‒ A last question about how war changes a person. It’s hard to imagine an experience with a more profound effect on the human psyche.

‒ I’m still holding it together, if it’s me you’re talking about.

‒ But I wonder if there are moments when you catch yourself reacting to things differently than you might have before. Do you notice you’ve changed at all?

‒ Perhaps I’ve become less emotional. There’s simply no time for that. Just like there’s no time for reasoned discourse and arguments. I only have the opportunity to think aloud in that way during interviews. I don’t do this with my subordinates and colleagues in the government. If I were to sit down and ruminate on every decision for an hour, I would be able to make only two or three decisions a day. But I have to make twenty or thirty.