Jocko Podcast 289: When The Call Comes, It's Time To GO. Seawolf Pilots, John Farr and Carl Nelson.

2021-07-11T02:59:48Z

Underground Premium Content: https://www.jockounderground.com/subscribe Join the conversation on Twitter/Instagram: @jockowillink @echocharles 0:00:00 - Opening 0:10:34 - Seawolf Pilots, John Farr and Carl Nelson. 2:27:12 - How to stay on THE PATH. JOCKO UNDERGROUND Exclusive Episodes: https://www.jockounderground.com/subscribe Jocko Store Apparel: https://www.jockostore.com Jocko Fuel: https://jockofuel.com Origin Jeans and Clothes: https://originmaine.com/durable-goods/ Echelon Front: https://www.echelonfront.com 2:52:08 - Closing Gratitude

AI summary of episode

Well, then I got a call from Tom Richards and Tom's on the ground and he said, when you're flying over here, did you see, you know, I have to put your strike in, you want to put a strike in, I put a strike in, single ship, which is against squadron policy, single ships strike because, you know, but I had no choice, obviously that guy's on the ground and they were taken fire, we were taken fire on the way in and on the way up. Because you know the publishers like, well, you know, we don't want to invest too much in that to become, you know, it's like, okay, cool. So we always tried to put a solid co-pilot with a pilot maybe not all of the races, the bases like John, but some guys, there are some guys who were good guys, but they, you know, got didn't give them those skills. I said, well, we got, you got, you know, Jay to go Hoover and you got Jay Wallace LeProd. Well, it's like your family, you know, these guys know all your crap and they still like you. When you guys were there, you know, like when we, like my generation looks, looks at the Vietnam War and the late 60s or the 70s, you know, it's all this. And, and a couple of times they got sappers on the boat, but they got them to seals got them before they did damage. So I'm glad he took the, you know, took charge of it and came through and you know, talked to Helen and got this arranged and I've enjoyed the two hours that we've spent here with you. So, you know, we got 14 guys, I got a worry about of my own before I worry about four more. They actually got into the barges and got on some of those boats and got out to see. And I said, well, our reward is that there are six guys that got wounded and they survived and they got families and most of them. Next time she says something like that, I'll be like, well, you know, he does he is the assistant director on some of these videos. And, and so, but we ended up getting divorced later, but I always kidding say that my, I got up because my wife didn't like the Navy, but turned out she didn't like me. Didn't know this, but I don't know how they know, but supposedly the first sailor killed in the Pearl Harbor attack was from Gridley, California. You know, you know, so now we know I am, I am unemployed in the individual. yeah, I got, I got 1012 guys dead there and we, and what else you see? He had the swift boats and there wasn't a lot of coordination with the swift boats except when they got in trouble they call us up and scramble us for close air support when they got in the trouble. Got hit in the shoulder, radio man got hit in the right shoulder. But the story got kind of muffled over 50 years because we never got the debrief the op. We're going to go by boat, you know, with they've got a kid Carson scout. By the way, I know I said that one time, but the way I said it is indicating that it's not as big of a deal as it really is. I see good people doing good things being kind to each other and particularly young old man who they have got no reason to be kind to you. But we got, I got so low I couldn't go back at the time. You're in the Navy, the training and and the people who are selected to go, you know, you know, you were just quality people and they were, we're into those things. And you know, sour grapes, and you know, like I show up there. Because after Meridian, you got to go to Kingsville and Bville, and then you get your wings, and then you go to a rag, and it, you know, it's a long time. Meantime, I got a seal team on the ground, I got a escort to slick out and my wingman's missing. We got loaded, got Tom on board and off we went back again. Literally, like, these shorts are so worn out because they wear them every single day that, like, it has the outline for my cell phone, like, on the pocket of whatever. I was gone for two of those months and we got, they months later we got married. This is going to lead him in and tell Jensen says XYZ is here and they would let us know where they're going to be. and I said, I got to walk and do this saying, you know, to stay at You know, it's like these are things that are like when you're in the game on the path. And then what was the kind of on the job training procedure to get you guys where, you know, you start, you start off as a copilot every time. If ours got free food and booze, so we got a big tent for the top of the backyard and everything. You know, you got your job to do and it doesn't work unless you're doing your part of the job. You know, is that, you know, kind of think she understands. And I got one, a roll got one done and we, this no big deal. You never know when the call will come and you never know how much time you will have. And if you're doing that, like your whole day is good in my opinion, got some books. So we got all, we got transition to the aircraft, precision and acrobatics. And so, so, I got this, I got this thing. And when you roll in and put me hot, that means we know what we're going to do with Intervalometer, whether we're going to fly a pair, a pair or two pair. Hope you got the air speed before you got to the water. You got some close calls on the LSTs, you know, the same thing you'd barely hover. Most server got was like 200, but I was a little guy. And you know you're in bad days and good days and I'm going to tell a story.

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Episode transcript

[00:00:00] This is Jockelpontcast number 289.
[00:00:04] As the seals from Zulu platoon insert into a rice paddy near where they had taken fire, Nelson's
[00:00:10] Huey, a UH-1 Bravo Gunship, commenced a right turn at 80 feet above the ground to cover them.
[00:00:19] Lieutenant Junior Grade Carl Nelson, a fire team leader at how three detachment one commanded
[00:00:26] to see Wolf Gunships during Zulu's last mission.
[00:00:30] He already had flown more than 600 combat missions.
[00:00:33] His co-pilot, Lieutenant Junior Grade, Earl Schau, controlled the M134 miniguns, while petty
[00:00:42] officers Michael Dobson and Tom Kleevon fired the left and right, respectively M60 machine guns
[00:00:49] from the doors.
[00:00:50] Lieutenant Junior Grade Edward Dyer would pilot the Huey UH-1 Lima Sea Lord transport
[00:00:59] that would insert and later extract Zulu from a very hot landing zone.
[00:01:06] Schau worked the LZ's edge with as many guns while Dobson and Kleevon fired their M60s.
[00:01:14] The seals patrolled northeast and then east on a dieke separating two rice paddies
[00:01:18] and then moved north to one perpendicular to the first, as they advance the enemy began firing
[00:01:23] from well concealed and dug in positions on a dieke covered with heavy vegetation.
[00:01:29] The seals and Nelson's gunship immediately returned fire.
[00:01:34] As the patrol continued closer toward the tree line, the seals took accurate withering fire
[00:01:39] from both sides of the dieke.
[00:01:43] Point man, Roland fell, shot through the groin.
[00:01:46] He was hit again as he crawled for cover.
[00:01:50] Seconds later, tell for, with shot in both legs.
[00:01:55] Both seals managed to return fire despite their wounds, but the severity of their injuries and
[00:02:00] the immediate necessity to extract them soon took them out of action.
[00:02:06] Lieutenant J. G. Richards immediately radioed Nelson for fire support as he and Lawrence
[00:02:12] advanced under fire to assist the two seriously wounded seals.
[00:02:17] Chris and the Hulk by his fellow seals, Lieutenant J. G. Tom Richards was well-liked and respected
[00:02:24] and he enjoyed a reputation as a highly capable operator.
[00:02:29] He was a native of bright waters New York and a graduate of Bayshore High School where
[00:02:34] he wrestled and played football. Following graduation, he attended Villanova University on
[00:02:41] Navy ROTC scholarship. There, he lifted weights and routinely benched press 400 pounds.
[00:02:48] He was commissioned in Ensign in the Naval Reserve in 1969. As Lieutenant J. G. Richards
[00:02:54] dragged Roland to cover, one round passed through Richards right hand,
[00:02:58] hating the Stoner Machine Guns pistol grip.
[00:03:02] Nevertheless, Lawrence Hedge and Food Trail returned fire.
[00:03:06] Richards continued to expose himself to enemy fire to drag the wounded to cover.
[00:03:14] When the automatic weapons manned, Food Trail was shot in the chest, he cried out,
[00:03:18] I'm hit. I'm hit. Lieutenant J. G. Richards sensing the rising panic in Food Trail's voice
[00:03:26] suspected the man was going into shock. To distract him, Richards ordered Food Trail to
[00:03:33] shut up and return fire. Food Trail briefly did so with his M60 and did not go into shock.
[00:03:40] As Food Trail became semi-conscious, Richards pulled him back as well.
[00:03:46] When Lawrence and Hedge ran out of ammunition minutes later, Richards passed them the
[00:03:51] linked 556 ammo for his now inoperable Stoner Machine Gun. The squad regrouped behind a
[00:03:58] dike and Richards urged the seals to keep pouring fire into the enemy as he radiowed for a
[00:04:03] emergency extraction. As the battle raged, extraction became imperative, including himself,
[00:04:10] Richards had four wounded men, three of them critical. For Lieutenant J. G. Nelson and the C. Wolves,
[00:04:20] there was no hesitation. He said, quote,
[00:04:23] my crew knew that leaving anyone behind was not an option.
[00:04:31] When Nelson saw Richards dragging the wounded seals to cover, he alerted Dyer to get ready
[00:04:36] for extraction and descended to cover it from an altitude of about 50 to 70 feet.
[00:04:42] From the ground, Lawrence and Hedge provided covering fire with their stoneers.
[00:04:46] Nelson's gunship hit the enemy with devastating rocket and mini gunfire while Dyer urgently
[00:04:52] searched for the seals exact location. On a second pass, Dyer spotted them,
[00:04:59] huddled next to a dike and came in hot, bleeding off airspeed during his approach. As the slick
[00:05:04] hovered, skids wet in the rice paddy, Richards dragged each of the three wounded seals
[00:05:10] in turn over the dike, then through the rice paddy, to the helicopter, lifting each aboard with
[00:05:15] his one good hand. Richards later wrote, with one hand, it was probably my heaviest lift I ever made.
[00:05:25] Best one, too. Enemy fire intensified during the loading. Lawrence still providing covering fire
[00:05:34] was about to climb aboard when Dyer began to pull pitch for lift off as enemy rounds hit the
[00:05:39] fuselage. Lawrence grabbed the slick skid and held on for Dyer life until the Hulk
[00:05:45] reached down with his un-injured hand and hauled Lawrence aboard.
[00:05:52] Having flown more than 600 combat missions, with scores of those flights in direct support of
[00:05:57] two seal teams, Nelson vividly remembers the scene unfolding below his gunship as the
[00:06:03] platoon struggled to survive. Nelson recalls, quote, watching a wounded Tom Richards under intense
[00:06:12] enemy fire, dragged each of his wounded seals to safety across a series of rice paddy dikes
[00:06:17] and load them into the sea lord Kilo. It was the most heroic act that I have ever witnessed.
[00:06:26] Tom Richards heroism rates a navy cross at a minimum. He directly saved
[00:06:33] the lives of his platoon. That's an article from the Naval Institute you can find it online.
[00:06:44] And if you fast forward from that event, which took place in 1971, fast forward about 20 years,
[00:06:53] it's a 1991. And I was a new guy at SEALT-1 and it was Saturday morning.
[00:07:00] And I was in the gym at SEALT-1 alone cranking some metallica on the stereo system.
[00:07:07] And when I say cranking, I mean it was the ear damaging levels of noise because I was young
[00:07:12] and stupid. And then the Hulk walked in. He was wearing his gym clothes and he was there to get
[00:07:22] a workout the same guy. This now, who was Lieutenant J.G. This is now Captain Richards legendary seal
[00:07:30] that you just heard about. It's now 20 years later. And of course, I knew who he was. We all knew
[00:07:36] who he was. He was the Hulk. Then he walked into the gym to get his workout on. And so I respectfully
[00:07:42] walked over to the stereo and turned it down, turned the dial about halfway back to bring it to a
[00:07:50] normal listening level. And as I did that, the Hulk shouted, hey, I looked over at him and he said,
[00:08:01] turn that back up. And I said, yes, sir. And I did. And he fast forward another six or seven
[00:08:09] years on top of that. And I was walking into the Admiral's office. Now Admiral Tom Richards,
[00:08:17] the Admiral in charge of all the seals. And I was going to interview you with him hoping to get
[00:08:23] a letter of recommendation for selection. So I could get my commission and become a seal officer.
[00:08:30] And he gave me that recommendation. And I did end up getting selected.
[00:08:35] And I'm certainly thankful to Admiral Richards for that. But more important. I'm thankful for what he
[00:08:40] did for America and for the teams. And for me in the end. And therefore, I am also thankful
[00:08:51] for those helicopter pilots and crews for getting him and his platoon out of there.
[00:08:58] And these are the same helicopter crews that risked their lives time and time again to get
[00:09:05] the seals out of the worst possible situations. These were the legendary sea wolves. The
[00:09:13] US Navy helicopter attacks Squadron 3. And this is a unit. It's the most highly decorated naval aviation
[00:09:24] unit. Collectively awarded in Vietnam five Navy crosses 31 Silver Stars, two legions of merit.
[00:09:31] 219 distinguished flying crosses 156 Purple Hearts 101 Bronze Stars 142 Gallantry Caut crosses
[00:09:40] over 16,000 air metals 439 Navy Commendation Metals 228 Navy achievement metals
[00:09:49] six Presidential Unit Citation Citations and two Maritorious Unit Commendations.
[00:09:56] And we have had the honor of having a sea wolf pilot on this podcast once before Dennis Rauley,
[00:10:03] podcast 153. If you haven't listened to that, go and check it out. But tonight it is an honor to have
[00:10:11] two more sea wolf pilots with us. John Far and Carl Nelson, the same Carl Nelson you just heard
[00:10:19] me read about who provided cover fire while Zulu Platoon extracted from a serious gunfight.
[00:10:29] Our relationship in the sea of teams with the sea wolves in Vietnam will never be forgotten.
[00:10:36] And therefore it is an honor to have you two gentlemen with me here tonight. Thank you. Thank you for
[00:10:43] coming. Happy to be here. So I know, well I know I could sit here and just listen to you guys tell
[00:10:50] stories about Vietnam for the entire time, which is which we will get to. But to start off a little
[00:10:55] bit, let's start a little bit about where you guys came from and how you grew up just so we have some
[00:11:01] background. What do you think, John, you want to start? John, you're the reason you're what's your
[00:11:05] son connected us, right? Yes, Eric, my son. He was one that's a Marine and he's big and
[00:11:10] agit as soon as he loved his place. Yeah. He does quite a bit of that. But yeah, he's the one that's
[00:11:16] was in the military. Well, thanks to him, thanks to Eric for for linking us up and it's outstanding
[00:11:22] to have you. So where did you guys grow up? John grew up in the Chicago area north of Chicago.
[00:11:27] Went to High School there and I went to a small college in Indiana, St. Joseph's college,
[00:11:32] which is, in Rentsselderer, about halfway between Notre Dame and Purdue. And my senior year
[00:11:39] There was a Navy recruiter came down looking for,
[00:11:43] recording for the Navy flight program.
[00:11:46] And I actually, so what year is this?
[00:11:48] This would have been 1968.
[00:11:50] Okay.
[00:11:51] So Vietnam is full on.
[00:11:53] Yes, yes.
[00:11:54] And that was here.
[00:11:56] They had the lottery for the draft.
[00:11:58] Okay.
[00:11:59] And I got the paper.
[00:12:00] I started at 365 looking for my number.
[00:12:03] That's the cheese.
[00:12:04] So I started at the top when, when through it again.
[00:12:07] They don't have my number in here.
[00:12:09] I flipped the paper over.
[00:12:10] The first number picked I believe was May 8th.
[00:12:13] The second number picked was April 24th, which was my birthday.
[00:12:17] So there's no doubt where I was going.
[00:12:20] And at the same time, I was looking for a job, you know, graduating from college and everything.
[00:12:25] And one of the first questions they asked, because well, what's your draft status?
[00:12:28] And I said, well, it's the same one.
[00:12:30] And most of the people say, well, why should come back after your service?
[00:12:34] And then I interviewed with Burroughs Corporation.
[00:12:36] They never asked a question.
[00:12:38] And I never provide the information.
[00:12:40] And I got hired.
[00:12:41] So I got hired by Burroughs.
[00:12:44] Graduated.
[00:12:45] Started working with them.
[00:12:46] And the meantime, I passed this flight exam down in college.
[00:12:50] And he said, well, now you need to go up to Glenview for an interview in a physical.
[00:12:55] And I lived probably 20 minutes from Glenview in North of Chicago.
[00:12:59] So I said, that's great.
[00:13:00] So I went up to Glenview.
[00:13:02] And my main real reason for going up there was on Saturday night, I'd go down to Rush Street for the night.
[00:13:08] And this was back home.
[00:13:10] So I did that, went through the physical and everything went fine.
[00:13:13] And I didn't hear anything for a while.
[00:13:15] You got to take the thing go through the process.
[00:13:17] And then I started working at Burroughs.
[00:13:20] And what kind of company was Burroughs?
[00:13:21] Burroughs was a computer company.
[00:13:23] So Calculators and any machines at the time.
[00:13:26] And so I started working with them.
[00:13:29] I was going to say a computer company in 1968's a little bit of a stretch, right?
[00:13:33] Well, the Calculators had a machine that, but they did become one of the larger computer companies.
[00:13:38] I competed against IBM.
[00:13:40] In fact, later in my career, I had sold the largest computer that Burroughs made at the time to the University of Chicago Medical Centers.
[00:13:47] Just before they merged with Spirory.
[00:13:50] God, but that's, we're out the track.
[00:13:52] So anyway, I started working.
[00:13:55] Then I got to notice from the armory to come in from my army induction physical.
[00:14:00] About a week after that, I got to call from the Navy, say, congratulations.
[00:14:05] You've been selected for the Navy's flight program.
[00:14:08] And I just started a job.
[00:14:10] I can't do this.
[00:14:11] And the guy says, son, you're in the Navy.
[00:14:13] When you wish you like to work.
[00:14:15] And I said, well, what's the latest stage you could give me?
[00:14:17] And it was October, I think October 18th.
[00:14:20] And I said, okay, I'll take that.
[00:14:22] So now I got to go in and tell my boss I'm going to go in the Navy.
[00:14:26] So I went in early one morning because he was always in early and set down,
[00:14:30] talked to him and said, Joe, I went through this program and I've been selected for the Navy flight program.
[00:14:36] As a turn-out, he wasn't a marine fighter pilot during World War II.
[00:14:41] And he says, hey, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity.
[00:14:45] You can't pass it up.
[00:14:46] Burroughs will always be here.
[00:14:48] So I worked the summer with them and at the end, they had a little party for me.
[00:14:52] Had this big cake, they had a bunch of little airplanes on and gave me a kind of a nail clipper kit that I have to this day.
[00:14:59] And that's how I ended up in the Navy.
[00:15:03] When you were growing up, so you were going to high school in like the early 1960s?
[00:15:09] Yes, I graduated from 63 from high.
[00:15:12] And it sounds like you were pretty, you had a plan.
[00:15:16] You wanted a job.
[00:15:18] You knew what you knew that you were going to move forward in a positive way.
[00:15:22] Yes, very much so.
[00:15:24] Well, in my father was in a corporate world business.
[00:15:29] And as a size story, he was actually Eisenhower's personal message and all during World War II.
