Thomas P.M. Barnett :: Weblog

Dateline: In the Shire, Indy, 11 February 2006

I've done the Air Force new one-star class course for three years now, and the Navy-Marine new flags training series for two years now. The missing link was the Army version. Got that one done last night, at the personal invite of General Peter Schoomaker, Army Chief of Staff.

A great interaction, but a price to be played in sleep.

Hellish pair of flights down to Austin, getting there just before a cold snap kicked in. I arrived at The Mansion on Judges Hill about 6pm. I had an hour to get my stuff together before cocktails began with the new one-star generals at 7pm. Schoomaker entered about 1930. He flew in from DC just like I did.

The generals had an audience with Michael Dell earlier in the day, which they were still buzzing about. After our drinks (I did a pair of Shiner Bocks, local TX beer), we had a very nice dinner. I got a seat next to Schoomaker, which was cool. This was our third interaction. I briefed him on Y2K when he was boss of Special Ops Command back in 1999. I also interviewed him in the spring of 2005 for the Rumsfeld piece in Esquire. So Tampa, the Pentagon, and now Austin.

Long dinner of about an hour of conversation, and then I go on about 2030, talking til almost 10pm. I take 30 minutes of Q&A, and then it's back to a cocktail scene until well past midnight.

All very interesting, since most of these new flags were there for the first few months of Iraq, so nothing like hearing it from the horse's mouth. Also cool to describe the revolution going on inside the Army and be able to point directly at the guy most responsible for it while you're describing it (Schoomaker). All in all, a very cool evening.

But a bit long. Asleep by 1am but up at 4am to catch my 0600 flight. Back to Indy just to catch my eldest daughter post-vocal competition. Back home, I nap a bunch, then catch "Munich" tonight with one of my kids. Really good, I thought. Guess I don't see the rewriting of history or slanting in Spielberg's work that others did. To me, it was right on, but it likewise had no impact on me regarding the utility of killing bad guys.

Nice long talk on the phone late tonight with Steve DeAngelis. Big names joining the firm as we gear up for all the work we're winning and all the talks we're having with an ever expanding mix of companies and gov agencies. Scaling the company upwards is all we talk about now (when we're not in some meeting with some company wanting to establish a relationship), and it's a fascinating process. It's really so cool to be doing this post the dot.com craze, because everything is held to a much higher standard now. It's deliver, deliver, deliver, proving yourself at every step. And Steve's frugality in running the company matches my own upbringing. It just feels so right to be doing something like this now than I'm sure it must have felt during those hazy-crazy days of the beforetime. I mean, no point in doing this unless it's going to be real from top to bottom.

I am beat. Three trips in less than 10 days. And not here for that long this time. But Steve warned me repeatedly that this was going to be a blistering year, and right now we are making hay like the sun will never go down.