Jocko Podcast 106 w/ Echo Charles: Be Clear In What You Intend To Achieve. We Were Soldiers Once...

2017-12-28T18:29:43Z

Join the conversation on Twitter/Instagram: @jockowillink @echocharles 0:00:00 - Opening. 0:03:42 - We Were Soldiers Once... And Young. 1:41:43 - Final Thoughts and take-aways. 1:52:40 - Support: JockoStore stuff, Super Krill Oil and Joint Warfare and Discipline Pre-Mission, Origin Brand Apparel and Jocko Gi, with Jocko White Tea,  Onnit Fitness stuff, and Psychological Warfare (on iTunes). Extreme Ownership (book), The Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual.  2:10:37 - Closing Gratitude.

AI summary of episode

okay there you go back to the book Sudanese and Gwen are agree that it was not long after this at the Alph the commander of Alphacompanese missing second platoon lieutenant Gordon Grove staggered into the American position from the east here's Larry going talking I saw Gordon Gordon Gordon Grove coming across the field along with two wounded men they were the only ones left of this platoon who could move Grove was distraught we got him and his two men with us and our got our men ex working on the wounded then Gordon asked for men to go back with him to get his people Joe Shadini's said Gordon I can't send anybody about else back out there it was clear that to leave this perimeter was deaf everywhere you looked you could see north Vietnamese Gordon asked for permission to go talk to the battalion commander so Jeanne said go ahead he jogged over asked me to aid for help to get his men got a negative response so he came back to our handheld so this is one of those classic examples you hear about all time people will try and get you in the the catch twenty two question like the got you question what what would you do if you were in the situation and you some of you guys were still out there but you didn't have enough people to go get him or you were being overwhelmed what would you do well here's what these guys did right here they'll know you can't go get him if you send in more people out there they're gonna die if they did if we send 10 guys out there 15 guys out there 18 guys out there to go recover the splin we're gonna lose 18 more guys we're gonna stay put we're in fight as best we can from here we'll get fire superiority back we'll get our shit together and then we'll go get these guys go in ads there was a tremendous battle going on in the vicinity of where we had come into the clearing and beyond there in the jungle it was Charlie company caught in the killing zone of the ambush fighting for its life the mortar fire had ceased the enemy tubes apparently had been overrun by Charlie company because we found them all the next day but there were still hundreds of North Vietnamese calmly walking around the area we were observing now began the sniping phase of our battle I call it that because for a long period of time all we did was pick off enemy wandering around our perimeter and this last until we started getting air support everything that had happened to this point had probably taken less than 30 minutes Gwen saw major frank Henry the batalion executive officer lying on his back using the radio trying desperately to get some tactical air support and succeeding the air was on the way but there was no artillery or aerial rocket artillery yet Jim Spires the S3 ran over to us and queried Gordon Grove Gordon Grove as the situation outside the perimeter where he had just come from Grove told him there were still men out there tightened into a small perimeter but they were all wounded and dying and the radio has had all been knocked out Captain Spires asked a second time if he thought anyone would still alive and none of us said anything Gwen climbed up top a termite hill and began sniping at the North Vietnamese visible across the clearing in the trees to the south with Xem 16 rifle there were plenty of targets and I remember picking off 10 or 15 NVA from my position my memories revolve around the way in which each enemy soldier fell that I hit someone simply limp slump limply to the ground some reacted as if they had been hit by a truck some that I missed on the first and second shots kept on milling around until I finally hit them what we did not know at the time was that they were wandering around the elephant grass looking for Americans who were still alive and killing them off one by one North Vietnamese soldiers climbed into trees and on top of those brush covered termite hills and poured fire down on the cavalry troops troopers trapped in the tall grass below them in the main body of the column there was serious firing including mortar fire both from both sides the strike at the head of the column was followed so quickly by the enemy encircling assaults that the whole business seemed to erupt almost simultaneously without doubt some of some platoons of mixtades battalion were alert and in as secure a formation as they could achieve in the elephant grass brush and fix scrub trees but the visibility problem made it difficult to maintain formation and one result was that American troop for closer to one another then was tactically sound providing juicy granite juicy targets for a grenade mortar round or a burst from AK 47 rifle all down the column platoon leaders sergeants radio operators and riflemen by the dozens were killed or wounded in the first 10 minutes rapidly degrading communication cohesion and control to this whole thing that we've talked about up in this poem is like a half an hour just a brutal onslaught that kicked off with massive violence of action Captain Fesmire adds the result was very intense individual hand to hand combat in the confusion I had no idea exactly where the company was located when lieutenant cornet died it was virtually impossible for me to talk to anyone in my company the battle had clearly become an individual struggle for life again that was the goal of the Vietnamese was to make it an individual struggle was to get in close was to separate people from the main battalion to split it up into as many parts as possible so they could pick it apart. and we need to put you back on back and back on the fight back to the book specialist john willenus bravo company mortar observer was doing some serious celebrating he had not only survived x-ray without a scratch but this day November 18 was his birthday I was 22 years old we were fed and showered new clothes were available I spent the afternoon at the men's at the enlisted men's club drinking beer with a well tuned exchanging stories and celebrating my birthday around 4 p.m. to dyric came in and told us to saddle up we were going to rescue the battalion out about 1600 hours lieutenant Rick rest score a recalls captain dyric walked up get the company together battalion's catching health we may have to go in you're the only patoon leader left in the company help all the patoons get their shit together men spilled out of the clubs and doubled time to their equipment they worked quickly throwing on their harnesses no protests but their eyes filled with disbelief again dyric then issued the the shortest frag order in bravo company history will be landing from the southeast open fired anything on your left run to your right a hostile landing with one side of the landing zone held by the north Vietnamese sit rep from the ground grim expect to be sandwiched between friendly and enemy fires at about 545 p.m. rest scorela gathered the patoons they pressed in close listening intently for word sergeant first class oldston oldston the mortar patoon sergeant sergeant staff sergeant martin speck for Vincent specialist walinas the towering sergeant Larry Milton 80 or more young faces hollow eyes you know the patangin is in the shit I said we have been selected to jump into that shit and pull them out if you fight like you did at x-ray you'll come through it stay together come out of those choppers ready to get it on across the field the first lift ships were sweeping in head him up captain direct grout I turned and walked ahead fantino trailing with the PRC 25 the road stretched out past the permanent hooches of the rear echelon at hallaway word spread that we were on a suicide fight tumbling out of cozy bunks hallways finest line the road to watch us depart Hawaiian shirts, aviator shades jeans, beer cans and hands cooks and bottle washers the shit burgers, projectionists club runners same army different species the company picked up pace a tight dirty brown column a few of the men carried eight k's trophies from x-ray no one had shaved noted risk orla but our weapon sparkled one out fit are you one spectator asked the hard core of bravo company second of the seventh where you headed to kick ass a yelled back a deep rumble ran through the ranks men yelling cursing not a man among us with swap places with these lardasses as we passed I asked fantino how we looking back there his reply no straggler sir every swing and dick is with us as we made a column right to the pickup point I looked back at our crew no outfit in the army had ever rendered a route step any better than these men at this moment we piled on to the huge without the usual loading instructions and skated away into the fading gray light at 645 p.m. the first lift ships roared into the small Albany clearing and captain to direct troopers bailed out into the tall grass the cavalry had ridden to the rescue but the killing and dying and terror continued unbated inside the american perimeter as the long night began once again that's the american soldier right there barely survived x-ray get called to go back in and they pick up the pace back to the book captain to direct road of the flight in in the situation on the ground assaulting Albany we picked up five bullet holes in the helicopter things were bad I found out what I landed that the battalion was shot up pretty bad so we came in the nica time to their rescue the main part of second battalion seventh calves was on their last ditch standard Albany little big horn revisited and here's rescor la talking looking sideways Now most of the battalions men from those two battalions had landed at LZ Victor which was about two miles away from X-ray and they had patrolled to X-ray on foot arriving for the most part without incident and then things seemed to settle down or a lot of next-ray one seven left and once one seven had left the battlefield two seven and two five were still there so at that point that portion of the battle was over and two seven and two five could have likely been extracted via helicopter pretty securely just at one seven had been it seems that general west moorland did not like the idea of two seven and two five pulling out he thought that that would appear as a retreat so he ordered that two five and two seven secure LZ X-ray for the night and then the next day they would move by foot patrol to another LZ called LZ Albany which was about two point five miles to the north and then B-50-U bombers were going to rain down bombs on LZ X-ray and the surrounding areas they didn't expect a lot of resistance because things had settled somewhat down so much on LZ X-ray that if you remember even towards the end of the last podcast there was reporters came in and landed in LZ X-ray and were doing camera shots and interviewing people so it was pretty settled down they felt like it was over and they didn't expect much resistance on this movement from LZ X-ray to LZ Albany so let's go back to the book the book is We Were Soldiers once and Young by General Halmore and Joe Galaway and like I said there wasn't much resistance expected and here's what it says in the book the word among Bob McDades troopers was that it was going to be a walk in the sun a stroll over to another landing zone where the helicopters would come in and extract them the first leg of the journey home to on K-Base the word was wrong and these guys even though there hadn't been much fighting going on they were actually a little bit tired because they had been awake on the ground so here we go just before Alpha Company second battalion moved out it's commander captain Joe Sadini's put out an unusual order his executive officer Lieutenant Larry Gwyn who we're going to let hear a lot from Lieutenant Larry Gwyn remembers it well the company had been on 100% alert for over 52 hours we were in such a state of exhaustion that captain Sadini's directed that each man take two APC tablets aspirin with caffeine a move designed to increase the mental alertness of the troops so there you go take a little caffeine little aspirin get you guys get your heads in the game because they've been awake for a long time and again they're not expecting much but they still put on the ground you know hop LZ for a while back to the book Lieutenant Ali the battalion's communication officer was with headquarters company we were told that this would be a tactical move there was a lot of stuff on the battlefield equipment supplies captured stuff that had to be police to up and blown up all in a hurry up situation and so here they give a kind of an overview of what's going on here it is this is what back to the book this is what was happening Sudanese alphar company was moving forward toward the albany clearing so they've they've now a pro they're kind of approached this this LZ Albany that's what they're talking about the albany clearing um alphar company the sygini's alphar company was moving toward the albany clearing Colonel McDade and his batain command group were with alphar company the other company commanders had left their companies under orders and were moving up to join McDade for a conference so the other company commanders are not with their companies anymore the batain was strong out along the line of march for a distance of at least 550 yards so half a kilometer the men of delta company were lulling around on the ground Charlie company had flankers off to each side but were mostly taking a break sitting or lying down George forus men at the tail of the column were in a wedge formation and also had flank security posted the men of batain were worn out after nearly 60 hours without sleep and four hours of marching through difficult terrain visibility in the chest high elephant grass was very limited that situation to be in here's lieutenant going talking we had been there a short time five minutes when i heard some rounds fired near our first platoon i thought they must have caught up with those NVA stragglers then everything opened up opened up the firing just crescendoed they hadn't found the stragglers they had run right into the north Vietnamese i was out in the grass away from the trees when it started the rounds were so fast and for years overhead they were knocking bark off the trees i ran to them one round struck the tree i was crouch next to and inch over my head i said holy shit and ran to join Joel we all got down then i heard the sickening whump of mortar fire landing where i had seen our second platoon disappear the most savage one day battle of the Vietnam war had just begun the second battalion seventh cavalry had walked into a hornet's nest the north Vietnamese reserve force the 550 man eight battalion 66 regimen had been bivouacct in the woods off to the northeast of nicknades column so you've got fresh soldiers that had been waiting they were the reserves that whole earlier battle in the hydrang with the one seven calf this this Vietnamese group the 66 regimen eight battalion 66 regimen had been waiting in reserve and now they just so happened to be in the line of march where these uh where the two five is coming through or sorry the two seven is coming through here's what Colonel Anne who again this was the Vietnamese commander here's what he had to say i think this fight of November 17th was the most important of the entire campaign i gave the order to my battalions when you meet the americans divide yourself into many groups and attack the column from all directions and divide the column into as many pieces move inside the column grab them by the belt and thus avoid casualties from the artillery and air we had some advantages now for let me just talk about that one real quick and you know you just become hard to understand what you're screaming yelling calm down get their attention give simple clear concise direction of what you want back to the book each and every man still alive on that field american and north Vietnamese was fighting for his life in the tall grass it was nearly impossible for the soldiers of either side to identify front or fro except it extremely close range americans in all of drab and north Vietnamese and mustard brown were fighting and dying side by side it may have begun as a meeting engagement a hasty ambush a surprise attacked a battle of maneuver and in fact it was all those things but within minutes the result was a wild melee a shootout with just gun fighters killing not only the enemy not only the enemy but sometimes their friends just a few feet away there would be no cheap victory here this day for either side there would be no victory at all just a horrible certainty of death in the tall grass unbelievable horrible horrible back to the book just for the headquarter section of the column Charlie company was beginning to die Charlie company talking about Charlie company a whole company of men 150 guys spec for jacksmith was with the lead elements in the Charlie company formation nearly tenet dawn cornet the acting company commander when the company charged into the teeth of the enemy machine guns in the first seconds smith saw one of the radio operators fall dead with a bullet through his chest his eyes and tongue bulging out the men of Charlie company were firing in all directions smith recalls within a span of perhaps 20 minutes everyone around me was dead or wounded except me you have to understand that an area the elephant grass was chest high once you hit the dirt your world was about as big as a dining room table your world's completely confined to that area and the six or seven men around you at that point we were isolated alpha company was in the same shape then the north Vietnamese swept through I believe they came between alpha and our company began to shoot people we didn't know if the noise was from five feet away as they began to shoot people was friendly or enemy smith saw soldiers take machine guns lie flat on the ground and begin firing into the grass often they were firing right into the muscles of other American machine guns people were screaming to stop the shooting it began to have all the elements of a massacre nobody was in control because all the officers were to the front and our radio operators had fallen dead on their radio sets no leadership no communication and they actually did the madmen it which is something that Hacworth talks about and it's something that they did in the first part of this book which is hey everyone in the perimeter is just going to shoot a bunch of rounds like at 630 in the morning boom everyone fire a full