Jocko Podcast 167 w/ SEAL Master Chief, Jason Gardner: Lessons on War, Leadership, and Life (Pt.1)

2019-03-08T01:52:21Z

Join the conversation on Twitter/Instagram: @jockowillink @jasonNgardner @echocharles 0:00:00 - Opening 0:02:50 - Master Chief, Jason Gardner.  War, Life, and Leadership. 2:12:00 - Support: How to stay on THE PATH. 2:47:46 - Closing Gratitude.

AI summary of episode

and this is what we are doing he's already got gigs booked which is awesome echelon front dot com if you need help with leadership in your organization we will help you that's what we do we have the master in 2019 23 24 May and Chicago 1920 September in Denver 4 and 5 December in Sydney Australia every event we've done has sold out go to extremownership.com if you want to come otherwise it's gonna be sold out and you won't be able to come and you'll be all mad and you'll be mad at me and then someone said that it's like when I went to Lala Palusa and I went and saw Rollins who I kind of knew and I was like hey man can you get us in and Rollins said it be easier to sneak you into Fort Knox and I kind of like was all hard to call or like he kind of forgot what it's like in the streets but it was an up to him exactly now now I'm the guy now I'm the guy that's going to be saying hey be easier to sneak you into Fort Knox I gave you a heads up your big time now so we're gonna check that's that EF online online interactive training from echelon front we needed to speak to more people and we don't have enough instructors can run enough monsters each year and it was a good contrast for them to see because it made it so obvious like why you have to work together why these relationships we have inside the tasking you're so important why we need if you have an issue you're bringing it up you're bringing it to me why it's not going to freak me out why we're going to talk about it why you know life always says and stoner would it tell you the same thing if life thought like hey I'd like to try this a different way I'd be like cool how do you want to try it go let's let's make it happen I don't care I don't I don't care what happens as long as it makes us win so there was a really cool for me unfortunately it was not cool for you to be in a position where I could look and use the leadership failures in that task unit and the other interesting thing was like you talk about those two guys you're yeah having no idea what's gonna happen is the worst I I talk about that example of rats and a cage and how the rats on one side of the cage they just get electrocuted randomly from the floor and but the electrocution isn't very strong the other side of the cage has a stronger electrocution shock but there's a little light that comes on that lets them know that you're about to get shocked and rats prefer to know that they're gonna get shocked even if it's more often and even if it's stronger they just prefer to know that it's common as opposed to be just randomly getting shocked and you know why it's gonna happen and that's basically where you where your task unit was because there was I mean it was like a public too it was like a public everyone kind of knew it was going on at least after about six months you know I would say after all of us being at the team for about six months it was readily apparent that's for sure and you guys actually the one of the pieces of collateral damage that was Mike's are Ellie and Mike's are Ellie he they didn't know what to do with them because I forget what the internal conflict Yeah that's a good point though when you say where does it go down to so three I would say there my son is like two he was like just before two and a half and I'd read him more reading it to my daughter he's there but he'll catch certain things you know when there's like monsters ready to bite he'll be you know like he'll know certain stuff so as you kind of get older you absorb more and more and so that's kind of what happened there the boss the new boss comes in and says hey here's what's going on here's what we're gonna do hey you guy that's all jacked up here's what you need to improve and everyone instead of what in your mind you might think hey I'm gonna piss everyone off if I come in and lay down the law at this you gotta remember that people have been wondering what the hell is going on for six months for a year they don't know who's in charge everything's a disaster no decisions are gonna be you come in and people go thank god thank you for telling me what the hell you want I'm tired of playing a guessing game every Monday morning about who's my boss and what direction we're going into so that's that's an important part remember now I am definitely there's a dichotomy of course because you can come in and you can start barking orders and everyone just says who are you where you come from you don't know what you're talking about you haven't been here shut up and of course they won't say that to you they'll just undermine what you're trying to do and calls all kinds of you know just just trying you serve you with whatever they can so that's probably but what I'm saying is there is a a happy medium and there are times when you lean towards being laying down the wall there's times where you lean towards being more loose and you gotta figure out where that's gonna be depending on the situation you're diving into and and so if if anything you do is like fashion which I mean there's some fashion stuff in your past like maybe hair styles etc that's why if you see old pictures of jacco with his hair you feel like you know that's kind of the thing that's the that's the guy that Jason was talking about earlier that's me like we like that And I'm just, you know, everything's a joke or whatever and get out of the vehicle and, you know, some guys yelling at us with the fake Russian accent and I'm just laughing at it inside and which means, you know, I'm like kind of, I got that I was 19 and the dude, the dude comes over and he like yells at me and I, you know, who knows what I said to prove that I was a tough guy and this dude correct me and I was like, but a huge cost so there's like this too little additional elements to a successful spas escape or whatever one you gotta be at least somewhat strong like you can like a smaller person like spasking is less effective even at high level there's that and then when you're strong when you're strong person and you spas successfully you're way more tired way more tired so you get a person where you put them in a spashing state like two three three times in a row and they make that emotional decision when in fact the teams can take care of you too you know the teams can go hey look we know you need some downtime you're gonna go to buds and be an instructor or whatever you know for three years you know you can get your kid through high school or whatever so the teams has a good job usually of taking care of of the people you know taking care of team guys but sometimes you know people they have the grassest screener situation and again in the 90s we're planning we're training for a big game that we're not going to do So a guy get pushed off a roof, we were watching, and in the evening we had gotten someone said, hey, this one building about two kilometers away, that's one of the clan leaders buildings, and we could see guys up there in the evening, and they get that caught there, that makes them all go kind of crazy, and we'd see guys sitting there like watching the sunset up on a roof, and then one of them when start to get animated, the waving their arms around, like there are going about something, then they were all animated, then they were up like beating each other with clubs, hitting each other with rocks, and then it would just stop, and then it would start up again, and I think at least one of those, we watched the guy just get pushed off a roof, fall dead, when that is just how they were all. so I feature like like famous Gigi to people or when you know like Jeff Glover, Keen and Kreni like these guys premise is we're just living our life but and you know what I'm the great part that you just mentioned is like a three hour conversation yeah which we don't aren't gonna have right now because look the second part of your career or the part that if yeah we'll get into this we'll do another one we'll just we'll just roll do another podcast we'll record it like tomorrow and that's gonna follow you into Afghanistan back to Iraq again more time more training more tours combat tours tours as senior listed tours as the command master chief tours as an ops master chief I mean there's a lot of massive stuff to talk about from here on out so we'll do that we'll record and you know I know in a way too where that's why these little smaller guys when they're super advanced I don't think they have for spas ever because it's always like it's been unproductive for them right every attempted spas is gonna be like unsuccessful you know Because, because now I look back, how awesome it must be when you got like guys like that at the team who were just like, oh, yeah, So was your dad was your dad kind of like the stereotypical marine that was just like, oh, like acting like a drill started charging. Then this camp that was 500 yards south of us, we saw a group of like seven guys, two of them had RPGs, you rocket propellant grenades, another guys patrolling with like two peak two pkm gunners, they're built finishing guns and like an AK gunner and they're patrolling and we can see him, we can see him and now they come out the front of the camp and at the gate of that camp which is facing us 500 yards away, there's two sandbagged positions for the watches who would be up there to check people coming in and out. And then a guy that straight across for me, I can remember seeing a big black hand come over his shoulder and it like covers up half of his chest, like like Andre the giant big and just moved the dude away and then another guy, a hand moves the other guy away and I think about just having a guy like Monty who's like level headed who's been in some shit before and can go you know what hey we need to shoot this guy before he shoots it us that's just totally sensible thing to say but if if everyone's because you got these massive oh RLE briefs and everyone's being paranoid They're only allowed to like hit you from out here to here, but it was like, you know, those those images in Rocky where it was like, oh, stars and that just, oh, that was that little smirk I just had on my face laying on the ground over there. and when I went to college for three years and when I came back I was like right the main thing I learned in college was never ever ever ever get out of the teams ever because it dealing with other people it was just so horrible and especially I mean like you and me who literally spent our whole adult life in a puttune you get out of in a normal people and you're like what are you everyone doing once I have what why is this even happening it just nothing makes sense like hey they're both guys I actually know both those guys and would be getting debrief to buy both of them like both of them would be telling me what the other person was doing and man you just be thinking guys instead of telling me go tell each other go talk to each other it didn't happen I was super stoked and super jealous of course like every other guy was like which actually this is why I did another arc because it seemed like hey if you're going to get some action you need to go with the Marine Corps in the arc and go out and do that. but man when you when you don't have that everyone's all excited everyone's freaking out and everything's just magnified and so it's pretty impressive and to me you know again you have a guy like Monty that's just looking at the OIC it's boss and saying hey we actually need to kill this guy right now and and not being like we need to take this guy out which just escalated then the OIC is thinking yeah we're like what's it pops with them when it got to go out and some ops with them got to go on a lot of date like my favorite thing to do was go out on daytime presence patrols with the army or the Marine Corps because that's was so fun you know but um you know that's uh the land it was under land warfare and the land warfare all I see at the time was uh worn off so pressure dug pressure to do some awesome dude he still works in shooting to this day and uh we got a lot of cool stuff done like we got the the ballistic computers which made you know shooting a whole lot more predictable just hey you're good load another round just being calm when I think about the advantage and how that's a pretty good performance you know what you guys who's a pretty good performance with no experience because I think of how you know what what I gain through experience and the maturity the combat maturity of seeing things and things unfolding being like yeah there's an organization that does a lot of just like work for like honestly cancer kids and stuff like that it's a situation that unfolds that you know is going to unfold that you know is not the correct thing to do and there's no way you can stop yourself from doing it like you just said you someone's gonna arm lock you you know what's gonna happen you could just go yeah deans thumbs up he's like training he's like the ex boyfriend of his data whatever so so Vader like chops his head off uh-huh hey man you got your lawn you're one like one degree separation from getting all the new stuff to where you're at really because it feels like 180 you know I'm over here looking on mine it's stuff anyway also mok right mornin jacen we talked earlier you just want that's not going on a style no sure it's not so there we go origin jeans we are in production with origin jeans in production at this time so check the website originmain.com if you want to get some jeans or if your name is not jacca will link you can get pair of joggers the joggers are good that's the thing where I got I wasn't down for the joggers Pete told me this he opened my open my little like a mind or whatever I put him on I was like dang these are comfortable but man they're skinny they're thin

Most common words

Episode transcript

[00:00:00] This is Jockel podcast number 167 with echo Charles and me, Jockel Willink. Good evening, I go. Good evening.
[00:00:10] Beware of that trap. Choose deer baywolf, the better part. Eternal rewards. Do not give way to pride.
[00:00:23] For a brief while, your strength is in bloom, but it fades quickly. And soon there will follow illness or the sword to lay you low, or a sudden fire or surge of water or jabbing blade or javlin from the air or repellent age.
[00:00:47] Your piercing eye will dim and darken. And death will arrive deer warrior to sweep you away.
[00:01:05] That right there is some timeless wisdom offered by the epic poem Bewolf. The first poem in the English language.
[00:01:20] Which of course it's old English, which is mutually unteligible from the modern English that we speak, but it has some incredible translations if you want to read it.
[00:01:33] I recommend the shame is a hany version.
[00:01:38] So regardless of the translation that you get, the story remains as due of the lessons, lessons based on the war and leadership and really human nature.
[00:01:58] Find these lessons over and over and over again throughout history and in different cultures and in different wars.
[00:02:10] And we all continue to learn everyday from history and from each other.
[00:02:18] And it certainly seems that there are some principles that are universal. There are some underlying unifying theories that bind together and thread through leadership and war and human nature.
[00:02:37] And more we experience in life, the more clearly we can see the thread of these unifying theories.
[00:02:50] And tonight I happen to have on the podcast an individual with a lot of experience.
[00:02:59] And experience in war, experience in leadership and experience in life. And he also happens to be someone that I grew up with in the Sealteams who is a great friend and who just retired a couple days ago as a seal master chief my friend and my brother by the name of Jason Gardner.
[00:03:27] Jason, do you know what? Thanks for coming on, man. Hey, I'm really excited to be here.
[00:03:34] And it's kind of cool because I know that you listen to the podcast and you were one of the first guys that reached out to me.
[00:03:45] I don't know what number podcast it was, but you reached out to me really early and said, hey, this is kick ass, man. Keep doing it.
[00:03:53] And then, you know, as the podcast kind of spread, I started hearing from more guys, but that was a pretty you were literally the first guy that reached out to me and said, bro, keep it going.
[00:04:04] And I said, cool, will co. That's awesome. Yeah. And like Iris is the one that said, told me, hey, Jocco's got a podcast.
[00:04:12] And I'm like, okay, she goes, you don't know how to listen to podcast to you. I said, no, gave her my phone. She got it set up. It was episode six and within a week and a half because of my commute.
[00:04:25] I was caught up. Yeah. And then just dialed in from there on out and talking about it, sharing it with a lot of other guys and it's been a huge help to me.
[00:04:34] That's awesome. And yeah, anyone hasn't put this together yet. This is Iris and gardeners husband and Iris is on podcast number 70.
[00:04:45] So if you want to listen to that, you can hear us talk about you. I guess indirectly because you were still active duty in the day.
[00:04:53] So all right, let's get to your story. Let's talk about you.
[00:05:00] Okay. Where's your car? My dad was in the Marine Corps. So we moved around a little bit, kind of settled down up in San Clemente here in Orange County.
[00:05:11] I grew up up there. Swam, played water polo, did that through high school and then yeah, I think started doing a martial art car college of camp on one of the instructors was a team guy in Vietnam.
[00:05:29] And back in the day, you know, I had no one knew what seals were. And then my parents had found out that he was a sea lion Vietnam and they're like, oh, you know, this guy was a sea lion. Like, what is that?
[00:05:41] And then they said, these guys are awesome. It's really hard training. They're water warriors, which was super appealing growing up at the beach and water polo and swimming. So then I just latched on to that.
[00:05:53] And that's what what I got after and and listed right out after high school. So was your dad was your dad kind of like the stereotypical marine that was just like, oh, like acting like a drill started charging.
[00:06:07] No, my dad my dad was super laid back easy. Just an easy going good guy and he was a jack officer in the Marine Corps. So he's like an attorney.
[00:06:18] But but not definitely not your stereotypical marine and at one point I was thinking about going in the Marine Corps and he talked me out of it.
[00:06:26] I don't do it. Don't do it. And he's like, hey, the Navy, the seal team just closed loop. Sure. You could go to recon. But at the time it wasn't closed loop. So you'd go in and out in and out. He goes, you don't want to do that. You want to do this.
[00:06:38] And then yeah, the racer now has Marsau which you can just go in and you can be a special operations guy for your whole career. What is closed loop? What does that mean?
[00:06:48] Meaning so what I just said about the Marine Corps, like now you can go in the Marine Corps and you can just be in special operations for your whole career.
[00:06:56] Before you could go for what would how long of a tour would they do two or three deployments at a special I don't know.
[00:07:03] I think it's like a three year tour six years they would do it a command and then it had to go somewhere else. They might go back to an infantry unit or something like that.
[00:07:11] And that's called like an open loop. Yeah, open loop meaning that you don't necessarily stay in the job you want the whole time.
[00:07:17] That's yeah.
[00:07:18] Now, at what point did you start listening to heavy metal punk rock and hardcore music?
[00:07:27] Because I know that's the first like connection you and I had which I don't know is there some weird sort of thing when you just like look at some other guy.
[00:07:35] This guy's in the hardcore. I mean it's not it's not like I walked up to you and said hey what kind of music do you like?
[00:07:41] No, it was just like immediate you just know right.
[00:07:45] Yeah, I don't know what the bone of fetties are actually on that.
[00:07:49] Yeah, I explored around with like a lot of different music and it just wasn't enough you know it's like okay well listen to the doors and
[00:07:58] Stray cats I like them for a little bit man then then and it was kind of an investment to buy an album back in those days or to find even any punk rock so I found I think like a dead Kennedy's album fresh fruit for writing vegetables that was kind of like my gateway drug.
[00:08:14] And then I'm like oh okay this is really getting me moving yeah.
[00:08:20] Yeah, then I remember like I think I was 14 or 15 when I went to my first show up at UC Irvine it was like P.I.L. which was Johnny Rodney's band and I saw I you know and then the mosh pit was just like what is this?
[00:08:40] Yeah, I want to live here. I want to get a mailbox right outside this thing and just stay in here at this point of friction circling around and around forever and I was like boom then that that was it then you know.
[00:08:52] Just go over G.B.H. and Orange County had a really really like probably a one of the biggest scenes in the world at the time for all the music that would come through there or was going out of there so G.B.H. the D.I. uniform choice was guys that I glondon later in high school those guys were awesome and and you knew the guys were beautiful.
[00:09:17] No, I do but I really like their music and I like their message because some of the other stuff like okay rage against some scene for instance.
[00:09:26] I like the music I just can't get behind the lyrics. You know or chromax that was a great example.
[00:09:32] Yeah, love the music and I like the lyrics too because it's good like get after it stuff so.
[00:09:39] And then they're just maybe that that buzzing I don't know what guys did in other wars when for sure no going music to go and then come back listening to kill them all instead of listening to pop the magic dragon right that that's literally what's what Americans were listening to like they're listening to pop the magic dragon and those folk music bands and I mean I guess maybe at the outside edge somebody might have been listening to Hendrix or something that's a little harder.
[00:10:08] Yeah, but yeah, yeah to me there's a there's a this is just straight up the way it is some human beings.
[00:10:18] I would say normally boys have this thing in their head that wants to fight and wants to break things.
[00:10:29] Yeah and and when you hear your example the doors you're like okay well this is you know you hear light my fire and you're okay like I kind of I'm feeling a little something there.
[00:10:43] And then you hear the chromax and you go okay you hear motor head and you go okay this is this is me this is what I'm talking about right here this I completely understand this music right now.
[00:10:54] Yeah and then that just and they can just pick it up and other people.
[00:10:59] Yeah.
[00:11:00] Yeah and then so.
[00:11:03] That and then like I stuck with punk rock for a long time and then a buddy of mine in high school who I swam with Steve Rosenthall is like hey you should check out Metallica.
[00:11:16] Oh yeah yeah and then they were like they crossed me over to where I'm like oh no now I like speed metal to and then finally I found my way to slayer and kind of stuck with them forever and it slayers on a continual loop in the back of my head all the time and it's always surfacing up or down.
[00:11:31] But now it's like really by exception that I listen to it because I just can't listen to it all day I can be that fired up but.
[00:11:40] Still really good.
[00:11:42] Yeah it's it is it's so then you enlist in the Navy you go to Buds and this time what you what years it.
[00:11:50] I went in 87 and then went up to Great Lakes did Gunners make a school up there and so I think I checked in the Buds sometime in May or June 88.
[00:12:03] And what do you have prepared for you for Buds because you know a lot of people that listen to this will think they want to go to Buds or whatever and they're paranoid about what they can do to prepare.
[00:12:14] And I know I'm assuming you probably did something similar to why did because we had no idea what was going on and have no idea what the training was like.
[00:12:21] And so that's the video you probably watch the same video as me if they even had that video the personal one special yeah so you watch the be someone special and you think well in order to get ready for the seal teams what I need to do is look cool.
[00:12:34] Yeah.
[00:12:34] Where all black.
[00:12:36] Yeah and be cool.
[00:12:38] But there was no hey here's the protocol to get good at pull ups here's the protocol to get good at swimming with friends none of that.
[00:12:46] And then you know like in boot camp I found that we actually got out of shape me and there was another guy in my boot camp class that actually just retired as a mass chief as well and we would go in the bathroom and do pull ups in on the stalls just to try and stay in shape.
[00:13:02] And one thing I didn't do enough is run so I hated running and then I was in every gun squad until I think third phase then it clicked and I was already a really good swimmer so the water wasn't an issue for me but I was just hammering a gun squad you know it's when your towards the back of the deal and and they're like okay you guys are done you're doing this run the rest of you start doing pushups hit the surf and they just mess with you forever.
[00:13:31] Feel like the first all through first phase every time run I threw up because I was gonna I was like inches in front of failing.
[00:13:41] Yeah and just had to reach deep and and push push it across finish line.
[00:13:46] You said there was some what happened at Sancle you were telling me the other day about something happened Sancle.