[00:15:35] He went over his patents message and Eisenhower found out about him, but him on his staff.
[00:15:43] And so he was with him for four years and I might as well tell the story.
[00:15:47] Yeah, finally got no wonder.
[00:15:49] I, there was some conflict between Eisenhower and Patty.
[00:15:51] He took his best freaking club.
[00:15:54] And so, finally, before my dad passed away, we got into the right as memoirs.
[00:16:00] Just for the family.
[00:16:01] And Carl, many of our friends have read it.
[00:16:04] And in there, one point, he was coming back to the States.
[00:16:10] And so he asked people on his staff, would you like you come back to the States?
[00:16:14] And of course, all his, so this was Eisenhower was coming back to the States.
[00:16:17] To meet with Roosevelt, for just like a week or so.
[00:16:20] Of course, all his movements are top secret.
[00:16:22] So he wrote a letter to my mother and says,
[00:16:25] Meet me at DC at this hotel and it's all coded.
[00:16:28] So he came back and, of course, nine months later, I'm around.
[00:16:32] And of course, my mother lived in Elmira, New York.
[00:16:35] That's why I was born.
[00:16:37] And of course, nobody knew my dad had been home.
[00:16:40] And we were talking about that.
[00:16:42] We were talking about that.
[00:16:43] Over the bench.
[00:16:44] So anyway, Eisenhower bought me a warbacht.
[00:16:47] And at some point, it cast that in.
[00:16:50] I wish it had kept it been really worth something today.
[00:16:53] But I do have the letter signed by Eisenhower authorizing the purchase of that warbine when I was born.
[00:16:58] I'll send.
[00:17:00] But my dad served on his staff for about four and a half years.
[00:17:03] I was probably a year old before I arrived saw my father.
[00:17:07] But he thinks the world of Eisenhower and says he's never saw Eisenhower do anything.
[00:17:12] That would challenge his integrity as honesty or his reputation.
[00:17:17] It's impressive.
[00:17:18] You don't hear that very much anymore.
[00:17:19] These days.
[00:17:20] We could use Eisenhower now.
[00:17:22] Oh, that's a nice.
[00:17:24] It's a nice.
[00:17:25] All right.
[00:17:26] Carl.
[00:17:27] Yes.
[00:17:27] Where the heck did you come from?
[00:17:29] I was born a poor black child.
[00:17:32] I actually.
[00:17:34] I believe it or not.
[00:17:36] I was born and reared in their panhandle of Texas.
[00:17:40] Between Memphis and Turkey, Texas and Hal County.
[00:17:43] There's a little father dirt and that's where I was born.
[00:17:47] And Maggie induced number three child.
[00:17:50] And I was the first Nelson male to graduate from high school.
[00:17:55] So I went to college.
[00:17:57] I thought I was a flipping genius.
[00:17:59] I mean, I get most know everything, right?
[00:18:01] So what would your parents do for work?
[00:18:05] They were children of sharecroppers and sharecroppers themselves.
[00:18:10] We didn't own anything, but raised cattle and did a cash crop,
[00:18:15] which I always got a kick of the term cash, because we're a many money on it.
[00:18:19] And that was cotton.
[00:18:21] And our many people that you know, I'm sure that drug a cotton sack at 567 and 89 years old,
[00:18:29] every fall.
[00:18:31] Our school started early like an August,
[00:18:33] let out for a month in September, October, whenever the cotton was ready to harvest.
[00:18:39] And of course, we needed all the family to pick the cotton because there's this wasn't enough labor.
[00:18:45] And so, drag on a cotton sack was, and of course, the rate going wages those days was when you paid somebody.
[00:18:55] And that wasn't often was a $1,100 penny a pound for picking cotton.
[00:19:01] And my dad picked a thousand pounds one day, a long day.
[00:19:06] Most server got was like 200, but I was a little guy.
[00:19:09] So that's my roots.
[00:19:11] And we moved to Oregon when I was in grade school.
[00:19:14] And it was a great relief getting away from that damn cotton.
[00:19:19] But the downside was I'm chopping and cutting wood.
[00:19:25] You know, the old story goes I was 15 before I knew my name wasn't Gipwood.
[00:19:29] I had to get wood all the time.
[00:19:32] And of course, being a very wealthy family, I carried water too.
[00:19:36] We didn't have a well.
[00:19:38] We had to get water from a couple miles away.
[00:19:41] So I'm carrying water.
[00:19:43] And it sounds like a lot of racial altered stories.
[00:19:48] I guess you're on a roller-rise, they've heard them.
[00:19:51] But I'm really proud of my roots.
[00:19:54] And it's interesting.
[00:19:56] My goal was to be a high school football coach.
[00:19:59] First of all, I thought I was going to be a professional athlete.
[00:20:02] I was sure I was going to be an NFL as a middle land record.
[00:20:05] Well, I did get drafted, but the real world was there was a war going on.
[00:20:15] I had just gotten married.
[00:20:18] And I thought, you know, a young brother in the army, in Vietnam.
[00:20:22] And this is 1966 when I graduated.
[00:20:26] And you're after John.
[00:20:27] I'm surprised by the way you hear.
[00:20:29] I was very surprised to hear that Tom Richard's finished high school.
[00:20:33] And John Far, that's breaking news on the same program.
[00:20:36] You did it, John Far.
[00:20:38] But I got a dream job.
[00:20:43] I thought, if I don't, if I don't, I'll do the try out.
[00:20:46] It was a sand vehicle.
[00:20:48] I would do the try out if, if I don't get a real job that I really first class job.
[00:20:55] But I want the first assistant job in a high school, and a large high school.
[00:20:59] And Oregon, and I got that job.
[00:21:01] So I didn't go to camp.
[00:21:03] And, but then I had to guilt setting in all year long.
[00:21:08] And my brother's still serving.
[00:21:10] He's going for another tour and Vietnam.
[00:21:12] So I resigned my, I was to be the head of the ball coach.
[00:21:16] I was Springfield High School, the following fall.
[00:21:19] And it was like April May, and I just, I couldn't do that.
[00:21:23] I resigned that job.
[00:21:25] I went, my department head, Dr. Bois P. and chemistry in high school.
[00:21:30] My chemistry department head was a guy named John Volt in John.
[00:21:33] Was an avolavator.
[00:21:35] This is what he can do.
[00:21:36] And I said, I think I'll probably join the Marine Corps.
[00:21:38] I don't know.
[00:21:39] He said, no, don't do that.
[00:21:41] Go fly.
[00:21:42] So, at the end, the sand point in the earlier station was open in those days.
[00:21:45] Up in Seattle, Washington.
[00:21:47] He says, come with me to reserve weekend.
[00:21:50] And I went flying in with him.
[00:21:53] And then we hung out on the oak club.
[00:21:55] And I was on the stage dancing with some Polynesian ladies.
[00:21:59] I thought, I could do this.
[00:22:01] I could do this job.
[00:22:03] So I took the test and did the interview.
[00:22:07] I was in class 32, 68, and the fall of 68.
[00:22:12] And Pensacola, off at a DLC class.
[00:22:15] And John, you were 38, 36 weeks later.
[00:22:19] Okay.
[00:22:20] Okay.
[00:22:21] So, there we go.
[00:22:22] So did you guys meet each other after that when you got into the actual aviation training program?
[00:22:27] I met in Vietnam.
[00:22:28] Yeah, we got three friends.
[00:22:30] He was always enough far enough behind me that I didn't really get to know him.
[00:22:34] Only three months.
[00:22:35] But you know, as you go through, it's pretty intensive training.
[00:22:38] Right.
[00:22:39] And not a big socializer in Norbert's John.
[00:22:43] I don't think.
[00:22:44] And we worked pretty hard.
[00:22:45] And so I really got to know John, in Vietnam.
[00:22:48] I met a fact.
[00:22:50] I think we looked in a logbook today.
[00:22:52] My logbooks somewhere in a bottom of storage in Sangra, California.
[00:22:56] But I think we flew together probably a couple dozen times.
[00:23:00] Oh yeah.
[00:23:01] And he was my, as we call it, today, we called it a clearance pumpkin.
[00:23:04] Cool.
[00:23:05] I see a bit of a guy.
[00:23:06] He was my clearance pumpkin.
[00:23:08] So, and I'm damn goodman, by the way.
[00:23:10] It's, I don't want to make him feel too good about himself today.
[00:23:13] But he, you know, it's critical.
[00:23:15] Every job and a cockpit, a critical thing.
[00:23:18] Combat or not.
[00:23:19] But getting where you're going and all systems being, switchies in the right position.
[00:23:26] And when you roll in and put me hot, that means we know what we're going to do with
[00:23:31] Intervalometer, whether we're going to fly a pair, a pair or two pair.
[00:23:35] And keeping an eye on things as a cop out of besides operating the miniguns or whatever else
[00:23:41] he does.
[00:23:42] So John was excellent.
[00:23:43] And then, and having a cop out of knows what he's doing.
[00:23:46] More than once, I'd be able to have to fly with guys.
[00:23:48] And you probably have two, John.
[00:23:49] You still don't touch a dang thing.
[00:23:52] Just don't touch anything.
[00:23:54] I'll let you know when I want you to do something.
[00:23:57] But John wasn't that kind of guy.
[00:23:58] He was a, he was, he was in the mode.
[00:24:02] He was a good guy.
[00:24:04] So when did you guys figure out or get assigned helicopters as opposed to whatever else
[00:24:09] The Navy has to offer?
[00:24:11] Is that happening at flight school?
[00:24:12] At the end of flight school?
[00:24:13] Yeah.
[00:24:14] We go to flight school and you go through primary training, which is flying at T34.
[00:24:19] The advanced training, which is flying at T28.
[00:24:22] And it's after that, that if you've done your carrier landings and your instrument
[00:24:26] flying, your formation flying stuff like that, either go multi-engine jets or helos.
[00:24:30] In my situation, my class, they need needle pilots to be at nom.
[00:24:35] So if they took my whole class instead, you guys would go on helos.
[00:24:39] And for me, it didn't, it wasn't a burning desire for one or the other.
[00:24:43] There were some people that wanted multi-engine because they wanted to go with the airlines or people
[00:24:47] that wanted to go jets because they wanted to go jets.
[00:24:50] And I told the guy, he says, well, I'd like to fly the big transports.
[00:24:53] Well, then you should have joined the Air Force.
[00:24:56] So going with heels was fine with me and got through the program.
[00:25:00] And I think flying in Hal III was probably the last of the World War II type flying.
[00:25:07] As long as you brought the plane back in one piece, they really didn't care what you did.
[00:25:13] There were, there were rules and flight rules, but the job was to get the mission done.
[00:25:18] And that was the main thing.
[00:25:20] I had my flight instructor, my primary flight instructor, was a guy named Johnny Hankle,
[00:25:27] Johnny's retired in Florida.
[00:25:28] I just called him another day to thank him.
[00:25:30] I haven't talked to him since 1969.
[00:25:32] And so I, on the sea of male lists, you get comes in with addresses numbers.
[00:25:37] I said, here's Hankle.
[00:25:38] That's the same guy, but I called him up.
[00:25:41] A lady answers her phone.
[00:25:43] Who may have said his calling?
[00:25:44] I said, John Carl Nelson.
[00:25:46] Like he knows.
[00:25:51] Like he remembers 42 years ago.
[00:25:54] And so more than that, 52 years ago, I'm sorry.
[00:25:58] So he comes in a phone cautiously.
[00:26:00] Like I'm not buying anything.
[00:26:01] That was.
[00:26:02] Hello?
[00:26:03] I said, Johnny Hankle, he says, who's calling?
[00:26:07] He didn't admit anything.
[00:26:09] Well, I said, hey, I'm a flight student.
[00:26:12] You're from February of 1969.
[00:26:14] Softly field, T34.
[00:26:17] He says, he's really?
[00:26:21] I said, I'm sure you remember, meaning this is actually I don't.
[00:26:24] That's it.
[00:26:25] I know you don't.
[00:26:26] But here's what he did.
[00:26:28] I was getting ready solo.
[00:26:30] And I thought I was going to fly just because I joined.
[00:26:34] I left my teaching in coaching job.
[00:26:36] I went in military because I wanted to serve you good,
[00:26:38] and I'm where my brother was serving.
[00:26:40] And he was serving actually.
[00:26:43] Back up the clock.
[00:26:44] When I got into Officer Canada School, he was serving.
[00:26:48] Sadly, he was killed in action in November, 23rd, 1968.
[00:26:53] So 22-year-old young man, second-door.
[00:26:56] Infantry, 25th Infantry.
[00:26:59] And so anyway, I wasn't a hurried to get there.
[00:27:04] I wasn't trying to get even.
[00:27:06] That wasn't my goal.
[00:27:07] I just wanted to serve.
[00:27:08] And I wanted to get to Vietnam.
[00:27:09] And I thought, just was the only way to get there.
[00:27:11] I knew I couldn't do it in the transport.
[00:27:13] I didn't want to fly mail to Saigon.
[00:27:15] I don't know God bless the mail guys.
[00:27:17] But.
[00:27:18] And so I read about there was a pool in advanced training in Mississippi.
[00:27:26] I thought, oh my God.
[00:27:28] And then Nixon's trying to stop the war.
[00:27:31] Good Lord.
[00:27:32] That guy's trying to ruin my plan.
[00:27:33] So I got, I was pretty depressed.
[00:27:35] And he was the pool.
[00:27:36] What do you mean there was a pool?
[00:27:38] Well, they were in flight training.
[00:27:41] They tried to keep moving through quickly.
[00:27:43] They're on a schedule to get students through to still a bit
[00:27:47] every flight from primary to advanced.
[00:27:50] And after advanced, I mean after primary,
[00:27:53] you go to Meridian, Mississippi,
[00:27:55] to advanced jet train.
[00:27:56] Or you go to the, the, the, the, the T28 flying,
[00:28:03] where they're preparing you for fixed swing or helicopter.
[00:28:07] Or for for multi-engine helicopter.
[00:28:10] And so that's where the decision was made after you finished primary.
[00:28:14] And it's softly field VT1 that called it,
[00:28:17] to T34 mentor.
[00:28:19] So I was, you know, I'm getting down there about three or four more
[00:28:25] flights to go.
[00:28:26] And I, and, and, and a pool would be where there was a weather
[00:28:30] hold up or a maintenance hold up or whatever.
[00:28:32] And the students were backed up.
[00:28:34] And so instead of getting through Meridian, which was kind of
[00:28:37] intermediate training, instead of getting through Meridian in six weeks,
[00:28:41] it might be three, four, five months.
[00:28:44] I thought, good, Lord, I will never get out of here.
[00:28:47] Because after Meridian, you got to go to Kingsville and Bville,
[00:28:50] and then you get your wings, and then you go to a rag,
[00:28:53] and it, you know, it's a long time.
[00:28:55] I didn't have much time.
[00:28:57] From the time I started flight school and so I got my wings.
[00:29:01] I was 11 months in nine days. I was in a hurry.
[00:29:04] It was 18 months program.
[00:29:06] John went through pretty quickly too.
[00:29:08] I was in a hurry.
[00:29:10] Well, that day, Hank will just, what's wrong?
[00:29:13] You've seen a little down.
[00:29:15] So then I'm way down.
[00:29:16] Here's the deal.
[00:29:17] They've got a pool and Meridian, I'll never get out of this
[00:29:19] campus and the press is going to stop the work.
[00:29:21] What am I going to do?
[00:29:22] This is awful.
[00:29:23] I gave up my great coaching shop.
[00:29:26] And he says, what are you doing tonight?
[00:29:28] I'm studying, sir. I wasn't studying.
[00:29:32] He says, come to my house, give me the address.
[00:29:35] I go to his house.
[00:29:36] My wife and I, he's a J.J.
[00:29:39] Pretty important guy when you're an incident.
[00:29:41] And he's guys wings and everything.
[00:29:43] And I said, wow, you know, I'm going to an office for
[00:29:45] his house and he's a senior officer.
[00:29:47] I got there and we have, I don't know what we had for dinner.
[00:29:51] I don't remember.
[00:29:52] I was just nervous, you know, and what I would do,
[00:29:55] how do I act, try to remember all the term schools,
[00:29:58] stuff they told us?
[00:29:59] Well, he brings out 8 millimeter movies.
[00:30:02] How three movies.
[00:30:04] And I went, oh, my God, where, what is that?
[00:30:10] And he told me, and I went, man, I flew out of his house.
[00:30:15] And I flew all the way through to get my wings to Ellison.
[00:30:18] And then I sweat at Ellison because at my week to get my wings
[00:30:22] they only have two slots for Halphry.
[00:30:25] Can you believe that?
[00:30:26] Two slots.
[00:30:27] Buzzy Buzel and I and Buzzy passed great guy,
[00:30:30] great friend, but Dick Buzel and I got the orders.
[00:30:34] So is that the first time you heard of Halphry?
[00:30:37] First time I heard of Halphry, we were some hankle at
[00:30:40] VT1 when he showed me the home movies.
[00:30:43] And I didn't tell anybody about it.
[00:30:46] My secret.
[00:30:47] I wanted to make sure I got the job.
[00:30:49] I'm not given any lead to anybody.
[00:30:52] So it was a blessing.
[00:30:53] And I'll tell you, I'm talking too much and I'm getting this puppy for
[00:30:58] John here, but greatest thing that I probably,
[00:31:02] not outside of the birth of my two daughters,
[00:31:05] the greatest thing that happened to me because
[00:31:07] of the mission was incredible and credible guys to fly with
[00:31:11] and working with seal teams and with the boats.
[00:31:15] Really, I'm mission we were needed and there's not a better mission on earth than that.
[00:31:23] I thought it was.
[00:31:26] When you get assigned to Halphry out of flight school,
[00:31:30] where do you go?
[00:31:32] Well, the first thing we had to do is we had to go to Fort Rucker for three weeks for
[00:31:36] gunnery training because the Navy didn't have any gunnery training for the
[00:31:39] heelos or anything.
[00:31:40] The army had that.
[00:31:41] So we spent three weeks in Fort Rucker,
[00:31:43] which is in Alabama, went through gunnery training,
[00:31:47] then we had to go through a sear school for escape from the Bayesian and
[00:31:51] that.
[00:31:52] So we went through that and that was interesting.
[00:31:56] And I did mine in Little Creek and actually was out in the field in
[00:32:00] Coronado.
[00:32:02] And I remember after that in your,
[00:32:04] out there for about three or four days,
[00:32:06] and we were coming back, they were on a bus bring it back to the Bayes after this.
[00:32:10] Then they stopped at this hamburger place.
[00:32:12] And I had to add anything to eat it for three or four days.
[00:32:15] So when then got a cheeseburger and I can taste that cheeseburger today.
[00:32:20] The best cheeseburger I've ever had.
[00:32:23] And then we got back and then you got orders.
[00:32:29] It was actually about six months from the time we finished flight school before I got to
[00:32:33] be at nine, which was the first of August.
[00:32:36] And I got my wings in February.
[00:32:38] Two of us had got our wings.
[00:32:39] The other was in Marine pilot.
[00:32:42] And he was flying colders and he was actually killing a bit.
