But, some scenes went flawlessly, like this attached B-21 Raider attack run.

Onward and upward.

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What I’m Reading

As always, this is a mere sample.

• A Ukrainian soldier severed his own foot to survive. Then came a dramatic rescue.

  https://www.reuters.com/graphics/UKRAINE-CRISIS/DRONE-RESCUE/znvngmqxzpl/

  If you have a Reuters account (thank you Patreon members!), this is a stunning read. Not only of it detailing the first known instance of a heavy drone air-lifting a wounded soldier from behind the lines (accompanied by anti-drone drones), but what that soldier endured and did to survive. It’s hard to wrap my head around.

• The New Subterranean Front

  https://www.theatlantic.com/national-security/2026/10/ukraine-war-gas-pipelines-russia/689105/

  A fascinating story about the infantry fighting taking place in the gas pipelines of Ukraine

• “Our Screens Lit Up”: Shooting Down SCUDs Over Riyadh In The Gulf War

  https://www.westpointcoh.org/interviews/our-screens-lit-up-shooting-down-scuds-over-riyadh-in-the-gulf-war

  A very interesting first-person interview - as I was looking for insight into personal air defense experiences.

Drone-Related Articles:

• Drones Are Creating New Opportunities For The U.S. Army To Deceive Its Enemies

  https://www.twz.com/news-features/drones-are-creating-new-opportunities-for-the-u-s-army-to-deceive-its-enemies

• Episode 128: The Future of War: How Autonomous Systems Are Reshaping Conflict

  https://www.rusi.org/publication/episode-128-future-war-how-autonomous-systems-are-reshaping-conflict

Space-Related Related:

• The Space Force Showed Us Its Weapons Used in Iran and Venezuela | WSJ Equipped

• New Space Force EW Unit Pairs Multiple Weapon Systems in a First

  https://www.airandspaceforces.com/new-space-force-ew-unit-meadowlands-bounty-hunter/

• Space war 2040: SPACECOM preps for attacks on ground segments, eyes cislunar ops

  https://breakingdefense.com/2026/08/space-war-2040-spacecom-preps-for-attacks-on-ground-segments-eyes-cislunar-ops/

More soon!

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The first draft of episode 24 is complete! I spent a tremendous amount of time researching the fight at Kaohsiung, the challenges for both sides, and what kind of operations the US would be capable of conducting in those first 4 days. Some of that research brought surprising results. Did you know that there are subways in Kaohsiung? I did not. 65 feet down. Adds quite a wrinkle to the urban fighting that will be taking place in the city. The script is out for copyediting and review by some of my Subject Matter Experts. I’m now roughing out the storyline and I will be meeting with Lew to plan out the animation work.

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What I’m Reading / Listening / Watching

This is just a few that I flagged for mention. In no particular order. Some are related to episode 24. Others for far-distant episodes:

The Future of War: How Autonomous Systems Are Reshaping Conflict

https://www.rusi.org/publication/episode-128-future-war-how-autonomous-systems-are-reshaping-conflict

A RUSI article

Russia Wasn’t Ready For This Operation

Youtube. How Ukraine is changing the ground fight

The Evolving Role Of Ukraine’s Artillery In The Age Of Drones

https://www.twz.com/news-features/the-evolving-role-of-ukraines-artillery-in-the-age-of-drones

The War Zone article

Epic Fury’s Lessons for the PLA

https://overcast.fm/+ABJV6wUja28

USNI The Proceedings Podcast Podcast

Underground Warfare 101

https://overcast.fm/+AA_H7QqaKMY

A Urban Warfare Project Podcast

Logistics, Landpower, and Large-Scale Combat

https://mwi.westpoint.edu/mwi-podcast-logistics-landpower-and-large-scale-combat/

Modern War Institute Podcast

US Navy should target carriers in fight with China, report says

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2026/09/17/us-navy-should-target-chinese-aircraft-carriers-report-says/

A Military Times Article

What if American Went Completely Dark?

