Why Should We Care if Chinese Naval Flotillas Are Now Patrolling the Pacific Islands? | With Ambassador Laura Stone

A Chinese naval task group carrying a thousand Marines and 30 helicopters just sailed straight through waters the United States is treaty bound to defend. The Republic of the Marshall Islands is home to one of America's most critical and remote military installations. Beijing knows exactly what this task group sailed through. Our guest today was there as the sitting US ambassador when it happened. So let's dive in to find out why we should care if Chinese naval flotillas are now patrolling among the Pacific Island countries. And welcome once again to why should we care about the Indo-Pacific brought to you by our producer i.e. J media and our sponsor our group Asia we will tell you more about them and do course. I'm Ray Powell I'm the former military officer here in California still down there in Arizona at his winter abode is the former diplomat Jim Kruso how are you Jim? All I'm feeling pretty good about myself having 80 degrees and nothing the blizzard likes from other people. Well we don't have any blizzards here in the Bay Area but we do have a lot of fog sometimes. Meanwhile let's see let's let's talk about it that how in December of 2025 a Chinese naval task group tracked southeast through the western Pacific going through waters near Polau Micronesia and notably the Marshall Islands. Australia scrambled surveillance aircraft while Pacific Island leaders basically said very little publicly most of the world of course barely noticed but our guest today Jim did notice because she was there. Ambassador Laura Stone just retired as the US ambassador to the Republic of the Marshall Islands and before that spent decades is one of Washington's why excuse me Washington's top China specialists of course both Jim and I had our experiences working with Laura and various assignments and I actually was a regular passenger with her on the shuttle from our little neighborhood in Hanoi to the embassy. Laura welcome and let's start with our signature question why should we care that Chinese naval flotillas are now patrolling the Pacific Islands. It seems kind of obvious to me but this is probably a new advancement in what China has been willing to do in terms of force projection. So on December 4th 2025 so just a couple of weeks ago press reported that the Australians had detected a force ship people's liberation army navy task force operating south of the Philippines sea and the satellite image they were collected by the US spatial intelligence company called Bantor and they showed a four ship task force and there were two warships a cruiser and a forget accompanied by a replenishment vessel and a U.S. and class landing helicopter dock ship. These were not well passed the first island chain probably well passed the second island chain. They were showing that they had the ability to project well outside of a normal operating area. Another company called Starboard Maritime Intelligence which is a New Zealand based company did describe this flotilla as a significant projection of power. They the helicopter dock ship is capable of hosting 30 helicopters and approximately a thousand marines and the replenishment vessel can carry over 11,000 tons of fuel and dry stores making its cruising range over 10,000 nautical miles. This seems to me something that deserves a certain amount of attention and as you mentioned was was noticed was commented on by a few people that really really watched this stuff but wasn't a major focus because there was a lot going on at that time. We were basically running into the exercise season for the Chinese. The Chinese were looking quite a lot going on in the East China Sea, the Yellow Sea and the South China Sea at the time. There were estimates at the time that you had 90 to 100 PLAN people's liberation army navy vessels that were engaged in operations in December and they were all in sort of a more normal area but then in addition it's come out subsequently that there were large formations soon thereafter of fishing vessels, Chinese fishing vessels that were making noticeable formations in the region. Now this wasn't anywhere near the Marshall Islands but there was basically just a lot going on during that time and so for entirely reasonable circumstances this particular task force or group of four vessels that were moving west didn't get the level of attention that I think it probably should have. So what do you think was the purpose of this exercise by China? I think it was basically to show that they could do it. So obviously you developed new capabilities by trying them out. These were not the most sensitive vessels that were going west. They weren't a particularly large number but they were capability that was going through a pretty sensitive area for the United States. We talk a lot about the first island chain and then we talk about the second island chain. I actually like the term that was originally used by Ellis back in whatever 1921 when he was talking about island hopping. He talks about a second island cloud because it's about whether you're talking about a defensive bulp work or sea lanes. The cloud is sort of an area that you go through a cloud and it's more of a transit area where you want to keep control of the transit and then you get to the line that you want to hold. As we look at that we understand that the the Marshall Islands, the federated states of Micronesia, Guam, Wake, Palau. Those are what Palau is in the first