[00:32:46] Did how three have any presence in America?
[00:32:49] Like was there a headquarters here or anything?
[00:32:52] So you didn't even, you was, that's it.
[00:32:54] You're just kind of on your own working through the system.
[00:32:57] And then Squadron was commissioned and decommissioned in Vietnam.
[00:33:00] Yeah, yeah, that's, that's, it's like the only one that's
[00:33:03] commissioned in a combat zone.
[00:33:06] Right.
[00:33:07] There's no presence.
[00:33:08] No headquarters back here.
[00:33:10] Nothing.
[00:33:11] No.
[00:33:12] So you don't even meet your team until you get to Vietnam.
[00:33:15] Yeah, you got to be.
[00:33:17] I just had the pleasure.
[00:33:19] By the way, I go back to Louisiana annually because, and I'll say it here,
[00:33:24] one of them, and a name to be unnamed.
[00:33:26] But one of my doorgunners, unfortunately, is in prison and in Angola, not a good place to
[00:33:32] be.
[00:33:33] Louisiana.
[00:33:34] Life.
[00:33:35] Well, I, on this trip, I got to meet a guy 92 year old Robert Spencer retired Navy captain,
[00:33:43] the first commanding officer of how three he stood the squadron up and he's,
[00:33:48] and he's, if you saw this, scrambled a sea wolves, little, he's in there.
[00:33:53] And quite a character.
[00:33:56] And he go to his house and he'll smoke 25-30 cigarettes in an hour.
[00:34:02] And he goes there and drink 8 or 10 bottles of beer right there in the cooler right next to
[00:34:07] his chair.
[00:34:08] I don't think she's chair.
[00:34:09] Great guy.
[00:34:10] Great guy.
[00:34:11] How old is it?
[00:34:12] What's the, oh go ahead.
[00:34:14] Well, I just gonna say it's 92.
[00:34:16] He's about how he's doing pretty well.
[00:34:19] But so my, my first, when I got to health three, then we got to Ben 2.
[00:34:24] And then he had the first part of he had these fam flights just to get familiar with
[00:34:28] and one of my first flights I just tell the car about this today that one of my first flights
[00:34:33] was to hoist a three-holler down to that six.
[00:34:40] Expand on that.
[00:34:41] So, so in carl says, well, we built our three-holler.
[00:34:45] So the three-holler was the outhouse.
[00:34:47] Okay, they didn't have one down at that six because that six was just kind of
[00:34:51] form or not.
[00:34:52] And so went there and dropped that off and there was a, as your first combat mission.
[00:34:57] I guess I wonder my first mission.
[00:34:59] Yes, I'm going to come down.
[00:35:00] He's holding the crap out.
[00:35:02] Yeah.
[00:35:03] So one of my later flights was about a month later.
[00:35:07] Was when we had one of our heels got shot down.
[00:35:10] And this was at BC Lake which down down near where that six was down by Son and Doc.
[00:35:16] And I was fine with the guy that was in his last couple weeks in Hal 3.
[00:35:20] And most of the time they just doing easy stuff.
[00:35:23] We got this call of heelers down.
[00:35:25] We went in to get the people out.
[00:35:27] Everybody was killed.
[00:35:28] It was in the kind of a swamp area.
[00:35:30] We were able to get one of the bodies out.
[00:35:33] And we're at the Hall this time we're taking fire.
[00:35:35] And I was shooting in the 16 out of the, I was a cop.
[00:35:38] I'm shooting outside.
[00:35:39] If I need to get the one body and we get out.
[00:35:42] Some cobras came and able to get us out.
[00:35:44] Then they brought in some, uh, fell for the black ponies.
[00:35:47] And they kind of cleared the area.
[00:35:49] And then they were able to secure it and get them out the next day.
[00:35:53] But when we get back and landed, probably a foot behind where I was sitting.
[00:35:57] There was a round of five rounds right behind where I was sitting.
[00:36:01] So that was my very first combat.
[00:36:04] That you'll hear about BC Lake.
[00:36:06] What was that day, John?
[00:36:07] That was September 15th.
[00:36:11] Big and so major, major, major operation.
[00:36:16] We lost four seawalls that day.
[00:36:20] Yeah.
[00:36:21] So then, two weeks later, I was assigned to that six,
[00:36:25] was one of the replacement pilots.
[00:36:27] So it was funny.
[00:36:29] I first I take the three-holder down there.
[00:36:31] Then they got this mission where they lost some of the pilots.
[00:36:34] And then I'm assigned to that six.
[00:36:36] So I was like destined to be there.
[00:36:39] And you said to them, I was the guy that brought you your first three-holder.
[00:36:44] I showed up as an I brought you three-holder.
[00:36:47] I'm John Farron.
[00:36:48] Oh, okay. Come on.
[00:36:50] So we were there and actually, son and doc got blown up.
[00:36:54] So we wanted to go into that story.
[00:36:56] On the 20th of October, I got there the 8th of October.
[00:37:00] And we got mortored.
[00:37:01] And the son and doc was on the river.
[00:37:04] And we had, we didn't have any perimeter around where the helopad was.
[00:37:07] But they had all the barges and that for the swift bolts.
[00:37:10] So all the swift bolts were down there.
[00:37:12] Big barges with fuel and everything.
[00:37:14] It was about, you know, 20, 30.
[00:37:17] You know, a cup of honor's feet from where the helopad was.
[00:37:20] And one night, it's very distinct sound when you've got the incoming.
[00:37:24] So we heard the incoming ran to the bunkers.
[00:37:28] It was late early evening.
[00:37:30] And I was actually reading Catch 22.
[00:37:32] It was about halfway through it.
[00:37:33] I still haven't, I haven't still haven't finished it.
[00:37:35] Well, that's ironic.
[00:37:36] Yeah, exactly.
[00:37:37] So there was a little law in the action.
[00:37:40] We ran to the, and I was on flight status.
[00:37:42] And we ran to the helos.
[00:37:44] And we got airborne.
[00:37:47] And we flew the rest of the night.
[00:37:48] And we called it then health.
[00:37:50] We scrambled that one.
[00:37:52] They were just done.
[00:37:53] I was nervous.
[00:37:54] And Earl and Carl, we flew all night long.
[00:37:57] Just put an strike after strike going back.
[00:37:59] We hungry fuel.
[00:38:00] Finally in the morning, we kind of got it secured.
[00:38:03] We went back and landed on the pad.
[00:38:05] And they had come in and ramseacked their shacks and everything.
[00:38:08] We wanted to make sure if you get the,
[00:38:10] see if the people were still in the bunker.
[00:38:12] They actually got into the barges and got on some of those boats and got out to see.
[00:38:16] So everybody, I think there was only one person.
[00:38:18] It was killed that was on one of the barges.
[00:38:20] But halfway through the night, they finally hit the fuel barge.
[00:38:24] You see the huge fireball come up.
[00:38:27] And you could see it from down where that one was, which was, you know, 50 clicks away or so.
[00:38:32] And easy navigate there.
[00:38:34] Look at the big barge flight.
[00:38:36] Yeah.
[00:38:37] And then the next day we found out there was five rockets pointed at the helos.
[00:38:41] Because if you're most vulnerable, just as you're starting to lift off.
[00:38:44] And for some reason, he messed up.
[00:38:46] They didn't work, but they didn't go off.
[00:38:48] And we found out afterwards, we were first detached from the Evertake
[00:38:51] Offter in a mortar attack and make it.
[00:38:54] Another record.
[00:38:57] Yeah.
[00:38:58] And so then so now we, now you ever start to feel like you had to kind of black cloud over your head.
[00:39:03] Because right now we got round.
[00:39:04] It behind you, replacing the guys that were killed.
[00:39:07] You got the first person to take off their reward.
[00:39:10] So that's only in the first two months or three months.
[00:39:13] And no wonder you didn't finish reading cats.
[00:39:16] Because you realized you were freaking crazy.
[00:39:18] Yeah.
[00:39:19] But the thing is, we had Colin and I were talking about this the other day.
[00:39:22] So you know, we were there to do a job and do a mission.
[00:39:25] So you never thought about those things.
[00:39:27] You never thought about the negative.
[00:39:29] You know, what could happen?
[00:39:30] You may be years later think, boy, I had some close calls.
[00:39:33] And we did.
[00:39:34] But not when it was happening.
[00:39:36] When you were, it's like the air, they would see the pilots are always so calm.
[00:39:39] You're always flying the airplane.
[00:39:40] And that's all your focus.
[00:39:42] It's to fly the airplane.
[00:39:43] What the engines go out of that is it.
[00:39:45] Why aren't they screaming or anything?
[00:39:47] Because they're focused on doing their job, which is to fly the plane safely and land it.
[00:39:51] How well did you guys feel you were trained when you showed up there?
[00:39:56] Highly trained.
[00:39:57] I think we were some of the better pilots.
[00:40:00] And because we were very trained and we'd done this a million times.
[00:40:04] And then flying in combat it was a little more intense.
[00:40:07] And we were focused on your job.
[00:40:09] I think the Navy does a great job of training their pilots.
[00:40:13] You know, just doing the care land.
[00:40:14] It was a piece of cake.
[00:40:15] And this is what's so hard about this.
[00:40:17] Of course, we did it on a beautiful day, calm seas.
[00:40:20] But we have shot, you know, probably a thousand approaches simulated at land.
[00:40:25] So you get out to see and it was nothing hard about it at all.
[00:40:29] Of course at night in rough seas.
[00:40:31] That's a different story.
[00:40:33] But the health rearing had nine detachments.
[00:40:36] And throughout the Mecca and Delta, strategically placed.
[00:40:41] Although it was in Cambodia and border down to where I was.
[00:40:47] Down in the lower, come out peninsula.
[00:40:50] And if you were flying, if you got in trouble at night,
[00:40:53] you needed a matter of fact at night or an advanced tactical support base.
[00:40:57] And ATSB kind of a triangle shape.
[00:41:00] And they got concentrating all around it.
[00:41:02] And they got hit all the time at night.
[00:41:04] And they got hit all the time.
[00:41:06] And we were all weather pilots.
[00:41:09] In those days, and most of the army guys were not all weather pilots.
[00:41:13] They were VFR daylight pilots.
[00:41:15] Not all of them.
[00:41:16] Most of them.
[00:41:17] I was going to say by all weather, that includes night time.
[00:41:20] Night time and rain.
[00:41:22] There would be monsoon season.
[00:41:23] You could barely see the front of your face.
[00:41:25] We're flying instruments in an old UH1B.
[00:41:28] But we were all instrument trained.
[00:41:30] And we were heavily instrument trained.
[00:41:33] After we got through our primary training in T28, we had instrument training there.
[00:41:38] We went through another squadron VT6, nothing but instrument training.
[00:41:43] So we got all, we got transition to the aircraft, precision and acrobatics.
[00:41:48] And then we got over to do instruments.
[00:41:50] And then instruments again.
[00:41:52] And then went to do FCL, P's field landing carrier practice.
[00:41:56] A lot of them before you go hit the boat.
[00:41:58] And those days every naval area had wings on.
[00:42:02] Was the carrier qualified?
[00:42:04] Not anymore.
[00:42:05] We're saving money now.
[00:42:07] So not anymore.
[00:42:08] And obviously the army's just not even landing on carriers at all.
[00:42:14] And you don't, I mean, just in a regular navy,
[00:42:17] that we got to fly a helicopter to do a resupply at sea.
[00:42:22] That decks moving and you got to do all weather anyways.
[00:42:25] And there's no horizon half the time and everything else.
[00:42:28] You don't necessarily have to contend with that in some of the other services.
[00:42:32] He was always interesting to me.
[00:42:34] When an aircraft package would come down to where I was,
[00:42:37] solid anchor, sea float, but solid anchor wouldn't have to run away.
[00:42:41] They would come and get there by nine.
[00:42:43] And they usually buy five.
[00:42:45] Got to get back.
[00:42:47] And when it gets dark, you know, okay.
[00:42:51] But to be fair, when you mentioned song and dark, I had a memory as I was a coper.
[00:42:57] And those days.
[00:42:59] And I was coped out for to go unnamed an o and sea.
[00:43:05] And we usually flew at 800 feet.
[00:43:10] And he had to be 1200 feet that night.
[00:43:13] That's it.
[00:43:14] Sir, we're getting no blues up here.
[00:43:16] We are rocking sir burning out before they get the ground.
[00:43:19] But you know, I remember my, I just went song and doctor,
[00:43:22] reminds me of it.
[00:43:23] So after that they brought in and us tea.
[00:43:25] And we did, we flew off an LST the rest of the time that we're down.
[00:43:29] That sounded dark.
[00:43:30] After that, so that that base got kind of overrun then.
[00:43:34] Yeah, but they got it secure.
[00:43:36] And they still kept the ship boats there and everything.
[00:43:39] But they didn't overrun that night.
[00:43:41] Yeah, they did.
[00:43:42] They did.
[00:43:43] And then they left.
[00:43:44] I was saying they left.
[00:43:46] Well, we secured the area.
[00:43:47] We got the area secured again.
[00:43:49] And we went back in.
[00:43:50] But then they moved a heel pads.
[00:43:52] And what we didn't keep the heel pad, they brought in the LST.
[00:43:55] And we flew off the LST the rest of the time.
[00:43:58] So so going back to showing up, you show up there.
[00:44:01] You feel like you're, you're saying you were well trained.
[00:44:04] And then what was the kind of on the job training procedure to get you guys where,
[00:44:10] you know, you start, you start off as a copilot every time.
[00:44:13] Every new guy is starting off as a copilot.
[00:44:15] Yes.
[00:44:16] We didn't have enough time.
[00:44:17] You're minimum time for aircraft commander was 500 total.
[00:44:20] 500 total, five hours.
[00:44:22] Most of us showed up by the training command with 250, 262, 270.
[00:44:26] So you transition in any squadron or an A.B.
[00:44:29] When you get there new, you have to transition to the type.
[00:44:32] You go through what's called a rag.
[00:44:34] Replacement, not an acronym, she's, you know.
[00:44:36] Replacement air group.
[00:44:37] And so you go to the rag.
[00:44:39] Set you up on all the systems.
[00:44:41] Fly the airplane.
[00:44:42] And you're a copilot.
[00:44:43] When you have enough time.
[00:44:45] And you qualify.
[00:44:46] You become aircraft commander.
[00:44:48] And you have to have three.
[00:44:51] Once you showed capability to manage and control two aircraft and
[00:44:56] tactically be monologous.
[00:44:58] You become a fire team leader.
[00:45:00] FTL.
[00:45:01] Another acronym.
[00:45:02] So John was an FTL.
[00:45:04] We're on.
[00:45:05] Yeah.
[00:45:06] Most of us were.
[00:45:07] Yeah.
[00:45:08] And then what, at what point did you realize who you were supporting?
[00:45:13] When you saw that, when you saw the eight millimeter home movies where the Z.
[00:45:16] He said, hey, we're supporting the seal teams over there.
[00:45:18] And let me tell you what the seal teams are.
[00:45:19] Yeah, he did.
[00:45:20] And I never heard of a seal.
[00:45:21] I had no idea what a seal was.
[00:45:23] And I forgot what it wasn't.
[00:45:25] I had to ask him the next day.
[00:45:26] What did you say they were?
[00:45:27] And he said, well, they're like, like, frog men.
[00:45:30] I said, yeah, I know what movies and well were too.
[00:45:32] I knew it would frog men were.
[00:45:34] And he said, well, they revolved from that community.
[00:45:36] They're still a UDT.
[00:45:37] But they're, and then that was 1968.
[00:45:41] The seals hadn't been around a long time.
[00:45:43] No.
[00:45:47] As seals.
[00:45:48] And yeah, and I remember going to the first fall,
[00:45:51] Seafloat was a bunch of barges tied together.
[00:45:54] And the, and the, the bot, the Bo Day River I think it was.
[00:45:58] And it's a clown peninsula.
[00:46:00] And it was great because they had two seal platoons there.
[00:46:05] We lived on these barges.
[00:46:07] Yet the, the, the jons were,
[00:46:09] you, the river was rushing down below.
[00:46:12] And this way it morning and this way in the afternoon.
[00:46:15] And all night long, you couldn't sleep at first when you knew
[00:46:19] guy because they're setting off concussion grade age all night.
[00:46:22] And the next morning, many mornings,
[00:46:25] there'd be a sapper that was trying to get there to blow the place up.
[00:46:29] Laying up the, go over on the bank, loaded up into the sun, you know.
[00:46:33] And, and a couple of times they got sappers on the boat,
[00:46:36] but they got them to seals got them before they did damage.
[00:46:39] But it's amazing the perseverance of some of those characters.
[00:46:44] I think the primary mission was we were the close air support for the swift boats going up.
[00:46:49] Now into canals.
[00:46:51] And if you ever go, I've gone to places and talk to somebody new.
[00:46:55] What's under swift boats and he found out I wasn't Hal 3 and he's buying me beer and
[00:46:59] rest in height.
[00:47:00] So they, the swift boat guys really sub, and the seals as well.
[00:47:05] Supported the seafloat.
[00:47:07] Oh yeah, that's it's a legendary to to make sure you give nothing but full respect to the seawaves
[00:47:13] where you're in the seawat teams for sure.
[00:47:16] So what's the normal mission look like?
[00:47:19] How are you getting the tasking?
[00:47:21] What are you are you meeting with guys beforehand or you meet with the seawat tombs and
[00:47:24] going over hey, here's we want to get dropped off.
[00:47:27] Well, how's that?
[00:47:28] What's that look like?
[00:47:29] Well, and Carl can speak to that.
[00:47:31] Concealed he was with the seals on that six we didn't have any seals with us.
[00:47:35] He had the swift boats and there wasn't a lot of coordination with the swift boats except
[00:47:39] when they got in trouble they call us up and scramble us for close air support when they got in the trouble.
[00:47:45] But the seals those missions were coordinated and I'll let Carl speak to that.
[00:47:49] They had many types of missions as you know, Jaco.
[00:47:53] And many times they would just be advising us look we're going to go in at night.
[00:47:59] We're going to go by boat, you know, with they've got a kid Carson scout.
[00:48:04] This is going to lead him in and tell Jensen says XYZ is here and they would let us know where they're going to be.
[00:48:10] And then coordinates are where they're going to be.
[00:48:13] And and I'll tell a story here about John's andos.
[00:48:18] I'll use your name, John and outstanding officer.
[00:48:23] And the good news on him is he operated often and heavy and nightly of seemed like.
[00:48:29] I don't think he got it.
[00:48:31] But there was one purple heart in his group, but he was a heavy operator and had soft
[00:48:35] him on that one.
[00:48:36] So, but he did a night operation one night.
[00:48:39] He's just no where he's going to be and I was we were on a pretty five.
[00:48:43] Discramble air craft all our gears all in.
[00:48:46] We've done all the checks.
[00:48:47] We crank it once it's ready to go and you literally hop in there in your airborne and like, you know,
[00:48:53] I've heard a term three minutes.
[00:48:54] We made we've got off a lot of work in three minutes lots of times.
[00:48:58] And we got airborne and it was black literally black.