load out or a full magazine or a couple magazines at likely targets and they did that and that seemed to calm things down they kind of did that once things had already calm down a little bit and it was it was it indicated that maybe things were calming down a little here's another thing back to the book the NBA came into the ambush area that night to recover their dead wounded when they found any of our guys alive they would beat them to death bayonet them or machete them to avoid shooting and drawing fire from us that was during the night they did that like I said they did the madmen and here's what here's what Lieutenant Riscordla said about the madmen and he said this decision was regrettable rifle fire shattered the silence and the perimeter was wring with reckless firing little fought had been given to that the remainder of our survivors were sprawled among the trees and ant hills within 500 yards the effective range of RM16s what the fuck is happening are you shooting at us the frantic radio call started coming in how many troops were killed or injured by our wake up call will never be known thank God for the trees the ant hills and the uneven terrain captain Dudley to Demy third brigade fire support coordinator remembers flying out to Albany at first light the next morning Tim Brown myself Mickey Parrish took a while to get through the smoke hanging over the whole area not much had really taken place in terms of policing the area the image is still vivid in my mind is the carnage folks were still sitting around in a days they hadn't done much had even taken ponchos and covered up these bodies I could handle the conversation I could handle grown men crying but we were talking 12 hours later sitting there feeling sorry for themselves Colonel Brown was very pissed off even if you do get caught in a bad situation you have to do something to recover it was young kids who paid the price in later years I used to stress that to my young battery commanders it isn't us who die in combat it's those young kids who die those kids we are responsible for training and leading it's our job to get the job done and get those kids home safe and here they're wrapping up this again now this the battle turned and really the Vietnamese left after the massive air strikes it started and here's another image of the cleanup back to the book specialist for John Molinas of Bravo Company second battalion seventh cavalry mortapal tune and most of the rest of Djeric's men were involved in this macabre depressing duty it was incredible carnage we went into areas where lots of artillery had come in during the night and we saw our guys have been blown up in the trees the bodies were already decomposed and it only happened night before we were in shock it was the first last and only time I ever saw anything like it and then you realize what happened so so that's what's going on here split forces things are going crazy now here we go acrimans back to the book acrimans recomplitude leader lieutenant pain he says all hell broke loose up along the north side of the lz i turned to my right and observed some american soldiers moving toward the northwest to set up positions and they went down in a hail of bullets within minutes we were all under heavy attack and my radio operator and i were pinned down in the middle of the lz with the most of the fire with most of the fire coming from the north and north west lieutenant pain's radio opera came alive as the alpha company platoon leaders reported heavy fighting pain says mortar rounds began falling which was a new experience to everyone since we had never had any kind of mortar fire against us the noise level was unbelievable i remember pressing my body flatter against the ground and i have ever been in my life and thinking that certainly the highest thing sticking up were my heels mortars continue to fall in small arms and machine gun fire continue to hectic pace finally my mind seemed to adjust and i once again began to think about the situation we were in and what we were going to do so you see there's a leader he's pinned down and this is something that the the insurgents and i rack would do as well they're going to hit you with multiple different weapon systems you know in a combined coordinated attack so if you can imagine if you start hitting people with mortars well everyone needs to get down you need to get down you need to take cover wall you're taking cover that's that's cover they're going to move they're going to maneuver in they're going to maneuver in with with heavy weapons or they're going to move maneuver in with an assault squad or they're going to maneuver in with a vehicle born i ed

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Episode transcript

[00:00:00] This is Jockel Podcast number 106 with echo Charles and me, Jockel Willink. Good evening,
[00:00:07] I go. Good evening. Now in podcast 105, we finished just as the 17 cab flew out of the
[00:00:20] hydrangea valley after keeping it together during a vicious three day fight where they suffered
[00:00:31] some massive casualties 79 killed an action, 121 wounded and on top of that the battle
[00:00:38] field was littered with enemy dead with the estimates of enemy dead to be between 500 and
[00:00:46] 1000 and we stopped there where the 17 cab left the battlefield so if you haven't listened to
[00:00:53] 105 yet go back and listen to that before continuing with this podcast 106 because even though
[00:01:04] the 17 left the battlefield the battle wasn't over yet and one of the events that I didn't
[00:01:11] really talk about in the first hydrangea podcast on 105 was the fact that two other battalions
[00:01:19] had arrived on the ground to reinforce the 17 and it was the second battalion fifth cavalry
[00:01:28] commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Robert Tully and the second battalion seventh cavalry led by Lieutenant
[00:01:36] Colonel Robert McDade. Now most of the battalions men from those two battalions had landed
[00:01:46] at LZ Victor which was about two miles away from X-ray and they had patrolled to X-ray on foot
[00:01:54] arriving for the most part without incident and then things seemed to settle down or a lot
[00:02:00] of next-ray one seven left and once one seven had left the battlefield two seven and two five
[00:02:07] were still there so at that point that portion of the battle was over and two seven and two five
[00:02:17] could have likely been extracted via helicopter pretty securely just at one seven had been
[00:02:24] it seems that general west moorland did not like the idea of two seven and two five pulling out
[00:02:35] he thought that that would appear as a retreat so he ordered that two five and two seven
[00:02:42] secure LZ X-ray for the night and then the next day they would move by foot patrol to another LZ
[00:02:49] called LZ Albany which was about two point five miles to the north and then B-50-U bombers were
[00:02:57] going to rain down bombs on LZ X-ray and the surrounding areas they didn't expect a lot of resistance
[00:03:06] because things had settled somewhat down so much on LZ X-ray that if you remember even towards the
[00:03:13] end of the last podcast there was reporters came in and landed in LZ X-ray and were doing
[00:03:17] camera shots and interviewing people so it was pretty settled down they felt like it was over
[00:03:24] and they didn't expect much resistance on this movement from LZ X-ray to LZ Albany
[00:03:34] so let's go back to the book the book is We Were Soldiers once and Young by General Halmore and Joe
[00:03:40] Galaway and like I said there wasn't much resistance expected and here's what it says in the book
[00:03:48] the word among Bob McDades troopers was that it was going to be a walk in the sun
[00:03:54] a stroll over to another landing zone where the helicopters would come in and extract them the first
[00:03:59] leg of the journey home to on K-Base the word was wrong
[00:04:13] and these guys even though there hadn't been much fighting going on they were actually a little bit
[00:04:18] tired because they had been awake on the ground so here we go just before Alpha Company second
[00:04:24] battalion moved out it's commander captain Joe Sadini's put out an unusual order his executive officer
[00:04:35] Lieutenant Larry Gwyn who we're going to let hear a lot from Lieutenant Larry Gwyn remembers it well
[00:04:40] the company had been on 100% alert for over 52 hours we were in such a state of exhaustion
[00:04:46] that captain Sadini's directed that each man take two APC tablets aspirin with caffeine a move
[00:04:54] designed to increase the mental alertness of the troops so there you go take a little caffeine
[00:05:00] little aspirin get you guys get your heads in the game because they've been awake for a long
[00:05:04] time and again they're not expecting much but they still put on the ground you know hop LZ for a while
[00:05:09] back to the book Lieutenant Ali the battalion's communication officer was with headquarters company
[00:05:16] we were told that this would be a tactical move there was a lot of stuff on the battlefield equipment
[00:05:21] supplies captured stuff that had to be police to up and blown up all in a hurry up situation
[00:05:27] I was personally carrying an RC-292 antenna in addition to my regular combat load I weighed about
[00:05:35] 140 pounds my normal combat load was 40 or 50 pounds the 2 9 2 and 10 away 60 pounds
[00:05:43] the temperature must have been 96 and the humidity was the same we were moving as fast as we could
[00:05:49] through the elephant grass and scrub oaks some high canopy we were humping everyone was as tired as could be
[00:05:57] so we're already in a rough situation we've been on the ground for 52 hours and we're going to move
[00:06:05] two and a half miles doesn't sound very far but when you're carrying so he's already
[00:06:09] he's carrying a hundred pounds it's 40 and 50 pound combat load plus his antenna and everyone else is
[00:06:12] carrying all kinds of extra stuff that they're pulling off the LZ it's 96 degrees out 96%
[00:06:18] humidity and walking through the jungle is never easy it's up and down little terrain features
[00:06:23] going through various foliage is hard so this is not easy not the biggest guy too by the
[00:06:32] 140 150 pounds which guys were smaller back then yeah but still they are now bar pal yeah no
[00:06:37] 100 pounds that's that's no joke that's no joke back to the book lieutenant Gary Gwyn of Alpha
[00:06:44] company says the jungle around us got heavier and heavier that's when things got a little scary
[00:06:51] there was a sudden absence of any air cover the guys were silent and I wondered where our
[00:06:57] helos and our aerial rocket artillery ships were we had not changed formation tactically
[00:07:03] but physically we had to move in much tighter to maintain visual contact because of the undergrowth
[00:07:09] the terrain forced our flaker flankers in so at this point they're they they had a bunch of
[00:07:14] air cover they don't have any air cover right now and now the terrain is making them get closer
[00:07:19] and closer together because if you and I are on patrol I don't I want to keep you in visual range
[00:07:26] I want to be able to see you and so if all the sun there's elephant grass will the only way to
[00:07:30] to keep visual of use for you to get close to me and for immediate close to the next guy and so
[00:07:34] everyone starts compressing he's talking about the flankers being out there a lot of times when
[00:07:38] we patrol in formation you'll put people out on the flanks with individual range but that'll be
[00:07:44] stretching the visual range but they're out there to make sure that there's no one sneaking up on you
[00:07:48] and so they've that it's getting dense now to the point where they can't keep their flankers out so now
[00:07:54] you're losing some of that flank security back to the book Gwen says alpha companies column order
[00:08:00] integrity had been good until two prisoners were captured and everything came to a sudden halt
[00:08:08] when I arrived so genies so genies was interrogating the two they were mint condition
[00:08:15] new weapons grenades new gear but both were feverish terrified and shaking none of us in
[00:08:22] company headquarters had seen alive north Vietnamese up close these were not the last we would see
[00:08:28] this day we gave them water and advised the battalion headquarters so all of a sudden they got a
[00:08:33] couple of prisoners little scary to me when the prisoners that we take have brand new weapons
[00:08:39] new grenades new gear I mean we at least know that they're fresh maybe they're not combat hardened
[00:08:44] but we know that they've got some good well supplied which is a scary thing in this type of war
[00:08:52] so this is this is kind of weird looking back hindsight of course being 2020 this is this is an
[00:09:00] error or a or a mistake that gets made right now and of course mistakes happen all the time
[00:09:06] and they they don't get capitalized on by the enemy sometimes by luck sometimes by skill of the enemy
[00:09:12] this is one of those mistakes that it gets capitalized again whether it's by luck or plan
[00:09:18] probably by luck maybe it's a little bit of both you wouldn't think much of it if things didn't
[00:09:23] go the way they did you know late late for now you stabbed this conversation a lot I mean
[00:09:27] you don't know when things are going to go wrong and and seriously you can be on the battlefield
[00:09:33] and you can you can say hey everyone go left and everyone goes left and everything turns out great
[00:09:38] or you can say everyone go right and everyone go right and everyone thing turns out great
[00:09:43] if you go left then you happen to go to where the enemy was waiting in ambush for you to go
[00:09:48] now you're you just made a bad tactical call the thing that made it a bad tactical calls that the
[00:09:52] enemy happened to be there you couldn't know that and if you'd been if you'd said go right
[00:09:57] well you'd great made the greatest call ever because the enemy was over there waiting for again
[00:10:01] you don't know where the enemy's gonna be don't have that luxury so sometimes you make the best
[00:10:05] tactical decision you can make and it turns out bad now we can look back at this hindsight being 2020
[00:10:11] of course and and critique what's about to happen so we'll we'll we'll talk a little bit more about it
[00:10:17] here's what goes down back to the book Captain George Forest commander of Alpha Company first
[00:10:21] baton fifth cavalry was more than 500 yards to the rear so these guys are in a long column of
[00:10:26] march group of people
[00:10:28] middaydast all the company commanders to come forward so middaydast the company is the baton
[00:10:35] commander he tells all the companies commanders to come forward so he's middayd's up at the
[00:10:40] front of this column and who knows how big they are you know he says he's 500 yards the rear of this
[00:10:44] whole thing probably spanned out probably six 700 maybe even 800 meters we're getting close to a
[00:10:51] kilometer in length of people to spread out just so everyone understands it's hard to control 40
[00:11:00] guys in a in a line of march with any kind of control that spread out over 200 meters that's challenging
[00:11:08] you get 500 600 guys spread out over almost a kilometer we have a serious command and control issue
[00:11:16] so now what he's doing to overcome this issue is telling all the all the company commanders so
[00:11:21] there's three companies that are out there actually there's more than that but there's multiple
[00:11:26] companies out there he tells all the company commanders hey come to my position at the front of
[00:11:30] this thing so we can talk about what's happening back to the book Captain Fezmire the Charlie
[00:11:36] Company commander was also moving up the count column to toward McDades position with him or his
[00:11:43] two radio operators his artillery his artillery forward exor observer lieutenant Sidney Smith
[00:11:49] and his radio men as well as fur first sergeant Franklin Hans so so I want you to think about that
[00:11:56] or let me explain this to you a little bit more here's the Charlie Company commander he's moving
[00:12:01] forth so he's leaving his company and with him he brings his two radio operators so who does that
[00:12:09] leave with the company there might be one paltoon guy left that's a radio operator maybe one
[00:12:15] an each paltoon but there there's he's pulling the the communications node out of the company
[00:12:22] right there he brings forward his artillery observer so this is the guy that's going to be
[00:12:27] able to place artillery other guys can pick up the slack but not as well as this guy can do it
[00:12:34] he brings lieutenant Sidney Smith and his radio men so that means that so sorry the the artillery
[00:12:39] observer is lieutenant Sidney Smith but that guy brings his radio men as well so there's another guy
[00:12:44] out of the loop and then the first sergeant the company first sergeant so now that's the leadership
[00:12:50] the company leadership is now from from Charlie Company is now gone they're moving up forward to talk
[00:12:55] about it and so here they give a kind of an overview of what's going on here it is this is
[00:13:03] what back to the book this is what was happening Sudanese alphar company was moving forward toward
[00:13:09] the albany clearing so they've they've now a pro they're kind of approached this this LZ Albany that's
[00:13:14] what they're talking about the albany clearing um alphar company the sygini's alphar company was
[00:13:20] moving toward the albany clearing Colonel McDade and his batain command group were with alphar company
[00:13:26] the other company commanders had left their companies under orders and were moving up to
[00:13:32] join McDade for a conference so the other company commanders are not with their companies anymore
[00:13:38] the batain was strong out along the line of march for a distance of at least 550 yards so half a
[00:13:44] kilometer the men of delta company were lulling around on the ground Charlie company had flankers
[00:13:51] off to each side but were mostly taking a break sitting or lying down George forus men at the tail
[00:13:57] of the column were in a wedge formation and also had flank security posted the men of batain were
[00:14:02] worn out after nearly 60 hours without sleep and four hours of marching through difficult terrain
[00:14:08] visibility in the chest high elephant grass was very limited
[00:14:16] that situation to be in here's lieutenant going talking we had been there a short time five minutes
[00:14:24] when i heard some rounds fired near our first platoon i thought they must have caught up with
[00:14:28] those NVA stragglers then everything opened up opened up the firing just crescendoed they hadn't
