Jocko Podcast 205: Dead Man Walking. Pt.2 with SOG Warrior, Dick Thompson

2019-11-27T20:01:29Z

Join the conversation on Twitter/Instagram: @jockowillink @echocharles @hps_ceo 0:00:00 - Opening 0:02:22 - SOG Warrior Dick Thompson. 2:36:50 - Final Thoughts and take-aways. 2:38:45 - How to Stay on THE PATH. JOCKO STORE Apparel: https://www.jockostore.com/collection... All Supplements: https://originmaine.com/nutrition/joc... Origin Jeans and Clothes: https://originmaine.com/durable-goods/ Origin Gis: https://originmaine.com/bjj-mma-fit/ Onnit Stuff: http://www.onnit.com/jocko The Stress Effect (Book): https://amzn.to/2pCKocA 3:10:12 - Closing Gratitude.

AI summary of episode

You would set down, you're going to rig this thing and for anyone that doesn't know you're on your knees, when you're rigging something like that, you're on your knees, and you're, you know, got to use both your hands. So, you know, I had to, you know, let him go to happy hunting ground wherever, you know, and crawl back and later on that day, my self and the other guy were able to come out on strings and then they really hammered a place there. When that kind of stuff was going on, what did you guys, was that, you know, we look back armchair, quarter back and say, oh, you know, what were they thinking, what were you guys thinking? This is the type of person that I'm thinking that you're going to save, you know, someone like Colonel William Reader who, you know, the stories that he told about being captured. And they said, you know, with an impact that hard, you know, you're bound to have some, you know, some bruises and whatever. I mean, however, I mean, people were being killed almost every week, but, you know, in every two or three weeks, we'd have, you know, like a memorial service. And, you know, so, you know, they said, your, your name's really, you know, terminator. so that he doesn't see me, you know, immediately, then, you know, I can probably wound him, dragging back in, and you know, he'll be ours. And, you know, when we got back, they said, you know, I think there's something wrong with you. We know that part of it, but when he takes you back to the moment, but we really don't know if this guy's going to live or not. And, you know, if he's got buddies, you know, you can only reach so far with a knife, but with that car 15, you reach way out there and tap somebody. So you start, you know, talking back and forth, you know, with, they've got a cubby out in the area now. I tried not to put anything, you know, besides, you know, the the med kit, which was pretty flat, the gals pads and things like that. and so I guess today, you know, in this day when I hear people saying, ban cluster bombs, you know, you use cluster bombs. Sometimes sometimes when we would get back, you know, the team member setting, you know, the American member setting around, sometimes we would say, man, did you see what, here what happened? I kind of trip out like when I go home in this in a lot of ways, but in this particular way where you know how like in the movies. And, you know, I knew we were going to get hammered because they were going to open up on us. I don't remember exactly how many I had, you know, maybe 30 years old, but, you know, a little less than I had. And then he said, he sent out another made a. And said, you know, we're on fire going down. I had commanders, you know, starting with Dick Meadows, that started this thing about, you know, you're the most relentless person I've ever seen. And, you know, I had other commanders that, you know, after that, saying the same thing. You know, you know, anger and not making good decisions and being loud and being confrontational. So, you know, how like you, when I forget to take it, like you kind of look at me crazy. And, you know, it's a lot closer than, you know, 3,000 meters. I mean, when you were talking to Tilt, he was saying, you know, in late 69 and going into 70, whole teams are just disappearing. And then you start, you know, putting those, you know, rounds through there as fast as you can. But just how weird this is where let's say you went back in time and visited, you know, tilt or whoever and say, hey, this is what you're going to do. And the next day there was a hatchet force that was there too that had a mission to go, I don't know what their mission was, but they were going somewhere. And you're doing all this just on top of, you know, losing your friend, your brother Dennis Neill, who completely, you know, disappears. And you know, you know, when you're in a, a dang, uh, captain of America outfit, just walking around. Bruce is, you know, close to me, but I know where he is. I mean, could you, you know, I had thought it was going to be three years. Because if this guy is going to start acting like an idiot, this is going to be a real problem. But, you know, the regular troops rarely, you know, fired on that much. And you know, I don't know if you've seen. And, you know, we didn't have, you know, communication back and forth. I know the answer I know I can do more. And then it was, okay, you got eventually, you know, but a time the next mission came around. And once they got out there and said, you know, where the king of the Hill, they were told, okay, come on back down. You know, to process out, they told me, now you're going to be stuck here for a couple of weeks or so before we can get you on a plane home. I mean, you couldn't just walk around through the cities and, you know, particularly after curfews and things like that. So you know, the controversy is is brewing around a lot of things between us and the aviation commander over what's going on. I think what I'm going to do is just crawl out there because they're, I know they're crawling around that. And they just couldn't believe that I actually went on a mission like that and was able to do, you know, what we did. They're going to know we're coming back. This guy might know you're going to and then they can beat me. You know, because it's just going to try to come up on auto. I mean, these guys for just to be thinking with all this enemy fire coming, they're not going anywhere. Just some just some little kind of nice to know information which you had none of your brief was there's good guys down.

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Episode transcript

[00:00:00] This is Jockel podcast number 205 with echo Charles and me, Jockel Willick. Good evening, echo. Good evening.
[00:00:09] And with us once again is a sag warrior, Dick Thompson, and he, we started on podcast 203.
[00:00:22] So if you haven't listened to that one yet, go back and listen to 203 and we talked for about three hours.
[00:00:30] And now we got to a point where we're going to cover an operation that took place.
[00:00:38] And Dick actually gave me a document based on this operation called, called rest and recuperation, R and R.
[00:00:49] So Dick, welcome back to the podcast. Thank you. Glad to be here.
[00:00:54] And like I said, if you haven't listened to 203 yet, you want to get the background for Dick Thompson,
[00:01:00] Sog warrior, and we're going to jump into this mission once again.
[00:01:07] The title is document that did gave me his rest and recuperation.
[00:01:12] And I'll jump right into it.
[00:01:16] As my eyes opened and I became conscious of the world around me, I could hear the buzzing of a large fly.
[00:01:23] Some muffled Vietnamese voices outside of my hooch and a radio playing by me a ticket on an airplane.
[00:01:32] This song quickly generated memories of my best friend Bob, who had been killed on a mission a few weeks earlier.
[00:01:41] He and I had done everything together, basic training, officer candidate school, airborne, ranger, special forces, and volunteered for Sog.
[00:01:52] We've been together for over two years.
[00:01:55] This song would forever bring back strong memories of the good times we had together.
[00:02:00] We'd often discussed the low probability of either of us returning to the world.
[00:02:07] Bob's death had been a significant emotional event in my life and one thing I was still trying to deal with.
[00:02:16] So here you are.
[00:02:18] How long you've been in Vietnam for at this point?
[00:02:20] You and Bob got to Vietnam together.
[00:02:21] How long you've been there for?
[00:02:23] Six months or so.
[00:02:25] So you've been there for six months after everything that you've been through with Bob.
[00:02:29] And and Bob gets, how did you find out who told you?
[00:02:34] Actually, I got a letter from a girl that my had been dating and Bob was dating her best friend.
[00:02:46] So we were double dating a lot.
[00:02:50] And she found out from Bob's friend who found out from Bob's parents.
[00:02:55] And then she wrote me. So I opened his letter up and you know, there it was.
[00:03:00] And you know, she said, I'm sure you've heard by now.
[00:03:04] And you know, I hadn't.
[00:03:06] But so this is nail mail. This is, this is, yeah.
[00:03:10] So the family had been notified, then the girlfriend had been notified.
[00:03:14] And then the girlfriend writes you, we're talking, you didn't find out for a month.
[00:03:18] Yeah.
[00:03:19] At least.
[00:03:23] That's kind of crazy.
[00:03:25] I mean, that's crazy.
[00:03:27] Yeah, thanks for slow back.
[00:03:28] Well, no, you're that. And this is something that Tillton I talked about was,
[00:03:32] you guys didn't always get the best turnover of information because everything was so secret.
[00:03:36] So this is an example of everything so secret that your best friend gets killed.
[00:03:41] And you don't even find out about it.
[00:03:43] You find out about it from your, your girlfriend's friend, which is his girlfriend.
[00:03:49] Yeah.
[00:03:50] So I mean, he was a, he was down at CC, see.
[00:03:55] So I mean, we didn't really know what their missions were or what they were doing.
[00:03:59] So being on a team, I didn't know what they were doing down there.
[00:04:05] And, you know, we didn't have, you know, communication back and forth.
[00:04:09] So I didn't know what he was doing.
[00:04:11] So it was tough.
[00:04:13] Plus, mail that you got didn't go directly to you.
[00:04:20] All mail, if you were sending me up, like my mother sent me a letter,
[00:04:25] it didn't go to me. It went to me through another mail center and be a nom.
[00:04:33] That then sent the mail to CCN because it had to be screened because they didn't want anything
[00:04:42] about classified operations.
[00:04:44] Mail going out had to be screened.
[00:04:46] So any letter I sent would, you know, start at CCN.
[00:04:50] It would go down to the sideguide.
[00:04:52] It would be screened.
[00:04:54] And then eventually, you know, it would be mail to her.
[00:04:57] So now, is this just confirming, like, you know, we talked about on the last podcast that you're thinking you're knocking up.
[00:05:04] You're 22 now.
[00:05:05] You didn't think you were going to make it to 22.
[00:05:07] Is this got to be confirming that you're not going to see 23?
[00:05:10] Yeah, kind of got my attention.
[00:05:13] So, and the other thing is there's no, I mean, you, there's no ceremony.
[00:05:18] There's no, well, not, there wasn't where we were.
[00:05:23] Okay. I mean, we had ceremonies on a regular basis at CCN for the guys there who would be in kill.
[00:05:29] I mean, however, I mean, people were being killed almost every week,
[00:05:34] but, you know, in every two or three weeks, we'd have, you know, like a memorial service.
[00:05:40] So, all right. So back to this story.
[00:05:47] As I looked up, I could see my car 15 hanging just above my head.
[00:05:51] I had on my normal sleeping attire, shirt, fatigue, pants, and jungle boots.
[00:05:55] Our compound was hit with rockets, mortars, and ground attacks on a regular enough basis that you had to be prepared to react quickly.
[00:06:01] Although it was only a little after nine o'clock in the morning,
[00:06:05] the temperature inside my room was already in the 90s, and I was soaked with sweat.
[00:06:09] But my mind began to travel back through the past two weeks and recall how my team had barely escaped the NVA during the last mission.
[00:06:16] We had made it back to our compound in Denang and spent the last two days undergoing a very intense debriefing session,
[00:06:22] conducted by our intelligence team at an effort to collect all the information they could about our mission.
[00:06:28] The next two days were mine for R&R, REST and Recruperation, before we began preparing for another mission.
[00:06:35] My plan was to sleep late each morning, eat real food, take several showers, and rest.
[00:06:41] We had to say that Denang is all right, and it had a lot of meaning right now, of course everything is relative.
[00:06:49] So there you go. You've finally got a couple days down time.
[00:06:52] You're going to eat some steak and enjoy yourself.
[00:06:56] This was Sunday morning in the mess hall, served as served breakfast until lunch.
[00:07:00] Soon I was eating and looking forward to the evening meal.
[00:07:03] Our mess sergeant always managed to have plenty of tea bone steaks every Sunday evening.
[00:07:07] No one asked where he got them because it was certainly not standard rations for a combat unit.
[00:07:12] Everyone would agree with his steak to his own perfection.
[00:07:14] This was something we all looked forward to.
[00:07:17] When you've been on mission for several days or weeks, eating one meal a day, usually rice and fish heads.
[00:07:23] This was a feast.
[00:07:25] So you're living large.
[00:07:27] Oh yeah. That's a great.
[00:07:29] After I finished breakfast, experience told me that I better go make myself invisible until it was time to go back to work.
[00:07:35] If you could be seen, you could be given work to do while you are on R&R.
[00:07:39] I decided to go off-limit to an off-limit section of the Nang where we had a safe house.
[00:07:43] The safe house was a secret location, CCN, R unit, owned, and protected.
[00:07:49] It was heavily guarded by mercenaries and only accessible to buy our people.
[00:07:54] My get out of jail free card, which was a special card that authorized us to travel in civilian clothes,
[00:08:00] carry conceal weapons, enter classified and restricted areas, etc.
[00:08:04] Would allow me to travel into this area of the Nang even during curfew.
[00:08:08] This would be my best chance of enjoying the next two days.
[00:08:11] Everything was looking good and I was beginning to relax.
[00:08:14] So you get the little get out of jail free card, huh?
[00:08:17] Yeah.
[00:08:18] I'm not sure everyone had them, but I know some of us live.
[00:08:23] And it basically said, don't mess over this guy.
[00:08:27] I mean, you couldn't just walk around through the cities and, you know, particularly after curfews and things like that.
[00:08:35] Or you would get picked up.
[00:08:37] You'd be in trouble, but with that card when I flashed that,
[00:08:42] they either let me go or they would call the phone number on there and be told, letting go.
[00:08:49] And don't ask him what he's doing, just leaving him on.
[00:08:54] It's legit continuing on.
[00:08:58] The sky had become overcast and it looked like it would probably rain by afternoon.
[00:09:02] The temperature was steadily climbing and the humidity was outproaching 100%.
[00:09:05] This type of heat and humidity had a debilitating effect on everyone.
[00:09:08] As I was walking toward the compounds gate, I heard the familiar,
[00:09:13] w-w-w-w-w-w-l-sound of a helicopter.
[00:09:16] I could see that it was approaching our helicopter. There was- there seemed to be a flurry of activity in that area.
[00:09:21] I was only about 100 meters from it as the chopper landed.
[00:09:25] The strong smell of JP4 was mixed with a wind and sand that hit my face.
[00:09:29] The men running around had placed some bags in the cargo compartment of the chopper and we're now talking to the crew chief.
[00:09:36] One of them spotted me and began yelling something at me.
[00:09:39] The sound of the helicopter prevented me from understanding what he was saying.
[00:09:42] It was obvious that he was very excited about something. He began to run toward me still shouting.
[00:09:48] As he got close, I heard him yell, LT,
[00:09:51] Do you know how to hook up a McGuire rig?
[00:09:53] A McGuire rig is 120 to 150 foot nylon rope with a large loop made out of heavy padded strap attached to the end of it.
[00:10:00] A bag of sand is tied to the loop to give it the momentum to penetrate the jungle canopy.
[00:10:05] The other end of the rope is attached to the floor of the helicopter.
[00:10:08] The rope is stowed inside a sandbag and a manner that allows it to feed without tangling.
[00:10:13] It is used when team members have to be extracted from the jungle where the helicopter cannot land.
[00:10:18] The team members sits inside the strap and fastens his left wrist to the strap through small loop.
[00:10:23] This prevents him from falling completely out of the rig if he is shot or when he is drugged through treetops during extraction.
[00:10:30] It would be very uncomfortable and painful to hang by one arm, but at least you would get out.
[00:10:37] As we ran to the helicopter, he told me that we had a team in trouble with casualties.
[00:10:41] One of our CH34 helicopters had gone into the area to attempt an extraction.
[00:10:46] During the attempt, it had been shot down and apparently exploded and burned on impact.
[00:10:51] There appeared to be two or three survivors.
[00:10:54] Another helicopter left a few minutes ago to try and help.
[00:10:57] There were no LZs in the area, just a very high and thick jungle canopy.
[00:11:03] The McGuire rigs would be needed for extraction.
[00:11:06] This is all spinning up and you are hearing about what is happening.
[00:11:12] You are 10 minutes from walking out the gate and being on our fur a couple days.
[00:11:18] Our last.
[00:11:20] I know how to do this. I do it all the time.
[00:11:24] I am usually on the other end of that rope.
[00:11:27] When you walked over the river, you think you are just going to rig it?
[00:11:30] That is why you were asked.
[00:11:32] You know how to put them in there.
[00:11:34] He is saying, hey, we got to get them a Gwire rig rigged.
[00:11:38] Do you know how to do it? Yes, you know how to do it.
[00:11:40] Cool. Come on over to the helicopter and you are thinking, I will help you guys rig.
[00:11:45] There is troops on the ground and contact. They need help.
[00:11:48] Okay, got it.
[00:11:50] Here we go.
[00:11:51] I took one look at the gate.
[00:11:53] About 150 meters away as we continue to run.
[00:11:56] The plans I had for my day were quickly being put on hold as my adrenaline level climbed.
[00:12:00] In my mind, I could see the smoldering remains of a burned helicopter dead and wounded crew members
[00:12:05] and the bad guys moving in for the final kill.
[00:12:08] Time was of the essence. I had to quickly rig the helicopter so they could go to the area and get the survivors out.
[00:12:16] As I approached the helicopter, I leaned my car 15 and ammunition band allure against the connex container.
[00:12:22] I climbed into the cargo compartment of the helicopter and began working feverously to attach them a Gwire rigs.
[00:12:28] After a few minutes, the crew chief leaned over to me and said, the team isn't heavy contact.
[00:12:32] We have to go.
[00:12:34] At that point, I realized I had been concentrating so much on what I was doing.
[00:12:38] I had not noticed the pilot had turned up the engine RPMs and the aircraft was beginning to vibrate.
[00:12:44] In fact, we were lifting off the ground.
[00:12:47] I pulled the crew chief over to me and said, I'm not supposed to be on here.
[00:12:51] He looked back at me and shrugged his shoulders as if to say, sorry about that.
[00:12:56] That was one of those common sayings in Vietnam.
[00:13:01] Sorry about that.
[00:13:04] I mean, you saw it all over the place.
[00:13:06] You heard people saying that.
[00:13:08] Anytime something was happening, like that, it was sorry about that.
[00:13:12] Yeah.
[00:13:13] Anytime something was happening, like you're getting, you don't have your weapon.
[00:13:17] So that's a key point.
[00:13:18] You would set down, you're going to rig this thing and for anyone that doesn't know you're on your knees,
[00:13:22] when you're rigging something like that, you're on your knees,
[00:13:24] and you're, you know, got to use both your hands.
[00:13:27] So you just thought, you yourself, oh, cool.
[00:13:29] Well, I said, my, my mission right now is just to rig this thing.
[00:13:32] What's going to expediate that the most is, or expedite that the most is for me just to put my weapon down over here.
[00:13:38] I'll get on there.
[00:13:39] I'll get it rigged and then I'll get out.
[00:13:40] That's the fastest way for me to get this done.
[00:13:42] All right.
[00:13:43] Next thing you know, the helicopter's taken off.
[00:13:45] Yeah.
[00:13:46] Sorry about that.
[00:13:47] Yeah.
[00:13:48] As I looked down and saw the compounds gate.
[00:13:51] As I looked down, I saw the compounds gate passed under me.
[00:13:53] I sat back against the fire wall, fastened to seat belt around my waist and resigned myself to the fact that my R&R would be delayed a couple of hours.
[00:14:00] As we flew and I began to realize that it had not known where I was going.
[00:14:03] What I, what I was going to do and was naked.
[00:14:07] I'd left my weapon and ammunition leaning against the connox.
[00:14:10] I was flying into combat without a weapon.
[00:14:13] The only thing I had was my fatigue and boots and a pounding heart.
[00:14:17] What a Sunday afternoon of R&R.
[00:14:19] This was turning into.
[00:14:21] About 15 minutes into the flight.
[00:14:24] My mind began to play out different scenarios of what might happen when we arrived on the battle site.
[00:14:28] One began to stick in my mind.
[00:14:30] What if the aircraft ahead of us is shot down?
[00:14:34] What if the only way to save them is for someone to go down there using them a Guyer rig?
[00:14:39] What if I have to climb down one of the ropes?
[00:14:41] I don't even have a weapon.
[00:14:43] About this time the crew chief pulled me toward him and said,
[00:14:47] the aircraft in front of us has been shot down.
[00:14:51] The team is still in heavy contact and cannot go to the crash site.
[00:14:55] We'll be there in about 10 minutes.
[00:14:57] The Pucker Factor just increased significantly.
[00:15:00] My premonition was becoming a reality.
[00:15:04] As I was thinking, I saw this play out.
[00:15:09] It was like watching a video.
[00:15:11] I mean, I could see the whole thing just taking place.
[00:15:15] That's the premonition.
[00:15:18] This is what's going to happen.
[00:15:21] When he told me that aircraft is down, I told him.
[00:15:26] It goes ahead and said something.
[00:15:28] He said it's happening.
[00:15:30] It's starting now.
[00:15:32] This is a crazy thought that you say to yourself,
[00:15:37] what if the aircraft ahead of us get shot down?
[00:15:40] Seconds later, he looks at you and says the aircraft in front of us is shot down.
[00:15:44] That's a nightmare.
[00:15:49] Going on, the crew chief and the other door gunner test fired their machine guns to make sure they were working properly.
[00:15:55] This brought about a sudden increase in my excitement level.
[00:15:59] Test fired the door guns always seemed to insert a sense of morality,
[00:16:03] mortality into what I was about to do.
[00:16:06] In a few minutes, the crew chief pulled me over again and said,
[00:16:10] it's just over this ridge line.
[00:16:12] I unfasten my seat belt and crawled over to the edge of the cargo compartment,
[00:16:16] so I could see better.
[00:16:17] As we came over the ridge line, we were welcomed by bad guys.
[00:16:21] A stream of automatic weapons fire with some green treasures mixed in past by.
[00:16:26] The loud crack of each bullet could easily be heard over the noise of the helicopter.
[00:16:30] Both door gunners opened up and began sending a hail of bullets through the jungle canopy.
[00:16:34] The most fearful part of combat for me had always been getting shot at while in a helicopter.
[00:16:39] There is no protection. The floor and the sides of a helicopter just don't stop bullets.
[00:16:44] My arousal level was continuing to climb.
[00:16:48] The pilot made a quick turn and bank the helicopter on its side.
[00:16:52] I was looking straight down at the jungle canopy and hanging on for my life.
[00:16:55] Smoke was coming up through a hole in the canopy where the first helicopter had gone down and burned.
[00:17:00] As we circled around the steep side of the mountain,
[00:17:02] we saw another hole in the canopy about 200 meters from the first.
[00:17:06] When we approached this hole and slowed down the ground fire, coming up at us increased.
[00:17:10] Shell casings from the door guns were piling up on the floor.
[00:17:13] Some were falling out.
[00:17:15] As we passed directly over the hole, I could see the second helicopter lying on its side in the steep ravine.
[00:17:20] The tail section was broken off and I thought I saw a crew member still in the aircraft.
[00:17:26] We circled around and came in for a closer look.
[00:17:29] This time I could see the aircraft was trapped inside the aircraft and fuel was spilling out on them.
[00:17:35] Any spark from inside the craft or a trace around would ignite the fuel and burn them alive.
[00:17:40] The door gunners were continuing to place your press and fire in the position shooting at us.
[00:17:44] It wasn't really having much effect on them.
[00:17:46] But let's we're coming up at us from all directions.
[00:17:49] We also detected some movement that indicated the bad guys were working their way up the mountain to the crash site.
[00:17:55] Something had to be done and fast.
[00:17:58] I'm trying to think of myself if anything could be worse right now.
[00:18:05] But I actually can't think of anything worse through this right now.
[00:18:08] Well, I knew what was coming.
[00:18:11] So I mean, I had already seen it play out.
[00:18:13] I mean, at this point is only one thing you can do.
[00:18:16] You got to go down there.
[00:18:18] And these helicopter pilots, these guys are bad ass.
[00:18:24] I mean, these guys for just to be thinking with all this enemy fire coming, they're not going anywhere.
[00:18:30] They're going to get this done.
[00:18:32] Yeah, because they've got that's their friends.
[00:18:34] Yeah, friends are down there now.
[00:18:42] Back to the book here.
[00:18:43] I told the crew chief to tell the pilot to go back to the crash site and I would drop him a
[00:18:48] goire rig down into the canopy, climb down to it, then climb down a tree to the ground.
[00:18:56] So I'm going to say that one more time.
[00:18:58] Your plan was to throw this rope out of the aircraft, climb down into the canopy somewhere
[00:19:04] once you were getting in the trees, then you would just climb down the trees until you got to the ground.
[00:19:09] That was your plan.
[00:19:10] My stress level was a little high.
[00:19:12] So I probably wasn't making the best plans that I could.
[00:19:16] But at the time that was the only way I could see to get down to him.
[00:19:22] When he told him, this is the crew chief talking to the pilot.
[00:19:25] When the crew chief told the pilot, both the pilot and the co-pilot looked around over their shoulders
[00:19:30] as if to say to me, are you crazy?
[00:19:33] The crew chief leaned over and said, the pilot says you're crazy.
[00:19:37] I told him to tell the pilot that I might be crazy, but his buddies were going to die if I a horrible
[00:19:42] death in a few minutes if we didn't do something.
[00:19:46] He quickly turned the aircraft around and flew back to the crash site.
[00:19:50] I pushed out one of the McGuire rigs and the bag of sand quickly took it into the canopy.