[00:13:50] Oh what was that so before you started training in pre training they said hey we need volunteers to come out to Sancle my now and to help out with the.
[00:13:58] The the class that was was out there and you just kind of go and work behind the scenes with the staff out there at Sancle many island and so.
[00:14:07] I think like the second night I was out there we were in.
[00:14:12] We basically went out with their members a couple of times they went out there wasn't
[00:14:22] I would say when I went up there no then I'd show you and you're facing them for as long as all of the family is in there was a small house out there and we have people.
[00:14:29] I'm making some more, come back up here and get one.
[00:14:32] So I ate my one taco, went back up to get my next one.
[00:14:35] He's like, here you go.
[00:14:36] And as I'm walking with my tray back,
[00:14:39] one of the instructors says to me, hey,
[00:14:42] didn't you already eat two tacos?
[00:14:43] And I'm like, oh my goodness, I didn't know what to do.
[00:14:45] So I said, no, and then I tried to keep going.
[00:14:48] Well, it was the phase officer.
[00:14:51] You know, it wasn't wearing any rank insignia.
[00:14:53] So then all the other instructors leap up.
[00:14:56] They're all huge.
[00:14:58] And they just start screaming at me.
[00:15:00] And I'm thinking to myself, oh, I've already ruined it.
[00:15:04] I'm done.
[00:15:05] So I had an even eat the taco.
[00:15:08] I just got out of there.
[00:15:09] And I went back to where, you know,
[00:15:11] our little hot where we were sleeping.
[00:15:14] And I just went to bed.
[00:15:16] It was like a 5 p.m.
[00:15:17] Because I was like, oh no.
[00:15:19] Then the next morning at 4 a.m.
[00:15:21] there's a knock on the door.
[00:15:22] And one of the guys opens up the door.
[00:15:24] And it's one of the students that's actually in the class.
[00:15:27] And he goes, hey, is there a gardener in here?
[00:15:30] And then everyone just looks at me, you know?
[00:15:33] And I'm like, yeah, I'm back here.
[00:15:37] And they go, they want you down at the beach.
[00:15:40] So I got dressed and went down there.
[00:15:42] You know, I feel like I'm going to Castle Dracula
[00:15:44] and like, oh, what are they going to do to me?
[00:15:46] So the instructors are all circled up.
[00:15:47] And the phase officer's there.
[00:15:49] He goes, gardener, get over here.
[00:15:50] So I go over there and he goes,
[00:15:52] he hands me a thermometer and he goes,
[00:15:54] we need to get the water temp.
[00:15:55] So you're going to go out in the water up to your waste.
[00:15:58] And you're going to stay there and do not,
[00:16:01] I need you to go all the way to your waste.
[00:16:03] And you're going to stay there for two minutes.
[00:16:04] Don't come in early.
[00:16:06] And I'm like, who ya?
[00:16:07] So I take it and I just go.
[00:16:10] I go out until I'm just trading water.
[00:16:12] Because I'm like, I see how this is going to go.
[00:16:15] So then, and I didn't even look at my watch,
[00:16:18] I just stayed there until finally they're like,
[00:16:20] get in here, dummy.
[00:16:21] So I come running in and hand them the,
[00:16:23] uh, thermometer and they check it.
[00:16:25] It was like 53 degrees or something like that.
[00:16:28] And then like get out of your gardener.
[00:16:31] And they did this like one other time.
[00:16:34] And then they just decided it's not going to be fun to pick on this guy.
[00:16:38] And that's what I kind of figured was going on.
[00:16:39] I just like, okay, don't give them a reaction,
[00:16:43] don't give them reaction.
[00:16:45] And then they went away and found someone else to mess with.
[00:16:49] But the guys in the class later told me that the group of pre-trainings
[00:16:52] that was out there before our group came out.
[00:16:55] Like they had one guy that they would just harass.
[00:16:58] And they would just make him burst into tears every time.
[00:17:00] And he ended quitting before even started training.
[00:17:02] But you know, you talk about this a lot on the podcast,
[00:17:07] how it's sealed puttunes are just super aggressive.
[00:17:10] And they're like, anybody looking for any weakness.
[00:17:13] And if you show a weakness, it's going to get hammered.
[00:17:16] And then you're like, no response, no response.
[00:17:19] You got to have normal face,
[00:17:21] you're going to mistyle your emotions or your life's going to be miserable
[00:17:24] until you figure out how to deal with whatever that weakness is.
[00:17:27] The thing, there's a couple things that really bother me in the world.
[00:17:31] And I won't tell anyone what they are.
[00:17:33] No one knows.
[00:17:34] Not one single person knows what really, really.
[00:17:36] Like there's a couple things.
[00:17:37] If I, if the seal puttunes would have known these things,
[00:17:40] I would have been eaten alive.
[00:17:42] But I never, ever say, and I won't tell anyone right now, ever.
[00:17:46] I'll put it in my will when I die.
[00:17:48] It'll be like, hey, you guys missed a huge opportunity.
[00:17:51] Because, and you know, and sometimes, you know, it's things that can happen with
[00:17:55] team guys just anyways, just things happen.
[00:17:57] And if you let it show, you're doomed.
[00:18:02] You are, or are they just hammered that weakness
[00:18:05] until that nervous dead and it doesn't bother you anymore?
[00:18:08] That's true.
[00:18:09] They'll get, they'll work you through it in a nice gentle way.
[00:18:13] And did you have any, so you, you were a crappy runner, obviously.
[00:18:17] And you said, that was a gut check.
[00:18:18] That's like me, every run, I failed to one run.
[00:18:21] And after that run, every run I did, I just ran as hard as I possibly could sprint.
[00:18:25] This was for the, for the, for the, for until we were done.
[00:18:27] Yeah.
[00:18:27] Until I was done.
[00:18:28] Uh, would did anything else, trip you up at all in Buds?
[00:18:33] Because every, all the water stuff was easy, pool comp, life saving, all that stuff
[00:18:36] was easy, because you did water problems.
[00:18:38] Yeah, and nothing about Buds is easy, but um, it was all stuff that I was really accustomed to.
[00:18:43] And so, so it was like, uh, this is no big deal.
[00:18:47] This is no big deal, but it, it was freaking brutal.
[00:18:50] Like, I wouldn't do it.
[00:18:51] I wouldn't want to do it again.
[00:18:52] That's for sure.
[00:18:53] Um, and then, but the truth of it is, like, it's cool as I was in Buds, colder in the team.
[00:18:59] So, tires, I was in Buds, tired in the team.
[00:19:02] So, yeah.
[00:19:03] Um, great guys.
[00:19:06] It was a great experience.
[00:19:08] I finished up, did you finish up with dive phase?
[00:19:10] Yeah, I finished with, uh, Landwerfer.
[00:19:14] So, so they switched it somewhere around when I was there.
[00:19:17] Which was 1991.
[00:19:19] That's, it was just before we got there that we switched it.
[00:19:22] In fact, I think there was actually a class that did it the opposite way,
[00:19:25] did it the old way the way you did it before, right, that was still there when I got there.
[00:19:30] So, right, it was because of pool comp.
[00:19:31] It was because of pool comp.
[00:19:32] So, when you guys get kicked out during pool comp, that they're like,
[00:19:35] why are we waiting till the end to do this?
[00:19:37] Let's shift it over.
[00:19:38] Yeah, pool competency is something that I knew zero about when I was coming into Buds.
[00:19:44] And they had, they had a poster in the med medical area by the grinder over there.
[00:19:51] And it was a Texas chainsaw masquerque poster.
[00:19:53] And yet they had written the Texas or the Buds pool comp masquerque and had like a guy with a regulator,
[00:19:58] getting ripped out of his mouth.
[00:19:59] And who's the killer in, um, uh, leather face?
[00:20:03] Leather face was, you know, like, had like an EEDT seal instructor T-shirt on.
[00:20:07] Yeah.
[00:20:08] And I just remember walking by, I was checking in or whatever.
[00:20:10] And I go, I don't know what that's all about.
[00:20:12] And then I found out that yeah, they're going to crush you in the water.
[00:20:16] And what about then you go to UNT Old School Airborne School?
[00:20:20] Oh, yeah.
[00:20:21] So, so for you.
[00:20:23] So it was really good, but I was, you know, I was really, really cocky.
[00:20:28] And when I go back and examine my cockiness, it was just,
[00:20:31] here's the deal.
[00:20:32] I was super insecure.
[00:20:34] And, uh, and then compensate for it by being cocky and hope hopes that no one figures out
[00:20:40] I wouldn't secure I am. But anyway, uh, the physical aspect of jump school, you know,
[00:20:46] the runs and stuff.
[00:20:47] It's so easy.
[00:20:49] And then, but you kind of get throttle back where it's kind of a boot camp mentality.
[00:20:53] You're not used to it.
[00:20:55] So me and the guys we were going out drinking on, and there's rules.
[00:20:58] You're not supposed to drink on a weeknight.
[00:21:00] And we were out drinking on a weeknight.
[00:21:01] Or it was like a Sunday night, um, the night before one of the last before the final week of
[00:21:08] Jump Weeks.
[00:21:10] And, uh, I went up to get a pitcher of beer at the bar there.
[00:21:15] And, uh, the guy who was the bartender turns out he was a black cat.
[00:21:21] And so he's like, hey, are you jump school?
[00:21:25] And I'm like, oh yeah, yeah, I'm a jump school.
[00:21:27] And he goes, you're not supposed to be drinking on week nights.
[00:21:30] And then I, I'm like, yeah, well, whatever.
[00:21:33] And he goes, do you know who I am?
[00:21:35] And I said, no.
[00:21:37] And he goes, I'm a black cat.
[00:21:38] And he said it in a manner where like there should have been some spooky music playing
[00:21:41] bar in it.
[00:21:42] And, um, and I was like, okay, well, if you don't think I can, you know, drink this beer and
[00:21:49] do the PT in run in the morning and you're out of your mind.
[00:21:51] And he's like, get out of my bar rightly.
[00:21:53] So kick me out.
[00:21:55] So we leave the next morning.
[00:21:58] We're on the bus on the way to the drop zone for the first jump.
[00:22:03] And there's kind of a commotion outside.
[00:22:06] And I look and there's that guy that was the bartender with his,
[00:22:10] and he's with one of our guys because he was in a different phase.
[00:22:14] And so they pulled everybody off the bus, lined us up.
[00:22:17] He walked down.
[00:22:18] He goes, oh, here's the guy.
[00:22:21] They pulled me out of line up.
[00:22:23] Um, pulled me behind one of the buildings and tuned me up.
[00:22:27] You know, I kind of deserved, I did, didn't kind of, I deserved it.
[00:22:31] And so they let me have it.
[00:22:34] And then that was it.
[00:22:36] I went back and did three or four more jumps.
[00:22:40] And then I was getting ready to do my fifth jump, which is the last jump there at
[00:22:45] Jump School.
[00:22:46] And the liaison officer came and pulled me out and said, hey, you were drinking on a weeknight.
[00:22:53] I've got this statement.
[00:22:56] You're, I'm pulling you out of this thing and I'm going to take you to NJP,
[00:22:59] which is nonjudicial punishment, Captain's Mass.
[00:23:02] So I was like, hey, wait a minute.
[00:23:05] These guys, shoot me out, you know, tune me up a little bit.
[00:23:08] Right out, I mean, like, gut punch me and I had, you know, I had it coming.
[00:23:11] It's all good.
[00:23:12] And, uh, you go, it was going to be done there and he goes, nope.
[00:23:16] We're not having this.
[00:23:18] This isn't it.
[00:23:19] So you're, you're going to go to Mass.
[00:23:20] So I got pulled out of the class.
[00:23:23] The class graduated and left.
[00:23:25] And then this is like Friday.
[00:23:28] You know, they did their last jump to the graduation.
[00:23:30] I was put, got put in a holding company.
[00:23:32] And then I wanted to, to Captain's Mass.
[00:23:36] In front of the, the Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel that was kind of like the officer out there
[00:23:41] and charged the Navy and Marines going through Jump School.
[00:23:43] And, uh, you know, I called my dad because he was still active duty at the time.
[00:23:48] And he said, Jack, and she's a Jack.
[00:23:51] And he said, yeah, but he couldn't pull any strings.
[00:23:53] He's like, hey, you're just going to have to go in there.
[00:23:56] And own it.
[00:23:59] So I go in, you know, I sit in the room, coming in the guys office, they read me the rights.
[00:24:06] They read the statement against me, which, which is basically the story I just told you
[00:24:10] to be balanced a little bit more, but it's all good.
[00:24:13] And so the, the Colonel, uh, he reads this stuff and then he just looks up to me.
[00:24:19] I'm standing at attention.
[00:24:20] And I think I, okay, I've done it again.
[00:24:23] I'm going to get thrown out.
[00:24:25] And he goes, uh, do you have anything to say for yourself?
[00:24:28] And I said, uh, sir, that's pretty much what happened.
[00:24:34] You know, the statement that he read out.
[00:24:35] And I said, uh, I've embarrassed the Navy and by-and-turn the Marine Corps.
[00:24:41] And all I can do is take my lumps and press on with my career.
[00:24:45] And then he just stared at me and he goes, I find you a hundred bucks for one month.
[00:24:50] And I'll let you reclass up with a next class and do your final jump and get out of here.
[00:24:53] Yeah. And so you got a hundred dollars extra month jump pay.
[00:24:58] So it was really kind of a wash.
[00:25:01] It was awesome.
[00:25:03] And then the, the one guy that had pulled me out of line and brought me in there to
[00:25:08] mass, he's like, you know, who told you what to say?
[00:25:13] But I found that. And I've always told you,
[00:25:15] guys in military career, just own it.
[00:25:17] If, if you get in trouble, own it.
[00:25:19] It's when you make excuses that you run into trouble. But when you're like,
[00:25:24] this is what I did. Most things that people have done.
[00:25:26] Guys have come close to doing or didn't just didn't get in trouble for.
[00:25:30] And when you own it, it, it, it, it just works out better in the end.
[00:25:34] There's every time. No doubt about that.
[00:25:38] So now you go back to back to team, where are you?
[00:25:41] You're a team five.
[00:25:42] Checking a team five.
[00:25:43] We didn't have SKT then. So what they did with us was, uh,
[00:25:49] we just kind of bounced around. So I worked in a different department at the team.
[00:25:53] They worked in diving for a couple of weeks, worked in ordinance for a couple of weeks.
[00:25:58] And I think I was at the team for about four months.
[00:26:00] And in those days, the team didn't deploy.
[00:26:03] We all, I was at two platoon's pushed forward and the command was back.
[00:26:07] So, uh, I think I was probably for five months at the team
[00:26:12] went out to Nyland to work at the old cap camp out there as a camp guard.
[00:26:17] It was a great experience. And, uh, and then, uh,
[00:26:22] got in the, my first platoon, which was in our galfa.
[00:26:25] So we did the whole deployment on a ship.
[00:26:28] And, uh, that was, that was, that was great.
[00:26:31] Had some awesome guys in that platoon.
[00:26:34] Uh, but platoon chief was his guy named Bill Cune, who's, uh, passed away now and
[00:26:38] really miss him. But he was just super, even keel quiet, direct.
[00:26:45] You never really saw him lose his temper. And, uh, a good, good man.
[00:26:50] Good example for all of us. And then, uh, then a couple other guys I'll get into here in a second,
[00:26:56] uh, you know, and then we wound up deploying on the ship.
[00:27:00] And we did a longer work up than it was, we did, uh, like almost a year long work up
[00:27:06] because we were going on the arc. We had to do everything. Guys were normally doing like an
[00:27:09] eight month or in, then they do a six months to PI.
[00:27:11] Yeah. Well, well, when I did, because I did two arcs, you know, for those things,
[00:27:16] you don't know. It's deploying on a ship. When we did that, it would be,
[00:27:19] we'd do the normal work up. But we do the normal work up before we started our interoperability
[00:27:25] with the Navy and the Marine Corps, so that tacked on that, that tackled on their work up.
[00:27:30] The Navy work up and the Marine Corps work up. So it was like we did two workups kind of.
[00:27:35] And it was awesome training. I got so much out of out of that. But then where did you,
[00:27:39] where did you guys go into playing it? Well, we'd started our West Pack and we were,
[00:27:45] we just got into the Philippines when the Sodom was saying invaded Kuwait and all that stuff
[00:27:51] kicked off. So then we pushed over for Operation Desert Shield and then was, uh,
[00:27:59] thought we were going to go home. We made it back to the Philippines and then we stopped there in the
[00:28:04] PI for like three weeks and then turned back around and went back over for Operation Desert Storm.
[00:28:11] Did you guys do anything? We just did a bunch. So we did the tanker boardings,
[00:28:17] like you talk about, and did a couple of those. And then we had a bunch of different operations
[00:28:23] that we had slated on some of the islands off the coast there that we would, we got all the way
[00:28:29] to point of doing rehearsals form and then like the Iraqis would have just abandoned the island or
[00:28:34] a couple of times when he was flew over to do a recon they surrendered to the helicopters.
[00:28:39] And then they just sent helicopters in there and took all the Iraqis over. But, um,
[00:28:46] Admiral McCraven was our task unit commander at the time. And so that was cool. He was really
[00:28:51] good to work for. And then, like, one of the guys in the platoon that I told you, I reached out to him
[00:28:57] because I want to mention him because he's kind of a bigger than life seal was Steve Hines. And
[00:29:04] Steve is, he's a big guy. He's all, you know, at the time, tatted up quite a bit, which in the early
[00:29:11] 90s a lot, not a lot of the guys had tattoos. He, uh, at some point in a bar fight, someone had cut him
[00:29:18] up with a knife. So he has these amazing scars, Chris Crossing is just, he's really smart.
[00:29:26] He's got a razor sharp whip whip. And it was just a lot of fun to work with. One of those guys
[00:29:33] where is he is bad as things ever got. He's always cracking, you know, cracking jokes. So it's always
[00:29:39] funny. Takes the edge off of it. And one of the things that he did really well was, you know, when you're
[00:29:46] on a ship, you're on the ship. And there are some guys that decide they're going to be condescending
[00:29:52] everybody. And, you know, that just doesn't get you far in life. Steve ran a PT for the ship.
[00:29:59] So we would do our own physical training in the morning. And then he had one that he would run
[00:30:04] in the afternoon. And he would invite everybody to it. And the captain of the ship came to his
[00:30:10] PT, the, the master chief of the ship was there. Um, by the end of the deployment, we would have
[00:30:16] most of the flight deck would be covered with guys coming to his PT. And then he'd be cracking jokes
[00:30:21] the whole time. Everybody loved him. We would do like, okay, hey, we're going to do a fan-tale shoot.
[00:30:27] And we would have different people from the ship come up. And we would let him shoot our guns and
[00:30:32] be their rain safety officer. So it's like, hey, all the guys that work in the galley.
[00:30:37] And you know, and the galley's our mess hall come out. We're going to run a shoot for you. And then
[00:30:41] when happens, they hook you up with food. You know, you, everybody. Chicken patties more chicken patties.
[00:30:50] You know, maybe some extra dessert. And then everybody just looked out for us. And it was so good.
[00:30:57] It paid off in spades. Yeah. And I love building relationships with people.
[00:31:02] It's just such a benefit across the board. And I certainly learned that literally getting extra
[00:31:08] chicken patties and extra chicken nuggets because I was bros with the dude working in the front line.
[00:31:14] And now the chicken nuggets, what? My son like like that's whatever. No, that's a real thing.
[00:31:20] You're cutting gator squares off the coast of Africa for 90 days. They don't have a lot of food left.
[00:31:26] And it gets down to, okay, what are we going to get? We're out there trying to get jacked by the way.
[00:31:31] And if you, if you don't have fuel, so yeah, bro out with those people a little bit.
[00:31:37] Everybody, why is it just like no skin off your back? Not to. Yeah. And you know what I mean?
[00:31:43] I mean, really that's what karma is, right? Yeah. Good to people. And then it comes back to you.
[00:31:48] Yeah. And so so you guys did some ship boardings. Mm-hmm. And but then the Gulf War
[00:31:54] and he was over in 72 hours. Yeah. It was done really quick. And the guys in the teams that did
[00:31:59] do missions, they were generally like like a couple of got there's a couple of tunes that got,
[00:32:06] there's a couple of tunes. There's a putton that almost got over there. Yeah.