island chain but those areas leading up to the first island chain are really a cloud. It's an area that's a region that you really want to keep control of and having Chinese projecting force even a very small force into that starts to be something that really does deserve attention. As we mentioned the Australians certainly noticed and they had their own recent experience with a task group that went a lot down their way and circumnavigated Australia. They were watching it pretty closely. What about in the Pacific Islands themselves? Was there a lot of discussion about this task group? Was it a concern of the governments there and how about in the Marshall Islands? Just to clarify the Australian understanding and what's been mentioned publicly, some being really careful to make sure I'm staying completely in the public domain here and only talking about things that the Australians or others have released publicly or that commercial companies have pulled down. The testimony that was provided by the Australian Defense Establishment was that this task force probably went with between five and seven miles of the Australian EEZ, the second one. And obviously earlier in the year there was the circumnavigation. These activities are harder to track. I think Ray you know quite a lot about this but the AIS that you get from the research vessels and from commercial shipping is not as secretive as you would get from for example a task force. So we do know that there have been Chinese research vessels that have translated through this region and that have translated through probably the EEZs. I haven't actually plotted them out but the EEZs of federated states of Micronesia of RMI, probably of Nauru of Kiribas. Now these are research vessels and it's within maritime law that a research vessel can go through these areas but it's very noticeable. If you take a look at for example there's a new service called the Micronesia Security Monitor that is actually tracking the AIS paths for these research vessels and we'll occasionally when they have their their they IIS is that that tracking system that vessels are Non-military vessels are supposed to use And will occasionally pick up a task force in various spots when they have those those when they're in Intense sea lanes often they turn them on even for a naval vessel You can go on there and you can take a look at that website and you can see all of the tracks that go right through the EEZs of for example the Marshall Islands But I think part of the reason that you weren't seen as much from the States in the region was that it's it's not the kind of thing they track in their normal fishing So it requires a Country that is is actively tracking naval vessels to provide the information and just because of the the difficulty and Passing classified information in in these these more remote areas. I think you don't you'll see a little bit of a lag Another issue is that the compactive free association states are Sovereign sovereign nations, but they also have By treaty accepted the defense protection of the United States This is actually even a more robust relationship than a treaty The United States has access-based in an overflight for all of these countries. We actually are responsible for their defense And in return we get full access and we control access to their Their territorial waters we get basing rights and we have right of overflight So I think part of it is that this is this is the responsibility of the United States and so it's the the Area the United States Government in the United States military has to be watching All right, so the compact states depend on us for the security so maybe they are less concerned when things like this happen I don't remember yeah, I don't think they're not concerned. I think it's that they They rely on the United States All right, did they express concern about this move? The I'm kind of trying to stay into the the unclassified area here There's been no public indication that they had expressed concern and The information most of the information has come out of the Australians in terms of what what was who was tracking what? Can you say if they contacted China to express? Any concern or ask for a heads-up next time or anything like that. There is no public indication that they've done that But also two of the countries that are in the compact Palau and the RMI Don't have diplomatic relations with Beijing And so their communication Is very secure this Right and just for our listeners RMI being the Republic of the Marshall Islands where you were posted. Yeah, so they're public Marshall Islands. Yeah, yeah So let's talk about the Republic of the Marshall Islands. Obviously most People have not been there, right? I was gonna say that most of our audience likely has not been there What are the Marshall Islands? What what distinguishes them? What what did when you when you arrived there? What was it like working with the people the Marshall Islands? What do you think people should know about it? So the Marshall Islands it is very remote It is does not have much of a tourism infrastructure. It's absolutely beautiful. It is a One of the lowest lying countries in the world I think the natural elevation for the entire country is about six feet above sea level and It is made up of two major chains of a tolls and then a few outlying islands the It is startling for how Flat it is how beautiful the water is how dark the nighttime skies are It's four hour flight beyond Hawaii And about another five or six hour flight West