[00:19:56] We were still receiving heavy ground fire.
[00:19:59] At this point we were approximately 50 feet above the canopy.
[00:20:03] I happened to see that the crew chief had an M16 strapped the wall behind him.
[00:20:07] I told him to give it to me.
[00:20:08] He was a little hesitant at first, probably because he thought he would never see
[00:20:11] it again.
[00:20:12] He handed it to me along with a bandelier of four magazines.
[00:20:15] I chambered around and checked the safety and fought great.
[00:20:18] I'm going into the middle of the battle myself by myself with a hundred rounds of ammunition.
[00:20:29] Yeah.
[00:20:30] And it gets worse.
[00:20:34] I mean, this is not a good scenario for in terms of survivability at all.
[00:20:41] At all.
[00:20:41] Are you thinking about that or are you just trying to think of what you're just doing
[00:20:47] the best you can?
[00:20:48] Doing what I got to work with.
[00:20:49] We got to get those guys out.
[00:20:53] I stepped out onto the skater the helicopter confident that I had a workable plan.
[00:20:57] As I grabbed the rope with my bare hands, I realized it was brand new white nylon rope.
[00:21:02] New nylon ropes are very slick.
[00:21:04] I knew I was going to be tough to hold on, but I figured I could wrap my feet around
[00:21:09] it and make it work.
[00:21:10] The crew chief leaned over and said the pilot says we're receiving too much ground fire.
[00:21:13] We're going to have to leave.
[00:21:14] I knew it was now or never.
[00:21:16] I stepped off the skid and quickly began to discover some flaws in my plan.
[00:21:21] That's an interesting decision point right there.
[00:21:24] Because you got it out.
[00:21:26] You've got it out right there of, hey, it's too much ground fire.
[00:21:29] Sorry, I couldn't get down there.
[00:21:30] And instead of you saying, hey, sorry, we had to leave.
[00:21:32] And I'm sorry, I couldn't go.
[00:21:34] You said it's now or never.
[00:21:35] You stepped off the skid and descended into hell.
[00:21:40] I could not hold the slick rope tight enough.
[00:21:44] It began to slide through my hands at a faster and faster rate after about 30 feet.
[00:21:48] The white rope began to turn red.
[00:21:50] It had burned the skin off the inside of my hands.
[00:21:53] And I was bleeding badly and could not slow down to make matters worth.
[00:21:57] The rope no longer reached the canopy.
[00:22:00] The aircraft was beginning to move because of the ground fire and it lifted the end of the rope
[00:22:05] about 10 to 15 feet above the tree tops.
[00:22:08] My rate of descent was increasing rapidly and the only thing I could, that could prevent my death
[00:22:14] was to be able to hold onto the maguire rig at the end of the rope.
[00:22:18] So now the end of the rope is 15 feet above the canopy.
[00:22:24] Which means if you fall off of it, you're going to go 10 to 15 feet of airborne.
[00:22:29] And then you're going to hit the trees.
[00:22:34] Unknown to me at this time our tactical operation center in the compound was monitoring the helicopter's radio frequency.
[00:22:39] I found out later that about this time a fourth aircraft had arrived in the area and was observing my descent.
[00:22:44] He radioed my aircraft and asked who the hell is that.
[00:22:48] The reply was, some crazy special forces guy.
[00:22:51] At the time that probably would have been my reply too.
[00:22:55] When I hit the maguire rig I closed down with every ounce of strength I had left and I stopped.
[00:23:01] The pain in my hands was unreal blood was running down my arms.
[00:23:04] It seemed as if the bad guys had stopped shooting at the helicopter and were shooting at me.
[00:23:09] As I looked up I could see the red streams of tracers coming down from the door gunners and the green tracers going up.
[00:23:15] The loud cracking sounds of bullets were all around me. I was now also now swinging on the end of a large pendulum about 10 feet above the canopy.
[00:23:23] I knew the canopy was about 150 feet above the jungle floor.
[00:23:28] My strength was gone. It was decision time.
[00:23:31] I decided that as I swung over the center of the next tree top I would let go and try to grab hold of something as I crashed through the canopy.
[00:23:42] Once again this is ridiculous.
[00:23:46] This is when I watch a stupid action movie and they show some guy jumping out of a hell of a helicopter or jumping off of a cliff and landing in the trees.
[00:23:57] And I was like, that's that's BS. That would never work.
[00:24:01] Apparently I need to spend more time hanging out with you to figure out what's going to work and what's not.
[00:24:06] So that's your plan. Your plan is that you're 10 feet above the 150 foot tall jungle canopy when you see a good target to jump into you're going to go.
[00:24:16] Back to this book. I looked down and as I centered the tree top I let go.
[00:24:21] The fall brought my stomach up in my throat. The sensation was quickly overcome by the impact with the jungle canopy.
[00:24:29] I grabbed wildly as I crashed through the limbs but just couldn't seem to hold on to anything. I was moving too fast and was just bouncing off limbs leaving blood and skin on each one.
[00:24:39] Finally I hit a limb with my stomach and wrapped around it and knocked the breath out of me but I had stopped falling.
[00:24:45] After a few minutes I was able to begin my descent. There was only about 50 feet to go which means you had thumpled through a hundred feet of jungle canopy.
[00:24:56] This is again you might have been thinking the same thing that I thought I can pull this off until your father that thing you go. I was this isn't working the way I thought it was going to work.
[00:25:06] I didn't have much I felt I didn't have much choice. I knew I couldn't hold on to the McGuire rig and you were used to fix and fly away.
[00:25:14] I was going to be much higher and when I fell off that would be it. At least now I was 10 feet of both something and I might have a chance if I let go and dropped into it.
[00:25:27] Trying to hold on to that thing. I wouldn't have lasted a couple more minutes and then that would have been it.
[00:25:35] I was not going to do anything. I was going to do something. I'm giving you about max hero credit on each and every decision that's being made whether it was falling.
[00:25:48] When you said hey I'm going that's all I need to hear.
[00:25:52] When I finally reached the ground I had to lie behind the tree for a few minutes to rest. At this point I had very little skin on the palms. My hands are inside my fingers.
[00:26:00] My fingers dirt and tree bark were all in my hands. There were numerous other cuts and bruises caused by the fall.
[00:26:05] Through the tree fortunately I still had my I still had the M16 and band allure but I had lost the magazine that was in the rifle during the fall.
[00:26:13] I was now down to 81 rounds. There was one in the chamber.
[00:26:16] I could hear the fire flight the team was involved in about 2 to 300 meters from me.
[00:26:22] More guy, bad guys were probably moving around the jungle. A feeling of loneliness crept over me as I realized that not only would the bad guys be shooting at me but so would the team because they probably did not know I was on the ground.
[00:26:35] I moved out rapidly in the direction of the crash site that was no time to waste. I'd only moved about 50 meters when I heard a twig break to my left.
[00:26:43] As I looked in that direction I saw 2 soldiers with AK 47's about 30 meters away moving parallel to me. Just as I turned my weapon toward them they both saw me and began to turn their weapons toward me.
[00:26:53] In the next fraction of a second I had to decide if they were really bad guys or two of the team members dressed like bad guys.
[00:26:59] I had practiced an immediate action drill for just such an occasion hundreds of times on our firing range and used it in previous encounters.
[00:27:08] I was in a position to take them out as I dove for the ground I emptied a 20 round magazine on them.
[00:27:14] It was a tight shot group and I saw both of them get hit several times as I quickly changed magazines. I watched and listened for any signs of life from their position.
[00:27:24] They had gone down in the undergrowth where I could not see them. My attack had been so sudden and violent that they had not been able to return fire.
[00:27:31] I decided that those two were not going to cause me any more trouble. I called up the hill a ways and then continued to move toward the crash site.
[00:27:44] That's that immediate action drill that you talked about or take the shots as you're going down.
[00:27:49] You chew full auto.
[00:27:51] Well, yeah. In that situation you don't fault you shot full auto.
[00:28:01] If I can spray a relatively tight shot group, I'm going to get them and I know I got hit a more than one second.
[00:28:09] I can't just pop off a couple of rounds because if I shoot it one that gives the other one the chance to shoot at me.
[00:28:14] So I go for both moments same time. Was the team that you were going to rescue? Was that another?
[00:28:22] It was a team in country thing.
[00:28:25] So you know that they're on the ground out there too.
[00:28:28] I knew when I saw these two guys were the AK 40-cellens.
[00:28:35] I could hear the M16 fire. I knew it was not a team that was carrying AK 40-cellens.
[00:28:41] They said it'd be bad guys.
[00:28:44] Yeah, because going into this you had no any if you had spent 10 minutes getting a brief on what was happening.
[00:28:49] You would have found out how big the team was. What kind of weapons they had.
[00:28:53] Just some just some little kind of nice to know information which you had none of your brief was there's good guys down.
[00:29:01] Yeah.
[00:29:02] And sorry about that.
[00:29:04] Yeah. And sorry.
[00:29:07] After moving about 150 meters a shot was fired at me. I thought it sounded strange as I'd deal for cover.
[00:29:12] It wasn't a rifle. It was a pistol probably a 38 caliber.
[00:29:15] AK 47's made a different and very distinguishable sound. The helicopter crew was shooting at me.
[00:29:20] The pilot managed to crawl out of the wreckage and this is from the down helicopter.
[00:29:23] The pilot managed to crawl out of the wreckage, seen my movement and begun firing at me with his 38.
[00:29:28] I yelled at him and told him I was a good guy. He did not believe me and continued to shoot.
[00:29:32] My experience had been that helicopter pilots were very cool, calm and in control when they were in the air.
[00:29:39] The jungle was a different matter. He continued to fire me until he had to reload at that point. I rushed him and got the drop on him.
[00:29:47] He was battered, wounded, bloody and exhausted and kept asking me where my other men were.
[00:29:52] He found it hard to believe that I was alone.
[00:29:55] I eventually convinced him that it was just me and that we had to get his men out of the aircraft to quickly spot why moved him to a very dense
[00:30:01] location of the jungle a short distance away and continued to go back and retrieve the crew one at a time.
[00:30:06] Most of the crew had lost a lot of blood and required immediate first aid. They were all injured as a result of the crash.
[00:30:11] The pilot had broken ribs, broken arm, cut some bruises, the copilot had a compound fracture of the femur.
[00:30:17] The bone was sticking out of his thigh.
[00:30:19] Cut some bruises. The crew chief had been shot in the leg and the door gunner in the arm. All four were soaked in JP4.
[00:30:26] A spark would have made torches of them all.
[00:30:28] I told the pilot that I was going to get help for him and to keep everyone hidden quiet and not to shoot anyone unless they physically stepped on them.
[00:30:40] Yeah.
[00:30:43] I began to move out toward the other crash site. By this time that firefight had stopped and I was not sure where the team or the enemy were.
[00:30:51] My movement was very cautious because of the team saw my movement they would open fire and they would not miss.
[00:30:58] As I near the other crash site, I heard some movement up, up front and some muffled voices.
[00:31:04] I moved very slowly and deliberately. I heard an American voice at this point. I could only assume that the enemy had captured one of the survivors from the first crash.
[00:31:11] My plan was to move in as closely as possible and look for an opportunity to attack and free the American.
[00:31:17] As I crept closer and closer to the group, I eventually got close enough to see an American sergeant that I recognized.
[00:31:23] He was the team leader of the team that was on the ground.
[00:31:26] We still armed and obviously not a prisoner.
[00:31:29] So this is about the first good situation that's unfolded.
[00:31:32] Yeah.
[00:31:33] You got some brothers now that are going to be able to work with you in some way.
[00:31:38] I got down behind a tree and yelled in and I was coming in and for him to have his people hold their fire.
[00:31:45] After he told me it was okay, I stood up slowly with my M16 and the air and walked toward the group.
[00:31:50] Once inside there perimeter I discovered that the loud American was the loud American voice was that of the American Lieutenant Colonel who had been the pilot of the first aircraft to be shot down.
[00:31:59] He was not very happy about what was going on and was giving the sergeant a hard time.
[00:32:04] Speaking of stress, right?
[00:32:09] You know, you know, anger and not making good decisions and being loud and being confrontational.
[00:32:17] So this Lieutenant Colonel is doing all those things.
[00:32:19] He's being confrontational with a sergeant.
[00:32:21] You don't want to do that.
[00:32:23] You did not want to do that.
[00:32:25] I informed the Lieutenant Colonel that I was the senior ground commander and was now in charge of the operation.
[00:32:30] The fact that a Lieutenant Colonel out ranks the Lieutenant did not matter because he was air force and we were on the ground.
[00:32:35] He became very upset and began to threaten me about what was going to happen to me when we got to safety.
[00:32:40] About that time the mercenaries on the team had heard enough.
[00:32:43] Several of them turned their weapons toward the Lieutenant Colonel and made some very cold and serious remarks.
[00:32:49] The interpreter told the Lieutenant Colonel that the Lieutenant wasn't charged and that everyone would do what I said.
[00:32:55] The Lieutenant Colonel realized they were ready to kill him if he did not submit that ended the discussion.
[00:33:02] So that's what happens when you when you try and get confrontational with the sergeant team on the ground.
[00:33:07] Yeah, I mean you don't know.
[00:33:09] The serge teams get very closely bonded.
[00:33:11] They're very closely bonded to the ones zero one one, you know, to their Americans.
[00:33:16] You don't mess with them anywhere.
[00:33:18] I mean they will defend that team.
[00:33:21] They'll defend those Americans.
[00:33:23] I mean even inside the compound you don't want to mess with them.
[00:33:26] I mean the compound is kind of like the old West.
[00:33:31] Everybody there is carrying a gun and there's locked in loaves not like the regular military units around.
[00:33:39] But the can't have a magazine in the gun.
[00:33:44] We were locked and loaded all the time.
[00:33:47] Yeah, it had frag grenades, you had all that stuff and you got these little pods moving around.
[00:33:53] And they're autonomous.
[00:33:55] Don't mess with my guy.
[00:33:57] Yeah, because they're locking load on you.
[00:34:02] And now we're out in the jungle.
[00:34:03] Yeah.
[00:34:04] And they see this guy as a threat.
[00:34:05] Yeah, a threat to their survival too.
[00:34:08] You know, a threat to you as the leader threat to their team and a threat to this survival.
[00:34:13] Because if this guy is going to start acting like an idiot, this is going to be a real problem.
[00:34:18] Yeah.
[00:34:19] So they put an end to that.
[00:34:21] Our next step was to move back down to the first crash site and recover the bodies.
[00:34:26] During this time, I discovered that there had been three survivors of the original crash, the Lieutenant Colonel, which was the pilot of Vietnamese Lieutenant Colonel,
[00:34:33] Copilot and an American sergeant.
[00:34:35] The Vietnamese and the sergeant had been badly injured and burned in the crash.
[00:34:39] The second helicopter to arrive on the site had lowered a jungle penetrator and Lieutenant Colonel had strapped them into it.
[00:34:46] Unfortunately, as they were being hoisted up through the jungle canopy, the second helicopter was also shot down.
[00:34:52] As it went forward, the jungle penetrator hung up on a large tree and the steel cable broke.
[00:35:00] The two men still strapped to the penetrator, fell across me, a hundred feet and landed head first on a large rock killing them instantly.
[00:35:09] We found the bodies and unhooked them from the jungle penetrator.
[00:35:12] When I got, when I picked up the American and put him over my shoulder, the air rushed out of his lungs.
[00:35:18] He was the smell of death as we worked our way back up the hill, it began to rain.
[00:35:25] So the second one had actually started to extract the team.
[00:35:30] And that's when they got shot down.
[00:35:33] They were extracting the wounded from the first aircraft.
[00:35:38] And you might want to edit out the smell of the attack, the little statements. Just in case some family members should listen to this.
[00:35:50] I think, for as parents are gone now, but he may still have brothers, sisters or somebody.
[00:35:59] Just so it doesn't sound so bad.
[00:36:06] Once inside the main perimeter, we laid the bodies down alongside each other.
[00:36:12] The heads were a bloody mess, and since we did not wear names on our uniforms, I did not know who I had carried up the hill.
[00:36:19] At this point, I asked the Lieutenant Colonel who the young sergeant was.
[00:36:23] The already-sickening feeling of my stomach increased tremendously when I heard his name.
[00:36:29] He was a friend of mine who I had joked with days before.
[00:36:32] I felt no remorse for the two NVA had killed an hour ago, but the sight of a dead American,
[00:36:37] especially a friend, created a range of emotions from deep sadness to extreme anger toward the enemy.
[00:36:43] One of the first rules you are taught when you arrive in country is not to get close to anyone,
[00:36:48] but there's no way you can prevent it.
[00:36:51] We covered them with ponchos and wandered to where and wondered where the bad guys were.
[00:36:58] My next problem was the pilots. They were still out there alone.
[00:37:02] I took 14 members and moved cautiously to their location and established a security force around them.
[00:37:08] To get everyone out, I would have to blow down some trees and bring in some helicopter gunships to suppress enemy fire,
[00:37:14] while everyone was hoisted up into helicopters.
[00:37:17] I had been able to contact the rear using the team's radio and had the necessary demolitions on the way.
[00:37:26] You and this, not only with some other person's gun and four magazines,
[00:37:31] you also didn't even have a radio.
[00:37:34] Nothing. That was not good.
[00:37:39] By the time the helicopter arrived with the demolitions, the weather was closing in.
[00:37:43] Man, this is just Murphy's Law.
[00:37:45] The weather was closing in. The rain was coming down harder and the clouds were moving down the mountain.
[00:37:51] We would have to work fast just to beat the weather. The enemy had been quiet until the arrival of a helicopter.
[00:37:56] Now we could hear them all around us shooting up at the helicopter.
[00:37:59] About the time the demolitions came crashing to the ground, the gunships arrived.
[00:38:03] We signaled our location and I had the sergeant begin to work working air strikes all around us.
[00:38:09] While the gunships were keeping the enemy busy, I carried 50 pounds of C4, blasting caps, time fuse and debt cord to it.
[00:38:16] Location near the pilots. I placed enough of them.
[00:38:19] I placed enough of the demolitions on trees and dropped them.
[00:38:21] This opened up a large enough hole in the canopy to give us a better chance of not having a repeat of the last jungle penetrator incident.
[00:38:28] So you, I mean, this is taking time.
[00:38:32] This is a, I mean to sit there in rig 50 pounds of demo on a bunch of trees and then put the blasting caps in.
[00:38:39] This is like, this is taking what? A half an hour to get this done.
[00:38:43] Yeah, probably. But you know, I didn't use all 50 pounds.
[00:38:47] That is part of just enough to cut the tree on it and get them down.
[00:38:51] But yeah, they all had to be rigged. You had to take the things under the trees, put the blasting caps in and set them off.
[00:38:57] They had to make sure they were not going to fall the wrong way.
[00:39:00] But, you know, that's why they called me dynamite.
[00:39:03] So I like to, I like to blow things up.
[00:39:09] The CH47 that had dropped the demolitions returned and hovered over the hole.
[00:39:15] As a began to lower the jungle penetrator, the enemy ground fire increased dramatically.
[00:39:19] And both door gunners open fire with their 50 caliber machine guns.
[00:39:23] Not only could we hear the very loud slow distinctive sound.
[00:39:26] But the 50 caliber casings began to rain down on us.
[00:39:30] After falling 150 feet, that enough velocity to do a lot of damage.
[00:39:33] We could see large red tracer's penetrating deep into the jungle.
[00:39:37] The two gun chips were now raining bullets down through the trees with their miniguns up to 4,000 rounds a minute per gun.
[00:39:43] Firing 40 millimeter grenades and 2.75 inch rockets with 17 pound high explosive warheads.
[00:39:50] The popping and cracking sound of the bullets and explosions of the grenades and rockets were exacerbated by falling tree limbs and trap them flying in every direction.
[00:39:59] The darkening sky made the tracers appear very bright.
[00:40:02] The hot wet jungle air was becoming smoky and filled with the smell of burned cordite and gunpowder.
[00:40:10] That's enough firepower going down range.
[00:40:17] You can't simulate that.
[00:40:19] The guv watched the craziest hollywood movie and they don't make it look like what that's.
[00:40:23] What that's what you just described right there.
[00:40:28] By the time the jungle penetrator reached the ground, we had drugged the co-pilot and crew chief over to where it landed.
[00:40:35] We strapped them on as quickly as possible and signaled to pull them up.
[00:40:39] There was no way to support the broken leg and we could hear the copilot screams over the battle sounds as he was going up.
[00:40:45] They say that a compound fracture of the femur is one of the most painful wounds you can have.
[00:40:50] After seeing the pain he was in, I believe it.
[00:40:53] The trip up took about 2 minutes.
[00:40:56] We sent another two crew members up next followed by the wounded team members, the lieutenant colonel and the two dead.
[00:41:04] The CH-47 left to take them to the hospital.
[00:41:08] So now you just jump into the CH-47 returned about an hour.
[00:41:12] During that hour, what's happening?
[00:41:14] Are you guys the enemy pressuring you?
[00:41:16] The gun chips are having an impact now.
[00:41:19] Got it.
[00:41:20] When they saw the CH-47 leave, that took some of the pressure all.
[00:41:25] They really wanted to knock it down.
[00:41:27] Got it.
[00:41:28] But the massive air support that you're getting is definitely put in a hurt known the enemy.
[00:41:33] I mean, that is, that's a lot of gunfire coming their way.
[00:41:38] Rock, it's the whole nine yards.
[00:41:39] The CH-47 returned in about an hour with a set of fresh gun chips to help begin extracting us.
[00:41:47] I began putting the team members on as fast as I could while the sergeant continued to work.
[00:41:51] The air strikes, the jungle forward become mud and was making the job of hooking people up much more difficult.
[00:41:56] Eventually there were just the sergeant in my self left on the ground.
[00:41:59] Unfortunately, some of the bad guys had moved up close to our position and were beginning to fire at the helicopter.
[00:42:05] We knew we'd be exposed to their fire as we ascended.
[00:42:09] We thought we had two options.
[00:42:10] Go find them and take them out or chance being hoisted up with them shooting at us.
[00:42:15] The pilot narrowed our options by saying the clouds were beginning to cover the whole up and it was now or never.
[00:42:21] We strapped ourselves on and fired behind each other's backs as we slowly moved skyward spinning,
[00:42:27] slowly and swinging back and forth and watching the tracer coming by.
[00:42:31] It seemed like it took an hour to make the trip up although it was probably only about two minutes.
[00:42:36] Once inside an unstrapped from the jungle penetrator, I rolled over on my back, closed my eyes, and set a prayer of thanks.
[00:42:47] There was an atmosphere of elation as you were flying away from the encounter such as this.
[00:42:53] The team members were exchanging war stories.
[00:42:57] Personally, I was too tired to say much.
[00:42:59] My mind turned to rest in recuperation and how I was going to make sure that I got rest tomorrow.
[00:43:04] The team leader was also particularly quiet.
[00:43:08] Upon arrival at the compound, we were greeted by a small crowd who welcomed us back.
[00:43:13] It was a really good feeling to be back and to pick up my weapon and ammunition that we're leaning against the connex container.
[00:43:19] We had been taught in Ranger School to never get more than an arms-lined from your weapon.
[00:43:25] I would not make that mistake again.
[00:43:27] Less than learn to every troop or out there, don't ever do it, not even for a second.
[00:43:33] I moved directly to the dispensary to have my injuries treated.
[00:43:38] They treated my hands and other cuts and bruises and told me to return the next day.
[00:43:43] As I left the dispensary, I was told that the Colonel wanted to see me in the mess hall.
[00:43:48] Maybe he was going to give me an extra day of R&R to make up for this one.
[00:43:53] So, you're pretty much smoked at this point.
[00:43:57] And I actually had two broken ribs.
[00:44:00] We just covered.
[00:44:02] Well, when you drop 150 feet through the jungle canopy,
[00:44:06] the Colonel was sitting at his table with another full-corner,
[00:44:13] and the Colonel, non-special forces, and seemed to be having a heated conversation.
[00:44:18] When they looked up at me, they saw wet, muddy and bloody person standing in front of them.
[00:44:23] The expression on their faces indicated that they had lost their appetites.
[00:44:27] He congratulated me on doing a good job, and then he told me what key in the other Colonel had been arguing about.
[00:44:33] We had left the crew member from the first crash on the ground.
[00:44:36] Apparently there had been a crew chief in the aircraft who had been killed and burned in the wreckage.
[00:44:41] The Lieutenant Colonel had told us that he was missing a person.
[00:44:46] The Colonel told me to get my team together and be prepared to launch a first light to go in and recover the true crew chief's body,
[00:44:52] and destroy the second helicopter.
[00:44:54] There was a concern that the helicopter had its communication equipment and codes intact.
[00:44:59] These needed to be destroyed before the enemy could make use of them.
[00:45:04] The news that I had to go back out there the next morning was not what I wanted to hear.
[00:45:08] I was tired, injured, and not sure if I could find enough of my team to do the job.