[00:32:08] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:32:10] One putton. No, was it? I think it was a team one putton. But was it a, I don't know,
[00:32:17] I thought I got one. I forget what it was. But it was right up the line and they punched through.
[00:32:20] It was pretty crazy. Yeah. Yeah. That's like one of the, and one of the guys that was in
[00:32:24] that putton, I ended up in a putton with later. But generally and even, even doing ship boarding
[00:32:31] is back then was like, yes, you know, we did something real world real world real world.
[00:32:36] Real world up everybody got around there. Yeah. Yeah. And that was the truth. That was the truth.
[00:32:42] That was, that was, that was the way it was. Hey, if you did something real,
[00:32:45] there was awesome. And I mean, when I was coming in, I had all these fantasies that once I was in the
[00:32:50] sealed teams, look, there's clandestine wars going on worldwide. And I'm going to be all up
[00:32:57] in them. I'm going to be fighting wars. People don't even know about. And then I found out when I got
[00:33:02] to the teams that there was no wars in Guam, which was where my first deployment went to.
[00:33:08] Yeah. I felt like that same thing was going on that there'd be like,
[00:33:12] guys with, you'd get there and within a week, people be on a load your stuff up. We're going here,
[00:33:17] you know, loading everything out. And then it doesn't happen that way or it does. You just got to
[00:33:23] you can't get it. I guess. Well, it happens more now. I mean, now there's a lot more stuff going on.
[00:33:28] And it is going on. And it is worldwide. And you see the news and sometimes you don't. But
[00:33:34] it is totally different. It's completely different now. I mean, we are at war. And so those little
[00:33:41] fantasies that you have about going into countries that happens now, whereas in the 90s, what happened?
[00:33:48] No. And then there are all these assumptions about what you're going to do when you're shot at.
[00:33:54] I remember like we shifted our immediate action drills around at Nyland right after the Panama
[00:34:02] thing happened. That Petia Airstrip. And we decided that or it was decided by guys thinking about
[00:34:10] they're like, hey, you're just going to win the first gunshot goes, you're just going to crawl.
[00:34:16] So we did everything crawling around in the desert. And you know, it's not, it's not how it goes.
[00:34:23] Yeah. No one knew. No one knew. And we lacked simulation or, or love laser systems that we ended
[00:34:30] up using as it was hard to know. I mean, even CQC was, oh, especially, totally ridiculous what we used to
[00:34:38] do. And you know, new guys like me, they're telling me that this is what you do. And this is
[00:34:43] why you do it. Because they have theories behind it. They have theories theoretically. And the theories
[00:34:48] are hard to argue with, A, because you don't know any better and B, because they've kind of
[00:34:52] pressure tested the theories in little arguments amongst themselves. So, hey, you listen to them.
[00:34:58] And you think, okay, this is the way it is. And then you find out, well, then everyone found out,
[00:35:03] actually even just when they started implementing paintball and simulation, it was like, you know,
[00:35:07] what? This doesn't seem like a smart idea. It doesn't seem like a smart idea for all of us to be
[00:35:12] standing in the hallway. That's one of the big ones. It's so obvious. You know, my first poll tune,
[00:35:17] it was like, hey, everyone's standing in the hallway and you get ready going the next room. And
[00:35:21] that's cool. Then second, the same way. It wasn't told either like, I think it was even past. I
[00:35:26] think it was, I think it was in, I don't know, I'm trying to think of the year. But like, 98 is
[00:35:33] when I started seeing a change in, hey, this is not smart because watch what happens. You guys
[00:35:40] are all lined up in the hallway. Cool. Somebody sticks a simulation gun around the corner of the hallway
[00:35:46] and mows down eight people. Right. And the first reaction is like, well, that wouldn't happen. It just
[00:35:51] happened. It just happened. Well, that guy wasn't aiming. Yeah, you don't need to aim. You have an
[00:35:56] automatic weapon. And so that was kind of the beginning or that that definitely had an impact on the
[00:36:02] way stuff is going to be. And it's just like you said, like you talked about in Panama, those guys,
[00:36:07] and how the guys made theoretical changes, which is, hey, when the shooting starts, you're going
[00:36:12] to crawl. Well, in the desert, your contact is likely to be much further away and you have much
[00:36:19] greater distance to travel in order to break contact or to assault. So if, if what you're doing is
[00:36:25] calling, not saying there's no times where you will be sucking mud because you certainly can be,
[00:36:29] but there's a difference between a factor fire and an effective fire. And there's this difference
[00:36:32] between dead space and when you're in, in open space where you can actually get hit. So yeah,
[00:36:39] it's weird. It was awesome and weird to see all that unfold. And it is actually very similar to what
[00:36:47] the UFC did, Dimash Alarts. You know, sure. Yeah. Because everything was theoretical. And again,
[00:36:54] it was, you remember some of the kind of weird martial arts that they'd throw at us in the teams.
[00:37:01] And I remember one in particular where it was, hey, when you hit the guy here, his,
[00:37:08] I forgot what they called it. They had a scientific name for it. His automatic reaction,
[00:37:13] but they had some scientific sound of where his automatic reaction, his physiological reaction,
[00:37:21] is going to be to do this. And then when they do that, you can do this. And then when, and when you do this,
[00:37:27] it's going to call me that. And they had these big scenarios that would, they would play out.
[00:37:32] And that was what it was. Hey, when you get, like it was literally, when you hit the guy in the neck,
[00:37:37] it's going to cause him to like fold to one side. And, and, and everyone that gets hit in the neck,
[00:37:44] arches their back and sticks their chin out. Then you'll hit him with this. It was,
[00:37:48] they're, they're that, that's what they're saying. And then you can't say, well, hey man, go ahead and
[00:37:53] like hit me in the neck with all your, and I actually did do that. I actually did say, like hit me,
[00:37:58] see if that happens. And it didn't happen. And then I got some other weird cycle babble circular
[00:38:03] argument about, well, that's because you're expecting it. Well, okay, but do it when I'm not expected.
[00:38:08] You know, it's just, it's just one of these things. Strike the neck, stomp the groin,
[00:38:12] break the eyes, re-stomp the groin. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. What was that? It was the,
[00:38:20] was it the scarf? Was it like a soft combat assault system or something like that? It was, and
[00:38:24] we went through a whole bunch of those. And all it takes is a couple of people in a leadership
[00:38:29] position to get convinced by this. I noticed I always saw a lot of circular arguments in those things.
[00:38:36] And it's, so that, that thing. So when the UFC started, it was like, oh,
[00:38:39] these kung fu guys are whatever, these karate guys are whatever, these ninja two guys are
[00:38:46] whatever, whatever their martial art was. And they had the thing that, oh, when I throw punch
[00:38:52] you, your breathing will be incapacitated for approximately 45 seconds, generally about 45 seconds.
[00:38:59] When you had someone to throw in order for the nuke that's about a 45 seconds, you get about a 45
[00:39:03] second window. We're now you want to attack the nerve basis. You want to attack the solar
[00:39:07] plexus when you get him the solar plexus, possibly. Now you got about another 45 seconds.
[00:39:12] This is where you can break the eyes. I'm doing some grandmaster kick. That was it. And,
[00:39:22] so when the UFC gave around, it was like, oh, all of a sudden that doesn't work. And it's the same
[00:39:26] thing that happened. And I'll even say pre-seminition pre-paintball and pre, and we used
[00:39:32] myles gear, but myles gear was kind of weak. Yeah. Myles gear wasn't quite good enough, which is
[00:39:37] for those you don't know, it's like a laser tag system that you mount on your wheel weapons,
[00:39:40] but it wasn't very accurate yet to deal with jams and your blanks. It was just, it wasn't
[00:39:45] that good. Yeah. But those things definitely started to make it lean towards, oh, this this,
[00:39:51] this theory doesn't seem to hold the water that we all thought that had held.
[00:39:57] Yeah. Yeah. It was just, but you know what? Here's the thing. Even if we were crawling,
[00:40:05] as long as we had a plan and rehearsed it, that was way better than stuff that wasn't. So a lot of
[00:40:11] those guys that did that first, those first fighting systems that there was a lot of goofy stuff.
[00:40:17] When they would get in a street fight, they would still do okay because what's, I think Pat
[00:40:22] said that thing about a good plan now is better than a perfect plan later. Right. You know,
[00:40:27] that's a good point. Now that I think about, if you think about the tactics and so you got told
[00:40:31] after Panama to crawl and that seems kind of crazy right now and if you think about it as a
[00:40:37] broad hey, what we're gonna do is crawl all the time. Think about this though. Remember when it was
[00:40:42] a whole squad getting up online and moving, getting up and running all at one time. Yeah.
[00:40:47] Just as ridiculous. Just as ridiculous. Exactly. And there's a time in place for both things.
[00:40:52] And you know, as I said, I was at one of the teams, I don't know, six months ago a year ago
[00:40:59] and we were talking tactics and a guy asked me like, hey, where does the argument? I might have
[00:41:04] been been your team. The question was like, where does the commander go in this situation?
[00:41:10] And it was like one group was saying they shouldn't be in the rear of the other group saying
[00:41:14] that should be in the front. That was my team. Okay. Yeah. And I was like, listen,
[00:41:18] there's different times where the commander needs to be in a different spot. And where the commander
[00:41:21] should be is where he isn't in the weeds, but still kind of understands what's happening and can
[00:41:27] provide the mask command control. So the answer is not he should be here. The answer is
[00:41:36] where should he be for that particular situation and does the commander have the understanding,
[00:41:41] the tactical understanding and the operational understanding to go, oh, you know what?
[00:41:44] If these guys are busting into a building right here and I go into that building and there's
[00:41:48] contact, I'm going to be sucked into that contact and I'm not going to be able to control anything.
[00:41:53] Contrary to that if I'm way at the back where the contact happens and I don't even know what building
[00:41:58] it's in, that's a problem too. Where should I be? I should be where I can provide the best command
[00:42:02] and control. And that's very adaptable and it's very easy to adapt. But it's very also very easy
[00:42:07] for people to come up with doctrine and then supporting arguments, supporting theories
[00:42:13] that that are very hard to argue against because you get into circular arguments against
[00:42:18] crazy people. Yeah, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it's emotionally attached to whatever the
[00:42:23] answer is. That's a sticker. And this is why I think Anna stuck you has always been so
[00:42:29] successful and I think it'll continue to be successful is because we're not so rigid in what we do
[00:42:37] and it's so it, it, it's in one way is it's a weakness but it's also at the same time
[00:42:41] our greatest strength because everything I've done on deployment most things actually was not exactly
[00:42:48] something that I trained for but the training that I got was 30% there to where it was easy to pivot
[00:42:56] boom and into whatever whatever is being requested overseas. Yeah and the training that you got
[00:43:03] trained you to think, to, to think. Not just hey, this is what you're going to do 100% of the time.
[00:43:12] It's a hey, this is going to work in this situation but you should be looking around. You should have
[00:43:15] your head on a swivel. You should be looking for work. You, all those little, those little,
[00:43:19] like, monsters that you get told they actually make sense because it's not just do the same thing
[00:43:24] every time. It's read and react. Right. We didn't react. That's one of the first things you start
[00:43:30] to hear. Like, read and react because you don't just do, you actually read and you actually assess.
[00:43:37] So those are all important. Anything else from that first deployment besides just being on the
[00:43:44] argument be on man. Hot, long, 10 month deployment. I remember it by the end of the deployment
[00:43:53] after that deployment none of us wanted to talk to each other for a while. It was like you see
[00:43:58] guys around the corner. Hey, and then because it was just so long. And there's no internet.
[00:44:03] There's no internet. You know, communication with home is snail mail. That's it. Three week
[00:44:11] conversations. You have back and forth. And the whole platoon is in a room that's twice
[00:44:17] the size of this. The racks are stacked for high. You've got like 80 movies on video tape.
[00:44:27] And they're just run and constantly. And you've seen every one of these 80 movies
[00:44:33] a 500 times because they're literally playing nonstop in the Pultoon space. It's ridiculous.
[00:44:38] We got on a kick. And this is another arc deployment. I went on later when I went up going to
[00:44:45] Somalia. But we got on a kick with, uh, uh, what's the movie with the girls had spins around?
[00:44:53] The X versus X versus. So we're watching the X versus is over and over and over again. And
[00:45:00] right about that was the time we did the the shell back ceremony where we went over the
[00:45:04] equator. And so there was only two guys in the platoon that had done it. So all the rest of us were
[00:45:09] wogs and we're going through it. And basically all they do is throw food at you and spray you with water,
[00:45:15] which is okay. It's like buds. We were just doing it. And guys have come by with like all of these
[00:45:21] wogs over here. And I remember one of the guys going, the power of Christ compels you. The power of
[00:45:28] Christ compels you. And then we all started shouting in the guy just looked out as for a second and
[00:45:35] wandered off and someone else came behind with the hose and spray us a little bit. But that no idea
[00:45:39] what to make of us at all. Awesome. Uh, you come home from that deployment and then what then
[00:45:47] what's up? What's next? Uh, then I went and worked in the armory for a little bit and waited to pick
[00:45:51] up another another platoon. Then after that I did, I worked in the armory for another six months,
[00:45:58] did another platoon. And then that was a speck of the human to the armory because you were interested.
[00:46:06] I was a gunner's mate. And so I was a weapon. What position were you in your first platoon?
[00:46:11] Oh, good point. So I was a sniper, but they didn't, we didn't, and the stub you didn't have a sniper
[00:46:19] course. So there was a guy that had just come from repointment, point man in second squad. And the first
[00:46:26] squad, point man was a sniper and he'd been to the army sniper school. So they ran, ran me through
[00:46:32] some different training and stuff like that to get me like kind of qualified, but I didn't have
[00:46:37] a certificate or nothing. And it was really, um, minor stuff. So me and the other sniper would, you know,
[00:46:44] practice just calling stuff out. And then when we do the tech abortions, I'd be up in the
[00:46:48] hellow, I was above passing info. And so when I got back, I went to, um, I was working in
[00:46:58] ordinance and then I got an opportunity to go to the second NSW sniper course they ran on the west coast.
[00:47:04] And that was, that was brutal. Um, I've never failed anything. Up until then, I'd never failed anything
[00:47:14] in my life. And I didn't make it through the first sniper course. I passed the shooting portion,
[00:47:19] which most guys pass, but, uh, and that's like five weeks straight of shooting. But then when it
[00:47:25] came to stalking, I just didn't get it. And, uh, I lacked the patience that I needed that I later
[00:47:32] figured it out. And so I didn't pass, I came out of there without not a sniper call, but an advanced
[00:47:38] marksman call, um, the badge of dishonor. Yeah, pretty much. And, uh, guys, so actually it's funny
[00:47:47] because I say that jokingly, but like everybody knows that how hard that's, they used to fail
[00:47:54] everyone in stalking. And it was crazy. My, my course, there's only two guys that graduated with a
[00:48:00] call with a sniper call out of like how much was that was the seal instructor, bro team guys going
[00:48:09] we're going to have the hardest course ever. No one's going to make it through. It's going to be
[00:48:12] the toughest course ever. I don't. Yeah, I mean, I mean, I don't know how it would have been in that position.
[00:48:16] I think there was that there was definitely a piece of that because there was like some guys
[00:48:21] getting pretty dang excited and screaming in yellow to you every yard line. You're like, good grief.
[00:48:25] What's going on and, um, but I don't know if that would have made a difference for me passing or not.
[00:48:32] Like, I had it been more leveled out and they hadn't gotten too excited about it, which I'm
[00:48:37] not saying they did, but that's just, that's how it rolled out. So second and I, I pulled
[00:48:45] tuned up and I was again a point man and then I think I acted as a sniper, but then the sniper
[00:48:51] thing kind of fell off the radar for an stubby a little bit. It wasn't a priority for anybody. And
[00:48:58] did a second platoon, which is back off platoon went to the Philippines or no, we went to Guam.
[00:49:04] That's where we met at the jungle in Guam and the jungle was this bar. Yeah, the jungle was not
[00:49:09] the jungle was the bar. That everybody went to and then, uh, yeah, did that platoon then
[00:49:17] I wound up doing a year overseas. Well, I went home for a week and then came back with another
[00:49:22] platoon straight away and did that and those were great experiences. I mean, we traveled around a lot.
[00:49:29] We did a lot of water work back in the day. A lot of tanker boarding, a lot of diving,
[00:49:35] all that, um, didn't do anything real. And then when I came back from those deployments,
[00:49:42] I went to work in our training cell at the team. Um, and the guy I was working in the land warfare
[00:49:52] section, working for a guy named Danny Carroll, who at the time was, uh, and I'm going to have
[00:49:58] to back up a little bit on this, but he was just, he was awesome to work for. He's, he's one of
[00:50:05] these guys that no matter how bad anything ever was, he never complained. He might complain to someone
[00:50:11] that was his peer, but he never complained down. And then never complained about, oh, this is
[00:50:18] stupid or he was not the torture genius, which when things were hard and he wasn't complaining,
[00:50:24] then it, then it, it wasn't hard. And he, he's another guy with a really good sense of humor,
[00:50:31] and, uh, and just a good, good time to be around with the biggest thing about him was just like,
[00:50:36] never ever complained, always something positive to say, um, and was, was an expert. And then
[00:50:44] when he did give you a critique, he didn't, it wasn't condescending. So he was somebody I looked
[00:50:52] up to when he wasn't in my platoon. He was actually a leadership in my sister platoon. And I would
[00:50:55] go over and talk to him all the time. And like back in a day, I had my hair bleached white. It was
[00:51:00] always long, you know, I was never in the right uniform ever because not being in uniform made me feel
[00:51:07] special because I was insecure. And, uh, all, all people would just scream at me, cut your hair,
[00:51:13] get in uniform, but they never would tell you, you know, hey, do it. And one day Danny goes, hey,
[00:51:20] Jason, why don't you, I don't cut your hair. It's so easy to have a decent haircut and be in the
[00:51:27] right uniform. And your life is going to be so much better. And you should just try it for a little bit.
[00:51:34] And he just laid it out and it, there was no condescension behind it. It was just straight up advice
[00:51:39] from one friend to another. And, um, and so I tried it. And I was like, hey, this is amazing.
[00:51:46] Like, people aren't asking, like, hey, what are you doing tonight? People are actually giving me
[00:51:52] stuff to do and then leaving me alone and letting me do it because they trusted me that I was going
[00:51:58] to be, you know, be professional about it. And after, and working for him, I got the opportunity
[00:52:05] because when the teams ran sniper courses, I got an interject real quick because there's also
[00:52:11] those guys that would be like, they're condescending. And all you do is, you know, the guy that's
[00:52:17] all straight-laced, running around the team, looking like a dork and you just think, when you're a
[00:52:21] young team guy, you're like, this guy's a dork, he doesn't eat. And if they come up and say something,
[00:52:26] you're just mad at him. You know, you're just like, you're stupid. You don't get it. You don't know what
[00:52:31] it's like to be young, jocca. Right. And that's how everybody else was. Was for me because you're like,
[00:52:38] really? Yeah. But, you know, Danny was a beast and yeah. And so it was like, yeah, I'm going to
[00:52:43] listen to what he's saying. You know, there's an important two things about Steve Hines and Danny,
[00:52:48] which I didn't work with either of those guys other than peripheral, peripherally through through the
[00:52:53] years, you know, I think Steve Hines put was at free fall school with who's at nylon forever. So
[00:52:59] whatever. And Danny Carroll, well, I remember Danny from being on deployment and hit my LPO was
[00:53:05] good friends with him. And so, you know, we were always like to up. But what I was going to say is,
[00:53:11] you mentioned this real quick, he was a good operator. Like he was a, oh, guys, because if you were
[00:53:19] good at your job, that's like the base level of having respect and getting people listen to you
[00:53:26] is, oh, this guy is a really good at his job. And you'd even hear before we before the word operator
[00:53:33] had the kind of meaning that has day where it's like, oh, he's an operator and it kind of is this
[00:53:40] taken on a life of its own. But back then, it'd be like, oh, yeah, that guy's a good operator
[00:53:44] and it really meant something when I would hear that about someone. Yeah. Like, hey, that guy's a really
[00:53:49] good operator. And you think, oh, wow, that guy's, that means he can shoot well. That means he can navigate,
[00:53:54] well, that means he can dive well. That means he's he's keeps his cool. It like meant all those things
[00:53:59] that guy's a good operator. And so that sort of, to me, was the baseline. And especially for
[00:54:04] guys that I looked up to at my team when I was a new guy, it was the guys where you'd hear
[00:54:10] all that guy's a really good operator. And then it was, okay, and it wasn't like that was everyone.