[00:14:36] found the stragglers they had run right into the north Vietnamese i was out in the grass away from
[00:14:42] the trees when it started the rounds were so fast and for years overhead they were knocking bark
[00:14:47] off the trees i ran to them one round struck the tree i was crouch next to and inch over my head i
[00:14:53] said holy shit and ran to join Joel we all got down then i heard the sickening whump of mortar fire
[00:15:00] landing where i had seen our second platoon disappear the most savage one day battle of the
[00:15:08] Vietnam war had just begun the second battalion seventh cavalry had walked into a hornet's nest
[00:15:15] the north Vietnamese reserve force the 550 man eight battalion 66 regimen had been bivouacct in the
[00:15:24] woods off to the northeast of nicknades column so you've got fresh soldiers that had been waiting
[00:15:31] they were the reserves that whole earlier battle in the hydrang with the one seven calf this this
[00:15:37] Vietnamese group the 66 regimen eight battalion 66 regimen had been waiting in reserve
[00:15:43] and now they just so happened to be in the line of march where these uh where the two five is coming
[00:15:50] through or sorry the two seven is coming through here's what Colonel Anne who again this was the
[00:16:00] Vietnamese commander here's what he had to say i think this fight of November 17th was the most
[00:16:06] important of the entire campaign i gave the order to my battalions when you meet the americans
[00:16:12] divide yourself into many groups and attack the column from all directions and divide the
[00:16:17] column into as many pieces move inside the column grab them by the belt and thus avoid casualties
[00:16:25] from the artillery and air we had some advantages now for let me just talk about that one real quick
[00:16:32] okay two things first of all get the battalion split up right and if you hear and i always talk
[00:16:38] about the common theme of keeping things together keeping people consolidated keeping your groups where
[00:16:42] they can mutually support each other his goal is the opposite that get them split up so they can't
[00:16:47] support each other that's number one so contrary to that what you should always be doing as a
[00:16:52] leader is trying to keep your forces as consolidated as possible so that they can they can maneuver
[00:16:57] well together and most important support each other to cover move hmm now the second part of this
[00:17:02] is move inside the column grab them by the belt and thus avoid casualties from artillery and air
[00:17:08] that's something that we still see to this day we talked about it with the session conflict that
[00:17:14] was the sessions mode of operand motors operand i to take to get inside and be right next to the
[00:17:21] Russians they call it hugging they would get in there and and get in the same building as the Russians
[00:17:25] so you can't call fire on your own building so that's what the that's what the Vietnamese
[00:17:30] were trying to do now what's beautiful about these statements think about these two statements
[00:17:34] this is beautiful commanders intent here's all i want you to do split them up get close to them
[00:17:42] that's what i want you to do he's not saying how to do he's not telling each individual
[00:17:46] group where to move and what to do he is hands split them up and get close to him and stay close
[00:17:51] to him this is gives the guys on the battlefield incredible flexibility to execute that plan
[00:18:02] we had some advantages on continuing we had some advantages we attacked your column from the
[00:18:07] sides at the moment of attack we were waiting for you this was our reserve battalion and they were
[00:18:13] just waiting for their turn the eight battalion had not been used in fighting in this campaign
[00:18:18] they were fresh spec for dick acumen was the right flank point man in the recon platoon
[00:18:25] which was itself the point of the battalion says acumen we were going to the left to a clearing
[00:18:31] we had gone about a hundred feet when he heard some shots then more shots and finally all
[00:18:36] hell broke loose the main brunt of the attack was right where we had been standing just a few minutes
[00:18:42] before we hit the dirt i was laying in the middle of a clearing and bullets were kicking dirt in my
[00:18:48] eyes and breaking off the grass acumen's first sergeant was standing shouting and giving directions
[00:18:57] his shirt was off and he was in a t-shirt he lifted his left arm to point and i could see
[00:19:01] were a bullet and ripped them ripped open the side of his arm and part of the side of his chest
[00:19:06] he was still giving orders we were then ordered to another part of the circle that was weak
[00:19:12] it was facing the main area of attack there were people running everywhere we couldn't just open
[00:19:17] fire in that direction because our guys were there we were on semi automatic and picking off
[00:19:22] whoever we could be sure of as a target so this just turns into immediately into chaos and again
[00:19:32] this is why consolidation of your forces is so important because the minute you have enemy in
[00:19:38] between you and other friendly forces your field of fire is completely shut off and you're likely
[00:19:42] when you are pulling the trigger you have a good chance you're going to shoot some of your own
[00:19:47] guys so that's again why consolidation of forces is very very important now i say this all the time
[00:19:54] i'll make the caveat again are there times where you can get away with with splitting your forces
[00:19:58] and there are other times that it makes sense yes absolutely there are times that it makes sense and
[00:20:02] we did all kinds of operations overseas where we had different units out on the battlefield that
[00:20:07] were split up and maneuvering from different areas we did all the time but you have to know and
[00:20:12] understand the risks you have to know and understand the risks of splitting forces of having
[00:20:18] enemy in between of trying to consolidate back together which is very very difficult you just have
[00:20:24] to really think about what the risks are and how you can mitigate those risks sometimes you can do
[00:20:28] with a terrain feature you can put guys in a certain area where hey i have free fire because you're
[00:20:34] down behind a null or you're in a ravine where i know that i can't shoot you that's the type of
[00:20:40] thing that you can do to mitigate but it is something that people think they can get away with
[00:20:46] and you know matter of fact we were doing FTX and it was interesting we had one of the
[00:20:52] females during the planning phase we we have them plan just a a couple operations just to sort of
[00:21:00] get used to planning before we start the actual FTX this is for those of you don't know we have
[00:21:06] a company called national and front and sometimes we do field training exercises with the companies
[00:21:11] we're working with to get them to help instill in them the fundamental principles of combat leadership
[00:21:20] so it was funny this this one female she had come up with this plan and they were going to
[00:21:26] enter this target building from two different directions talking about the classroom course
[00:21:29] yes the classroom course that they did and she actually i said you know we've said keep it simple
[00:21:36] and it can be a little bit confusing if you start entering a building from two different sides
[00:21:40] and you're now you've got guns pointed at each other and you know you've got to be careful
[00:21:46] that you don't shoot each other and and she literally said i just don't see how it's going to happen
[00:21:53] that we could go into this building and we're just going to start shooting each other yeah of course
[00:22:00] inside and said okay and and literally the next day during the FTX phase of the training
[00:22:08] which we're using airsoft weapons and you're shooting at bad guys they came up with a plan
[00:22:17] entered a building from two sides and she entered the building and literally shot one of her own
[00:22:23] people she did exactly what she didn't think could happen yeah and and that's what people
[00:22:27] have to understand now you might think oh well it's this girl or this female and she was she's not a
[00:22:32] military person and it's you know that's why it happened no i saw seals do it on the regular
[00:22:38] you're all hyped up you go in that room you see a person moving crack crack them fire a couple shots
[00:22:45] and then you realize what happened so so that's what's going on here split forces things are going
[00:22:53] crazy now here we go acrimans back to the book acrimans recomplitude leader lieutenant pain
[00:23:03] he says all hell broke loose up along the north side of the lz i turned to my right and observed
[00:23:08] some american soldiers moving toward the northwest to set up positions and they went down in a hail of bullets
[00:23:13] within minutes we were all under heavy attack and my radio operator and i were pinned down in the
[00:23:18] middle of the lz with the most of the fire with most of the fire coming from the north and north west
[00:23:25] lieutenant pain's radio opera came alive as the alpha company platoon leaders reported heavy
[00:23:30] fighting pain says mortar rounds began falling which was a new experience to everyone since we had
[00:23:35] never had any kind of mortar fire against us the noise level was unbelievable i remember pressing my
[00:23:42] body flatter against the ground and i have ever been in my life and thinking that certainly the
[00:23:46] highest thing sticking up were my heels mortars continue to fall in small arms and machine gun fire
[00:23:54] continue to hectic pace finally my mind seemed to adjust and i once again began to think about the
[00:24:01] situation we were in and what we were going to do so you see there's a leader he's pinned down
[00:24:06] and this is something that the the insurgents and i rack would do as well they're going to hit you
[00:24:12] with multiple different weapon systems you know in a combined coordinated attack so if you can imagine
[00:24:17] if you start hitting people with mortars well everyone needs to get down you need to get down
[00:24:22] you need to take cover wall you're taking cover that's that's cover they're going to move
[00:24:27] they're going to maneuver in they're going to maneuver in with with heavy weapons or they're going to
[00:24:30] move maneuver in with an assault squad or they're going to maneuver in with a vehicle born i ed so this is
[00:24:35] same thing happening here as you're getting mortars which these guys aren't used to which
[00:24:38] there's not that there's that much you can do to get used to it because it doesn't matter
[00:24:42] it doesn't help you defend it you can be used to it you still have to get down you still have to take cover
[00:24:46] these guys are taking cover and what i found interesting about this was you can see in his
[00:24:53] mind for a couple seconds maybe 30 seconds he's just going holy crap i'm going to die
[00:24:59] and then finally he says my mind seemed to adjust and once again he'd be in think about the situation
[00:25:03] we were in and what we're going to do now this is where combat experience is helpful if you haven't
[00:25:08] been in the situation before it's going to take you a few seconds to adapt and be like oh dang i need to
[00:25:13] do something if you haven't been in that situation before you could end up with some you're it's
[00:25:19] going to take you some time to adjust and it's like we talk about with self defense with jiu jitsu
[00:25:23] if you've never been grabbed before and you've never been ground on before you've never had
[00:25:29] humble someone pulled you before it's your mind set takes time just to get through that before you even
[00:25:35] start thinking about actually defending yourself you're just getting used you're just saying
[00:25:38] a whole crap wise is happening however you train all the time then you're used to it you go oh okay
[00:25:44] someone's got me here's where we're going to get out same thing with getting punched in the face if
[00:25:48] you've never been punched in the face before it takes some getting used to you're going to get
[00:25:51] punch three four five times before you're like wait a second i need to defend myself
[00:25:55] if you've been punched before boom oh i just got punched here's my reaction here's what i'm
[00:25:59] gonna do and you're speaking of jiu jitsu going back to getting inside that's the same thing
[00:26:04] getting close to someone what they were trying to do what the north of you to me is we're trying
[00:26:08] to get close stay close that's the same thing that jiu jitsu is you're trying to avoid the big
[00:26:12] punches you get in close you stay close you keep the person close to you that's how you avoid
[00:26:16] getting knocked out same thing so train train hard
[00:26:22] back to the book alpha companies alpha company alpha companies commander captain sugenis
[00:26:30] was in the trees headed to where he had seen the batain command group disappear
[00:26:35] just as i noticed a small clearing up ahead i heard one or two shots to my rear
[00:26:39] back where my first and second platoons were i looked back there was a pause of several seconds
[00:26:44] and then slowly all hell began to break loose i remember if we were reading the book
[00:26:53] by early pile and he talked about the expression all hell broke loose because we we just heard it like
[00:26:59] five times yeah and he's talking about how it gets overused but it's real and you can tell
[00:27:05] with these guys it's it's just absolutely real that all hell is breaking loose and i want to say
[00:27:11] this too because i didn't mention this about date miqdeid who's the batain commander miqdeid is
[00:27:17] the batain commander he had just taken over the battalion like a few weeks before and he had moved
[00:27:22] from some admin position inside the inside the the the i don't know if it's inside the battalion
[00:27:30] or inside the brigade but he had moved from like a sort of an administrative position into battalion
[00:27:36] command so in other words he wasn't charge of in charge of any troops and then all of a sudden
[00:27:40] he was in charge of troops and then three weeks later they're going into combat now that being said
[00:27:46] he also said that this guy hadn't been in charge of any troops in like ten years so he
[00:27:51] he he apparently done his platoon commander in his company command in world war two in Korea so
[00:27:57] miqdeid is an experienced combat leader but he's out of practice he's out of practice and more
[00:28:04] probably more important or just as important to to being out of practice is he just took over
[00:28:09] so part of being a battalion commander is that you train and prepare your troops for combat you get
[00:28:16] to know all your men you get to understand their weaknesses you just can't jump in and take over
[00:28:21] and all of a sudden have the knowledge that you would have if you were preparing everyone that's why
[00:28:25] training is so important that's why we train so if you are if you are not given the opportunity
[00:28:32] to train and learn your troops you're at a huge disadvantage you're at and you haven't had time
[00:28:37] to train them up to the your standards you know this guy was in World War II and Korea he
[00:28:43] understands combat and so to think that he wouldn't put his guys through a you know a certain
[00:28:48] level of training to get them up to speed and make sure they do things like like make sure that there's
[00:28:54] other people in the chain of command that can step up and lead having a succession plan so
[00:28:58] so like him calling people forward maybe if he had trained the battalion he knew that there was
[00:29:03] other guys in there that would be able to take charge he didn't realize that there was like a little
[00:29:06] little hesitation there that was gonna happen which is what happened yeah so he doesn't know his
[00:29:12] his team well enough for this situation and that's not good
[00:29:22] back to the book captain so genie says Larry going and I hit the edge of Albany on the
[00:29:28] northeast side of the clearing as the column began to receive intense fire we began to receive
[00:29:33] sporadic sniper fire part of the recompletoon had already reached the island of the island
[00:29:38] they're talking about as an island of wood's an island of trees I yelled across the opening for
[00:29:43] someone to cover us we ran to the island at this point I called my first and second platoons on the radio
[00:29:48] almost immediately I lost communications with first platoon the platoon sergeant for the second platoon
[00:29:54] came on the radio that was sergeant first class William A. Ferrell 38 from Stanton Tennessee
[00:30:01] he was a veteran of World War II and Korea had been a prisoner of war in Korea and could have chosen
[00:30:08] to remain in the states he did not have to deploy with Vietnam with us everyone called him
[00:30:15] papi Ferrell kept asking captain sergeini's where he was telling him that they were mixed up with
[00:30:22] the north Vietnamese and had several wounded and killed I couldn't pinpoint his location I knew
[00:30:28] where he should have been directly east of our island papi then radio that he was hit that there
[00:30:35] were three or four men with him all hit I could hear the firing at his location over the radio
[00:30:42] I never heard from papi again he did not survive
[00:30:47] this confusion that happened this is far go war stuff this is this complete far go war stuff
[00:30:58] and by the way the enemy gets a vote the enemy gets a vote the enemy can do things like this
[00:31:04] that you don't expect the enemy can hit you from multiple sides the enemy can have a strategy
[00:31:09] to get or attack to getting close that's what the enemy is going to do
[00:31:12] you don't know what the enemy is going to do actually you don't know what they're going to do
[00:31:20] you don't know they're going to have mortars this time
[00:31:25] back to the book lieutenant Colonel McDade himself recalls when things began happening I got in
[00:31:30] without for company I know I was trying to figure out what was going on I moved very fast let's get
[00:31:37] over there in those trees and let's all get together the enemy seemed to be all over the woods
[00:31:44] we had good tight control in the immediate area and we're trying to figure out where everybody else
[00:31:50] was one of the things I was very concerned with was people being trigger happy and just shooting up
[00:31:57] the grass I was telling them make sure you know what you're shooting at because we are scattered
