unique ways

  • How climate change and rapid technological progress are challenging the post-WWII global governance framework and why we need to get busy designing something new

  • & Much, much more

Stay tuned to the end to hear why Dee believes it may be time to rethink the entire post-WWII global order and why now is such a pivotal moment in world history.  Dee also challenges us to start looking for and supporting a new generation of leaders who aren’t so afraid of change.

As always, I hope you all enjoy this episode.  Thanks for tuning in!     

Love this episode? Please rate, subscribe, and review on your favorite podcast platform to help more users find our show. 🙏 Thank you

Dee Smith, CEO of the Strategic Insight Group, discusses the situation in Ukraine and Russia, highlighting the historical perspective and the fragility of Putin's regime. He emphasizes the ineffectiveness of the Russian bureaucracy and the changing nature of warfare with the rise of asymmetric and cyber warfare. Smith also addresses the war in Gaza and the complexities of American policy in the region. The conversation covers the consequences of provocation in conflicts, the global migration crisis, the fear of change, and the need for new systems to address the challenges of the future.

Takeaways

  • The Russian bureaucracy is inefficient and ineffective, leading to failures in protecting the Russian people.

  • The conflict between Russia and Ukraine is rooted in historical and cultural factors, with Putin asserting control over Ukraine to protect Russian interests.

  • The changing nature of warfare, including asymmetric and cyber warfare, poses new challenges for military powers.

  • American policy towards Ukraine should prioritize supporting Ukraine to prevent further Russian aggression and maintain stability in the region.

  • The war in Gaza is complex, with Hamas using radicalization to maintain power and the Abraham Accords threatening their influence. Provocation in conflicts can lead to unintended consequences and create long-lasting enemies.

  • The global migration crisis is driven by factors such as resources, climate change, and conflict, and poses complex challenges for countries.

  • Fear of change and nostalgia for an imagined past can hinder progress and effective leadership.

  • The existing systems may not be fit for purpose in the face of rapid technological advancements and societal changes, necessitating the exploration of new systems.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Dee Smith and the Strategic Insight Group

01:06 The Situation in Ukraine and Russia

12:00 Putin's Fragile Regime and Threats to Ukraine

22:45 US Policy towards Ukraine

23:15 The Changing Nature of Warfare and the Role of Drones

31:48 The War in Gaza and American Policy

42:47 The Consequences of Provocation

52:23 The Global Migration Crisis

01:03:42 Fear of Change and the Need for Leadership

01:15:04 The Need for New Systems

Nick Halaris

I’ve been fascinated by investing for as long as I can remember. As a kid, I would read the Wall Street Journal, the Economist and Barron’s, pouring over the data tables, stories and interviews with a passion and an insatiable kind of curiosity. As I grew into adulthood, I struggled to find the right outlet and channel for this passion and spent much of my twenties wandering and trying out different things. I had a very brief career as an attorney, spent some time as a strategy and leadership consultant for big multinational companies, failed in an attempt to start a hedge fund, and even ended up helping run a scrap metal recycling operation for a while.

At the age of 30 though, I took my stand. I made up my mind that no matter what I was going to be an entrepreneurial investor. As crazy as it sounds, I owe everything in my life to this one foundational decision—even my amazing wife and my beautiful kids. I don’t think I would ever have met Alicia had I not made this one choice. At that moment in time, the financial world had just been devastated by the crash in the housing market and the near systemic failure of the global banking system that followed. I’ve always had a contrarian bent to my investment thinking; so, to me the carnage in real estate looked like an opportunity.

It all started with one house in Compton California. The business plan was simple: buy a distressed foreclosed home from a bank, bring it back to life with a big renovation and sell it to a first-time homebuyer. Things progressed slowly as they tend to do with real estate. In the first years of this, I think I did 6-7 homes. But then after plugging away day-by-day, suddenly it seemed, things just came together. I found the right investors and the right loans and the right deals and in just a few short years I ended up investing in over 100 such transactions, building a portfolio of almost 2,500 multifamily units and creating a fully vertically integrated real estate company with almost 100 employees.

Fast forward to today and I’m running the second evolution of my entrepreneurial investing career and having so much fun that I have to stop and remind myself that this is all real.

http://www.nickhalaris.com
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