[00:54:15] It was not a big number of people. Yeah. And to develop a reputation as a good operator when there's
[00:54:20] no war going on, it's actually very hard to do that because what that means is everyone of these
[00:54:27] stupid training missions, everyone of these dumb dives that everyone's bitching about. You're
[00:54:32] actually taking completely serious and you're doing your best and you're teaching other people.
[00:54:36] And that is what that's what developed the reputation back then was like, this guy's a good
[00:54:42] operator. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. And so then then that guy's got the kind of
[00:54:48] warsta where he can hand out advice. And then the fact that he gives it out without being
[00:54:53] condescending or straight up, it's just so much, it's worth absorbing. What about, did you,
[00:55:00] so what are the schools that you go to? Did you get any, what about, did you go to Sears School?
[00:55:04] Yeah. How was that? Good times. You know, that was, and I was, I forget when I, I think it was in
[00:55:12] this period after I did those two platoons that I finally got sucked into going to Sears School.
[00:55:17] And I remember I didn't get waterboarded for some reason in Sears School, but I did
[00:55:24] kill a needle rattlesnake and they're like, hey, you're nuts, boys to do that. And then I got caught.
[00:55:29] And then I'm like, okay, well, but this is just in the field training portion where, you know,
[00:55:35] you're doing patrolling and, um, danger crossing. That's all you're doing all day. And then you
[00:55:42] have these little land nav exercises you're doing. It's super easy for me because this is what we did.
[00:55:47] So I would just just get them done and be done, sleep in in Hungary and try to eat grass
[00:55:52] operas and everything because they don't feed you for the whole week. And then when they catch you
[00:55:58] and they put you into that that prison camp. So the first thing they do is have everybody
[00:56:03] line up and then they strip you down naked because apparently they're, they're checking you for ticks.
[00:56:08] Yeah, that makes sense. So then they see all my tattoos and one of the instructors is like, hey,
[00:56:14] this guy's got the mark of the devil because the guys all have that Russian accent right? Yeah.
[00:56:18] So I get, I get grabbed and then I'm in the circle of these instructors and they're like,
[00:56:25] he's got the mark of the devil and they're kind of shoving me back and forth and I'm like, oh,
[00:56:29] okay, this is kind of fun. This is, you know, this isn't a big deal. And then a guy that straight across
[00:56:36] for me, I can remember seeing a big black hand come over his shoulder and it like covers up half of
[00:56:43] his chest, like like Andre the giant big and just moved the dude away and then another guy,
[00:56:48] a hand moves the other guy away and then there's this just mountain of a man. Grav me with his left hand,
[00:56:56] picks me up. They're only allowed to like hit you from out here to here, but it was like,
[00:57:02] you know, those those images in Rocky where it was like, oh,
[00:57:09] stars and that just, oh, that was that little smirk I just had on my face laying on the ground over there.
[00:57:15] Oh, your comes again. And humbling. I literally got the exact same treatment. I remember I was
[00:57:24] in some vehicle and it was after you got you avoided capture and then eventually they could
[00:57:29] call up in the woods and they go, come down. You have to surrender now. So we had avoided capture
[00:57:33] me and my pilot buddy, we had avoided capture. We go down and get in the vehicle to drive us somewhere.
[00:57:38] And I'm just, you know, everything's a joke or whatever and get out of the vehicle and, you know,
[00:57:44] some guys yelling at us with the fake Russian accent and I'm just laughing at it inside and
[00:57:49] which means, you know, I'm like kind of, I got that I was 19 and the dude, the dude comes over and
[00:57:57] he like yells at me and I, you know, who knows what I said to prove that I was a tough guy and this
[00:58:03] dude correct me and I was like, yeah, I was like, I can't believe he just did that. And okay,
[00:58:13] well, good times. So that must be they must know who we are coming in. They must look at the young
[00:58:19] punks and go, yeah, I got this guy. Hey, I got what number is Gardner coming over here from
[00:58:25] seal team five? What number is a willing coming over here from seal team one? I'm gonna get me some of that.
[00:58:30] Yeah. And it's got to give him just an immense amount of satisfaction when that look,
[00:58:35] it's knocked off your face because they could just see the light come out of your eyes and you're like,
[00:58:39] oh, yeah, it's okay. It's a, I mean, I've been punched many times. Yeah. That open hand smack
[00:58:46] full on and I don't know what you're talking about. Only bringing it back to wherever this brother brought it
[00:58:51] back all the way and put it all the way home, dude. It was a good one. And I've been like I said,
[00:58:56] I've been hit before I've been knocked out before. It didn't knock me out, but it was definitely a,
[00:59:00] it was definitely a reality of, oh yeah, these guys are these guys are not playing around. These guys
[00:59:05] are gonna take pleasure in beating the crap out of me and they're gonna do it if they, if I give them
[00:59:10] any reason to. So, in which, so that was two deployments you come back, you're in training.
[00:59:16] How much did you learn when you were working and training? Because I know I, as an E5,
[00:59:21] working in seal team one training cell, learned like just mountains of information.
[00:59:27] Tons. Yeah, exactly. Because that's when when you have to teach something is when you got a
[00:59:31] really absorb it because you have to completely understand it and everything else. So that's when
[00:59:37] and it opened up the curtain for me. So I saw everything that went into training that was behind
[00:59:43] the scenes, you know, and you go through the training like, oh okay, well there's a lot that goes on
[00:59:48] from laying on the ranges to doing the med drills to order in the ammo, to trying to make the
[00:59:54] training relevant and realistic for the guy. So you just don't feel like you're wasting their time.
[00:59:59] But yeah, and then it was at that, at that time that I went back and restocked and got my sniper
[01:00:11] crawl and then was an instructor for a couple of different sniper courses.
[01:00:17] That period of time. And the difference is what you, was there something you said you didn't
[01:00:21] get it the stock in the first time around? Was it like you didn't quite figure out?
[01:00:26] Dead space? Was it you just didn't have the patience for it? Were you like whatever?
[01:00:31] What, what, what did you, what changed about you? What did you learn about the bus?
[01:00:34] I, so they drop you off and then they'll just point, hey, the observation point is that way.
[01:00:42] And during a stock, you're, you're trying to find where these other guys are at and you
[01:00:52] don't know and they're other, they're sniper instructors so they have really, really good skills
[01:00:57] and optics and they're sitting out somewhere. They should not totally concealed, but you've got
[01:01:03] to find them before you move. And the mistake I was making before is I'd getting impatient and I'm
[01:01:08] just like, I'll just start going that way and along the way, I'll figure out where they're at.
[01:01:13] And as opposed to, okay, I'm going to just sit right here and take my time and figure out where
[01:01:24] everything is and how everything's laid out and then try and find the OP before I move
[01:01:30] down toward it at all. You'd have to, I'd have to move laterally one way or the other to figure it out.
[01:01:35] And so typically on the stocks, when it clicked for me, I would be the last guy to leak to,
[01:01:42] to actually leave where they drop us off and I'd be the first guy darn. And typically, I'd spend
[01:01:49] almost no time crawling because I would do the, you know, find the OP once I had it located,
[01:01:56] then I would study the terrain really hard and figure out where I needed to go to get within
[01:02:01] that 200 yards to do your, you know, final shot. Do you figure this out on your own?
[01:02:06] Well, they tell you that, but I just started listening to them and, and it clicked. They're like,
[01:02:13] hey, you got to find the OP. Okay. Because, yeah, isn't it strange? And I mean, well, your kids,
[01:02:22] well, yeah, you got kids at all. And stuff like, it's the same thing with your kids.
[01:02:26] You, you tell them, like, hey, figure out where the OP is before you start crawling.
[01:02:30] Or whatever it is, less life, less than that you learned. I get hit in the head with a baseball bat,
[01:02:35] then you try and give your kids a hint or just tell them. And they're just like, no,
[01:02:40] I'm just going to start moving. Yeah, I got this. Yeah, and I have no idea how to deal with that.
[01:02:47] It's, it's funny because I think you and I have had a lot of the same experiences with dealing with
[01:02:52] our kids. You're like, hey, I'm telling you, I've lived through this. Here's what you should do.
[01:02:58] And, but now I've come to the point where I'm still going to tell them, but I know
[01:03:02] what they're probably going to do and then yeah, and then just wait and see.
[01:03:07] Keep your fingers crossed. Yeah. I guess. It's what people say. Okay, so, what I noticed,
[01:03:14] one of the things that I'm, I'm actually thinking about this right now,
[01:03:19] when I was in training cell, and I was, because I was single and didn't care about anything else.
[01:03:24] And so I taught everything. It was like, oh, there's a landmark for trip going, go, go,
[01:03:28] go teach land war for, oh, there's a CQC trip, go teach that, go teach combat swimmer, just teach everything.
[01:03:33] Because, because now I look back, how awesome it must be when you got like guys like that at the
[01:03:41] team who were just like, oh, yeah, I don't mind going on another month long trip. Back to back,
[01:03:44] doesn't matter. We'll go train and it wasn't just me that was doing this like all my,
[01:03:48] all my bros that you know, I was friends with all my guys from team one. We're all saying that.
[01:03:51] Like, I will go teach whatever he said, because on the road, we don't care. It's awesome.
[01:03:54] I had a Volkswagen van that I'd taken all the seats out of the back and just line up the carpet and I had
[01:04:01] some, some bean bags in there. And when I was on the strand, I slept in the parking lot.
[01:04:05] For like, I think eight months, because I was like, I would rather be on a trip,
[01:04:10] collect collecting pradim and doing stuff than sitting here. And so that's, that's where,
[01:04:16] that's where I was. It was always out on training block. I was running an SQT. I wasn't running it,
[01:04:21] but I was one of the instructors on an STT when we used to run STT at the team. So it was a
[01:04:26] bunch of new guys. We were putting them through training. And I remember right now, I'm remembering this.
[01:04:32] There was like multiple officers in the same STT class. So each squad had multiple officers. So we
[01:04:39] were rotating through like, okay, it's your turn, re-squad later. It's your turn during Iads.
[01:04:44] And now that I think about it, I remember so much of looking at like, okay, it's the one guy
[01:04:51] do it and he'd be all screwed up. And you'd say, what is wrong with this guy? Oh, he's shooting
[01:04:55] the whole time instead of looking around. And then just from one iteration and the big difference
[01:05:01] is when you're not doing the Iad, when you're actually watching it unfold, everything becomes.
[01:05:06] So with this is like, when I talk about detaching, you're, this is my earliest or some of my
[01:05:11] earlier experiences are being detached. You're watching these immediate action drills unfold.
[01:05:18] And I remember one officer that was all jacked up. And I watched him like, why is, why can't this
[01:05:24] squad do a whatever? Why can't this squad do a a strong left or whatever or a peel right? Why can't
[01:05:32] they do it? What is wrong? So I'm watching this one officer. And the other officer like, oh, this
[01:05:36] officer did it fine. I watched him. The contact happens and the people start shooting and then the
[01:05:41] guy looks around and makes call. I watched this other officer, the contact happens. He starts shooting
[01:05:46] and he does the stop shooting and no one's making the call. And it was just as simple as like,
[01:05:49] hey, man, your job is not to shoot, your job is to make, you know, look around and make a call.
[01:05:55] That you learn so much when you're instructing not only because you have to think about what you say
[01:06:01] and you have to be able to articulate why and that makes you dig deep into the reason why.
[01:06:08] And then you get to detach and actually watch it unfold and watch these little minor mistakes
[01:06:13] happen and then you get to correct them and then you get to recognize them in yourself when you
[01:06:17] make them. It's a powerful thing too. And when I was at trade it, I think we did a good job of
[01:06:27] transfer because no one at, you know, you speak, I don't want to go to training. I don't want to
[01:06:30] retreat at. I think we did a good job of transferring the mentality to, hey, if you want to get good
[01:06:36] at this job, you gotta come here. You got to. Yeah, which I believe is the truth. So,
[01:06:44] anyone, if you want to get good at something, try and teach it. Same thing with your jitsu as well.
[01:06:50] The, um, that was an SOP for us when when I was in land warfare at five, was when a guy was
[01:06:58] having a hard time, we'd pull him up. It's like, hey, come stand next to me the R. So, and just watch
[01:07:04] your guys 80% of the time that would, that would all fix the problem. Yeah, yeah, which is a testament
[01:07:11] to just attachment. Yeah, it is, it is a testament to detachment and man, once you learn how to
[01:07:17] detach even though you're in this situation, it's like just makes life so much easier, so much easier.
[01:07:23] Okay, so now what you do another part of. So, I got three part of my belt I'm working in,
[01:07:33] in, um, land warfare, or at trade, you know, train cell at the team. And then one of the
[01:07:40] the part of the part was on the arc, they were going to pull into Somalia and help the
[01:07:47] the, the UN pull out of Somalia. This is 95 and one, their, their sniper in their platoon got thrown
[01:07:57] in jail in Hong Kong and with a big international incident, so they were down to sniper. So, I happen
[01:08:03] to be on quarterback watch when the OIC of the platoon called back to the team and said, we need another
[01:08:11] sniper out here, we're down one and we know we're going to go into Somalia here in like three months.
[01:08:15] And, uh, I'm like, hey, I'm a sniper, I'm a sniper instructor, send me. So, I passed it back to the,
[01:08:26] um, XO and there were actually a couple, there was another guy that was senior to me, it was
[01:08:30] any six at the time that was going to go and then something came up at the last second, he couldn't
[01:08:37] go so they're like, hey, you're going. So I packed up my stuff, um, they flew me over to Bahrain.
[01:08:43] I'm, uh, when the ship pulled in, I met up with the platoon and then got in the platoon and, uh,
[01:08:49] about six weeks later, we wound up in Somalia. So, like, I just got lucky, you know, because you can't,
[01:08:56] you can't chase it. And then in the 90s, there was no, like, at that point, I think there had been
[01:09:03] two other platoons that had cycled through Somalia and, and both of them had, had gotten in troops
[01:09:10] in contact, which was a dream for all of us. Yeah. Uh, and timing wise, this is like two years after
[01:09:19] the big black Hawk down thing happened there. So, got in that platoon, um, another arc platoon,
[01:09:27] back on the same ship that I did in my first arc and we were in the same burning space. What's
[01:09:32] it with it? The, the Ogden LLPD5. Yeah, get some. Uh, and, uh, but another guy that was, really another
[01:09:42] guy that was a big mentor, a mine I looked up to a lot was, and he was the LPO, his money tree size,
[01:09:48] and money had been around SW for a long time and he had the additional deal where he,
[01:09:54] and he had broken service, so he was a police officer up in Los Angeles, and, uh, he had a lot of,
[01:10:03] you know, because those guys were, he'd actually been in gun fights before in an high-stress
[01:10:07] situations. So, it was, it was really good having him having him there, and then when we did go
[01:10:14] ashore myself and the other snipe, we split up into two different sniper elements, and, uh, money was with my element, and then,
[01:10:26] the chief was with him, and then each of us had like five guys in our group, because it was an
[01:10:30] excuse to get ashore, and the reason, and this was completely the Marines deal. They were there to pull the
[01:10:37] you in out, but they didn't have the 50 caliber sniper rifle capability, and that's something that they wanted
[01:10:45] to have so that they could reach out these long distance and be a little bit more surgical with their
[01:10:52] application of force. Um, so we were, our officers were able to sell it, and, uh, and then we got to go
[01:10:59] ashore doing that, and that was, uh, how many days did you spend on the ground? Man, we were only
[01:11:06] in there for like three days. And so the Marines, I think, we were on the, the second lift to
[01:11:15] shore, and I was down on the airfield, but the airfield in the Mogee Share reports right up against the
[01:11:22] ocean, and, and it's, the reason I say, um, is because before this, or maybe it was after this,
[01:11:30] but I was cutting gators squares, which means driving around in circles off the coast of Somalia for
[01:11:34] for a long time, and we were supposed to go in and we were, we, we had, we got our issue of, of
[01:11:42] ammo, real ammo. You know, all of our, our ammo, our mags were loaded, um, our, I remember, I put the
[01:11:50] real, um, 40 mic mic into my vest for the first time, and they didn't quite fit right like it was a
[01:11:56] car. No one had one's longer. No one had ever, you know, done it or, no, no, like I didn't know. And,
[01:12:03] and so here we were, and we, and so we did all kinds of maps, so we, we were ready to go in,
[01:12:08] and then we, we never went in, which was, and part of the reason we didn't go in is the same
[01:12:12] reason we didn't go into Rwanda, because Black Hawk down had happened. Okay, we were just like,
[01:12:17] they were, everyone was super hyper cautious about everything. And so yeah, I remember we were
[01:12:23] going, we were actually taking boats into the airfield. That's what we were going to do. So I
[01:12:27] remember that airfield. In the end. So, uh, this is a funny, you guys find helicopters in? No, we
[01:12:34] wrote in in on one of the big hovercraft, the L-capped, but we went in. So, okay, this is not dangerous now,
[01:12:42] but, you know, the Mugini Sharports controlled by the UN, and then there's that green beach right there,
[01:12:47] which is infested with bullsharks. I think there are like 12 total shark attacks and a couple
[01:12:54] fatalities on that beach. So, we got tasked with doing the hydrographic condos. There's some story about
[01:13:02] some kind of slaughterhouse or something that like, I never saw it, but that was the story. There was
[01:13:07] the camera's brother. There's a camel slaughterhouse. It's just teeming with blood and the sharks
[01:13:11] can't resist. That's exactly what we were going in with. We had that story, the big story,
[01:13:16] like the midget sniper in Iraq. And they're all, they're all just waiting for you to hit the water.
[01:13:22] Yeah. Um, you know, which is kind of what I think any time I'm doing anything at night. I'm like,
[01:13:28] in the ocean, you're like, like the sharks are just waiting right there for you to come in and just
[01:13:33] come up and bite you. I'm so stupid. I never think about that. I never one time in my whole career
[01:13:40] thought, okay, I'm getting in the water tonight in Southern California. There's big sharks living
[01:13:44] in there could be one. I never thought about that for whatever reason. I don't know. I'm too steep.
[01:13:49] I do, but then I'm like, um, cold now. I think about some mouse. So you're still a
[01:13:55] guy's take a taxi. So wait. So we go to do a hydrographic condon and because of the sharks,
[01:14:01] we got to do this big perpendicular hydrographic cond perpendicular parallel, whatever. Um,
[01:14:07] and we're doing it was zodiacs and then we're spaced every 50 yards and then the ribs on the outside
[01:14:14] of it and the water is, I mean, so you're not swimming. We're not to take it yourself because of
[01:14:19] from boats. And there was a big net that we had to get out of there so that the L-Cax and the
[01:14:25] landcraft coming. So I'm in the first rib and then, and a rib is like, it's kind of inflatable whole
[01:14:37] 30 feet and then the next one out is like 50 yards past mine. So the water's super clear. Like you
[01:14:44] can see the bottom. It's like 60 feet deep. And the boat out past me, they're all yelling. They're like,
[01:14:52] hey, look down. There's some sharks down there. So one of the, the team guy that was in that boat
[01:14:59] jumps up on the, the sponsor of the rib to look at the sharks and slips in the water. And it was
[01:15:06] like he hit a trampoline. I don't know how he did it because that the rib was so high out of the water.
[01:15:13] You're like, how did he even get it? But he got in and he was out so fast. I'm not even sure he got wet.
[01:15:20] And I don't blame him. But no, we went in there was just a, the planning cycle was crazy for that
[01:15:28] four days. Everybody was down to the spot. They were going to be in. We, we didn't, our study.
[01:15:32] There was a bunker that we wanted to use. That would be a good position from where we were at. So
[01:15:40] we were unlike the third lift on the elk acts and the elk acts. Those big hovercraft,
[01:15:45] but you can't sit down on the deck. So they had this big 40 foot mil van strapped to the deck.
[01:15:51] You went inside of it. And then there was a bunch of troop seating. And then we just rode in on that.