[00:49:03] Well, we'd pre brief John.
[00:49:04] We gave John what the strobe what was the strobe called that we had.
[00:49:09] John that we carried.
[00:49:11] There were little strobes that it had a guard around it and it was.
[00:49:15] Oh, it direction on strobe.
[00:49:16] Yeah, it was a good any hat one.
[00:49:18] And he had a prick 90 radio of mine that I gave him because it was small.
[00:49:23] And it was easy to operate and so John himself.
[00:49:26] Tough seal he's out there and the enemy's over here and freedom's over here.
[00:49:33] And John is between both them and he's going to defend and he's out there.
[00:49:37] See, Wolf won three.
[00:49:39] Put some fire in northeastern about three about zero, three zero.
[00:49:48] And just walk it in and I'll tell you that one to stop.
[00:49:52] So we, I rolled in and started laying rockets in.
[00:49:57] And it was the lyrical because he goes, okay, hello, closer.
[00:50:01] A little closer.
[00:50:03] And he's voice starts raising a little bit closer.
[00:50:06] Let's closer.
[00:50:08] And I could hear, yeah, I could hear rockets going off in the background.
[00:50:13] And I was here.
[00:50:14] I am safe and sound that 800 feet or whatever.
[00:50:17] I was 600 feet and it was hilarious.
[00:50:20] And I never let him forget that ever.
[00:50:23] So when you're flying at, I mean, it's really how black it can be at night like it can be so dark outside.
[00:50:32] So when it's that dark, you're just flying pure instruments.
[00:50:36] You're just looking at your, you're not even looking outside because there's nothing to see.
[00:50:40] Unless you're looking at fire coming up at you.
[00:50:43] That in some minutes real bright.
[00:50:46] Sometimes you get lucky and there's a moon out.
[00:50:49] Then you get flashes of light off the squiggly and rivers and streams.
[00:50:54] And yeah, there's nice out there when you're like this.
[00:50:58] And that's when you have to have a cop out who knows what he's doing, who can navigate
[00:51:04] because you're busy as hell keeping that thing on altitude on heading.
[00:51:08] And realize you've got a wingman who's got to have discipline too.
[00:51:12] He's got to know the heading you're on and now you've got any collision light, top and bottom.
[00:51:17] And you can keep tracking each other, but it's, it can get hairy out there at night.
[00:51:22] And it's, you know, some guys you look over at what I mentioned, our old shot,
[00:51:26] Snake, where her all was cop out of my many time.
[00:51:29] Good guy.
[00:51:30] But he was over there like this.
[00:51:31] He got the leans pretty bad because the Simmer Circle canal is kind of getting messed up.
[00:51:36] And you think your level, but you're not when you start when you start getting the vertebrae.
[00:51:40] He's over there like I said, okay, we're all resistant.
[00:51:43] We weren't in combat or anything.
[00:51:45] He's just flying. He's over there leans.
[00:51:47] I was just saying, okay, roll, you got, oh, that's okay.
[00:51:50] I said, no, you got anything.
[00:51:52] And I'm over there laughing to cruise laughing, but,
[00:51:56] Earl, excellent pilot, but once and why you can get them like that.
[00:52:00] No, it is dark and it's like, how do you say the inside of somebody's right
[00:52:06] and what do you say that nicely?
[00:52:08] It's dark.
[00:52:09] I think you just did it.
[00:52:10] Okay.
[00:52:11] But once again, if you do it enough, you know how to do it and you're comfortable doing it.
[00:52:17] So what were the sweet, let's talk about the swift boat operations,
[00:52:20] because those guys were pushing up and pushing the envelope into enemy territory.
[00:52:24] What was that up tempo like?
[00:52:27] Well, there's a grand beyond you go to where the coordinates were then you were just putting in fire.
[00:52:31] And once again, they would say shoot right over our heads and say, well, we'll line to pull back a little bit.
[00:52:37] Just to make sure.
[00:52:38] But those would get intense and I think you saw quite a bit of that when they did the documentary on scrambled old sea wolves.
[00:52:46] And that's what it was like.
[00:52:47] We were out there supporting them, putting it in a close fire to them just so they could get back out of that situation.
[00:52:54] And you mentioned John, you mentioned the World War II attitude when it comes to flying and fighting.
[00:53:02] I mean, I get that.
[00:53:04] But can you talk a little bit more about I know that the way you all felt about A, your gunners, the guys that were on your birds, but also your maintenance crews that were keeping your birds up and running and using beer cans to patch them up and whatever else.
[00:53:19] So that's that's sort of the World War II mentality that you're talking about where you said there were rules, but.
[00:53:26] But you had to do the mission right.
[00:53:28] And I think that's was part of it. Every it was a team effort. So you talk about the gunners and the maintenance people.
[00:53:35] We all worked very well together.
[00:53:37] We all had our part to do and it was all coordinated and it all came together.
[00:53:42] And we had to get the the gunners do their job and maintenance people.
[00:53:47] And it just it was a team effort.
[00:53:49] And it's in everybody supported the team and all had the same mission to do even though it was a different part.
[00:53:56] It's like a football team. You know, you got your job to do and it doesn't work unless you're doing your part of the job.
[00:54:03] And that's what we did. It just worked.
[00:54:07] I was going to say and you ought to know, Jocco is that.
[00:54:11] A fire team and most of the Tyson was would come on for 24 on 24 off for 24 on your on for scrambles.
[00:54:20] You get your meals and you get your rest when you can, but you're on duty from noon to noon usually we did it.
[00:54:26] But wherever. But and when you're and anything that happened during that time.
[00:54:32] You're you're cruise at the radio. You're all briefed and by brief.
[00:54:37] You go down to to what we call TOC with the army that operation center.
[00:54:43] We know where are there. We were there. Our teller is that. We know where the units all the units are.
[00:54:48] We know what the radio frequencies are. We know what the planned operations are. We have a general idea where the bad gay.
[00:54:55] So I remember most of the time when we weren't actually involved in a combat operation.
[00:55:01] We would be patrolling and basically looking for trouble. So we always did and we'd usually find it.
[00:55:08] And sometimes people get it.
[00:55:11] We've never, I can't, I have a hard time thinking about a flight that I was on that we didn't get shot at.
[00:55:18] I'm sure there was some, but it was rare that we didn't get shot at.
[00:55:22] And we wanted to shoot at us because we could shoot back. We couldn't know where they were.
[00:55:26] Didn't have to call for clearance. They shot at you. You could just be fired.
[00:55:29] In my a. Oh, our a. Oh, don't dead one before I went to dead.
[00:55:33] We had to get to dead. Six months of John and the a. Oh, we had was literally a free fire zone. We could shoot any eligible age male.
[00:55:43] Now we didn't. We were, I'm not how we operate. You don't go. We didn't go blown up hooches and shooting randomly and cheated.
[00:55:52] We didn't shoot it. And we didn't do that.
[00:55:54] Honestly, ever, I mean, you do that on somebody's crew and you're going to get your butt kicked off and back to home garden.
[00:56:01] We were professional, but.
[00:56:04] Elves relationship male could be that we just, we might just take his sand pound out of
[00:56:09] Munderham, you know, because he's in a wrong area. We don't kill a guy, but he's swimming.
[00:56:14] And if it's a guy who gets stupid and start shooting back, well, then we erase that guy.
[00:56:22] But again, we were pre-brief. We knew where everything was. What was going on?
[00:56:27] And more often than not, we could brief T.O.C. as well as they could brief.
[00:56:32] We could get different frequencies from them, but the intel we could feed to them.
[00:56:37] We knew what was going on everywhere.
[00:56:39] So in a 24 hour period where you're on, so you said you'd be 24 hour on and then 24 hour off.
[00:56:44] And it's 24 hour period that you're on how much time are you in the air.
[00:56:48] Depends on what kind of operation you have, but I honestly, I flew a lot because I was at the
[00:57:00] PIN in the morning when I was a better pilot. I was a better my crew was because everybody's doing their job.
[00:57:05] They loved it. I loved it. And the better we knew our area of operations.
[00:57:11] We have many times flown, if you say, every other day's 15 days, I flown many months for 130 hours a month.
[00:57:21] And during the day, maybe 8 to 10 hours, it wasn't unusual.
[00:57:26] We were looking at your log book today. We flew together that first month at DevSaint Long.
[00:57:32] Yeah. All day long.
[00:57:35] That was how it was. That was our job as to fly. That's sitting in the hooch when I was doing our job. So we were out fine.
[00:57:42] Just even if it was just training looking for action or looking for something.
[00:57:47] So when you're day off, what are you doing? You're doing your job whether it's ops or admin or maintenance or whatever your job is or sleeping.
[00:57:54] Because you know the next day, you may not get any sleep. So you sleep.
[00:58:00] And no, it was we were J. G's.
[00:58:05] And I remember I was getting a fitness support deep free from my own seat. Very nice man.
[00:58:12] I didn't know what it was. I saw it in class sometime. But I barely know what it was.
[00:58:18] And he was stroking me and I didn't know it. But he says, now Carl, I know you really liked this mission.
[00:58:24] You're really enjoying it. Oh, yeah, sir. I mean, that was just he says, but the real name is not like this.
[00:58:30] You're not going to go to a squatter and have this much authority and responsibility.
[00:58:35] We're not there. It's exciting who lives and who dies every day.
[00:58:40] And we're trying to make the right decision.
[00:58:42] Yeah, I think we did.
[00:58:44] So he was right. We got to lay cursor modes of life.
[00:58:48] And it was so we were J. G's and you're a fire team leader, you're responsible for that whole flight. You're in charge of it.
[00:58:55] Even if you got a lieutenant commander sitting next to you, you're the one that's calling shots as a J. G.
[00:59:01] Because you're in charge of it.
[00:59:03] And that was important. I think, and I look at people say, what's the best period of your life?
[00:59:07] I was always high school or college. I can honestly say the best period of my life was the six years I spent on active duty in the Navy.
[00:59:16] The rent, the friendships you make during that period, especially in combat are so close closer than any other friendships I have.
[00:59:24] So like Carl and Earl and Tim Zimmer, we all were all there.
[00:59:29] We've done the same thing together.
[00:59:31] And we had a reunion.
[00:59:32] What 10 years ago now was 2009 at my house up 12 years ago.
[00:59:37] 12 years ago.
[00:59:38] He's not good at math.
[00:59:40] And Carl, well, first of all, I invited Earl and his wife up to Chicago because his wife had never been to
[00:59:46] Chicago. So I'll come up and show you this big city in the right lights and everything. And then the hour later I got a call from Carl.
[00:59:53] Well, thanks for inviting me because I always talked to him in the meantime.
[00:59:57] Nice to see you.
[00:59:58] Carl, you've been here before you're always welcome.
[01:00:00] The next thing I know, I had my house full of people coming up for every reunion.
[01:00:04] We're pointing to you, sure.
[01:00:06] This is on the 4th of July.
[01:00:07] If ours got free food and booze, so we got a big tent for the top of the backyard and everything.
[01:00:13] And we had this little reunion and John St. Louis, which always had a seal that everyone of our
[01:00:17] Union is very small.
[01:00:19] We just a small group of people that were together.
[01:00:22] What I found interesting about the first time that we did it, some of these people I hadn't seen in 40 years.
[01:00:28] And so where you started was a common denominator was Vietnam.
[01:00:32] Remember this mission? Remember that guy?
[01:00:35] Remember that incident?
[01:00:36] By the end of the evening, it was like we had just seen him last weekend.
[01:00:39] I was amazed how fast you could catch up with somebody.
[01:00:43] You should do a study on it.
[01:00:45] Well, it's like your family, you know, these guys know all your crap and they still like you.
[01:00:51] And you know you're in bad days and good days and I'm going to tell a story.
[01:00:56] It's one of those, this is just a no, but it's true.
[01:01:00] He talked about being when you're in charge of a fire team, you're in charge.
[01:01:06] And in rank matters, but rank on the cockpit goes away.
[01:01:10] You may say, sir, but you're in charge of the airplane.
[01:01:13] It's a copilot, it's a captain, okay, a captain, a sit there, do a touch anything.
[01:01:16] That you're in charge.
[01:01:18] And it's Navy regs that your aircraft cannot be common deerd by some guy on the ground saying,
[01:01:26] Fly over here and do this.
[01:01:27] No.
[01:01:28] The only person that can dominate your comidier aircraft in your aircraft commander is a flag officer, a line officer.
[01:01:35] In your back, sitting in a seat, is the only guy that can override an aircraft commander.
[01:01:42] Fly off.
[01:01:43] So that in mind, what night, if that one, captain Martin Twight, great guy he's passed on.
[01:01:50] He was our seal.
[01:01:51] He came to fly at that one.
[01:01:54] And you know, you start flying and you don't mean it in a bad way, but you get your chin out and you're just out.
[01:02:01] And you're aggressive and no BS, you can laugh and have fun, but the mission serious, that's no screw on around.
[01:02:10] So captain Twight wanted to go on a combat flight.
[01:02:13] So it came down and he was my copilot.
[01:02:16] Of course, I sat in the left seat and respect with him.
[01:02:18] How the right was your aircraft commander and helicopter.
[01:02:21] My wingman was two other guys.
[01:02:24] I won't use their name, but Lieutenant Commander and Lieutenant.
[01:02:27] And I'm a JJ, very, very, very green JJ.
[01:02:31] But not green.
[01:02:32] So you're the junior guy in rank, but you're the, but you're the final guy.
[01:02:35] I didn't.
[01:02:36] Got it.
[01:02:37] And we're down there at the TLC and there was this army guy who had in the light anyway.
[01:02:41] He was a captain.
[01:02:42] He didn't like me.
[01:02:43] He was just, he was just too good at Kushe, too good at Kushe's and didn't know squat.
[01:02:48] What are you talking about?
[01:02:50] So he's up there and he's briefing those Eagles on Captain Twight.
[01:02:54] He kept, you know, kissing up and I just said, stop.
[01:02:58] Stop.
[01:02:59] Brief me.
[01:03:01] This is not the army.
[01:03:02] This is the Navy.
[01:03:05] The Navy, it has nothing to do with rank.
[01:03:07] It's who's the smartest guy here.
[01:03:09] And on this mission, I'm the smartest guy here.
[01:03:12] Brief me.
[01:03:13] Captain Twight.
[01:03:14] Should've you said, look down, it's a Carl.
[01:03:17] He was so nice to me.
[01:03:19] And he should've slapped me, but he didn't do that.
[01:03:22] And that army guy was mad, but he's nothing you could do about it.
[01:03:26] But that's kind of how it is.
[01:03:28] The aircraft commander is the ultimate.
[01:03:31] Just like the captain of his ship.
[01:03:33] Use what you say goes and your job is to do the right thing.
[01:03:39] I want to try and get a little bit better fuel for the, some of the operations.
[01:03:44] And I mean, just the first operation that you were talking about going to the VC lake.
[01:03:49] And you're going to recover a helicopter.
[01:03:52] Like talk us through from you get the call to you're leaving the scene.
[01:03:57] And you got the body recovered.
[01:04:00] What was it?
[01:04:01] You're sitting in your sitting in the in the in the ready room.
[01:04:04] And all of a sudden the call comes in.
[01:04:06] What does that look like?
[01:04:07] No, I was in a fam flight.
[01:04:09] So we were out flying just in the general area.
[01:04:12] And we get this call that the halo was down.
[01:04:14] We got the coordinates and we were close to the coordinates.
[01:04:17] So we were there fairly quickly.
[01:04:19] So we got in and you have, are you always, you're always fine with a section of birds of two birds.
[01:04:24] You're always fine together.
[01:04:25] This is a single bird.
[01:04:27] Okay.
[01:04:27] Because it was a, it was a, it was a John was new in country.
[01:04:31] And you were flying an admin flight, right?
[01:04:33] Yes.
[01:04:33] You're flying a flying flight.
[01:04:35] So flying a star.
[01:04:36] You still had, you still had doorgunners.
[01:04:38] You still had to crew in the back.
[01:04:40] But you might fly alone if you're doing an admin mission.
[01:04:43] You might fly with just one bird.
[01:04:44] Like when you hoisted the three holder down.
[01:04:46] You're just a single bird.
[01:04:47] You're just a single bird.
[01:04:48] Because you weren't, you weren't looking to be in, you know, a mission, a combat mission per se.
[01:04:53] So just trying to get familiar with there.
[01:04:55] But if something happens, you got to respond to it.
[01:04:57] And we did this bill.
[01:04:58] Bells was, it was his last weekend country.
[01:05:01] And he flew in and tried to get these guys out.
[01:05:04] It was best we could.
[01:05:05] And the, so that else was your, was your.
[01:05:08] He was the helicopter commander pilot.
[01:05:11] The one that went down to the one that you were in.
[01:05:13] The one I was in.
[01:05:14] Okay.
[01:05:15] And it's his last weekend.
[01:05:16] It's last weekend country.
[01:05:17] He's getting ready to go home and everything.
[01:05:19] But he was showing me around the area.
[01:05:21] Stuff is, is a new pilot.
[01:05:23] And then we get this call.
[01:05:24] He'll us down, respond to it.
[01:05:26] And the crewman in the back.
[01:05:28] Once we got down low, they got, they jumped out.
[01:05:31] How long did you take you to, to find them, to find the down he low?
[01:05:35] Oh, it was in minutes.
[01:05:36] You have coordinates.
[01:05:37] Yeah.
[01:05:38] You can see smoke.
[01:05:39] It's, well, we wouldn't, there wasn't any smoke or anything.
[01:05:41] But it was down.
[01:05:42] It was a kind of swampy area.
[01:05:43] So there wasn't any fire.
[01:05:45] But we were close to the area.
[01:05:47] They gave us the coordinates, which are, we're kind of right there.
[01:05:49] So we were there within, I want to say, we, you know, five, ten minutes, etc.
[01:05:53] Within five minutes.
[01:05:55] Easy.
[01:05:56] And so we just flew in.
[01:05:58] And, you know, then we, there wasn't any fire at times.
[01:06:01] We were down there.
[01:06:02] The crew jumps out to try and get the bodies out.
[01:06:05] But they were kind of, the hedle was turned and they were kind of pinned under it.
[01:06:08] They were only able to get one body out.
[01:06:10] We got that in the heel.
[01:06:11] And the meantime, we started taking fire from the tree line.
[01:06:15] And that's when I was shooting the M16 at the tree line.
[01:06:19] And then we, we got enough then we got the body in.
[01:06:22] And then we just, then some cobras came because they had heard about the coordinates.
[01:06:26] And then they covered us as we came out.
[01:06:28] Let me ask you John, we're on the flyer.
[01:06:30] Two guys from depth one.
[01:06:31] We were down to one bird because every hundred hours we had to get a new aircraft from maintenance.
[01:06:37] The major maintenance done in Ben Toey.
[01:06:39] So we would do the oil changes and filter changes so forth.
[01:06:43] But they did all the heavy stuff.
[01:06:45] But two guys from depth one were, Michael Agal, I'll get me in the wrist lambored.
[01:06:49] They came up and they got shot down that day too.
[01:06:52] Were they already shot down when you got there?
[01:06:54] Were you got their first probably, didn't you?