from Papua New Guinea or Australia. So it's it's in the middle of it's in the middle of the Pacific Ocean Because of that that's part of why it's strategically important It just happens to be in a geographical sweet spot for some very important active and passive US space activities And also it's where our major testing is at the US Army Garrison Quadilina toll for a lot of our missiles and Things like that that are related to our nuclear triad not testing any nuclear there and the the remarkable thing about the Marshall Islands is just how close our relationship with is with them More Marshallies actually live in the United States because of this this old historical relationship where they were a trust territory administered by the United States for so many years all three compact countries pull out the federated states of Micronesia and the Republic of the Marshall Islands and The when they got their full sovereignty they maintained this this compact relationship with the United States So they are in free association with United States They have sort of a mixed domestic economy in which part much of their economy is almost like a US territory still And we still provide quite a lot of a federal contributions to for example the paying their their nurses salaries and paying for a lot of their healthcare workers and paying for a lot of their teachers They have US postal service and they serve in the US military at A higher percentage than any US state So they're really quite committed to the relationship They are very proud of that relationship but they also are proud and sovereign country have a very distinct historical legacy and because of the the legacy of US nuclear testing They also have a somewhat complicated historical relationship with the United States It's Remarkable for its beauty and how untouched it is underwater But it's also one of the things that really struck me as somebody who has done China is just how strategically important it is It's one of these funny things that I think you actually Can get more from doing just a Google search of the US Army garrison, Quadulent atoll and space fence Then I could say in an unclassified environment But it's it's definitely worth taking a look at and seeing why that particularly weird geographical sweet spot in the middle of the Pacific is so important for North Korea responding to North Korea China and Russia All right, Laurie spend most of your career at status and economic officer, which is what makes you so special Um, a mormor things But when you look at the Marshall Islands economy, we're actually pretty much any Pacific Island economy How does it survive a be how does it Push back against the offers of Chinese aid and built-in-road projects and that sort of thing yeah So the compact countries are a little different because they do still have this relationship with the United States that That's a budget relationship in addition to the emotional and historical ties And the defense ties But um, you know that these places are really really hard to invest in They don't have a lot of natural resources. They've got tuna They might have some deep sea mining That's you know a very new area, but they're hesitant to go into far on that because they're not quite sure what the environmental impacts will be they don't want to turn up a lot of Whatever one would turn up the bottom of the ocean that would damage the the fishing um the um There's so remote that Very few US investors are are that interested um, you know, they have Land ownership issues and things like that so it's quite hard to create a tourism industry They have very few air connections. So nobody really wants to to build a hotel um and so what's the cost to go flight Um round trip ticket from DC is about three thousand five hundred dollars Uh, business class. Nope. That's that's that's way in the back economy Um from Hawaii. It's about another two thousand dollars round trip Um, so it's really pricey and you then they're too far away from the Asian market So they can't really take advantage of uh what pull out has been able to create Yeah, so it's a real challenge. It really does need support from things like the FC in order to get investment. The development finance corp was the corporation was the entity that Congress created out of the overseas private investment corporation and part of USAID. About eight years ago, seven or eight years ago, in order to try to find somebody that could counter the rationalize the US development finance and overseas investment mechanism, but then also to counter Belt and Road. And it's been kind of a mixed result. It's still in the Pacific, which is where I have most recent experience, because it's just these are really hard places to invest. A lot of the requirements that the United States would expect in an investment like really clear land rights and things like that. Just don't exist really clear labor rights, everything else. And so we're still working on that. And I still am sort of marginally optimistic that we can get some investments going. But and there's in fact a big summit conference going on in Hawaii right now with all the Pacific Islands and the State Department that they're trying to bring in or just cause of cross fertilizations that we can get more investment and more private sector. But that said, at least for the Kofi States, quite a lot of their economy is still public sector in martial islands is the base, especially. So you mentioned recognition of Taiwan and obviously it shares that in common with Palau. We