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/18/magazine/national-blackout-power-electricity-outage.html?unlocked_article_code=1.F1E.lPaN.gPGsB4qxDr7d&smid=url-share

A New York Times article

How Drone Detection Is Evolving To Counter Smaller, Faster, And Swarm Threats

https://www.twz.com/sponsored-content/how-drone-detection-is-evolving-to-counter-smaller-faster-and-swarm-threats

The War Zone article

The Coming Blitzkrieg: Adapting Armored Formations for the Future of Warfare

https://www.armyupress.army.mil/Journals/Military-Review/Online-Exclusive/2025-OLE/The-Coming-Blitzkrieg/

Army University Press article

2 minutes ‘to succeed or fail’: 44 US soldiers stayed at Al Udeid to intercept Iran’s missile barrage

https://www.stripes.com/theaters/middle_east/2025-06-27/us-iran-nuclear-bombing-18260158.html

Stars and Stripes article

Air Defense Artillery Journal

https://ndqsa.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/ADA-Journal_October-2023.pdf_extract.pdf

2023 Issue

Hue 1968: A Turning Point of the American War in Vietnam

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071Y87H9H?lv=shuf&channelId=500&ref_=KC_GS_GB_US&plpRedirect=mhFallback

This is actually a re-read as I first read it back in 2019. I so wish my uncle-in-law was still alive to chat with him about this book, the series and everything and anything. An amazing guy. He served in the Marines at Khe Sanh. He died in 2022.

More updates soon!

John

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Episode Background:

Months worth of research, multiple interviews with various Subject Matter Experts, and 6 drafts of the script went into creating this episode. If there was one key takeaway from the deluge of information gathered, it is this: the fight for Kaohsiung would be brutal, where the opening hours would essentially be both sides racing to seize (or eliminate) the bridges crossing the Gaoping and Linbian Rivers. The goal with this episode was to show the scale of the fight, and the immense challenges and dangers facing both the ROC and the PLA in the first 24 hours of the landings.

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Watch Episode 23, Commercial-Free

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Center for International Maritime Security podcast

Sea Control 606: The Growing Complexity of PLA Amphibious Exercises

https://overcast.fm/+AAW-H2W1Glk

CIMSEC interviews Jason Wang and Marvin Bernardo about their recent report published by the Naval War College titled, “China Maritime Report #52: Everything Everywhere All At Once: The Growing Complexity of PLA Amphibious Exercises”. It was a fascinating listen, detailing how the PLA is honing their amphibious operations skills, including the use of floating causeways, ROROs (roll-on, roll-off ships), and simulating obstacle avoidance during AFV landings.

The interview sold me. I had to read the report.

US Naval War College

China Maritime Report #52: Everything Everywhere All At Once: The Growing Complexity of PLA Amphibious Exercises

https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cmsi-maritime-reports/52/

The report details a large-scale exercise the PLA carried out in August of 2025. It is incredibly in-depth and as mentioned in the Podcast, it feels like a peek into something classified, though all the information is open-source, including several commercial satellite images the authors purchased themselves.

The scope of the exercise is revealing, in that it stretched across approximately 360 kilometers of Chinese coastline (roughly the same distance from Taipei to Kaohsiung), with simulated beachheads that aligned with anticipated Taiwan landing sites.

Also, as mentioned in the Podcast, you definitely want to read the Appendix at the end of the report, which provides a minute-by-minute timeline of the exercise. While reading it, I had a moment where I literally sputtered aloud, “holy shit.”

During the exercise, the PLA brought in 5 sections of floating causeways, each 70 meters in length via a semi-submersible barge. According to report’s timeline:

• 0841 CST: Sections of the floating causeway begin to arrive at Shanwei West.

• 1004 CST A floating causeway system (COORD: 22.6914, 115.3941) was imaged at

  02:04:46 hours approximately 2.7 kilometers west of Jiesheng Base.