[00:45:13] At any rate, it would be a long night.
[00:45:15] On the way to the shower, I found one of my guys and told them to assemble as many team members as he could while I shoured.
[00:45:21] The shower was great even though I found three fat leeches that had crawled under my shirt and attached myself to the attachment cells to my body.
[00:45:28] They were having a feast on my at my expense.
[00:45:31] A squad of insect repellent made them turn loose.
[00:45:34] So your team was your team all on our and our at this point?
[00:45:37] Fortunately, the majority of them were still out of there in the compound.
[00:45:44] Fortunately, I guess.
[00:45:48] Maybe not fortunately for them.
[00:45:51] Fortunately for the team.
[00:45:53] Later that night we moved the team members who were going onto the mission into the isolation area and made our plan for first light launch.
[00:46:03] When I woke it was raining cats and dogs outside and the wind was blowing hard, the weather continued like this for the next two days.
[00:46:10] The delay gave me time to rest and heal before we inserted.
[00:46:13] The drawback to the delay was that it gave the enemy more time to discover the body.
[00:46:17] They knew we would make an effort to recover it.
[00:46:19] They typically booby trapped the body placed.
[00:46:22] Others in the area and likes to plan an ambush to get us on the way out.
[00:46:27] I had been on several body recovery missions in the past and knew what to expect.
[00:46:32] The morning of the third day the weather had lifted and it was time for the insertion.
[00:46:36] We loaded up our helicopters and departed for the launch site while it was still dark.
[00:46:40] At the launch site we attended the mission briefing with the gunship pilots forwarder control of our pilots and the launch site personnel.
[00:46:47] It was a very detailed briefing with everything from the angles of attack, suspected enemy ground forces and fire locations, code words and the teams route to the helicopter, objective discussed in detail.
[00:46:58] Shortly after that, we were given the word to load up.
[00:47:01] At this point in the operation the adrenaline begins to flow.
[00:47:04] You've just made three trips to the latrine and now you have to, and now you have all your equipment on, you need to go once again.
[00:47:16] You can hear the slow, high pitched wind of the helicopter engine starting to get up and get faster and faster.
[00:47:24] You smell the camouflage paint and insect repellent on your face and JP4 in the air and you know it's time.
[00:47:30] I gave the team the signal to lock and load, put the safety on and climb it to the helicopters.
[00:47:38] Their engines were now turning at full RPM as were our hearts and they were ready to lift off.
[00:47:45] As we began to lift up and move forward we received the thumbs up from the launch team personnel on the ground.
[00:47:50] I was sitting in the door with my feet hanging outside so I could get a clear view of the landing zone on the way in and be the first to hit the ground when we arrived.
[00:47:59] A adrenaline flow and at this point, huh?
[00:48:04] Yes.
[00:48:05] And you're considering this is pretty much guaranteed to be a hot insert.
[00:48:09] That they might not hit us on the LZ but they definitely wouldn't once we got down to where the wreckage was.
[00:48:15] Was your plan to insert right on the crash sites or were you going to insert somewhere offset?
[00:48:20] We went in on top of the ridge and then worked our way down.
[00:48:24] Okay, so it wasn't offset.
[00:48:25] How was the distance?
[00:48:27] Two or three hundred meters.
[00:48:29] Okay, but it's so close.
[00:48:30] It was far but yeah.
[00:48:32] In my day we would an offset insert would be a couple kilometers away.
[00:48:38] Two hundred meters a week and sit at that on the x.
[00:48:41] I mean pretty damn close.
[00:48:43] Two hundred meters.
[00:48:44] I'll go in the jungle.
[00:48:45] It couldn't take you some time to get two or three hundred meters.
[00:48:48] How long would it take?
[00:48:49] How long would you plan for it to take you to get two hundred three hundred meters?
[00:48:52] Well, we were right from the beginning.
[00:48:54] We were expecting the ambush any any second.
[00:48:57] So, you know, you're back down to the hundred yards on an hour kind of thing.
[00:49:04] So you're going very slowly down through there.
[00:49:06] You know, plus it's very wet as muddy as slippery.
[00:49:10] You're going downhill to get down to it.
[00:49:13] And you're just expecting them to be anywhere.
[00:49:16] And the first light, when you guys be taking off the helicopters in the dark and first light is when the extraction goes.
[00:49:23] When the insertion goes or are you not taking off until there's a little bit of light out.
[00:49:28] There's a little bit of light on this particular mission.
[00:49:35] Here we go after about 20 minutes of flight.
[00:49:37] Two cobergunships came by us one on each side.
[00:49:40] They were going to the LZ ahead of us and make a low slow pass to try and draw fire from the enemy if they were there on the LZ.
[00:49:48] There were two other cobras trailing just behind us.
[00:49:50] Ready to open fire on enemy positions if we made a mistake.
[00:49:53] If we made the mistake of firing on the first two.
[00:49:56] We had not anticipated the LZ to be hot.
[00:49:59] So we were going to, so we're not going to prep it, meaning that the gun ships would shoot them up.
[00:50:05] We wanted to get in as unobtrusively as possible.
[00:50:10] To the degree you can with two helicopters, four gun ships and a four-air controller flying around over the LZ.
[00:50:16] So the enemy's going to know that you're there.
[00:50:18] They're going to know we're coming back.
[00:50:21] Soon the crew chief gave me a thumbs up indicating the LZ was cold and we were going in.
[00:50:28] We began to lose altitude very quickly as we made our way toward the small clearing on the red line.
[00:50:33] As we descended, the air became warmer and humid.
[00:50:36] We only turned on to the final approach and began our descent.
[00:50:40] I could feel the helicopter began to vibrate and my heart rate increased.
[00:50:43] We all scanned the tree line vigorously for signs of the enemy.
[00:50:46] All of a sudden we were only two or three feet off the ground and the crew chief was motioning for us to get off.
[00:50:51] I jumped in the waist high grass and went down to a prone position.
[00:50:54] The team members quickly followed and the helicopter helicopters all flew off to a rendezvous point.
[00:51:00] The sound of them disappearing in the distance created a very lonely feeling.
[00:51:05] We moved quickly into the tree line and set up a small security perimeter to let our eyes ears and nose adjust to the environment.
[00:51:11] This is an extremely important part of survival in the jungle.
[00:51:15] The sounds or lack of sounds of bugs, birds and animals as well as the smells tell you what's going on.
[00:51:22] You must read these signs correctly if you are to survive.
[00:51:27] After about 15 minutes we radioed at Team OK moving east.
[00:51:32] This meant we had not detected any signs of the enemy and it was OK to release the helicopters and gunships to return to base.
[00:51:39] We were really on our own now.
[00:51:41] The Thunder policy in our unit was that teams would always have at least two Americans with them when they were on the ground.
[00:51:46] This was a team I had been training to operate on special missions without any Americans.
[00:51:52] They were still in training and I was the only American on the team.
[00:51:56] This added to the isolation effect.
[00:52:02] Do they have any English speakers that were good enough to call for fire?
[00:52:06] The interpreter?
[00:52:08] Yeah.
[00:52:09] Did you have a cross train with those guys?
[00:52:12] Did they call for fire with the interpreter?
[00:52:14] Some.
[00:52:15] But not enough.
[00:52:17] Yeah, I think when you say this is a lonely isolating thing, I think that's the understatement of this entry.
[00:52:28] But sometimes my thoughts were if it's just me.
[00:52:38] I'm the one I have to worry about.
[00:52:41] If you're with me, now I have to make sure that I protect you.
[00:52:46] I have to make sure that I get you out if you're hit.
[00:52:49] I pick up these additional responsibilities when I have other Americans with me.
[00:52:56] But if it's just me and the team and I go down, I go down.
[00:53:04] Even the previous one where I went in alone, it was a unique feeling to know.
[00:53:15] I was the bright light team.
[00:53:17] One person, bright light team.
[00:53:20] There were other times where I suggested that I might either go in alone on a mission.
[00:53:25] Or go in with one or two other people.
[00:53:29] Because I don't have a problem.
[00:53:31] It'd be an alone out there.
[00:53:34] So, that didn't do that.
[00:53:37] But the burden of responsibility of the other person is so heavy.
[00:53:43] And it's hard to get them out.
[00:53:45] I mean, that's why you have so many missing in action from the stock teams.
[00:53:51] You can't get them. They get hit and you're being overrun.
[00:53:55] You can't get back to get them.
[00:53:57] And they might still be alive.
[00:54:00] And everybody says no man left behind.
[00:54:04] But you got to decide, you come to that decision point where do I leave Jocco and save the team?
[00:54:13] Are you sure you're going to get us all killed trying to get your body out?
[00:54:22] And my position, I'm not going to get everybody killed.
[00:54:25] If I can get you out, reasonably, I will, but if I can't.
[00:54:30] Yeah.
[00:54:31] And what would I want you to do?
[00:54:33] Because I don't want you to get anybody killed trying to get my body out.
[00:54:36] I know. That's what I'm saying.
[00:54:37] Leave me.
[00:54:38] I'll, whatever, doesn't matter anymore. Take care of the rest of the team.
[00:54:45] Back to this document.
[00:54:48] From here, our plan called for us to work our way down the side of the mountains.
[00:54:52] Find the crash site, recover the body, destroy the second helicopter and move to an alternate landing zone for extraction.
[00:54:59] Altogether, it should be a very simple mission that should take about five to six hours.
[00:55:04] Then I could get started on my honor and honor.
[00:55:07] We moved very consciously down the steep wet mountainside with every step you expected to hit a booby trap or have an ambush open up on you.
[00:55:13] When, when on the ground, no one talked.
[00:55:16] Hand-norm communities signals were all the team communications we used.
[00:55:20] Silence was critical. Every foot placement was deliberate so as to avoid any noise.
[00:55:25] A broken twig would signal the enemy of your approach.
[00:55:29] After about an hour we stopped for a break.
[00:55:32] We filmed a small parade and some very thick brush and put out claymore mines, aimed in four directions.
[00:55:38] I laid back on my rucksack and tried to relax while constantly looking for any movement and listening for out-for out-of-place sounds.
[00:55:46] All of a sudden I heard what seemed to be a very loud pop and pssss.
[00:55:52] Everyone hugged the ground. Everyone except Huang.
[00:55:55] He had brought a coke with him against my very strict orders. If looks could kill he would have been dead.
[00:56:03] He may have just compromised the safety of the entire team and mission.
[00:56:07] I took the coke buried it and then we moved out.
[00:56:11] About 30 minutes later we knew we were close to the crash site that smell of a decaying body was very strong.
[00:56:16] You could see the change in the expressions on everyone's faces.
[00:56:20] If the bad guys were going to get us, it would be around the crash site.
[00:56:24] We began to move more slowly and cautiously.
[00:56:28] Finally I could see the sunlight coming up through the hole in the jungle canopy.
[00:56:32] We stopped just short of it and set on a two-man recon team.
[00:56:35] They returned without seeing any signs of the enemy.
[00:56:38] I knew they were out there. I just didn't know where.
[00:56:41] I set up security around the crash site and stepped into the opening.
[00:56:46] There was no doubt my mind that there would be mines and or booby traps in the wreckage.
[00:56:51] Not only would I have to watch for these but I would be standing in the open as I recovered the body.
[00:56:56] A perfect target for a sniper. I could see large concentrations of flies toward the center of the wreckage.
[00:57:02] Upon careful observation I saw what looked to be a bone sticking up.
[00:57:07] I cautiously made my way to the location of the bone while trying to maintain a low profile.
[00:57:12] Another part of our mission was to photograph everything.
[00:57:15] I did this quickly and began slowly on to slowly uncover the remains of the body.
[00:57:20] Did you have someone assigned for look to look for booby traps or was it just every man was constantly on guard and on guard?
[00:57:27] Everybody was looking for it as we moved along but as I went out there it was me.
[00:57:33] What were you put to feet? What's for wires? What's for anything?
[00:57:38] You know what abnormal?
[00:57:40] One thing that happened was it had rain hard.
[00:57:45] All the powder and materials like that from the fire.
[00:57:50] It washed away so you had mostly pieces of metal, bigger pieces of metal things that you could see easier than you could.
[00:57:59] When it was all covered with the powder and stuff.
[00:58:04] The crew chief had died face down in the middle of the wreckage and the intense heat of the burning aircraft had burned him into a small charred piece of meat.
[00:58:13] His legs were completely gone from the knees down.
[00:58:17] His arms were gone from the elbows out and something aluminum had melted and burned through his head.
[00:58:22] When I touched what was left of his skull had disintegrated into white powder.
[00:58:26] As I was trying to retrieve his torso from the wreckage it broke in half at the lower back.
[00:58:31] When it did some of the liquid decay flew into my face, some of it on my lips. I almost lost at this point.
[00:58:36] It was almost impossible to breathe and just as hard not to throw up after a few minutes.
[00:58:41] I was able to get it on a poncho and move back into the woodland wood vine.
[00:58:46] I'd seen people burn to death before but never to this extent.
[00:58:51] Now that the body had been recovered we had to find the jungle penetrator and photograph it.
[00:58:57] The aviation unit did not believe the cable had broken where I'd said it had.
[00:59:02] They wanted photographic evidence before we could do this however someone had to be assigned to carry the body.
[00:59:08] No one wanted to in fact they wanted to leave it behind.
[00:59:11] I became somewhat forceful and directed whang to carry it.
[00:59:14] This was part of his punishment for the coke.
[00:59:17] It took only a few minutes to find and photograph the jungle penetrator.
[00:59:21] Now it was time to move to the other helicopter.
[00:59:24] Blowing this one up was going to be the highlight of the mission for me.
[00:59:28] I always enjoyed missions where I got to use demolitions. My only concern was where were the bad guys.
[00:59:34] We recovered the demolitions left over for three days ago and carried them to the other crash site.
[00:59:40] I was really beginning to get the sixth sense feeling that you have just before everything breaks loose.
[00:59:47] Everything was too quiet.
[00:59:49] The helicopter was down in a small ravine.
[00:59:52] A very undefendable place.
[00:59:54] Just as I communicated the decision to move the five team members to the top of the ravine,
[00:59:59] births of AK-47 fire from about three to four NVA began to hit all around us.
[01:00:05] The team returned fire is quickly quickly as they move to the top of the ravine.
[01:00:10] Since there were only a few of them, I decided to stay with the helicopter and plant the demolition charges.
[01:00:16] The bad guys shooting in us turned out to be the point team for a much larger group.
[01:00:22] As I worked feverously to pack 40 pounds of C4 into the appropriate places,
[01:00:27] the intensity of fire increased. My hands were beginning to bleed and blood was dripping out of the ends of my fingers and my gloves.
[01:00:35] Bullets were now ripping through the floor and the side of the aircraft,
[01:00:39] somewhere even hitting the C4 as I packed it against the instrument panel.
[01:00:43] Fortunately C4 requires a detonation device like a blasting cap to set it off.
[01:00:48] I felt like Houdini inside a chest except instead of swords coming through the sides, I had bullets.
[01:00:54] As the battle intensified, I radiowed for help.
[01:00:58] The fight was turning into a war and we needed gunships now.
[01:01:04] So there you are standing in the millis crashed helicopter trying to pack C4 into get that thing completely destroyed.
[01:01:14] Did you ever think when something like that, hey, I got a good idea.
[01:01:18] Why don't you guys just drop a bomb on this thing?
[01:01:21] And by the way, and also when somebody tells me hey, go search around for this jungle penetrator with a cut cable, then take a picture of it,
[01:01:28] I would have some issues with that.
[01:01:30] I had a lot of issues with the whole thing.
[01:01:32] They should have told me to go, I was there to start with.
[01:01:35] You know, the pilot of that aircraft should have said, one of my guys is missing.
[01:01:39] You know, he should have never been left there to start with.
[01:01:42] He never said there was another person. He said he had everybody.
[01:01:45] He didn't.
[01:01:47] That guy was was out there. We could have got him out at the same time. We got everybody else out.
[01:01:53] So you know, the controversy is is brewing around a lot of things between us and the aviation commander over what's going on.
[01:02:06] But now I'm packing you know, the 40 pounds of C4 in there and I've got a few hundred feet of debt cord to that was left over.
[01:02:16] So I got that big roller debt cord in there with the C4.
[01:02:21] They're shooting, hitting it.
[01:02:24] The thing that bothers me about that is, that means it's coming close to me.
[01:02:29] Yeah.
[01:02:30] That would be all that you do.
[01:02:32] And I got the Blasting Cups.
[01:02:35] I'm thinking, once I stick the Blasting Cups in the C4, if a bullet hits one of those, this over.
[01:02:42] But at some point you got to do that. So had to make the decisions stick a man, ignite the fuses and try to get out.
[01:02:52] How long were the fuses?
[01:02:54] About three or four minutes, not long at all.
[01:02:58] Were the other guys up on the reds line still?
[01:03:01] Yeah.
[01:03:01] So you're just on us.
[01:03:02] Another.
[01:03:03] I'm down in there.
[01:03:04] Damn dynamite solo mission.
[01:03:06] Yeah.
[01:03:07] They, I needed them up there because they had a higher angle of fire down on the bad guys to keep them back.
[01:03:15] And you know, my plan was to go out there with them.
[01:03:18] And that having it in the gully and having us back up on the high ground like that,
[01:03:24] put by did some shielding for us from the blast that was going to happen.
[01:03:29] I mean, 40 pounds of C4 and a couple of honors for you to debt cord.
[01:03:33] It makes a pretty good display.
[01:03:36] It goes off.
[01:03:38] They're not going to be anything left to the helicopter.
[01:03:41] No.
[01:03:43] No.
[01:03:44] Once you pull that time fuse, by the way, they're better not be anything that it lays your exit from the scene.
[01:03:53] No.
[01:03:54] I had to get out.
[01:03:55] The decision was made.
[01:03:57] Once you pop those, he just ignitors the decisions made you got to get out.
[01:04:01] You cover that gear back to this document after a few minutes.
[01:04:05] Another decision pointed to Ryebdo is time to insert the blasting caps and light the time fuse.
[01:04:09] The questions going through my mind were, would a bullet hit one of the caps and detonate the C4 before I could get out and move to a safe distance?
[01:04:16] Could I get out without being hit?
[01:04:19] I would be completely exposed while climbing out.
[01:04:21] If I got out, could I fully run, expose, could I run fully exposed to the bank, climb it 15 feet and get to the team?
[01:04:30] That's another horrible thing.
[01:04:32] Because once you pull these time fuse, if you get wounded anywhere in that vicinity, you're done.
[01:04:39] Yeah.
[01:04:43] It became obvious that they knew I was in the helicopter and were moving in on me.
[01:04:47] It was now or never.
[01:04:48] I inserted two blasting caps into the C4, ignited the two time-fused fuses, climbed out of the side of the helicopter, rolled to the ground, low crawled to the base of the bank and began to climb like a madman.
[01:04:58] I'm sure it looked like a contest between me and the enemies' bullets to see which could dig into the ground the most.
[01:05:03] It only took a matter of seconds to put it seemed like an eternity.
[01:05:06] My team had really increased their volume of fire to help cover me.
[01:05:10] As I rolled up on top of the bank, I looked back to see 3 to 5 NVA, run up behind the helicopter.
[01:05:17] If I had waited a few more seconds, they would have had me.
[01:05:20] Several of the team members looked quickly at me with the same expression of disbelief that I had.
[01:05:26] Could they really be hiding behind the helicopter that had 40 pounds of C4 and 200 feet of debt in that court in it with time-fused burning?
[01:05:34] Were they going to try and pull the fuses out and save the helicopter?
[01:05:38] It quickly came apparent that they did not realize I had been setting charges.
[01:05:42] I could see the smoke from the time-fused coming out of the helicopter, but the enemy were so gross in the heat of battle that they did not realize that they were about to become history.
[01:05:50] I signaled to the team that it was about time for the explosion.
[01:05:54] What happened next was beyond words.
[01:05:57] There was a tremendous explosion, producing a giant black fireball followed by a shockwave.
[01:06:02] You can actually see the compressed air moving out in a circular pattern that literally dazed all of us.
[01:06:08] There was a momentary low in the fire as it began to rain metal.
[01:06:12] Pieces of metal rock, dirt, and tree limbs, and the remains of the NVA had been hiding behind the helicopter.
[01:06:18] The jungle is filled with black smoke.
[01:06:22] I'd wanted a good explosion, and it was a good one.
[01:06:26] But I had intended for it to be much further away when it happened.
[01:06:30] But I had intended to be much further away when it happened.
[01:06:34] The enemy picked up quickly with a new twist.
[01:06:37] The enemy fire picked up quickly with a new twist.
[01:06:40] So yeah, that's pretty much-
[01:06:42] You can't plan that one any better.
[01:06:44] The enemy you leave that helicopter with 40 pounds of debt or 40 pounds of C4 and a bunch of debt cord,
[01:06:50] which for those of you that don't know debt cord, it's just explosives in a string.
[01:06:55] And so when it blows up, it blows up, and it's actually pretty powerful.
[01:06:58] It's actually very powerful debt cord.
[01:07:00] So these guys were blown away by this explosion.
[01:07:04] And all they had to do was see what was going on, walk over and cut the time fuse.
[01:07:09] And they would have been all right.
[01:07:11] I don't know if they still had time to get inside.
[01:07:14] They had to crawl, somebody had to crawl inside to pull it out.
[01:07:19] They could have pulled it out and tossed it aside.
[01:07:23] But when you're watching time fuse burn, it's not like it all burns up to wherever it's burning.
[01:07:33] Everything falls.
[01:07:34] It's going down through the middle through the tube.
[01:07:36] And you don't know exactly where it is.
[01:07:39] And so they might grab it just as it hits the count.
[01:07:45] But we didn't know to worry about that.
[01:07:49] Worked out.
[01:07:51] The enemy fire picked up quickly and with the new twist.
[01:07:55] They had moved a machine gun position on the other side of us that we are now in a crossfire.
[01:08:00] We were pinned down and couldn't move.
[01:08:02] We had to get rid of the machine gun or we were all dead.
[01:08:05] There was a small group of rocks about 20 meters from our position.
[01:08:09] If I could get to those rocks, I would be able to call back directions to our M79 gunner.
[01:08:14] And we might knock out the machine gun.
[01:08:17] The problem was getting across the 20 meters of open terrain with fire coming from both sides without getting hit.
[01:08:23] They had also brought an RPG and it fired a couple of those at us.
[01:08:28] Time was running out.
[01:08:31] I told the team to cover me as I went across the ground like a mole watching the mud being dug up all around me.
[01:08:36] The only way I could explain not being hit was that got to put a force field around me.
[01:08:41] The enemy had begun to shift their fire off of me as I neared the rocks.
[01:08:45] This seemed strange but I was glad that I made it.
[01:08:50] I didn't think much about it.
[01:08:52] The rocks did not provide as much cover as I anticipated they would.
[01:08:55] The machine gun had to be dealt with quickly.
[01:08:58] I pulled myself over to the edge of the bank and looked over and discovered why the enemy shifted most of their fire off me.
[01:09:04] Less than three feet from me was an NVA crawling up the bank to get me.
[01:09:08] I didn't know which of all of us had the biggest look of shock on their face.
[01:09:12] Probably me.
[01:09:13] Time began to move in slow motion and what was reality was two to three seconds seemed like minutes.
[01:09:19] In the next fraction of a second, he squeezed the trigger on his AK-47.
[01:09:24] The first round just missed my head by what must have been an inch or two.
[01:09:28] Powder coming out of the barrel was hitting me in the face as the bullets streamed out.
[01:09:33] AK-47s have a tendency to rise up when they are on automatic so that the other bullets were going over my head.
[01:09:41] I squeezed off a burst of six to eight rounds from a distance of less than three feet.
[01:09:46] They all hit him in the face and the top of his head causing it to explode, sending debris all over me.
[01:09:52] As his body tumbled down the bank, I could taste the blood that hit me in the mouth.
[01:09:57] The fire immediately shifted back on me.
[01:10:00] And I was hugging the ground so close that I must have looked like an empty pair of fatigues lying on the ground.
[01:10:06] Nevertheless, I felt an occasional bullet hit my rock sack.
[01:10:10] Fortunately, the radio was not damaged.
[01:10:12] A green trace or ricochet off a rock and landed right in front of my face.
[01:10:16] I watched it lie there and burn.
[01:10:19] As I continued to fire at the enemy, the handguard on my car 15 became so hot I could no longer hold it.
[01:10:26] I was having to shoot one hand at.
[01:10:29] I shouted back directions to the M79 gunner.
[01:10:32] His first shot was high and off to the left.
[01:10:34] I continued to direct his fire until he hit a tree beside the machine gun,
[01:10:38] sending shrapnel into the position.
[01:10:40] The two NVA were wounded and momentarily stunned.
[01:10:43] This gave me a chance to put 10 to 12 round burst on them and silence the machine gun for good.
[01:10:55] Oh man.
[01:10:56] It was an exciting afternoon.
[01:10:59] Yeah, that's completely crazy.