[01:06:56] I think we got their first.
[01:06:57] You got their first.
[01:06:58] They came in scrambled up and went in and they had a gunship.
[01:07:02] And the bad guys, I think had a 51 caliber.
[01:07:06] And they were knocking them out there.
[01:07:09] It was like a setup.
[01:07:10] It was like an ambush.
[01:07:11] Because once the first one comes down, they know we're going to try and come and get people out.
[01:07:16] So they kind of.
[01:07:17] You were lucky.
[01:07:18] You guys were shut down.
[01:07:19] Yeah.
[01:07:20] Very lucky.
[01:07:21] When you're flying and Carl, you mentioned that you can't even remember operations where you didn't take fire.
[01:07:29] How often is your aircraft getting hit?
[01:07:32] You know, it's your post flight really heavily when you get back.
[01:07:36] And you can, you know, when you're, when you're a new guy, you can't hear if there's certain things.
[01:07:42] But when you're got to experience, you can hear a gunfire.
[01:07:45] You can hear it from a, from 800 feet.
[01:07:48] You can hear it.
[01:07:49] You can danger hear it when you're breaking off target 200 feet.
[01:07:52] But, uh, back on, you know, the bottom line is that, uh,
[01:08:00] we would get back on post flight and more often than not.
[01:08:05] Um, we, by the way, we've, we found, uh, we would find, uh, the seals would bring in intel stuff.
[01:08:12] And they would be a drawing ever helicopter and then Vietnamese telling the bad guys who were to aim.
[01:08:18] So they could hit the aircraft.
[01:08:20] Because most of the time they'd shoot at us and hit the tail section.
[01:08:24] Most all of my hits, not all of them.
[01:08:26] But most of them were after of the cabin.
[01:08:29] They were some in the cabin and they were uncomfortable.
[01:08:32] Sometimes I know John got a purple heart and you can tell that story.
[01:08:36] And I got one, a roll got one done and we, this no big deal.
[01:08:40] I mean, you get it because you got shot.
[01:08:42] There's not nothing necessarily heroic.
[01:08:44] People think a big, a purple heart's a big deal.
[01:08:46] There's not a big deal.
[01:08:47] Uh, I give my name may want you to have the whole back.
[01:08:51] Period.
[01:08:52] So since you brought the topic up, uh, this is something we'll, let's, let's talk about your
[01:08:57] talk about this all the time.
[01:08:59] And, uh, so we, Carl was on that six at that point and we were out and that one only had one of their birds.
[01:09:07] They had one in maintenance.
[01:09:08] So we went down to that one and we formed of three plane formation.
[01:09:12] And so I was a pilot at one.
[01:09:14] Carl was a pilot at one.
[01:09:15] That's a little shot.
[01:09:16] It was a pilot of the third.
[01:09:18] So we went out, took some fire up on the target.
[01:09:21] And I'm not sure who was first one in.
[01:09:23] I think me, you, you forgot to add.
[01:09:26] There was a heavy fire team at I was a fire team leader.
[01:09:29] So Carl those two guys are doing everything I asked me to do.
[01:09:32] Okay.
[01:09:33] So Carl's the first.
[01:09:34] So have the fire team mean you got three birds.
[01:09:36] Three birds.
[01:09:37] Okay.
[01:09:38] So Carl's the first one in and you're going in to do what?
[01:09:40] What are you going to do?
[01:09:41] We're going to strike in.
[01:09:42] Put in a strike in.
[01:09:43] So if I was, when you say putting a strike in, meaning you're going to lay fire down on.
[01:09:47] Into rockets.
[01:09:48] Is it close air support necessarily?
[01:09:50] Or is it, what does she have to do?
[01:09:52] We're taking some ground fire and we're going to put it out.
[01:09:55] Basically.
[01:09:56] And so you roll it in and then Carl was the first one in.
[01:09:59] Or was the second one.
[01:10:01] And so Carl peels off and Earl's putting down fire.
[01:10:04] So I see speeling off.
[01:10:05] That's when the plane was between the second plane was put down on fire.
[01:10:08] So Earl put down fire.
[01:10:10] By that time Carl's supposed to come around.
[01:10:12] Then when Earl comes off to target, I'm putting fire down.
[01:10:16] I came off to target and that's when I got hit.
[01:10:19] And so we argued today.
[01:10:22] And so I said, Carl, you didn't cover me coming off target.
[01:10:26] And he says, were you a route of position?
[01:10:28] I said, I wasn't a route of position.
[01:10:30] And so I got hit.
[01:10:32] So where did you get hit?
[01:10:33] I got hit in the foot.
[01:10:34] So the ground came up and acted tips.
[01:10:37] My two toes off.
[01:10:39] Tips that my toes off on my right foot.
[01:10:42] And then you saw the scrambledal seawalls.
[01:10:45] My gunner that day was.
[01:10:47] He got hit the same time.
[01:10:49] Kid.
[01:10:50] And the scrambledal seawalls at the end.
[01:10:54] Where the round came up.
[01:10:55] Cut his mic cord.
[01:10:56] Came out.
[01:10:57] Dotted his helmet and dotted the eye.
[01:10:59] I'm kiddin' on the back of his helmet.
[01:11:01] It was in the movie.
[01:11:02] It was in the movie.
[01:11:03] And it cut the back of his neck like he cut it with a knife.
[01:11:06] Yeah.
[01:11:07] And he was told.
[01:11:08] So he gets hit.
[01:11:09] I look back and I'm trying to call him.
[01:11:11] And he's not responding.
[01:11:12] I look back.
[01:11:13] Now I see his blood.
[01:11:14] Like, oh, geez.
[01:11:15] He gives me a thumbs up.
[01:11:16] A big smile and start shooting.
[01:11:18] And then he's like, okay.
[01:11:20] And the round just cut the mic cord.
[01:11:22] Just graze the back of his neck.
[01:11:24] And of course, when you cut your neck or head,
[01:11:26] it just bleeds like crazy.
[01:11:28] And then, so then we go back.
[01:11:30] Land.
[01:11:31] Carl comes over.
[01:11:32] Picks me out and cares me into the infirmary.
[01:11:35] The real story.
[01:11:36] Should we hear the real story?
[01:11:38] Well, that's the story.
[01:11:40] And so this day, we argue,
[01:11:42] who was out of position.
[01:11:43] But we're the best friends.
[01:11:45] It's interesting. That's like, you know, in a seal platoon.
[01:11:48] That's, that's one of the basic maneuvers we do.
[01:11:51] Like, one person shooting is that person rolls out.
[01:11:53] There's someone that's picking up fire right behind him.
[01:11:55] As that person rolls out, there's someone picking up fire right here.
[01:11:58] That's the way it's supposed to be.
[01:11:59] Carl.
[01:12:00] That's the way it's supposed to be.
[01:12:01] And a race track you jack.
[01:12:03] And a race track pattern.
[01:12:05] At this veteran, if that time I probably had 800 missions in far,
[01:12:09] it barely knows how to pre-flight.
[01:12:11] Yeah, if it's in position, I'm not.
[01:12:13] But what's funny is we got back.
[01:12:15] And I didn't know that the current gym was wounded.
[01:12:18] And we got back and landed.
[01:12:20] And John was, oh, oh, I thought my God.
[01:12:24] He probably has a body shot.
[01:12:26] Chuck's body.
[01:12:27] Chuck, the blood.
[01:12:28] I couldn't find any blood anywhere.
[01:12:30] I'm looking.
[01:12:31] Nothing nice dry.
[01:12:32] That's again.
[01:12:33] I can't imagine.
[01:12:34] And I picked him up.
[01:12:36] And gently carried him.
[01:12:38] 600 yards down the inferbering length of the base.
[01:12:41] He's moaning the whole way.
[01:12:43] Meantime, Burlington's bleeding.
[01:12:45] And he's walking chat in the whole time.
[01:12:47] But John's moaning.
[01:12:49] Not that he must have a brain move.
[01:12:52] I can't see or something.
[01:12:54] And so it's a similar put-up.
[01:12:57] And we get down to take his boot off.
[01:12:59] And you shot in the big toe.
[01:13:02] So we're all calls.
[01:13:04] Or all calls you.
[01:13:06] Or all calls him nine toes.
[01:13:08] That's his name.
[01:13:09] So then I got met a back-up to Ben Tui to the third surgery, which is the Army Hospital.
[01:13:15] And I obviously wasn't that badly wounded.
[01:13:18] And they put me in the back room.
[01:13:21] And that night everybody came over to see me.
[01:13:24] I had a little night stand table.
[01:13:26] I must have had 30 scotch and waters on a little table.
[01:13:31] Because everybody brought me a drink.
[01:13:33] Do you save your boots?
[01:13:34] The boots?
[01:13:35] I do.
[01:13:36] And I was very lucky the doctor said because he had still told boots.
[01:13:40] But he came up to the bottom.
[01:13:41] And he said, just missed a steel toe.
[01:13:44] He had to hit the steel toe that would ricochet around in a,
[01:13:47] taking all of your toes out.
[01:13:48] John has a bullet on a nice little stand.
[01:13:51] He's living room with his sprinkler around it and music.
[01:13:54] And so he's got a plaque there.
[01:13:57] That's so.
[01:13:58] But I do.
[01:13:59] And I actually had the round that came up.
[01:14:02] Okay.
[01:14:03] He's got the round from.
[01:14:04] He's got the round.
[01:14:06] So it came up with my foot and then hit me on the side of the leg.
[01:14:11] And I didn't know you can only feel one pain at a time.
[01:14:14] And what hit me on the side leg and when I was getting out of the heel,
[01:14:17] I saw this round down by the collective.
[01:14:19] So I picked it up and put it in my pocket.
[01:14:21] It was that two days later I was getting out of bed.
[01:14:23] I bumped my knee and I got shoes that really hurts.
[01:14:26] And I had a big wealth about this big around.
[01:14:28] I'm the inside of my thigh there.
[01:14:30] And so you can only feel one pain.
[01:14:32] There's this feeling my toes at the time.
[01:14:34] A couple days later I was feeling the other one.
[01:14:36] But that was the round.
[01:14:37] Who was the seal then?
[01:14:39] Oh, there was a change command.
[01:14:41] That day I got shot was a change command.
[01:14:44] And Captain Berksdom was taking over from Captain Twy.
[01:14:48] And the tradition was that the first guy that got shot the seal had to buy him a bottle of scotch.
[01:14:53] So he's got a bottle of scotch.
[01:14:55] So we had an ostrich meeting in that month later or something like that.
[01:14:59] And sure enough he gave me a bottle of scotch.
[01:15:02] But I backed it that and shared it with the team.
[01:15:05] Was it cheap?
[01:15:06] I can't remember.
[01:15:07] I was two hours or something like that.
[01:15:10] So what about you, Carl?
[01:15:11] When did you get shot?
[01:15:12] What happened to you?
[01:15:13] Oh, a roll and I were together and we just,
[01:15:15] it was minor.
[01:15:17] It was minor stuff but I'd left a lot.
[01:15:20] We took a round through the cockpit.
[01:15:22] What was the operation?
[01:15:24] You know, actually we were just on a patrol.
[01:15:26] We weren't actually even putting it in the strike.
[01:15:28] We could take a round randomly.
[01:15:30] And it happened one time when we were taking a, a platoon to insert them.
[01:15:37] The radio went and got shot on the way in with one of Richard's guys.
[01:15:43] Tom Richard's guys.
[01:15:44] But we used to go round him around as I recall.
[01:15:48] And, and a roll and I took both the flack and the face were it bounced off of the center
[01:15:55] and the windscreen so we got glass in our face and metal in our face and it looked pretty bad
[01:16:01] until we shaved the beard and actually was bad at all.
[01:16:03] It was minor.
[01:16:04] So I didn't limp anywhere.
[01:16:06] I didn't have to be carried down to third, third, third, third, third, third, third, third, third, third.
[01:16:10] Nobody bought me booze at all.
[01:16:12] Nobody cared.
[01:16:13] You know, and I didn't care.
[01:16:14] But when they treat you and you're wounded and they treat you and they,
[01:16:18] you know, they stitch you whatever you get a purple heart.
[01:16:25] That's what the honorable German figured out.
[01:16:26] It hurt Morgan soin' out the dead getting in the shot.
[01:16:29] It's been the, the pull of skin around my toes and stuff.
[01:16:32] And I had to soak my foot for about a week to make sure there's no infection.
[01:16:35] We gave him tons of grief over that and we loved Johnny's great guy.
[01:16:39] One of the best guys I know and a gentleman.
[01:16:41] I don't have many guys I can call a gentleman that I know.
[01:16:44] At least not seawalls.
[01:16:45] Anyway.
[01:16:46] But I was back flying in two weeks.
[01:16:49] And at what point, so what point did you guys link up and start where you,
[01:16:53] were you at the same debt?
[01:16:54] Was that a debt six you said?
[01:16:55] Yes.
[01:16:56] And what caused that?
[01:16:57] What caused you to be, to start working together?
[01:16:59] What had happened?
[01:17:00] Well, I, I was a very experienced, far-off team leader.
[01:17:04] What they do is they, when you first get to how three of those days,
[01:17:08] you had a month or two in the home guard and you kind of transitioned,
[01:17:13] you already transitioned to the age one because you flew the age one in flight school.
[01:17:17] But you transitioned to the mission and build your time,
[01:17:21] get to know the area of operations.
[01:17:23] You fly to every debt, taking mail and parts and people.
[01:17:26] And not a month or two, you do that.
[01:17:29] And then you were detachment and you make aircraft commander.
[01:17:32] And then you make a fire team leader.
[01:17:34] And after a period of time, before you go home, they bring you back in.
[01:17:38] You fly at home guard again for a couple of months.
[01:17:41] As the aircraft commander like Bill Belts get for you.
[01:17:44] And when you, when you went to BC Lake.
[01:17:46] And so the executive officer was one of bringing back to do that.
[01:17:53] And I said, it was March.
[01:17:55] And I said, hey, I got two months.
[01:17:57] March and April.
[01:17:58] I, I don't want to go back.
[01:18:00] I'm just getting good at this, leave me alone.
[01:18:03] And so I wind and wind and wind and finally he demanded me.
[01:18:07] He quickly took me to death six.
[01:18:10] He invited me.
[01:18:11] So they didn't have a fire team leader.
[01:18:14] One and got killed.
[01:18:16] And one had, we send you his tour.
[01:18:20] And so they had some really, really good aircraft commanders.
[01:18:28] And you were a cop out of the first got there.
[01:18:31] I think you'd be care man.
[01:18:32] Maybe you weren't air commander.
[01:18:33] I was a air commander.
[01:18:34] Oh, you're okay.
[01:18:35] Well, there were three or four five good guys.
[01:18:37] And all the name of John Farge, John Barnes,
[01:18:40] a Mac him and Paul Waters.
[01:18:42] Who did I miss?
[01:18:43] That's it.
[01:18:45] Mac him and I miss him.
[01:18:47] I know he said Mac.
[01:18:48] And super guys.
[01:18:51] And the exos said, go get those those guys are all just,
[01:18:54] they need a little leadership, they need a little experience.
[01:18:57] And go do it.
[01:18:59] If you got any, don't see.
[01:19:02] Not so much.
[01:19:05] He had a bad case of Lieutenant Commander.
[01:19:08] Again, which is do nothing.
[01:19:10] I tried to figure out, I wanted to win the Navy.
[01:19:12] I tried to avoid Lieutenant Commander.
[01:19:14] If I could go from Lieutenant Commander, I'd have been very happy.
[01:19:17] But anyway, so I sort of had to be me and a little put my chin out and just out.
[01:19:25] And that these these great guys that took about 30 minutes to fire up and get going.
[01:19:31] And all of a sudden, we were flying all day every day.
[01:19:34] Like was supposed to.
[01:19:36] Not sitting back at the boat waiting for meals.
[01:19:38] And then what's on with the movie?
[01:19:40] We don't give a damn what's in the movie.
[01:19:42] We're going to fly it and period.
[01:19:43] That's what you do.
[01:19:44] That's how you know your A.L.
[01:19:46] And that's how you support the people out there in the boats.
[01:19:48] And that's how it happens.
[01:19:50] Somebody gets shot down.
[01:19:51] You're right there on the spot.
[01:19:53] That's what we do.
[01:19:54] Are you guys flying the same helicopter all the time?
[01:19:58] Do you have a particular one?
[01:20:00] Or are you just whichever one's ready?
[01:20:03] Well, whichever is one is ready and able to fly.
[01:20:06] So you got to mind that the two you have on debt, you're flying nose.
[01:20:10] Obviously.
[01:20:11] And then you have to take up what you want some mother ever,
[01:20:13] or somebody hours to do the end of maintenance.
[01:20:16] And then get another one back.
[01:20:18] How much difference is there between, you know, this one and that one?
[01:20:22] None.
[01:20:23] You know, physically flying there all the same.
[01:20:25] Just like driving a car.
[01:20:26] You know what to do there all.
[01:20:28] You know, I was on training squatting with the roll.
[01:20:31] And VT3 after our helicopter, we went back,
[01:20:34] fixed wing for a while.
[01:20:36] And I remember guys fighting over a aircraft that was smoother.
[01:20:41] And it was a problem model instead of a charter model,
[01:20:44] it's faster.
[01:20:45] And who gives a craft?
[01:20:46] They just go fly.
[01:20:47] You know, and that's what we did.
[01:20:49] We didn't have our name on the aircraft.
[01:20:52] That's top gun, crap.
[01:20:54] We didn't push you.
[01:20:55] You know, I've tell us, joke.
[01:20:58] I, when I became maintenance officer VT3,
[01:21:01] I was a boot lieutenant commander, unfortunately.
[01:21:03] And we had 400 airplanes.
[01:21:05] And we were starting this downsize,
[01:21:07] taking these old charter models that were made for carer landings.
[01:21:10] And they were all beat up from hard landings.
[01:21:12] And they were torn them over and scrapping them.
[01:21:14] Well, my assistant maintenance officer is a guy in Russ Combs,
[01:21:17] great guy.
[01:21:18] And he's boss.
[01:21:20] You want me, you're my new boss, you're moving to put me.
[01:21:22] Your name on my own is airplanes.
[01:21:24] I said, you put my name on those airplanes.
[01:21:26] And I will break every bone in your body.
[01:21:29] Don't you do it.
[01:21:30] So one day I get that.
[01:21:33] I come back from a flight.
[01:21:34] And he's a, I got your plane parked up in front.
[01:21:37] So you see it, I said, where?
[01:21:39] I go out and all the land guys are on laughing.
[01:21:42] He took one of those old charter models,
[01:21:44] scraped off the exhaust, painted Lieutenant Commander,
[01:21:47] CD Nelson, Rotterhead, on it.
[01:21:50] And old charter model, right there in front.
[01:21:52] And it was a big high.
[01:21:53] And so they're going to take it to May.
[01:21:55] And so they're going to take it to May inside and just scrap it anyway.
[01:21:57] So who cares?
[01:21:59] Well, pretty soon I get a phone call from guys today.
[01:22:01] I was just in the Navy leave museum and you're airplanes in there.
