STARRS Podcast

The Seditious Six: Military Orders, Outrage and the Law

• STARRS • Season 4 • Episode 32

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Hot takes made it sound groundbreaking: elected officials urged service members to “disobey unlawful orders.” Anyone who’s worn the uniform knows that duty already exists—and the harder question is how statements like that ripple through a force that must act fast, trust its chain of command, and still honor the law of armed conflict.

In this episode of STARRS & Stripes, host Al Palmer, retired Navy Commander, sits down with a former Air Force JAG Bruce Tucker Smith to unpack what the Uniform Code of Military Justice actually requires, when orders are presumed lawful, and where the bright red lines are in combat.

Our conversation moves from the headlines to the hard edge of modern conflict: narco-terror networks, blurred battlefields, and how Geneva Convention criteria apply when adversaries don’t wear uniforms or follow the rules. 

We dig into maritime law, whether a disabled smuggling boat is “distressed” or still a legitimate target, and why humanitarian missions and National Guard disaster response are essential to public trust. 

Along the way, we tackle recruiting, morale, and the quiet power of the NCO corps—the leaders who turn strategy into action and shape the character of the force.

We don’t call for theatrical prosecutions to settle political scores. Instead, we make a case for sunlight: clear language, better civics, and honest dialogue about authorities, constraints, and intent. If critics suggest ongoing operations are unlawful, name the statute, name the order, and bring the debate to the proper venues. Meanwhile, we’ll keep telling the full story of military service—from kinetic strikes to lifesaving airlift—because accuracy beats outrage. 

If this conversation sharpened your thinking, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review to help others find it. Your voice keeps the debate honest.

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For more information about STARRS, go to our website: https://starrs.us which works to eliminate the divisive Marxist-based CRT/DEI/Woke agenda in the Department of Defense and to promote the return to a warfighter ethos of meritocracy, lethality, readiness, accountability, standards and excellence in the military.

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Al Palmer:

Well, hello America, and welcome back to STARRS and Stripes. This is your host, Commander Al Palmer, United States Navy retired. And I have got a very special guest today. And we've got a very special topic to talk about, too. This is going to be a bit about some current news and issues that relate to military performance, uh, law, and ways that we do war fighting today. And to help me with that, I've got my good friend and fellow uh STARRS member uh Bruce Tucker Smith. Uh Bruce, uh the honorable Bruce Smith is an attorney, uh a JAG officer, career JAG officer in the United States Air Force, and a law uh admin law professor and chief counsel while I was in the Air Force to commanders in the field. So he knows about the way we interpret the law in the military. He also knows how we do it outside as well. And uh, Bruce, it's good, sir, to have you back with us again because you and I have done this in the past. So welcome back to STARRS and Stripes.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Hello, Alan, and uh it's an honor to be with you again and the and the good folks who listen to your muchly needed service of this podcast. So thank you. It's an opportunity, and I'm honored to be here with you.

Al Palmer:

So the interesting thing about your background and mine is we share a couple of things, do we not? Uh we were both uh service brats. Uh we grew up in uh you and the Navy, me and the Air Force, uh, but spent all of our young years uh around the military. And then we both uh learned how to fly at an early age. Uh I think you told me you sold over when you're 13 years old, uh mine a little bit later. But uh we have a love for aviation, for the military, for service, for the law. Uh, although I'm not an attorney, I'v e dealt with an awful lot of uh JAG officers over my career, too. And uh and it's a very interesting mix that we have. So we'll get into some of those things today, just so our audience knows we're not newcomers to this business of the military or to the law, uh, and we know how fight goes because I'm I'm a very experienced combat veteran, and I've seen an awful lot of the ways that we do warfare that work and don't work. So, with that, uh, let's just get into it a little bit here. Uh, you and I have been watching very carefully the unfolding of this business with the famed six politicians who have started to take on uh lawfare uh and working with the military, uh, using it in ways I think that our general audience might appreciate, uh, that is a little bit unusual, we haven't seen before. Uh but what we're going to talk about is how law really works in war fighting, and that's what we're talking about now, uh, and also how it works uh administratively, uh, but how that works with the general public who may not know as much about the military as uh the small percentage of us who do serve. So, Bruce, with that, I'm gonna open that up to you. Can you tell me a little bit about what the issues are with this today?