[01:11:03] I can't imagine sitting there as all this machine gun fires happening and the trace or
[01:11:08] settles itself and funny your face and you sit there and watch it burn.
[01:11:14] About this time, two helicopter gunships arrived.
[01:11:17] I marked our position initially with a flare gun and then with purple smoke grenade.
[01:11:22] After they had identified our location, I directed their mini gun 40 millimeter grenade and rocket fire into the enemy.
[01:11:27] The gunships were literally ripping the trees ground and enemy apart.
[01:11:31] Even though we had already killed a lot of enemy, there were still 20 more shooting at us.
[01:11:35] The gunship spotted the enemy further down the ridge, moving toward us and fired rockets on them to slow their progress.
[01:11:43] I worked the air strikes in as close as I could to our position and eventually was able to suppress the enemy fire enough to crawl back to the team.
[01:11:51] So far only one team member had any serious wounds.
[01:11:54] Schrappin' off from one of the B40 rockets that hit him in the back.
[01:11:57] It was not life-threatening at the moment, but he was in a lot of pain and bleeding.
[01:12:01] We were beginning to run low on ammunition.
[01:12:04] And the enemy force was increasing.
[01:12:06] The time had come to break contact with the enemy or die in place.
[01:12:10] Yeah, you were going, in order for your car 15 to get that hot that you put, you were shooting a lot.
[01:12:16] Yeah.
[01:12:17] How many rounds did you go in with?
[01:12:19] I don't know.
[01:12:21] Normal on a sog machine.
[01:12:22] I used to carry around 50 magazines.
[01:12:25] Did you say 50?
[01:12:26] 50 or 5 zero magazines.
[01:12:28] Of course we had the little ones.
[01:12:31] Yeah, there was a 20 rounds.
[01:12:33] Yeah.
[01:12:34] Yeah.
[01:12:35] Because even though I was the leader, I still attended to engage the bad guys.
[01:12:41] So you're in there, and what about for this one?
[01:12:43] Well, you know you're kind of a high potential for contact.
[01:12:46] I don't think we had that many. I don't remember exactly how many I had, you know, maybe 30 years old, but, you know, a little less than I had.
[01:12:53] How did you even load out 30 30 magazines or 50 magazines?
[01:12:58] I mean, you can only fit so many on your web gear.
[01:13:02] You, with a canteen, canteen pouch.
[01:13:05] You can put 5 20 round magazines in it.
[01:13:08] You know, so I would carry two of those at least on the belt.
[01:13:13] And then you know, I'd put the others in the rucksack.
[01:13:16] So I'd come to the left side.
[01:13:19] I'd have, you know, 10 magazines.
[01:13:22] You know, because you've got to put the magazine in when you left hand.
[01:13:25] Yeah.
[01:13:26] The right side.
[01:13:27] I'd have one or two bags of grenades because I could put usually five of those in a canteen pouch.
[01:13:33] And you've got to throw right handed.
[01:13:35] You didn't want to have to be rolling and turned.
[01:13:38] I tried not to put anything, you know, besides, you know,
[01:13:42] the the med kit, which was pretty flat, the gals pads and things like that.
[01:13:48] My compass on the front.
[01:13:50] So I could get closer to the ground.
[01:13:53] And then in the rucksack, I was loaded up.
[01:13:58] I was wondering if everything was so heavy.
[01:14:01] And then, you know, you had to have a couple of courts of water on the belt.
[01:14:06] And sometimes more in the rucksack.
[01:14:10] You had to clay more mines in the rucksack.
[01:14:13] How many claymores would you usually carry?
[01:14:15] I used to carry two.
[01:14:16] And depending on the size of the team, we might everybody else might have two.
[01:14:21] But, you know, claymores are heavy.
[01:14:23] Yeah.
[01:14:24] Yeah.
[01:14:24] Would you, would those be rigged?
[01:14:26] The ones rigged with like five seconds or 10 second times.
[01:14:28] We had to, we had to fuse this depending on what we wanted to do with them.
[01:14:31] And then you also had a rig for perimeter security that you can clock off.
[01:14:34] Yeah.
[01:14:35] Yeah.
[01:14:38] We carried a lot of stuff.
[01:14:40] Yeah.
[01:14:43] Yeah.
[01:14:44] It's, uh, to be in these kind of fire fights to shoot your weapon enough that it's hot.
[01:14:50] And to be sitting there under that, under that fire directly.
[01:14:54] And I mean, this is just, this is, these are crazy things.
[01:14:57] You can barely even capture.
[01:14:59] How, how, well, what your chances are survival in such a way.
[01:15:04] So, you know, the chances are not good.
[01:15:06] Let me put it to that way.
[01:15:07] With the, with the original M16, the hand guard would, would get hot.
[01:15:13] But, you know, the regular troops rarely, you know, fired on that much.
[01:15:19] They would get warm.
[01:15:20] But with the car 15, it had a different type of hand guard front.
[01:15:26] And with the amount of firing that we were doing.
[01:15:30] And, you know, the thing was 110 degrees to start.
[01:15:33] And then you start, you know, putting those, you know, rounds through there as fast as you can.
[01:15:38] It very quickly.
[01:15:39] It would get hot, uh, most American tour gloves.
[01:15:43] You know, and I particularly had them on this time because they were just, again, on the inside of my hands.
[01:15:48] A lot of the muscle and beat was gone.
[01:15:51] Um, so, and, and we cut the fingertips out, you know, so we had some dexterity to do things.
[01:15:58] And I would put, uh, piece of canvas around the hand guard.
[01:16:02] And that would just give me a little extra protection to it.
[01:16:06] It got hot.
[01:16:07] And then, you know, just, the one handed thing, having, um, the rope, small rope.
[01:16:14] Go through the little site, bracket up there and hooked into the snap link on your shoulder.
[01:16:21] You could put pressure down on that.
[01:16:23] It made it easier to shoot one handed and be able to hold it down.
[01:16:27] You know, because it's just going to try to come up on auto.
[01:16:30] Um, but you could do that.
[01:16:32] It was a little uncomfortable on that machine because of my hands.
[01:16:36] But the good thing about your hands is all of that scandal grow right back.
[01:16:41] You didn't take it long.
[01:16:42] It'll come back.
[01:16:43] The other places on the body just, they didn't come back that fast.
[01:16:47] For me.
[01:16:48] All right.
[01:16:49] So you guys are running low on ammo.
[01:16:51] And here we go back to this document.
[01:16:52] I signals the team to get ready to move out and radio to the gunship.
[01:16:56] What we're going to do as they made their next run firing minigun 40 millimeter grenades
[01:17:01] and rockets myself and two team members exposed ourselves long enough to throw white
[01:17:05] phosphorous grenades as far toward the enemy as we could.
[01:17:08] When they exploded each productive produced a very dense 30 meter radius of white smoke
[01:17:13] and streams of burning phosphorus.
[01:17:16] The smoke didn't stop the bullets, but it did prevent them from seeing our direction of escape.
[01:17:21] We quickly drugged the body and the wounded team member into the thick jungle and began slipping
[01:17:29] and sliding up the mountain.
[01:17:31] I radio the gunships that we were clear to make their next pass directly over our old position
[01:17:37] marked with a red smoke grenade estimating that the bad guys would be there by then.
[01:17:42] It was a good move resulting in the gunships killing several of them where we had been.
[01:17:46] The gunships continued to pound the area for another 20 minutes sending thousands of bullets
[01:17:50] hundreds of 40 millimeter grenades and dozens of rockets through the jungle canopy onto them.
[01:17:56] Once again the weather moved in on us very quickly and the rain began to come down hard.
[01:18:01] Before we were halfway up the mountain the clouds were already covered.
[01:18:05] The clouds had already covered the ridge line.
[01:18:08] We would not be distracted that day.
[01:18:11] Tired and somewhat demoralized we continued to climb toward the top of the mountain.
[01:18:16] We had at least temporarily burlken contact with the enemy.
[01:18:20] Eventually we found a very dense rocky and steep peak.
[01:18:23] We thought we could defend.
[01:18:25] The rain continued to rest the day and throughout the night.
[01:18:28] That's a morale crusher.
[01:18:31] Yeah.
[01:18:32] Your low on ammunition.
[01:18:34] You think you're making your final movement and then you're going to get extracted
[01:18:40] and then the weather comes in and you're shut down.
[01:18:43] Yeah. It didn't go over well with the team.
[01:18:46] It had a significant impact on them around because they really thought I really thought
[01:18:55] that once we got up here we would get extracted but not once the weather rolled in.
[01:19:01] Then I knew.
[01:19:02] We're going to be here at least until tomorrow and things just don't work out.
[01:19:09] As a leader in that position. What is it important for you to do as a leader as that morale starts to slip?
[01:19:18] Part of what I was doing was congratulating them because this was one of our first heavy fire fights as a team.
[01:19:31] So popping them up, how well they did, how we destroyed all those guys.
[01:19:36] We got the body that we went down after.
[01:19:39] Trying to tell you, you really did a good job.
[01:19:44] So Wayne, don't ever think about it.
[01:19:47] I'm a salt machine again.
[01:19:52] That still, okay. So you give them like a pep talk.
[01:19:59] You did great but they got to be looking at you.
[01:20:01] Hey, thanks a lot boss and now we're here and the enemy that we just killed a bunch of enemy.
[01:20:05] What are they going to do? They're going to come after us.
[01:20:08] We've got to keep the guard up pay attention.
[01:20:11] You can't dwell on what's happened.
[01:20:14] The weather will clear when it clears.
[01:20:16] In the meantime, we got to stay sharp and we're in a good position.
[01:20:22] If they try to come up, we'll take them out.
[01:20:24] This is like the ultimate form of when people get in competition of some kind and they think they win and then it turns out they don't.
[01:20:33] Yeah. I got a buddy named Tim Kennedy who's actually a special force to guide great guide.
[01:20:37] He was actually a UFC fighter.
[01:20:40] A mixed martial arts fighter, incredible fighter.
[01:20:43] But he had a match against a guy.
[01:20:46] And the guy he was going against was an Olympic champion guy.
[01:20:50] It really tough guy and Tim was beating him.
[01:20:53] And I think it was between the second and third round.
[01:20:56] The opponent didn't answer the bell.
[01:20:59] So he didn't come out to fight.
[01:21:02] And then the corner man, there were some shenanigans going on.
[01:21:06] And all of a sudden, with an extra 30 seconds of rest or whatever, the guy stood up and ready to fight.
[01:21:12] And now Tim Kennedy who had just bought he'd won because the guy didn't answer the bell.
[01:21:16] They go, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, it's not over. You got to fight.
[01:21:18] And here and him tell that story to me.
[01:21:20] He said it was this situation, right?
[01:21:23] All of a sudden, he thought he would head won.
[01:21:25] Thought the day was done.
[01:21:26] Raised his hands in victory.
[01:21:28] And then all of a sudden, no, you got to fight again.
[01:21:30] And he didn't, you know, he told me he's like, I didn't get back in the game.
[01:21:35] And he ended up losing that fight.
[01:21:36] And that, unfortunately, that fight would have put him in the slot to be the UFC champion,
[01:21:41] which he absolutely should have been.
[01:21:43] But it's, it reminds me of this and you as a leader have to take these people.
[01:21:49] In that moment where they could let down their guard, they could get them or
[01:21:51] Otherwise they could give up and instead say, no, guess what?
[01:21:54] Okay, hey, good job.
[01:21:56] We got to make a through tonight.
[01:21:57] We're not done yet.
[01:21:58] Yeah. And that happens all the time.
[01:22:00] I mean, cutting him the first, first got to, to be in ace pilot,
[01:22:08] and bring it on, when, when they shot down their, the fifth aircraft.
[01:22:15] And then something, the mission was over, the shot down that, that, that, that
[01:22:19] MIG and they turned and go home and he and, you know, the co-pilot,
[01:22:23] they're patting each other on the back.
[01:22:26] Man, we're ace is now. We've done this.
[01:22:28] That was great. And then just going back and forth,
[01:22:31] they didn't hear the missile alarm go off.
[01:22:34] Eugh.
[01:22:35] Fortunately, they were almost back to the coast.
[01:22:38] When the missile hit them, they had to punch out.
[01:22:41] They landed in the water and, you know, got picked up out there.
[01:22:45] But they were celebrating so hard.
[01:22:48] Yeah. They'd like to guard down.
[01:22:50] They thought it was over.
[01:22:52] And it, it, over till it's over.
[01:22:54] That's right. And in this particular case, it ain't over yet.
[01:22:58] Here we go.
[01:23:00] Back to this document, even though the mission was supposed to
[01:23:02] been a five hour mission, I'd made just everyone, just, I'd made
[01:23:06] everyone bring two meals just in case.
[01:23:08] The team members had grumbled about the extra weight, but no one was grumbling
[01:23:12] now.
[01:23:13] Nor did they during the next day, as the rain continued,
[01:23:17] we spent almost 48 hours on that little peak,
[01:23:21] constantly watching, listening, and feeling for the enemy
[01:23:26] before the weather cleared and we were extracted.
[01:23:29] Neither say everyone was very excited to climb on board.
[01:23:31] The helicopter had for home, even though the smell was terrible.
[01:23:36] I really look forward to seeing, I really, I was really looking forward
[01:23:40] to some time off to let my body and mind heal.
[01:23:44] When we arrived at the compound, however, I discovered my team was scheduled
[01:23:48] to begin preparing for a new mission the next day.
[01:23:51] Our nr would have to wait.
[01:23:54] Three months later, I was awarded the air medal with the V-Device
[01:23:57] second award for heroism during aerial combat for my actions.
[01:24:00] I'm May 4th, 1969.
[01:24:02] The first trip, I was also awarded the bronze star medal with V-Device
[01:24:06] for heroism in ground combat for my actions on May 7th, 1969.
[01:24:12] The second trip.
[01:24:14] And it was worse.
[01:24:19] When I got, well, please tell me, what was worse than that?
[01:24:27] Because whoever wrote up you for a bronze star for that, no disrespect,
[01:24:33] but I'd like to slap that first right in face because that is ridiculous.
[01:24:38] That entire thing is ridiculous.
[01:24:41] So when I got back, we had the aviation guy there with the art colonel again.
[01:24:50] And he's saying, you blew up my helicopter.
[01:24:56] I'm saying, that's what you told me to do.
[01:25:01] Destroy the helicopter.
[01:25:03] He said, I didn't tell you that.
[01:25:06] You were not supposed to destroy it.
[01:25:08] You know, just put a thermo into something on the radio.
[01:25:12] It's not destroy the helicopter.
[01:25:14] I don't know what he thought he was doing with it.
[01:25:17] But that Joker was in a million pieces out there.
[01:25:21] It's gone.
[01:25:23] Next time do it yourself.
[01:25:26] I think like go that far.
[01:25:28] I've been thinking that.
[01:25:30] I was not happy when I heard that.
[01:25:33] I wanted to hear that man.
[01:25:34] He did a great job.
[01:25:35] Yeah.
[01:25:39] Why did you blow my helicopter up?
[01:25:41] Wow.
[01:25:43] That's a disconnected person, a very disconnected leader.
[01:25:47] Unbelievable.
[01:25:50] So that's just completely crazy.
[01:25:53] Did you get wounded during that mission?
[01:25:55] No, just banged up a little bit.
[01:25:58] Just banged up a little bit.
[01:26:00] I mean, it wasn't uncommon to get hit with something.
[01:26:04] But I got the broken ribs and burned hands and all of that.
[01:26:09] You know, with the first part of it.
[01:26:12] But you know, the second part.
[01:26:14] I just got skin up and stuff.
[01:26:18] So then.
[01:26:20] So now what's the next.
[01:26:22] Let's see.
[01:26:23] That was in two to seven May.
[01:26:27] And then the next thing we got is a king be down.
[01:26:31] So what if it can be helicopter's goes down?
[01:26:35] That wasn't a good day.
[01:26:39] So I'm, you know, I take RT, Virginia.
[01:26:43] And we go on a mission.
[01:26:47] And I think that's the one where it was the NVA division or regimen.
[01:26:57] And we were supposed to go find them.
[01:27:05] And then bring air strikes and things on.
[01:27:11] Try to stop them.
[01:27:13] Because hamburger Hill was a very political battle that happened.
[01:27:22] The hundred and first was trying to fight their way up to the top of this mountain.
[01:27:26] And taking all kinds of casualties.
[01:27:30] And everybody was questioning at the time.
[01:27:33] Why do they need to go up there?
[01:27:35] Why does it go to take the high ground?
[01:27:37] It'll be a political victory that as well as military as we if we take it.
[01:27:42] They were taking all kind of casualties.
[01:27:46] The North Vietnamese had this large unit that was coming.
[01:27:50] And that was going to crush that battalion.
[01:27:53] And you know, so our mission was to go out and find it.
[01:27:57] Stop it. Don't let them get there.
[01:27:59] They had moved a lot further along.
[01:28:02] Then we thought.
[01:28:03] So we do our little circle around thing.
[01:28:07] And as we're coming in on short final, they open fire.
[01:28:11] Hit the aircraft.
[01:28:13] We lost power.
[01:28:14] And you know, I'm setting in the door.
[01:28:17] And I'm watching the ground come up and thinking, you know,
[01:28:20] this is not good.
[01:28:23] Man, we're going to really smack in and we did.
[01:28:27] So hit the ground.
[01:28:29] Everything went black.
[01:28:31] And you know, then I, my eyes come open and I'm laying there thinking.
[01:28:36] I'm out of lava, dude.
[01:28:39] And then I hear the bullets crack at behind.
[01:28:41] I'm thinking, I must be alive.
[01:28:44] Somebody's trying to shoot me.
[01:28:46] So I look around and see what's going on.
[01:28:49] I get my guys who are scattered out on the ground to drag them over into a bomb crater that's there.
[01:28:57] So we had some protection.
[01:28:59] They eventually got the helicopter flying again.
[01:29:02] Oh, wow.
[01:29:03] We've been taking a lot of hits, but he got it back in here somehow.
[01:29:06] Was your, the King B pilots?
[01:29:08] These were South Vietnamese pilots.
[01:29:10] South Vietnamese, but yeah, they flew for us.
[01:29:13] There, there are guys.
[01:29:15] Yeah.
[01:29:16] So.
[01:29:17] Yeah.
[01:29:19] You know, we're, we're in the crater fighting.
[01:29:21] They can't get back in to ground fires.
[01:29:23] Way too heavy.
[01:29:25] We're working there, strikes.
[01:29:26] We're working them.
[01:29:28] A1E's.
[01:29:30] We're hitting the whole redsline.
[01:29:33] We're hitting the top of the hill.
[01:29:35] Getting second year explosions up there.
[01:29:37] You know, because they already moved a lot of ammunition and stuff up on the hill.
[01:29:42] So we're smoking it pretty hard.
[01:29:45] But I mean, they can shoot right across the top of the bomb crater.
[01:29:49] So it was kind of hard to stick you head out.
[01:29:52] Everybody's busted up.
[01:29:55] I'm experiencing, you know, a tremendous amount of pain.
[01:29:59] And I'm not quite sure where's this coming from.
[01:30:02] I mean, I'm hurting.
[01:30:05] It's hard to breathe.
[01:30:06] All that kind of stuff.
[01:30:08] But, you know, we're getting a lot of kills.
[01:30:11] They're trying to crawl out there to us.
[01:30:14] And then eventually we suppressed the fire enough.
[01:30:19] That one helicopters able to come in and took everybody on the team except for myself and one guy.
[01:30:28] So two of us stayed there in the bomb.
[01:30:31] That was that because the crowd of the too many people.
[01:30:34] Is that because there are tactical reason to do that?
[01:30:37] In this case, I wanted somebody else with me.
[01:30:40] And then we were loading the aircraft down.
[01:30:44] We were really putting too much weight on it.
[01:30:46] So you, the fear was if you, if you, but if everyone got on that, the king be a wouldn't be able to take off.
[01:30:53] Right.
[01:30:54] It would go down.
[01:30:55] So two of you are going to stay.
[01:30:57] Yeah.
[01:30:58] So, you know, it's a question kind of like we talked about before.
[01:31:01] Sometimes you have to, the way to the good of the many,
[01:31:05] you know, for us, the best solution was for us not to get on the helicopter.
[01:31:10] We would stay there if we got out, we got out.
[01:31:12] We didn't, we didn't, but the rest of the team, you know, would survive.
[01:31:16] So, um, so they went away, was still, you know, doing a lot of shooting, working gunshots and stuff.
[01:31:24] And then I just got a little irritated.
[01:31:28] And I thought, I need to go get one of them.
[01:31:31] I think what I'm going to do is just crawl out there because they're,
[01:31:34] I know they're crawling around that.
[01:31:36] They're in the grass.
[01:31:37] I'm going to crawl out there and get one of these dovers.
[01:31:40] Meaning, I mean, you're going to go and capture a live.
[01:31:44] Yeah.
[01:31:45] And it'll be.
[01:31:46] So, you know, I told you, because, because you're right.
[01:31:48] You know, you got two people, two of you, you're injured somehow.
[01:31:52] You don't really know what it is.
[01:31:53] You're in a bomb crater.
[01:31:54] You're surrounded by an NVA division.
[01:31:56] And you think, now's a good time to go and capture.
[01:32:00] So what?
[01:32:01] If I'm going to get somebody, I mean, this might be my last chance.
[01:32:03] So I want to connect one of those dokers up because if we can
[01:32:07] take him back, I mean, he give a lot of intel about where they are,
[01:32:11] what they're doing, and everything.
[01:32:13] So I start crawling out there in the grass.
[01:32:16] Yeah, and the grass is about that.
[01:32:18] But two and a half, three feet high.
[01:32:21] And I'm crawling around out there and I can hear them.
[01:32:23] You know, because they're shooting, they're still shooting at the,
[01:32:26] the bomb crater.
[01:32:27] They haven't realized that I've crawled out there with them.
[01:32:30] And I can hear there's one up in front of me.
[01:32:33] And I'm crawling up there and I said, y'all,
[01:32:37] if I can get the timing right so that he doesn't see me,
[01:32:42] you know, immediately, then, you know,
[01:32:45] I can probably wound him, dragging back in, and you know, he'll be ours.
[01:32:51] It just didn't go well when we had the encounter.
[01:32:56] So I more than wounded him.
[01:32:59] And, you know, so I didn't have a prisoner.
[01:33:03] Did you shoot at him or did you stab him?
[01:33:05] Yeah, I shot him.
[01:33:07] Yeah, I mean, there are times to use the knife,
[01:33:10] but sometimes you need to do it quick.
[01:33:13] And, you know, if he's got buddies, you know,
[01:33:16] you can only reach so far with a knife,
[01:33:18] but with that car 15, you reach way out there and tap somebody.
[01:33:22] Yeah.
[01:33:23] So I decided to go back in because I didn't have any strength.
[01:33:28] And I wasn't sure what was going on.
[01:33:30] So I got back in.
[01:33:31] Eventually, you suppressed the fire enough
[01:33:33] that they were able to come back in and get to two of us.
[01:33:37] And went back to the launch site and they said,
[01:33:41] you know, that was good, but there's still a ton of them out there
[01:33:47] and I need you to go back in tomorrow morning.
[01:33:50] So take the team back.
[01:33:52] You know, so I replaced some team members.
[01:33:56] And why did you replace team members?
[01:33:59] Because some of them were injured.
[01:34:00] Yeah.
[01:34:01] They were like, I got to cramst in.
[01:34:03] And what about you, your back, and whatever.
[01:34:07] I got with them.
[01:34:08] I got with the medics and they drugged me up.
[01:34:12] And they said, you know, with an impact that hard,
[01:34:15] you know, you're bound to have some, you know,
[01:34:18] some bruises and whatever.
[01:34:21] And that's it, man.
[01:34:22] This is not a bruise.
[01:34:23] I mean, it's hard to breathe when I move.
[01:34:26] But, you know, I, they said, we really need you to back out here tomorrow morning.
[01:34:31] I mean, this is critical.
[01:34:33] Okay.
[01:34:34] We go to it.
[01:34:35] So we go back in the same same insertion point.
[01:34:38] No.
[01:34:39] We moved over to different location.
[01:34:41] You know, a few clicks away from that first one.
[01:34:44] And went in.
[01:34:46] And right after we got on the ground,
[01:34:49] we went in into the jungle. We made contact.
[01:34:53] So all of a sudden we were in heavy contact there.
[01:34:57] And trying to suppress that fire, working against ships and things that we had with us.
[01:35:03] Got it suppressed enough that we were able to get.
[01:35:07] Again, all but me and one of the guys out on strings and lifted them out.
[01:35:14] So the two of us were still there.
[01:35:16] Still working there strikes.
[01:35:18] And we were in a better position at this point to really hit the main body of the force.
[01:35:24] And, you know, we had that big stick with us.
[01:35:27] And we were hammering those.
[01:35:29] I mean, literally thousands of were killed, you know, that morning.
[01:35:33] I mean, we pretty much decimated, you know, that force.