[01:15:57] I hope the thing didn't sink because you would just be done. God out. And then
[01:16:03] patroled over to our spot where we, we wanted to set up in this, this bunker. And
[01:16:12] it didn't work. The slits out of the bunker, the scope of my 50 cowards stick out. And the scope
[01:16:19] was looking right at the cement. So then we built, we got up on top of the bunker and we started
[01:16:23] filling sandbags, moving sandbags around, made ourselves a little like firing position on top of that
[01:16:30] bunker. And um, and that's really something. Don't cover down on your cover down looking for
[01:16:36] attackers on. They came in to, to try and attack the airfield. So the airfield was controlled. So we had
[01:16:42] set a perimeter up inside of the UN perimeter that was already there. And so the first day there
[01:16:49] nothing really happened because it was all status quo. The UN controlled the airfield. There
[01:16:54] were watch towers and stuff like that. And then we had a line set up that was just a narrow strip of
[01:17:01] beach between us in the ocean. So when the UN left, then we would just all fall back into the
[01:17:08] amphibes and go back out to the, to the ships. So the first day, you know, there's always tracer fire going
[01:17:15] on. Mogadish is pretty active. Um, not much happened. Then the next morning, at like 4 a.m.
[01:17:23] all the manned positions were replaced by tanks. And then everybody left. And they just, there was a
[01:17:30] big camp like 500 yards to the south of us. And they just, they just, they just left everything there.
[01:17:37] And then then it like 8 in the morning, the tanks all left and just left it open. So there was this
[01:17:47] weird period of time where everyone was like, what just happened. And then a lot of the civilian
[01:17:52] populists started piling in because there was like, there's water, there's building materials,
[01:17:56] they were ripping the roofing off a lot of the buildings that these guys had just abandoned.
[01:18:00] Um, and then about an hour after that, the, you know, you had your different, uh, um, war loads
[01:18:10] and factions figured out what was going on. And then they had to stop people from getting stuff
[01:18:15] because they wanted it. So we watched like a big crowd of people and I was just like in that movie.
[01:18:19] There's a big crowd of people ripping stuff, running everywhere, ripping stuff out of these buildings.
[01:18:24] And then guys show up with a Jeep with like a pkm, which is a belt fed machine gun on the back.
[01:18:28] And just aim at the people and start shooting them. And then you just see it like oil on water,
[01:18:35] whatever everyone moved and they're just all taking off. So one clan kind of took control
[01:18:45] of a camp that was at 500 yards the south under the runway, there are 5, 600 yards away from us
[01:18:52] with edge of that camp. That was you and controlled. The other clan, which these two major faction
[01:18:59] is the warlords down there, controlled the other under the runway. At one point, they moved down
[01:19:06] the runway and tried to attack this other clan that was holding because you can't control half of a
[01:19:11] runway. And they had like this crate, they had crazy technicals and our, our rules and gauging
[01:19:18] ones, they can have technicals out and that's a civilian vehicle. It's like a road warrior vehicle.
[01:19:22] With some kind of crew crew sort of weapon in the back. And they had one was like a big 5-ton truck
[01:19:29] with a quad anti-aircraft gun sitting in the back where they dialed. You know, dialing a thing to
[01:19:34] move it around and stuff. And they weren't halfway down the runway. They tried to shoot it out. But
[01:19:40] this other camp, the other faction shot back and shot them off of there. So that went on. But that
[01:19:48] was really those two facts. There were some spill over torness but it was two factions shooting
[01:19:52] at each other. Well, at some point people stood, they started the one faction that controlled the
[01:19:58] south, this camp to the south under the runway started to shoot it us. And so we started taking a lot
[01:20:05] of indiscriminate small arms fire. And then we had a, a recoilless rifle launched at us but it went
[01:20:13] over and landed in the ocean. And some random RPGs. It was all pretty far away. So, you know, as
[01:20:21] you know, on an urban environment, it's really difficult to tell where you're getting shot at.
[01:20:25] And then especially when there are 600 yards away, there's it's daylight. You can't see any
[01:20:31] muscle flash. So unless somebody gets really sloppy or you're really lucky you're not going to see it.
[01:20:36] And the way Moge issue is like a big hillside with all these buildings and rolls up. It's just
[01:20:42] not like you're looking at one set of buildings. You're looking at like a roll buildings, then
[01:20:46] behind it, another roll buildings. Yeah, just the giant mouse maze. So, saw Guy on a roof with an RPG
[01:20:57] and then a second later one gets launched at us. And then we're like, oh, okay, buddy missed. And then
[01:21:05] so we basically at that point, they're like, you're you're cleared hot. This is silly. We've
[01:21:14] met our rules of engagement because and then back in the 90s, the appetite for applying lethal
[01:21:21] force was was pretty subdued. It's not as liberal as it is today and how it should be. And so it
[01:21:28] took us a little while to get there and they're like, okay, these guys are bad. These guys are
[01:21:33] obviously trying to get us so you're cleared hot, find somebody to shoot in, couldn't find anyone
[01:21:38] to shoot for a while. Then this camp that was 500 yards south of us, we saw a group of like seven
[01:21:46] guys, two of them had RPGs, you rocket propellant grenades, another guys patrolling with like two
[01:21:52] peak two pkm gunners, they're built finishing guns and like an AK gunner and they're patrolling
[01:21:59] and we can see him, we can see him and now they come out the front of the camp and at the gate
[01:22:05] of that camp which is facing us 500 yards away, there's two sandbagged positions for the
[01:22:11] watches who would be up there to check people coming in and out. And a guy, there was one guy,
[01:22:18] he had a gray ironically, he had a gray t-shirt on that said army, right? And he's gunner,
[01:22:25] RPG, and he's definitely in charge and he put a pkm on one of the sandbags pointing us,
[01:22:30] stalking a guy's given direction, turns around, puts the the RPG on his shoulder and it's
[01:22:36] looking at us through the site. And so our, our OIC is like, okay, well hey, let's hold on
[01:22:45] see what we're doing. The money, who's, money is really savvy. He's like, hey, they're getting ready
[01:22:51] to shoot at us. He's adjusting the sites right now. He's getting, and we wanted to preempt this so I could
[01:22:58] shoot it the guy before he got a chance to launch the RPG because it's a close. That's a good plan.
[01:23:03] So, um, the OIC is like, okay, go, shoot him. So I've got kind of, I've got a really jacked up firing
[01:23:15] position. It's a 500 yard shot. I, uh, I squeeze, squeeze around off boom, and then apparently I missed.
[01:23:26] So, which, which, which, I, my shooting position was not good and I was really, really like excited
[01:23:33] I that what they call, you know, buck fever. It's a first time I've ever shot at a human, so I was
[01:23:37] worked up pretty good. Um, and then the guy who was spotting for me, who wasn't a spotter because
[01:23:44] there was the sniper was in the other, but to him, or at the other, at the other, at the other firing
[01:23:48] position, he was sitting right next to me on the sandbags, looking through the spotting scope,
[01:23:53] and when the 50 cow went off, it's got a big muzzle break, so the recoil doesn't break a collarbone.
[01:23:59] It ports back. It just blew a bunch of sand in his eyes and knocked the spotting scope right out of his hands.
[01:24:07] So, Mon is like, hey, you missed. Like, do you have a correction? And, and he's like, no, and it's
[01:24:14] like he was talking in slow motion because he was just just super calm and cool. And, um, I'm like,
[01:24:22] oh, no. And now I'm questioning whether I might, my, my dope, my dad on previous
[01:24:27] games for five, five, five, five, my yard is any good or anything. That 50 cow, you to take the entire
[01:24:33] bolt out of the gun, knock the brass out from the round you just fired, put a new round in,
[01:24:38] chamber it and reload. So, I chamber it reload, downrange, they were, they were like, oh, they
[01:24:46] just shot at us, you know. So, the guy was like, wow, so they're starting to talk and now he's got
[01:24:52] that RPG on his shoulder. And now I hold a little harder. I take a breath, let half out, start to
[01:24:57] squeeze that trigger, I get that surprise bake, boom, pull the bolt out, knock in the brass out,
[01:25:04] load another round and I'm going, did I hit? And our calms guy had grab binos and he goes, oh, man.
[01:25:14] And I'm like, did I hit? And he goes, god darn it, good grief. And I'm thinking that he's going
[01:25:22] to tell me that I missed by like half a mile and he doesn't even know what kind of correction to
[01:25:27] give me. And I hit him in the arm, I'm like, dude, what happened? Did I hit any, and he didn't even
[01:25:32] hear me? He goes, he is, dauh, oh, that had to hurt. So now, that PKM gunner who who was set up on the sandbags,
[01:25:45] he just lets a rip. And so there's the bullwit crap, so those rounds going over the top of us,
[01:25:51] and Monty's like, hey, I think this guy's right right at 500 yards, you got your dialed in,
[01:25:56] you know, he's just talking to my ear. Like, man, like, we're going to get the mail or something
[01:26:01] or whatever, just calm. And then, so I can't see the guy at all, all I can see is the muzzle flash.
[01:26:10] So I put the crosshairs in the middle of the muzzle flash, squeeze the round off, reload,
[01:26:15] come back up and look to see what what had happened. And there was a, the gun had spilled over the
[01:26:24] front side of the sandbags, there was a huge divot in the sandbag. I couldn't see, you know, I couldn't
[01:26:29] tell, I think I hit the rifle, but then he had spilled out, he was out from the side of the sandbags
[01:26:35] on his side, and, and it's just he's got to where everywhere. He was flailing around for a little
[01:26:40] bit, and then he expired. I assume, because I quit looking at him at that point, because it
[01:26:45] giped now, shown up, and it had like one of their 50, 51 cows in the back, and a guy is just
[01:26:54] and I'm thinking, oh man, we've grabbed the tiger by the tail, because I've got this round, I
[01:26:59] can, you know, one round at a time, and I'm waiting for like, there was a toe missile,
[01:27:05] gunner, right near our position for him to light it up, but we've gotten really, really strict
[01:27:13] rules of engagement briefings before we went in. So the guys were a little bit hesitant to let
[01:27:19] a rip. So that shot, I rushed, I wound up hitting the Jeep right on the side walls between
[01:27:27] the gunner's legs, but that was enough. Soon as a Jeep got hit, boom, they drove away and they
[01:27:32] were done, and then these guys started to do a peel, and it was a really organized square
[01:27:39] to a good peel, so they were peeling behind the buildings, so then now they were starting to gain
[01:27:43] a little bit of distance on us, and they were falling behind this big building. Monkeys giving
[01:27:49] me, gives me another round, he's like, hey, I think they're about at 700 yards now, I'll just
[01:27:53] your dope, so I'd not made my adjustment from where I was just shooting at to 700, and as, you know,
[01:28:01] as the, they're doing a peel, a guy gets up and runs, so there was a guy running full value,
[01:28:07] he's running across with the rock RPG, so I shot at him, hit way behind him, and he went
[01:28:14] behind the building, then reloaded two more guys peeled behind the building, and then they were just
[01:28:19] gone. So I held my crosshairs on the edge of that building where they had just gone, and a second
[01:28:28] later the guy with the RPG steps back out into my crosshairs. And so my crosshairs are squared up
[01:28:37] on his pelvis, and I start loading the trigger as he's taken a knee to shoot the RPG, so his heat
[01:28:45] knee hit the ground when that 50 cal round hit him in the chest, and so we were shooting the
[01:28:51] Ralphess Mark 2111, which is an multipurpose armor piercing round, and it explodes when it hits
[01:28:57] something hard, and the spotters like bro, that thing will hit right up when it hit his chest. Boom,
[01:29:03] down he went, and then that was it, then they got some guys over there that
[01:29:12] linguists, and they had loudspeakers on their homies, and they were like, hey, don't shoot at us. We're
[01:29:17] not taking sides in this whole thing, and that kind of calmed everything down for the next couple hours
[01:29:24] and into that day. And then we watch the guy, life was incredibly cheap there.
[01:29:32] So a guy get pushed off a roof, we were watching, and in the evening we had gotten someone said,
[01:29:39] hey, this one building about two kilometers away, that's one of the clan leaders buildings,
[01:29:46] and we could see guys up there in the evening, and they get that caught there, that makes them all
[01:29:51] go kind of crazy, and we'd see guys sitting there like watching the sunset up on a roof,
[01:29:57] and then one of them when start to get animated, the waving their arms around, like there are going
[01:30:02] about something, then they were all animated, then they were up like beating each other with clubs,
[01:30:08] hitting each other with rocks, and then it would just stop, and then it would start up again,
[01:30:15] and I think at least one of those, we watched the guy just get pushed off a roof, fall dead,
[01:30:21] when that is just how they were all. And so this, so the first day was pretty melod with this
[01:30:26] all this activity took place on the second or the third day. First day was melod, second day was
[01:30:32] always when they pulled back, and then the third day was when they, the first day was melod,
[01:30:36] second morning is when they pulled back, and then the second day is when we got in that first
[01:30:39] firefight, and then it was either that afternoon or the next day, my memory, you know, it's been 13
[01:30:47] years, Emory slips, where they called, and they had that issue with the guy, they're like,
[01:30:54] wait, one of three years, but yeah, we'll take it. Okay. I should have taken more discipline.
[01:31:00] Um, they, uh, they hit us up. They're like, hey, we've got a guy down here that is close to where
[01:31:09] we're getting ready to move some armor, and he has an AT4, which is weird, because that's one of our
[01:31:16] weapons. It wasn't an RPG, he had a legit AT4, and they shot at him, and he ran away and came back.
[01:31:23] They're like, he's going to use it. So we want to do this deal. We're going to have a sniper
[01:31:27] initiated kind of assault on this guy. So um, the Senate LAV over to our position, me and the
[01:31:38] OIC got in it, and we went and saw the Lieutenant Colonel, and he's like, hey, here, we, we study
[01:31:45] to map, he's like, hey, here's where the guy is. I think a good spot is this tower. There's some
[01:31:50] recon guys up there. We're going to put you up there with him, and then then get this going. So
[01:31:58] I went up to the tower. They moved up to the tower. The guy showed us what it was was out there.
[01:32:05] There was a set of bunkers in alongside of the airfield that was now controlled by just whoever.
[01:32:12] And this guy was in one of the bunkers, and then he would come out with like six or seven
[01:32:18] other guys, and you know, and they would smoke cigarettes, and he had the AT4, and he would,
[01:32:21] they were watching the US line. So they said, hey, here's what we want you to do.
[01:32:28] You know, he keeps coming in and out when he comes out again. We want you to shoot him.
[01:32:33] And then we're going to have, they shifted some of the light armored vehicles down the line
[01:32:39] to where they could go at, go at the bunker with their coax guns, and try and get him in his buddies.
[01:32:48] So we put us up in the tower. There's this like 20 mile an hour wind just howling
[01:32:55] full value. It's right to left. And then it's from where I was in the tower. It's a thousand yard
[01:33:03] shot. So I got a bunch of sandbags, bunkered my position up, we waited around, you know, for the guy
[01:33:12] to come up, he comes up. So I take this thousand yard shot at a guy in a 20 mile an hour, you know,
[01:33:18] full value crosswind, which at the time there's probably two, three people in the world that can
[01:33:23] make a shot like that. And I'm not one of them. I missed and hit his buddy.
[01:33:27] So I didn't hit the guy with the 84. I hit the guy with the AK 47 stand and three feet to his
[01:33:38] right, because I put in too much wind. And they all dove in the bunkers, then everybody on the line
[01:33:44] started shooting the bunkers toward the bunkers up. They called the ceasefire. And then the one of
[01:33:52] those guys survived and it was the guy that had that 84 but he left it and he just got up and ran away.
[01:34:00] Then at a later point there was a guy's, they were shooting at the L-cocks as they were coming in
[01:34:04] and out. And so we there was a big center block wall seven hundred yards away away from the
[01:34:15] the airfield there. And he was on the other side of it and there was one center block missing and he
[01:34:19] would look through and shoot through it. So I shot it and hit the wall right next to the
[01:34:23] where he was shooting at and I scared him away and then he'd come back. But then that was it. Then
[01:34:31] the next day we backed up and everybody fell back out to the ship. The the Marines ran a great
[01:34:39] operation because everything kind of went like clockwork exactly the way it was supposed to.
[01:34:44] And it was good to go. And you went back on the L-cocks you just said.
[01:34:49] Yeah the L-cocks came up on the beach. Got back in the Milvan.
[01:34:52] Got back in the Milvan went back out to the ship and then the final deal was there was just a strip
[01:34:58] of the amphibs that just drove out to see as they broke down the final deal. And that was it.
[01:35:06] Yeah that was it that was but but then I was like one of six guys at the time on the west coast
[01:35:12] that had you know been on the trigger and and been in combat. Yeah no I remember it was awesome.
[01:35:18] I was super stoked and super jealous of course like every other guy was like
[01:35:25] which actually this is why I did another arc because it seemed like hey if you're going to get
[01:35:30] some action you need to go with the Marine Corps in the arc and go out and do that. That's why
[01:35:36] myself and all the other guys that you know all my old run amades we all were like okay what's
[01:35:39] doing another arc get back over there let's let's make this out. It's going to the problem.
[01:35:43] I mean I had two arcs and two combat action ribbons. Yeah and then you know it worked out for a lot
[01:35:48] of other guys since then or before that because there were two the other guys that had rotated
[01:35:54] through some while he had been on the arc plan. Yeah when you get home you know what was going on.
