#8--Sebastian Bae

In this episode, we discuss -What drew Sebastian to the Marine Corps and the infantry in particular -The persistent public view of the Marine Corps as an all-infantry force -The future of the ‘Every Marine a Rifleman’ ethos -The wearing away of front lines and rear areas in modern-day warfare -What Sebastian’s Marine Corps boot camp experience was like -Sebastian’s thoughts on changing bootcamp -His experiences at the School of Infantry-East -What it was like serving as a reserve enlisted infantryman -The stigma against reserve Marines -Some things Sebastian wishes active-duty Marines understood about reservists -Sebastian’s pre-deployment training and preparations for Iraq -His experience of breaking the news to his mother of his impending deployment to Iraq -Sebastian’s deployment to Ramadi, Iraq -Sebastian’s interactions with the Iraqis -What he took away from the deployment -How Sebastian’s operational experiences have influenced how he designs, develops, and facilitates wargames -How good decision games pose dilemmas to participants -Sebastian’s words of advice to young Marine reservists and those interested in the reserves -How Sebastian got into wargaming -How he learned how to design and facilitate wargames -How Sebastian defines “wargame” -The differences between analytical and educational wargames -Sebastian’s thoughts on the educational utility of commercial wargames -The design “autopsies” Sebastian runs in his wargame design courses -Sebastian’s two “translation points” for wargames -How the wargame design process enriches the designer -Why Sebastian prefers digital wargames for personal use and analog games for professional purposes -What matrix games and operational decision games are -The differences and similarities between different kinds of decision games -Where wargames fail most -The most common barriers to getting people interested in wargaming -How Sebastian wound up teaching wargame design at Georgetown University -Some of the standout student games from the wargame design course -Where the historical settings for those games came from -What inspired Sebastian to create the Georgetown University Wargaming Society (GUWS) -What GUWS has been up to lately -GUWS’ collaborations with the Army War College, Naval War College, and other organizations -The value proposition of playing wargames for Marines -Sebastian’s thoughts on the most effective way to introduce Marines to wargaming -His wargaming work with the Marine Corps’ Command and Staff College and US Naval Academy -Sebastian’s work with the Wargaming Division at the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab -Sebastian’s thoughts on SOI-W’s incorporation of chess into the new Infantry Marine Course -Sebastian’s contribution to the Rand report, “Next Generation Wargaming for the Marine Corps” -The addendum Sebastian would write to the report to reflect the realities of COVID-19 -Where Sebastian thinks the Marine Corps gets wargaming right -Where the Marine Corps could improve with wargaming -What Sebastian would do with wargames if he were Commandant of the Marine Corps for the day Links -Sebastian’s RAND profile page: https://www.rand.org/about/people/b/bae_sebastian_joon.html -Georgetown University Wargaming Society: https://www.guwargaming.org/ -(RAND) Next-Generation Wargaming for the U.S. Marine Corps: https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR2227.html