[01:35:37] David, what was your, what was your, were you in an elevated position?
[01:35:41] Yeah.
[01:35:42] Yeah. So we were up pretty close to the top of a mountain.
[01:35:45] And we could see him in the valley. We could see him on the ridge line coming up to where we were.
[01:35:50] We could see him on the ridge line where we did it.
[01:35:52] Did they know where you were?
[01:35:54] Yeah. I mean, from the fire that was going on, they knew we were up there.
[01:35:58] But they couldn't get up there too.
[01:36:00] As it's up for the ones that were already there.
[01:36:02] Because, you know, now we had a big enough air support team.
[01:36:06] We'll just out there to just smoke on.
[01:36:08] We had the spads.
[01:36:09] I mean, you know, the A1Es.
[01:36:11] We had the L4s and gunships.
[01:36:13] And I just rotating those things in.
[01:36:16] I mean, they were stacked out here, waiting on their turn to come in and go after him.
[01:36:21] Where we were, you know, I could see him.
[01:36:24] And we had, you know, pretty significant contact right there.
[01:36:28] And where we were directly on us.
[01:36:31] And for some reason, it just seemed like a good idea to take one of them back with us.
[01:36:39] Oh, so you got the notion again that you're going to try and capture.
[01:36:42] So I thought, you know, it's a different terrain.
[01:36:45] I need to get one of them.
[01:36:48] So I, I crawled out here, you know, would cover in fire from a little guy.
[01:36:56] In counter to guy and you know, I didn't have the strength to manhandle.
[01:37:02] I wounded him.
[01:37:03] But I was hurting so bad.
[01:37:05] I, I just didn't have the strength.
[01:37:08] I mean, I, on their normal conditions, I could have brought him back.
[01:37:11] But I was in too much pain.
[01:37:13] So, you know, I had to, you know, let him go to happy hunting ground wherever, you know,
[01:37:22] and crawl back and later on that day, my self and the other guy were able to come out on strings
[01:37:29] and then they really hammered a place there.
[01:37:32] How long were you on the ground for on that one?
[01:37:34] Most of the day.
[01:37:36] So it was a long time.
[01:37:42] And, you know, when we got back, they said, you know, I think there's something wrong with you.
[01:37:46] I said, yeah, I think so.
[01:37:47] By the way, the NVA, that, that element of NVA of thousands and thousands of NVA did they ever make to hamburger Hill.
[01:37:55] So, so that's why, that's why the hundred first was not wiped out.
[01:38:01] They did finally make it to the top.
[01:38:04] And once they got out there and said, you know, where the king of the Hill, they were told, okay, come on back down.
[01:38:11] When that kind of stuff was going on, what did you guys, was that, you know, we look back armchair,
[01:38:17] quarter back and say, oh, you know, what were they thinking, what were you guys thinking?
[01:38:22] When you guys hear that, hear what hear about that, would you think, what the hell is the leadership doing?
[01:38:27] What are we doing?
[01:38:28] I mean, why would you do that? Why would you sacrifice that many lives? And I, I've forgotten now, they're exact number,
[01:38:35] but it was a lot of American's kill trying to get to top of that hill just to turn around and walk back down.
[01:38:41] And I know it wasn't just that.
[01:38:44] It was a big political move and everything, but it's just my opinion that I don't think it was worth losing people like that.
[01:38:55] If you're going to turn around and go back down.
[01:38:57] Now did you guys think about that? Did you talk about that? Did you guys look at each other and say, what the hell are we doing?
[01:39:03] What, why would we make this?
[01:39:04] Sometimes sometimes when we would get back, you know, the team member setting, you know, the American member setting around,
[01:39:11] sometimes we would say, man, did you see what, here what happened?
[01:39:16] And questioning, you know, some of the political things that we're going on.
[01:39:20] Because now it's 1969. So this is like the height of the American anti-war movement right now.
[01:39:28] This is like Woodstock's coming and all that stuff.
[01:39:31] Yeah. Are you guys hearing any of that?
[01:39:34] We are hearing some about the protest, but, you know, we didn't get to see.
[01:39:39] I mean, we didn't have TV's and stuff like that. We didn't see what was going on.
[01:39:45] And if you got a hold of an army times, you might see something in there, but a lot of stuff was held back.
[01:39:50] Because they, you know, didn't want us being exposed to it.
[01:39:55] But you knew, and you had heard from them, the people who were coming in more recently, things that they had seen.
[01:40:02] You knew that you were likely to be spit on and the airport on the street.
[01:40:09] If you were in uniform, and it was, what are you thinking about that?
[01:40:14] I mean, if, if, are you just, can you even fathom that?
[01:40:20] Well, I wasn't happy about it.
[01:40:25] And, well, there were a lot of hijackings of planes going on at that time too.
[01:40:33] So, not by protesters, but by different people hijacking them, they're fly the different countries.
[01:40:40] And, you know, one of my thoughts was this browning, high power, nine millimeter, that I took off of a NVA.
[01:40:51] I'm carrying that women down to plane. My plane is not going to be hijacked.
[01:40:56] It would be the hijackers worst nightmare to try to stop my plane.
[01:41:02] So, I carried it with me.
[01:41:07] And I had it when I went through the airport. I did get spit out. I got called baby killer.
[01:41:12] You know, all kinds of things like that. You know, from various groups in the airport.
[01:41:17] So, it was not the welcome home kind of thing that you see today.
[01:41:23] Although, we don't, I don't think we do a very good job today.
[01:41:27] We do a lot better than we did.
[01:41:30] So, yeah, I wasn't happy about what was going on.
[01:41:36] So, you were about to say before I cut you off, you were about to say that you get back.
[01:41:40] And now, you're saying, hey, there's something, actually, I think there's actually something wrong with me.
[01:41:45] Yeah, they decided that they decided at the time that I had severely bruised my back and maybe some vertebrae.
[01:41:55] And I think I'll broke another couple of ribs.
[01:41:58] I don't remember right now, but I think there's a couple of ribs broken to you.
[01:42:01] And, you know, beat up, cut up, and it was determined later that I had fractured my spine and a couple of vertebrae.
[01:42:09] And they just couldn't believe that I actually went on a mission like that and was able to do, you know, what we did.
[01:42:19] But it's, it's what they give you a couple days down time and some moturing.
[01:42:23] Oh, they promised that. And then they said, no, yeah, I got a few days down time after that.
[01:42:28] But yeah, it, a moturing like it was candy.
[01:42:33] And then it was, okay, you got eventually, you know, but a time the next mission came around.
[01:42:41] Yeah, right, it'd be good.
[01:42:43] And it was, you have a note in here about the POW mission.
[01:42:50] Is that, is that after you got home?
[01:42:53] No, this is still, I'm still over there.
[01:42:56] Okay. So we got intel, excuse me, got intel all of a sudden that said there was a small group.
[01:43:06] And 10 to 15 American POWs that were being moved north.
[01:43:11] And the intel said, we know where they are.
[01:43:15] So they said, we need to get them.
[01:43:19] So that became the mission, but it was going to be intense combat kind of mission.
[01:43:27] So what we did was we created a spike team.
[01:43:31] So buddy of mine, Bruce Longward and I would do that sometimes.
[01:43:36] We would put our two teams together.
[01:43:38] So we'd have about 20 or so people to take out there.
[01:43:42] We took a medic with a system.
[01:43:44] We were loaded for beer, two machine guns, all of that, you know, extra ammo, everything.
[01:43:51] And our mission was to go out and find them and get them back.
[01:43:55] So we went to the launch site with, we were supposed to launch.
[01:44:00] And the next day there was a hatchet force that was there too that had a mission to go,
[01:44:10] I don't know what their mission was, but they were going somewhere.
[01:44:13] And we had a team, a dentist nail, and Michael Brown's team was on the ground.
[01:44:23] They had finished their mission, they moved back to an extraction, LZ.
[01:44:29] They had call for extraction.
[01:44:31] And then all of a sudden they called it a prayer fire emergency.
[01:44:35] They were being overrun and then a lost contact with the radio contact with a team.
[01:44:46] One of the aircraft, because one of the aircraft out in the area heard a transmission on the little URT radio.
[01:44:56] They just operated on to guard frequency.
[01:45:00] They picked up what they thought was an American voice saying, somebody helped me, help me,
[01:45:06] for God's sake, somebody helped me.
[01:45:08] They heard that voice and that was all we heard.
[01:45:13] And so everything, everything, the launch site stopped because now it's a prayer fire.
[01:45:20] And we got to go get dentist's team.
[01:45:26] And that was a situation where I didn't have a 2 day R in our coming out, but I'm looking at the aircraft that's about to go out to try to bring them back.
[01:45:36] And I'm thinking, I probably should get on that aircraft.
[01:45:42] I think I should go with them.
[01:45:44] And then I think, I've got to lead my own mission to get POW's, a couple hours.
[01:45:52] I've got to go do that. I can't jump on this aircraft and fly out there.
[01:45:57] I mean, that's not going to work.
[01:45:59] So I didn't go. They went out into the area.
[01:46:06] They saw some movement. They saw what they thought were good guys.
[01:46:10] They dropped the McGuire reach down.
[01:46:13] And as they were lifting off, three of them pulled tight.
[01:46:17] And then one of them shot loose and they came on up. They had two indigenous personnel on them agrieregs.
[01:46:27] And the crew chief said he thought he saw an American on that third one that POW lose.
[01:46:35] That he thought an American had gotten in there and fell out as they were pulling attention up.
[01:46:42] But they were receiving so much fire.
[01:46:44] They couldn't go back in there. So they brought the two survivors from the team back to the launch site.
[01:46:51] They did a quick debriefing from them.
[01:46:55] They said everybody else who was dead.
[01:46:58] They launched the hatchet force to go in as a bright light team.
[01:47:04] They changed their mission to bright light and decided to put them out there because there were so many bad guys in the area.
[01:47:11] But they inserted them a couple thousand meters away from where the inspection site was.
[01:47:19] They were pinned down on the LZ. Never moved anywhere.
[01:47:23] They just got into the tree line and that was as far as they could go.
[01:47:27] So once that started happening and they saw they couldn't go anywhere.
[01:47:31] Then they came to me and said, you know, your mission changed.
[01:47:35] You were now the bright light team.
[01:47:38] So I got all my guys together and said, okay, we're going bright light.
[01:47:43] The other mission we'll do later.
[01:47:46] So then, you know, we planned to mission right quick and they inserted us.
[01:47:52] The whole spike team.
[01:47:55] So I mean, that's five aircraft going in.
[01:47:58] And he said, you know, it's a really hot area.
[01:48:02] So we're going to prep the LZ but we have to be careful because we don't know where to go.
[01:48:07] And no, where the other team members are that might be out there.
[01:48:10] So we can't just hammer the whole area.
[01:48:13] We can only prep it right around the LZ.
[01:48:16] So they went out, you know, the gunshots they had of us.
[01:48:20] They prep the LZ.
[01:48:22] And, you know, I'm listening to the headset and it's not sounded good.
[01:48:27] And, you know, I knew we were going to get hammered because they were going to open up on us.
[01:48:32] It says we got close.
[01:48:34] And I was in the lead chip and as we started then, you know, bullets are coming everywhere.
[01:48:40] They are craft's taking hits.
[01:48:42] The ones behind me are taking hits.
[01:48:44] But we went on in, got on the ground, got my first load in the tree line, brought in the rest of the guys.
[01:48:53] One chip at the time, working hair strikes, you know, right around us.
[01:48:57] It's pressed the fires, much as you're good.
[01:48:59] So we spent until the next afternoon, mostly fighting, looking for Dennis' team, trying to find any survivors that we could.
[01:49:13] So it was a long night and they were firing mortars over at the hatchet force.
[01:49:21] We could hear them from back up behind us.
[01:49:24] I mean, I would call them and say, you know, rounds on the way.
[01:49:28] Outside of here, I'm dropping into to you and douche, you know, and I just tell them.
[01:49:32] You got in coming and get everybody down.
[01:49:35] But we couldn't get to where the mortars were because there were too many people around us.
[01:49:42] When you got daylight, we were still looking for more looking for Dennis Moore.
[01:49:47] We were in the middle of a bunker complex.
[01:49:50] We were all around us. And that's why one reason that the LZPRout didn't have much of the effects.
[01:49:57] They were in their bunkers.
[01:49:59] So anyway, we brought in a lot of air support.
[01:50:02] I've been so he got out.
[01:50:04] Dennis' team was never found.
[01:50:08] And the two survivors, there's no doubt in my mind that they gave us the wrong location.
[01:50:19] Where the team was when it was overrun.
[01:50:23] I don't think they did it intentionally.
[01:50:27] I think it was the stress.
[01:50:29] I think it was being chased trying to survive.
[01:50:33] I think they lost track would have for them to get to where they were picked up from.
[01:50:38] Because otherwise you would have failed something.
[01:50:40] We would have found something.
[01:50:42] But you can go out there and you can find people who've written all kinds of things about Dennis' mission.
[01:50:49] And that nothing, you know, never that's what's found and things like that.
[01:50:53] I was there.
[01:50:54] I was the guy on the ground.
[01:50:56] You know, I searched that area.
[01:50:58] I know what was there.
[01:51:03] And Dennis was my roommate.
[01:51:07] So we were already very close.
[01:51:11] And so I had a personal stake and finding his team.
[01:51:18] And we just didn't make it.
[01:51:21] So we came back.
[01:51:24] So I was our mission for the PW.
[01:51:26] So it was postponed.
[01:51:29] And we went back down.
[01:51:31] It started replanting that mission again.
[01:51:33] But you know, because according to the intel they had moved more.
[01:51:37] So we had to pick a new site to go into and kind of think through it a little differently.
[01:51:44] And it turned out to be one of the most interesting missions that I had.
[01:51:55] Maybe one of the most unique and and sob because of a couple of things that happened.
[01:52:04] Well, like what?
[01:52:08] You know, it's it's really interesting that if anyone listen to this podcast, we've we we I had on a one of the guys have had on the podcast was a guy named Colonel William Reader.
[01:52:19] And he was a helicopter pilot that was shot down two times.
[01:52:23] And the second time he was shot down, he was captured.
[01:52:26] And he was one of those folks that was being moved from South Vietnam to the north,
[01:52:32] which was actually the worst possible thing to have happening.
[01:52:35] And guys died on those tracks and you know, this was this was them.
[01:52:39] The the stereotypical image that you get of of the Vietnam prisoner of war.
[01:52:46] In the jungle, that's what these guys were going through.
[01:52:48] So the guys in the Hanoi Hilton that were at least they were identified.
[01:52:53] People knew that they were there, etc.
[01:52:55] These guys in the jungle.
[01:52:57] They were just getting, you know, every horrible thing that could possibly happen.
[01:53:01] And then the last thing that could happen was that they were going through the last thing that could happen to those guys.
[01:53:05] So when you talk about the fact that you knew, you know, you had intel.
[01:53:09] This is the type of person that I'm thinking that you're going to save, you know,
[01:53:13] someone like Colonel William Reader who, you know, the stories that he told about being captured.
[01:53:19] And you know, at one point he was in a two-foot tall bamboo cage.
[01:53:24] His legs are shackled.
[01:53:26] He's in the middle of the jungle.
[01:53:28] He's trying to get some sleep, but he can't sleep because the rats are knowing at the wounds in his legs.
[01:53:34] So that's the, when you say, hey, you got an opportunity to go capture these, these guys.
[01:53:39] That's what I'm thinking about.
[01:53:44] And you're doing all this just on top of, you know, losing your friend, your brother Dennis Neill,
[01:53:48] who completely, you know, disappears.
[01:53:57] So what changed about what changed about the mission when what, what, what did it start, what made it so unique?
[01:54:02] Having, we were going into a different location, different route.
[01:54:08] Other than that, the beginning was basically the way it was supposed to go when we got canceled before.
[01:54:18] We go, we go in relatively un-eventful.
[01:54:23] And we get on the ELZ, and it's the big team.
[01:54:27] So Bruce and I have our teams together.
[01:54:29] It's a big one.
[01:54:31] And we start moving up the redsline.
[01:54:35] It was kind of a late in-sersh and not last light, but kind of late.
[01:54:39] We start up the redsline.
[01:54:41] We get a few hundred meters up there and then we stop, you know, for the night.
[01:54:48] You know, because you got a big group now, it takes longer.
[01:54:50] You get everybody in position and get set up, get all the claymores out, get everything.
[01:54:54] The way you, you know, way you need it.
[01:54:57] So, and now we have a larger perimeter.
[01:55:01] I am in the center of it.
[01:55:03] Bruce is, you know, close to me, but I know where he is.
[01:55:08] And what was, in a resting way, you know, it got dark.
[01:55:13] And the weather was starting to get bad.
[01:55:16] But it's dark.
[01:55:19] And you can't see your hand in front of your face.
[01:55:24] And I'm leaning against the tree.
[01:55:28] My rooksack behind me.
[01:55:30] I got my core 15 across my lap.
[01:55:33] I'm like I normally do.
[01:55:35] And I'm just about to sleep.
[01:55:38] And I hear a twig break.
[01:55:42] And my eyes open.
[01:55:45] And I'm thinking, wow.
[01:55:47] Did I just hear a twig break?
[01:55:50] And then I hear another one.
[01:55:51] And I'm saying to myself, that's directly in front of me.
[01:55:59] There's somebody in front of me that's moving in this direction.
[01:56:03] So now I'm listening.
[01:56:05] And I'm saying, somebody is coming directly at me.
[01:56:11] And I'm thinking, how did you get through the perimeter?
[01:56:14] I mean, we're not spaced very far apart at all.
[01:56:16] I know, we're all good.
[01:56:17] This guy have walked through our perimeter.
[01:56:20] And he's on the inside now.
[01:56:22] And he's coming.
[01:56:23] Straight at me.
[01:56:25] And so I'm playing all those thoughts in my mind.
[01:56:28] And he's getting closer.
[01:56:31] And now I've got my adrenaline going.
[01:56:34] I've got my super senses working.
[01:56:37] And even though it's so dark, I can't see anything.
[01:56:41] I can visualize him and find me.
[01:56:44] I can literally see a black silhouette in my mind.
[01:56:50] Because I'm tracking the sound.
[01:56:52] I can hear him breathing.
[01:56:53] And he's coming right at me.
[01:56:55] And I'm thinking, this is not going to be good.
[01:56:59] This guy is going to walk right into me.
[01:57:02] So I've got to make a decision.
[01:57:05] If I just shoot him right now, it's going to light me up.
[01:57:10] Like a neon sign. And all these buddies are going to open up.
[01:57:15] I've got to do something. Use about the step on me.
[01:57:18] So I've got to select, switch on the full order.
[01:57:23] I've got my weapon in the hand.
[01:57:25] And I'm tracking mentally this silhouette.
[01:57:29] And when it gets in my mind, where he's within reach,
[01:57:35] my plan was I'm going to reach out and grab a hold of him.
[01:57:41] I'm going to cram the barrel of the car 15 in his head.
[01:57:45] And I'm going to pull him. He'll be off balance.
[01:57:48] I'll pull him and bring him down to the ground.
[01:57:51] If he fires his weapon, if he yells, if he makes any kind of sound,
[01:57:57] I'm going to put a three or four round burst in his head.
[01:58:01] And of course, I'll light me up and everybody starts shooting at me.
[01:58:05] But I can't let him be in there.
[01:58:09] So I got within and range. I reached up. I grabbed him.
[01:58:14] It just the same instant to gun.
[01:58:17] He didn't even decide to head. Cut it to be gashin.
[01:58:19] His head. I pulled him down. He hasn't set a word.
[01:58:22] I jerk him right down to the ground.
[01:58:24] And the gun is there.
[01:58:26] And I'm saying, now what am I going to do?
[01:58:29] I mean, I've got him. But why am I going to do with him?
[01:58:35] And all of a sudden, I hear him whisper.
[01:58:40] Trump, we, Trump, we.
[01:58:42] He's saying, look down. Look down.
[01:58:44] Lights, lights.
[01:58:46] And I'm thinking, what?
[01:58:49] Lights, lights.
[01:58:51] And I realized we had a Vietnamese captain with us.
[01:58:54] Vietnamese Army captain.
[01:58:59] And he had seen something. And he was coming to tell me.
[01:59:02] You know, look at him.
[01:59:04] He wasn't used to going out with us.
[01:59:07] And he was coming to tell me.
[01:59:09] I've got him down on the ground now with the guns.
[01:59:12] I can't wait to do his head.
[01:59:14] And he's saying lights and lights.
[01:59:17] And I look up and I'm looking up the ridge up towards the top of the mountain.
[01:59:22] And all the way from the top of the mountain, about halfway down the ridge,
[01:59:26] are just lights.
[01:59:28] I thought, you know, there might be flashlights, but I think there was some kind of a lantern.
[01:59:34] And there was just a stream of people coming down the mountains.
[01:59:38] You know, so I led him up.
[01:59:41] I looked back down the ridge.
[01:59:43] And there's a stream of lights as far as I can see down the ridge coming up.
[01:59:49] The guy that's monitored in radio right then says,
[01:59:54] Sir, you need to hear this.
[01:59:58] The handsmith of handset.
[02:00:00] And I respond.
[02:00:01] And what I hear is, you are now a prayer-fire emergency.
[02:00:06] This is coming from Saagheg, where down in Saigon, being a relay to tell us that we are prayer-fire emergency.
[02:00:17] And I'm thinking, I didn't know that.
[02:00:20] But I mean, you know, I'm looking now and seeing all these lights.
[02:00:23] And I'm thinking, yeah, I think we probably are.
[02:00:29] And we're carrying a KY38.
[02:00:33] All right.
[02:00:34] We have the most secure tactical radio that there is.
[02:00:39] They kind of, you have to set that gun with about 20 manual settings.
[02:00:43] And the punch in the crypto code.
[02:00:47] You have to have all the frequencies.
[02:00:49] You have to have all the settings.
[02:00:52] And then the guy I'm honored and radio says,
[02:00:56] It's our unique idea of this.
[02:00:58] Nothing.
[02:00:59] Now what?
[02:01:00] These guys are coming from everywhere.
[02:01:02] And he's got something else.
[02:01:03] He wants me to listen to.
[02:01:05] And I pick up the handset.
[02:01:09] And I'm thinking, what do I hear?
[02:01:12] It's music.
[02:01:14] I'm hearing music coming over the handset.
[02:01:18] And then I hear this female NVA, whatever.
[02:01:24] Start talking.
[02:01:26] And it dawns on me all of a sudden.
[02:01:29] This is funeral music.
[02:01:32] This is the obituary music.
[02:01:34] This is the, what I used to hear when I was little.
[02:01:38] On my grandmother's radio every day, you know, at lunch.
[02:01:43] They do the news, but then they would do the obituaries for the people,
[02:01:47] you know, in that county or whatever that had died.
[02:01:50] They'd read off your name and all the stuff.
[02:01:52] And they'd have this music in the background.
[02:01:55] And this female is reading off our obituary.
[02:02:02] That we were killed in action that day.
[02:02:07] And she reads my name off as Dick Thompson.
[02:02:13] And I'm thinking, there's only one person on this side of the world who knows me as Dick.
[02:02:23] That has any clue that that's my name.
[02:02:27] And that was barred well.
[02:02:29] And you, you know, barred well was someplace.
[02:02:33] Nobody had him.
[02:02:35] And she reads my name off as Dick Thompson reads off the name of every member that we had on the team.
[02:02:42] All of us as being killed in action that day on the secure encrypted radio.
[02:02:51] So I got on's listening to this and thinking, what is going on?
[02:02:57] And I'm thinking, what is going on?
[02:02:59] This isn't making me, you know, a little nervous.
[02:03:02] How did you know my name? I did they get on this frequency.
[02:03:06] And, you know, and then that goes away.
[02:03:10] So it's kind of got my attention now in the bad guys are coming.
[02:03:14] So you start, you know, talking back and forth, you know, with,
[02:03:20] they've got a cubby out in the area now.
[02:03:23] So we start talking about, you know, what are options for getting us out of here?
[02:03:28] Because the weather's not that good.
[02:03:30] The weather's starting to roll in.
[02:03:33] And you know, I've got a couple of friends of North Vietnamese all around us.
[02:03:37] I've got this one woman who just told us all that we were killed a day.
[02:03:41] I read our obituary.
[02:03:44] I guess she'd get our names.
[02:03:47] Though everyone is in shock and confused about, you know, what's going on?
[02:03:52] How did they know exactly where we were in their coming at us?
[02:03:56] The weather's starting to roll in.
[02:04:00] And the clouds are slowly starting to come down on the mountains.
[02:04:04] So now I'm thinking, I mean, we're not going to be able to get air support.
[02:04:08] They can't get aircraft into extractus.
[02:04:11] And I'm having this conversation now with Kaviy about, I need some options.
[02:04:17] Because these, these guys are going to be here pretty soon.
[02:04:21] And you know, it's not going to be pleasant.