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Absolutely. So, to reset um and the graphic you just had, uh in the last couple of weeks, we've had uh six people elected representatives, all Democrats. Um, Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona, uh Senator Alyssa Slotkin of Michigan, and then four Congress people, uh Jason Crow of Colorado, Maggie Goodlander of New Hampshire, Chris Deluzio, and Chrissy Hulan of Pennsylvania. Um Ms. Slotkin apparently was with the CIA, everyone else uh with uniformed service, and as far as I know, uh Captain Mark Kelly is the only military retiree in that group. Let me state the case for the outrage and the basis for that outrage. Uh, over the past couple of weeks, uh, that group of six, and I'll focus mostly on on Captain Kelly because he is both a United States Senator and a retired Navy 06, to one degree or another, each of them made a point rather publicly of saying that military members should disobey unlawful orders from their commander-in-chief or their chain of command. And of course, the unknowing media who are both biased against the current administration and woefully poorly educated on the matters that we're discussing here today, seized on this as if they were articulating some landmark proposition of constitutional or military law. And they jumped all over it, screaming headlines. There are several points to be made about what Captain Kelly, Senator Kelly, and the uh others did. The first is it's almost silly for them to declare publicly that military members have an obligation to disobey unlawful orders, because everybody who's ever worn the uniform, from the day you're commissioned, from the day you swear the oath of enlistment, everybody knows you have an affirmative obligation to disobey unlawful orders. It's sacrosanct. Everybody knows it. So when the six of them went public with what sounded like this grandiose announcement of law, in fact, it was something so basic and so fundamental it was almost laughable, but for the obvious intent. And now let me uh argue the case of outrage against them. Number one, and let me be very plain about this. What the six of them did, and particularly what Captain Senator Kelly did, was reprehensible. It was beneath contempt for these reasons. First and foremost, they were attempting to incite insurrection, they are clearly attempting to foment mutiny in the armed services. There's no other, there's no other explanation for what they're doing. They clearly don't like what the president and the secretary of war are doing in the Caribbean, but then again, they don't like the president or the secretary of war personally or the fact that they're in office. And so the statements they make, they're clearly pointing at our operations in the Caribbean against the narco-terrorist state, and they are implying to military members that what the president has ordered, what the secretary of war has ordered, is illegal. This is reprehensible. First of all, they are, again, I believe they're clearly trying to incite mutiny. They are attempting to politicize the military, which we, Alan, as you know, have a 250-year history and tradition and law prohibiting the military from being engaged in partisan political activities. And I refer to uh DOD Directive uh 1344.10. And again, everybody in the military knows this. You can't be political, but these six people, and and again, and they should all know better, but particularly Senator Captain Kelly, you are attempting to drag the uniform military into the middle of a political controversy. You are attempting to incite insurrection and mutiny, and it is reprehensible.

Al Palmer:

Um, and and and a good Captain Kelly knows, or he should know, since he uh likes to talk about his 39 combat missions that he flew in the Middle East and a couple of medals, he should know above anybody else that you can't just stop every time somebody gives an order and try to figure out whether it's legal or not. And and I can picture him sitting on a catapult uh waiting to get shot and saying, you know what, I'm not so sure I got enough fuel because I'm not sure I you know saw them the board right. Let's stop here because this is an illegal order. No, stop. You can't do that in real life.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Yeah, let's talk about the the legality and illegality of orders. As a general proposition, orders from your chain of command are presumed to be legal. However, you know, as in the case of you know uh Ernest Medina and and William Cali from the Vietnam uh tragedy, yeah, there are acts that the at Mili uh that are absolutely on their face illegal. But that's not a subject of um uncertainty because those prohibited actions are listed in the Geneva Conventions, which all of us are schooled on. So it's not a mystery, but apart from a clear facial violation of the uh law of war, of the uniform of the uh Geneva Conventions, military orders are deemed to be uh presumed to be legal until a court of competent jurisdiction rules otherwise. And so you are so right, Alan. We cannot have an armed force which picks and chooses uh which orders it will obey and won't obey based on their own subjective interpretation. And this is again to my point about the reprehensible conduct of Captain Senator Kelly and others. Uh, they are implying to the uniform services that the orders to engage with these narco-terrorist operatives in the Caribbean are illegal. Now, uh that's the clear intent, that is the clear implication of what they're saying. And so I would challenge the good senator and the other congresspeople. If you truly believe these actions are unlawful, then go to the will of the Senate, go to the floor of the House of Representatives, and exercise your franchise under the Article I of our Constitution, the legislative function, and restrain the power of the president. Do so under the rules of that constitution, which we all swore to uphold, protect, and defend with our lives. So rather than going on the Rachel Maddow show or going on the view and stirring the pot, I say to you, Captain Kelly, do your damn job. If you feel so strongly about it, go introduce appropriate legislative matters. Now, I'm reading the news today, apparently the Congress Powers Act. If you want to have that conversation, then do so in our appropriate mechanisms set forth in our government, but not on the Rachel Maddow show and not trying to incite insurrection, fomenting mutiny among the forces.

