An American Life Through a World in Turmoil. A Journey in Search of Truth.
October 2026
By Bob Djurdjevic | Scottsdale, Arizona
WHY DAVID?
Imagine a truck stop somewhere in the Arizona desert.
A truck driver walks into a diner, orders a hamburger, coffee, and a slice of pie, and sits down to enjoy his meal.
Three rough-looking bikers enter.
The first grabs his hamburger and takes a bite. The second pours his coffee onto the floor. The third crushes his pie.
The trucker says nothing. He gets up, pays his bill, and leaves.
One of the bikers turns to the waitress.
“Not much of a man, is he?”
“Not much of a driver, either,” she replies. “He just ran his truck over three motorcycles.”
😀
There are two lessons in that story.
First, actions speak louder than words.
Second, a smart man chooses his battlefield. Preferably one where the odds favor him.
That’s what I have tried to do throughout my life. I’ve confronted giants and bullies—political regimes, corporate empires, powerful institutions—and somehow survived the battles.
Not because I was stronger. But because I learned to choose my weapons and my battlegrounds.
Just as David did when he faced Goliath three thousand years ago.
That’s why I called my book BEING DAVID.
As I wrote in its Prologue:
They say David was only a boy. Too small for the king’s armor. Too young to inspire fear. Perhaps too naive to know that one does not stand up to giants.
But David stood up anyway.
Not because he believed he would win—but because he could not kneel.
I have never held a slingshot in my hands. But I have lived in a world of giants.
And I have never willingly bowed my head.
NOT AN ORDINARY MEMOIR
BEING DAVID is not a conventional autobiography, proceeding obediently from childhood to old age.
It is a symphony in five movements.
Each movement reflects a different dimension of a life spanning more than eight decades, several continents, and careers that might ordinarily belong to several different people.
The first movement is business and technology. The next three explore war, geopolitics, journalism, and the struggle for truth. The fifth brings us to music, nature, and spirituality.
Together, they tell the story of an American life lived across a world in turmoil.
FIRST MOVEMENT — ANNEX RESEARCH: THE BUSINESS OF TRUTH
I stumbled into the computer industry in 1969, when Neil Armstrong was preparing to walk on the Moon and most people had never seen a computer.
Neither had I.
In 1978, I founded Annex Research, an independent technology market research and consulting firm.
My business was predicting the future of an industry that was changing the world.
That accidental encounter launched a career that eventually took me to IBM and into the boardrooms of some of the world’s largest technology corporations.
Sometimes I earned millions of dollars by telling powerful executives truths they needed to hear.
Sometimes I lost millions by telling them truths they didn’t want to hear.
The book chronicles more than five decades of my love-and-war relationship with IBM, the transformation of the computer industry, and the price of intellectual independence.
It also explores an idea I advanced in 1994: that humanity was approaching a new Renaissance, a reunion of art and science, imagination and intellect.
Three years later, in my Forbes column, I proclaimed:
“Move over, Einstein—Signor da Vinci is back!”
Three decades later, I realized I wasn’t merely writing about that fusion.
I was living it.
SECOND MOVEMENT — TRUTH IN MEDIA: INVESTING IN TRUTH
The second movement begins with an unexpected turn.
After two decades away, I returned to my birthplace, Belgrade, in 1989, expecting a brief visit.
Instead, I found myself drawn into the political upheavals that would soon engulf Yugoslavia.
As the country disintegrated, I exchanged corporate boardrooms for war zones.
I became a different kind of analyst—a geopolitical one.
I traveled among refugees, soldiers, generals, presidents, diplomats, and religious leaders. I reported what I witnessed, often challenging the narratives presented by mainstream American media.
My writing sometimes brought recognition and influence.
It also brought threats, shattered windows, and acid-damaged automobiles.
But the greater question was always the same:
Who benefits from war?
My answer was simple: follow the money.
Wars destroy. Reconstruction follows. Banks finance it. Corporations receive contracts. Ordinary people pay in blood and treasure.
More than three decades ago, I summarized this relationship in an axiom:
PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL COMMERCE.
The Truth in Media chapters document my efforts to challenge official narratives, expose contradictions, and encourage readers to think independently.