[01:36:00] What were you married at this point? I was I was married to my son's mother and uh and when did you
[01:36:06] get married? I don't remember. Was it was it no not not what year but like what you
[01:36:13] had been training sell at the time? I was in training sell at the time I was out after a
[01:36:16] pretty much a less than a year of marriage or maybe two years of marriage. And then how
[01:36:24] did how was that dealing with you know being gone and being the team guy marriage. Oh it's
[01:36:30] generally really hard. It was hard and and it I want to back up really quick because I want to make
[01:36:35] sure I point this out before we get into this next thing and another thing that that money
[01:36:40] told taught me that we kind of talked about a little bit was he's like wherever you go run for mayor
[01:36:48] and he's just talking about be good to everyone everywhere you go because they're going to
[01:36:53] go out of their way to take care of you. So like that crew on the organ on that deployment they took
[01:36:59] great care of us because he always went out of his way to be good to everybody. You know
[01:37:04] just to go back to money a little bit it's weird to think about now right you look back at what you
[01:37:12] did now. What you've done since then which is obviously a ton and going back to you being there
[01:37:20] and when I think about it in my mind about how just I guess immature is part of the word but it's
[01:37:27] beyond just being immature because I'm not just talking about being immature in the traditional
[01:37:30] sense of the word I'm talking about being combat immature meaning no one had any combat right
[01:37:37] and I think about just having a guy like Monty who's like level headed who's been in some shit
[01:37:43] before and can go you know what hey we need to shoot this guy before he shoots it us that's just
[01:37:49] totally sensible thing to say but if if everyone's because you got these massive oh RLE briefs and
[01:37:55] everyone's being paranoid and you can't listen we don't want we don't want this to escalate
[01:37:59] and all these things are in everyone's head and it's so easy it's kind of like the detachment
[01:38:04] when you just go hey you know what this guy has an RPG they just shot one at us he's aiming it
[01:38:09] and he's going to shoot us again we need to kill this guy okay go ahead and then instead of you know
[01:38:15] do your load you're low you know or whatever just hey you're good load another round just being calm
[01:38:21] when I think about the advantage and how that's a pretty good performance you know what you
[01:38:27] guys who's a pretty good performance with no experience because I think of how you know what what
[01:38:34] I gain through experience and the maturity the combat maturity of seeing things and things unfolding
[01:38:39] being like okay I can handle this right now or this is in a big deal or whatever but man when you
[01:38:44] when you don't have that everyone's all excited everyone's freaking out and everything's just magnified
[01:38:50] and so it's pretty impressive and to me you know again you have a guy like Monty that's just
[01:38:56] looking at the OIC it's boss and saying hey we actually need to kill this guy right now and
[01:39:02] and not being like we need to take this guy out which just escalated then the OIC is thinking oh my
[01:39:07] you know you might say shot you know whatever yeah just going hey man we need to take this guy
[01:39:11] just just having that mentality is is so important and I don't know how well would you guys have
[01:39:18] done if he wasn't there I don't think we need to done as well we might not have been in the
[01:39:23] position where we shot yeah yeah because he just carried us through that whole thing he he had a
[01:39:31] funny thing he taught us he goes if you're ever really excited and he may have put this out to you
[01:39:37] to over the radio he goes if you try to talk like you have a Southern draw it'll slow you down
[01:39:46] and he goes and you won't have a Southern draw by the way but it'll slow you down and he told us
[01:39:51] of a case there was some officers in a high speed chase and they were so calm over the radio people
[01:39:57] didn't believe that they were in a high speed chase except for the rep the speed at which they
[01:40:04] are gone out we just passed this street we just passed this street we just passed this street
[01:40:09] because they were cool as cucumbers you know I'm not freaking out yeah that's awesome now it's
[01:40:14] definitely just it's cool to hear that story and you you tell probably told me that story
[01:40:18] twenty one years ago or something like that and I actually heard you brief that story to a
[01:40:24] bunch of people at a dog and pony show and it was really epic to tell that story but to hear the
[01:40:31] full actually I don't think you ever give me that detail to the debrief but it's awesome that
[01:40:35] at that time no combat experience it's like okay here's what we're gonna do and that's a good lesson
[01:40:41] for everyone man detached stay calm look what's going on and it all does go back to the fact
[01:40:48] that you were in that position probably had something to do with the fact that you that you know you
[01:40:53] were running from air or you know money as a poaching for running from air and building relationships
[01:40:57] and hanging out with Marines and teaching them whatever and getting giving them some gear and
[01:41:01] what you know just doing those things that your building relationships with the rest of the team
[01:41:05] is that it being an arrogant jerk to everyone because you think you're better than them absolutely
[01:41:10] because there was another unit that had 50 cal sniper rifles that didn't get to come well there you go
[01:41:17] yeah there it is okay so now you get back and how long was that deployment was that just a six
[01:41:23] month or well they they were already deployed so I didn't like three and a half months with them
[01:41:28] because I replaced it the guy that got in trouble got it and then but okay so now we were
[01:41:34] to get started to dive into a marital scenario that's going on so you got a kid already you got a kid
[01:41:40] uh my son's mother was pregnant when I went on that deployment and so he was that was in February
[01:41:53] and he was born in September of 95 so yeah I came back and then it was one of those situations where
[01:42:01] um me being gone all the time didn't help but me being home all the time didn't help either
[01:42:11] and and so we just parted ways and it was uh it was hard for me not to have my son in my house but
[01:42:20] it was it was the best thing because me and his mom just didn't get along and then this is at the point
[01:42:28] at the same time is this when you got out this is right with it we got divorced right after
[01:42:36] I got out which did you get out with the vision in mind that you're going to be able to save this
[01:42:41] thing or did you get out with the vision in mind like no this is already too far so no yeah I got out
[01:42:45] she she wanted to like hey I want you around more you're gone too much it's you know this isn't good
[01:42:51] get that but then so you got out I got out and then uh and she realized that she really doesn't
[01:42:58] want you yeah pretty much and I can't blame her so so then then we ended up separating or or get you
[01:43:06] know going through your plan getting out oh I was gonna go work for a guide doing some kind of
[01:43:12] uh um investment stuff because that makes a lot of sense yeah me there there was no plan
[01:43:23] it wasn't thought through the smartest thing I did was the day the day I got out I enlisted in
[01:43:28] their or I joined the reserve so I was in the Seal team five reserve teams so I did that for a year
[01:43:35] and a half and then when all of dust settled and uh with with uh the you know who's going to have
[01:43:43] custody and where my sons gonna live it was like what am I doing? I'm the I'm only happy when I go
[01:43:50] to do my reserve drill yeah and so I'm like hey I want to go back and act duty at the time they were
[01:43:56] critically under man for E6's so they're like boom so the timing like my timing I've been so lucky
[01:44:05] for my timing like being on the quarterback that one day I checked into trade at in August of 2001
[01:44:12] into the sniper cell and then you know the planes hit the towers and then the teams are just
[01:44:19] off to the races yeah did you when you when you were civilian um or whatever you were a reserve
[01:44:27] a civilian how long did it take you to realize that this was a bad call and I'm gonna jump forward
[01:44:33] like when you would have guys that were saying they were gonna get out at 13 years or nine years
[01:44:38] or whatever did you you know what what would you tell them about that? Oh you mean later yeah like later
[01:44:45] like because you know I would you know when I was well my you know once I was an officer and I would have
[01:44:50] friends that were like hey I'm gonna get out and you know I'd say the experience I had was I
[01:44:55] went to college right and when I went to college for three years and when I came back I was like
[01:44:59] right the main thing I learned in college was never ever ever ever get out of the teams ever because
[01:45:04] it dealing with other people it was just so horrible and especially I mean like you and me
[01:45:12] who literally spent our whole adult life in a puttune you get out of in a normal people and you're
[01:45:20] like what are you everyone doing once I have what why is this even happening it just nothing makes sense
[01:45:26] yeah there's a lot of awkward silence is no one gets your jokes and it was what I usually tell
[01:45:33] guys is like hey I got broken service and you're gonna once you get out you're gonna miss this
[01:45:39] peer group you'll miss this job and I don't think you're gonna make that much more money
[01:45:45] and but I never I always tried the soft sell yeah yeah hey I would tell guys here's my phone number
[01:45:56] do not lose my phone number and if you decide you want to come back in please call me I will you
[01:46:02] know figure out how to get you wherever I'm at or back in and I've done that for at least two or three
[01:46:10] guys yeah no it's a I know it's a hard decision for guys to make and and usually and sometimes it's
[01:46:15] some what is that it's an emotional decision oh completely because they had a bad deployment they
[01:46:20] didn't like someone or their wife's mad and whatever and they make that emotional decision when in fact
[01:46:27] the teams can take care of you too you know the teams can go hey look we know you need some
[01:46:32] downtime you're gonna go to buds and be an instructor or whatever you know for three years you
[01:46:36] know you can get your kid through high school or whatever so the teams has a good job usually
[01:46:42] of taking care of of the people you know taking care of team guys but sometimes you know people
[01:46:48] they have the grassest screener situation and again in the 90s we're planning we're training
[01:46:55] for a big game that we're not going to do and so there was a loss of job satisfaction there
[01:47:00] yeah and and who knows where NSW what trajectory we were on had these wars not started yeah
[01:47:09] yeah that's a good question that's a scary question um what so would you do when you got back in
[01:47:17] so you went to you went went into trade it just got stood up and then went into the sand up
[01:47:23] that's 2001 that's lucky huh and so I got and and there they're like hey we're gonna do a
[01:47:31] sniper cell and we're gonna be dedicated to this which is something that wasn't replicated on
[01:47:35] the other coast um I was like oh man are you kidding me I'm just gonna do sniper stuff all the time
[01:47:42] yeah and throw me in that burp yeah and you were the perfect literally the perfect guy and they
[01:47:49] probably were just overjoyed to have you coming in with the real world experience which is
[01:47:57] serious at that time because no one had it yeah and so it allows you to say stuff to people and
[01:48:01] they're gonna listen to you like like we were talking about earlier where if a guy tells you to
[01:48:04] get your haircut and he's a goofball and ain't done anything just like yeah whatever
[01:48:12] and and then so when you're running that sniper course
[01:48:15] are you guys now was that the sniper course no the sniper course was already stood up so now
[01:48:22] what we're doing this is what we kind of ended up with that trade out which is you guys are going
[01:48:26] out to training your implementing sniper things into the overall training and you're doing
[01:48:31] specialized training for the sniper that's what you ended up that yeah we so for a little bit we were
[01:48:37] still running the sniper course and they till like 2002 or three and then doing the
[01:48:44] sustainment training and so you know we developed the urban course the long range target
[01:48:50] in the addiction course which they they have a different variant on it now but um you know that's uh
[01:48:57] the land it was under land warfare and the land warfare all I see at the time was uh
[01:49:03] worn off so pressure dug pressure to do some awesome dude he still works in shooting to this day
[01:49:08] and uh we got a lot of cool stuff done like we got the the ballistic computers
[01:49:12] which made you know shooting a whole lot more predictable and then we could get guns
[01:49:20] ready to go in a lot less rounds because we had these computers that did it and we did a lot of
[01:49:25] good research and development and tactics that we could push directly to the platoons
[01:49:31] which I mean and as W snipers are like the mainstay group I think of snipers in the world
[01:49:41] yeah but I'm not saying that we're better than anybody because everybody's really good but
[01:49:46] we've had a really rich history of employing snipers and doing stuff with snipers you know
[01:49:53] as you well now yeah and speaking of that how did you end up doing an augment because you
[01:50:00] augment it to Ramadi right right and what year was that 2005 so there was there was some of that
[01:50:08] video that got released of uh you know it's guy getting that there's a couple snipers or
[01:50:14] whatever it was in Ramadi and uh the common word at the time saw that and he goes that's it
[01:50:22] and they they had a piece of gear that was supposed to help us detect enemy snipers
[01:50:29] and so they bought some they gave it to us to test out real quick and then we got to take it forward
[01:50:38] with uh seal team seven to go hey here's this new gear here's how you use it and uh and then
[01:50:45] it also gave us the ability to get get straight over there and kind of into the fight so we
[01:50:51] team seven had just moved into the the shark base there at Ramadi and then we went in there with
[01:50:57] him and how long did you stay there for six weeks how was it awesome?
[01:51:03] it's so cool so cool I didn't I didn't want to come back but you know you come from the
[01:51:09] strand I didn't do the work up my guys didn't do the work up and there's other guys doing PSD and they're
[01:51:15] like hey what's up with these dudes who aren't even at our team and they're going out on sniper
[01:51:20] missions so it's it's not cool it's combat tourism and I was super lucky that we were able to you
[01:51:28] know be there as long as we were and then it was just like at time to go and you did to turn over
[01:51:32] with the guys that were there in other words you taught them how to use the system and yeah we're
[01:51:37] like what's it pops with them when it got to go out and some ops with them got to go on a lot of
[01:51:42] date like my favorite thing to do was go out on daytime presence patrols with the army or the
[01:51:49] Marine Corps because that's was so fun you know and then so we could to get embedded in a daytime
[01:51:58] presence it was of one slide five W's which which for the planning cycle is really easy it's like
[01:52:07] gonna be approved no problem and then if you wanted to mix it up that's that's where it was
[01:52:12] happening out on the streets with the guys that are walking around using themselves as bait so we
[01:52:16] would bounce between going out with the Marines and going out with the army and in both cases it
[01:52:26] was awesome but I really have a saucepot in my my heart for the Marine Corps because my dad was
[01:52:30] Marine but when you're in a Marine patrol it it's like a being part of a big huge beast that's just
[01:52:40] walking down the street waiting for someone to bump into it and then they just turn and go after it and
[01:52:48] were you guys setting up a bounding over watches during that are you just going on patrol this we
[01:52:54] would go on but so so the reason that we would go on patrol is so we could we could look for
[01:52:59] positions to put up sniper over watches and the sniper over watches were to catch guys placing
[01:53:06] IEDs out in the road and they'd already gotten like three or four because some guys went out
[01:53:13] on a really good up and you know a guy that we both know and they they got two guys or digging
[01:53:17] on an IED and then there was another couple where they got and they were having an impact
[01:53:22] for a little bit so well that meant a lot to the Marine Corps in the army when they were losing
[01:53:28] guys all the time to IEDs and then and you know hardly ever to the IED in place there's actually
[01:53:35] to get captured or killed so when they're getting laid out in the streets by snipers man those
[01:53:40] guys were excited about it and then then you know you had that whole thing going on with the
[01:53:47] populace because they they'd be kind of believed that every building at an American sniper in it
[01:53:53] which is a good thing that's exactly what you're denying them freedom of movement and they got
[01:53:57] to look over their shoulders before they placed you know one one of those one five five rounds in the
[01:54:03] road yeah yeah so you get done with that how much longer after that did you go to team three
[01:54:09] immediately I got back from that and then checked out a trade-out and checked in the seal team three
[01:54:15] from my platoon chief slot and that was an interesting ride that troop you because so now I'm at
[01:54:24] seal team three I'm in task in a bruiser and you're at seal team three in your task unit and
[01:54:30] there's that one there was some trauma in that one right in our fact I mean life and I wrote
[01:54:35] about it in extreme ownership because this is the story in extreme ownership of when the platoon
[01:54:41] commanders and the task unit commander did not couldn't get along and unfortunately they could not
[01:54:50] come to any kind of agreement of how to work together in fact you know the the skipper said
[01:54:55] hey you guys got the weekend figure out how to how you're going to deploy together and I think they
[01:55:00] could have come back and said look you know he he goes there I'll go somewhere else we'll figure it out
[01:55:06] but they both came back in and kind of stuck to their guns which is no I don't want to work with
[01:55:10] him no I don't want to work with him and the the skipper fired in both actually yeah that was crazy
[01:55:18] that was a horrible like that had been brewing for a long time and so just that drama is so
[01:55:27] horrible to deal with like the when and they're they're both good guys yeah but it just this drama
[01:55:34] brood and then there was all this crazy uncertainty and you know who's going to get fired what's
[01:55:41] going to happen as a result of that and so you know I'm glad the admiral made the call that he did
[01:55:49] and it it worked and then we the guy you took over as the TU command so we our a-o-i-c went over
[01:55:59] and became the o-i-c-o-i-o-i-c-r system officer in charge became the o-i-c-o-the-l-l-l-platoon
[01:56:03] um there is an officer you read a counseling chip for and real early podcast that the new
[01:56:15] task unit commander the first thing he did the first day was sit down and give him a counseling
[01:56:22] chip yeah that's good leadership yeah he's like hey here's what you're doing wrong here's what
[01:56:27] Wright looks like's laid it all out for him and uh and that was it and then he he was super direct
[01:56:35] gave us our left and rights and then we were just like I was like I remember thinking personally
[01:56:40] this is awesome yeah he's strict but that I don't care if you if you tell me where my left and
[01:56:46] rights are especially you know and that guy especially because when you're coming and I've said this
[01:56:52] many times when you're coming into a situation where there's there's problems right because there's
[01:56:57] definitely problems when the o-i-c and the task unit commander just got fired there are problems
[01:57:03] you have to come in and kind of set down you have to lay down the wall a little bit it's not like
[01:57:07] you know if I roll into a task unit they're doing great and the one of the guy had a family emergency
[01:57:11] and he had to leave and I roll in and it's like okay I'm not gonna lay down the lawn a bunch of
[01:57:16] guys that are doing well I'm gonna go in there and say hey I'm happy we're working you guys and
[01:57:20] and then over time if there's things that need to be adjusted cool maybe they don't need to be adjusted
[01:57:24] but whatever it's different when you roll into a situation where things are not good and then you
[01:57:29] have to lay down a lot the other thing that's very important about what you just said is
[01:57:36] sometimes people are sometimes from a leadership perspective you don't feel comfortable
[01:57:41] giving direction because you're like well I don't really know what's going on and but
[01:57:45] it's important to think about times in your life or times in your career when you didn't get
[01:57:51] good direction from the person you're working for and how just you don't really know what's happening
[01:57:56] and you don't feel you don't you can't predict what's gonna happen and so you you just feel kind
[01:58:00] a little bit lost and then you think to yourself man I just wish the boss would just tell us what
[01:58:05] the hell he wants and so that's kind of what happened there the boss the new boss comes in and says hey
[01:58:09] here's what's going on here's what we're gonna do hey you guy that's all jacked up here's what
[01:58:12] you need to improve and everyone instead of what in your mind you might think hey I'm gonna piss
[01:58:19] everyone off if I come in and lay down the law at this you gotta remember that people have been
[01:58:24] wondering what the hell is going on for six months for a year they don't know who's in charge
[01:58:28] everything's a disaster no decisions are gonna be you come in and people go thank god thank you
[01:58:33] for telling me what the hell you want I'm tired of playing a guessing game every Monday morning
[01:58:38] about who's my boss and what direction we're going into so that's that's an important part
[01:58:43] remember now I am definitely there's a dichotomy of course because you can come in and you can
[01:58:47] start barking orders and everyone just says who are you where you come from you don't know what you're
[01:58:50] talking about you haven't been here shut up and of course they won't say that to you they'll just
[01:58:54] undermine what you're trying to do and calls all kinds of you know just just trying you
[01:58:59] serve you with whatever they can so that's probably but what I'm saying is there is a a happy medium
[01:59:07] and there are times when you lean towards being laying down the wall there's times where you
[01:59:12] lean towards being more loose and you gotta figure out where that's gonna be depending on the
[01:59:16] situation you're diving into and and not so the advantage that the guy coming in had
[01:59:21] was he'd been watching the situation for a while and a new everybody so sometimes when you come
[01:59:27] somewhere new it's it's maybe keep just listen before you start making some major adjustments or
[01:59:34] something like that and but that would have just prolonged the angst all of us were feeling and he
[01:59:40] came in he had a big brief it was and after that I felt like someone had taken 40 pounds out of my
[01:59:45] rocks act because you're finally new where you were going who was in charge and what at least the
[01:59:53] near future met which think you get rid of what the near future you get with get rid of the
[02:00:00] certainty of the near future you get rid of who's in charge you get rid of what's gonna happen
[02:00:04] you take all that away and you're just left uncertain and that's a horrible feeling yeah
[02:00:09] probably the worst yeah I think from from a perspective of being led yeah having no idea what's
[02:00:18] gonna happen is the worst I I talk about that example of rats and a cage and how the rats
[02:00:25] on one side of the cage they just get electrocuted randomly from the floor and but the