[01:22:04] They took that plane just at random and reworked that charter model
[01:22:09] and put it in the museum and they left my name on it.
[01:22:12] Then museum down in Pensacola.
[01:22:14] Yeah.
[01:22:15] But I think it's gone.
[01:22:16] I couldn't find it last time.
[01:22:17] And they got for that.
[01:22:18] But anyway, no, we didn't want.
[01:22:21] We didn't care what we flew.
[01:22:22] We weren't flying.
[01:22:23] Yeah, well, we'll say it.
[01:22:25] A lot of time crews get his name on something.
[01:22:27] We did have nicknames for each other.
[01:22:29] I can't tell you John's real name because his family's going to see this.
[01:22:33] I was see Wolf's six eight.
[01:22:35] There you go.
[01:22:36] That sounds like the Fiji version.
[01:22:38] So you talked about the last weeks in the squadron.
[01:22:41] And people would just come up and kind of chill out the last two weeks before the left.
[01:22:45] And I actually flew the last two weeks that I was in the squadron.
[01:22:51] The CIA had sold something on the black market.
[01:22:54] And this was down in human force.
[01:22:56] There was some kind of communication center in the human force.
[01:23:00] And they couldn't quite figure out what it was or where it was.
[01:23:03] And so they sold something on the black market.
[01:23:05] They wouldn't tell us what it was.
[01:23:06] But they knew it would end up to this headquarters area.
[01:23:10] And so they had to.
[01:23:12] They picked a signal or a frequency that wasn't being used by any other families in the area.
[01:23:18] But that at home we were in the vice and we switched to follow it.
[01:23:21] And we did this for ten days.
[01:23:23] And then that's when I'm a stipend.
[01:23:24] I just go slow and go a couple hundred miles and spend the night.
[01:23:28] Go a little froze spend the night.
[01:23:29] And finally got to an area.
[01:23:31] Oh, we were getting a straight signal.
[01:23:32] We never got a real strong signal.
[01:23:34] So we talked and says one night we just followed the signal back.
[01:23:38] And it flew over this church and the needle just did a 180.
[01:23:42] So I went back, told the seals about this.
[01:23:45] And they went and rated that church.
[01:23:48] And they found a huge communication center in the basement of the church.
[01:23:51] So once they knocked that out we had this real strong signal.
[01:23:55] So we flew it.
[01:23:56] And we were just going to say, I hope this guy gets the place before I have to leave country.
[01:24:01] So the last day I was in country.
[01:24:04] We finally decided, well this is it had moved for three or four days.
[01:24:08] It must be the place.
[01:24:09] It wasn't exactly where they thought it was but must be the place.
[01:24:12] So we were to fly in throughout smokes and they had a couple flights of F-4s off the coast.
[01:24:20] So we went in a hundred feet through the smokes out pull back and that was the best air show ever.
[01:24:26] So my life and the F-4s came in and just bombed and found the place.
[01:24:31] And so then I flew back to Ben Tui, literally jumped out of one heel.
[01:24:35] They had my bag packed in another heel.
[01:24:38] Jumped to another heel through the side guy and the next day flew home.
[01:24:42] So I flew a mission my last day in country.
[01:24:45] When you guys were there, you know, like when we, like my generation looks, looks at the Vietnam War and the late 60s or the 70s, you know, it's all this.
[01:24:56] Protesters and hippies and controversy about being in Vietnam.
[01:25:01] How much of that stuff did you guys actually experience or think about when you were over there?
[01:25:07] I didn't think about it at all.
[01:25:09] Not at all.
[01:25:10] I always, we're doing our job doing our mission.
[01:25:14] We didn't think about what's going on back in the States to be honest with you.
[01:25:17] At least for my part.
[01:25:18] I remember going to R&R and I didn't go to R&R until like in my 11th month.
[01:25:24] I said, I didn't want to miss out on you to fly and that's terrible.
[01:25:27] I'm awful flight dog.
[01:25:28] That's what they used to call me.
[01:25:30] And that was a nice name they called me.
[01:25:32] But we got, I remember we flying over to Honolulu.
[01:25:36] I'm going to meet my wife, my then wife, then she liked me then.
[01:25:40] And see girls I miss you and your mom.
[01:25:43] And so, guys, we're all chatting and all excited.
[01:25:49] We get on this old bus and we're going there.
[01:25:52] Taking us to Fort Dorousi there on Waikeke.
[01:25:56] And all the women are all lined up.
[01:25:58] And as we drive through Alamohana Drive past the park and everything is we're going to Fort Dorousi.
[01:26:04] You could hear a pin drop on that bus.
[01:26:07] All that chatter all excited died and guys were all a gap.
[01:26:12] Because women weren't wearing bras.
[01:26:16] I've we've never seen that.
[01:26:18] And men have poncho longer than mine.
[01:26:23] And they looked funny.
[01:26:26] They had beers and they were funny.
[01:26:28] Tide-dide-taste up.
[01:26:29] I'd never seen.
[01:26:30] So in 10 months, I didn't recognize.
[01:26:33] Where I honestly, I was in shock and I also remember.
[01:26:37] I don't know what the hell I was doing.
[01:26:39] But we went to a movie in Honolulu one of the times.
[01:26:43] And it was the movie version of Mash.
[01:26:47] Okay.
[01:26:48] And I was so offended by the disrespect for officers in the military.
[01:26:54] I got it and walked out about 10 minutes.
[01:26:57] Wouldn't stay.
[01:26:59] It's funny how you know so offended.
[01:27:02] And then when you mentioned up, I remember going in.
[01:27:06] And this is 1970 going in.
[01:27:08] Leaving me saying goodbye to people.
[01:27:10] And they're all gung-hole, Ra-Ra.
[01:27:12] But when I came back, same guys were.
[01:27:15] Was it really bad?
[01:27:17] No.
[01:27:18] Oh, gee.
[01:27:20] Kill babies over there?
[01:27:22] No.
[01:27:23] But some of that stuff.
[01:27:25] And I even 50 years later in my living room.
[01:27:28] One of my relatives asked me,
[01:27:30] She had Carl, I didn't know you were a Vietnam.
[01:27:33] Yeah.
[01:27:34] Oh, well, were you, what's she used to turn?
[01:27:37] What term did she use?
[01:27:40] Made a drugatory term.
[01:27:42] She said, whatever it was.
[01:27:44] Were you disappointed or were you ashamed or whatever she said?
[01:27:50] I said, no.
[01:27:52] Matter of fact, I wasn't.
[01:27:53] My son loves giving me the cut side.
[01:27:55] Because it's his step on.
[01:27:56] And he was a woman to blow her away with my fired fury.
[01:28:00] But I didn't.
[01:28:01] I restrained.
[01:28:03] And I said, matter of fact, I don't know anybody that I served with.
[01:28:09] Who feels that way?
[01:28:11] Matter of fact, and this is interesting.
[01:28:14] Guy, friends of mine that didn't serve.
[01:28:17] And didn't go to Vietnam.
[01:28:19] I've yet to meet one, it talked to one,
[01:28:22] who's not sorry they didn't.
[01:28:27] And I've yet to meet one who served that was sorry they did.
[01:28:31] So that's my little world, I guess.
[01:28:34] That's the people I hang around.
[01:28:36] Mostly, good people.
[01:28:38] So.
[01:28:39] Did you see anything like that, John?
[01:28:42] When I came home, I was welcome to home because from a family perspective,
[01:28:45] I got to the house and my parents picked me up at the airport and I was in uniform.
[01:28:49] Got back to house and they had a sign.
[01:28:53] It was a eight by four board.
[01:28:57] Paragabort.
[01:28:58] They had written on it.
[01:28:59] Welcome home and my sister had painted and she was an artist.
[01:29:03] The C. Wolves, Signia, on this.
[01:29:06] Was a eight by four foot board.
[01:29:10] And so I was a sit in the front yard.
[01:29:13] And the front yard up, welcome home, John.
[01:29:16] So in my course, my dad, being in the army and his history is very supportive of that.
[01:29:22] But I did have one incident where they had me go on some recruiting duty.
[01:29:27] When I first came back for about two months and they had to go down to the University of Illinois.
[01:29:32] And we were down there for a couple of days doing some recruiting duty.
[01:29:36] Not that we got a lot of people signed up for anything.
[01:29:39] But I went to put my pants on one more end of the legs and my pants just fell off.
[01:29:44] So when I was there apparently somebody had thrown some acid or something on my uniform.
[01:29:50] That was the only incident I had with that.
[01:29:54] But other than not recruiting very well are getting a lot of people into the Navy.
[01:29:59] What about, you know, it's a question that comes up a lot.
[01:30:03] And I've working with draftees.
[01:30:07] And from what I've, when I've talked to Vietnam vets and when I read about them,
[01:30:13] the common thread is that people that were,
[01:30:17] people that were good leaders and took care of their men.
[01:30:21] They would either not know who the draftees were because they just, they just were good.
[01:30:27] Or they liked the draftees and could tell who they were, but they had no issues with them because the draftees would say,
[01:30:33] They kind of had to step up and, and the draftees say, I don't like the way we were doing this to say,
[01:30:38] they want to do it and they would kind of engage them into the into the planning and get, listen to their input.
[01:30:43] And then you, you can read some negative opinions of the draftees when you get someone that's,
[01:30:48] you know, it's almost like an excuse.
[01:30:50] Well, the draftees didn't want to do what they needed to do.
[01:30:53] What did you guys, did you guys notice any difference between draftees and, and guys that were,
[01:30:59] I guess, for lack of a better term, lifers?
[01:31:02] I don't think I did.
[01:31:04] I think if you were drafted in, it was, maybe a specific for the Navy.
[01:31:09] I think it may be a different situation because most people there drafted went into the army.
[01:31:14] They were, then I think the people that ended up in the Navy were more violent.
[01:31:18] Years.
[01:31:19] And wanted to be in the Navy.
[01:31:20] They're going to pick a service.
[01:31:22] I want to be in the Navy either, therefore, I don't want to, that's sort of being the army.
[01:31:25] Draw it.
[01:31:26] If there's sea wolves, they've long tiered.
[01:31:27] And they've long tiered to be sea wolves.
[01:31:29] Yes.
[01:31:30] I've got one time. I had to give a speech. I was asked to get, reluctantly, of course, I did.
[01:31:35] To give a speech on Memorial Day.
[01:31:37] Come out of your shell for that.
[01:31:38] Yeah, I did.
[01:31:39] It's so, uh, there's a cemetery in a little town, a gridley California up north of Sacramento, about an hour.
[01:31:47] And they've got a really, uh, a many Arlington in the back.
[01:31:51] And I was really overcome.
[01:31:52] It was neat.
[01:31:53] Didn't know this, but I don't know how they know, but supposedly the first sailor killed in the
[01:31:58] Pearl Harbor attack was from Gridley, California.
[01:32:03] Now, I don't know how they decided to do that kill first.
[01:32:05] That's a configuration, but they did.
[01:32:07] And so, they built it around that.
[01:32:10] And they have a celebration over here.
[01:32:12] Well, I met the manager because, friend of mine was on the board of directors.
[01:32:16] I thought, the board of directors of a cemetery.
[01:32:18] What do you do?
[01:32:19] Find over spots or, I mean, what do you need a board for that for?
[01:32:22] A lot of refer, a flat plotter.
[01:32:24] Anyway, and I met her, a nice lady, gauging, she says, you know, you served.
[01:32:29] Not the way I did.
[01:32:30] And she says, we didn't speak her.
[01:32:33] This was like November.
[01:32:35] I said, when she says, oh, it made the moral damn, but, yeah, I mean, I'm just, I was farming those days.
[01:32:43] I was raising olives for olive oil.
[01:32:46] 500 acres, that's how to stick your toe in the water.
[01:32:49] You're good toe.
[01:32:50] And so, so, I got this, I got this thing.
[01:32:53] Oh, god, how long did it talk?
[01:32:55] She said, whatever you want.
[01:32:57] I said, realistically, she said 20 minutes.
[01:32:59] That's okay.
[01:33:00] I said, you want to read this piece before I give it, because, you know, I don't want to be caught.
[01:33:05] No, if she says, whatever you want.
[01:33:08] So, I started reading books and kind of going through stuff.
[01:33:11] And I read a book that was pretty neat and well, it was well documented and it was well referenced at all the pages.
[01:33:19] And it was written by a guy named B.G. Burkett and the book is called stolen valor.
[01:33:26] And about guys who pretend to be a rank they're not or pretend they serve and they didn't.
[01:33:32] And I mentioned our friend as former senator and secretary of state, John Kerry and other people like that.
[01:33:39] And it was really interesting book because I learned a lot.
[01:33:44] And what I learned was that if I ask you what percentage of men volunteered for Vietnam, what would you say, John?
[01:33:57] About 10%.
[01:33:59] 76% according to this research.
[01:34:03] Okay, a big number.
[01:34:05] And a big number, not only volunteered, but it was a lot of shocking things about drugs and
[01:34:13] people like to see if you're going to be a drug.
[01:34:16] And people say, gee, you're going to be a Vietnam.
[01:34:19] You must have a problem with drugs.
[01:34:21] I didn't smell where I wanted to allow you to.
[01:34:23] John Denver, Convert, 1975.
[01:34:26] I had no.
[01:34:27] I mean, if somebody did drugs and that, I swear I would.
[01:34:30] And we were close.
[01:34:31] We live side by side.
[01:34:32] We're like a family.
[01:34:34] We're known.
[01:34:35] I agree with it.
[01:34:36] I had no.
[01:34:37] None of the enlisted nobody did drugs.
[01:34:39] I never saw any of that in Vietnam.
[01:34:42] I was a little bit blind and teased and psyched.
[01:34:43] I don't know.
[01:34:44] But we didn't have anyone to chase where I was.
[01:34:46] It's just a bunch of blood ugly guys.
[01:34:48] So I think they may be part of that.
[01:34:50] It's because of the squadronry in, you know, it's a different level.
[01:34:53] You're in the Navy, the training and and the people who are selected to go, you know,
[01:34:58] you know, you were just quality people and they were, we're into those things.
[01:35:03] I see.
[01:35:04] The country changed, Jack.
[01:35:06] Look, I'm a jockel because that day I remember.
[01:35:10] My opening line of my speech on and in a bad way, I walked.
[01:35:14] I went to think I'd put a suit on, but I went to give that speech a memorial day and
[01:35:19] really 2005, I think was it here.
[01:35:23] I, my daughter's dropped me off and I said, I got to walk and do this saying, you know,
[01:35:27] to stay at and I walked past this big hedge in this big many arms and they had 500 people in there.
[01:35:33] And then every miss, whatever county sing of the song and they had a fly over from from the air base and
[01:35:39] Sacramento and they had even had a guy from World War I who could barely walk and he's uniform and I mean,
[01:35:45] and they had an honor guard there and she called it a fire wasque, but it's an honor guard.
[01:35:52] So, and I remember my opening line and all of that was the last battle of the Vietnam War was fought and won by the Swipboat veterans against John Kerry.
[01:36:07] And people got on their feet and clapped, that's what kind of crowd I had.
[01:36:12] How's that for change in the country? Amazing.
[01:36:15] So, that's coming a long way from 1970.
[01:36:20] That is definitely heading back in the other direction for sure.
[01:36:25] You know, before we, I know I open talking about that operation where you are, where Carl, you are, you are supporting,
[01:36:33] Zulu, Poutoon. What do you remember about that day? I mean, that had to be sort of, that sounds like that had to be one of the more, you know, more,
[01:36:43] I guess dramatic operations that you supported.
[01:36:48] We had some, we had with the seal seams, we had some exciting was most of them were night, but that was a broad daylight one.
[01:36:57] And when the O&C of Zulu came to me the night before and we sat down and he mentioned about the education.
[01:37:05] We lived within 575 yards of those guys. And so, yeah, we'd pretty brief the night before and talk about, you know, where they're going.
[01:37:13] And most of the time, you know, they didn't, wasn't daylight. It was a night off and we would stand ready to scramble if they got in trouble.
[01:37:20] And, but this was going to be a daylight off and he had intelligence about some supplies or equipment or ammo or something that was north of our, of our base.
[01:37:32] Probably, you know, maybe 50 clicks. I'm not sure if 20 clicks.
[01:37:36] And we'd briefed it and what he was going to do and he had a, had a seal or it's lit. Come on, he had dire, was flying that, as you mentioned.
[01:37:44] Ed was a former fire team leader of a debt nine, well-experienced, understood fire team tactics and so forth.
[01:37:52] And so, we briefed it and so forth and we took off and my, my co-pilot, my co-pilot was oral and he's well-experienced.
[01:38:04] And so, the first thing I heard from the world was ready to be, I think he was about this far from aircraft commander and obviously was a very successful, 15 meter retarders and AV captain, hello, the guy.
[01:38:16] And, but my wingman, to go on name was questionable.
[01:38:22] But we put him with a new, with a newer co-pilot who was a pretty solid guy. So we always tried to put a solid co-pilot with a pilot maybe not all
[01:38:31] of the races, the bases like John, but some guys, there are some guys who were good guys, but they, you know, got didn't give them those skills. So that's fact.
[01:38:40] So, so I knew my wingman was questionable, I'd briefed off the op and what we're going to do, we're going to escort this slick end and, and I would lead, we'd lead it into the LZ and to Lannies, I'm with, I'd lead it in.
[01:38:56] And I decided it was going to be a, it was going to be a break left because I wanted the right door and was my adoption,
[01:39:05] going to be the outside of the circle. We would go down to about 100 feet or less and circle low orbit while the seals exit the slick and cover.
[01:39:17] We literally lay cover fire down, not wait for any fire and, and then once they're all out and clear an imposition, we had the slick one to pull pitch and he would call and warn me we would escort him out.
[01:39:29] I'd lead him out, other, the wingman following out. Well, as I made my turn and I'm looking across Earl, I made a, I made a left hand turn, so I'm looking across my copilot and I'm saying Earl, do you see,
[01:39:46] see, well, whatever his number was, I know he's number, but I'm not saying it. No.
[01:39:54] Calling, stay on the radio and find him. Meantime, I got a seal team on the ground, I got a escort to slick out and my wingman's missing.
[01:40:05] So, had to be shot down or had a mechanical failure or something, but I ended up trying to raise him. Earl's trying to raise him. I'm communicating with dire, we get dire out, we get him, we get him over to a safety area at altitude where he could orbit and wait until we need him.
[01:40:22] Because they got to come out sometime, so, meantime we're calling for my wingman. He's not answering. No answer. Can't find him.
[01:40:32] Well, then I got a call from Tom Richards and Tom's on the ground and he said, when you're flying over here, did you see, you know, I have to put your strike in, you want to put a strike in, I put a strike in, single ship, which is against squadron policy, single ships strike because, you know, but I had no choice, obviously that guy's on the ground and they were taken fire, we were taken fire on the way in and on the way up.
[01:40:58] So, they were not happy folks on the ground, they're bad guys. So, Tom asked, you know, do you see anybody? I said, after putting the strike in, I said, yeah, I got, I got 1012 guys dead there and we, and what else you see? That says, there was a big diek, they were on the diek's for kind of running east west and they were flooded.