THIRD MOVEMENT — A WORLD IN CONFLICT
The third movement broadens the geopolitical canvas beyond the Balkans.
Russia. Europe. China. Ukraine.
The changing relationships among great powers. The ambitions of governments. The economic interests behind political decisions. The consequences for ordinary people.
In March 1999, when NATO began bombing Yugoslavia, I published an editorial titled A New Day of Infamy, deliberately invoking America’s memory of Pearl Harbor.
I did not confine my reporting to a desk in Arizona.
I traveled to Serbia during the bombing and witnessed the conflict firsthand.
By May 1999, Truth in Media had become one of the most widely visited websites in the world, ranking 33rd among approximately 40 million websites, according to the contemporary ranking I cited in my September 2026 speech.
The book tells the story of those years through eyewitness accounts, analysis, and encounters with people whose decisions shaped history.
It also asks readers to reconsider how much of what they believe about international affairs comes from direct evidence—and how much from narratives constructed by others.
FOURTH MOVEMENT — WHEN WAR CAME HOME
September 11, 2001.
For years, Americans had watched wars unfold far beyond their shores.
Suddenly, the violence arrived at home.
While the World Trade Center towers were still smoldering, I published an editorial titled Collateral Damage Hits Home.
What followed was an era of wars against terrorism, expanding military commitments, and profound questions about American foreign policy.
The fourth movement examines those conflicts, their political justifications, economic consequences, and human costs.
It is also a continuation of my lifelong argument that patriotism and independent judgment are not enemies.
A citizen can love his country and still challenge its government. Just as I did as a young man in Tito’s communist Yugoslavia. And as a grown up in Clinton’s America.
Indeed, sometimes that is precisely what love of country requires.
FIFTH MOVEMENT — MUSIC, NATURE, AND SPIRITUALITY
After decades of business battles, wars, and geopolitical conflict, the fifth movement changes key.
The generals and presidents depart.
Enter Australia, Hawaii, the mountains, the rainforests, the volcanoes, the animals, and the music.
I have spent years exploring the natural world, making music, writing, arranging, designing, planting trees, and discovering new ways to express ideas.
The computer industry analyst became a musician and creative experimenter.
The war correspondent found another kind of truth in the beauty of nature.
And the man who once predicted a reunion of art and science found himself collaborating with artificial intelligence to create music and literature.
One of the most memorable experiences came atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii, the tallest mountain on Earth from the ocean floor to the top.
Standing on its summit high above the clouds with my wife back in 2023, I felt the extraordinary paradox of being both infinitely small and spiritually indestructible.
That mountain has been a metaphor for my life.
To start from the deep bottom. To rise high above the storms. To gain perspective. To see the world more clearly.
And then to share that perspective with others. In order to empower them also to become spiritually indestructible.
THE SECOND VOLUME — WAR STORIES & TRAVEL VIGNETTES
The companion volume, War Stories & Travel Vignettes, adds a Shakesperean dimension to the journey.
First come the tragedies, ironies, and human encounters of war.
Then the curtain rises on a lighter stage: adventures and misadventures around the world.
Shakespeare might have approved.
From the absurdities of international travel to the unintended comedy of mistranslated English, these stories remind us that humor is sometimes the best antidote to human folly.
Tragedy followed by comedy.
Together, the two volumes comprise 808 pages—633 in the main hardcover memoir and 175 in the paperback companion.
WHY SHOULD YOU READ BEING DAVID?
Not because my life was more important than yours.
Not because I have always been right.
And certainly not because I won every battle.
I didn’t.
But I learned that the greatest obstacle to confronting a Goliath is often our own belief that he cannot be defeated.
Sometimes the giant is a government or a corporation.
Sometimes it is an employer, an institution, a personal crisis, or a seemingly impossible dream.
And sometimes the giant is the fear inside us.
You don’t need to be stronger than your Goliath.
You need the courage to stand up, the intelligence to choose your battlefield, and the determination to keep going.
That is why I wrote BEING DAVID.
Because it may help empower YOU to overcome the Goliaths in your own life.
BEING DAVID — An American Life. A Life of Purpose. A Story of Faith.
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