In approximately 1.5 hours, the PLA had the causeway assembled and in-place. That was my ‘holy shit’ moment. I later messaged the info to one of my subject matter experts to verify I was understanding this correctly. That was confirmed. My SME cautioned, rightly, that this was surely under ideal conditions. Regardless, it’s both impressive and alarming.

Lastly, I was not aware until reading this report that there are “commercial” Chinese ROROs that can release vehicles well off-shore. That nugget of information took me here:

China is Preparing Merchant Ro-Ro Ferries for Amphibious Warfare

https://maritime-executive.com/editorials/china-is-preparing-merchant-ro-ro-ferries-for-amphibious-warfare/

EVENTS

If you’re going to be at Oshkosh Airventure 2026 this year, look me up. Happy to grab a beer, have a chat and gawk at airplanes.

EPISODE 23 UPDATE

While on vacation, I’m taking time to finalize the script for episode 23. I had a major re-write after receiving feedback from my SMEs. And though the original intro scene (that I loved) was removed from ep23, it will get bumped to a future episode. I can’t say this enough, that the input I receive from my SMEs always makes the final script better. Love it.

My goal is to have the script ready by next week. Then, Lew and I will coordinate on the storyboard visuals.

More to come!

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Background

This specific episode has been well over a year in the planning. I can remember sitting with my laptop on vacation in Italy in October of 2024, reading think tank reports about what an invasion of Taiwan might look like. Dozens of hours of conversations with subject matter experts helped me refine the story and nail down plausible scenarios. Visually, my goal for this episode was to project the sheer mind-boggling scale of this operation, while the storytelling tells just how insanely complex, risky and dangerous a contested crossing of the strait would be.

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Watch Episode 22, Commercial-Free

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As work continues on episode 22, I am also wrapping up the script for episode 23. I (thought) I had that episode complete a few weeks ago, but once I put it in front of a few of my subject matter experts, they tore it to shreds. As the creator of this beast, I have to let any ego go when that happens. I consider myself more a reporter than a novelist or screenwriter here. I’m most interested in getting it right, and if that requires gutting whole sections of the script and starting over… so be it! All to make the story stronger.

Episode 23 is heavy in amphibious, airborne and urban fighting operations. To that end, here are a few articles and a podcast I’ve been consuming of late. Some, as you’ll see, are Taiwan-specific. Others are to gain some sensory feeling examples for armored warfare.

Taiwan to Integrate Abrams Tanks Into National Command System Amid Lawmaker Concerns

https://thedefensepost.com/2025/11/19/taiwan-abrams-command-network/

Desert Storm Part 22: Charge of the Heavy Brigade

https://britisharmy.wordpress.com/2016/02/28/desert-storm-part-22-charge-of-the-heavy-brigade/

Confessions Of A Tank Commander

https://taskandpurpose.com/culture/heres-like-command-m1-abrams-tank/

USNI Podcast: Win the Urban War in Taiwan - The United States and Taiwan should plan a defense strategy centered on defeating China in an urban war.

https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2023/february/win-urban-war-taiwan

President Lai attends commissioning of M1A2T tank battalion

https://www.ocac.gov.tw/OCAC/Eng/Pages/Detail.aspx?nodeid=329&pid=80991494

Growing Big – Know About Chinese Airborne Forces

https://airpowerasia.com/2020/06/09/growing-big-know-about-chinese-airborne-forces/

Coming Up

In a future post, I’ll be talking with Lew Roscoe, the creator of the YouTube Channel, The War At Home, who has joined my team (team being a total of 2!) to help with the creation of the new and stunningly beautiful Unreal Engine animations. In particular, we’re going to talk about all the detail that went into the climax scenes for episode 22, from the researched real-world locations, to building the sets for those locations, to character development and filming. There’s detail in there that will blow your mind. I only know because it certainly blew my mind.