[02:04:23] We're loaded for bear, but not for that many people, not to be trapped in the dream.
[02:04:28] So finally they said, you know, one option might be combat skyspots.
[02:04:34] Although that's, elf-forces coming out with 500 pound bombs.
[02:04:39] And you know, you give them a coordinate two or three thousand meters away from you.
[02:04:46] They're flying by radar and being vectored by radar toward those coordinates.
[02:04:52] And then when the radar says, you're at the right place to release the bomb.
[02:04:57] You release, you know, a bomb.
[02:05:00] And you see where it hits.
[02:05:02] So this is because it's a nighttime scenario.
[02:05:05] It's night. Well, it's night plus now the clouds are down on the mountain.
[02:05:09] So he can, you can even see the mountain that we're on over the reason.
[02:05:14] I mean, what was that?
[02:05:16] He's called combat skyspot.
[02:05:20] So that's a technique that's not used very often because it's not very accurate.
[02:05:27] Right.
[02:05:28] And you know, only because this was the emergency situation.
[02:05:32] Did you improve it?
[02:05:34] And you know, they said, you, you need to give us a set of coordinates.
[02:05:38] You know, two or three thousand meters away.
[02:05:41] To start with, letting put one bomb out there and let's see where it hits.
[02:05:46] And then we'll start to adjust.
[02:05:50] So I say, you know, that's all we got. Let's do it.
[02:05:54] So it didn't take long to there's an L4 out in the area.
[02:05:58] And I actually, you know, were using my emergency radio.
[02:06:04] I was able to talk directly to the L4, which, you know, you can't normally do.
[02:06:12] And, you know, he's all in the bombs away.
[02:06:16] It's going to be impact about 20 seconds.
[02:06:18] You got to get your head down, right?
[02:06:20] You're just going to get something in the us nice to know.
[02:06:24] So it goes off.
[02:06:26] And, you know, it's a lot closer than, you know, 3,000 meters.
[02:06:30] So I'm thinking, I'm really glad I pushed it on out there, ways.
[02:06:34] And it wasn't really on the, wasn't online with the Ridge anyway.
[02:06:38] Kind of went over the Ridge and down into the valley.
[02:06:42] But at least I knew where it,
[02:06:44] I probably were hit, so I could start to adjust in some now.
[02:06:48] So we started messing with that.
[02:06:50] With that irritated, the North Vietnamese,
[02:06:54] they were not happy that somebody was out there trying to draw the bomb on.
[02:06:58] So we, we overheard radio transmission saying,
[02:07:06] shoot them in the legs.
[02:07:08] Take all their Americans prisoner.
[02:07:10] And we got a message coming out from Saigon.
[02:07:14] They were intercepting North Vietnamese transmissions and land.
[02:07:18] They planned to capture you.
[02:07:20] And they're going to try to wound you and take you.
[02:07:24] Okay.
[02:07:26] Then we got to get these sconspots working for us here.
[02:07:30] Get them in closer.
[02:07:32] And the bad guys are getting closer and closer.
[02:07:36] And so I start working them down.
[02:07:40] And I'm kind of behind a tree.
[02:07:42] And one of the bombs goes off.
[02:07:46] And a piece of scrap metal.
[02:07:50] Two and a half inches as long as I am.
[02:07:52] There comes out across the top of my head.
[02:07:56] It goes into the tree right in front of me.
[02:07:58] And just cuts, you know, the line across the top of my head.
[02:08:00] Is it going into the tree?
[02:08:02] And I'm thinking,
[02:08:04] that was close.
[02:08:06] I mean, that was pretty close.
[02:08:08] So, you know, I was behind a tree for a little while.
[02:08:12] Once it cooled down a little bit,
[02:08:14] I popped it out and I put it in my pocket.
[02:08:16] I still have it at home somewhere.
[02:08:18] I wanted to bring it just a joy to you.
[02:08:20] But, you know, so that creased the top of my head.
[02:08:22] Got my attention now.
[02:08:24] You know, there's serious about doing something.
[02:08:26] Eventually, you know, we do some gun battles and stuff.
[02:08:30] And that's going on.
[02:08:32] Is it late yet?
[02:08:33] No.
[02:08:34] But it's getting close when it finally did get light.
[02:08:38] There was a marine squadron that came out.
[02:08:40] Helicopter squadron that came out.
[02:08:42] And it was gunshots.
[02:08:44] And I guess the leader came over close to where the redsline was.
[02:08:46] And I was like, I'm going to be a little bit closer to the redsline.
[02:08:50] And I was like, I'm going to be a little bit closer to the redsline.
[02:08:54] And it came over close to where the redsline was.
[02:08:56] And we just received so much ground firing stuff from it.
[02:09:00] He told the rest of his guys back off.
[02:09:02] We're not going in there.
[02:09:04] There's too much ground fire.
[02:09:08] And then all of a sudden,
[02:09:10] I get a call from one of the gunshot pilots.
[02:09:14] And he says, I'm coming.
[02:09:16] No, don't come in here.
[02:09:20] If you try to fly up that ridge,
[02:09:22] you're going to have to go solo.
[02:09:24] You're going to fly around the tree tops.
[02:09:26] And barely moving.
[02:09:27] You're going to have to almost be hover.
[02:09:28] They're going to knock you down.
[02:09:30] Don't come in here.
[02:09:31] We'll find a way.
[02:09:32] Don't come up here.
[02:09:34] He's down coming.
[02:09:36] So this was a helo.
[02:09:39] Yeah.
[02:09:40] Helicopter gunshot.
[02:09:41] Marine Corps helicopter gunshot.
[02:09:42] So it wasn't.
[02:09:44] But if you mean I could hear him coming.
[02:09:46] And it wasn't a few minutes.
[02:09:47] And then I heard him.
[02:09:49] He said, I forgot his name.
[02:09:52] Eagle claw, something.
[02:09:54] Made a made a made a.
[02:09:55] We're hit.
[02:09:57] And we're going down.
[02:09:59] And so I talked to him a little more.
[02:10:01] And then he said, he sent out another made a.
[02:10:04] And said, you know, we're on fire going down.
[02:10:07] I'm going to try to make it to the river.
[02:10:10] So I think this is not good.
[02:10:13] So.
[02:10:14] And he actually made it to the river.
[02:10:17] And it was kind of a deep, swift flowing river.
[02:10:22] Wind inside ways.
[02:10:24] The pilot got out.
[02:10:25] The door gunner on that side got out.
[02:10:28] And the two of them got out.
[02:10:33] The crew chief on the on the side.
[02:10:37] It went.
[02:10:38] Wind in first.
[02:10:39] And the copilot.
[02:10:41] It didn't get out.
[02:10:44] And the guy.
[02:10:47] The door gunner got out.
[02:10:48] Was a good swimmer and stuff.
[02:10:50] So he jumped into water and swam over there and went down.
[02:10:53] You know, to try to get them.
[02:10:55] The other gunner got out.
[02:10:57] But the pilot couldn't get out.
[02:10:59] And never saw the door gunner again.
[02:11:02] He never came back up.
[02:11:04] So they lost those.
[02:11:05] I was too guy.
[02:11:06] Too many bad guys in that area.
[02:11:09] They couldn't go in to try to.
[02:11:11] They didn't come out.
[02:11:14] But they did get the pilot.
[02:11:17] And the door gunner out.
[02:11:21] And so that wasn't a good scene.
[02:11:23] So how far away was that from you from your location?
[02:11:26] They're there impact with the river which probably 3000 meters.
[02:11:30] Okay.
[02:11:31] So this is all in the vicinity of you.
[02:11:33] Yeah, it's all right around me.
[02:11:34] So they go in.
[02:11:36] And then.
[02:11:38] Yeah, we have a we have a battle.
[02:11:41] And it's it's not looking good.
[02:11:43] There's too many of them.
[02:11:45] And we have no place to go.
[02:11:47] So.
[02:11:48] It eventually gets to the point where I'm talking back to.
[02:11:53] To kind of be talking to the L.
[02:11:55] Forers.
[02:11:56] And now I have to go in.
[02:11:58] You have any cluster bomb units going to see the young board.
[02:12:03] And he said they did.
[02:12:05] I said.
[02:12:09] I said.
[02:12:09] Pretty don't mind position.
[02:12:11] And you know, I don't know if you've seen.
[02:12:13] Clutch their bomb units, but.
[02:12:15] It's a big container and it's full.
[02:12:18] Small bomblets that are about the size of a great fruit.
[02:12:21] Not a little bigger.
[02:12:23] So it drops out about the canister comes open.
[02:12:26] And you know, it just rains about 200 of those things down.
[02:12:30] So I just.
[02:12:32] So so how close to the enemy was all around.
[02:12:34] I mean, I'm already at the point.
[02:12:36] I mean, for you to be called.
[02:12:38] I'm looking around your position.
[02:12:40] That means you're about to be over what I'm looking around saying.
[02:12:44] Man, it's just the last thing.
[02:12:45] What time of day is it now?
[02:12:47] It's.
[02:12:49] Made morning.
[02:12:50] So it's midnight.
[02:12:51] So you guys have been in heavy contact the entire morning.
[02:12:53] Yeah.
[02:12:54] The enemy's closing in on your position.
[02:12:56] They're making progress, obviously, because now you're getting to a point.
[02:13:01] Because we can't go up or down.
[02:13:04] I mean, in the side, just, you know, it's the sides of the ridge or beer steep.
[02:13:07] So we can't go down the ridge on the sides.
[02:13:10] And they're coming in.
[02:13:12] And I'm thinking.
[02:13:14] How long will I be able to keep pulling the trigger?
[02:13:17] I mean, once I start getting hit.
[02:13:19] Did you guys already blow your claymores?
[02:13:21] Your perimeter claymores?
[02:13:22] Claymores are going.
[02:13:24] I mean, they're coming.
[02:13:25] And I'm thinking.
[02:13:26] And you had 20 guys in this.
[02:13:28] Yeah.
[02:13:31] Yeah.
[02:13:32] So the perimeter we're in.
[02:13:34] It's bigger than this.
[02:13:36] A little bigger than this room.
[02:13:38] So we're working like 15 by 15 feet.
[02:13:41] Yeah.
[02:13:42] It's a fairly small perimeter.
[02:13:44] And you guys are surrounded by.
[02:13:46] Yeah.
[02:13:47] You know, the end of the house.
[02:13:49] In the thousands of hardened to NVA.
[02:13:52] So regular.
[02:13:53] Yeah.
[02:13:54] And they're coming.
[02:13:56] Yeah.
[02:13:58] I tell a pilot to make your first run.
[02:14:00] Put it on us.
[02:14:02] If you don't hear me come back on the radio.
[02:14:04] And then make your next pass.
[02:14:07] And just level everything on this ridge.
[02:14:10] Because that means we're not here.
[02:14:13] Yeah.
[02:14:14] So he tells heads down his coming in.
[02:14:17] And it rains all these things down.
[02:14:19] And we had seven of them.
[02:14:22] The land either inside the perimeter or right on the edge of the perimeter.
[02:14:27] None of them went off.
[02:14:30] None of them exploded.
[02:14:32] But they were exploding all around us.
[02:14:35] And you could hear the screams and all this stuff.
[02:14:37] Because some of them were going off into trees.
[02:14:39] Shrapnel is going everywhere.
[02:14:41] And it broke.
[02:14:43] Broke their attack.
[02:14:44] Yeah.
[02:14:45] So I told him to make them put another one on us.
[02:14:47] Yeah.
[02:14:48] That's working.
[02:14:49] You can back off a little bit now.
[02:14:51] So that's just divine intervention.
[02:14:53] Yeah.
[02:14:54] Further to seven of those cluster bombs that land inside your perimeter.
[02:14:57] And none of them go off.
[02:14:59] I mean that just doesn't happen.
[02:15:01] You might have one or two of them go off somewhere.
[02:15:03] But not all the ones that are right there.
[02:15:06] And all the other ones do go off.
[02:15:08] The others do go off.
[02:15:09] I mean, I don't know that there were some out there.
[02:15:11] Yeah.
[02:15:12] They were appears that they all went off.
[02:15:14] So they backed off.
[02:15:16] Some things calm down a little bit.
[02:15:18] So I had a bruise.
[02:15:20] And then we found out now that we had a bruise.
[02:15:21] So I solved that there.
[02:15:23] And we had他說 as they could have told us that there was a woman
[02:15:27] died of cramp and with her bruise.
[02:15:28] I recorded about 10 cases.
[02:15:29] So basically there was about like 10 cases,
[02:15:28] So we had heard will go away.
[02:15:30] But I didn't remember.
[02:15:31] So sometimes seeing anything powerful,
[02:15:33] those are coming from me.
[02:15:35] I can't remember anything was uplifting
[02:15:36] in detail.
[02:15:37] I had not been in understanding that it was like that either.
[02:15:39] I worry less than my soothing and everyday body or as I got up from
[02:15:50] What do you want me to do?
[02:15:52] So we need to identify who the person is.
[02:15:55] So without going into detail, I just told him to take their
[02:16:00] property action so he could be identified and bring
[02:16:05] that back with him to the team.
[02:16:09] So then we finally get some gunshots working now because
[02:16:15] the weather started to lift up.
[02:16:20] We've been bombing quite a bit during the night.
[02:16:23] So we start working down toward the LZ that we can't come in on.
[02:16:28] So we're going to try to get an extraction there.
[02:16:31] Ran into a small ambush, but that didn't last long.
[02:16:34] So we were able to keep going.
[02:16:36] Got down to the LZ and we're looking around, looking for
[02:16:40] bad guys, but what I see is the tail fins sticking up out of the
[02:16:44] ground couple feet to the 500 pound ball sticking in the LZ
[02:16:49] unexploded.
[02:16:52] So now we're thinking, are we going to bring a helicopter in here
[02:16:55] with a bomb setting there unexploded?
[02:16:58] So excuse me, some of them.
[02:17:01] We, you know, tow cubby.
[02:17:03] This is what's going on.
[02:17:06] We really like to get out of here because they're coming back.
[02:17:10] And so we have some dialogue and they decided, okay, we're going to
[02:17:14] do the extraction.
[02:17:15] This is going to take five aircraft because it's out.
[02:17:19] So we started rotating them in and with my team it's going to be
[02:17:24] the last team out.
[02:17:26] So we got to machine guns, place and fire.
[02:17:29] You know, I'm trying to suppress the fire, the gunships are
[02:17:32] suppressing fire, rotating those chips in.
[02:17:36] And we had so many gunships and they won't use, you know, on
[02:17:40] standby out there and just waiting on their term to come out.
[02:17:43] It's unreal.
[02:17:44] But eventually, I think it was around 1700.
[02:17:48] You know, we got out.
[02:17:50] So I started at 2100 the day before.
[02:17:54] And, you know, 1700, we finally got extracted and headed back.
[02:18:01] But we didn't, you know, get to go after the prisoners.
[02:18:05] So then the question start.
[02:18:08] How could they know who was on the team?
[02:18:10] How could they have their frequencies?
[02:18:12] They had to have a KY38.
[02:18:14] Where did they get that?
[02:18:18] So it was, I mean, to my knowledge, those questions whenever
[02:18:22] answered, if they were answered, you know, we never found out how
[02:18:26] they managed to do that.
[02:18:30] You know, there was about about a two week delay between the time that
[02:18:36] we did the bright light mission for Dennis' team.
[02:18:39] God, and us coming back.
[02:18:41] Right.
[02:18:42] So, I mean, the mission had already been planned and I had to take
[02:18:45] in a couple of weeks and then we get delayed a couple of weeks.
[02:18:50] So there was a leak.
[02:18:52] Some were had to be a leak in our compound.
[02:18:56] So the information got out.
[02:18:58] I mean, when you were talking to Tilt, he was saying, you know,
[02:19:02] in late 69 and going into 70, whole teams are just disappearing.
[02:19:09] I mean, the information was getting out somehow.
[02:19:12] I mean, they were getting smarter, but the information was getting out
[02:19:16] and where you're losing teams.
[02:19:19] So that was a little unique because you didn't normally get your
[02:19:22] bit your way here.
[02:19:24] I mean, then...
[02:19:25] No.
[02:19:26] No, no, normally get that.
[02:19:28] One point there we found out, ASTR, we got back.
[02:19:30] We found that there was a point during the mission there.
[02:19:34] They had actually listed us as MIA because all the radio traffic
[02:19:40] they were picking up from the North Vietnamese.
[02:19:43] So they had us that we really wasn't there now.
[02:19:47] And all this bombing and stuff that was going on.
[02:19:50] We wasn't there.
[02:19:52] Didn't anyone get wounded during that?
[02:19:55] Yeah, trapped in stuff.
[02:19:57] No one was killed.
[02:19:59] But, you know, we'd trapped no.
[02:20:01] I got the top of my head cut.
[02:20:05] And you got that qualification of calling a cluster bomb in on your position.
[02:20:11] Which is a pretty rare one to walk away from.
[02:20:13] Yeah, and so I guess today, you know,
[02:20:17] in this day when I hear people saying,
[02:20:21] ban cluster bombs, you know, you use cluster bombs.
[02:20:25] I'm saying, man, I'm glad that thing was around at least one time.
[02:20:29] Yeah, that's sort of the, you know, that's like the,
[02:20:33] I don't always say the ultimate horrible situation.
[02:20:37] It doesn't get you worse than when you are calling for
[02:20:41] air strikes on your position.
[02:20:43] That's the absolute, that's the last thing you do, right?
[02:20:46] That's when you say,
[02:20:47] you know, you're going to be overrun where probably get a die.
[02:20:51] This is our last ditch if effort is the ultimate of all hail marries.
[02:20:55] This is it.
[02:20:57] Call for fire on our position.
[02:20:59] And that's what you did.
[02:20:59] And by the grace of God, those browns that hit inside your perimeter.
[02:21:03] That's the only way you can explain it.
[02:21:05] I'm telling you.
[02:21:06] And give me one other.
[02:21:08] So I'm trying to get the last tail of copter loaded and get my guys on it.
[02:21:13] And this one's going to sound strange too.
[02:21:15] But I'm standing right next to the helicopter and putting people on.
[02:21:19] And I hear a voice that says drop.
[02:21:23] A loud voice that says drop.
[02:21:27] Without hesitation, I just collapsed to my knees.
[02:21:31] And as I did about a 10 round burst of machine gun rounds.
[02:21:37] Hit the side of the chopper right where my head was.
[02:21:41] I mean, a fraction of a second later.
[02:21:44] And I would have been decaped and decapitated.
[02:21:48] I mean, there were things like that happening throughout.
[02:21:52] And you think, what did this come from?
[02:21:54] How is all this happening?
[02:21:56] It's beyond coincidence.
[02:21:58] Yeah, it is.
[02:22:00] And it was definitely an interesting mission.
[02:22:04] I just, you know, very upset that we didn't get to go after the pureed evidence.
[02:22:10] But what's a peri.
[02:22:13] What is it called?
[02:22:15] Peri fire.
[02:22:17] Peri fire.
[02:22:18] So the area of operations is.
[02:22:21] They would call it prairie.
[02:22:23] And then the prairie fire emergency was when there was a bad situation.
[02:22:27] And where these guys need to get extracted.
[02:22:29] That's the that's the prairie fire emergency.
[02:22:32] They kept in the forward for us to.
[02:22:34] Be captured.
[02:22:36] Are discovered.
[02:22:38] So whatever it took to make sure that we were not.
[02:22:42] And if you read the sodg material, you'll read about here about that, you know, sometimes a team,
[02:22:53] which rumored at least that sometimes of B-50-T strike was put on teams that disappeared to make sure there were no survivors.
[02:23:02] I've been, I've done bomb assessment damages.
[02:23:06] I have to be 50-T strikes. Never had one put on me. And, you know, this would have been a good down for an up-at-one.
[02:23:14] Out there if they were going to do that.
[02:23:16] But I don't know that that's true.
[02:23:18] But you know that you had volunteered to go on a mission where you can't under any circumstances be taken alive.
[02:23:28] So.
[02:23:30] You have another mission highlighted where it just says a prisoner snatch.
[02:23:34] 22 caliber pistol with a silencer.
[02:23:37] Did you ever get your prisoner?
[02:23:40] I never got one of my.
[02:23:43] Why?
[02:23:44] And at what point did your nickname, or your codename, turn determinator?
[02:23:48] Because I'm thinking it might have had something to do with this.
[02:23:52] Yeah, it was, it was actually after sawg on some other things I was doing.
[02:23:58] I had commanders, you know, starting with Dick Meadows, that started this thing about,
[02:24:06] you know, you're the most relentless person I've ever seen.
[02:24:10] I, you're the last person in the world I want to have come in after me.
[02:24:14] Because you just want to stop.
[02:24:16] And, you know, I had other commanders that, you know, after that, saying the same thing.
[02:24:22] And they have to, you know, terminator movie came out.
[02:24:26] So they, they named that movie after you got it.
[02:24:29] But then, you know, the name all of a sudden was prominent.
[02:24:32] And, you know, so, you know, they said, your, your name's really, you know, terminator.
[02:24:39] So I kind of hung on to that one.
[02:24:42] I usually does a race name, do Iron Man competitions and stuff.
[02:24:47] And I had a good conversation with, when I was talking to till,
[02:24:51] and he was, he went through a lot of the scenarios that he described was,
[02:24:54] he was talking about the dogs that would be coming after him.
[02:24:57] Oh, yeah.
[02:24:58] And, you know, I asked till they said, do you like dogs?
[02:25:00] He says I hate dogs.
[02:25:01] And he said it without a moment of hesitation.
[02:25:03] I said, what do you think of dogs now?
[02:25:04] He said I hate dogs.
[02:25:05] And, of course, he also said his wife likes dogs.
[02:25:08] And therefore, they have dogs.
[02:25:09] Yeah.
[02:25:10] But are you, are you scarred from, from dogs as well?
[02:25:13] No.
[02:25:14] Yeah.
[02:25:15] Even though I do have a robotic dog, I've had a lot of dogs, you know, across the years.
[02:25:23] But you can deal with dogs.
[02:25:26] I mean, they tend to give you position away sometimes.
[02:25:30] But, you know, they're 22, pistol with a silence.
[02:25:35] They're still going to make some noise.
[02:25:39] But if the dog gets far enough away from the group, you know, you can take him out.
[02:25:46] You know, we'd want to those.
[02:25:47] You can put out CES powder, you know, on the trail.
[02:25:52] And that really screws that are smell up when they sniff that.
[02:25:56] So they're ways to deal with dogs.
[02:25:58] But yeah, it scares you a little bit when you realize they're coming after you have dogs.
[02:26:03] I prefer trackers because I know how to get them.
[02:26:06] I don't, I don't miss trackers.
[02:26:09] They will step on one of my lines.
[02:26:12] So the hardest trackers to get rid of.
[02:26:16] When they put three of them out there,
[02:26:20] it different locations with a couple pieces of bamboo.
[02:26:24] And they'll crack the bamboo over here.
[02:26:26] And you'll hear that and you say, well, we're not going that way.
[02:26:30] So we start to turn this way.
[02:26:32] And if you go too far, you'll hear your clock and over on this side.
[02:26:35] Those are actually channeling.
[02:26:37] They're channeling you right in 10 a.m.
[02:26:39] But you know that's going to happen.
[02:26:41] So it's hard to put out toe poppers or something for those guys.
[02:26:44] Because they're so far away from you.
[02:26:46] And you don't know where they're going to walk.
[02:26:48] They don't get to them.
[02:26:50] So that makes it more interesting.
[02:26:53] You got to get away because you know they're hurting you right.
[02:26:56] So they're dead and.
[02:26:57] What was the deal with the note you have in here about the 22.
[02:27:00] The Hosh Poppy 22 with the silencer and the prison snatch.
[02:27:04] Was that just another failed prison snatch?
[02:27:07] Well, it was another technique.
[02:27:09] Yeah, I had trouble keeping them alive.
[02:27:14] But with the 22, we used a similar scenario as the ambush we were talking about.
[02:27:20] Where I had a I shot the 22.
[02:27:23] I would shoot the guy in the thigh.
[02:27:27] And it would it would sting enough.
[02:27:29] It would cause them to drop their hands from the weapon.
[02:27:32] And then thumper.
[02:27:34] You know, would take him down.
[02:27:37] I'd hit the morphine in him.
[02:27:39] And you know, that was the plan.
[02:27:41] So I hit the female artery one time with the 22 of all the, I mean,
[02:27:46] I'll hold leg there.
[02:27:47] And I hit the David artery.
[02:27:49] You know, so the guy I've led to death.
[02:27:51] I mean, just just little accidents like that.
[02:27:56] Got in a way.
[02:27:59] But.
[02:28:00] And I didn't have, but one of the other teams said they had one.
[02:28:03] And he was alive.
[02:28:04] They were coming out on strings.
[02:28:06] And one other little guys was was holding the guy.
[02:28:10] And even though he'd been dragged up a little, he was just holding him.
[02:28:14] And they were about 3,000 feet.