Al Palmer:

Yep. Well, and it it seems that they're also not fully informed themselves. I noticed that uh Crow, when he was on talking uh with some of the Fox people one day, um, he started making the comment about this is important because it's for my troops, even though I'm not still in the service, but it's for my troops, and I have to get it right for them. No, they're the ones that are gonna be suffering, are they not? If if they start defying orders, they're on their own. Now they're gonna probably be court-martialed, thrown in the brig, court-martialed, and then they're gonna have to explain why they're not in the service anymore, and their families, why they're not supporting them. Because the if the presumption is that they're all legal orders and you're gonna fight that, you better have a damn good case for doing it. You can't just knee-jerk and say, well, I don't like it and I'm not gonna do it. We're not talking about Crow is putting his own troops in jeopardy, in a sense, by by fomenting that. And I think that's what they're all doing.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Yeah, and I doubt sincerely that Lieutenant Captain Crow would have had the cojones to do that in real life in a combat situation. Um he would have been a very poor commander if he would have done that. Um so it's easy for him to armchair quarterback now that he's out of the service and he's has the benefit of being a congressman. Um, but I doubt that he would have done that in uniform.

Al Palmer:

Yeah, and I think they rely on the general public, as you say, that knows very little about how we actually work in the military. He's relying on them to promote that for him, and it gives him extra credibility, I suppose. But I think it's starting to come around, do you think?

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Well, so here's here's something that has to be considered. Uh, I understand that I've I think I've seen the Secretary of War, Secretary Hegseth, apparently soliciting information. Uh, and there is some conversation in some circles about uh bringing Captain Kelly back on active duty as a retiree and subjecting him to trial by court martial. Um let me be very plain here again. I I find what Captain Kelly did, Senator Kelly did to be utterly reprehensible. And I know that what he is doing is attempting to politicize this, and I think he's even trying to foment insurrection and mutiny. However, um it would be a damn mistake to bring him back on active duty to try to prosecute him for a variety of reasons. First of all, we as retirees are always still subject to the UCMJ. Alan, you and I could be recalled and court-martialed tomorrow. Not likely that it would happen. And typically it only happens when the military discovers conduct that you committed while you were on duty, then you retired, they can bring you back if it's still within a statute of limitations. Or in the rare case, if a if a retiree like you or I, Alan, or any any other retiree, you know, committed treason, we in fact incited insurrection, in fact, incited insurrection, took material steps toward treasonous conduct, then then we could be brought back. But here is why it would be utterly folly to attempt to bring Captain Kelly back on active duty. Because strictly speaking, strictly speaking, the words he spoke and what the other Congresspeople spoke were in fact true. Military members do have an obligation to disobey unlawful orders. There's no doubt about it. So he has not committed a crime, according to Judge Smith. So his defense is first of all, the words he spoke, the actions he took, were actually legally correct. It is true. We as military members have an obligation to disobey unlawful orders. There's no question that's true.

Al Palmer:

Yeah.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Second of all, as a member of Congress, uh, he's protected by Article 1, Section 6 of our Constitution, the speech and debate clause. We want our politicians to have the freedom to say whatever they want to say. It is the nature of our system, even if they are being damned fools in what they say, but we protect that speech. So, and then you add to that just the general proposition of the First Amendment. Um, again, as reprehensible as what Captain Kelly and the others did, but we're talking about bringing Captain Kelly back on active duty. He spoke truthfully, he's protected by the First Amendment, he's protected by the speech and debate clause. It would be utter folly to bring him back on duty to court martial him. But there's another reason, it would be a tragic, tragic mistake. I think Alan, you and and other smart people back in the day debated the wisdom of impeaching Bill Clinton. And a lot of smart people said if you do this, there's going to be hell to pay downstream.

Al Palmer:

And there was gave them a cause.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

And and and that was part of the reason for the various attempts to impeach Donald Trump. You better be damn careful about bringing someone back on active duty to prosecute them because there may be a change of administration in three years, and then Republicans, Republican retirees like you and I, we could be drugged back onto active duty and prosecuted for our civilian political beliefs. It is a Pandora's box that nobody should open. I would strongly urge the president and the secretary of war to absolutely engage in forbearance here. Don't do it. Don't do it. Don't do it.