[00:32:02] so notice how he says this we had good tight control in the immediate area and we're trying to figure
[00:32:08] out where everyone else is this is horrible it shows you two things when you have good tight control
[00:32:14] over people you're okay if you know where your people are you're okay there's the one of the
[00:32:19] worst feelings on the battlefield is not knowing where your guys are that is one of the worst
[00:32:26] feelings on the battlefield not knowing where your guys are and sitting there trying to figure out
[00:32:32] where everyone else is which I guess those two are the same things and so the biggest concern that
[00:32:39] he has right now is like he's so concerned about friendly fire keep control your people
[00:32:50] back to the book the battalion operations officer captain spires believes that the the fact that
[00:32:55] the commanders were absent from their companies when the fight started contributed to the confusion
[00:33:01] it had the most effect I think on Charlie company their commander captain skip festmire was up with
[00:33:08] us and Don Cornet the Charlie company executive officer was killed early on so they had no commander
[00:33:15] and they just disintegrated so leadership is the most important thing on the battlefield
[00:33:22] talk about that all the time this is why this is why when you see a platoon or a company that doesn't
[00:33:29] have any leadership they fall apart now if you are well trained and if you have a good
[00:33:36] succession plan and if you've done drills where the company commander gets killed and you take
[00:33:39] them out other people have to step up and lead yes that is how you prepare for these situations
[00:33:44] you have to prepare for those situations you have to prepare for leaders to go down
[00:33:48] but if you have no one that steps up you're going to be in a real hard way real fast
[00:33:59] back to the book the entire area is now alive with north Vietnamese soldiers who had obviously
[00:34:05] cut through the battalions line of march severing the head of the battalion from the body
[00:34:10] go in saw three jia jia is coming through the high grass running from the area swarming with enemy
[00:34:17] I jumped up and screamed to them waving my arm they saw me and headed directly to our position
[00:34:23] the first man was a captain our air force forward air controller who is completely spent
[00:34:28] I pointed out the battalion command group which was huddled to our rear at the at another
[00:34:32] ant hill and he crawled toward them he was followed by the battalion sergeant major Jim Scott
[00:34:38] who dropped down next to me and Scott was followed by a young very small pfc who was delirious
[00:34:44] and holding his guts in with his hands he kept asking are the helicopters coming I said yes hang on
[00:34:55] the battalion commander initially thought that the incoming rounds were all friendly fire
[00:35:01] so think about that the battalion commander initially thought that the incoming rounds were all
[00:35:07] friendly fire so what does reaction take cover don't wish you back which is actually
[00:35:13] if you're getting maneuvered on by an enemy the worst possible thing you can do is take cover
[00:35:17] and not shoot back because that means the enemy is going to maneuver faster on you back to the
[00:35:21] book he had been hollering for all of us to cease fire and the word went out over the command net
[00:35:26] but to no avail as the troops on the perimeter could see north Vietnamese
[00:35:30] the can you imagine the confusion you've got the battalion commander on the command net yelling
[00:35:37] to everyone to cease fire meanwhile you can literally see north Vietnamese and you're shooting and
[00:35:41] engaging them this is this is meham the sergeant major and I were looking to the rear when I
[00:35:47] heard a loud blast the sergeant major yelled I'm hit he had taken around in the back
[00:35:52] under his armpit and there was a large hole underneath his right arm I told him he would be okay
[00:35:58] to bandage it himself this he did ripping off his shirt then he picked up his M16 and
[00:36:05] headed back to one of the ant hills I saw the sergeant major a few times after that and he was fighting
[00:36:10] like a demon sergeant major Scott says I took a bullet through my chest not more than 15 or 20 minutes
[00:36:18] into the battle I could see enemy soldiers to our left right and front in the in platoon and company
[00:36:23] size elements they were up in trees up on top of ant hills and in the high grass we weren't exactly
[00:36:30] organized we didn't have time everything happened all at once I didn't see a whole being dug up
[00:36:36] prior to 8pm that night we did use the trees and ant hills for cover within a half an hour there
[00:36:43] was an attempt to organize groups into defense a position in a company area individuals did this
[00:36:49] no one in particular I think that's what saved us so this is decentralized command coming out
[00:36:57] you the only thing that gets them together is that individuals stepped up and said okay we need
[00:37:02] to form a perimeter defense now unfortunately half an hour an hour had already passed when they got to
[00:37:07] this point where the individual start making the call the other thing is there's a lack of overall
[00:37:13] direction so you get to a point where if everyone knew hey here's the position we're going to be in
[00:37:20] the battalion here's our formation if something happens here's what we're going to do we're going to
[00:37:24] bound towards this area you there's all kinds of contingency plans that could have been done here
[00:37:28] no again I'm doing hindsight 2020 which I hate doing but we are trying to learn
[00:37:35] and we are trying to talk to all the military people that are listening to this that are out doing
[00:37:40] operations right now think about this and I had this probably told this story before but when we first
[00:37:48] got to Ramadi my one of the junior officers was taking a patrol out and it was a combined
[00:37:58] patrol with some Iraqi soldiers and some seals and he was going over the patrol route with me
[00:38:03] and he got to this big open field and he said yeah I'm going to go we have to go across this
[00:38:08] field because it's only way to get from here to there and I said what are you going to do when you
[00:38:11] get this open field he said what we're going to get across it that's how you're going to get across it
[00:38:16] and he said well we're going to walk across it I said what if you get hit and he didn't really have
[00:38:20] any answer I said okay so here's what you're going to do leave some guys in the tree line over here
[00:38:25] have these guys bound across to this little dark right here then those guys can join them
[00:38:29] cover move just cover move across this field and that's what they did and sure enough they actually
[00:38:34] got hit they got hit with a pretty significant attack and with more resistance small long fire and
[00:38:39] they covered moved out of the situation but my point is looking at the terrain beforehand having a plan
[00:38:46] and the next cut in the plan and dictating the situation you're going to be it instead of letting
[00:38:50] the situation dictate what happens to you don't do that it's not a good answer situation
[00:38:57] dictates that's not a good we dictate this situation talked about it before
[00:39:01] and then have your like the Vietnamese command was very broad the commanders intent get close
[00:39:10] split them up these guys didn't have a command like that what could the opposite command would
[00:39:15] been stick together stick together keep integrity well there you go don't let them in close okay there you go
[00:39:25] back to the book Sudanese and Gwen are agree that it was not long after this at the
[00:39:37] Alph the commander of Alphacompanese missing second platoon lieutenant Gordon Grove staggered
[00:39:41] into the American position from the east here's Larry going talking I saw Gordon Gordon
[00:39:45] Gordon Grove coming across the field along with two wounded men they were the only ones left of
[00:39:51] this platoon who could move Grove was distraught we got him and his two men with us and our
[00:39:58] got our men ex working on the wounded then Gordon asked for men to go back with him to get his people
[00:40:05] Joe Shadini's said Gordon I can't send anybody about else back out there it was clear that to leave
[00:40:12] this perimeter was deaf everywhere you looked you could see north Vietnamese Gordon asked for
[00:40:19] permission to go talk to the battalion commander so Jeanne said go ahead he jogged over
[00:40:25] asked me to aid for help to get his men got a negative response so he came back to our
[00:40:30] handheld so this is one of those classic examples you hear about all time people will try and get you in the
[00:40:39] the catch twenty two question like the got you question what what would you do if you were in the
[00:40:43] situation and you some of you guys were still out there but you didn't have enough people to go
[00:40:47] get him or you were being overwhelmed what would you do well here's what these guys did right here
[00:40:51] they'll know you can't go get him if you send in more people out there they're gonna die if they
[00:40:56] did if we send 10 guys out there 15 guys out there 18 guys out there to go recover the splin we're
[00:41:00] gonna lose 18 more guys we're gonna stay put we're in fight as best we can from here we'll get fire
[00:41:05] superiority back we'll get our shit together and then we'll go get these guys go in ads there was
[00:41:14] a tremendous battle going on in the vicinity of where we had come into the clearing and beyond
[00:41:19] there in the jungle it was Charlie company caught in the killing zone of the ambush fighting for
[00:41:25] its life the mortar fire had ceased the enemy tubes apparently had been overrun by Charlie company
[00:41:31] because we found them all the next day but there were still hundreds of North Vietnamese
[00:41:35] calmly walking around the area we were observing now began the sniping phase of our battle
[00:41:42] I call it that because for a long period of time all we did was pick off enemy wandering around
[00:41:47] our perimeter and this last until we started getting air support everything that had happened to
[00:41:52] this point had probably taken less than 30 minutes
[00:42:01] Gwen saw major frank Henry the batalion executive officer lying on his back using the radio
[00:42:05] trying desperately to get some tactical air support and succeeding the air was on the way but
[00:42:10] there was no artillery or aerial rocket artillery yet Jim Spires the S3 ran over to us and
[00:42:18] queried Gordon Grove Gordon Grove as the situation outside the perimeter where he had just come from
[00:42:24] Grove told him there were still men out there tightened into a small perimeter but they were all
[00:42:29] wounded and dying and the radio has had all been knocked out Captain Spires asked a second time
[00:42:34] if he thought anyone would still alive and none of us said anything
[00:42:38] Gwen climbed up top a termite hill and began sniping at the North Vietnamese visible across
[00:42:45] the clearing in the trees to the south with Xem 16 rifle there were plenty of targets and I
[00:42:50] remember picking off 10 or 15 NVA from my position my memories revolve around the way in which
[00:42:56] each enemy soldier fell that I hit someone simply limp slump limply to the ground some reacted
[00:43:03] as if they had been hit by a truck some that I missed on the first and second shots kept on
[00:43:09] milling around until I finally hit them what we did not know at the time was that they were wandering
[00:43:15] around the elephant grass looking for Americans who were still alive and killing them off one by one
[00:43:26] North Vietnamese soldiers climbed into trees and on top of those brush covered termite hills
[00:43:31] and poured fire down on the cavalry troops troopers trapped in the tall grass below them in
[00:43:36] the main body of the column there was serious firing including mortar fire both from both sides
[00:43:44] the strike at the head of the column was followed so quickly by the enemy encircling
[00:43:48] assaults that the whole business seemed to erupt almost simultaneously without doubt some of
[00:43:55] some platoons of mixtades battalion were alert and in as secure a formation as they could achieve
[00:44:02] in the elephant grass brush and fix scrub trees but the visibility problem made it difficult to
[00:44:08] maintain formation and one result was that American troop for closer to one another then was
[00:44:14] tactically sound providing juicy granite juicy targets for a grenade mortar round or a burst from
[00:44:20] AK 47 rifle all down the column platoon leaders sergeants radio operators and riflemen by the
[00:44:28] dozens were killed or wounded in the first 10 minutes rapidly degrading communication cohesion and control
[00:44:41] to this whole thing that we've talked about up in this poem is like a half an hour just a brutal
[00:44:45] onslaught that kicked off with massive violence of action Captain Fesmire adds the result was
[00:44:55] very intense individual hand to hand combat in the confusion I had no idea exactly where the
[00:45:04] company was located when lieutenant cornet died it was virtually impossible for me to talk to
[00:45:09] anyone in my company the battle had clearly become an individual struggle for life again that was
[00:45:24] the goal of the Vietnamese was to make it an individual struggle was to get in close was to separate
[00:45:30] people from the main battalion to split it up into as many parts as possible so they could pick
[00:45:37] it apart. Spec 4 jacksmith who is in Charlie company had been a radio operator until about a
[00:45:44] week or so before this operation when he was shifted to a supply clerk's job the events of November
[00:45:50] 17 are etched on his mind. Smith's company commander Captain Fesmire had like the others been
[00:45:58] called to the front by lieutenant Colonel McDade subsequently many people pointed to this as a major
[00:46:05] error and in light of what has happened it was the firing began to roll on all around us the executive
[00:46:13] officer of my company a man called Don Cornette a very fine officer jumped up and in the best
[00:46:18] style of the infantry school yelled follow me elements of our first and second platoons ran right
[00:46:26] towards a series of ant hills within 10 feet of them we saw where the machine gunners behind them
[00:46:31] firing point blank at us man all around me began to fall like moan grass i had never seen
[00:46:40] people killed before they began to drop like flies and die right in front of me these were the only
[00:46:47] friends i had and they were dying all around me
[00:46:54] private first class james h shadden was in forps delta company mortar platoon
[00:47:07] the intensity of the fire increased to the point where shadden couldn't hear anything but weapons firing
[00:47:14] and here's what he says tone johnson came crawling with me hitting the cheek in the back of the
[00:47:18] hand the trees were full of north Vietnamese but spotting one was almost impossible they blended in so
[00:47:24] well i kept raising up to try and detect a good target math you sheltered who is laying next to me
[00:47:30] kept jerky me down as i raised up again a bullet pierced my helmet straight through front to back
[00:47:37] i went down again and came back and as i came back up a bullet struck the tree beside my head from
[00:47:45] behind i don't know if we were surrounded or was our own men they were firing wild anything that moved
[00:47:53] somebody shot at it one trooper crawled up next to me shooting through the grass a few inches off the
[00:48:00] ground toward where our own people lay never thinking what he was doing i told him to be sure he knew
[00:48:05] what he was shooting at the firing eventually began to slack off shadden has no idea how much time
[00:48:14] elapsed there was no way to keep track of time in a fight like this men were wounded and dead all in
[00:48:22] the area six were alive that i know of sergeant Tyler pfc Carter pfc johnson pfc shelton pfc
[00:48:31] cones and myself Tyler gave the only order i heard during the entire fight tried to pull back
[00:48:40] before they finish us off sheldon froze to the ground and would not move the five of us
[00:48:49] proceeded to try and pull back but the snipers were still in the trees soon i was hitting the right
[00:48:54] shoulder which for a time rendered at useless Tyler was hitting the neck about the same time he
[00:49:00] died in arms length for me begging for the medic spec for william pleasant who is already dead
[00:49:07] the last words Tyler ever spoke or i'm dying sergeant Tyler 35 was from Columbia South Carolina
[00:49:24] the helplessness i felt is beyond description within a few minutes i was hit again in the left knee
[00:49:30] the pain was unbearable cones who's hitting the feet and ankle we were wounded and trapped
[00:49:41] i could see we were getting wiped out a buddy helped me bandage my leg he got the bandage off a
[00:49:49] dead Vietnamese i got behind a log and there was a Vietnamese there busted up and dead
[00:49:56] this was behind us so i knew we were surrounded
[00:50:12] it's for me it's crazy to think these are Americans it really is you know it's crazy to thank you
[00:50:19] you always think knifely so that Americans have the upper hand all the time but you know
[00:50:26] here you are you you you you don't you don't always have the upper hand
[00:50:37] if you're chatting continues on it appears as if the ground was opening up and swallowing
[00:50:42] the mortarmen they they felt so fast a brown wave of death rolled over them and on into Charlie
[00:50:49] Company Vietnamese intermixed with them then reality said in the enemy held ground beyond the
[00:50:57] downhill the column was cut in half in coming fire drew our attention back to the tree line
[00:51:04] the firing increased rapidly we returned fire at muscle flashes i heard an explosion behind me
[00:51:10] turning i saw chai congregate's landing all flash and smoke no casualties the volume of fire
[00:51:16] became almost unindurable bullets peeled bark from trees vegetation disintegrated i looked to
[00:51:24] lieutenant James Lawrence for help saw his head violently recoil he hit the ground
[00:51:38] here's another description back to the book here's what the Vietnam War looked like in the
[00:51:42] afternoon of November 17 through the eyes of two of Captain Forrest Alpha Company Rifleman
[00:51:49] PFC David or a perp lavender of Murphy's Burrow Illinois and spec for James Young of steel
[00:51:57] ville Missouri says lavender my platoon was bringing up the rear we started to maneuver and work our