[02:28:16] And this guy started coming to and decided he was not going to be a prisoner.
[02:28:20] So he started kicking and squarming and biting the guy in the face.
[02:28:24] And and it a little guy said, okay.
[02:28:27] Just you wrote that option.
[02:28:29] Option two and yeah, 3,000 feet is turned in loose and watched and disappeared into the
[02:28:33] canopy.
[02:28:34] So that was somebody else's bad luck on that.
[02:28:37] That wasn't mine.
[02:28:41] And at this point, you got to be close to your one year run over there.
[02:28:47] And are you starting to feel any of the any the short time mentality you started to think
[02:28:54] goes the last mission wins the last one or you starting to feel that at all?
[02:28:58] I started to feel not so much the last mission, but I started to feel like.
[02:29:03] I mean, they hit this compound from time to time.
[02:29:07] So I've been over there, you know, a year.
[02:29:10] So I go to the supply room and I say.
[02:29:14] I'd like to sign out of black jacket and a steel pot.
[02:29:18] And you're saying, why?
[02:29:20] I said, I, you know, next time the siren goes off and we head for the bunkers.
[02:29:24] I'm going to have on the flag jacket and steel pot.
[02:29:27] So I don't have long left.
[02:29:29] And I don't want to, you know, somebody's lucky shot to take me out.
[02:29:33] How many, what was that like last month you were there?
[02:29:36] Yeah, last few weeks.
[02:29:37] You think I made it this fall.
[02:29:39] I'm not going to get hit by it.
[02:29:40] No, it was just from the ag in the compound.
[02:29:42] Because you would see people.
[02:29:43] I had another friend in my under that had been with it for a long time before I'm so.
[02:29:48] He only had a couple weeks left before he was going home.
[02:29:54] And they had a mission come up and he volunteered to go on it.
[02:29:58] And I said, Pete, what are you doing?
[02:30:02] He got two weeks, man.
[02:30:04] He said, they need a potential leader to go out with his company.
[02:30:08] So I'm going to do it.
[02:30:10] No, no, no, no, no.
[02:30:12] I was just last month.
[02:30:14] You know, so you see people like that.
[02:30:17] So I tried not to think of anything as this is my last one.
[02:30:22] This is what I'm going to do this week of whatever.
[02:30:26] It's not my last one.
[02:30:29] But I did think about, yeah, when I'm running to that bunker, maybe it's still
[02:30:35] a part of like that.
[02:30:36] It wouldn't be okay.
[02:30:38] It's night.
[02:30:39] It's relatively cool.
[02:30:41] So I'll be right.
[02:30:43] So how did it, how did the deployment?
[02:30:45] So I finished up and left there went back down to the train.
[02:30:54] You know, to process out, they told me, now you're going to be stuck here for a couple
[02:31:00] of weeks or so before we can get you on a plane home.
[02:31:03] So I went over to the S.F.
[02:31:05] I had quarters and I said, I need help.
[02:31:09] So there was an NCO there.
[02:31:11] What can I do for you?
[02:31:13] I said, I need to go on a plane tonight.
[02:31:15] And he said, let me see what I can do.
[02:31:18] Yeah.
[02:31:19] So I go out and party with some other guys that I know.
[02:31:23] But two o'clock in the morning, somebody's knocking on my door and this guy's there saying,
[02:31:28] I need you to get over, I forgot what they call the place you had to go through.
[02:31:33] But you need to get over there right away.
[02:31:35] So they can process you through and get you on the plane.
[02:31:38] So are you a captain now at this point?
[02:31:40] No, you still are.
[02:31:41] First of all, you're still a first of all.
[02:31:43] So at this point are you thinking you're staying in the army?
[02:31:46] I'm thinking I may stick around for a while.
[02:31:48] I mean, could you, you know, I had thought it was going to be three years.
[02:31:52] But when you get into an organization that has the latest greatest gadgets and missions and a
[02:32:03] Spreed of core, I mean, you can't just walk away from there.
[02:32:08] I mean, that's hard to get to walk to.
[02:32:10] Yeah, it's all, it's all down here.
[02:32:12] There's nothing else.
[02:32:13] There's like the guys that come back from walking on the moon.
[02:32:15] Yeah, what are you going to do?
[02:32:17] Yeah.
[02:32:18] I mean, we had everything from the little tiny grenades, much bigger than a job record that they gave us the
[02:32:25] test.
[02:32:26] I had a rocket pistol rocket.
[02:32:29] This was a little, a little expand.
[02:32:32] It was like, it was like a little 10 gun that you probably played with when you were a kid.
[02:32:37] You stick a cork in the end of it and you squeeze the little trigger and it pops the cork out on a little
[02:32:43] string. This thing popped out of 50 caliber round with a rocket in the back of it.
[02:32:50] I mean, they gave us this and you know what?
[02:32:56] I thought, was this cool?
[02:32:57] He didn't make much noise.
[02:32:58] They sound like shooting a bottle rocket.
[02:33:00] It's just a woosh.
[02:33:01] I mean, this thing's big as you thumb and it's solid steel.
[02:33:07] I mean, no one else side still.
[02:33:08] What was it, what did they build it for?
[02:33:10] What was the purpose of it?
[02:33:11] It was something really quiet that had a tremendous penetrating power.
[02:33:15] So like you take a vehicle out with it or something?
[02:33:18] Not a vehicle, but you know, did you go right through a vest?
[02:33:21] I mean, I got it.
[02:33:23] Unless I was right here.
[02:33:24] If I shot you with it right here, it bounced off of you.
[02:33:27] Because it wouldn't have.
[02:33:28] It takes about 10 to 15 feet to build up the speed.
[02:33:31] But beyond that, I mean, I shot it through two by fours.
[02:33:35] I mean, you just couldn't stop it.
[02:33:38] But again, I tried to use it.
[02:33:42] And I figured I'll take this guy out because it's going to be really quiet.
[02:33:46] And so I get it up and it's night and I go click.
[02:33:52] And you can hear the click.
[02:33:55] No rocket.
[02:33:58] So one of the other guys had to take you out because this thing didn't work.
[02:34:03] So they got rid of those because they had such a malfunction
[02:34:07] rate.
[02:34:08] Well, I mean, go Google it.
[02:34:09] Go.
[02:34:10] Rocket pistol.
[02:34:11] Rocket pistol.
[02:34:12] I mean, their video is out there.
[02:34:14] People shoot no man trying to make them work.
[02:34:17] Sometimes they work.
[02:34:18] Sometimes they don't.
[02:34:19] So you're around your, is this around your three year mark?
[02:34:21] You must be around the three or he'd you already re-enlisted or you was re-enlistment
[02:34:24] coming up.
[02:34:25] Well, because because I went to OCS, then I incur extra time.
[02:34:32] Okay.
[02:34:33] So I had to stick around.
[02:34:35] And if I was going to accept captain in all I had to go and definitely.
[02:34:41] So so the weird thing is you're your inviant nom, you're insog, you're conducting these crazy
[02:34:47] operations.
[02:34:48] You barely live through this.
[02:34:49] And then you, you all of a sudden, two o'clock in the morning, you're still drunk,
[02:34:54] probably.
[02:34:55] You, it's every knocks on your door and says, hey, you're going home.
[02:35:00] Yeah.
[02:35:01] I go down to get on the plane.
[02:35:05] You're going through a little security thing.
[02:35:07] And the guy says, what's that in your pants?
[02:35:11] Yeah.
[02:35:14] And I said, you mean this?
[02:35:16] And he said, yes.
[02:35:17] And I said, it's a war trophy.
[02:35:18] And he just says, okay.
[02:35:20] I put it back down in my pants.
[02:35:22] And I got on that civilian aircraft and off I go.
[02:35:25] And thinking nobody's going to hijack this thing.
[02:35:28] It's ready.
[02:35:32] You got off the plane with it in San Francisco or I think it was in San Francisco
[02:35:37] or LA one of the TV and went right on to do there.
[02:35:41] Of course you didn't have the security checks and things like that.
[02:35:44] So now you're in either San Francisco, you're somewhere in California, you're whatever.
[02:35:51] You're 48 hours or 72 hours or something less than a couple days, few days out of the bush.
[02:35:57] How's that transition?
[02:36:00] It's tough.
[02:36:03] It's a different world back here.
[02:36:06] Aside from the protest and all that, it's just a totally different environment, different world.
[02:36:14] I've come from the wallwrest, I've come from a world where I didn't have all these rules of engagement
[02:36:24] that you have now. The rule of engagement was if I see you, I kill you.
[02:36:30] If I run across somebody out in the area of operations, I terminate them.
[02:36:35] You're a bad guy. You don't have to have a weapon.
[02:36:39] You don't have to be doing anything aggressive toward me.
[02:36:42] I just have to see you.
[02:36:44] Because you're not supposed to see me.
[02:36:46] So if I let you see me, then I basically signed your death warrant.
[02:36:51] Now I'm in a world where you get in the rules, their laws, their all kinds of things.
[02:36:57] You can't do that.
[02:37:00] And what did the Army do to help you reintroduce reintegrate to being back in America?
[02:37:10] At that point, the reintegration was, here's your next assignment you're going to be a reindering instructor in a reindered department.
[02:37:19] Okay. I'm saying, okay, I can do that.
[02:37:23] I mean, I wanted to be a reindering instructor.
[02:37:27] So I get that particular job.
[02:37:31] And I thought, I've got maybe eight months at the most before I'm going to be back.
[02:37:39] So what better place to put me than as a reindering instructor,
[02:37:44] going out and evaluating reinders to you and it's on small patrols tactics, all that kind of stuff,
[02:37:50] and having a journal.
[02:37:53] And here's how I can prove this technique that I used in SOC.
[02:37:58] Here's how I can practice slipping up on people.
[02:38:01] And more, I can improve all the techniques that I've been using there.
[02:38:05] I can go improve them. I can spend more time with a range.
[02:38:09] I can use them. I had a range shooting, improve my markmanship skills, my listening skills, my night movement skills.
[02:38:15] I can go out and work on this stuff for eight months, journal it.
[02:38:20] And when I get back to SOC, I'm going to be a better SOC guy than I was when I was there before.
[02:38:27] Well, I'll tell you what, we've been going for another two hours and 40 minutes.
[02:38:32] We're going to pick up with your Ranger instructor, period of your life on the next podcast.
[02:38:41] Okay, good.
[02:38:42] Thanks for coming on.
[02:38:44] Thank you very much.
[02:38:45] And yeah, I think that's not just thanks for coming on, it's thanks for everything.
[02:38:50] We'll talk to you on the next podcast.
[02:38:53] Okay, thank you.
[02:38:55] Well, once again, Colonel Henry Dick Thompson has left the building and has once again left me in a complete sense of awe.
[02:39:09] Because we're talking about just absolute insanity.
[02:39:15] And the fact that the men of SOC did what the men of SOC did and the fact that the fact that we get to sit here and talk to some of them is just unbelievable.
[02:39:31] Because who who survives what he did, who survives what tilt did, who survives what the Frenchman did.
[02:39:42] Not many.
[02:39:45] And that's something that we need to remember as awesome as it is to sit here and hear these stories.
[02:39:52] Remember that they're not just stories.
[02:39:56] That these were people's lives and these were people's deaths.
[02:40:02] And so many of these men did not return.
[02:40:08] And they gave their lives so that we can live ours.
[02:40:16] And here we are forever indicted to them, to their sacrifice.
[02:40:27] And while I know that that we cannot ever repay them,
[02:40:37] it's just impossible.
[02:40:42] But what we do know is that the best we can do to attempt to repay them, this to live our lives every day in a way that venerates their sacrifices.
[02:41:03] So don't just live.
[02:41:09] Don't just be.
[02:41:15] Instead be everything that you are capable of being.
[02:41:26] That's what we need to do.
[02:41:32] So echoing, I guess that being everything we are capable of being starts out with us just being capable.
[02:41:47] You like that word capable.
[02:41:50] You went through a hole.
[02:41:53] You went through a hole.
[02:41:56] You were kind of...
[02:42:03] You latched onto something that I said.
[02:42:06] But then you kind of adjusted it to it made sense to you in a clear way.
[02:42:13] I would say even more accurately put where I latched onto it exactly.
[02:42:17] Good way of putting it.
[02:42:19] I latched onto it and then just sort of like, how you go down that wormhole more and more and more.
[02:42:24] And that and playing the long game versus the shirk.
[02:42:29] That's another.
[02:42:30] That's another.
[02:42:31] For sure because that's really what it kind of is.
[02:42:33] It's almost like every decision you make.
[02:42:36] Most decisions that you make are going to land on like one of those things.
[02:42:39] Like okay.
[02:42:40] And a lot of times both of them.
[02:42:41] So you're like okay.
[02:42:42] Am I going to play the long game here or the shirk game?
[02:42:45] And that's everything pretty much.
[02:42:46] And then the other one I want to be capable or comfortable.
[02:42:49] That's the other two like okay.
[02:42:51] If you can kind of keep that in your mind.
[02:42:54] Your decision making will be a lot better for yourself.
[02:42:57] It's interesting though this little.
[02:42:59] This little play on words a little bit of a play on words.
[02:43:02] I just said right if you want to be everything you're capable of being.
[02:43:06] Well it starts with just being capable in the first place.
[02:43:09] Yes.
[02:43:10] Where do we need to be capable and how can we improve our capabilities.
[02:43:16] Physically mentally.
[02:43:18] Any motion only.
[02:43:20] I spiritually.
[02:43:21] And spiritually I think yes.
[02:43:23] Because some people will tell you no not spiritually.
[02:43:26] Really.
[02:43:27] Well then again what is let me tell you.
[02:43:29] Let me tell you.
[02:43:30] Do you get to will definitely help you in all aspects.
[02:43:32] Let's think about this pragmatically confidence.
[02:43:36] Yes.
[02:43:37] If you know do you get to you will be more confident.
[02:43:39] This is now you'll take a little.
[02:43:41] You'll start off by taking a little bit step back in confidence.
[02:43:44] Because when you very first start training you're going to be overwhelmed by the fact that you're going to be scared of everyone.
[02:43:49] Looking at them going away.
[02:43:50] This guy might know you're going to and then they can beat me.
[02:43:52] But then after a little while you go, okay.
[02:43:54] No cool.
[02:43:55] Even if this person knows you're going to do it.
[02:43:57] I at least know what to do a little bit.
[02:43:59] Yes.
[02:44:00] So confidence is definitely going to help you.
[02:44:03] Stress relief.
[02:44:04] We talked about that last time.
[02:44:05] It's definitely going to help you.
[02:44:06] Capability is definitely going to help you.
[02:44:09] Yeah.
[02:44:10] So it's going to help you across the board.
[02:44:12] That's so much more.
[02:44:13] Social aspects going to help you.
[02:44:14] Okay.
[02:44:15] Go ahead.
[02:44:16] Sorry.
[02:44:17] Back to doctor Thompson.
[02:44:18] And you know all the sub guys were well actually a lot of guys that we've talked to.
[02:44:23] Whatever.
[02:44:24] I kind of trip out like when I go home in this in a lot of ways, but in this particular way where you know how like in the movies.
[02:44:30] Right.
[02:44:31] Where you got the guy and he's almost about to geek out.
[02:44:34] Yeah.
[02:44:35] Right.
[02:44:36] But in the back of your mind you're like unless this movie is going to kill this character which they're not.
[02:44:40] If it's the main character.
[02:44:41] Right.
[02:44:42] Unless it's way at the end and that's a different story.
[02:44:43] But you know it's in the middle of the movie or whatever.
[02:44:45] And he's about to get found out by the Mad guy.
[02:44:47] Like it's going to get found and kill to whatever.
[02:44:49] You're like okay.
[02:44:50] This is good the way they present it and everything.
[02:44:52] And I'm so it's suspenseful.
[02:44:54] But the back of my mind like they're not going to kill this guy.
[02:44:57] You know.
[02:44:58] So you kind of get that feeling when they're telling this story.
[02:45:01] But it's like a real story.
[02:45:03] Yeah.
[02:45:04] And that's why that's why you know when I was thinking about this like it's cool.
[02:45:08] It's so awesome to sit here and talk to these guys that lived.
[02:45:12] Yeah.
[02:45:13] But you have to remember that there's countless guys that the exact scenario that these guys went through.
[02:45:21] Where oh, the bullet went to inches to the left and set a two inch to the right.
[02:45:25] And that guy's dead.
[02:45:26] The helicopter got hit with this.
[02:45:28] The helicopter crashed.
[02:45:29] It's just it's that's why it's such a miracle that these guys are sitting here talking to us.
[02:45:34] Yeah.
[02:45:34] And that's what I mean.
[02:45:35] Then that's why I'm actually tripping out because sure.
[02:45:38] We know that guy lived because he's sitting right here.
[02:45:40] We know that part of it, but when he takes you back to the moment, but we really don't know if this guy's going to live or not.
[02:45:47] Yeah.
[02:45:48] I mean, as far as myself.
[02:45:49] And then at your body, even more, I kind of go down a little wormhole.
[02:45:53] Like man, this is just how impossible this is not impossible.
[02:45:56] Maybe that's not the right word, but it kind of feels like the right word.
[02:45:59] But just how weird this is where let's say you went back in time and visited, you know,
[02:46:06] tilt or whoever and say, hey, this is what you're going to do.
[02:46:11] And these very specific things are going to happen.
[02:46:14] And you're going to live.
[02:46:16] Even him himself would be like, I don't know if that's possible.
[02:46:21] Yeah, for sure.
[02:46:22] Meanwhile, it's actually happened.
[02:46:24] Yeah.
[02:46:25] Man.
[02:46:26] Yeah, it kind of puts a lot of things into perspective.
[02:46:29] Yeah.
[02:46:30] Yeah.
[02:46:31] It's it's crazy.
[02:46:33] Yeah.
[02:46:37] Yeah.
[02:46:38] And that story from Dick Thompson that I read today, just going into rescue with no plan, with no,
[02:46:47] somebody else's weapon.
[02:46:49] It's just like completely just dropping 15 feet into 150 foot of jungle canopy,
[02:46:56] falling through the trees until you luckily hit a branch.
[02:47:00] You know, by the way, if you hit the ground without hitting anything, you just die.
[02:47:05] Straight up just die.
[02:47:07] Yeah.
[02:47:08] And so yeah, these guys are just, they're just awesome.
[02:47:12] They're awesome human beings.
[02:47:14] Yep.
[02:47:15] Yeah.
[02:47:16] And then you kind of, you sort of see them sitting across you when you're like,
[02:47:19] can there's there is?
[02:47:20] Yeah.
[02:47:21] This is the guy you did that for real stuff, you know.
[02:47:24] Yeah.
[02:47:25] You know, what about those old pictures of tilt when tilt's like 20, 20, two years old?
[02:47:29] Yeah.
[02:47:30] You just look at those.
[02:47:31] That's like the coolest guy ever.
[02:47:33] And you see pictures of all these guys, the Frenchman with his, with his legs all taped up.
[02:47:39] And you see Dick Thompson.
[02:47:41] Dick Thompson was lucky.
[02:47:42] Yeah.
[02:47:43] Of was he a first lieutenant?
[02:47:45] I thought it was cool on the first podcast when I was asking about how, like, when you volunteered,
[02:47:51] was there any resistance?
[02:47:52] He's like, no, he's volunteering to be an officer in Vietnam.
[02:47:55] The life expectancy was a couple weeks.
[02:47:58] They're like, oh, you want me an officer cool step right over here into this line.
[02:48:01] Oh, you want to be going to range of schools, cool step into this line.
[02:48:03] Oh, you want to be special forces cool step into this line.
[02:48:05] Oh, you want to go to sag cool.
[02:48:07] No problem step over here.
[02:48:08] There's zero resistance.
[02:48:10] Zero resistance for him to go and do what he wanted to do because the life expectancy of every one of those.
[02:48:17] It's just like volunteer to volunteer to volunteer to, to be dead.
[02:48:23] Yeah.
[02:48:24] And there's no resistance.
[02:48:26] So it's a minute.
[02:48:29] Yeah.
[02:48:30] It's crazy.
[02:48:31] Well, very capable people were talking about here.
[02:48:35] Yeah.
[02:48:36] Mentally physically, mostly and spiritually.
[02:48:38] 100%.
[02:48:39] Then last time to digit two.
[02:48:41] Yes, covers all those things and we should be doing this in my opinion.
[02:48:46] So we need G's when we do digit two because that's part of the uniform.
[02:48:51] We get an origin gate.
[02:48:53] Don't even have to ask that question.
[02:48:56] No longer a question.
[02:48:57] No longer a question.
[02:48:59] Origin gate goes to originmain.com, boom, pick whatever you want.
[02:49:02] Easy money.
[02:49:03] Also, they also have rash guards on there.
[02:49:07] Other clothing items.
[02:49:08] Yeah.
[02:49:09] Because you want to represent, you know, being in an American maid clothing.
[02:49:15] But you can't wear your ghee to the store.
[02:49:19] Unfortunately.
[02:49:20] I mean, you could attack the American man.
[02:49:22] You could technically, but usually the cut off for that are as around 11 years old.
[02:49:26] Yes.
[02:49:27] That's a sense.
[02:49:28] Like my daughter, my little 10 year old daughter, she's walking around in a guy.
[02:49:31] No fact.
[02:49:32] No fact.
[02:49:32] No.
[02:49:33] No one says anything to her.
[02:49:34] She's not like walking around trying to be proof that she's a jiu-jitsu player.
[02:49:39] I mean, it's kind of evident that she's a jiu-jitsu player because she is wearing a ghee.
[02:49:43] But, you know, it's no fact or she'll go to dinner with a ghee on.
[02:49:46] You know what I mean?
[02:49:48] Well, you know, okay.
[02:49:50] All right.
[02:49:51] You know, she's taking your glasses off.
[02:49:53] I think her cut off is 11.
[02:49:54] Yes.
[02:49:55] When she turns 11, she'll probably be like, I'm going to take off my ghee right now.
[02:49:58] Well, if you come straight from jiu-jitsu and you're like, hey, let's pick up some of your
[02:50:02] cheese and you're hanging out.
[02:50:03] She's not going, hey, we're going out for dinner.
[02:50:05] If I let her go, let me put my ghee on.
[02:50:07] No, she's not doing that.
[02:50:08] I wouldn't be bothered if she did.
[02:50:10] You know what I mean?
[02:50:11] My son wore a dang, a dang Superman uniform for like two straight years when he was, you know,
[02:50:18] five years old, five and six.
[02:50:20] And you know, you know, when you're in a, a dang, uh, captain of America outfit, just walking around.
[02:50:24] Just go to school with that.
[02:50:25] It had the muscles in it, you know what I mean?
[02:50:27] Oh, dang, walk through.
[02:50:28] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you're straight.
[02:50:30] Calston, he's just walking around.
[02:50:31] Yeah, whatever.
[02:50:32] Gootman, I dig it.
[02:50:33] And my other daughter wore a dang 22, you know, that is like a ballerina outfit, ballerina uniform.
[02:50:39] And she was, you wore that thing all the time.
[02:50:41] Just whatever.
[02:50:42] Yeah.
[02:50:43] She just know factor.
[02:50:44] So what I'm saying is when you get past age 10, maybe 11, you don't want to wear.
[02:50:49] You don't want to wear your G to the store to the restaurant.
[02:50:53] Yeah.
[02:50:54] But you still in your heart, you want to represent your good because we got to origin jeans.
[02:50:59] You got the origin jeans.
[02:51:01] You can get the regular weight jeans.
[02:51:05] Or you can get the Delta 68 jeans, which are, I guess they're the Jocco signature model.
[02:51:12] Yeah, maybe, but if they're thinner, right?
[02:51:14] Yeah, thinner, well, technically isn't that a fashion thing.
[02:51:17] I'm not saying this particular thing is the fashion thing.
[02:51:20] I'm saying being thinner, fashion jeans tend to be thinner.
[02:51:24] Okay, well, I don't know about that.
[02:51:26] What I do know is this, I live in California.
[02:51:29] It's warmer here.
[02:51:31] We don't always need to wear thicker jeans.
[02:51:34] So we get jeans, et cetera.
[02:51:36] Light weight, just like when you're in the military, which you weren't, so you wouldn't know anything about,
[02:51:41] about field camis, about how they used to have woodland camis.
[02:51:44] They had a lightweight man, a heavy weight.
[02:51:46] You don't know about that.
[02:51:48] So I do.
[02:51:49] Yes, I do.
[02:51:50] So guess what we have?
[02:51:51] Light weight jeans.
[02:51:52] And I'll say the other ones are medium.
[02:51:54] The other jeans are just normal jeans.
[02:51:57] Yeah.
[02:51:58] The Delta 68 named after my forefathers and the seal teams that were jeans in the Maycon Delta 68.
[02:52:07] For the year?
[02:52:08] Yeah.
[02:52:09] That's a good day.
[02:52:10] Yeah, no Delta 68.
[02:52:12] Yeah.