[01:41:25] They were little dikes and there was a great big diek and beyond that of tree line and that's where the fire was coming from from behind the big diek and the tree line. Well, we knocked out that big diek pretty quickly, but the tree line, we had a hard time stopping the fire and we, we lay pretty good. I mean, it all walks the many young up and down there many times.
[01:41:48] But I'm, I'm starting to get concerned about conserving my ammo and making sure to make sure it counts and we got to find my, but I couldn't worry about those four guys that were in my trail ship.
[01:41:59] My lost him, but I had six seals on the ground, my own four guys and four guys on the other, playing a diers. So, you know, we got 14 guys, I got a worry about of my own before I worry about four more.
[01:42:14] And all of a sudden, in Tom and I were talking and all of a sudden, they started taking a heavy fire and I, I didn't know who it was, but it was Grant Telfer that went down.
[01:42:26] You took a round in one leg and it went up and msx at miss the family jewels and went down the other leg. I mean, he heard about that and he survived it. No, no, no, female or artery puncture.
[01:42:38] I mean, he could have been gone right there and, and those wounds, there was a guy shot in the chest, I'm not sure which guy, there was a guy shot in the lower abdomen. Tom was getting the hand and just just, it disabled his weapon.
[01:42:51] And, and I'm talking to Tom and it was obvious to me, I'm, I'm sitting there at low level.
[01:42:57] I'm doing pedal terms literally the aircraft and you know what happens when you're going slow.
[01:43:02] You get the treating blade stall is called an aircraft throw it's kind of fucking, but I did that because I wanted to have a flat profile on the aircraft so that my right door and my left door and Earl could shoot because we needed every weapon firing.
[01:43:18] Meantime, it looks like, you know, and before Tom even asked for extraction, I could see that they were in extremists. Absolutely. More than I'd ever seen on any mission. Guys in trouble, you know.
[01:43:34] How many guys told them they have on the ground? That's six.
[01:43:37] And so that was the slick carried in all other, all the six heels in one third. And I, and I, in my haste, I mentioned there, I forgot them first part of the story. On the way in,
[01:43:50] I'm in front, Ed, Ed's in the middle and my trotchip behind and we're crunching up in about 10 clicks short of the LZ.
[01:44:00] The kid sitting on there, I think it was the right side of the aircraft. Got hit in the shoulder, radio man got hit in the right shoulder.
[01:44:08] So it, and that happens when you're flying in a hospital area. So we turn around and flew back.
[01:44:14] We went back, landed, got the kids in medical help.
[01:44:19] And Tom wasn't even, Tom Richard wasn't even part of the operation. And, gelifer said, let's go back.
[01:44:26] Okay, hold cover here. And he says, and Richard says, I'll go. And, and I know that a couple of guys, and I'm not sure I, I won't use her names, but a couple other.
[01:44:39] She'll say, don't, but they wanted to go. So Tom, I'm upset and off we went.
[01:44:45] But the story got kind of muffled over 50 years because we never got the debrief the op.
[01:44:55] The guys got wounded, went to third surge, went home. They were at the end of the tour. Most of them had already packed up all their stuff except for their favorite weapon.
[01:45:03] So we never debriefed it. Ever. So, come back to the, a mission here. We got loaded, got Tom on board and off we went back again.
[01:45:13] Now, the story over the years, like remember hearing from other seals well, you guys went to the LZ and then, and you went back back to the same LZ.
[01:45:22] That's why they got hit. That's not true. It didn't happen that way. We did not even get to the E's LZ the first time. We didn't even make an approach to it.
[01:45:30] Because again, we just got hit, transiting the area. So we went back and started. They got in place. I could see I'm coming back to the extremist part.
[01:45:43] And I called Ed in and Ed was already on his way and thank God Ed was a former fire team leader. He knew the story. He knew he knew how to fly. He got a slick with a lot of power.
[01:45:54] And because I was about a quarter of an inch from landing and picking up myself. Now, that would have been the last possible situation because as you know, all no John on a hot day, a scene well, loaded with armament.
[01:46:08] The probability you're putting six people in, taking off is 1%. If that, if you could even get airborne at all.
[01:46:15] And you have to understand that these UH-1 problems were 8,000 pound airplanes and we had them loaded with fuel and load of armament and four people in it.
[01:46:29] And on a hot day, we could sometimes we couldn't even hover. We had to take off skip along before we got transnational lift. We had to be into the wind and very careful and be smooth.
[01:46:40] We would say, I'd say to my cop, you want to hold this collective and this stick.
[01:46:47] Black it's a beautiful woman. You don't want to fend her. You don't want to be rough. You want to be gentle.
[01:46:52] And just ease this, think it off the ground as whatever it's say, don't pull the pitch. Think it up and it'll get up okay. And then we did.
[01:47:01] And sometimes you hear the RPM start going down at 6,000 red light comes on and get an oil.
[01:47:10] And then you've got to be kicking out boxes of ammo on the river throwing out your rocket pods and hoping you'd all crash. I never did. Did you?
[01:47:17] No. You got some close calls on the LSTs, you know, the same thing you'd barely hover. We'd get it over the edge and then you would dive for the water to get air speed.
[01:47:27] Hope you got the air speed before you got to the water.
[01:47:29] And use the water to push off the air to get transnational lift.
[01:47:34] So we were that heavy stuff out of crap. And on I, my guys knew we may be dumping rockets to the bad guys and a lot of women need to get these people.
[01:47:44] It will wait and say, well, Ed came in. He got them all.
[01:47:48] I didn't see the kid hanging on to the kid basically. I was busy. We were putting fire in. But thank God for Tom Richard John that flight.
[01:47:59] But I did see Tom dragging guys across several levees under fire.
[01:48:05] And the two guys that weren't wounded did a heck of a job laying down fire and Tom will tell you to cover the extraction of those wounded guys.
[01:48:15] Grant tell first lucky to be here in this world.
[01:48:19] And whenever I see Tom Richard's, it never fails. He hugs me, which is not all that nice.
[01:48:27] But he thanks me for him being on the green side of grass.
[01:48:30] Did the same thing at your house last year. And that's us up. And my, my, one of my,
[01:48:38] Cruman, my adoption, he was, who is a heck of a guy, a stellar one of the best. And we had some good ones.
[01:48:46] Gunners ever. And he, he says, why didn't we get more awards on that? And I said, well,
[01:48:55] our reward is that there are six guys that got wounded and they survived and they got families and most of them.
[01:49:03] I think all of them got back on active duty.
[01:49:06] That's a big award. So my winman, what am I doing?
[01:49:12] Didn't answer. Wouldn't answer. So we're escorting the slick back to the base with wounded people.
[01:49:19] That's on my mind. I'm calling to get the ambulance out of to get to get the guys ready and so forth. And Earl still calling on the radio.
[01:49:29] No response. And all of a sudden, Thompson says, sir, see what black flag just joined up on us.
[01:49:36] He joined up on us.
[01:49:39] Well, my temperature went to, I don't know a thousand. And we landed.
[01:49:45] And first of all, we had to get the shield taken care of them. They were. And, you know, and you're kind of coming down from a high,
[01:49:54] after that much adrenaline is going. And I talked to you there a little chef commander.
[01:50:02] He says, I don't know what happened. We just got stuck in the ground.
[01:50:07] And that's, that's all I'll say. But it's supposed that it just went when we were going in low. He just lost it and flew into the ground.
[01:50:17] And it got stuck in the mud and couldn't get out. That's the story I get from the copa, it's now dead. He passed away.
[01:50:24] And from the crewman.
[01:50:28] It's a sad day for sea walls because, and I reported that happening to my exo, not to see what the exo, who I knew pretty well.
[01:50:41] And nothing was done. Pretty embarrassing.
[01:50:46] If, if one of those, I promised the aircraft commander that was my trailship that if one of those seals didn't make it, he, he wasn't going to make it either.
[01:50:56] And I meant it, but they all made it. So that's kind of a story that hasn't been told.
[01:51:03] And when they, when Mike Slattery wrote the, wrote the award recommendation, and I was talking to Gordy Peterson.
[01:51:11] He was also a sea wolf for a while, debt one end debt to.
[01:51:16] And Gordy says, you mean he abandoned you and the face of the enemy.
[01:51:21] And that's damn sure it did. Now again, the guy was suspect. We certainly didn't think he would do that.
[01:51:33] So I'm conflicted by that one. I want to kill the guy still.
[01:51:37] On the other hand, it made it out. Everybody did their job.
[01:51:43] My four guys Tom Klave on spaston Mike Thompson as a saw last week, Earl Shot. I just talked to him a few days ago. He's close to us.
[01:51:53] Really good guy. On 100% auctioned by the way, COPD problem, but what a guy.
[01:52:01] He's probably going to outlive us both John.
[01:52:04] And you and I talked and I know you're still connected to Tom Richards, who, you know, as I mentioned, had played a role in changing my life for me.
[01:52:12] And hopefully we can talk to him and I can get him out here to sit down in this room and that would be just honor to be able to do that.
[01:52:20] Tom has changed a lot of lives. One time he was speaking at a sea wolf and mentioned in 2004.
[01:52:28] And somebody is the camera I'm here now.
[01:52:31] Yeah. Oh. And so what he says, and when you're for two hours.
[01:52:35] At most show me your wound. He goes, this finger. He got shot in the finger. But good makes it clever like you know Tom changed a lot. He's one of the, again, one of the bravest and nice disguise I know.
[01:52:47] And and so all because of Jackie, I'm sure not not Tom. And just a good guy and happy he's a friend of mine and happy he's there.
[01:53:02] Any other John any operations that stick out in your mind as sort of the pinnacle of your tour over there?
[01:53:10] I think the one when Ben II we got hit or son and doc.
[01:53:15] That one, that was the big one.
[01:53:18] So all night long, you know, we've up for like 12 hours just put in strike interest strike interest strike in.
[01:53:24] So you're sitting there and the base starts to get attacked. And is it is it the first call does that a contingency plan that you all have? Hey, if we start getting attacked, we're going to get these birds out of here.
[01:53:38] Well, the first reaction was to get to the bunker.
[01:53:41] It's just so it can. You know, then assess the situation and then there was that law and said, now's the time to go and we just ran out to the heroes and hopped in and took off.
[01:53:52] And how many guys were on base defending the base or did everyone get into either helicopters or swift boats and get out of there?
[01:53:58] Well, the base was was an open area. There was no perimeter around that six.
[01:54:04] And I'm not sure there was a perimeter around the the barges around the river.
[01:54:09] They just had a whole string of barges right there down the river.
[01:54:12] And it wasn't a big village or anything.
[01:54:15] We didn't have any perimeter guards around where we were and we were just a couple hundred yards off from where the the barges were.
[01:54:23] So we just got in the bunker and after we took off and then we went back because we weren't sure about the rest of the people that were there. The crew, the other pilots and so, but we found out they had gotten to the boats and got out.
[01:54:35] How much fuel, how long can you guys fly for in the hewry when you're loaded out to bear?
[01:54:41] A couple of hours. I don't have to. Most flights are pretty short, but I don't have to long flight.
[01:54:48] And the 20 minute fuel light is very accurate. I had one mission where we came back and we literally the 20 minute fuel light came in.
[01:54:57] We went back up to Kamala, which was where death three was. And as we as we touched down the engine shut itself down.
[01:55:05] We ran out of fuel as we were touching down.
[01:55:08] But were you flying with me when we had to land and send out for fuel because we ran out?
[01:55:16] No, we got out of fuel. We got out of fuel.
[01:55:19] Yeah, well this is this is in Scramble the Sea Wolves.
[01:55:22] Right, this story. Yeah, and it's nice about that one.
[01:55:25] My doves and was my crewman again. And we didn't run out of fuel, but I landed at Hotion because I was at the end of the 20 minutes.
[01:55:37] And that light gets bigger and bigger and at nighttime, it's huge.
[01:55:41] Just like it's sunny. A daytime is still pretty damn big.
[01:55:45] What was the mission that you were doing?
[01:55:47] We were covering seals that day, and I don't remember what the Pacific operation was.
[01:55:52] The missions all come together.
[01:55:55] I remember Mike Slatter, we asked him on the phone time.
[01:55:58] How about blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I said, you know, they all kind of blend together.
[01:56:03] It's hard to separate them out. I remember the Zulu and Andy tail.
[01:56:08] I dream about that one and thank God about it every night.
[01:56:13] Not every night, but most nights.
[01:56:17] But we were covering seals and Mike dobson could give you more detail.
[01:56:23] But we had to make a call about whether we ended up in less fuel than my winning money.
[01:56:32] And we ended up swapping stations and refueling one time to cover back and forth.
[01:56:37] But we got, I got so low I couldn't go back at the time.
[01:56:40] The seals were already in. We were safe.
[01:56:43] But so you stayed on station to support them.
[01:56:45] Absolutely. Even though you were low on fuel.
[01:56:47] And you had enough fuel just to get them and then make it to a rice patty.
[01:56:51] Yeah, basically, well, it was no place called Hotion.
[01:56:53] It was in no fuel there.
[01:56:55] And it wasn't really an any bad there. It was a rice patty near a little town.
[01:56:59] Yes. And so we set it perimeter up and we sent out for fuel.
[01:57:04] And by sending out for fuel, you grab the ammo.
[01:57:08] And it's pulled fuel from the other bird.
[01:57:12] Yeah, and it's pretty embarrassing.
[01:57:15] You think about how can you let yourself run out of fuel?
[01:57:18] Well, sometimes you don't have any.
[01:57:20] And you know, the big thing is contamination.
[01:57:22] You worry about getting fuel contaminated.
[01:57:25] And but it worked out okay, we made it. But that was, it takes Mike Dobbson to tell the story.
[01:57:30] He can tell it without any alcohol.
[01:57:32] He's a better story, Chelenaya.
[01:57:34] Mission focused.
[01:57:36] Sure.
[01:57:37] So then when you guys get home from Vietnam, what happens with your careers at this point?
[01:57:41] Because whichever whoever was counseling you, Carl, that told you,
[01:57:45] the rest of the Navy ain't like this.
[01:57:48] He was definitely right. I know I had some new guys that were on their first appointment.
[01:57:53] When I was in the battle, the battle of the body.
[01:57:56] And it's kind of a corrupting thing to be in this situation where there's very limited bureaucracy.
[01:58:04] We have total control over what's happening.
[01:58:06] You're doing the job you always dreamed about.
[01:58:09] And I remember some of the older, more experienced guys saying,
[01:58:12] it's not going to get me better than this.
[01:58:14] This is the best of for me. You're ever going to do so enjoy it.
[01:58:18] And it sounds like you guys got some of that advice.
[01:58:20] But what was the reality when you got back?
[01:58:22] How many of us would we would like from how three? How many of us would the lay cursed?
[01:58:27] Well, I, what I did is said, I wanted to go to lay cursed, but I had orders to quantify.
[01:58:33] What was lay cursed?
[01:58:35] A lay cursed New Jersey. There was a naval air station.
[01:58:38] And that's where the lamps program started.
[01:58:42] And what was the lamps program?
[01:58:44] Light airborne, multi-purpose systems.
[01:58:47] And we were, we were, we had helo's, the H2's contract submarines.
[01:58:52] And that's where you submarine warfare.
[01:58:54] Yes, W.
[01:58:56] As Danny says, and so what?
[01:58:58] So the detail was actually in Vietnam.
[01:59:01] And Earl and Carl had already left.
[01:59:06] And they were going to Lakehurst.
[01:59:08] And I had orders to quantify and so the detailer wanted to go out on a mission.
[01:59:14] So I put him in the co-pilot scene. We went out and found some targets.
[01:59:18] And then I'm shooting the mini gun, everything.
[01:59:20] And I told the crew, if you ran the, the mini guns dry,
[01:59:23] he had to buy the crew a case of beer.
[01:59:25] Because it was so hard to re-restring and everything.
[01:59:28] It's easy to just cut the next one and go.
[01:59:30] So I told the crew, let him shoot as much as he wants.
[01:59:33] I'll buy a case of beer if he runs a drive.
[01:59:35] Well, he ran the mini guns dry.
[01:59:38] Get back. And this is not really like to go to Lakehurst.
[01:59:41] And he says, I can't promise anything, but I'll see what I can do.
[01:59:45] And about four weeks later, I get my orders in our Delayhurst.
[01:59:49] Beautiful. And then I'm in Lakehurst.
[01:59:51] And maybe he un-sauce a lot of problems on both ends.
[01:59:54] But I'm in Lakehurst now and I'm walking through the hanger.
[01:59:58] And as he has commander coming the other way and I salute him.
[02:00:01] And I'm still a JG at the time.
[02:00:03] And he sees my name tag. He says, far. He calls me over.
[02:00:06] And I think he was supposed to be in my squadron. And I said, I don't know.
[02:00:10] They gave me orders to come here. And I'm just following orders here.
[02:00:14] But that's how I ended up in Lakehurst.
[02:00:17] And then the three of us were still real close and became closer even then.
[02:00:22] We got to Lakehurst a bunch of how three guys were.
[02:00:25] What was almost embarrassing was most of us had three, four rows of rows.
[02:00:32] And we didn't know almost a man. We just, we got to know these medals.
[02:00:37] You know, somebody asked me a thing, well, where are your right-ups?
[02:00:39] And I said, I don't know.
[02:00:41] Where are your ribbons? I don't know.
[02:00:43] I know it's in the storage somewhere.
[02:00:45] But we're at this base and there's a bunch of guys that either dodged to be at an arm
[02:00:51] or they're, let's give them to the benefit of the doubt.
[02:00:53] They just didn't get a chance to go.
[02:00:54] But they're on the East Coast.
[02:00:56] And they were resentful.
[02:00:59] And they were warned someone as awards were following us.
[02:01:04] There was always quarters and you're always getting another word.
[02:01:07] And I was like, oh crap, maybe I should take leave.
[02:01:10] I don't want to get to.
[02:01:13] And you know, sour grapes, and you know, like I show up there.
[02:01:17] And I got 11, 1200 hours or whatever.
[02:01:21] And most of those guys got having you made their cref commander.
[02:01:28] Yeah, because we've been flying our butts off.
[02:01:30] And they've been on a, in most, well.
[02:01:33] Well, I think the guys from the health that came back to the squad and liked that from
[02:01:38] Health 3, we had been in combat.
[02:01:40] We'd seen a lot.
[02:01:41] And you mentioned in the book that you've been about tactics and strategy about filling the void
[02:01:47] and just taking charge.
[02:01:49] If you see something that's not going to done, you got to step in and take command.
[02:01:53] And I think the guys from Health 3 stepped up.
[02:01:56] And they did their jobs better than anybody else.
[02:01:59] We just stepped up and started getting stuff done.
[02:02:01] Can I remember at one point how was the night maintenance officer in the squadron?
[02:02:07] And the bird, there's always birds down.
[02:02:11] But I was night maintenance officer.
[02:02:13] And one night we got every single aircraft in the squadron was up and ready for flight to next day.
[02:02:19] And I went in the wardrobe and put on the board.
[02:02:22] And I said, well, I think that's the best thing that I've ever seen.