Events

If you’re going to be at Oshkosh Airventure 2026 this year, look me up. Happy to grab a beer, have a chat and gawk at airplanes.

Episode 22 Update

Filming is pretty much complete! Video editing begins next week. There’s light at the end of the tunnel, folks.

Next steps:

• Video editing

• Special visual effects

• Graphics (map call-outs, titles, etc.)

• Intro opening sequence

• Music editing

• Sound effects

• Closing titles, credits and Patreon new member announcements

• YouTube post data - title, descrip, transcript

• Internal draft review and modifications

• Exclusive post to Patreon for review and final modifications

• YouTube Thumbnail creation and post for voting on Patreon

• Post to Substack

• Post to public YouTube

• Rest for a day, have a beer, start episode 23

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Thunder Run: The Armored Strike To Capture Baghdad, by David Zucchino

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/55324.Thunder_RunAs the ground battle begins for my story in Taiwan, I turned to this book for insight and first-hand accounts of urban warfare. I’m about half-way through right now. It’s a riveting read.

In tech-related readings this week, I stumbled on two articles that fed my cyberwarfare curiosity.

Bluetooth tracker hidden in a postcard and mailed to a warship exposed its location — $5 gadget put a $585 million Dutch ship at risk for 24 hours

https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/cyber-security/bluetooth-tracker-hidden-in-a-postcard-and-mailed-to-a-warship-exposed-its-location-a-eur5-gadget-put-a-eur500-million-dutch-ship-at-risk-for-24-hours

This article reminds me of the Fitbit issues years ago with US troops inadvertently giving away their positions and routines in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are now endless ways to make the battlefield virtually transparent, regardless of domain.

And then I found this article which, as a former software developer, deeply rattled me - but also gave me dark ideas for a future episode.

Claude-powered AI coding agent deletes entire company database in 9 seconds — backups zapped, after Cursor tool powered by Anthropic’s Claude goes rogue

https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/artificial-intelligence/claude-powered-ai-coding-agent-deletes-entire-company-database-in-9-seconds-backups-zapped-after-cursor-tool-powered-by-anthropics-claude-goes-rogue

What bothered me most was not that it happened, but that the AI agent did it knowing it was wrong. I would love to think that if I was still in the game, I would have safeguards in place to avoid this kind of disaster, but what’s not to say the AI wouldn’t identify and bypass those safeguards. Frightening.

Next Episode Update

The narration track is edited and completed, which gives me my estimated episode length for episode 22, which will be almost 15 minutes to the second.

All the map graphics are complete. Loving Google Earth Studio, though I also have to use Google Earth Pro to do the graphic overlays, then import them into Studio to do the animation.

Filming has begun! Working on the DCS footage now, and then will turn to ARMA.

Meanwhile, Lew is working on the character scenes in Unreal Engine. One of the hiccups in transitioning to Unreal is the need for all the uniforms and kit. For episode 21 alone, we need PLA, US (Airforce and Green Beret) and the ROC. That requires a whole lot of time getting the uniform as close to “right” as we can, with their kit. The good news is that once we get past this initial hurdle, those assets will be used countless times throughout future episodes.

Work continues on script modifications for episode 23. There is so much happening in that script, I have now broken it into 2 episodes.

For the Next War Room release, I’ll talk about all the work this week that went into the research of the PLA’s invasion fleet, including ships utilized, their numbers, formations, locations, approach, etc. A massive undertaking.

Event Info

I’ll be at Oskhosh 2026 this year, so if you’re there and want to chat, reach out!

John

While researching for episode 23 and 24 (involving ground combat in Taiwan), I found this article:

The Thunder Run

https://www.latimes.com/la-120703zucchino-story.html

It is an absolutely riveting tale about the US’s 2nd Brigade of the 3rd Infantry Division and their dash into Baghdad in 2003. Reading it, my thought went to Blackhawk Down, only this is something exponentially more. My second thought was, ‘this should be a movie!’, and apparently several years ago it was in the planning stage for just that. But like many movie ideas, it remains on a shelf somewhere, waiting to be made.