Al Palmer:

So that brings up the interesting question, then. How do you how do you counteract the effects of the inst all of a sudden installing uh you know lack of order and discipline? How do you now go about you know fighting that issue if if if you don't go after them? And I agree with you, I think that would be folly, because it would set them up, they'd be on the view, they'd be everywhere talking about how mean and nasty the folks are in the military, and we don't need that. But the question comes up: how do we fight that?

Bruce Tucker Smith:

You're doing it right now, Alan. You know, you you get in the public square, you you go to public forums, and you state your case. And you state your case loudly, clearly, and repeatedly. That is the beauty of our country. It's the First Amendment. You know, if if you're not smarter than the other guy, then you deserve to lose.

Al Palmer:

And so Well, as I say, you're always you always bring your A game to the dispute. And that's probably what we need to do here, right?

Bruce Tucker Smith:

I I absolutely believe it. And and so Senator Captain Kelly has run his mouth, the other six of them, the other five of them, then we need to stand up and be a be better at arguing the other position. We it it is the nature of political debate and public speech. Uh get out there and tell your truth. And you're doing it. You're doing it right here.

Al Palmer:

Well, we try. But but but there's one aspect of this, though, that that as I think about it, and it's been in the press, so it's not any revelation, but there seems not to be any solid case that they're making for what is the illegal order that they're all upset about. When they're asked about it, they say, Well, we don't know. I mean, that could happen, you know.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Yeah, and that's and and and you make a great point, Alan. And it's because of that why are you people running your mouths? You no no one has even suggested a rational basis why the attacks on these narco-terrorists, which are a clear and present danger to our security, why those attacks are unlawful. And you're so right. Nobody on the other side has articulated why those might be illegal acts. In fact, they're not illegal acts.

Al Palmer:

No, and in fact, what they're what they're actually doing is standing up for it by not being against it.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Yeah, and here's a very important uh point to be remembered. Hamas, a a known global terrorist organization, trains and is supported financially and by other means uh by the Venezuelan government. They have an island off the coast where they train, they are in our hemisphere terrorism training to do harm to the United States and our allies. They are engaging in warfare against us. Um, we live in an interesting era, and much has been written on this topic. What is terrorism? It lives in a gray legal area between crime and classic set piece warfare. Yes, and because of that, we struggle with how to interpret it. And it was at the soul of the uh debates about Guantanamo. Um, who who are these people? You know, do they exactly fit under the Geneva Conventions? And do they are they afforded the protection of the Geneva Conventions? So terrorism is is the 21st century version of warfare. Coming to grips with how we deal with that is important. I think, from my own point of view, that it clearly is warfare. They are engaging in warfare against us because let's face it, Hamas don't dogfight, they don't have F-35s, F-16s, F-15s. You know, they don't have the M1A1As. So they wage war in the shadows. But make no mistake, it's a war, nevertheless.

Al Palmer:

Well, and when you get so when you get so narrow, too, that you try to define people by the the existing standards like the Geneva Conventions that were written years ago when we didn't have this focus on terrorism, you know, oh, they they're the guys that are wearing uniforms, they're wearing patches, they're wearing red crosses, so that means they're an actual combatant or they're exempt from those things. But they don't do that, do they? They're not wearing the uniforms that we always had worn in combat before. And uh, in doing the kind of work we're doing from 30,000 feet with a camera on a boat skimming across the ocean, you can't see anyway.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

No, it I mean it's true. I I don't believe that these narco-terrorists fit the definition of a lawful combatant, which would entitle them to protections under the Geneva Convention. And there's a laundry list of criteria that mark you as a lawful combatant, chief among which is that you yourself obey and follow the law of war. And then there are other criteria that you wear distinctive uniforms, you fly under a uh recognizable banner, you have a chain of command, etc. And when you are a lawful combatant, then you are entitled to protections under the Geneva Convention. And the United States historically has been, as you know, Al, uh incredibly attentive to paying attention to the law of war and not violating the law of war. But these folks don't adhere to it, they don't follow it. Ergo, they're not entitled to the protections of the law of war, in my opinion. Um but they are clearly a danger to this nation, the drugs, the money that they make from drugs, what where that money goes. Uh and so the president, as both the commander-in-chief of the armed forces and the nation's chief law enforcement officer, would be derelict in his duties if he did not take on this clear threat right on our shores.