[00:52:04] way up the column to help those ahead every time we made a move we were hit by mortars
[00:52:10] it was something you can't describe people were dropping like flies the first blast killed a young soldier
[00:52:18] named loca telly every time we moved they dropped mortars on us i know we must have had 12
[00:52:24] or 15 wounded out of our platoon including our platoon leader these were my buddies i had been with
[00:52:31] in the army for two years the majority of our whole battalion had been drafted at age 21 and it
[00:52:37] had been the service for over 18 months all of us were nearly 23 years old they became my brothers
[00:52:45] over time hearing these fellow scream hearing them killed stuck in my heart and mind ever since
[00:52:55] the most critical part of this fight was the beginning it was the surprise
[00:53:01] this they had us in a U shaped ambush and they had us cut off with mortars
[00:53:11] surprise and violence of action surprise and violence of action two key elements of fire fights
[00:53:22] and here's what young said the other the other individual introduced a moment ago
[00:53:26] there was a grassy field to my left 25 or 30 yards and a sniper off on my right i couldn't
[00:53:34] see him but i saw a trace of bullet go across my hand i felt the wind of that bullet
[00:53:42] the same bullet passed over the back of Smith's neck he was lucky he had his head down
[00:53:48] our company commander captain force came running along our line he was stopping and telling
[00:53:52] everybody where to go he acted as though he was immune to enemy fire i don't know how he kept from
[00:53:58] getting hit so captain for a stepping up and leading and what's all things do not happen without leadership
[00:54:12] so in less he gets up and makes these things happen they are not going to happen that's what
[00:54:18] you do is a leader you have to make things happen talk about it all the time there's an example of it
[00:54:25] things do not happen unless you make them happen
[00:54:32] now if you remember that oftentimes in Vietnam there would be a command and control helicopter
[00:54:39] and we talked about this on 105 where the brigade commander actually came and landed for a little
[00:54:45] bit and then left well that was Colonel Tim Brown and here we have a little section with talking
[00:54:51] about what's going on with him back to the book Colonel Tim Brown telecopter was running low on fuel
[00:54:56] and the chopper had to return to refuel brown says i knew they weren't a contact i did not know
[00:55:03] house of your or anything else while i was talking to McDade i could hear rifle fire but he didn't
[00:55:10] know what was happening i asked what happened to your lead unit he didn't know where's your trailing units
[00:55:18] he didn't know and he didn't know what happened to any of the rest of them nobody knew what the
[00:55:25] hell was going on we were not in a position to shoot a bunch of artillery or air strikes in there
[00:55:29] because we didn't know where to put them only now that Colonel Brown began rounding up reinforcements
[00:55:36] to send in to help bobbic dates second battalion you notice what he wants to know is where people are
[00:55:49] that that's the you've heard me talk about this before i used to ask the you young junior officer what's
[00:55:53] the most important piece of information you you can have on the battlefield and they tell where the
[00:55:57] enemy is and how how many there are and what kind of weapons there are and no the most important piece of
[00:56:02] information there is on the battlefield is where you are and i actually tell the same thing to businesses
[00:56:06] because sometimes businesses don't know where they are because they're not tracking what they're doing
[00:56:09] so you ask them hey where are you and your in your p and l and your profit lost they don't know
[00:56:14] you ask them where they're doing and there's where their sales performance is they don't know
[00:56:18] well how are we going to make any changes you need to know where you are most important piece of
[00:56:24] information there is here's McDade talking again this is the Colonel or the the the the
[00:56:34] batalion commander lieutenant Colonel in charge on the ground in that first hour or so the situation
[00:56:40] was so fluid that i was acting more as a platoon leader than a batalion commander that's a flag red flag
[00:56:45] right you're acting if you're acting as a battalion leader and you're in charge of so a platoon is
[00:56:49] 40 guys a battalion is 500 600 and he's acting as a platoon leader who's running the battalion
[00:56:58] we were trying to secure a perimeter i was trying to figure out what the hell was going on myself
[00:57:02] i don't think anybody in the battalion could have told you what the situation really was at that time
[00:57:08] i can see where this might have left Tim Brown the brigade commander in the dark about what was
[00:57:13] going on i didn't know myself until things quieted down the battalion commander adds i could have
[00:57:19] yelled and screamed that we were in a death trap and all that crap but i didn't know it was as bad as
[00:57:24] it was i had no way of checking visually or physically by getting out of that perimeter so all i could
[00:57:30] do is hope to get back in touch i wasn't going to scream that the sky was falling
[00:57:35] especially in a situation where nobody could do anything about it anyways
[00:57:46] so if you don't know what's going on that means there's a bad problem that's that's my assessment
[00:57:53] and also it's also if you i'm not trying to say that you should cry wolf because you shouldn't
[00:58:03] but when things are going sideways you can wait for them to develop if you have a grip of what's
[00:58:11] happening if you don't know what's happening you better spin some people up to come help you
[00:58:15] at least get them spinning at least get them turning that happens a lot where the guy on the ground
[00:58:21] might not fully understand what's happening make the call and say hey i need i'm stand by their
[00:58:25] support stand by get qr f spun up you know you make those calls doesn't mean send anybody
[00:58:31] but get them ready get them closer get them on standby qf is quick reaction force so if i'm on
[00:58:36] the ground also getting shot at multiple different directions i'm not really sure what's happening
[00:58:40] i might not say send the qr f but i'll say hey have the qr f move to position alpha
[00:58:46] which is very close to where i am in case i do need them in 15 minutes or a half an hour or an hour or
[00:58:51] right now of at least made that progression that like for just provide some general awareness
[00:58:59] yeah so your qr f quick reaction force they might be they might be 30 minutes away and then it
[00:59:07] might need 15 minutes of notification time yeah so i mean if you call them right now
[00:59:12] they're going to be here in 45 minutes 45 minutes from bad firefight is not going to help you
[00:59:18] yeah so your first call now you might bring them in and you pre-plan this this is when i talk
[00:59:24] about pre-planning we would always pre-plan hey if we need qr f we're going to call you to this point
[00:59:28] here we'll call you to this point here if we need to bring you on standby we'll care call you to
[00:59:32] this point let's say this point is 500 meters away from where we actually are and then we have one
[00:59:36] that's right where we are like you come to this building if we call qr f you come to this building
[00:59:41] we're going to try and get into that building if you don't hear from us and we just call for qr f
[00:59:45] come to that building we'll be inside it the best of our ability as they get closer hopefully
[00:59:50] you can establish communications with them directly but if you start losing control of the situation
[00:59:55] this is the thing when you start losing control of the situation you call up the qr f and say
[01:00:01] hey move to the staging point so now they're moving you start at that 45 minute clock right
[01:00:07] now they've all spun up they're all getting their vehicles they're woken up the people that need to
[01:00:11] get out they get their vehicles and they drive so now they might get to the 500 meters away
[01:00:17] and i had the situation under control and i say hey we don't know you'd you come in we're okay
[01:00:21] pulled off in what you got their bummed but they don't care they'd rather have that
[01:00:26] because maybe in 30 minutes things have developed to a point where i need them and now they can
[01:00:30] get there in 15 minutes instead of in 45 yeah okay so again we're not trying to spin up and
[01:00:36] waste assets but and and actually know who did this a very similar in the in the previous podcast
[01:00:42] the guy that called broken arrow which means troops are about to be overrun he didn't wait for anyone
[01:00:45] tell me he just called it he's okay broken arrow now it takes some time for those guys to show up
[01:00:49] there by the time they got there they needed them similar thing now yeah don't advocate yelling or
[01:01:01] screaming sometimes you might have to though you know you might need to get that information people
[01:01:06] are paying attention what you're saying it didn't be impactful if you've ever been sitting in
[01:01:09] it's in attack corporations and we hear people yelling it gets attention because most
[01:01:14] military guys don't yell in scream for no reason they're yelling in screaming because there's
[01:01:17] there's a reason why they're yelling in screaming don't recommend it i don't recommend it but
[01:01:27] i've heard it you know i prefer the calm guys if you got a yelling scream then calm down and
[01:01:33] talk about what you actually need you can't just continue yelling scream because you'll
[01:01:37] you won't get through clear communication you'll come off his office too emotional
[01:01:43] and you know you just become hard to understand what you're screaming yelling calm down
[01:01:48] get their attention give simple clear concise direction of what you want back to the book each
[01:01:54] and every man still alive on that field american and north Vietnamese was fighting for his life
[01:01:59] in the tall grass it was nearly impossible for the soldiers of either side to identify
[01:02:03] front or fro except it extremely close range americans in all of drab and north Vietnamese and
[01:02:10] mustard brown were fighting and dying side by side it may have begun as a meeting engagement a
[01:02:18] hasty ambush a surprise attacked a battle of maneuver and in fact it was all those things but
[01:02:24] within minutes the result was a wild melee a shootout with just gun fighters killing not only
[01:02:30] the enemy not only the enemy but sometimes their friends just a few feet away there would be no
[01:02:38] cheap victory here this day for either side there would be no victory at all just a horrible
[01:02:44] certainty of death in the tall grass unbelievable horrible
[01:02:57] horrible back to the book just for the headquarter section of the column Charlie company was beginning to die
[01:03:06] Charlie company talking about Charlie company a whole company of men 150 guys
[01:03:10] spec for jacksmith was with the lead elements in the Charlie company formation
[01:03:18] nearly tenet dawn cornet the acting company commander when the company charged into the
[01:03:22] teeth of the enemy machine guns in the first seconds smith saw one of the radio operators
[01:03:26] fall dead with a bullet through his chest his eyes and tongue bulging out
[01:03:32] the men of Charlie company were firing in all directions smith recalls within a span of perhaps
[01:03:37] 20 minutes everyone around me was dead or wounded except me you have to understand that an
[01:03:45] area the elephant grass was chest high once you hit the dirt your world was about as big as a
[01:03:51] dining room table your world's completely confined to that area and the six or seven men around you
[01:04:00] at that point we were isolated
[01:04:02] alpha company was in the same shape then the north Vietnamese swept through I believe they
[01:04:08] came between alpha and our company began to shoot people we didn't know if the noise was
[01:04:13] from five feet away as they began to shoot people was friendly or enemy
[01:04:22] smith saw soldiers take machine guns lie flat on the ground and begin firing into the grass
[01:04:27] often they were firing right into the muscles of other American machine guns people were
[01:04:33] screaming to stop the shooting it began to have all the elements of a massacre
[01:04:39] nobody was in control because all the officers were to the front and our radio operators had fallen dead
[01:04:46] on their radio sets no leadership no communication you know I talked to businesses that I
[01:04:56] explained this to my there's your point yeah it is loud and clear tell these businesses
[01:05:01] were like going talk to businesses they talk about this problem and that problem the other problem
[01:05:04] the problem is leadership that's the problem is the problem is leadership
[01:05:11] and the situation like this where the leaders are not there to lead you've got serious problems
[01:05:16] on your hands especially once again if you haven't trained people to lead to step up and lead
[01:05:22] when the leader's gone if you haven't trained people to do that you're gonna have problems no one is
[01:05:27] going to lead
[01:05:36] back to the book pain fought the north Vietnamese had done a much much better job of anticipating
[01:05:43] and preparing for the attack but the Americans who survived the initial onslaught began to rally
[01:05:48] in one respect you could think of it as little big horn we were surrounded with our
[01:05:53] packs in front of us shooting it out during the course of that long afternoon I never saw
[01:05:59] soldier not do his duty I never saw anyone who cowered in the face of the enemy our backs were
[01:06:07] against the wall and it was a matter of survival every person I saw rose to the occasion so this is
[01:06:13] the American troopers are doing what American troopers do fight even in these terrible
[01:06:22] situation no one cowers no one stands down back to the book shortly after word the command came
[01:06:30] over the batangin net throw smoke lieutenant Gwen moved a little way into the grass and the
[01:06:36] men in Albany perimeter all began to throw smoke grenades I saw skip fuzzmire Charlie company commander
[01:06:43] throwing smoke I had no idea what the hell he was doing up here our perimeter was marked with colors
[01:06:49] with all colors of smoke delineating our positions and shortly after the air strikes started
[01:06:57] they were the they were eight one east sky raiders with napom the first napom canisters fell
[01:07:04] right at the point where sajini's and i had left the jungle and came into the clearing
[01:07:09] we could see masses of north Vietnamese on the other side I was sure I was very sure they were
[01:07:14] going to come across at us I think they were cleaning up over there shooting down at the ground
[01:07:19] dispatching our wounded that first strike was right on target with two napom cans I saw them hit
[01:07:26] the tops of the trees and jelly napom was coming down through the limbs and the NVA were jumping
[01:07:31] trying to get away and being engulfed in flames I saw that time and time again lieutenant Gwen
[01:07:40] remembers it cleaned out swath after swath those fuckers would jump up and try to run they didn't
[01:07:47] make it by now the Americans were cheering and laughing at each strike the cheering stop when they
[01:07:53] dropped two canisters directly onto the position where the remnants of the second platoon had been
[01:07:57] making their stand it might have been me but all I could hear was the cracking of unexpected
[01:08:03] rounds burning in the flames that engulfed our men none of us know if there were any alive at the time
[01:08:13] but none of us wanted to think about it
[01:08:30] spec for dick acumen of the recompletun remembers our artillery was supporting us so close that we
[01:08:36] would occasionally get some shrapnel there were planes flying close air support we started digging in
[01:08:42] everywhere we could my entrenching tool was attached to my pack left out in the clearing so I used my
[01:08:47] band at my fingers and someone else is too old when it was available the comfort of a trench just
[01:08:53] big enough to hold your body is unbelievable no more than 200 yards away in that tortured column
[01:09:01] of desperate Americans one man prayed for a miracle and the US Air Force delivered it
[01:09:06] pfc Jim shaden delta company who had booby trapped his own body with a hand grenade was badly wounded
[01:09:15] an unable unable to move he was directly in the path of a group of north Vietnamese soldiers
[01:09:21] methodically sweeping the ground killing his wounded buddies then here's what he says
[01:09:28] before the north Vietnamese got to me half a dozen of them a pilot came over at treetop level
[01:09:34] level turned straight up and dropped the canister of napalm dead center on them
[01:09:40] i never cease to be a mage amazed at the accuracy of that drop the heat of the napalm rolled across
[01:09:47] my face and body like an open door on a furnace i owe this pilot more than it is possibly possible
[01:09:56] for a human to pay may god bless all pilots now we hear from captain abuse tally's
[01:10:11] bravo company first battalion fifth cavalry was a was assigned the mission of attacking
[01:10:17] to relieve the pressure and attempt to link up with the beleaguered battalion
[01:10:21] refreend forcements were also on the way for the battalion command perimeter at the head of the
[01:10:27] column during the afternoon captain miranda dyrics battle weary veterans of the fight at
[01:10:34] landing zone x-ray bravo company second battalion seventh cab got a warning to prepare for a
[01:10:40] night aerosol into a hot landing zone the bravo company troopers delighted to have survived the
[01:10:48] hellish fighting on x-ray and enjoying a well deserved rest and a lot of cold beer back at camp
[01:10:53] hollow a were stunned when they were told they were being thrown back into a desperate situation
[01:11:00] so suddenly so if you remember did gyric from podcast 105 from 270's bravo company 27 they
[01:11:07] went in and helped turn the situation around at lz x-ray they fought hard and then they got extracted
[01:11:16] and now they're getting told there's a bad situation going on again and we need to put you back
[01:11:21] on back and back on the fight back to the book specialist john willenus bravo company mortar observer
[01:11:33] was doing some serious celebrating he had not only survived x-ray without a scratch but this day
[01:11:38] November 18 was his birthday I was 22 years old we were fed and showered new clothes were available