had President Whips, Palau on the podcast few months ago. He talked about how the great cap power competition plays out in a place like Palau and also how his, his country's refusal to switch recognition from Taiwan to China is a constant topic of discussion, especially with the Chinese. What does that look like in the martial islands? And is it is it significantly different than in a place like Palau? It's very similar dynamic, although just because the Palau and economy has a lot more tourism and a lot of Chinese invested tourism. They are a little more on the and they're also on the first island change so they're just closer to China. They're a little more vulnerable and I think subject to a lot more influence pedaling. The Chinese have not been as successful in getting into the martial islands. And so I give a lot of credit to people like the current president of the martial islands who really just wants to make sure that the United States remains the primary economic relationship and political relationship for the martial islands. But especially when you look back a few years, you can see that the Chinese were really trying to come in and invest. And in fact, one of the few successful prosecutions in the United States of corrupt practices by Chinese aimed at influence pedaling was a guy named Carrie Ann. And he had tried to bribe a bunch of martialese officials. And in fact, we just sanctioned a few of them in the last week to make it clear. Oh, I'm sorry, I take that back. The person we sanctioned actually was domestic corruption, but we have in the past sanctioned martialese officials for having taken money. Being caught on taking money from this Chinese businessman. And so there is this real attempt to get in there, especially because they would like to be around the base. Okay, but China's active throughout the Pacific Islands, it seems. What kind of islands they have apparently an agreement to do deep sea mining as you mentioned elsewhere. You're retired now. I don't know if you're able to comment this way, but how do you see the US counter to the Chinese efforts? It's really hard. It's fitting around peg in a square hole. The US systems don't work particularly well in the Pacific Islands. For example, require that you are able to show land clear land rights to develop a piece of land. And this is one example, but throughout the Pacific, the lands are owned by chief dins or communally owned or owned by multiple people. And there's not that sort of clear land rights. And so it becomes really hard for the US to put in investment. And the Chinese just don't care about that stuff. They are willing to take losses. Their capital costs are a lot lower. And so they're willing to take risks for political reason reasons in a way the United States institutions are set up to do. So it's not been awesome. There are some potential to invest in some of the ports and things like that. But it hasn't it hasn't been a great success story yet. Like I said, I still I'm still like a little bit optimistic that we can get our act together and get the get the financing in. I think the current deputy secretary is very committed to trying to make that happen. Well, historically, you used a ID to do a lot of our work and now a ID is basically eviscerated. So and private investment, as you said, is very difficult given all these restrictions. So my concern is we're trying to get people on the hand tied behind our back. There is no question that some of the projects that USAID had in the Pacific having them go away has caused a setback in terms of private investment in the region. So a lot of things that we used to do were things that were really soft skills like helping infrastructure project that was already being funded by the United States, but the low capacity and some of the the Pacific islands to actually put together a structured finance or architectural design and managing a really complicated infrastructure project were beyond the local capacity. And so, you know, for a pretty low price USAID would come in and provide a contractor, just a general contractor that would be trying to hurt all the cats. And now with that not there. And these are really pretty small embassies without a lot of US government on the ground. It's it's it's concerning. It means that a lot of the things that the US taxpayers are already paying for are not being done as efficiently as they could be otherwise USAID had a not just you know USAID that didn't only do the kind of thing that you see on television of you know feed starving children in Africa they were do they also did a lot of soft work in Asia in EAP that facilitated the efficient use of other US funds. They did that be it non Philippines a lot of Pacific where they were basically coming in kind of being a project manager just filling a gap that didn't exist in any other part of the US government there wasn't the ability to fund to that kind of like small project that you just need that one general contractor to come in. You know if you're building a house and you've got the plumber and the electrician and everything else. But you kind of need the one person to come in and say okay you go over there and you do this and that that part isn't funded through their ways and so USAID was filling the gap. So yeah it's a big problem. So I do want to go back to one thing you mentioned before you talked about the fact that the US does not do nuclear testing in the Marshall Islands but of course those of us who read our history books once upon a time know