Al Palmer:

So and the and the other issue in this is the number of people who have died as a result of this drug traffic each year in our country, up to 100,000 people a year, is about twice as many as we lost in the whole Vietnam War.

unknown:

Yeah.

Al Palmer:

I mean, that's that's terrible.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

And and it's not it's not an accident. This is an intentionally waged war against the people of the United States. Um and I, for the life of me, do not understand why the some factions in the Democrat Party feel so obliged to protect and defend these people who are clearly trying to wage war on us. I I've never understood what their agenda is, why they feel uh so uh uh emboldened to try to protect those who would harm us. I don't get it.

Al Palmer:

I don't I don't either, like you, except the only thing I can think of is it's just because they want to be against something. So you know, it's the you know, the the the enemy of my friend is my friend, you know. So they are attacking, attaching themselves to this issue just to fight the administration and make political points is pretty clear. Because there's no other sensible argument about that.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

I think you're uh as always, Alan, you you've nailed it. That's what what you in the in the in the flying business would call a shack. Um and and that's fine, you know. Uh in America, you know, politics is a hardball sport. I get it. But when you start to involve the military, when you try to intentionally involve the military in a political, a domestic political dispute, man, you have crossed a line that should never have been crossed. That is just not what we do in the United States.

Al Palmer:

And there's a whole host of unintended consequences, which would probably spring from that. I mean, you know, back in back in Vietnam, we had a problem with race relations and it got out of control, and all of a sudden you had uh whole crews on aircraft carriers going on, you know, a revolt uh over some small issues. Once you start that, there's no predicting where it's going to go, in my humble opinion.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

It's true, and and I I suspect you you have done, well, you and STARS have done some yeoman service highlighting uh the past administration and its social policies intentionally inflicted on the military, which goes to your exact point. It it had the effect of undermining military discipline, effectiveness, readiness. Um and it's it's far worse than even the fools on the view would care to understand. Um but and that and this is just another example. But but I I mean to tell you, when when Mark Kelly, in essence, is implying to the uniformed service personnel that the orders given to them by the commander-in-chiefs of the Secretary of War are unlawful. There's only one there's only one possible reason he's doing that, and that's to incite mutiny.

Al Palmer:

And it's well, and I'm also struck by the fact that that that they got that far last week or so. Uh and and they thought I think they were turning a corner on this. Turned out they weren't. So today the story is, well, this one boat, the last one that they struck, it was a second strike. Uh and that was bad. You shouldn't do that to hurt those people because they're just shipwrecked people. Well, first of all, what they what they did to that boat was not a shipwreck. It was an intentional strike to put them out of business. If they ran across a sandbar or ran aground someplace or had a fire on board and had to abandon ship, that's another matter. And that's pretty obvious to people. But but now they've they've taken us to a new direction. Here they are hanging on to the boat, and somehow that still makes them a combatant if they haven't abandoned their ship. And if they're trying to talk on the radio to communicate with other people, as has been rumored, uh that that's an intentional way of continuing the fight. And in that case, they would have been right to continue whatever effort they needed to do to put them out of business.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Well, again, you've you've nailed it, Commander. Um, there is, as you know, an entire, and I mean centuries-old, body of law in maritime law that says you come to the aid of a mariner in distress. Absolutely. And there's not a nation in the world that doesn't adhere to that law. But this is war. They're not shipwrecked. These are enemy combatants who are now. Maybe if you had the capability to go grab one of them for intel purposes, but they're still targets. They are still targets, and they may not have the instant ability to wage war or return fire, but they are still combatants, and as such, they are legitimate targets. Period.

Al Palmer:

What I would tell the good Senator Kelly is so you want to make up bad guys on this by going after people like that. But haven't we been the ones that are the first to show up when there's a tsunami in the Pacific or there's a volcano that's uh you know gone off or another natural disaster someplace? We, particularly the United States Navy and the Marines and Coast Guard, are the first ones to show up. We're there to help people. But you know what? There are orders that go with that too. There are orders that are developed probably from the president on down through SECDEF to send troops out of their way to take care of those things. Now, are those illegal orders?

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Of course not. Of course not. Even though, strictly speaking, humanitarian work is not the mission of the military. Uh absolutely, the sea services have always, always been there. The Air Force with heavy airlift capability of getting people, material, supplies around the globe. And our our track record on this is unparalleled amongst the nations of the world. The United States has always been incredibly generous with its resources to help other human beings. And that's you know, it's our pride and it's our honor to do it. But you make a great point. Is that strictly speaking the mission of the armed forces? To kill people and break things? No. Does that so we're going a little off script when we do humanitarian stuff? Yeah, so if someone wanted to complain about it.