[01:11:47] I spent the afternoon at the men's at the enlisted men's club drinking beer with a
[01:11:51] well tuned exchanging stories and celebrating my birthday around 4 p.m. to dyric came in and told us to
[01:11:59] saddle up we were going to rescue the battalion out about 1600 hours lieutenant Rick rest score
[01:12:08] a recalls captain dyric walked up get the company together battalion's catching health we
[01:12:15] may have to go in you're the only patoon leader left in the company help all the patoons get their
[01:12:20] shit together men spilled out of the clubs and doubled time to their equipment they worked
[01:12:27] quickly throwing on their harnesses no protests but their eyes filled with disbelief again
[01:12:33] dyric then issued the the shortest frag order in bravo company history will be landing
[01:12:40] from the southeast open fired anything on your left run to your right a hostile landing
[01:12:46] with one side of the landing zone held by the north Vietnamese sit rep from the ground grim
[01:12:53] expect to be sandwiched between friendly and enemy fires
[01:12:56] at about 545 p.m. rest scorela gathered the patoons they pressed in close listening
[01:13:06] intently for word sergeant first class oldston oldston the mortar patoon sergeant
[01:13:16] sergeant staff sergeant martin speck for Vincent specialist walinas the towering
[01:13:24] sergeant Larry Milton 80 or more young faces hollow eyes you know the patangin is in the
[01:13:34] shit I said we have been selected to jump into that shit and pull them out if you fight like you
[01:13:40] did at x-ray you'll come through it stay together come out of those choppers ready to get it on
[01:13:46] across the field the first lift ships were sweeping in head him up captain direct grout
[01:13:54] I turned and walked ahead fantino trailing with the PRC 25 the road stretched out past the
[01:14:01] permanent hooches of the rear echelon at hallaway word spread that we were on a suicide fight
[01:14:08] tumbling out of cozy bunks hallways finest line the road to watch us depart Hawaiian shirts,
[01:14:17] aviator shades jeans, beer cans and hands cooks and bottle washers the shit burgers,
[01:14:24] projectionists club runners same army different species the company picked up pace a tight
[01:14:34] dirty brown column a few of the men carried eight k's trophies from x-ray no one had shaved noted
[01:14:43] risk orla but our weapon sparkled one out fit are you one spectator asked the hard core of
[01:14:50] bravo company second of the seventh where you headed to kick ass a yelled back a deep rumble ran
[01:14:58] through the ranks men yelling cursing not a man among us with swap places with these
[01:15:04] lardasses as we passed I asked fantino how we looking back there his reply no straggler sir
[01:15:13] every swing and dick is with us as we made a column right to the pickup point I looked back at our crew
[01:15:20] no outfit in the army had ever rendered a route step any better than these men at this moment
[01:15:28] we piled on to the huge without the usual loading instructions and skated away into the fading gray light
[01:15:36] at 645 p.m. the first lift ships roared into the small Albany clearing and captain to
[01:15:43] direct troopers bailed out into the tall grass the cavalry had ridden to the rescue but the killing
[01:15:51] and dying and terror continued unbated inside the american perimeter as the long night began
[01:16:02] once again that's the american soldier right there barely survived x-ray get called to go back in
[01:16:09] and they pick up the pace back to the book captain to direct road of the flight in in the situation
[01:16:21] on the ground assaulting Albany we picked up five bullet holes in the helicopter things were bad
[01:16:26] I found out what I landed that the battalion was shot up pretty bad so we came in the nica time
[01:16:32] to their rescue the main part of second battalion seventh calves was on their last ditch standard Albany
[01:16:38] little big horn revisited and here's rescor la talking looking sideways I saw trickle of blood
[01:16:47] down the pilot sleeve this is as they're flying in the choppers drop the few feet the pilot
[01:16:53] yelled at the gunner the gunner snalled get out I hesitated get the fuck out four of us dropped the
[01:16:58] bone-jarring ten feet now inside the battalion command group perimeter rescor la took stock
[01:17:06] here's what he says the battalion sergeant major sat against the tree with a bandits chest we got hit
[01:17:12] bad sir real bad the wounded were gathered thirty yards from the CP only half my platoon
[01:17:18] hit arrived the other ships turned back because the ground fire in darkness the perimeter was an
[01:17:24] oval island of trees three platoons could man the perimeter but with the exception of our people
[01:17:30] and pat pains recomplatoon there was no unit cohesion Colonel McDades slumped against the tree
[01:17:37] he looked exhausted he was exceptionally silent major frank Henry has executive officer was
[01:17:42] reassuring the active a short fire plug of a man Henry waved a welcome working the radios
[01:17:49] captain Jill Price the fire support coordinated coordinator crouch beside him
[01:17:54] clumps of survivors sprawled inside the perimeter including several company commanders
[01:18:02] lieutenant Larry go in watched the reinforcements arrive I saw Rick rescor la
[01:18:06] comes swaggering into our lines with a smile on his face an m seventy nine on his shoulder
[01:18:12] and his m sixteen in one hand saying good good good I hope they hit us with everything they've got
[01:18:18] tonight will wipe them up his spirit was catching the troops were cheering his each load came in
[01:18:26] and we really raised a racket the enemy must have fought that an entire battalion was coming
[01:18:31] to help because of all our screaming and yelling major Henry directed that I round up some men
[01:18:40] and police all the ammo resupply which the choppers brought in on the last flight it was lying
[01:18:46] and crates on the far side of the lz somehow we got it all into the perimeter as I came back with
[01:18:51] the last load I passed right over the body of that northeastern east side killed early in the flight
[01:18:57] there wasn't much of them left and I didn't give a damn so I mean there you go there you see one
[01:19:08] one leader makes a difference one leader makes a difference here these guys are completely surrounded
[01:19:14] dead and wounded everywhere and Rick Resscorla comes in and says good I hope they bring it tonight
[01:19:20] will wipe them out back to the book lieutenant pat pain of the recompleton was just as happy
[01:19:27] about the reinforcements as Quinn we were all very surprised to see those helicopters come in
[01:19:33] we were only securing one side of the lz so when the guys would jump off the helicopter we
[01:19:38] halted them which way to come I had a feeling we had actually been rescued that in the fact that
[01:19:43] the cavalry had arrived just like in the movies I admired the courage it took to land in all the
[01:19:49] knee lieutenant Resscorla was one of the best combat leaders I ever saw during two tours in Vietnam
[01:19:55] he walked around and pepped everyone up by telling them they'd done a good job that there was
[01:20:00] support now that things were under control he never raised his voice almost spoken of whisper
[01:20:06] we were awfully glad to see him and the others from bravo company we got in there until
[01:20:15] every hour you did a good job didn't get all negative although he's actually and he talks about it
[01:20:22] I think I think I'm going to cover it but he talks about what he was actually thinking was like
[01:20:26] this is going to be really problematic in his mind he was thinking this is bad really bad but he didn't
[01:20:32] show that he showed hey we're good bring it you're you're good now good job get ready to get it on
[01:20:43] talking a little bit about the the air support that they're getting back to the book chief worn
[01:20:49] officer Hank Ainsworth had been overhead in the second baton command chopper all day and here's what
[01:20:54] he says I was overhead when the fight started and orbited overhead to late that night I was on a
[01:21:00] freak talking to a major frank Henry later that evening he called me Henry said we have critically
[01:21:07] wounded down here if we don't get them out they're going to die I called met a back and they came out
[01:21:12] made a pass drew fire and refused to land to land Frank Henry knew exactly what to do about
[01:21:19] that situation he told Hank Ainsworth to call the 229th Huey slicks the old reliables
[01:21:26] Ainsworth notified the 229th pilots told them that L's Y Albany was hot but that second baton
[01:21:33] seventh cavalry had critically wounded men who would die if they were not evacuated
[01:21:39] says Ainsworth the whole damn unit volunteered I told them we only needed two ships
[01:21:46] despite Ainsworth's call for only two ships four Huey slicks lifted off from camp all the way
[01:21:52] Turkey farm at 950pm for the 40 minute flight to Albany Captain Bob Stinette was again in the
[01:21:57] lead followed by a Captain Bruce Thomas chief one officer Ken Faba and war officer Robert Mason
[01:22:06] and here's what Stinette says normally the Huey pilots thought I'll back their engine
[01:22:10] as soon as they touched down to conserve you will fuel not tonight something told me not to do that
[01:22:18] to keep the engine turning at a full flight to RPMs they told us the wounded were ambulatory
[01:22:24] when we got in there they were all stretcher cases my crew chief and gunner had to get out and
[01:22:28] raise the seats so we could get all the stretchers in then all hell broke loose fire was coming
[01:22:34] in from everywhere I immediately pitched I immediately pulled pitched and with the RPMs at flight
[01:22:39] the ship instantly jumped 30 feet in the air and kept going up we went so fast that the crew
[01:22:45] chief and gunner got left behind on the ground and I didn't even know it we just flat left them
[01:22:50] we had the wounded inside when we got back we counted 30 holes in my machine that was enough
[01:22:56] for me and my Huey the lift of three that went in after dawn after me took in medical stuff
[01:23:03] and brought back more wounded and my crew major Frank Henry was on the flashlight at the time
[01:23:09] Joel Sajini's watched it with all the brave aviators wrist everything for the wounded at all
[01:23:17] the knee I remember thinking they were the bravest pilots I had ever seen they were sitting ducks
[01:23:22] and I fully expected to see them shot down at any moment they were guided in by Frank Henry
[01:23:28] you could see the tracers the aircraft didn't hesitate it a bit they landed loaded and were gone
[01:23:34] in seconds so again you see what that's the American flighting spirit oh we got a hot LZ
[01:23:42] where we're probably gonna get shot down but we've got wounded Americans on the ground we're going
[01:23:46] to get them everyone in the unit volunteers we only need two aircraft guess what we're bringing for
[01:23:52] back to the book after midnight several shots rang out from inside the perimeter a
[01:24:03] trooper 20 yards behind risk gorilla inside the perimeter had rattled off a panicky three rounds
[01:24:09] risk gorilla walked back and cost out the group in the middle of perimeter if I hear one more
[01:24:14] round out of you we'll turn our weapons around and open up no one fires from inside the perimeter
[01:24:19] if you want to fire out to the perimeter if you want to fire get out to the perimeter line
[01:24:25] whispered communication took place all night between isolated elements outside the perimeter
[01:24:29] if there was heroism it was out there in the tiny groups of wounded and those who had
[01:24:34] bandaged and protected them through the night they were just like hunting buddies said risk gorilla
[01:24:40] surviving by instinct looking out for each other lieutenant Larry going a valve company recalls
[01:24:46] that late that night one of Alpha's missing men crawled into the American perimeter here's what he
[01:24:51] says sergeant James a malarty from our first platoon made it back to our lines his story the
[01:24:58] NVA had been shooting our wounded one came up to him stuck a pistol in his mouth and fired
[01:25:05] the bullet exited through the back of his throat knocked him out and they left him for dead
[01:25:09] he survived and when he woke up that night he started crawling to us
[01:25:20] the next day was a real nightmare as we went out to find our dead in missing
[01:25:26] I think each of us cracked up a little bit that day as the true picture of the action began to unfold
[01:25:32] then it came across the radio Bravo company had found another survivor from our second platoon
[01:25:38] he had been badly wounded in the legs and it prop himself up against a tree he had been
[01:25:44] burned by napalm waiting in the night and some north Vietnamese had put a pistol to his eye and pulled the
[01:25:49] trigger shot him in the eye blinded him but he was still alive I saw him being brought in by
[01:25:59] stretcher smoking a cigarette all fucked up so at this point things had backed off a little bit they
[01:26:08] backed off and they actually did the madmen it which is something that Hacworth talks about
[01:26:14] and it's something that they did in the first part of this book which is hey everyone in the
[01:26:20] perimeter is just going to shoot a bunch of rounds like at 630 in the morning boom everyone fire a
[01:26:26] full load out or a full magazine or a couple magazines at likely targets and they did that and
[01:26:35] that seemed to calm things down they kind of did that once things had already calm down a little bit
[01:26:41] and it was it was it indicated that maybe things were calming down a little here's another thing
[01:26:49] back to the book the NBA came into the ambush area that night to recover their dead wounded
[01:26:53] when they found any of our guys alive they would beat them to death bayonet them or machete
[01:26:59] them to avoid shooting and drawing fire from us that was during the night they did that like I
[01:27:07] said they did the madmen and here's what here's what Lieutenant Riscordla said about the madmen
[01:27:12] and he said this decision was regrettable rifle fire shattered the silence and the perimeter
[01:27:17] was wring with reckless firing little fought had been given to that the remainder of our survivors
[01:27:23] were sprawled among the trees and ant hills within 500 yards the effective range of RM16s what the
[01:27:29] fuck is happening are you shooting at us the frantic radio call started coming in how many troops were
[01:27:36] killed or injured by our wake up call will never be known thank God for the trees the ant hills
[01:27:42] and the uneven terrain captain Dudley to Demy third brigade fire support coordinator remembers flying
[01:27:52] out to Albany at first light the next morning Tim Brown myself Mickey Parrish took a while to get through
[01:27:59] the smoke hanging over the whole area not much had really taken place in terms of policing the area
[01:28:05] the image is still vivid in my mind is the carnage folks were still sitting around in a days
[01:28:12] they hadn't done much had even taken ponchos and covered up these bodies I could handle the
[01:28:19] conversation I could handle grown men crying but we were talking 12 hours later sitting there
[01:28:26] feeling sorry for themselves Colonel Brown was very pissed off even if you do get caught in a bad
[01:28:32] situation you have to do something to recover it was young kids who paid the price in later years
[01:28:40] I used to stress that to my young battery commanders it isn't us who die in combat it's those young
[01:28:45] kids who die those kids we are responsible for training and leading it's our job to get the job done
[01:28:52] and get those kids home safe and here they're wrapping up this again now this the battle turned and
[01:29:09] really the Vietnamese left after the massive air strikes it started and here's another image of the
[01:29:20] cleanup back to the book specialist for John Molinas of Bravo Company second battalion seventh
[01:29:27] cavalry mortapal tune and most of the rest of Djeric's men were involved in this macabre depressing
[01:29:34] duty it was incredible carnage we went into areas where lots of artillery had come in during the night
[01:29:42] and we saw our guys have been blown up in the trees the bodies were already decomposed and it only
[01:29:48] happened night before we were in shock it was the first last and only time I ever saw anything like it
[01:29:57] and I pray never again the stench was unbelievable we started hauling in the whole body's first
[01:30:07] then we brought in the pieces and parts two chinooks came in and we loaded one with about 20 corpses
[01:30:16] neatly arranged in lids the pilot began preparing to take off one of our officers pointed
[01:30:23] M16 at the pilot told him to keep the board on the ground we weren't through bodies were loaded
[01:30:30] floor to ceiling when the ramp finally closed blood poured through the hinges I felt sorry for the
[01:30:40] poor bastards who would have to unload this chopper back at Holloway the nightmares
[01:30:49] born of this battle have never faded the final division headquarters account
[01:31:09] reported that the two seven alpha and bravo companies and the one five battalion suffered
[01:31:19] 151 men killed an action 121 wounded and four missing in action and on April 6th 1966 so
[01:31:33] quite some months later how more who was at that time had become the third brigade commander
[01:31:41] went back to lz all been he and recovered the bodies of all four members of two seven who were
[01:31:49] brought back on a hero and began the long journey home to America
[01:31:55] now this was as I said kind of the the tipping point in the Vietnam war and this
[01:32:11] battle had a impact strategically one thing that came from this battle and I'll talk about a
[01:32:19] little bit more in the book but the body count came back and the body count came back
[01:32:24] basically as 10 to one maybe 12 to one so for every 10 or 12 north Vietnamese soldier that was dead
[01:32:33] there was only one American killed and our generals liked that ratio they thought hey you know
[01:32:42] we we can win a war of attrition and one of the comments that comes in in the book
[01:32:52] as they go back and an interview general jayap who's the the senior general of the north
[01:32:59] Vietnamese army he's got a book actually we're going to do in the podcast at some point
[01:33:04] he's the mastermind of a strategy and he said we thought that the Americans must have a strategy