[02:00:31] electrocution isn't very strong the other side of the cage has a stronger electrocution
[02:00:37] shock but there's a little light that comes on that lets them know that you're about to get shocked
[02:00:43] and rats prefer to know that they're gonna get shocked even if it's more often and even if it's
[02:00:47] stronger they just prefer to know that it's common as opposed to be just randomly getting shocked
[02:00:52] and you know why it's gonna happen and that's basically where you where your
[02:00:56] task unit was because there was I mean it was like a public too it was like a public everyone
[02:01:01] kind of knew it was going on at least after about six months you know I would say after all
[02:01:07] of us being at the team for about six months it was readily apparent that's for sure and you guys actually
[02:01:13] the one of the pieces of collateral damage that was Mike's are Ellie and Mike's are Ellie
[02:01:18] he they didn't know what to do with them because I forget what the internal conflict but there was
[02:01:25] internal conflict with Mike's are Ellie and meaning that I don't even know what it was but
[02:01:32] so they said hey jocca you want this guy and like affirmative and then you came up to me and I was
[02:01:39] like you know this guy and you're like yes he's awesome and I was like cool and then it was
[02:01:43] other people that were say to OEs this and he's that and of course the other people I'm like okay
[02:01:48] and I listen to him and then I was like thinking okay and that's why I think I asked you like hey
[02:01:51] what's this guy's deal yeah he's awesome you're you're stoked and I was like cool good to go
[02:01:55] yeah Mike was awesome yeah and and he was obviously he still is awesome and then you guys did that work
[02:02:02] up and then you guys deployed over to while I was in Ramadhi you guys were over in Guam
[02:02:10] in Guam yeah so I tell you what if if it hadn't been contrasted it was an amazing deployment
[02:02:20] like we nobody gotten trouble we did a lot of great stuff which this is a big problem in Guam
[02:02:26] guys just getting in trouble and you know the the the problem was it was you guys were
[02:02:34] hearing in real time like hey they just got the first Carl Gustaf kills in Ramadhi and hey this is
[02:02:41] happening and and I remember one day we were in wearing Thailand on an exercise staying in a five
[02:02:49] star hotel and guys are all whoo whoo I mean I had to get everybody at the side of the pool
[02:02:57] at the five star hotel and I'm like listen I want to be there too it's not gonna happen we have
[02:03:04] to put the mission first our mission is to be here and this is an amazing experience I guarantee
[02:03:11] you're gonna remember for the rest of your life you guys you got to stop planning yeah stop worrying
[02:03:17] about it and of course all the guys always joke about the fact that when you're sitting in a
[02:03:20] sweaty Overwatch position it's a hundred and eighteen degrees like okay we just spend a week in Thailand
[02:03:27] right now by the pool I know well and then when they used to do that rip yeah where you'd go to
[02:03:32] Iraq and then halfway through come back to Guam the problem isn't Guam they be like guys
[02:03:36] get back here and they wouldn't want to do any work yeah and they weren't they weren't focused on
[02:03:41] what was going on you know but then that's the mission is got to come first and the mission isn't
[02:03:46] all is something that you can tell stories about yeah but hey I got to ride elephants I got to
[02:03:53] sit on a crocodile's back I got great per dime of the neither of those yeah I was it was
[02:04:01] interesting to like going back to the work up it was a good contrast for my especially for my
[02:04:09] officers to kind of see like I'd be watching this unfold and you know I had stoner and life
[02:04:16] and I'd be you know we would talk about it but like bro this is what's going on fellas look at
[02:04:20] this look what's happening here and it was a good contrast for them to see because it made it so obvious
[02:04:28] like why you have to work together why these relationships we have inside the tasking
[02:04:32] you're so important why we need if you have an issue you're bringing it up you're bringing it to me why it's
[02:04:39] not going to freak me out why we're going to talk about it why you know life always says and stoner
[02:04:44] would it tell you the same thing if life thought like hey I'd like to try this a different way I'd be like
[02:04:49] cool how do you want to try it go let's let's make it happen I don't care I don't I don't care
[02:04:53] what happens as long as it makes us win so there was a really cool for me unfortunately it was not
[02:04:59] cool for you to be in a position where I could look and use the leadership failures in that task unit
[02:05:07] and the other interesting thing was like you talk about those two guys you're like hey they're
[02:05:10] both guys I actually know both those guys and would be getting debrief to buy both of them
[02:05:15] like both of them would be telling me what the other person was doing and man you just be thinking
[02:05:23] guys instead of telling me go tell each other go talk to each other it didn't happen yeah the
[02:05:32] enemies outside the wire not on yeah what were you what was what were you when you're looking at
[02:05:40] my task unit what were you thinking when we're in a work up and stuff you guys you're going to go to a
[02:05:44] rack and we're we're going to go to pay calm yeah yeah but that's fine I mean that's that is
[02:05:51] we knew where we were laid out and how we were manned and it was all good to go I wasn't like we
[02:05:56] were kicking cans oh no it's like okay well that's how it's going to be well they
[02:06:02] proposed they made a the command made a proposal that this was early on as my effect I was at
[02:06:09] Nyland dirt so that was our first block attorney the command made a proposal that we kind of
[02:06:15] disassemble the task units and reassemble them in a way that was more fair with regards to
[02:06:26] who's been to Iraq and who's not and they made this proposal and so they made this proposal to us
[02:06:34] it was to me personally to the task unit commanders I was a matter of fact hey that we can rearrange
[02:06:38] this thing and that way guys have been can get to go it was like the fair fairy was coming out right
[02:06:42] and I mean I was just like there's no possible way but I went back to Nyland you know I sat down
[02:06:51] with the platoon commanders and the platoon chiefs and the my senior chief and I was like hey
[02:06:57] here's what they're proposing they're proposing that we could disassemble these task units
[02:07:00] and we could reassemble them so that guys that haven't been to Iraq can go and then the other
[02:07:05] guys that have been to Iraq that have combat experience and there's all those things you can
[02:07:08] later on top of that like hey because guys will say well I can't get promoted if I haven't been to you
[02:07:12] know what I mean like all these things they later all these things on top of it because that's a
[02:07:15] crazy proposal if you think about it yes but also if you think about it that's how much it means
[02:07:20] to guys that they want to go and so now this is 2005 so there were still guys that had been on
[02:07:26] shorty to the over that we're cycling back in never been to combat and they missed the 2003
[02:07:31] 2004 deployments and they're thinking hey this is ridiculous and it's what you talked about earlier
[02:07:37] job dissatisfaction you know you've been in the teams for 12 years and you and there's a big
[02:07:42] war going on and you don't get to go that is the kind of thing you have to consider and think how
[02:07:46] can we take care of the troops you take care of the guys because we want it they all want to go
[02:07:51] to war and there's a war going on and yet we're going to send them some of them to not war
[02:07:55] but I came I came back in island I was said hey guys here's the proposals I recommend
[02:08:03] we we they also offered it's a competition it's a competition and it was really just a competition
[02:08:08] between my task unit and your task unit because the other task unit they they actually didn't
[02:08:16] that task unit didn't go to Iraq on the last deployment so they said look you guys get to go this
[02:08:21] time for sure and then it was between us too and they said we can either split apart but we'll do that
[02:08:26] or make it a competition and this commanding officer will decide who's going to go based on performance
[02:08:31] and I told my guys I was like I say we go for performance and we do the best we can and we will
[02:08:39] probably crush everyone and if we don't we don't deserve to go and we'll go do our job in bank
[02:08:45] home and of course all the guys were like hell yes that's what we did sure and you know like
[02:08:53] when I was a CMC at team five and I was doing my manning the hard-fast rule was if you went to
[02:08:59] pay calm last time you are not going to pay calm again and then so those guys could get a chance
[02:09:06] and then some of the some of the guys that went to SENT calm went back but in the end when I'm building
[02:09:14] seal leaders I need guys that have been everywhere I need guys that have had the pay calm experience
[02:09:20] and understand their mature enough to go all the mission is first and then guys that have been
[02:09:25] exposed to combat so they know what that's all about yeah you know and and when you got done so
[02:09:34] when you got done with that potential to work then where'd you go so because I didn't because I
[02:09:39] wasn't pay calm I I made a deal with the new command master chief and and I said hey I know I'm
[02:09:46] stepping down but I want to go to SENT calm so can I stay here in the capacity of as the ops chief
[02:09:54] for one troop which was the guy who was the OIC of my platoon who fleet Jack Regans
[02:10:02] fleeted up to be the the troop commander and I'm like hey can I can I stay and go to SENT calm now
[02:10:09] because he was going to go to SENT calm as his his his ops chief and they're like sure and it's
[02:10:15] just I'm actually stepping down Tony did the same thing and then Tony and I both made senior chief
[02:10:21] and they're like hey it's time for you to go and they sent us over to the senior and
[02:10:28] listed academy and then we went over to seal team seven together which worked out great yeah
[02:10:35] we'll get into that later and you know what I'm the great part that you just mentioned is like a
[02:10:41] three hour conversation yeah which we don't aren't gonna have right now because look the second part
[02:10:50] of your career or the part that if yeah we'll get into this we'll do another one we'll just we'll just
[02:10:55] roll do another podcast we'll record it like tomorrow and that's gonna follow you
[02:11:02] into Afghanistan back to Iraq again more time more training more tours combat tours
[02:11:10] tours as senior listed tours as the command master chief tours as an ops master chief
[02:11:15] I mean there's a lot of massive stuff to talk about from here on out so we'll do that
[02:11:25] we'll record that tomorrow good check echo yes while we're waiting for the next podcast
[02:11:36] mm-hmm I know how you probably have some suggestions on what we can do instead of just sitting
[02:11:45] around and waiting there's probably some ways that we could get better yes I do have for one
[02:11:49] day first thing is Jason Jason yes there you go I'm a one-stripe white belt then there you go so
[02:11:58] and so we know what it what it what it would it feel like when you got the bug
[02:12:02] when did you get on the map for the first time legitimately thinking all right I want to know
[02:12:06] what this is all about okay so the same master chief that taught us in Guam oh Steve Bailey
[02:12:12] Steve Bailey I trained with him for a little bit in Guam and then just got distracted and
[02:12:16] like talking my teeth into a little bit but then it's like a year ago I started training
[02:12:21] out in East County and it was just awesome but I I was like a spaz and I yeah so I was in
[02:12:30] like what a belt death match it's like what am I supposed to like relax I'm like I'm
[02:12:34] I'm just supposed to lose only right now 49 49 so everybody that asks um 51 can I start
[02:12:42] jjitsu um 39 can I start jjitsu um whatever age you are the answer is yes you can start
[02:12:49] jjitsu we recommend that you calm down we must start reading let's relax I wanted to roll
[02:12:57] if you do what's your relaxation level right now if I was because I have a drone like six months
[02:13:03] but I probably I probably spas out for a hot minute and then then figure it out but uh yeah
[02:13:11] because you're torn you don't know what you're doing but you just don't want to roll over and like oh
[02:13:17] here I have my arm yeah so you just put on a triangle and uh no it's a it's a it's a
[02:13:24] it's a it's a situation it's a situation that unfolds that you know is going to unfold that
[02:13:31] you know is not the correct thing to do and there's no way you can stop yourself from doing it like
[02:13:35] you just said you someone's gonna arm lock you you know what's gonna happen you could just go okay
[02:13:41] you know what I'm I'm just he's got me I'm gonna let him but no you cannot stop yourself from
[02:13:46] grilling gripping your other hand and hanging on for dear life for an extra 12 seconds before
[02:13:52] you tap there's no possible way to overcome that it's just coming so yeah you have to do that but
[02:13:59] hopefully you can make through that you can make it through that transition you fairly quickly
[02:14:04] yeah yeah the amazing for my kids too oh kids it's a beautiful thing it's a beautiful thing for
[02:14:10] kids yeah it seems like the spashing thing even as you get it I mean obviously it happens less and
[02:14:15] less but there'll be like momentary spas situations even at like the top level
[02:14:21] where you kind of got to stay calm I mean everyone's gonna all run into it where I got to stay
[02:14:26] conscious of it like oh I see the danger coming and it's coming pretty quick you got to think
[02:14:31] well I in my sister I'll think through it and I'll be way more successful rather than like
[02:14:36] oh spas through it so now I'm more tired and it's still coming kind of I hate to say this too
[02:14:41] because it's horrible for me to put this out there but there are times when you have to spas to
[02:14:47] escape something Dean Lister will if I do that he just like he he it's worth it even if I
[02:14:54] get out it's worth it that I spasks that can make fun of me yeah it could defend you spas
[02:14:59] yeah he's just making fun of me because we know we both know the only reason that I got out of
[02:15:05] whatever he just did to me is because I kicked and squarmed and spasped out and he wasn't ready for it
[02:15:11] and then I got out yeah it'll work out but a huge cost so there's like this too little
[02:15:18] additional elements to a successful spas escape or whatever one you gotta be at least
[02:15:25] somewhat strong like you can like a smaller person like spasking is less effective even at
[02:15:32] high level there's that and then when you're strong when you're strong person and you spas
[02:15:37] successfully you're way more tired way more tired so you get a person where you put them in a
[02:15:43] spashing state like two three three times in a row yeah you can't spas more than three times I don't
[02:15:49] think you give a max spas reps after that you're the next one there will be no spas left
[02:15:55] yes after three legit spas is that there's no no spas left in which brings you back to
[02:16:00] went back early on as a white belt or something like this where you know it spas spas spas
[02:16:06] and they feel the effects of three spasers in a row yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
[02:16:10] you're like dang this is exhausting yeah yeah yeah we're like when you start that's you're just
[02:16:16] just spashing and more spashing and then it's like the opposite of when you know in the beginning
[02:16:23] there's these small moments where you don't spas and then when you get better there's small
[02:16:29] moments when you do spas yeah and then when you're really good I mean very seldom do I make
[02:16:33] Dean spas yeah I do occasionally though it gets a little little little bit crazy and you know I
[02:16:39] know in a way too where that's why these little smaller guys when they're super advanced I don't
[02:16:45] think they have for spas ever because it's always like it's been unproductive for them right every
[02:16:50] attempted spas is gonna be like unsuccessful you know and it kind of you know it's a spectrum obviously
[02:16:56] so their whole thing is just thinking through the thing Andy Burke sure he does this his form of
[02:17:04] spas is like this silent spas he pretends it's not happening but it is happening the whole
[02:17:12] very yeah he's doing these like in little movements and it's there's only one technique
[02:17:19] that it could truly be called that's a spas but he acts like it was he's real cool he's real cool
[02:17:25] he's acting like that was you know just like a defense that he knows one of his things I'm on to you
[02:17:30] Andy Burke yeah I know what's up that's a good tip I want to look off for it I don't know if I've ever
[02:17:34] made Andy spas but you know I'm gonna be looking out for it nonetheless when you're in jiu jitsu we all
[02:17:38] need a ghi if we're doing ghi and I'm not saying you have to do ghi you should do ghi I think
[02:17:43] should you know he responded yeah do both that's the recommended both if you trained
[02:17:48] ghi no ghi both oh yeah the place we were training at they did both yeah so one night was no
[02:17:54] ghi the other night was ghi was awesome I got origin ghi is they're awesome oh and just so you're
[02:18:00] in the game so some people they they may or may not be looking hey what kind of ghi should I get
[02:18:05] there you go just like Jason Gardner said origin ghi hundred percent best ghi's factually
[02:18:09] by the Jason Gardner with the origin ghi plug common straight off the toproaks yeah he just pulled that
[02:18:14] out of nowhere he's like yeah I train ghi and no ghi and by the way I happen to use origin ghi which is
[02:18:21] the finest ghi in America and many people say the finest ghi in the world yeah I say that I
[02:18:27] say that too yeah and it is made in America by the way yeah so yeah anyway when you get you
[02:18:32] you go to origin main dot com that's where you get it you can also get other stuff like
[02:18:37] rash guards t-shirts for that no ghi if your name is echo Charles no I shouldn't say that if your
[02:18:44] name is not jocca willink you can get joggers because I don't look like normal I don't I don't know
[02:18:54] what to say I look you don't match I don't I don't feel match yeah joggers are not for me yeah
[02:19:01] is it up what is that but you just don't match so here this is what actually this is what it is
[02:19:07] okay jogger you know what joggers are right you have origin ghi skinny no okay yeah they're
[02:19:12] so they're skinny ghi sweatpants kind of tapered not kind of they're really tapered little bit
[02:19:17] of what he call like a drop crotch a little bit from like a lot of roomy in the hip area kind of
[02:19:21] think you think they're functional yes but I think the big push is a style thing because there's
[02:19:28] like skinny jeans and all this stuff so it's kind of like a functional thing yes but it's a style thing
[02:19:34] that's the part you don't match with any especially anything that says skinny or thin or trim
[02:19:40] fit or what that's not you that's somebody up so yeah that's not gonna match with you at all
[02:19:45] the fact even to you know people have like real fitted jeans yeah like real fitted yeah yeah yeah
[02:19:52] I want to say tight but I'm not gonna say that yeah so they fit it you should not do that either
[02:19:57] no because that's not you but the weird thing is the world changes right the fashion
[02:20:04] changes I just keep wearing the same stuff yeah at some point is what I wear gonna come back
[02:20:10] well fashion wise but I wear this is the thing I think what I wear doesn't it doesn't it's just
[02:20:17] what hey you can't say hey this guy's wearing a t-shirt in a pair of jeans you could wear
[02:20:22] t-shirt in a pair of jeans in 1950 1960 1970 never never go out of style you probably never
[02:20:28] goes out of style yeah and actually even to be more precise since years you don't go for fashion at
[02:20:33] all you go for like this functionality kind of situation so if if anything you do is like fashion
[02:20:39] which I mean there's some fashion stuff in your past like maybe hair styles etc that's why
[02:20:45] if you see old pictures of jacco with his hair you feel like you know that's kind of the thing
[02:20:51] that's the that's the guy that Jason was talking about earlier that's me like we like that like hey
[02:20:57] we we're in the teams we have long hair yeah push the handle a white hair long as I could get it
[02:21:04] yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
[02:21:05] and now the fashion thing to look good but you're clothing wise you'll never go fashion so you'll
[02:21:09] never go out of style because since the fashion is the thing that revolves and goes out of style
[02:21:14] origin jeans uh I got like the final kind of cut and everything no they're legit so that's another thing
[02:21:22] they're it's not it's not a fashion thing right the origin jeans well they're not mutually
[02:21:29] exclusive either so functionality are strong they're flexible they're durable they're durable
[02:21:35] they're durable right that's not going on a style no sure it's not so there we go origin jeans
[02:21:41] we are in production with origin jeans in production at this time so check the website
[02:21:49] originmain.com if you want to get some jeans or if your name is not jacca will link you can
[02:21:54] get pair of joggers the joggers are good that's the thing where I got I wasn't down for the joggers
[02:21:59] Pete told me this he opened my open my little like a mind or whatever I put him on I was like
[02:22:05] dang these are comfortable but man they're skinny they're thin you know they're they're tight you know
[02:22:11] they had a specific look that I wasn't very accustomed to but and Pete's noticed it he was like
[02:22:16] yeah they're like you know he's like jacco they're probably not for jacco but you pull them off
[02:22:21] that's what Pete said to me oh you mean oh I hope he was like being like honest with it but
[02:22:27] yeah ever since I was like okay maybe I can do this so I only wore a met camp so I was like oh I
[02:22:32] might not wear these at home but wearing my camp and then at camp I was like dang these are good
[02:22:36] too and when you jog they're way better than regular sweatpants so I'm like oh these are good
[02:22:40] and they're like super comfortable too because you know the cotton and thie is or whatever
[02:22:44] and then I'd wear them at home and that's all I would wear now I kind of switched over to that
[02:22:49] whole thing to for real how are the pockets are the pockets all kinds of life changing things
[02:22:56] haven't on this podcast one of them is eccletrails switching to joggers be noted
[02:23:02] we pockets like what for like functionality yeah like for my everyday carry so I'm going down to the
[02:23:07] store and the joggers yeah I would say like any other sort of sweatpants situation so I'm doing
[02:23:12] the hip pockets on either side right yeah yeah like regular sweatpants don't have pockets bro
[02:23:18] yeah like all the pain you're talking about you know like g m coach from 1979 yeah
[02:23:23] they're not that they have pockets for sure I got to tell you I saw those boots online and I'm pretty
[02:23:29] excited right yeah I'm helping the gun mentioned in that now those are what we're making them
[02:23:34] we're making them yeah they're awesome oh yeah but pair of those too I do a perfect
[02:23:38] good hey man you got your lawn you're one like one degree separation from getting all the new
[02:23:45] stuff to where you're at really because it feels like 180 you know I'm over here looking
[02:23:50] on mine it's stuff anyway also mok right mornin jacen we talked earlier you just want your mok
[02:23:56] recipe morning recipe okay so I get up in the morning bro 20 ounces of coffee I grind up the
[02:24:03] beans do it in the french press I add a little bit of stevia to sweeten it but it's not
[02:24:10] gonna spike my insulin then I put some coconut milk in there or no coconut oil grass fed butter
[02:24:17] about a tablespoon of that some mcto oil a scoop of vanilla milk I hit that with a stick blender
[02:24:26] oh did that an eye it or I do not have to eat until like one or two in the afternoon I get all
[02:24:33] my fat in early in the morning so I got a stress getting good fat in and that's an awesome