Al Palmer:

But it is a story, is it not, that kind of balances some of this out? Uh I remember this back during uh you know the Gulf War. Uh and I was out in Hawaii and I was working with a PACAF commander out there building an aviation museum at Pearl Harbor. And one day he had a meeting and he was trying to defend what the criticism was of the Air Force and being you know part of that effort uh in the Mideast. And they and their method was we don't want to say much because we don't want to be targets, so we're not going to say anything at all. And I remember putting my hand up and saying, General, look, if you don't say something to defend yourself, who's going to do that? Particularly in this environment that we have today. And I do think that it would behoove uh Heg Seth and everybody else to start talking in more positive terms about things like we do. I mean, no one no one says you got to go out there and do disaster relief and get people resettled and drop food to them and spend your time. No one says we have to do that. We do it because it's the right thing to do. And that's I think that's an antidote a bit for what this bunch is trying to do. Because you're right, they're just trying to foment unrest and uh disobedience in their anxious, uh, which ain't a good thing. But we do good things, and maybe it's time for us to talk more about that.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

And that goes back to your point you made it a little earlier about so what do we, who are of this mindset, what do we do to counteract what the Mark Kellys and the Senator Slotkins? The answer is stand up and be heard.

Al Palmer:

Yes.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Yeah. Raise your voice in the public square and be heard and remind the world what it is that we do when we're not we're not dropping bombs. And that's most of the time. The military, most of the time, we're not fighting. And a lot of times we're simply helping people. Uh, and then you let's just add to that our our National Guard brothers and sisters. The National Guard routinely called upon by the state governors to respond to floods, natural disasters, earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, and on and on and on. These are people in uniform who are giving uh of time and treasure and and were spending money simply to help people. So this, and I again, I and you make again the point, I never understand why people in our company in our country, particularly people who have served and and the political left in recent years, feel so obliged to run down the military and run down this country. Uh exactly. I I I it it befuddles me. And the only answer is you're doing it for cheap political points to self-end self-grandize. And and I say, when you do that, then you, sir, you ma'am, are a disgrace to the uniform that you used to wear.

Al Palmer:

Well, of course, I my my time was in Vietnam, and when we came back home, there were not a lot of people who were welcoming us coming off an airplane. And and over and over the years, uh, of course, that's changed a bit, which is really good. And people do appreciate what the military does. And often people come out to me if they recognize me if I'm wearing a t-shirt or hat or something, and they'll say, Well, sir, thanks, thanks very much. We really appreciate your service. Thank you for your service. And I always go back to them and I say, Well, how'd that work out for you? And they go, What? Well, you're you're nice and safe. You're in a nice grocery store with your kids, they all look like they're pretty healthy. Hasn't that worked out well for you, too? Oh yeah. And that's the kind of thing I think we might want to start thinking about. But uh, this is the purpose, is uh Bruce, as you as a wonderful member of our board of advisors and one of our staunch uh legal minds. We know how that works with the outside world. You just have to convince them, as we're talking about now, about the things that can work out better for you rather than just gripe about things that aren't working.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Well, and I'll tell you, so there's some very encouraging signs, and and um I'm very proud of this fact. I have a grandson who just two weeks ago graduated from Air Force Basic Training at Lackland, and uh he's now on his way to his specialty school. Um, I can report to you that the esprit amongst the kids in his training class going through Lackland, he said these kids are just fire eaters. They're just rare in the go. They're proud of that uniform, their families are proud of that uniform. And you know, we we all know that during the Biden administration, uh, recruiting took a serious nosedive, serious nosedive. And and the reason for that, we know this, you and I are examples of this. Military service tends to run in families. And during the Biden administration, you had parents and grandparents saying to the kids, yeah, I don't think I'd put on the uniform right now. I don't think it's a very good time to be serving the country. And I'm uh no political commercial here, but almost immediately upon Trump's election, Heg Seth being in office, recruiting has gone through the roof. They're turning kids away. People want to serve because their families are saying, now's the time to go, we've got leadership now. So I was I was very encouraged. And so the downstream effect of that is the kids like my grandson, 19 years old, uh, one day he's gonna come out of the service and he's gonna go out into society, he and the other people with him, and and he'll have a story to tell. Like we do what we do. And so I put congrats uh in the young people that are that are signing up now because they are they're our best hope going forward. Um they'll they'll tell the story, but we need to keep telling the story.