[01:33:12] we did we had the strategy of a people's war no part of what that means is that
[01:33:20] the strategy of the people's war means we're going to suffer some casualties and we're okay with that
[01:33:27] so our strategy of saying well we'll get them into a war of attrition they're okay with it they don't care
[01:33:33] human life has less human human life has less value for them at this time they the commander
[01:33:39] sure's held in care you know we talked about that last time they're losing guys on the from malaria on the
[01:33:44] trail you're going to lose five sick guys they don't care they've got a war to win so talking
[01:33:53] about some of the other sort of strategic things or strategic implications from this
[01:34:06] night nineteen sixty seven so this is a couple years later back to the book in mid-december
[01:34:11] president Johnson convened a white house meeting of his top advisors will bungee says that
[01:34:16] McNamara's option number one get the hell out of Vietnam now while the getting is good was never
[01:34:21] seriously considered nor was it pressed by McNamara option number two the huge build of
[01:34:29] of the American combat and support troops was readily approved by all including McNamara
[01:34:34] ever the numbers cruncher McNamara told the gathering the military solution to the problem is not
[01:34:42] certain the odds of success are one out of three or one out of two
[01:34:49] McNamara did push for a bombing post prepare US opinion public opinion for the coming escalation so
[01:34:56] again well I'm sure at some point in this podcast we will dive deep into the
[01:35:04] political manipulation the political decision making that happened during the Vietnam War but
[01:35:10] this is this is what they're talking about it's interesting here McNamara even back in 1967
[01:35:17] to say in how we got like a one in three maybe one in two odds of winning
[01:35:21] this is not this is not this is not good odds we don't like those odds
[01:35:33] here's here's how more talking again back to the book in late June 1966 my turn was
[01:35:39] up as commander of the third brigade when my replacement a Colonel straight out of the pentagon
[01:35:44] showed up to take over my brigade was in the field fighting near Dong Tre it would have been
[01:35:49] criminal and those circumstances to relinquish my command to a two man who's still
[01:35:54] still pissing state side water and I flatly refused to do so the change of command was delayed
[01:36:00] ten days until the fight was over a month later on August 8th 1966 my replacement sent my
[01:36:06] replacement sent alpha company first battalion seventh cavalry back in the hydrying valley by itself
[01:36:12] and twenty five men were killed in one terrible day so not a good turn over situation
[01:36:20] again this is where this is where the beer you people always talk about when I talk with businesses
[01:36:24] they go we have a big bureaucracy here and you don't understand like no we understand the military
[01:36:28] understands peroxie better than anybody we probably got the biggest and most most firm
[01:36:35] in place bureaucracy in the world and this is part of it right here back to the book I
[01:36:42] hope that my next assignment would be to the infantry school at fort bending where I could pass
[01:36:46] along what I had learned in Vietnam for the young officers who are headed for combat it was not to be
[01:36:51] in fact only one of the hundreds of officers who had gone through air mobile training and a year
[01:36:56] in the field with the first cavalry division was assigned to the infantry school I was sent
[01:37:02] instead to Washington DC where I was told my next job would be Latin American desk at the U.S. State
[01:37:08] Department this is this is an embarrassment right here's this guy basically created or helped
[01:37:15] create or helped test the the idea of air mobile helicopter assaults and then he did it for a year
[01:37:23] in the field commanded at the battalion and that the brigade level and instead of putting him in
[01:37:29] the infantry school or he could teach the stuff that he learned they send him to be the the
[01:37:34] Latin American desk and I'll tell you what's awesome this was awesome when I was in the
[01:37:40] sealed teams I went to Romadi when I came home guess where I went I took over the west coast
[01:37:45] seal training for the for the guys that were getting ready to deploy right out of the casing
[01:37:49] I did what he wanted to do which is perfect and luckily we have the little a little less bureaucracy
[01:37:55] and I was able to talk to my boss and say hey this is what I should be doing see yeah you're right
[01:38:01] and put me in that position but it didn't happen and here's all this knowledge going and they said
[01:38:06] only one officer out of a hundred that's another thing like when you hear you know people on the
[01:38:16] business well they say what the military is this great organization the military has all kinds of
[01:38:20] problems military is no perfect no perfect example of the way to run things parts of it are
[01:38:28] but you can't look at the military to hold and say that that even remotely makes sense in any
[01:38:32] way shape or form and I could point a thousand things out to you today the military is the same way
[01:38:35] doing dumb stuff I mean it's a great organization there's got great people there's there's
[01:38:41] unbelievable leaders in there but there's also idiots the military is made up of people of human beings
[01:38:52] brilliant ones dumb ones back to the book for the next year I watched Bob McNamara
[01:39:03] and John McNott and both brilliant man go through hell as they struggled un-successfully to get
[01:39:08] a handle on the war and the pacification progress and Vietnam at the end of that year neither of them
[01:39:15] was either neither of them was any closer to finding or creating such a handle an office wit
[01:39:23] summed up what was happening in Vietnam sadly and succinct although we have redouble our efforts
[01:39:31] we have lost sight of our objective so we're pouring all these troops in there
[01:39:39] pouring all this money in there put all this all these assets in there we've we've redoubled our
[01:39:44] efforts but we've lost sight of our objective back to the book what then had we learned with our
[01:39:53] sacrifices in the hydrating valley we had learned something about fighting the north Vietnamese
[01:39:58] regulars and something important about ourselves we could stand against the finest light infantry
[01:40:04] troops in the world and hold our ground general west moreland thought he had found the answer
[01:40:11] to the question of how to win this war he would train one American life for 10 or 11 or 12
[01:40:19] north Vietnamese lives day after day until Ho Chi Minh cried uncle west moreland would learn to late
[01:40:31] that he was wrong that the American people didn't see a kill ratio of 10 to one or even
[01:40:38] 20 to one as any kind of bargain but we had validated both the principle and the practice of air
[01:40:47] mobile warfare a million American soldiers would ride to battle in Huey helicopters for the next
[01:40:54] eight years and the familiar whoop whoop of their rotors would be the enduring soundtrack of this war
[01:41:04] finally even though it took 10 years cost the lives of 58,000 young Americans and
[01:41:12] afflicted humiliating defeat on a nation that had never before lost a war some of us learned
[01:41:18] that cause vets had it right 150 years earlier when he wrote these words no one starts a war
[01:41:30] or rather no one in his senses ought to do so without first being clear in his mind what he
[01:41:38] intends to achieve by that war and how he intends to conduct it
[01:41:43] class with
[01:41:58] be clear in your mind in what you intend to achieve
[01:42:08] no what you are going to do that doesn't seem like too much to ask certainly in war
[01:42:25] and you wouldn't think it would be too much for people to ask in their lives either
[01:42:31] their precious lives as precious as these 58,000 that died in Vietnam heroes
[01:42:48] but how often do we see people going through their lives without knowing what they are trying
[01:42:54] to do without having any intent without having a clear mission I'm talking on an individual level
[01:43:03] as a person people go through their lives without knowing what it is they want to do
[01:43:13] what they want to accomplish
[01:43:14] so no what your mission is no what you're intent as the commander of your life
[01:43:32] no what your intent is and then fight with everything you've got to win
[01:43:50] and I think that's all I've got for tonight so
[01:43:54] echo maybe if you want to shed some light on how people can
[01:44:04] maybe help themselves when that war and maybe support the podcast if they want to
[01:44:11] they want to that point though in my opinion is it good it's a good one it's a good one
[01:44:20] I think about people go through their lives and they're trying to do yeah and it sounds the same thing
[01:44:25] is going to war without knowing what they are coming supposed to be
[01:44:28] yeah you go but it sounds kind of like obvious when you say it you know like hey go through
[01:44:39] when you go through life should you have a goal real obvious yes you're not going to say no you
[01:44:44] shouldn't have a goal kind of thing so it seems obvious but you know how you live day to day
[01:44:49] you you know you might have a goal for the day maybe two maybe three but Brad life is four
[01:44:54] life is a full spectrum stuff well again it's so shocking because what you're saying is
[01:45:00] absolutely true you wouldn't think that people would be going through life without knowing
[01:45:04] where they're trying to get to yeah but you wouldn't think that a nation would go to war
[01:45:09] without clear intention of where they want to end up and how they're going to get there at
[01:45:14] least an idea how you're going to get there now I have a little bit of like when claustrophic says
[01:45:18] how you're going to conduct the war that's not necessarily true because you don't know you can't
[01:45:23] know how you're going to conduct a war before the war starts you can have an idea but you can't
[01:45:27] know fully just like if you were to say hey my goal is to ex in my life you don't know how you're
[01:45:32] going to be able to do that yeah because you're going to you're going to make it adaptation things
[01:45:37] are going to come up things are going to change the battlefield changes your life changes things
[01:45:41] pop up I mean things happen so I think that that idea that you're going to know how you're
[01:45:46] going to execute something is is far fetched I think you what actually I should use the word idea
[01:45:53] you should have an idea of how you're going to do it yeah you should have an idea like okay well this
[01:45:56] is what I need to get done this is what I want to achieve in my life I want to make I want to do this
[01:46:03] what's a simple one I want to own a house that's a simple one that's a good place to start
[01:46:09] I want to own a house okay well let's think about how we're going to get there you know that's
[01:46:14] let's let's think about how we're going to get there you have to build your credit you have to
[01:46:19] you have to borrow money some people something they go to buy a house they've never borrowed money before
[01:46:22] you can't borrow money if you've never borrowed money you can't borrow money for a house if you've
[01:46:25] never borrowed money for a car or a or some smaller object before so you got to establish your credit
[01:46:30] then you got to have two years worth of income then you got to have a big fat down payment sitting
[01:46:34] ready so there's things you got to do this thing now now that might change a long way the idea is
[01:46:39] that you got to move towards that goal but that's what was so nice about hearing the V in the
[01:46:43] Mese commanders intent get close split them up boom you go make that happen hey guess what you want
[01:46:49] to buy a house one day save money have good credit yeah okay well you got to make money how you
[01:46:54] make money you might make it drive an Uber you might make it deliver in pizza you might make it you got
[01:47:00] your real job but that's important your family but then you need a little extra to throw in there
[01:47:03] that's why you end up driving Uber you end up with whatever you're going to do you want to make
[01:47:06] your you're some money on the side that you can start stashing away yeah and at the end of the day you
[01:47:13] do have that goal you know so it is yeah how you conduct yourself it's not going to be cut in
[01:47:20] drive for sure but you know in these examples like you know you want a buy house that's a goal
[01:47:25] that's just physical but that's just one teeny tiny goal in life if you're on of course you're
[01:47:29] not going to run into somebody who they're only goal in life is to buy a house no no no it's
[01:47:33] I said it's a one yeah it's like a don't buy house it's stupid you should rent things that's fine
[01:47:39] yeah I'm not telling everyone what they're going to should be and if you want to keep renting
[01:47:42] keep renting maybe that's for you yeah yeah yeah yeah not for me yeah but maybe it's for you there's
[01:47:47] other things you want to put your money that's cool you're doing some other something else smart with
[01:47:51] your money yeah like buying rooms or something like that either way though if you
[01:47:57] uh consider like just what went um closet closet it tell you see what what he's saying
[01:48:04] and compared to life right where buying house sure that's one of many goals you're going to
[01:48:08] have in life because life is full like was it but so it kind of when you really think about it
[01:48:14] but it's hard it's hard to like designate some specific goals and then that's all you're going to
[01:48:19] okay let's say you're going to say you're going to be financially secure and independent okay that
[01:48:25] would be a much bigger boss right that's an awesome goal to have and of younger you make that
[01:48:29] goal but better chance you have a achieving it yeah because now you're not wasting your money you're
[01:48:32] actually saving for a house so you can get that house paid off so now you don't have a mortgage anyway
[01:48:35] you know he's like yeah that's a bigger goal that's a broader goal just like when you when you
[01:48:38] go to war you need to know what it is you're going to war for what are you going to do and when you
[01:48:42] going to stop and what's your intended result yeah so you got it in a way you got to fill your life
[01:48:49] with a bunch of goals so you don't get jam because like you have small goals that lead to the
[01:48:56] big goal right so for instance you want to be financially secure and stable what are you going to do
[01:49:02] you're going to save some of your money okay that's one thing you're going to buy a house that's
[01:49:05] another thing you're going to pay off your car and you're not going to buy expensive dumb car
[01:49:09] you're going to buy cheap cars until you have the money to buy them with cash you're going to
[01:49:14] make all these little things you're going to work extra you're going to you're going to do these
[01:49:16] things so you're right you have you have your broad goal yes you have your long-term goal yes and
[01:49:21] then you got your short-term goals that lead and are strategically aligned with that long-term goal
[01:49:25] it's the same thing in war you have to have those both those things going on yeah yeah and then on top of
[01:49:31] that you should have you want to have the last word did it don't you know no no no no I'm making this
[01:49:39] every time I can slightly close out what you're trying to say you you add because it's not that I mean
[01:49:45] it is that but then you're talking about life now and here you're just kind of the point where you
[01:49:49] say okay you say one example is financial like you want to buy house you want to be financially
[01:49:57] least secure that's one goal but in life there's more life than just financial so you want your
[01:50:01] health you want your you know relationships you want your like there's all these things that
[01:50:06] you you kind of hope or want to be solid yeah we'll say so but most people don't really put it in
[01:50:16] perspective that clearly like okay I want you know I'm going to write this down one this so we're saying
[01:50:20] those in the goals if you have goals yes if you have goals in those areas then you can you know you can
[01:50:27] you can you can you can you can avoid a maneuver toward some exactly right avoid distractions all this
[01:50:31] front and fight and fight towards those goals sounds obvious but that's what I'm saying it's like hard
[01:50:38] to like designate each goal in life oh I didn't say this was going to be easy yeah that's
[01:50:45] but it's not that hard if you sat down for 20 minutes I bet you could come up with some solid life
[01:50:49] goal that's kind of the that's kind of the point I was making where it's too busy cruising
[01:50:53] you know and being really it's about this this being distracted I think that's what it is
[01:51:00] you know and if the clear your goal the more I think control you can have over being distracted or
[01:51:05] not because like if your goal isn't that clear it's almost like it's not going to be clear or it is you
[01:51:11] won't really be clear when you're being distracted or not kind of thing people don't you know I'm
[01:51:17] saying people I mean myself yeah we don't live our lives like just in constant pursuit of all our
[01:51:25] specific goals we it's like a lot of life is minute to minute no no you can have some sections
[01:51:34] that you can carve out so you can live like that but yeah that's not where you want to be how
[01:51:38] you're rolling yeah no it's not how it should be so I'm saying so if you're and you'll notice
[01:51:42] in life I think like any any solid goal that you've achieved you'll notice that that it took
[01:51:48] that clear goal and you just didn't get distracted and you just want for it so it's like you've
[01:51:52] done it for yourself and there's also just like being on the path yeah that's what I get about
[01:51:56] Gjitsu right my goal in Gjitsu is never to get a black belt I never said like I want to be a
[01:52:03] black belt just never I never even fought that yeah I just wanted to get better at this thing
[01:52:08] right okay so you will not take it it was it was it was never you go was never my
[01:52:13] goal was not to get a black belt my goal was to train Gjitsu and get better Gjitsu yeah in their four
[01:52:20] comes my goal was like even finances I wasn't like hey I want to make X amount of money I was like