[02:52:13] Yeah. So get the Delta 68 jeans if you need something that's a little bit lighter weight.
[02:52:18] Not for fashion.
[02:52:19] I guess if you're echo Charles, you can do it for fashion.
[02:52:21] Or if you're a normal human.
[02:52:23] Fashion too.
[02:52:25] But potentially, we'll just say, look, you know Pete sprinkled some fashion in there.
[02:52:30] You know that.
[02:52:31] You've got to watch him like a hawk.
[02:52:33] No, but there's no fashion on the Delta 68 jeans.
[02:52:36] Are you sure about that?
[02:52:37] Yeah, I'm positive.
[02:52:38] All right.
[02:52:39] Well, I'm going to wear the jeans.
[02:52:41] My Delta 68 jeans.
[02:52:43] If that ever happens, I'm going to make a evaluation report back.
[02:52:47] But my hypothesis is that if Pete has anything to do with it, which incidentally he does, he sprinkled some fashion in there.
[02:52:54] I got to watch that guy like a sniper.
[02:52:57] Because he will constantly try and do it.
[02:53:00] He's a better guy.
[02:53:01] He's a better guy.
[02:53:02] I'm surprised they're not bell bottoms.
[02:53:04] Okay.
[02:53:05] You're bringing them back.
[02:53:09] Yeah, I dig it and you're correct.
[02:53:11] You're not wrong.
[02:53:12] You're right.
[02:53:13] But you're like, you eat steak.
[02:53:15] Right.
[02:53:16] What do you put on your steak?
[02:53:17] Steak.
[02:53:18] Like what do you put on there?
[02:53:19] You can salt them pepper on there.
[02:53:20] Salt them pepper.
[02:53:21] Salt them pepper.
[02:53:22] So you don't put like a special seasoning.
[02:53:25] They got their special rub.
[02:53:26] Are you with that?
[02:53:27] Or are you just like whatever?
[02:53:28] Kind of like a little bit of pepper.
[02:53:30] I'm not anti.
[02:53:31] I'm not hating them, but I'm not.
[02:53:33] It seems unnecessary to me.
[02:53:34] Okay.
[02:53:35] So here's the comparison that what Pete does with fashion.
[02:53:37] What people could do with steak.
[02:53:40] Okay.
[02:53:41] Let's say you're the kind of person who was like salt and pepper.
[02:53:44] That's my jam.
[02:53:45] Don't touch my steak otherwise.
[02:53:47] Medium or medium or whatever.
[02:53:49] You like to cook.
[02:53:50] Salt them pepper.
[02:53:51] That's all.
[02:53:52] You put your stupid rub.
[02:53:53] You're seasoning on it.
[02:53:54] You're messing up my whole steak.
[02:53:55] Okay.
[02:53:56] You know people are like that.
[02:53:57] Yeah.
[02:53:58] And I dig it.
[02:53:59] Man, that's you think.
[02:54:00] Pete is the kind guy will be like, hey, no problem.
[02:54:02] I got you.
[02:54:03] You've salt and pepper that's it.
[02:54:04] But he knows confidently that if you put some of that special rub on there, you'll
[02:54:08] like it.
[02:54:09] Yeah.
[02:54:10] Not it.
[02:54:11] Yeah.
[02:54:12] As far as you're concerned, you're like nope.
[02:54:13] Don't touch it.
[02:54:14] Yeah.
[02:54:15] Yeah.
[02:54:16] And then he'll be like, okay.
[02:54:17] I got you.
[02:54:18] You know, sneak it in there.
[02:54:19] You're 100% accurate.
[02:54:20] Yeah.
[02:54:21] Yeah.
[02:54:22] And there's been time for I've been like brawl.
[02:54:24] He put your mouth on that side.
[02:54:25] Yeah.
[02:54:26] But I think, I think he's spray.
[02:54:27] He sneaks it in there.
[02:54:28] And then when you taste the steak, you're like,
[02:54:31] Hey, Pete makes a great steak.
[02:54:33] Not even realize he's snuck in the rub.
[02:54:35] Yeah.
[02:54:36] That's what he does with the fashion.
[02:54:37] With you.
[02:54:38] Dish.
[02:54:39] I hope he doesn't hear this, which I know he will.
[02:54:40] He's going to be like, he's going to get excited about it.
[02:54:42] And think he can sneak in more.
[02:54:43] Yeah.
[02:54:44] You can't Pete.
[02:54:45] I'm watching you.
[02:54:46] Like a sniper.
[02:54:47] I got eyes on bro.
[02:54:48] So the jeans.
[02:54:49] I say Pete, do what you do, bro.
[02:54:51] Do it.
[02:54:52] Just don't take it too far.
[02:54:54] Yeah.
[02:54:55] The jeans are good.
[02:54:56] I like, and this is how I know about the jeans too.
[02:54:58] Because when I put them on, it's like, okay, my wife is kind of critical.
[02:55:02] She's from the Pacific Northwest.
[02:55:04] My wife.
[02:55:05] So she knows about just functional jeans for work and like all that stuff.
[02:55:09] She's just, and but she's, you know, she's not like a child.
[02:55:11] Yeah, you know, she's down.
[02:55:12] She, and she gets it.
[02:55:14] I'm speaking for her.
[02:55:15] By the way, but she doesn't like it.
[02:55:17] She doesn't like the look.
[02:55:18] You reminds her, you know, those are dad jeans.
[02:55:20] And, you know, my dad has a worker, whatever.
[02:55:22] She doesn't like the look.
[02:55:23] That's what I'm saying.
[02:55:24] So I put on the origin jeans.
[02:55:26] If she didn't like them, she would tell me.
[02:55:27] 100%.
[02:55:28] She probably wouldn't even let me be seen with her, which I can respect on a certain level.
[02:55:34] And she even said those jeans look good.
[02:55:37] Interesting.
[02:55:38] So the man approved in my household approved looks like a peat,
[02:55:43] the lime and spice right for that goes deep.
[02:55:46] Perfect.
[02:55:47] Also, what else does origin have the assufflements?
[02:55:50] Obviously.
[02:55:51] Keep us on track in the game.
[02:55:54] Even when you get older.
[02:55:56] If you're old school, and you ask, am I too old to join you to?
[02:56:00] Nope.
[02:56:01] I was working with a tech company yesterday.
[02:56:05] And they were talking about age.
[02:56:07] And everyone there was young.
[02:56:09] And they were like, say, no, no, there's some older people here.
[02:56:12] Like late 40s.
[02:56:13] And I'm like, hey, how's it going?
[02:56:15] Hey, pretty funny.
[02:56:16] But yes, here's the thing.
[02:56:19] One thing that can help you is these supplements during
[02:56:22] Warfare Curl Oil, Discipline, Discipline Go.
[02:56:26] They are definitely beneficial.
[02:56:28] If you think you might forget, first of all, take more discipline.
[02:56:34] But second of all, subscribe.
[02:56:35] You can do the subscription thing on originmain.com.
[02:56:38] And then you just get.
[02:56:39] It just shows up.
[02:56:40] Just just make it a standard operating procedure.
[02:56:43] Done.
[02:56:44] Then you don't fall off.
[02:56:45] You know how long I've gone without joint Warfare for?
[02:56:48] Never.
[02:56:49] I take it every day.
[02:56:51] You know, I take it every day.
[02:56:52] Yes.
[02:56:53] You're saying with cruel oil.
[02:56:54] You mentioned forgetting.
[02:56:55] So, you know, how like you, when I forget to take it, like you kind of look at me crazy.
[02:57:00] Like proud.
[02:57:01] Like how do you forget you just started out with it?
[02:57:03] Yeah, it's not hard to find a true paste.
[02:57:05] Or one might argue, oh, it's not important to you.
[02:57:08] Right.
[02:57:09] But it's not really true because if you're in a certain routine,
[02:57:12] and this goes to your point where if you don't roll that into your routine,
[02:57:16] you will forget even if it's important.
[02:57:18] Because there's certain times of the day or certain times of moments in life.
[02:57:20] Whatever you do, like Brad, you know when you're driving, right?
[02:57:23] When you're driving home, Brad, you'll forget the whole experience of driving home.
[02:57:27] Because you're thinking of the stuff, like routinely or whatever, and you're like,
[02:57:30] oh, shoot.
[02:57:31] I don't remember one single moment of driving home really.
[02:57:33] You just did it automatically.
[02:57:34] You lived.
[02:57:35] You lived.
[02:57:36] Yes.
[02:57:37] What?
[02:57:37] Living's not important?
[02:57:38] Well, go.
[02:57:39] Driving home's not important.
[02:57:40] Yeah.
[02:57:40] It's very important, but it's just so routine.
[02:57:42] Same thing.
[02:57:43] So like I said, if taking the cruel oil or joint joint warfare is not rolled into your routine,
[02:57:48] you can potentially forget it.
[02:57:50] So roll it into your routine.
[02:57:52] Subscribe.
[02:57:53] And you actually save money if you subscribe to.
[02:57:57] So do that.
[02:57:58] Don't forget about the ready to drink cans.
[02:58:02] You don't need to drink these hyped up,
[02:58:05] energy drinks anymore.
[02:58:07] That are literally not good for you.
[02:58:09] You can now drink something that is good for you.
[02:58:11] Taste delicious.
[02:58:13] Give you a little.
[02:58:14] Get you.
[02:58:19] It's a milder taste to than the energy drinks.
[02:58:22] So what it kind of allows you, I mean, I'm assuming this is why it allows you to drink like more of them.
[02:58:28] Be careful with it.
[02:58:30] I'm saying, but you know the kind where you drink two of the,
[02:58:33] we'll say for lack of a better term, traditional energy drinks.
[02:58:36] You drink two of those.
[02:58:37] You don't feel good afterwards.
[02:58:38] No, you feel like crap.
[02:58:39] Even if you're into energy drinks, typically.
[02:58:41] Yeah, you kind of feel junk.
[02:58:42] Those are just like, man,
[02:58:43] you can kind of have one going.
[02:58:45] Yep.
[02:58:46] Kind of.
[02:58:47] Yeah, so yeah, so you can end up getting about milk.
[02:58:49] All different kinds of protein desserts.
[02:58:52] Just straight desserts for you for your warrior kid,
[02:58:55] milk for your kids, get some of that.
[02:58:57] And then we got the white tea going to get you through the winter months with the warm white tea.
[02:59:02] It get the canned white tea.
[02:59:04] And of course the benefit is 8,000 pound.
[02:59:07] I left a post already know that.
[02:59:09] Yep.
[02:59:09] Also speaking of benefits.
[02:59:12] Kind of.
[02:59:13] Chocolate store.
[02:59:14] It's called the Uncle Store.
[02:59:15] That's where you can get shirts.
[02:59:17] Why is that beneficial?
[02:59:18] Because it's speaking of benefits.
[02:59:20] No.
[02:59:21] Not presenting.
[02:59:22] I thought what you were going to say is there's a guy that said his wife said to him,
[02:59:26] what do you want for your birthday?
[02:59:28] And he said there's a store.
[02:59:30] It's called the store.
[02:59:32] And she was like,
[02:59:34] Yeah.
[02:59:35] In my mind, she said,
[02:59:37] She probably didn't.
[02:59:39] She probably said, okay, what's that?
[02:59:40] Yeah, let me go and look into it.
[02:59:42] And you can get shirts.
[02:59:43] It is beneficial.
[02:59:44] Because especially nowadays, like you can get, right, you can, I think nowadays, I don't
[02:59:50] say the word fashion necessarily.
[02:59:55] I'm saying, but what you wear as well.
[02:59:58] You know what you wear.
[03:00:03] We're going to shut down the store.
[03:00:05] The way you wear it's not a fashion store.
[03:00:09] It's not.
[03:00:12] But what you wear is like, you have many options.
[03:00:16] Right.
[03:00:17] Like in life.
[03:00:18] I'm saying, you can wear just a blank shirt if you want.
[03:00:21] You know.
[03:00:22] So you kind of look for a little bit more than just the,
[03:00:25] Well, I guess you kind of look for a lot of things.
[03:00:27] Anyway, one of the things that this, as far as this stuff that you can get,
[03:00:31] it kind of is representative of a certain,
[03:00:34] you know, should I say, not message, but a certain discourse.
[03:00:41] Okay.
[03:00:42] Yeah.
[03:00:42] So anyways, what you can get is t shirts, rash guards, hats,
[03:00:46] sweatshirts, but not t shirts.
[03:00:48] But not t shirts.
[03:00:49] I just need t shirts though.
[03:00:50] Yeah.
[03:00:51] So what I'm saying.
[03:00:52] Good quality ones.
[03:00:53] Good quality ones.
[03:00:54] You are 100% yes, given.
[03:00:55] But, you know, there's a little added layer to what you're wearing.
[03:01:01] Is there a placebo effect when you wear a shirt that says this one equals freedom?
[03:01:06] Yes.
[03:01:07] Does it affect your mentality?
[03:01:09] Technically yes.
[03:01:10] It is, it is, I guess, technically a placebo effect.
[03:01:14] But that's how, right?
[03:01:15] Or is it just a real effect?
[03:01:17] It's a real effect.
[03:01:18] Well, placebo effect is a real effect.
[03:01:19] Yeah.
[03:01:20] It's kind of like, um, like hypnosis or something like this.
[03:01:24] Yeah.
[03:01:25] Right.
[03:01:26] That's a real effect too.
[03:01:27] Most of the time sometimes it's just a show.
[03:01:28] But the effect, the result is real.
[03:01:31] Yeah.
[03:01:32] That's where we get the 19% increased risk.
[03:01:35] Strength and performance.
[03:01:37] We can recommend to the security.
[03:01:39] Yes.
[03:01:40] With the rashguard with the t shirts.
[03:01:42] Yeah.
[03:01:42] Actually we're up to 22% now.
[03:01:44] Okay.
[03:01:45] Yeah.
[03:01:45] That happened last year.
[03:01:46] Late last year.
[03:01:47] And yeah.
[03:01:48] Up 22% improved everything.
[03:01:49] Mental, physical and spiritual and social.
[03:01:53] By the way.
[03:01:54] Okay.
[03:01:55] With all these items.
[03:01:57] Anyway, talk with story.com.
[03:01:58] Sure.
[03:01:59] It's t shirts, rashguards, uh, hoodies, hats, beenies.
[03:02:03] I said all this stuff, bro.
[03:02:07] Well, there's your reminder, boom.
[03:02:09] Talk with your, dot com.
[03:02:11] Also, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already.
[03:02:15] If you want, there you go.
[03:02:17] Stitcher.
[03:02:18] iTunes, whatnot.
[03:02:20] Also, if there's not enough of this podcast to listen to, which really means you have a long
[03:02:25] commute.
[03:02:26] You can also check out the grounded podcast, which is a different podcast that we do.
[03:02:32] It's called grounded.
[03:02:33] Yes.
[03:02:34] We talk about.
[03:02:35] Gejitsu, life, experience, humor and other things.
[03:02:42] And other things.
[03:02:43] And here's a, here's a bit, like, get it back me up on other things.
[03:02:47] It's true.
[03:02:48] It's true.
[03:02:49] Because there are some elements of that that I did notice that, you know,
[03:02:54] there's like issues, not necessarily controversial.
[03:02:56] You're like, type on the grounded podcast.
[03:02:58] Yes, because I think it's because you kind of, like,
[03:03:00] feel like you're a little bit of the star of the ground.
[03:03:02] No, I don't feel like I'm a star at all.
[03:03:04] Actually, I feel like a bit that you will allow me,
[03:03:08] maybe not anymore, but you will allow me to introduce elements to it.
[03:03:12] That kind of have two sides to it, you know,
[03:03:14] and then I can, you can kind of see, okay, where does people, where do people fall on this
[03:03:18] issue?
[03:03:19] Not a poor issue.
[03:03:20] By the way, but.
[03:03:22] So yes, I am, would you say, hyped?
[03:03:25] You're hyped.
[03:03:26] Yeah, I guess, I guess, I guess.
[03:03:28] You sit around and listen to the grounded podcast, like rewind and replay your parts again.
[03:03:32] No, no, no.
[03:03:36] No, anyway, how about this?
[03:03:38] Let's just say, I highly recommend that one.
[03:03:41] Okay.
[03:03:42] Good.
[03:03:43] Don't forget about the Warrior Kid podcast.
[03:03:44] We got some new episodes coming your way.
[03:03:46] We'll say in the near future.
[03:03:49] And don't forget to get some Warrior Kid soap.
[03:03:52] You can support an actual warrior kid out there running a business young,
[03:03:55] aiden making soap so that you can stay clean.
[03:03:59] I reshows ranch.com.
[03:04:01] You also, YouTube, you're interested in the video version of this podcast.
[03:04:08] I want to see what Dick Thompson looks like.
[03:04:10] Oh, yeah.
[03:04:11] Yes, or anyone, you know, anyone on the podcast that we interview or each other.
[03:04:18] If you didn't know what chocolate looks like.
[03:04:20] Yeah.
[03:04:21] And then we have psychological warfare, which is a little mental support, psychological support.
[03:04:29] If you find yourself in a moment of weakness, you can just press play on your phone.
[03:04:37] And you'll get to listen up a little guidance from me.
[03:04:41] That's available on Google Play, iTunes and B3 platforms, all kinds.
[03:04:45] If you need a visual reminder to stay on the path.
[03:04:48] Check out flipside canvas.com from my brother Dakota Meyer podcast.
[03:04:53] 115, by the way.
[03:04:55] He makes these things here in America.
[03:04:58] You go to flipside canvas.com to get one books.
[03:05:02] Got some books.
[03:05:03] First of all, stress effect.
[03:05:05] Again, we haven't hit it yet.
[03:05:07] But the next podcast with Colonel Dick Thompson.
[03:05:12] We'll be covering the stress effect.
[03:05:16] So you can get that book.
[03:05:17] It's on the website.
[03:05:19] It's also on Amazon, but you can click through our website.
[03:05:24] DuccoPontcast.com.
[03:05:25] And then you can get the book, the stress effect.
[03:05:27] And then there's leadership strategy.
[03:05:30] Tactics is my new book.
[03:05:32] I have coming out, which is actually very granular.
[03:05:38] Here's a little section from it.
[03:05:40] Part two.
[03:05:41] This is just from the contents part two.
[03:05:43] Leadership tactics.
[03:05:44] One, becoming a leader.
[03:05:46] How to succeed is a new leader.
[03:05:47] How to be chosen to lead when you're not chosen.
[03:05:50] Imposter syndrome.
[03:05:51] Insecurity as a leader.
[03:05:53] Transitioning from follower or peer to leader.
[03:05:55] Overcoming a grudge.
[03:05:56] New sheriff in town.
[03:05:57] Don't go overboard.
[03:05:59] Rambo.
[03:06:00] So there's some topics that are in the new.
[03:06:03] Leadership strategy in Tactics book.
[03:06:06] If you want to get a copy of it, try and get a first edition.
[03:06:10] You need to order it right now.
[03:06:13] Because otherwise, when it comes out January 14th, Amazon's going to send you a note that says,
[03:06:19] You go, oh, cool.
[03:06:20] Jocca was book came out today.
[03:06:21] I'm going to order it.
[03:06:22] You'll go on there.
[03:06:23] It'll say it's shipping in three to eight weeks.
[03:06:26] And you're going to go, what is wrong with the logistics train?
[03:06:29] Jocca was horrible.
[03:06:30] And I'll say, yeah, I know.
[03:06:32] I didn't do a good job of convincing you when you need it to order them.
[03:06:35] I need it to order the book.
[03:06:36] So I failed.
[03:06:37] So let me not fail by getting on there and helping me to help you.
[03:06:44] And then, of course, we got the warrior kid books.
[03:06:48] One, two, and three.
[03:06:52] These are books with that.
[03:06:53] I wish I had when I was a kid.
[03:06:56] And if I promised you when you read it, you're saying, I wish I would have had this book.
[03:07:00] And I said, you might even be in a full on adult and say, I wish I learned these lessons.
[03:07:04] Way the warrior kid won, way the warrior kid two marks mission and way the warrior kid three,
[03:07:09] where there's a will.
[03:07:11] So check those out.
[03:07:12] If you've got a little kid in your life somewhere, a little bit younger, maybe six years old,
[03:07:17] five years old, seven years old, three years old, get a mickey in the dragons.
[03:07:21] They're actually going to learn a pragmatic technique to overcome fear.
[03:07:25] Which if you remember being a little kid, life is filled with fear.
[03:07:29] So how do you overcome that?
[03:07:31] You get mickey in the dragons.
[03:07:32] That's what you do.
[03:07:33] Discipline equals freedom field manual.
[03:07:35] There's the Christmas present.
[03:07:37] There's the Christmas present you want to get for someone that may be drifted off the path.
[03:07:43] Maybe they're having a hard time.
[03:07:45] Maybe life isn't going good.
[03:07:46] Maybe they could do better.
[03:07:48] Maybe you know that discipline would help them in their life.
[03:07:51] Get them the discipline equals freedom field manual.
[03:07:54] Simple as that.
[03:07:55] And then for leadership, we got extreme ownership.
[03:07:58] We got dichotomy of leadership.
[03:08:00] I wrote those with my brother, Dave Babin.
[03:08:02] He's about what we learn.
[03:08:03] I'm a battlefield and how you can apply it to your life, to win, to your business, to win, to your company, to win.
[03:08:10] I also have a leadership consultancy.
[03:08:12] It's called echelon front.
[03:08:15] And what we do is we solve problems through leadership.
[03:08:19] That is what we do.
[03:08:21] So go to echelon front dot com for details.
[03:08:24] If you want to have someone from the team, come and speak at your company.
[03:08:28] Don't go to a speaker's bureau.
[03:08:31] No, you go to echelon front dot com.
[03:08:33] You cut out the middle man and you go right to the company.
[03:08:36] That's what we do.
[03:08:37] You don't need to Google, jaco speaker.
[03:08:41] Because you're going to get somewhere.
[03:08:42] You'll see echelon front.
[03:08:43] You won't know what it is.
[03:08:44] Maybe you go to click on someone else.
[03:08:46] And then they charge you a big chunk of money on top of what I'm going to charge.
[03:08:50] Don't do that.
[03:08:51] Go to echelon front dot com.
[03:08:54] We also have online training.
[03:08:57] Because leadership training is not an accumulation.
[03:08:59] You don't get one shot.
[03:09:01] And now you're good to go.
[03:09:02] No, it takes time.
[03:09:03] It takes reps.
[03:09:05] Get the reps in.
[03:09:06] See you again.
[03:09:07] See you from a different angle.
[03:09:08] EF online dot com.
[03:09:10] And then we got mustard dates coming for 2020.
[03:09:14] Go to extreme ownership dot com.
[03:09:16] This is our.
[03:09:17] Leadership seminar.
[03:09:20] Our leadership conference.
[03:09:21] Come and check that out.
[03:09:22] And of course, EF overwatch and EF.
[03:09:24] Legion.
[03:09:25] These are.
[03:09:26] Our placement platforms where you're taking military personnel and putting them into civilian organizations.
[03:09:37] So that they can help those organizations lead at every level and win.
[03:09:41] Go to EF overwatch dot com or EF Legion dot com.
[03:09:44] That is what you need.
[03:09:46] Is leadership.
[03:09:47] And if you.
[03:09:49] Need more of us.
[03:09:51] Or you have questions for us or you have answers for us.
[03:09:54] You can find all of us on the interwebs.
[03:09:56] Dick Thompson is on Twitter at hps underscore CEO.
[03:10:03] And at hps.com high performance systems.
[03:10:08] That's his company.
[03:10:10] And of course, we are also on Twitter.
[03:10:13] Instagram.
[03:10:15] And the phrase and box.
[03:10:18] Echoes, adequate Charles and I am at jocca willink.
[03:10:22] And once again.
[03:10:25] Sincere thanks and appreciation to Dick Thompson for coming on this program.
[03:10:32] And sharing his lessons with us.
[03:10:34] And of course.
[03:10:36] We thank him for his incredible service and sacrifice to our great nation.
[03:10:40] And that goes to all the rest of our service men and women who stand the watch against evil.
[03:10:46] And against tyranny so that we can be here.
[03:10:49] Living in freedom.
[03:10:51] Into our police and law enforcement and firefighters and paramedics and EMTs and dispatchers and correctional officers.
[03:11:01] And border patrol and secret service and all the first responders.
[03:11:06] All you that are out there risking your lives for us.
[03:11:12] Thank you for standing the watch over us here at home so we can sleep safely at night.
[03:11:20] And everyone else out there ask yourself that question.
[03:11:26] What are you capable of being?
[03:11:31] What are you capable of being?
[03:11:33] And are you doing everything in your power to be the most capable human being you can be?
[03:11:43] I know when I ask myself that question.
[03:11:46] I know the answer I know I can do more.
[03:11:50] I know I can't.
[03:11:51] We can all do more.
[03:11:55] And that starts each every day by getting up.
[03:12:02] Going on the attack and getting after it.
[03:12:08] And until next time this is echo and jocco out.