Al Palmer:

Well, I was uh I was given a speech at a military ball up in uh Minnesota several months ago, and this lieutenant colonel came up to me and he wanted to kind of call me in the in the corner here and talk to me. And he uh and uh and I said, so what's bothering you? He says, Well, my son is at the Air Force Academy. He's uh he's in his third year, uh, and he's now saying to me, I don't want to stick around, Dad. The the stuff I see is discouraging, and I don't think I'll be happy because all these things are happening. And I said, Look, Colonel, uh, you need to sit him down and talk to him, and and you can tell him from somebody else outside that that has been there and done it, he'll be happy with that journey. You know, no one knows where they're gonna go. It's it is an adventure. Uh you you don't know what you're gonna do, where you're gonna show up. You write a blank check to Uncle Sam, and then you're kind of on your own. But I said that's the joy in it, is is discovering what you can do and how people can work. So I said, you know, tell them to stick with it. He wrote me back a few weeks ago and said, yeah, he decided to stick it out, uh, and he'll be uh and he graduated, uh, which is great. But without that support and and something to point to, people are ready to leap into the the current jargon or whatever happens to be the popular point of view. Unfortunately, sometimes that's a negative point of view, right? So I'm so glad to see your uh your grandson come out of this. And uh thanks for sharing him with the country.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Well, he's he's a great kid, and and and there's but there's a million great kids just like him, and that's that's the thing that you get. Yeah, the other thing to be remembered is this we all tend to um look at our military careers with a little bit of rose-colored glasses. Man, everything was just great. Well, no, it wasn't. There were a lot of days when it was horrible. I mean, it was, and and you you far better than I uh from your service in Vietnam. There were a lot of days it was a Charlie Foxtrot, but on balance, service above self, dedication to the mission, the people that you served with, even in the worst of circumstances, that's what makes that's what makes our country and our military great. Um, you know.

Al Palmer:

Well, I see some of these these uh uh media folks and celebrities and politicians scurrying around trying to dress themselves up to make themselves look like they've done something, and it's kind of pathetic in a way. Uh but but you and I know because we've run across them some true true heroes and remarkable people who've done exceptional things. And some of them you you would never have thought about that. One that comes to mind is Chuck Yeager. You know, Chuck Yeager came from West Virginia and barely got out of grade school, went into the Air Force as an enlisted guy, became a pilot, and and was had an amazing career. But Chuck Yeager would say himself, he said, if I hadn't had that opportunity, I would have gone nowhere.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

You know, the other night my wife and I were watching Jeopardy, and there was a question that came on that had to do with military ranks, and all three of the contestants did not know, they thought a sergeant outranked a major. Now, in reality, we should ought to the majors ought to listen to the sergeant some a lot of times, but the the the percentage of the population who've never served don't know a corporal from you know the chief of staff. They don't know. And it's and it's but this is the price tag we have for an all-volunteer military. Um it's too bad that we don't have a draft. I think universal service would benefit the entire nation and would give everybody a better sense of how the military works. Even if you peel potatoes in Louisiana and that's all you ever did, uh it would it would be beneficial to the nation. And frankly, while we do have a number of people in Congress, and we're talking about them here today, who have served, um, we don't have enough because it's Congress that has the authority to make war. And it would certainly be a benefit to our democracy and our republic if we had more informed people making those decisions had they simply served. So um that's that's the downstream price tag of an all-volunteer force, but there you have it.

Al Palmer:

But one of the things that's happened is within the within the public, the outside world, uh academics and performance in schools has gone right down the tubes. Uh there the kids are not learning, they're not digesting things, and then they go out into the workplace and they can't get a job, or when they do, they can't perform very well. The military has always found a way to solve that. You know, we train people well, and even if they don't know a whole lot, like Chuck Yeager, when he when he first came into the Air Force as a mechanic, became an amazing fighter pilot, broke the sound barrier, and and yet he didn't have the formal education that most of our kids get going through the eighth grade. But he was able to do it. We in the military can handle that. We can train people to do things, and they'll do amazing things. So you're right, it would be good if we had some sort of uh not compulsory service, but service where we could we could say, we'll take you for a few years, we'll train you, spend some time with us, and if you want to spend a career, that's great, we'll even do more for you. But but I think there's a value there to the general public that a lot of people don't see with the military.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

