Stavridis offers insider’s view of global affairs

Former supreme allied commander of NATO commanding 150,000 troops in Afghanistan. Four-star admiral. The longest-serving combatant commander in recent U.S. history. Five years as dean of the Flether School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. Author of 15 published books on leadership, character, risk and the oceans, including a New York Times bestseller on a fictional next world war. Once a Democratic candidate for vice president.

President Satish K. Tripathi had one more way to introduce James Stavridis, the inaugural speaker for UB’s 2025-26 Distinguished Speakers Series, who charmed and intrigued an abundant crowd Tuesday night in the Mainstage Theatre in the Center for the Arts. Stavridis, Tripathi said, was the senior military analyst for CNN.

“Actually, he was on CNN twice today,” he noted.

Stavridis walked onstage after listening to the impressive introduction, came to the front of the stage to be closer to his audience and pronounced it an “intimate” crowd. So he could tell them something.

“I have got to tell you, when people hear that introduction, supreme allied commander and all that stuff, and then they actually see me, they tend to have two reactions,” Stavridis said. “Let’s be honest. One is ‘I thought you would be taller.’ The other one is ‘Stavridis, if you are really that cool, why were you not a Navy fighter pilot? Like Goose and Maverick.’”

Yes, let’s be honest here.

Stavridis was very cool, indeed. Switching between a clear-eyed and insider’s view of the real threats to global stability and a pragmatic “cautious optimism,” Stavridis broke down the multiple threats throughout the world with a surprisingly easy-to-follow discourse, pausing to mix in levity and humanity.

For the leadoff in the Distinguished Speakers Series, it was an impressive and tough-to-match appearance.

In a measured but determined delivery — perhaps unexpected for an admiral — Stavridis talked about “geopolitical risk” and then opportunities. “What should we be doing about it?”

The Middle East. Ukraine. Taiwan. South Korea. Stavridis led the audience through each global flashpoint.

He called Bashar al-Assad, recently deposed dictator of Syria, “this monster”  who ran to Russian President Vladimir Putin after his unspeakable, repressive regime collapsed. “All of the proxies of Iran — Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria — have all been diminished and all of that pushes Iran off.

“In addition to that, the Trump administration, in a very bold and good move, took out a chunk of Iranian nuclear program in a pretty precision strike,” said Stavridis. “It didn’t eliminate it, but it knocked it back significantly. So when you step back from the tragedy of Gaza and you look broadly at the Middle East, there are reasons to be very cautiously optimistic. It’s what comes after for Gaza.

“It will unlock the kingdom of Saudi Arbia, which will then be able to recognize Israel. Israel will be this flywheel economically that will access Arab capital, and the prospects for the region look pretty good, particularly if Iran can be boxed out of the equation.”

Showing easy-to-decipher maps and graphics, Stavridis switched to Ukraine. He said he wanted to dispel any “magical thinking” that reasoned that if only the West would have shown more respect to Putin, he wouldn’t have invaded Ukraine. Or if only NATO hadn’t expanded at the end of the Cold War, “this would have never happened.”

“Here’s the problem,” Stavridis said. “His name is Vladimir Putin. We call it the war of the Ukraine. This is the war of Putin’s ego. He seeks to recreate the old Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Putin wants Ukraine to conquer it.

“He has lost a million young Russia men, killed, wounded or departing the country. Here’s why he wants Ukraine. Not because it’s part of Mother Russia. He wants Ukraine because it’s full of resources. It’s the breadbasket of Europe. By the way, it has 40 million subjects in his mind. Putin covets it.

“I pray every night Donald Trump gives the Ukrainians Tomahawk missiles.”

Assisted by moderator Jacob Kathman, chair of the Department of Political Science, Stavridis worked his way around the globe, discussing China and North Korea, giving the audience a cogent description of the world of risks, each with its own opportunity of stability of democracy and capitalism over autocratic repressive regimes.

“It is critical that the United State remains supportive of Ukraine. And if we do that, our allies will stand by us and Ukraine, and we can stop Putin.”

Kathman asked Stavridis what was his most important message of leadership.

“The importance of your peers,” Stavritis said. “Most of us who study the practice of leadership have figured it out. Take care of the people who work for you. That pertains whether you are supreme allied commander of NATO with 1.5 million people working for you or running a team of 12 at Google. Most people get that you want to be loyal to your boss.

“Loyalty up. Care, concern, compassion down.”

Stavridis closed with thoughts that he said help him sleep at night. The first was alliances.

“If we can keep the band together, and I think we can,” he said, “that is a strong comparative advantage.”

The last was a big hit in the CFA.

“The history of this century will be remembered for the rise of women,” he said. “The leader who has handled Donald Trump the best — and he is a handful — is Claudia Sheinbaum, the president of Mexico. Here is a Jewish woman elected to the presidency of the most Catholic country in the world. A woman elected to the most patriarchal country in the world.

“The pragmatic value of all that human capital coming online, and it’s going to happen in this century. … As that unfolds, the human potential and all the sensibilities of women brought into real production value, that’s pretty remarkable.

“Martin Luther King said the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice. The moral arc of the universe is long. It bends toward women.

“That helps me sleep at night.”