that we did after World War 2 there was a period of time a little over a decade where we were blowing up some pretty big atomic bombs in the Marshall Islands. Clearly that must have had a significant legacy that you are still dealing with today right. Yeah definitely the a lot of the historical identity of the Marshall Islands has to do with their legacy of nuclear testing. The United States has worked really hard actually in the the 1980s to try to fund trust funds for the people that had been affected. One of those trust funds was completely run down by local local officials and that was one of the local officials was one of the person that I referred to that was designated a couple of weeks ago because he helped facilitate with others the diminishment of the bikini island trust fund and the bikinis the you know the famous one although a lot of the testing was done on actually another island called an we talk or another toll. But yeah I mean the it's a historical legacy the United States admitted it was a different time and we continue to do everything we can to take care of the people that were on medically injured. by the the nuclear testing and a few bombs that went off that were larger than expected and had fallout on occupied islands There's still a lot of disputed bags actually how much should be paid in Out to survivors, and I think that's the kind of thing that needs to you know It has been resolved in treaty, but also needs to continue dialogue. So the United States started this year. We restarted a Discussion between the Department of Energy, which has the Is the legacy agency that handles the the nuclear the nuclear legacy and Just making sure that we're keeping those lines of communications open. It's It's such a historically difficult country that I'm not or historically difficult issue that I'm not sure it's ever going to get resolved But it's you know the best we can do is just kind of keep on on trying and One of the things that we did with this new compact is we have set up a trust fund That will be for people in the martial islands that have special needs without getting into whether or not This is directly related to nuclear legacy or something like that, but just you know the the martial islands rightly notes that many many of its people live in outer a tolls and have really unusual uncovered needs and so we are starting this this huge program to try to get funds and programs and things like that out to those people who do have special needs So the other countries allies or partners of the U.S Couple of which have Territories like Britain and France In the Pacific and Australia New Zealand which have special interests How well do we work with them in sort of devising strategy and By the enough resources and efforts I think we can better um in part because In the past I think there was this idea that you did kind of divide things up And everybody had their own little area and they were going to take care of these atolls and these easy and things like that Um, and I think you're getting a lot more cross fertilization now, but I think there can be a lot more There was the the franchise who tried to Do some some sales into places like martial islands uh port visits with their navy navy vessels Uh, I think the Australians are opening new embassies trying to work a lot more closely with us Over the equator so in the micronesia not just down in Polynesia And uh Melanesia so there's three basic regions in the Pacific. There's micronesia Um, and then there's Polynesia which includes Hawaii but also Areas around Fiji and then Melanesia which is kind of based around um Uh pop a new guinea And there was an idea that you know each area so each each each big country Um had responsibility for a certain area I think now as you're getting a lot more cross fertilization I think there's a lot of room for example for war joint exercises um More diplomatic exchanges uh, it's still because it's the transportation is so hard in this region Um, and communications still pretty um primitive in This particularly on the classified side The um It's pretty hard to do but uh people are starting to do it and there's a lot more effort One thing that really could be done is is a lot more cooperation On bringing in private sector bringing in better transportation Um bringing in air links things like that They all that needs to be subsidized so it's so cooperation you know based on that um Pay me an optimistic picture what what is a what is a you know in 25 years If things go right for the Marshall Islands What could things look like in a quarter century that would be substantially different than now If things go right What one of the main things that will have to happen is that they'll need to get control of their population decline um so the And they'll have to Be a sort of positive trend line in terms of um severe weather and climate impact It's like I said it's it's only six feet above sea level So if you start to get traditionally storm start in uh Micronesia and then uh in in the Republic of the Marshall Islands and then the big storms generally move towards the Philippines uh or towards the mainland Asia Um if those storms start turning around The islands could become unlivable if they're hit repeatedly by typhoons um and the other problem is if you really do have massive population decline the population seems to be declining by 345 percent a year uh which is pretty dramatic From outward migration outward migration to to the United States mostly um And so you do need to start