Further research regarding near-future ground combat, took me here:

The Killer Robots Are Coming. The Battlefield Will Never Look the Same.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/20/world/europe/ukraine-russia-war-robots-drones.html?unlocked_article_code=1.cVA.kGZz.8UQNUzyl_D6z&smid=url-share

(note, the NY Times link is a gifted link and is only active for 14 days)

Details how Ukraine is tactically using UGVs (unmanned ground vehicles) in coordination with aerial drones, for combat operations. Of particular interest was a look inside how Ukraine used the combined capabilities of drones to assault a building held by Russian troops.

Which led me to this article from the Atlantic Council:

The Coming Compute War In Ukraine

https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/content-series/the-big-story/the-coming-compute-war-in-ukraine/

Tells of warfare’s insatiable appetite for data and bandwidth and the vulnerabilities therein.

Next, I tumbled down a separate rabbit hole watching this video, put out by the Georgetown University Wargaming Society

Wargaming Lessons for Intelligence Analysts & What I’ve Learned Playing Red

A very interesting interview about effectively ‘red teaming’ for wargames, put on by Ian Sullivan, Director of Intelligence, Deputy Chief of Staff, G-2 for the U.S. Army Transformation and Training Command (T2COM G-2).

This led me to their website:

https://oe.t2com.army.mil/

A ton of great resources there. The most timely was this one:

T2COM OE Threat Assessment 1-1, How China Fights in Large-Scale Combat Operations

https://g2webcontent.z2.web.core.usgovcloudapi.net/OEE/China%20Landing%20Zone/2025NOV05_T2COMG2_How_CHI_Fights_LSCO_Assessment1-1.pdf

Next Episode Update

Today I finished the voice-over narration for episode 22. Also, one of the new tools I’m using is Google Earth Studio, which is very cool in improving map graphics. I also downloaded KMZ files for country borders and am playing with polygon usage to better display held territory and unit movements.

Meanwhile, Lew is working on the Unreal Engine scenes for ep22 which feature character close-ups.

I also purchased a uniform and kit package for Unreal Engine (thanks to your contributions both here and on Patreon) to be used both for episode 22 and will definitely be used for many episodes to come.

Still working on pretty significant script refinements for episode 23 and 24. Michael Hilliard of The Redline Podcast had great insight that required me to make changes to improve the story and plausibility. All good things.

More soon!

John

Closing the Air and Missile Defense Gap in the Indo-Pacific

https://warontherocks.com/closing-the-air-and-missile-defense-gap-in-the-indo-pacific/

The article lays out the need for internationally coordinated air and missile defense in the event of a conflict in the Indo-Pacific. This, based on modelling from the Stimson Center that predicted,

“the United States would likely run out of Patriot and [upper-tier, terminal-phase missile] interceptors within the first 24 hours of a military conflict.”

Toward that end, the United States Studies Centre held a tabletop exercise with participants from the US, Japan, Australia, South Korea and Taiwan. The article provides a high-level overview of the outcome of that exercise.

This then led me to the USSC’s full exercise report. It’s a long, but fascinating read:

Missiles and multipolarity: Can an Indo-Pacific coalition defeat China’s missile overmatch?

https://www.ussc.edu.au/missiles-and-multipolarity-can-an-indo-pacific-coalition-defeat-china-s-missile-overmatch

Key takeaway:

Coalition Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) operating concept — which we label ‘Long Sense/Short Defence’ — centring on two elements. The first is that the partner under attack focuses on point defence through a combination of high- and low-cost-per-engagement effectors. The second is that other JASTU partners support point defence through mobile and long-range sensing that provides redundancy and early warning to point defence sensors.