[01:52:29] I want to be able to do whatever I want to do so let's move in that direction yeah that might not
[01:52:35] even have a financial value like there's some people that do whatever they want to do but they
[01:52:38] have a very low income but they set themselves up in such a way that they're allowed to do what they
[01:52:43] pretty want to do check all right are you done last word not on any way oh yeah support right
[01:52:51] that's what we were talking about all right yeah you can support it when you pursue goals
[01:52:57] you may or may not need support I recommend support supporting yourself support of others from others
[01:53:04] for others to a street kind anyway if one of your goals is to maintain physical shape and
[01:53:12] capability it's important I work out right you work out proud yep all right yeah good so I work
[01:53:21] out right and you know all so my wife will give me grief sometimes because I'll just like work out
[01:53:29] at the wrong time you know because in my mind like working on it's important all right so I can
[01:53:33] like love about you yes I can loosely justify oh yeah you know yeah it's dinner time but hey my health
[01:53:41] right and sometimes it'll still frame it like oh yeah you choose to like work on your work on your
[01:53:47] body or something like that and I say no it's health it's capability it's true but the point there is
[01:53:57] it's important no matter how you frame it or your wife frames it it's important yeah you want to
[01:54:02] do it strategic anyway while doing that you take real oil take stuff that helps maintain the structural
[01:54:12] integrity of your body and the good news is Jocquai supplements for that real oil Jocquai super
[01:54:18] curl and joint warfare I've been taking these consistently and it's all a legit thank you Jocquai
[01:54:26] also Jocquai has a new one called discipline it's a pre mission if your if your mission is a workout it's
[01:54:32] a pre workout if your mission is a studying it's a pre study studying pre studying supplement you know
[01:54:40] pre mission little cognitive enhancers in there little bit of caffeine micro dose right like the
[01:54:47] micro coat yeah yeah you don't want to get all strong out on caffeine it's just the perfect amount essentially
[01:54:53] also if you are oh wait let me tell you where to get these things good point yeah
[01:54:59] because they're not just floating out there anyway put an origin main dot com that's where you get
[01:55:04] them also an origin main dot com you can get cool geese a lot of people still know still asking me
[01:55:10] maybe not every day maybe not every other every other day but they still ask me what geese should I get I
[01:55:16] sort of due to geese should I get is once origin geese 100% not even 99% 100%
[01:55:24] origin geese a big range to choose from um they also got rash guards in their compression gear
[01:55:31] for any other activity you like some fashion stuff on there too
[01:55:37] and into fashion no come on but a little bit no little bit of it also oh you mean they have
[01:55:45] a plain black victory mma t shirt no we have oh okay because that's my level fashion yeah well it
[01:55:51] happens beyond jockel store dot com but i'll get to that first things first just check if you're
[01:55:57] doing did you say that origin stuff is made in here in America no big deal yeah do you it's no big deal
[01:56:02] this made in America yeah i think it's a big deal but i don't like oh you're not gonna focus on
[01:56:11] because you know the quality kind of leads with this one or they could go hand in hand
[01:56:17] is it good quality because it's made in America or is it made in America because it's good quality
[01:56:25] well both yeah it's good quality because it's made in America by qualified craftsmen yes i think
[01:56:33] that's really the case yeah and some of it is no one of my buddies is he's he was on deployment
[01:56:38] had an origin gee shipped over on deployment and i came home from deployment and he'd been training
[01:56:45] while he was on deployment and he's like bro that origin gee is the best thing i've ever
[01:56:50] ever known like yeah no yeah it is yeah for sure so anyways and it's made in America so yeah
[01:56:56] from the cotton the cotton that's grown here in America what do you call uh processed here in America woven
[01:57:08] in America made into again America you can wear it wherever you want but
[01:57:12] you can't wear your gee wherever you want actually more or less no with no there's some
[01:57:18] tension all out there if you're gee yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
[01:57:20] club no gee
[01:57:24] grocery store no gee yeah have you ever want to gee to grocery store no maybe there i've
[01:57:31] i've never worn my gee outside of a jiu-jitsu academy me i'm confirmed what about what right
[01:57:37] right now what about the kind you're either going to jiu-jitsu or lead jiu-jitsu and i don't you
[01:57:41] change there yeah you change it what if i just started rolling in the geolotime
[01:57:46] like everywhere i got time yeah yeah yeah yeah that's awkward that's i ever want to fall
[01:57:49] you know what little kids do it yeah that's what i've got her she throws the gee on
[01:57:53] uh she's no problem that she walk around the supermarket no she's
[01:57:57] whatever the supermarket she's ready representing so gee joke somebody is he keel
[01:58:04] wearing a gee in the store can be tactically sound you know she even her goals
[01:58:08] everyone's focused you gotta demonstrate everyone's in all not being distracted it's good
[01:58:14] nonetheless you're gonna get a gee again i'll say it now i'll say it again
[01:58:17] on me to merit in america or jiu-jitsu i'll come boom select whatever gee you want get to
[01:58:23] i have two set three actually wait no then you discipline equals freedom gee i got that one so
[01:58:29] three yeah all together boom origin i think i'm gonna get a black one too by the way okay that's you know
[01:58:35] also working out you're doing jiu-jitsu maybe you're doing weightlifting maybe you're running
[01:58:43] whatever i say do kettlebells and when you do kettlebells get the cool one from on it on it
[01:58:48] on it dot com slash jockel look for the primal bells my opinion actually the zombie ones are pretty
[01:58:53] dope too but get those that's what i think makes it work out more interesting i did one yesterday
[01:58:59] it was interesting kind of hard to but nonetheless yeah get the get them from there i
[01:59:05] they got a lot of cool stuff on there for interesting workouts you want to switch it up
[01:59:09] if you don't do the same like if your workout is boring or something like that get like a
[01:59:14] get some battle ropes go through one of those workouts you didn't want to like that before or
[01:59:19] a battle ropes workout before i have yeah yeah interesting it kind of makes you like serrets kind of
[01:59:26] sore you know what that is you're in your cost almost once yeah i've done there nonetheless
[01:59:32] anyway on it dot com slash jockel that's where you get them solid site also when you are getting
[01:59:39] this book we were soldiers once in young actually i thought it was we were soldiers once in
[01:59:46] young and i was a great no it's we were soldiers once in young and young and by the way we were young
[01:59:53] kind of thing anyway can you get that book good book outstanding book it's a great title when you see
[01:59:58] like my wife will we'll do something that there will be like young seals at yeah and my wife
[02:00:05] so it's like oh thank god so young yeah they look so young you know that's the geoyce thing
[02:00:10] yes i think that these kids are so young and then i i was one of those kids yeah and yeah they
[02:00:16] are young you know that's two fights wars young kids well that's 18 19 20 22 years old 23 years old
[02:00:23] that's who fights wars yeah and it's crazy and jpe kind of talks about this where your maturity kind
[02:00:29] of gets on this like fast track when you jump to the military it doesn't it doesn't in some
[02:00:35] way it doesn't it doesn't because you're also institutionalized oh yes so you don't like when
[02:00:40] you're in the middle that's what hurts some guys when they get out of the military they're like
[02:00:43] wait a second i don't wait what is my paycheck it's well it's come every two weeks now it's not
[02:00:46] there and it's used to it yeah oh you have a mission here's what you're gonna do and that
[02:00:51] when you're in the military you just here's your clothes that you're gonna wear yeah you don't
[02:00:55] mean here's the haircut that you're gonna have you get all the military also and you're like
[02:00:59] you don't have this direction anymore so you do get it matures you in some ways and otherwise
[02:01:05] you get stunted growth that's why you get some guys doing dumb shit we're 30 years old 38 years
[02:01:09] old 42 years old yeah they're doing the midlife crisis thing but when you think when you don't
[02:01:16] maybe it's not even a midlife they're just trying to figure it out because you haven't had right they
[02:01:20] didn't do that like at the time is everyone else but you know how you talk about your wife looks
[02:01:25] at the younger guys or the seals and say well they look so young that's I think that's like
[02:01:32] an indicator that she doesn't feel old you know because you know how like when you're when you
[02:01:37] kind of like I do the same thing when I look at college football when I watch college football because
[02:01:41] I remember when I was playing football it's oh yeah there was like I 26 years old on my team
[02:01:46] 26 we're in the same age as old school yeah it didn't help you kind of going bald and stuff like that
[02:01:52] but nonetheless he's 26 26 is young by the way and depending on how old you are because when you're 16
[02:02:00] you don't think you if I tried to ask my son who's 15 like what what how far away 25 years
[02:02:09] or how long was it until he was 25 like he would understand 10 years he has no
[02:02:14] he would not be able to like cognitively assess what a 25 year old human being is thinking about
[02:02:23] he's 50 no access he's not got it going on yeah but I feel like he would still be able to figure
[02:02:29] out okay 25 you know people when do people die of old age quote unquote would be what 80s
[02:02:35] right typically just you don't win ever so you figure 25
[02:02:40] so what less than a 30 year life 26 less than a third that would be considered old technically
[02:02:48] if if they were to think about I think a 15 year old would grasp that even though 26 year old was old
[02:02:53] he was old yeah I thought so so when I look back and then I don't feel old as old as I am
[02:02:58] I don't feel like old I think back when I was in like college or whatever and I think about
[02:03:03] the number of my current age and I think dang that's that's old that's old or person
[02:03:08] being that older person now I don't feel like how I thought that older person to film right
[02:03:15] and I really think that now it really comes and gets put into perspective when I watch college
[02:03:20] football and I seem to take off their helmet I'm like dang that is a child right there playing
[02:03:24] college football performing out performing like super good but they just look so young I'm just like
[02:03:29] your wife they look so young but it's because I don't feel like an old person that's so that's good
[02:03:36] yeah I guess so because you know if you feel like old person you're like yeah they look
[02:03:40] young because they're young there are young I mean old person there you feel like you should
[02:03:44] be in there too and they're like oh yeah and then you say oh okay he's easy on going to
[02:03:47] old you know one of those things nonetheless back to support when you buy this book
[02:03:56] we were soldiers once and young go to jocopiedcast.com we got a section that all the books
[02:04:03] that this book listed by episode all the books listed by episode plus a few other ones boom click
[02:04:09] through there we got you takes you direct link Amazon prime you're primary I do one day shipping
[02:04:17] same day she was sometimes yeah you know get it there good way to support and if you're going to do
[02:04:22] other shopping carry on good way to support also joc was store and I'm gonna talk about it
[02:04:38] but before I do that I think if you subscribe to the podcast is good way to support so
[02:04:44] I was gonna say subscribe if you haven't already seems obvious but subscribe
[02:04:48] leave a review on iTunes if you subscribe to iTunes if you want to leave a review
[02:04:54] if you're feeling reluctant just get over it leave the review also youtube subscribe
[02:04:59] youtube video version of this podcast also excerpts various types of excerpts you know so you can
[02:05:06] share so you know if you don't want to share the whole two and a half hour podcast with people
[02:05:12] there are excerpts if you wanted to share an individual concept with people they can boom they can
[02:05:18] get that concept and you know share it internalize you know also joc was the store
[02:05:26] it's called joc was store joc was to come sure it's t-shirts, rashbirds, hoodies,
[02:05:34] some patches on there hats on there just it's the stuff I'll say it's cool stuff
[02:05:41] I wouldn't be pushing stuff that anything goes cool and it's joc will prove kind of the pink
[02:05:47] shirt's aren't joc or no but nonetheless if you want to get shirts and stuff that's where it is joc was
[02:05:52] store calm they are good stuff they are good they're not like the cheap ones this is what I'm saying
[02:06:01] so boom you can rest assured but yeah tell much you think if you have one hey people take pictures
[02:06:06] of themselves with the shirt on and they say this is a good shirt and that's good I encourage that
[02:06:12] and if you don't like this shirt let me know too there it is also good way to support yourself
[02:06:22] one of the better ways in my opinion depends on what kind of person you are is psychological warfare
[02:06:27] if you don't know what that is it's an album with tracks with joc on each track telling you
[02:06:34] that in your on your campaign against weakness when you hit those roadblocks that's what it is
[02:06:41] rope that's what they are roadblocks mental fatigue distractions all this stuff these tracks will
[02:06:48] help you through it it's joc of telling you pragmatically given you practical information in advice
[02:06:55] how to get over those roadblocks around those roadblocks or through those roadblocks
[02:07:01] I'll make a psychological warfare track then it's gonna be directed towards you to make you talk
[02:07:08] about this stuff faster okay well here's the thing when I you know I come across this
[02:07:15] smart right yeah see and I'm I feel compelled to share the valuable points that I think
[02:07:23] are valuable that I've used or that I felt with each thing but then I'm like oh wait that'll take
[02:07:30] a long time to explain so sometimes I go with it you don't seem to care sometimes I don't
[02:07:36] but today I'm giving you a downjack no I think it's valuable okay we'll go with that
[02:07:45] now watch how fast I do this yeah but you're not gonna give them the whole thing you know
[02:07:49] like the jockel way to you know you didn't demonstrate not demonstrate explain
[02:07:56] yeah the jockel way to guaranteed to get your deadlift 8000 pounds boom that's it done next
[02:08:01] but there's three books you can get way the warrior kid gets kids on the path boom done
[02:08:07] I should have dropped more about bigger kid that's cool no need I don't know man but I think
[02:08:14] like I read way the warrior kid to my daughter every single night it's one or two chapters not too
[02:08:20] long just one or two chapters so she wants to read the next chapter she wanted she wants me to
[02:08:25] read the next chapter that night I say no tomorrow she's looking forward to it every single night
[02:08:28] it's just the mantra the whole way the warrior kid is just a background to you for life yes
[02:08:35] good thing to know don't be weak like work hard all this stuff it would explain that whole thing
[02:08:42] to me I just say because that's the value that I got
[02:08:45] way the warrior kid if you want a longer explanation you can email echo he'll give it to you
[02:08:49] extreme ownership same thing combat leadership for business in life
[02:08:52] that's new version just came out has a little Q&A from you all from the podcast that's in there
[02:08:59] so you can get that also for an individual perspective discipline equals freedom field manual
[02:09:06] it's available whatever you wear there's no better gift than discipline the audio version of that
[02:09:10] which people ask me about a lot is not on audible dot com it is on it's it's an album with tracks actually
[02:09:19] you can get it from iTunes Amazon music google play other MP3 platforms for leadership also
[02:09:26] beyond the podcast beyond the books we have a leadership consulting company it's me latefab and jpg
[02:09:31] nl davberg you can email info at echelonfront.com if you want to book a speaker don't call a
[02:09:39] speaker's bureau or a speaker's agent don't just go to ischelonfront.com fill out the form
[02:09:44] and want to also come talk to you your company on top of that we got something called the
[02:09:50] mustard also known as the mustard we're doing two of them this year only why we don't have
[02:09:57] enough for them in the schedule to do three again washing in dc may 17th and 18th San Francisco
[02:10:04] California October 17th and 18th coming get it next remuner ship dot com that's where you register
[02:10:11] there's some video stuff about it that that's that also if you want to ask us more questions
[02:10:22] or you have answers to questions or points to make outside of the podcast and you want to get in
[02:10:29] touch with us you can do it on the interwebs twitter instagram and that's a busy book that
[02:10:37] is where you can find us echo is at echo Charles and i am at jaco willink and to those people
[02:10:45] out there the soldiers sailors airman and marines around the world right now standing watch
[02:10:54] thank you for protecting our nation and our freedoms and a police and law enforcement
[02:10:59] thanks for watching our backs here at home and protecting us from evil in our own backyard
[02:11:07] to the firefighters that walk into fire to keep us safe and the paramedics that keep us alive
[02:11:18] first responders thanks to all of you for what you do and to everyone out there
[02:11:23] make sure you have a plan make sure you have a goal make sure you have intent make sure you have a mission
[02:11:35] and then get out there and get after it and until next time this is echo and jaco out