And I'll tell you something that we all should be very proud of is our NCO Corps in our service branches. Uh our NCOs have and should have always run the military. You know, officers, we get we get the privilege of leadership, but but the men and women who are wearing the stripes, the NCOs, our NCO corps, they are, as a group, I think, the most amazing human beings on the planet. And boy, when when those folks come out of military service, go in at age 18, do 20 years, they come out age 30, 8, 40, they're still very young people. You talk about you talk about a group of people you want working in your industries, are these incredible former NCOs who've who've had one foot on the loading dock and one foot in the boardroom. Uh, and it's something we should be extraordinarily proud of because no other military in the world uh cultivates and puts as much strength and and and faith as we do in our NCOs. And I, you know, talk about a just an incredible group of Americans. So, you know, they they're an amazing resource, and um, and I and I suspect so many of them go on and are tremendously successful in in commercial business life after they get out of the service.

Al Palmer:

To our audience, uh, if you want to know how that works, uh, there was a really good mini-series done on aircraft carriers called Carrier. And it it and it talked about life on board, and it focused a lot on uh the the senior uh uh lead chief petty officer on the ship, uh, who who had everybody in line. He knew how to handle people, he knew what to do to get them to be uh energized and work. I also knew he also knew how to get them straightened out when they didn't do something right. That is an amazing thing to do. But that's a really good way of looking at it. That was a good series that demonstrated that.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

It was, and and and let's let's face it, um, you know, I'm certain good chunks of my career were due in large part to the outstanding NCOs I worked with when I was a young captain, young lieutenant and captain. Um, and and so that again, that relationship in the service when you're a young officer, if you have enough good sense and judgment and can put your ego in check to listen to what the NCOs are telling you, man, they are a storehouse of wisdom if you just pay attention. And uh again, you take you take that out of service and go into corporate business America. Wow, you can't meet those people, can't beat them.

Al Palmer:

Well, Bruce, listen, this has been such a really interesting discussion because we've gone quite a ways away from just talking about law, as we wanted to start with here. But I wanted to thank you so much for being with us today to delve into this. I think there's more to come from this, uh, but for anybody that doesn't know what STARS does, we're the people who aren't partisan. You know, we don't have a dog in a fight. Uh, you know, as somebody once said, if you bark at every if you stop and try to correct every dog on your journey down the road, they'll never get to where you go for fighting barking. So we we try to do things in a smart way at STARS, and we've been successful. We've we've made changes, we've done things that benefit the troops, their families, and all that. And uh I want to thank you for being a big part of that uh with STARS, but not just SARS, you know, Bruce, you you've had an amazing career of protecting the troops and the law, and uh you know, we all do this in our own small way, I guess, but uh I want to just thank you again for your service and what you're doing. Maybe I'll be able to do that.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Well, for me, it's uh it it's an honor, and and again, our very conversation here answers your opening question. What do we do to push back against those who speak in opposition to us? You're doing it. We're we're we're having this conversation in public. We're encouraging others to have that conversation. Maybe our words will generate other smarter people to think different thoughts and go out and speak their truth. So this is how you do it. It's freedom of speech, it's the first amendment, it's the constitution, it's that thing you and I swore to protect with our very lives. And so we're doing right here exactly what the Founding Fathers wanted us to do. Exactly.

Al Palmer:

And as you you uh mentioned to me the other day when we were talking about some of this, you know, we signed up, we committed ourselves to a lot of risk, uh, and a lot of not always good times. But as you said, we signed up, raised our hands, and we did it for a piece of paper.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Yeah, we didn't we didn't swear to uphold, protect, defend the nation, the flag, mom, the girl next door, apple pie, baseball, none of that. We swore to defend with our lives an idea, you know, a document, a piece of paper, the law stuff. Well, you know, and the and the and again, the first amendment, the most important one, the freedom of speech part. So, Captain Kelly, you want to stand in the public square and be an idiot? Okay, we're gonna stand up and oppose you, and we're gonna do it loudly. That's how America works.

Al Palmer:

And I and I'm happy to invite him or any of the crew of six to come on our podcast and we can talk about it.

Bruce Tucker Smith:

Yeah, I'd like to see that.

Al Palmer:

I'm sure a lot of people might. Well, Bruce, listen, thanks again for for uh reprieves of our earlier uh thing together, and and you've done a remarkable job. To our audience, uh, we hope you'll like this. If you do, you can always drop us a line on stars. Go to our stars website, stars.us, and you can probably do that. Uh but in the meantime, we'll be back next week with another episode of Stars, and this time we'll be talking a little bit about ideologies that don't work. So stay tuned for that. And with that, good night.