This then led me to an article I read a few months back and used for research for episode 20:

Cratering Effects: Chinese Missile Threats to US Air Bases in the Indo-Pacific

https://www.stimson.org/2024/cratering-effects-chinese-missile-threats-to-us-air-bases-in-the-indo-pacific/#elementor-toc__heading-anchor-1

It covers how a Chinese missile attack could degrade USAF operations across the Indo-Pacific, including projections of how many hours air bases and airfields could be rendered inoperative. Further, it looks at countermeasures, from dispersed forward basing, to runway repair, and missile defense. This article was extremely helpful in planning episode 20 for the PLA’s initial missile ‘blitz”, with PLARF missile capabilities, estimated numbers of missiles by types, their range and locations.

From there… relatedly, with what’s happening in the real-world, was this article:

Iran’s Asymmetric Counterair Campaign: Attacking the U.S. Air Force’s Nests and Eggs

https://warontherocks.com/2026/04/irans-asymmetric-counterair-campaign-attacking-the-u-s-air-forces-nests-and-eggs/

The article covers Iran’s counter missile and drone attack strategy and success against US assets in the Middle East, including the damage or destruction of AN/TPY-2 primary sensor of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) battery, the damage of one E-3G and the loss of another.

Key takeaway:

This is a template, not an anomaly. Iran’s asymmetric counter campaign is a harbinger of air wars to come.

Piggybacking on that article is this one:

Operation Epic Fury U.S. Aircraft Losses Visualized

https://www.twz.com/air/operation-epic-fury-u-s-aircraft-losses-visualized

Pretty clear what Iran’s priority targets are, with lessons clearly learned from Ukraine’s Operation Spiderweb. How we have not had US bomber or ISR aircraft struck on US soil from drone operations is a bit stunning to me, frankly.

And then I stumbled on this article, which shows US early warning systems that were hit by Iran:

New Images Provide Clearest View Yet of Damage to U.S.-made AN/FPS-132 Early Warning Radar in Qatar

https://theaviationist.com/2026/04/11/early-warning-radar-al-udeid-damage/

These photos were far too eerily similar to the Aegis Ashore system I attacked and destroyed by drones in episode 19.

Next Episode Update

The shot sheet for episode 22 is complete (84 scenes in total) and I had a web conference with Lew about the upcoming Unreal Engine scenes which will be used for character close-ups. He’s already starting building sets. Meanwhile I’ll start the voice-over narration for 22 and begin filming using DCS, ARMA and SeaPower.

I’m also working on refinements on the script for episode 23. And lastly… I had a great meeting with Michael Hilliard last week of The Redline Podcast to knock around thoughts and ideas about upcoming Season 3 when the war returns to the Baltics.

Lots happening. More soon!

John

Background:

If you are wondering why it took so long for me to produce episode 21, it’s because I needed to take the time to research and write the scripts for episodes 21-23 which are tightly integrated, all having to do with the PRC’s invasion of Taiwan. Episode 21 is primarily focused on the final thought processes and reasoning for the invasion’s timing by the President of China, and the monumental challenges and struggles that the US and its allies would have in the opening hours and days of the war. These episodes required untold hours pouring through white papers, articles and interviews with various subject matter experts, all in order to get this right.

Now that episode 21 is done and the other scripts are written, I will immediately go into production for episode 22. So don’t worry… you won’t have to wait 3 months next time!

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Background:

Episode 20 opens within seconds of where we left off with the surprise drone attacks at the end of episode 19. This is the big one - the missile event that has been endlessly discussed, studied, wargamed and worried over for a decade. Will China’s intermediate and long-range ballistic missiles, including the feared DF-26B “Carrier Killers” work as advertised? Will the US’s “Golden Dome” Tiered Missile Defense Architecture work as advertised? This is what I was looking to explore.