attracting people back and so that's why you're gonna need jobs You're gonna really need to harden the country um both economically and um and physically from the from storms And so that's I think for me the optimistic approach of they're really looking at this and the United States is aware of it But we somehow have to bring in the resources and use the many compact resources that we already do about there intelligently um In a way that really does look to their future because otherwise in 25 30 years It could be a country that is actually literally hard to sustain um and On our experience climate change is always the most important issue for these countries as they call it existential Yeah, and of course the current administration of Washington does not prioritize climate change to put them mildly How we were able to manage the relationship given this different viewpoint Like you said it is sort of existential not sort of it is existential um and it's not really sea level rise it's The impact on the overall climate environment um It tends to be used as sea level rise as a shorthand But really what you're talking about is do the weather patterns change to the um uh Currents change in such a way that either the low lying a tolls You just can't live on them. You can't rebuild every couple of years or It becomes too dangerous or things like the the fish start to move away and there's just no no Way to sustain people's livelihoods anymore And have we seen that in the last you know decade or so? Are you seeing the fish move away if you see the the the currents change Despite my two years of the Marshall Islands and my my newfound love of deep sea fishing I actually not quite sure about the tuna, but I do know that the tuner are they they're migratory, but They they move around a lot And to based on on climate and based on where their their feed fish are So yeah, it's definitely something that's really sensitive and really vulnerable And just started follow up on that that you'd mentioned storms turning around Is that a phenomenon that's been observed recently or is that something that's projected out and say this could happen in the future So it has happened before Um there have been typhoons that As they were they generated in the Marshall Islands and then we're heading west um, but then for whatever reason um hooked Back towards the Marshall Islands and did hit the Marshall Islands um But it it's pretty rare Uh if you look at one of those uh storm trackers you can see that a few have hit um pretty you know Category one category two, but if you start getting stronger storms that are Uh, hooking back around Toward and start heading east towards the Marshall Islands then you Could have some very serious impacts these are These are not High places and they're not hardened All right, I'm gonna ask you a question to sort of get get you on your way You spent most of your career at embassies are huge China Tokyo Thailand Vietnam Marshall Islands How how did you adjust to being the biggest fish in the tiniest of ponds um so It you know it It gets you don't feel like a big fish basically you kind of bring all the fish up with you um, you know It's the hierarchy that exists in the issues huge embassies just doesn't exist And a really small place um, it's it's lovely the people are great the embassy is great I really loved it. I don't know why I didn't do it earlier on the You really feel like you can on any given day do something that's really you know at a very high level of um Uh granularity or you can think about big picture and it's all being done under the embassy. We have a great step back in Washington, but they're also pretty, they're covering multiple countries also. And so I really enjoyed it. I loved it. I loved the people that I worked with. I loved the people in the RMI government, whether they were for us or against us, they were still incredibly welcoming. And like I said, I got to do some fishing. Well, speaking of people you love, we should mention that you are married to a friend of the podcast, Mark Lambert, who was on last year talking about US tariffs. Somehow you've decided to stick around and keep putting up with him. So I want to ask you on the way out. Mark is sort of famous for his sense of humor. And one of the monikers that I have become accustomed to because I am connected on social media is the term "diplo-bride." So what I need to know is do you still allow him to call you "diplo-bride" or is he now required to say "ambasseter" "diplo-bride"? So there is the paramount like the big or paramount or Marshallese word for large is "lop-lop." And so the paramount chief is the "erogelop-lop." One of the bigger tolls is "eiling-lop-lop." And so I am "diplo-bride" "lop-lop" now. All right, well then on that note, "diplo-bride" "lop-lop." We want to thank you for coming on this time and we hope that we'll have you again on real soon and maybe we'll even let you bring that other guy with you. Excellent. All right. Thanks so much. Thanks. And of course our podcast is supported by our group Asia, a Strategic Advisory Firm. That specializes in the Indial Pacific. Bauer Group applies unmatched expertise and experience to help its clients navigate the world's most complex and dynamic markets. Jim Kruso by a co-host is a senior advisor with Bauer Group and you can visit their website at Bauergroupasia.com. Well Jim, you know it's always funny when we talk about these Pacific Islands, you know they certainly do not make the news, right, very often. It makes the news that people