[02:24:38] that's an advanced take are the kids on the mok train they are we and uh is it if you tried
[02:24:44] strawberry mok strawberry warrior kid strawberry mok no we haven't we've been doing the chocolate
[02:24:48] um hot chocolate yeah the hot chocolate's awesome and Iris has been making the pancakes oh yeah
[02:24:53] what's up that's it yeah she's just using it and mix and straight up pancakes because
[02:24:58] it's always talking about it the other day I got it from there's a guy in line who was like yeah
[02:25:02] mcto pancakes it was like technically a good idea so I just added them I basically replaced like
[02:25:07] a portion of percentage of the pancake mix with mok I thought you didn't know what pancakes
[02:25:12] are even made of because I haven't had them in so long yeah that's just wrong hey bro that's on you
[02:25:17] and you're kind of missing out on that one because it did they work out really good yeah
[02:25:21] what and that okay so we got the mok back away we're on that we're on mint I'm on mint
[02:25:25] and I'm actually in this whole deal now where I'm having both mint peanut butter I don't really
[02:25:30] I don't really like the flavor vanilla as I've mentioned on here so I don't have that but the
[02:25:35] strawberry too the warrior kid strawberry mok which Brian is working on the adult strawberry mok
[02:25:42] the vanilla like I'm not a big vanilla flan either but it just mixes so well yeah so like when
[02:25:48] Iris is making smoothies the vanilla milk in there I put it in my coffee because the mint chocolate
[02:25:53] it should've done more coffee no that sounds like it's my favorite like okay I get to have
[02:25:59] dessert and that's exactly what it is it scratches that it when it comes along
[02:26:04] see that's the thing man I went out last night I had a legit steak legit at Ragland Obey
[02:26:11] and I still was needed a little something I needed a little something because they sell this
[02:26:17] thing at Ragland called the illegal which is a giant chocolate chip cookie cooked in a cast iron
[02:26:23] thing it's massive and the name put vanilla ice cream on it which is the only time I like
[02:26:28] vanilla and the vanilla ice cream is all melting it's just ridiculous but obviously that's not
[02:26:35] part of the program so I left Ragland Obey without eating any legal and I went home and I'm like
[02:26:40] I still need some kind of a little heater so I went peanut butter I went peanut butter mok
[02:26:47] and I just did I did like a scoop and a half with a like a half a jaker of water I tried to think
[02:26:55] it was so good I was sitting there saying this is a milkshake if this is a milkshake it's
[02:27:00] freaking ridiculous yeah so there you go and I added protein let's not forget that yeah for the
[02:27:05] and and don't forget the probiotics you got a normal that micro biome is true yeah we haven't
[02:27:12] even gotten to your whole health scenario because what did you say you're 50 years old at 51
[02:27:16] but I'm 49 40 50 this year and you're getting after it I feel great you feel awesome
[02:27:22] walking around at like 157 and in before I you know before I adjusted my diet and everything I was
[02:27:29] 193 and I had all kinds of inflammation and everything hurt just crappy and now it's all just
[02:27:37] dialed in yeah I remember when you were first going down that path because our wives were hiking
[02:27:43] and you and I met somewhere and you were just talking about like the you were starting
[02:27:47] down this path and you were coming home from deployment too yeah so that's all I was looking for
[02:27:51] yeah this is my last deployment I don't have deployments to go on and get back and shapes
[02:27:54] so I'm gonna have to stick with it and yeah so those supplements join warfare twice a day
[02:28:04] do you tune the morning and tune in the evening and that the turmeric is amazing yeah
[02:28:10] incredible in the morning every morning and then usually uh any time I'm gonna do something
[02:28:16] the discipline go you discipline well yeah jp said the other day we need to have the discipline go
[02:28:23] he could see people's knots anyways get all the stuff at uh orgma.com sorry yes
[02:28:30] take a really long time oh good also jaco is a store it's called jaco store so jaco store.com
[02:28:36] you understand and uh yeah they say if you want to represent discipline equals freedom
[02:28:40] this where you can get your shirts who it is hats, trucker hats, flex fit, truck hats, flex fit
[02:28:47] I can go either way oh yes fence walker they go no he's at both sides right yeah
[02:28:53] what do you call it when you can adapt in a just one either way that bill is got to have a roll
[02:28:58] and it though I am not a flat bill boy god yeah that's actually strange coming from a california
[02:29:04] my person but that app that's like in the last couple decades or something it was not
[02:29:10] yeah jack yeah either way there you go jaco store that's where you can get them or sorry
[02:29:15] jaco store.com also whip stuff on there as well yeah if you want to represent while on the pat
[02:29:21] that's where you go it's good also jaco weight if you dead lifting and you're like tired of
[02:29:28] your like 500 pound death deadlift tired which yeah you know I can see how you'd be tired of that
[02:29:34] oh and you want it to go up to 8000 pound talk away tea and it happens to taste good and it
[02:29:40] happens to be USDA or gam certified organic organic yes what's a good one now that adds a
[02:29:50] kind of a little spin because people used to say to me did you ever have a picture that you
[02:29:53] be making tea and it's kind of funny you know and I've got whatever but now it's like next
[02:29:59] level did you ever picture that you'd be making organic tea oh yeah that is kind of a different
[02:30:03] thing maybe we're in joggers soon as the whole world gone crazy if you don't subscribe to this
[02:30:12] podcast which is shocking to me but now we have reports from the field of people that listen to
[02:30:18] 160 7 podcasts and haven't subscribed to it and so now echo has made it clear that you need to
[02:30:26] subscribe also don't forget about the the warrior kid podcast you want to warrior kid podcast
[02:30:31] oh yeah have the kids memorized him yet they love it I'm pretty much yeah yeah I've been
[02:30:38] lagging I don't get him out as much as I can part of it is because I like really like doing
[02:30:42] those stories from Uncle Jake and they take a little bit more time and so I need to invest the
[02:30:48] time the cute I should just do the Q&As as well but anyways warrior kid podcast if you want to
[02:30:54] get your kid on the pot on the path and what you what you and I were talking about earlier of how
[02:31:02] your kids just don't really want to listen to you they listen to Uncle Jake yeah absolutely just listen
[02:31:08] Uncle Jake absolutely I had another Master Chief East Coast Master Chief come out and came to the
[02:31:14] gym and he's like bro and I never I didn't know you know he's just like another guy East Coast
[02:31:18] guy that I didn't know and he's like he's like bro your book your little warrior kid books he said
[02:31:26] you got my kid I he's 11 years old everything I did for 11 years to get him to do pushups and
[02:31:32] pullups failed he goes he read that book I he's like I can't thank you because it's awesome
[02:31:38] and I was like dang it's 100% true if your your kids are not going to listen to you as much as
[02:31:44] you want them to they will listen Uncle Jake for some reason Uncle Jake will take it home form
[02:31:50] I listen Uncle Jake I love those books yeah I've taken out as just reading the books I'm like
[02:31:56] oh yeah I got to fix that oh here's something I could do better yeah it's yeah it's Uncle Jake
[02:32:05] who Uncle Jake has good information he's kind of everybody's Uncle Jake yeah that's kind of what
[02:32:11] it's all right and people people say like oh aren't you know you're Uncle Jake
[02:32:16] to me and I'm like I am so not Uncle Jake if I was Uncle Jake I'd be so much cooler
[02:32:20] Uncle Jake is my Uncle Jake yeah I'm just a little warrior kid over here trying to turn
[02:32:24] around to try to get on the path you know that's the way it is and warrior kid soap you can get that
[02:32:31] Irish Oach Irish Oach Ranch dot com speaking of warrior kids aid is making soap on his form and he
[02:32:36] wants you to stay clean what did my what do my kids said today like comment and subscribe
[02:32:47] I was like oh my god wait who said that what's your kids we we I don't know where it's
[02:32:52] talking about something you know oh so Instagram this and then one my kids is like like comment
[02:32:57] to subscribe and subscribe yeah that's going up there if I start saying that it's getting the
[02:33:03] joggers out yeah we're already at where you can organic tea for some crazy which is just
[02:33:08] good but that's a good thing it's just yeah I know it does taste good and it's good for you yeah
[02:33:12] so these are all things they just sound kind of lighthearted compared to your you know your
[02:33:17] whole anyway also yes you too by the way that's where they say that's where you can run into these
[02:33:22] videos where this because my daughter sometimes will watch a little youtube videos and that's what they'll
[02:33:26] say like comment and subscribe just repetitive yeah so yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
[02:33:32] get it they get it oh yeah so Jocce no to say that but we do have youtube channel and you're basically
[02:33:37] right now saying subscribe with youtube channel if you want and so you want Jason says you should
[02:33:42] like the youtube channel you should like it and then I'm over here saying you should comment like
[02:33:47] comment and subscribe yeah well here's the thing I don't know that you can like the youtube channel
[02:33:53] you like the video yes which is a quote unquote like but here's the thing you like the youtube
[02:33:59] channel you like the youtube channel that's a matter of opinion right so you like it you kind of
[02:34:02] neutral or you don't like it kind of thing that's up to you if you want to have fun you can go to
[02:34:09] the youtube channel jockel podcast and you can look at the people that attack the downvotes
[02:34:17] all you so there'll be and you know we don't have many downvotes which is I guess cool
[02:34:23] yeah it's crazy or whatever it thumbs down people get mad
[02:34:27] oh my god I'm kind of ISIS terror is just game who the 13 ISIS members that gave this
[02:34:34] a downvote you will rot in hell so thanks for having my back there they also liked it let like to
[02:34:41] let everyone know that that could look jacked echo look to whatever there's a video that was just
[02:34:46] released was the most recent video you just did that just got this and normal face one
[02:34:51] normal face one over action you you released the video you are not in the video but
[02:34:56] people are saying that they could feel that you reject just for watching the video so yeah
[02:35:02] like your call is jack psychological warfare you can get that on iTunes Google Play and B3 platforms
[02:35:08] if you think you might have a moment of weakness in your day-to-day life press play
[02:35:13] and you'll get pushed through that moment of weakness but jockel by the way by me yeah and not
[02:35:17] pushed we'll say spotted that's better yeah because some people they're not in the mood to get
[02:35:23] pushed pragmatically reasoned with yes reasoned with yes yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
[02:35:29] very good also speaking of reason when you want to improve your home gym I don't know maybe even
[02:35:36] your commercial gym you're 20 for everything it's I don't know go to onit.com slash jockel get yourself
[02:35:41] more kettlebells like me got the storm to trooper one oh you're gonna break out some star wars
[02:35:48] nerd stuff over here bro yeah you're ready yeah so jenga fat was the guy that they used for
[02:35:55] they're like oh you're the perfect warrior we're gonna make all the clones based on you and I believe
[02:36:00] that his deal he made with those people was like you're gonna give me one of the clones back
[02:36:03] that I'm gonna raise as my son who turned out to be bobo fat yes okay yeah wait wait so you're
[02:36:09] you're letting me know because I messed that up I think so I think jane yeah tune you up and then
[02:36:14] on the last podcast it it you guys were talking about it again yes is there is there books for that
[02:36:21] I don't know it's just something that you kind of because you're working on it nerd Jason oh hey
[02:36:25] I played Dungeons and Dragons one I wasn't a high school so yes and yeah absolutely and
[02:36:32] and I can be open about it today I wouldn't have been horrified to tell you when I wasn't high school
[02:36:37] but I played Dungeons and Dragons or that got out but right now I don't care you got all kind of you
[02:36:45] you got all kinds of like little nerd no science fiction nerdism right yeah handshoey science fiction
[02:36:51] it's a lot of fun there you go it's cool my younger brother who's a tattoo artist up in
[02:36:57] Sancle Manny he has a complete stormtrooper costume so do you so are you in the 501st
[02:37:04] is it the 501st Vader's fist no so well mine I got the stormtrooper costume like the full one
[02:37:12] what's 501st Vader's fist so there's a there's yeah there's an organization that does a lot of
[02:37:22] just like work for like honestly cancer kids and stuff like that and it it's all these people
[02:37:27] that are Star Wars villains and because they don't make no one can make costumes because it's all
[02:37:33] licensed so they have to make themselves and then you go there and they'll validate it and say okay
[02:37:38] you're good to go your costume is good and then and I hope I'm not screwing up the unit name but
[02:37:43] I think it's the the the 501st Vader's fist I've never that's pretty cool actually going to
[02:37:51] the one the one I have is like I don't know if it's a licensed costume or what but there aren't any
[02:37:57] you just it has to be so good that they're like they'll validate it because there's no such thing as
[02:38:03] a licensed costume for any for Stormtrooper you just make the stuff somehow yeah the ones like
[02:38:09] you just were like a lot they were like a well I bought two there's a Darth Vader one and a Stormtrooper
[02:38:14] they're like a few thousand dollars yeah that's a thing you wrote off for Flick's point right so
[02:38:22] I was making these videos called the hobbies of Darth Vader I gotta go check those out those are
[02:38:26] really good videos so we used to do for that to be the potential in those videos by the way
[02:38:31] yeah you didn't get you didn't get where you needed to get well we were going I know
[02:38:35] so I feature like like famous Gigi to people or when you know like Jeff Glover, Keen and Kreni
[02:38:40] like these guys premise is we're just living our life but Darth Vader's here too yeah he's kind of
[02:38:46] you know so like he's doing this so he's going on dates he you know he's doing this anyway
[02:38:51] it turned out kind of funny whatever so there's one where the Stormtrooper was in it he was on his
[02:38:56] lawyer when he got arrested the choppy deans head off it was pretty good yeah deans thumbs up he's
[02:39:01] like training he's like the ex boyfriend of his data whatever so so Vader like chops his head off
[02:39:05] uh-huh so the next episode he gets arrested for that uh-huh his lawyers a stormtrooper
[02:39:10] um so that's why I love it yeah do you ever see that one where they did like a cop
[02:39:15] episode but it was troopers and their stormtroopers and they show up to Luke's Aunt
[02:39:21] Nunko and it's really a domestic dispute and they kill everybody
[02:39:28] he's terrible it's old yeah there's a lot of fun to be had with those guys for sure
[02:39:35] nonetheless I got the kettlebell and I got it from on it and they got some good stuff on their
[02:39:39] on it.com that's yeah good spot including Star Wars stuff also got some books
[02:39:45] Mikey in the dragon Mike in the dragons Jason you were actually maybe the third or fourth person
[02:39:53] to hear me read Mikey in the dragons and I did it on the beach in Coronado to you and Iris
[02:39:59] I was so excited to read it guys I couldn't believe it when you started rhyming and the whole thing
[02:40:05] I'm like how did you do that? It's like he's still rhyming and it's still going and this story is
[02:40:11] just awesome yeah super stoked on Mikey in the dragons it's how old are your kids?
[02:40:19] 86 and what age group can it go down to would you say? I would say probably three yeah it can get
[02:40:27] young it's got very beautiful pictures that are bright and colorful there's so yeah and then the
[02:40:34] story rhymes it's gonna make your kids smarter and there's times when I was writing it you know
[02:40:38] they say write it a certain level but at the same time I put some words in there that kids aren't
[02:40:44] gonna necessarily know right away and so they need to look them up and then you do learn them.
[02:40:48] Poise is one of them and every new new word Poise and I was thinking wow most kids won't
[02:40:52] know what Poise is and then I thought to myself good now they can learn a new word be smarter.
[02:40:57] Yeah that's a good point though when you say where does it go down to so three I would say there
[02:41:01] my son is like two he was like just before two and a half and I'd read him more reading it to my
[02:41:07] daughter he's there but he'll catch certain things you know when there's like monsters ready to bite he'll be
[02:41:11] you know like he'll know certain stuff so as you kind of get older you absorb more and more but yeah
[02:41:17] if you're two yeah oh yeah it looks for them too. There you go. All kids if your kids are a little bit
[02:41:23] older you can get him way the warrior kid you can get a marks mission which is the second book in
[02:41:29] that series and now we have book three coming out the title of book three is where there's a will
[02:41:35] and mark he gets involved in some more situations but luckily his uncle Jake is there to help him out
[02:41:44] I get so many pictures of kids doing pull ups working out studying they're gonna be warrior kids so
[02:41:52] get that book for your kids get that book for your library get that book for your school get that book
[02:41:57] for anyone that you know that has kids you'll be thankful and they will be thankful and they'll
[02:42:02] come and thank you it in you know it's cool going to wrestling tournaments this is pretty cool I've had
[02:42:09] kids that are you know freshman in high school so they're 14 years old or whatever and they're like
[02:42:15] hey I read will you kid that's why I wrestle yeah yeah think about that so three years ago when it
[02:42:22] came out the kid got it and now he's wrestling that's what I'm talking about get you kids that
[02:42:27] kids will listen Uncle Jake this money equals freedom field manual if you want to know how to
[02:42:32] get after it there you go you have to wonder you can just get the field manual if you want the
[02:42:39] audio it's on iTunes Amazon music Google play and on a happy day by by I'm sure extreme ownership
[02:42:46] first book I wrote with my brother life babbin and then that follow on book is that I
[02:42:52] caught a new leadership which is takes all those lessons and shows where you can screw them up
[02:43:01] and then teach you out of fix them that caught a new leadership both those books me and life we
[02:43:07] wrote them check them out and then we have echelon front leadership consultancy we solve problems
[02:43:13] through leadership it's me it's life babbin it's JP to know it's Dave Burke it's Flynn
[02:43:21] Cockran it's Mike's Relee it's Mike Bima and it is now also Jason Gardner Jason is at echelon front
[02:43:33] he just retired and this is what we are doing he's already got gigs booked which is awesome echelon front
[02:43:40] dot com if you need help with leadership in your organization we will help you that's what we do
[02:43:47] we have the master in 2019 23 24 May and Chicago 1920 September in Denver 4 and 5 December
[02:43:57] in Sydney Australia every event we've done has sold out go to extremownership.com if you want to come
[02:44:05] otherwise it's gonna be sold out and you won't be able to come and you'll be all mad and you'll be mad at me
[02:44:11] and then someone said that it's like when I went to Lala Palusa and I went and saw
[02:44:16] Rollins who I kind of knew and I was like hey man can you get us in and Rollins said it be easier to
[02:44:23] sneak you into Fort Knox and I kind of like was all hard to call or like he kind of forgot what it's like
[02:44:31] in the streets but it was an up to him exactly now now I'm the guy now I'm the guy that's going to be
[02:44:38] saying hey be easier to sneak you into Fort Knox I gave you a heads up your big time now so
[02:44:44] we're gonna check that's that EF online online interactive training from echelon front we
[02:44:52] needed to speak to more people and we don't have enough instructors can run enough monsters each
[02:45:00] year so if you want to know what we teach you want to get granular with it check out EF online.com
[02:45:07] and finally we have the EF Overwatch which is where we take guys that came from special operations
[02:45:17] and combat aviation they have massive amounts of experience leadership experience they understand
[02:45:22] the principles we talk about we write about that we teach they understand those and they will
[02:45:27] bring them into your company you can hire them to work and help your organization win EF Overwatch.com
[02:45:36] is where you can make that happen and if you want to keep this conversation going
[02:45:43] which is a pretty varied conversation where we're talking about Star Wars, sniper operations
[02:45:47] and joggers and D&D I mean that's pretty good spectrum you know you might be that D&D
[02:45:54] old school D&D player with your multi-sided dice getting after it and if you want to talk to us
[02:46:03] about that we are on the interwebs we're on Twitter we are on Instagram we are on the FISH
[02:46:11] but echelon was at echelon Charles I am at Jaka Willick Jason is at Jason N Gardner
[02:46:20] Jason N Gardner at on Facebook Jason dot n dot Gardner on Instagram and Jason N Gardner on Twitter
[02:46:29] and you're new to all free platforms no I've been on Instagram the Facebook for a while
[02:46:34] okay just new to Twitter have you ever checked out Twitter before no it's mayhem and then I heard
[02:46:40] I'm gonna have to be careful no no I heard no don't like you do have to be careful yeah
[02:46:45] and you kind of don't but it's weird but then I found out like they were talking about
[02:46:51] maybe Sam Harris and he was talking about there's legitimate there's Russian people Russian
[02:46:56] bots it's not so funny they're sitting there just trolling they're just trying to create mayhem
[02:47:01] so we don't have a lot of mayhem to be quite honest with you there's not a lot of mayhem coming at me
[02:47:06] before whatever reason but everyone's pretty cool and it's I've gotten a lot out of it out of
[02:47:13] Twitter out of Instagram out of Facebook people giving me information recommending books
[02:47:19] I'm I'm the book recommendations because I'm pretty much
[02:47:22] exhausting my personal knowledge of books right now and so right now I'm getting so many good books
[02:47:29] from troopers out there that are letting me know what's up so echo anything else
[02:47:36] any other Star Wars comment well you know not for right now no but now that we know that you know
[02:47:42] we Jason has a knowledge yeah man maybe later but yeah it's for now thanks for thanks for
[02:47:47] Ian here and Jason will continue this conversation you know next podcast anything else any closing
[02:47:53] comments I'm really excited to be on the podcast I just want to tell my wife Iris that she's
[02:48:00] amazing and made my life so much better by meatner my oldest son Chase South proud Ianim of them
[02:48:07] and Storm and Thor love you guys also looking forward to seeing you soon awesome
[02:48:14] and of course we actually could not do this podcast or even live the lives that we live
[02:48:24] if it wasn't for our people in uniform around the world here at home our military personnel
[02:48:32] police and law enforcement firefighters paramedics and EMTs correctional officers border patrol
[02:48:37] all first responders out there thank you for what you do every day so that we can do what we do
[02:48:45] every day and to everyone else that's listening until that next podcast remember that
[02:48:53] advice that Rothgar gave bail-off that you should choose the eternal rewards not the short term ones
[02:49:02] and keep it always in the back of your mind that you're piercing eye will dim and darken
[02:49:15] and death will arrive to sweep you away so until then keep getting out there into the world
[02:49:23] and getting after it and until next time this is Jason Gardner and echo and jocco out