A TON of time went into episode 20, from numerous interviews with various SMEs, to pouring through volumes of articles, to playtesting for timing details for the script using the game Command Modern Operations. The scope and scale of events in this episode proved fascinating, daunting and deeply troubling.

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Background:

I think of this episode as H-Hour (minus 1). It is the attack that will pave the way for the next episode when the missile blitz begins. For this episode I wanted to highlight the vulnerabilities we face through cyberattacks, including how our own vehicles could be used against us. Also, I wanted to show how drones will be used ubiquitously and to illustrate that their reach will be far and used in ways we may not be prepared for (yet). There are no longer ‘front lines’.

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Background:

This is the bridging episode that takes us from China’s gamble regarding the quarantine, the US’s attempt to break it, and what comes next: open war. In this episode, I wanted to show how the momentum of events are affecting both sides and a behind-the-curtain look at how decisions were made. Within that, I was also looking to highlight how both sides misread the other while being influenced by their own agendas (personally and politically), as well by misinformation, disinformation and missteps. Definitely on my mind while writing this were events of late spring and summer of 1914 in the weeks leading to World War 1, where once Serbia and Austria-Hungary began to mobilize, momentum took over, spiraling Europe into war. Finally, I wanted to introduce the US Marines unit to the story, who we will revisit in much further detail later in the season! I know this one was a slower-paced episode, but it was really necessary to make that connection to all the episodes coming. In episode 19… things begin to cook.

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Background:

What if the Berlin Airlift or the blockade of Cuba had not only failed, but ignited a war? This is what was in my mind when preparing for this episode. I also wanted to explore how, despite characters on both sides of the Pacific not wishing war, events can quickly spiral beyond control through miscommunication, mistakes and overconfidence. Lastly, I wanted to take a first, hard look at how fast and lethal a modern naval battle could be - in particular when in such close proximity where the benefits of range and SAMs are reduced. The 1980’s tanker war and the Falklands War both were great resources for this episode.

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Background:

A great deal is happening in this episode. The general idea behind it is that as the quarantine takes effect and with China moving to further isolate Taiwan, both the US and China begin to misunderstand and miscalculate the other and, under increasing pressure, make decisions that will have grave effects in this episode, and more importantly, the next. I also wanted to highlight the local and global economic effects, the uncertainty of geopolitics when it comes to friends and allies in the region, and the technologies used in undersea ISR and sabotage. And though the script for this episode was planned many months ago... it has been outpaced by real-world current events in the Baltic Sea, North Sea and off Taiwan! It’s hard to keep up and keep ahead.

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To access a commercial-free private version of episode 15, as well behind-the-scenes documents, map locations, sources, scripts, shot-sheet and all the things that went into creating the episode, join the Flat Circle History War Room.

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Background:

There’s much to tell in this episode, laying the groundwork for the entire season - so for those looking for beginning-to-end action, this one is a slow-burn. To begin, I wanted to start with China’s justification for the quarantine and in a way that would be the most troublesome to Taiwan and its allies. In talking to my network of SMEs, an invasion of the Kinmen Islands - and in particular using unidentified forces (though clearly PRC), would do nicely. The difficult challenge for Taiwan, the US, Australia, UK and Japan would be how to respond without going kinetic. I also wanted to give a peek into the decision making process in Washington, most notably, their debate about Taiwan’s willingness to fight and the US commitment to Taiwan’s defense. Toward that, I wanted to insert a nod to the very small but important US State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), who doesn’t receive much love, but from my own research… does some amazing work.

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To access a commercial-free private version of episode 15, as well behind-the-scenes documents, map locations, sources, scripts, shot-sheet and all the things that went into creating the episode, join the Flat Circle History War Room.

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This is a compilation of episodes 1-14 from season 1.

Access the FCH War Room

To access a commercial-free private version of season 1, as well behind-the-scenes documents, map locations, sources, scripts, shot-sheet and all the things that went into creating season 1, join the Flat Circle History War Room.

Read more