see around larger countries that it's going to be something but that's a really big deal. And yet the competition for these islands among great powers is the biggest it's been since World War II. Did you ever see the movie "A Ladden" by Disney with Robin Williams as the. Oh yeah. Genie. Oh yeah. Remember when he says enormous powers. Itty bitty lilyltony space. Exactly. Yes. This is giant living space. Little teeny powers. So she's all islands with tiny populations and no economic base to speak of but are incredibly strategic because they straddle an area much larger than the continental U.S. much much larger. And it's on the way to everywhere. Right. So it matters a lot. But we have trouble paying attention to it. And that's why we started with the lead of these this PLA Naval Task Group going through this area. You know because frankly the PLA Navy hasn't been operating in this part of the sea and it's indicative of the fact that you know China is aware that if you are going to control the western Pacific you know control of these islands is actually supremely important. Now you think back to the Japanese effort to control the islands in World War II to cut off U.S. access to places like Australia and the oil in Indonesia. I also think it's a reminder that the U.S. that you know you thought guys can sail around South China Sea. Well we can sail around your assets too. Yeah. Well and that's going to be happening a lot more often right because the PLA Navy is growing and China's military reach and paramilitary reach is growing and so we should expect to see more of that. And so this is a little bit of a canary in the coal mine. I think we're going to see a lot more of it. And we're going to see China not only using this stick but the carrots as we've seen in the Cook Islands and elsewhere where they're offering a lot of money over and under the table to gain influence and access. So tell me a story Jim what can you tell me? All right well sort of in the vein of these are tiny countries it's also means it doesn't take a lot of resources to have a real positive influence. So when I was in the Pei calm one of the little islands had the measles outbreak it was pretty bad and so our chief surgeon at Indopeicon said you know for 30,000 bucks I can fly out there with a couple doctors and measles vaccine and we can inoculate the whole island. Now Indopeicon spends $30,000 probably a minute and about a second but there was no money available to do this which really had huge impact and this is a problem with US policy making perhaps or how you need someone who look at the whole picture of US influence all aspects of domestic power and how do you use the resources but why is your heads in mind prevailed and we did nothing. You know I mean it really does show that you know we used to call it budget dust right you know these amounts of money which for the nonprofit known as sea light $30,000 of the early big deal but for as you say the US government $30,000 is basically completely unnoticeable. I remember when I was in the Air Force Honor Guard and there was some big scandal that erupted about how much money had been spent on a particular show of the Thunderbirds and it had to do with some waste that had happened in conjunction with this big multimedia event that they put on and I remember as the Air Force Honor Guard commander the only thing that we had that was remotely comparable to the Thunderbirds which of course is the fighter jet demonstration unit. It was the Honor Guard drill team which is basically you know 12 to 16 member team of people for on rifles and I said for that amount of money I could tour the Honor Guard for 200 years but you know it does show you know that you could do things like treat 30,000 people or you know have very much for measles for a fraction of the cost in fact again some sort of a rounding error on another activity and it's really it's it's one of those things frankly in the end it probably takes somebody from a very high level to come in and say not look everybody out of the way we are going to go do this thing. I'm sure lava is it wasn't budgeted right there's no budget for that. Well so somebody who does a lot with very little is Ian Ellis Jones our producer he's very liberal. Was that? Are we the very liberal he does stuff. Yeah that's pretty much what I was talking about him but he does a lot with us and that's Ian Ellis Jones and his company i.e. J. Media who which produces our podcast and he also puts out those fantastic military and geopolitical graphics that everyone is paying extra special attention to because in case you haven't noticed there's a bunch of activity out near this place called Iran that everybody is starting to pay a lot of attention to you so you can follow him and you should at Ian Ellis Jones on X. Of course if you like this podcast you should subscribe and follow on youtube youtube.com/ippodcast and you can also watch us on social media so if you're on LinkedIn follow us on LinkedIn if you're on Facebook there or on X and if you've got all three then you should absolutely follow us on all three. You should then email us if you have something really important you want us to pay attention to Indo-Pacific podcast at gmail.com Indo-Pacific podcast at gmail.com and of course we want to thank our great supporter power group Asia whom you can see at their website powergroupAsia.com. For Jim and Ian this is Ray saying thanks for joining us this time and please join us again next time on why should we care about the Indo-Pacific.