[02:02:27] And I think that was a nice accomplishment to have all the birds up because I think they can charge.
[02:02:33] Working with the chief and the maintenance people.
[02:02:36] And we worked late hours.
[02:02:38] We actually, we were past midnight one time just to get this last bird up.
[02:02:43] So we could have them all up on that next day.
[02:02:45] That is when I got the licorice, they had 10 birds and one up forever.
[02:02:51] And the first one I had was there.
[02:02:53] Mr. Peanut, I told you about him.
[02:02:55] He looked like the guy on the planet of Peanut Charity.
[02:02:59] And I was a line division officer.
[02:03:01] I mean, I was a charge in nothing but Mr. Guy said we're yelling at women and doing,
[02:03:06] I tried to keep them all on the control.
[02:03:08] High school guys, well, I really worked on them.
[02:03:11] We trained and we got pretty damn good.
[02:03:14] And they looked almost like a troupe.
[02:03:17] Well, they were the best.
[02:03:19] Like a troupe. Well, there was one bird up.
[02:03:23] And I had them all trained up and I'm watching them from the line check.
[02:03:27] On the end, which is on the end, the big blimp anger.
[02:03:30] And the commander comes out, our CEO and he pre-flight Sarah Kraft and it passed the pre-flight.
[02:03:36] What? All right. He claims in.
[02:03:39] Go about it.
[02:03:40] He claims in. He got through the checklist. Okay.
[02:03:43] They plugged the power in.
[02:03:45] Start one. Start two.
[02:03:47] All right. Sounds perfect. Everything is good.
[02:03:52] They had the guy out here playing Captain Friend.
[02:03:55] He had them wands and he's holding the guy short here and so forth.
[02:03:58] We had a guy who was on the APU there.
[02:04:01] I was literally a power unit.
[02:04:02] It was like a four wheeler.
[02:04:05] And he turns, you know, and the CEO sluts him.
[02:04:09] He sluts him. He sluts him.
[02:04:11] Hops back on and drives off.
[02:04:13] Yanks the plug out of the side of the earplate.
[02:04:16] It's down.
[02:04:18] And I ran and hid.
[02:04:21] So we were flying the H2s.
[02:04:24] We were assigned to a destroyer.
[02:04:26] So that we were landing on the back of the shorts.
[02:04:29] And we were like the third dead.
[02:04:32] I was on the sixth dead.
[02:04:34] I went over. We had lost a bird in the med.
[02:04:37] And they put an H2 in a HC5.
[02:04:41] We flew it over.
[02:04:43] And there was just the replacement crew.
[02:04:46] So it was a two pilots and a crewman.
[02:04:48] And so we got to sit in the cockpit of the C5.
[02:04:51] Flan across the Atlantic.
[02:04:53] We flew over and I was sitting in the cockpit and they got a warm and fuel light.
[02:04:57] And one of the engines had to shut it down.
[02:04:59] If I hadn't been sitting in the thing I would have never known that shut an engine down.
[02:05:03] We had to land in Madrid.
[02:05:05] Wait for wait.
[02:05:07] Wait for a part.
[02:05:09] The finally come.
[02:05:10] We finally got over two Naples. And that's where they unloaded the helo.
[02:05:14] Then that's where I know the bone.
[02:05:17] And then that flew in the med.
[02:05:20] Doing a SW work.
[02:05:22] Well John, just one story about.
[02:05:24] Tell him what happened.
[02:05:25] Why you didn't tell him was the crew that you replaced white.
[02:05:29] They.
[02:05:31] The guys you replaced the aircraft.
[02:05:33] Yeah, they had crashed in the med.
[02:05:35] Lost in the middle.
[02:05:36] Lost in the bird and a crew in the med.
[02:05:38] We had we were where our planes were starting to drop like flies at that time.
[02:05:43] And he's going over there with another bird.
[02:05:46] Got to be on your mind John.
[02:05:48] No, I didn't.
[02:05:49] You don't think about that.
[02:05:51] So you got a job doing it that you're thinking about doing there.
[02:05:54] And I was happy to be in the med.
[02:05:56] And we were flying.
[02:05:57] You know we're working the med.
[02:05:58] And the only place you really wanted to go to was Greece.
[02:06:02] And so we're pulling into Greece dropped anchor.
[02:06:05] And we're going to go in Liberty.
[02:06:08] All of a sudden there's some Russian subs coming out of the Adriatic.
[02:06:11] We had to pick up anchor and go chase them.
[02:06:13] So we were chasing across and we were actually at one point.
[02:06:17] They surfaced all their subs.
[02:06:19] And we think they're trying to sneak some nuclear subs into the med.
[02:06:23] So they had all the surface ones.
[02:06:25] The decals up on.
[02:06:26] And we were like in perfect formation.
[02:06:28] Ten Russian ships.
[02:06:29] Ten US ships.
[02:06:30] Information going across the med.
[02:06:32] All of a sudden they all their subs went under.
[02:06:36] Aircraft were flying every which way because we're trying to keep track of them.
[02:06:40] And so we're flying to get, but you could never get a confirmation of where they were because there was so much noise in the water.
[02:06:46] With all the ships and everything.
[02:06:48] But they're flying around and they're helicopters taking a picture of us on our hangers.
[02:06:52] We're flying around taking a picture of them on their hangers and stuff like that.
[02:06:56] We go all the way across the med.
[02:06:58] And the Admiral from the Russian ship calls up our admins says,
[02:07:02] Thanks for the escort across the med.
[02:07:04] And they peeled off and went into Alexander.
[02:07:06] And that's of course what we didn't have good relationships with each of them.
[02:07:10] So what was an interesting tour across and that with the Russian ships?
[02:07:14] It's the least.
[02:07:16] And then how long did you guys end up staying in the Navy for?
[02:07:20] I stayed at, well, I did a tour at Lakehurst.
[02:07:24] And then that's when I met my wife at the end of my tour.
[02:07:28] And I got out of the Navy when back in work for Burroughs.
[02:07:32] So that job was still there.
[02:07:34] Like you were told.
[02:07:36] It was always be here.
[02:07:38] And then I joined the reserves.
[02:07:40] So I spent 24 years in a reserve.
[02:07:44] So I actually got 30 years in here, Tyra's a captain.
[02:07:46] And I know that you were in Guam for a chunk of time.
[02:07:50] When were you in Guam?
[02:07:52] When were you last in Guam?
[02:07:54] Oh man.
[02:07:55] I was probably last in Guam in the 80s.
[02:07:58] I went over there as a maintenance officer.
[02:08:01] And we did our two weeks.
[02:08:02] We considered a good planning to leave Chicago and February
[02:08:06] and go to the South Pacific and Guam and do our two-executive duty.
[02:08:10] Good for that.
[02:08:11] So we did that.
[02:08:12] And the unit I was in was the Guam unit.
[02:08:15] And the Guam was the, where the Naval Air Station was there.
[02:08:19] And we won the Bartoll trophy one year,
[02:08:23] which was the best reserve unit in all the Navy.
[02:08:26] And we won that one year.
[02:08:28] I think when I was the training officer.
[02:08:31] We got that.
[02:08:32] And then I became, I was CEO of the Midway Unit.
[02:08:36] They actually got to fly out to Midway on a P3.
[02:08:39] I landed on Midway Island.
[02:08:40] I'm not many people can say they've been on Midway Island.
[02:08:43] Then I was the CEO of the Comnever Land,
[02:08:47] which was down in Norfolk.
[02:08:51] And that was a nice tour for me.
[02:08:53] And then the Guam unit ran into some tough times.
[02:08:58] And they fired the CEO and they brought me back in.
[02:09:01] And we turned that around.
[02:09:03] And I found this marine poster.
[02:09:08] You know, it was a couple of eight-fours.
[02:09:10] And it said, on top.
[02:09:13] And so I took this poster and I read it a little bit.
[02:09:18] And I said, put this poster up.
[02:09:20] We're getting back on top.
[02:09:22] And we took the, the Guam unit back up.
[02:09:25] And then I went out there as a CEO with the unit to a Guam.
[02:09:29] And Captain Butterfield was a CEO out there.
[02:09:34] And he was involved in that, the buckle when they tried to get the
[02:09:38] hostage out of Iran. He says, we could have used some good heal pilots on that.
[02:09:45] The mission.
[02:09:46] For sure.
[02:09:47] And, but so that was like the late 80s and it was really in Guam.
[02:09:53] I just know I was in Guam in like 1990.
[02:09:56] Late 1992 or early 1993 is when I got there.
[02:10:00] I was thinking maybe you and I were in the Navy at the same time.
[02:10:03] You're a big team by the years.
[02:10:08] You're not going to do 75 year old guys.
[02:10:09] I'm 75 years.
[02:10:10] We're 76.
[02:10:11] Yeah.
[02:10:12] So it's a with it.
[02:10:13] Oh, go ahead.
[02:10:14] But I love Guam was a great place.
[02:10:16] I love, yes.
[02:10:17] And I had a nice tour with the, with the reserves.
[02:10:20] Then my last four years, I was on the animal staff.
[02:10:23] That's a deputy for training and readiness, a bit great.
[02:10:26] Like, because they called Glenn View at the time.
[02:10:29] I thought he had to actually talk to him and to keep him Glenn View open.
[02:10:33] But I think, because we met with some of the senators.
[02:10:37] And that was when Brake was going on and everything.
[02:10:40] I had to give a speech about why we should keep Glenn View open to these people.
[02:10:44] And then I had lunch with him at a table.
[02:10:46] And I thought he thought he'd talk to him in the keeping Glenn View open.
[02:10:50] But I think they went behind doors as well.
[02:10:53] You can have Glenn View or you can have great legs.
[02:10:55] So the Navy had to make a pic of they took great legs.
[02:10:58] And now today is the sole training center.
[02:11:01] If you go in the Navy as an listed, you go in through great legs.
[02:11:04] 100% but I was on the animal staff up there for about four years.
[02:11:08] And then I retired out of there.
[02:11:10] And how long did you stay at Burroughs for?
[02:11:12] Four.
[02:11:13] I was at Burroughs until it merged with Spirory.
[02:11:17] And I actually got my picture in the last Burroughs and the report.
[02:11:21] Because I had just sold the largest computer that Burroughs had to
[02:11:25] to the University of Chicago Medical Center, which was the 815.
[02:11:29] And it was a big deal.
[02:11:30] And then at Merge was Spirory.
[02:11:33] Then I went to Digital.
[02:11:35] And I ended up working for SAIC, which is this up here in La Jolla.
[02:11:41] And I was in telecommunications.
[02:11:44] And we did all software development for the Starbucks.
[02:11:48] And I had a merit tech, then SBC bought a merit tech and bought Pack Bell.
[02:11:52] So I had offices in Chicago, down in San Antonio, actually,
[02:11:56] and a part because that's where the main executives were.
[02:11:58] And then now in San Ramon, where Pack Bell was.
[02:12:01] And I can remember I was with their president when day.
[02:12:03] And I said, you know, if I put all my offices together,
[02:12:06] they'd be bigger than you're off.
[02:12:08] And you looked at me and he said, you know, I could fix that.
[02:12:11] So I was having responsibility for all the art box, you know,
[02:12:15] kind of, the software operations for their back end systems and stuff.
[02:12:21] Got it.
[02:12:22] And so what about you, Carl?
[02:12:24] How long did you make it in the Navy after you got home from Alphineau?
[02:12:27] You know, John admitted the part about Glenview.
[02:12:31] That's really important.
[02:12:33] And that was, I grabbed a T28.
[02:12:35] That was an ask for a training squad in for a while.
[02:12:37] And we'd take off early.
[02:12:38] And I, several times, and in coming time, Earl shot nine,
[02:12:41] those time, got him Tim Zimmer and Zip, as she referred to you by some.
[02:12:46] Zip and I would fly up and we'd go up just.
[02:12:49] Just stay in John and eat and sleep for free and give him our time.
[02:12:53] But yeah, I, I, I, I was in Lakehurst there and I, I wasn't sure what I was going to do.
[02:13:04] I was still a USNR.
[02:13:06] I hadn't augmented, but I was thinking about it.
[02:13:09] And, and Steve Schreider and I were both on track to go into the blue and not going to the FBI.
[02:13:18] Steve actually went in.
[02:13:20] I didn't.
[02:13:21] I was my interviewer.
[02:13:23] I never forget his name was Jay Wallace LeProd.
[02:13:25] He ended up running the New York office.
[02:13:27] One of my questions on my interview.
[02:13:29] I thought I was being funny.
[02:13:30] I said, well, we got, you got, you know, Jay to go Hoover and you got Jay Wallace LeProd.
[02:13:35] And what I'd be Carl Dean Nelson or C. Dean Nelson.
[02:13:39] He didn't laugh.
[02:13:41] But he's a good guy.
[02:13:42] Yeah, yeah, because he said that was funny.
[02:13:44] So I came down to go back to school or teacher or whatever.
[02:13:49] So, but I, I went down and was flight instructor went through West Coast.
[02:13:53] Did, he just all 35.
[02:13:58] Got picked up early for Lieutenant Commander Commander.
[02:14:01] Did my last tour an Apple 5.
[02:14:03] I got offered a job by a guy on a ship.
[02:14:06] My last cruise in my wife who at that time and
[02:14:10] wrestlers sold, she's passed on, but she was not a fan of the Navy and didn't like me
[02:14:15] to enable offers.
[02:14:16] I appreciate you know that some work is not easy.
[02:14:19] And, and so, but we ended up getting divorced later, but I always kidding say that
[02:14:25] my, I got up because my wife didn't like the Navy, but turned out she didn't like me.
[02:14:30] And can't imagine that.
[02:14:31] But so, I did 10 years, 11 months and nine days.
[02:14:35] Navy was great to me.
[02:14:36] I can't imagine anybody was treated better than obviously treated her.
[02:14:39] But the Navy just a kid from Kusbeur, Oregon and literally, and John
[02:14:44] was saying that the Navy's got a great system of evaluating and promoting the right people.
[02:14:48] With some exceptions he was looking at me.
[02:14:50] But I meant my wife when I was stationed at Lakehurst.
[02:14:56] Oh, yes.
[02:14:58] So, I was just getting ready to get out of the act of duty Navy.
[02:15:04] And I met my wife, we dated, and then the seal,
[02:15:11] wanted me to be the old and see if it's take a detachment out.
[02:15:15] And it was the North Atlantic cruise detachment on the boat.
[02:15:20] And I said, I went to, and says, you know, there's people that are more qualified
[02:15:24] to take this detachment out than me.
[02:15:26] And he says, he looked at me and says, you're the most qualified and you're going.
[02:15:31] And he knew I was dating Gina at the time.
[02:15:35] So I just met Gene.
[02:15:37] So we dated for a couple months and I was gone for two months on this North Atlantic cruise
[02:15:44] on the boat.
[02:15:45] And Carl was on the sea of a debt prior to me.
[02:15:50] And so we both know the seal of the ship, which was just a great guy.
[02:15:55] And we were pretty close to him.
[02:15:58] And came back and got out of the Navy in December.
[02:16:07] Got married in January and started back at Burles in February.
[02:16:12] And somebody says, you know, you should do three life changing situations like that in succession.
[02:16:18] You should put some time between them.
[02:16:20] But so we dated for eight months.
[02:16:23] I was gone for two of those months and we got, they months later we got married.
[02:16:27] And we just had our 47th wedding anniversary last January.
[02:16:31] Outstanding.
[02:16:32] Great.
[02:16:33] What did you end up doing, Carl, in the rest of your, once you got out of the Navy?
[02:16:37] I got recruited to a train corporation.
[02:16:39] I ran off of Sarah and lived in a new to beach California and then, and new poor beach.
[02:16:47] And then got recruited to Boise Cascade Corporation, office of Protestant vision.
[02:16:54] I was General Selzmanager and never sold anything by life.
[02:16:58] A botsam stuff, I just sold anything.
[02:17:00] So then I ended up getting recruited to the Hershey organization.
[02:17:05] I love Western State Service, Nacken Babards, and then I did a tour of craft.
[02:17:10] Matter of fact, a couple times in Chicago.
[02:17:12] John and I had dinner there with his dad.
[02:17:14] He was a great man.
[02:17:16] John F. Far Sr. was no reason, no wonder that he and I,
[02:17:23] state close and communicated through the 50s when I was present.
[02:17:27] And he still had time to communicate with your dad to make a couple of phone calls for your aunt.
[02:17:35] Was it?
[02:17:37] Or had it risk?
[02:17:38] Yeah.
[02:17:39] And in just a good guy.
[02:17:40] And his dad was absolute a class act.
[02:17:43] I always sat by him at John's wedding and other times.
[02:17:48] I always was trying to pick that man's brain because there's a lot there.
[02:17:52] And just he was a senior executive at Cantine Corporation,
[02:17:57] which was a contract feeder for all companies and so forth.
[02:18:02] And then he was seeing stuff with just a good guy.
[02:18:05] But anyway, I did craft and then I got recruited to a metagone and airplane and he had my seat.
[02:18:13] I had a lot of frequent flyer points.
[02:18:15] And so I had one A first class in those days united.
[02:18:18] I could roll in after a long week and I commuted in California, worked in Chicago.
[02:18:23] I have about that.
[02:18:24] And beat myself up and he had my seat and got a chat and he hired me to be my first CEO job.
[02:18:31] So running instead of running a $300 million section of craft and on healthcare food service.
[02:18:39] I had a $3 million muffin company I ran.
[02:18:42] But it took more work.
[02:18:44] And I paid less money and that's how smart I am.
[02:18:48] So took a, got to be part of a company going public after that.
[02:18:52] We sold that company.
[02:18:54] Garden Burger was a vegetarian garden burger I had.
[02:18:57] A 600-acre ranch.
[02:18:58] They thought I was a cattle ranch.
[02:19:00] I thought I was an ideal candidate.
[02:19:01] But my food background to run a veggie burger company.
[02:19:06] And all my employees at Irrings and,
[02:19:09] I was a good guy.
[02:19:14] And flip flops and one of the one of the one of the one who choose those leather shoes.
[02:19:18] Birking stock.
[02:19:19] They all had Birking stock.
[02:19:21] I know you're talking about that.
[02:19:22] Here I'm sitting here on the three-piece and start shirt.
[02:19:25] Almost as much starts, John's got.
[02:19:27] And anyway it was a great deal.
[02:19:30] It was a lot of fun.
[02:19:32] And then ended up last year and it was a starting-around company.
[02:19:35] Made Olive Oil up to 300,000 gallons a year.
[02:19:39] We were the second largest in the US when I sold.
[02:19:42] I got lucky.
[02:19:43] Some guys came along and maybe an offer.
[02:19:47] I didn't understand and they came back and double the offer and then I understood.
[02:19:51] So I sold.
[02:19:53] I've been the luckiest guy in the planet.
[02:19:55] I got two grown daughters.
[02:19:56] Three grand sheds.
[02:19:57] And they were the grandkids helping me in the plant.
[02:20:00] They were always a cubby was born when I, when I poured concrete.
[02:20:04] They think they owned that plant.
[02:20:06] But great-grey life, luckiest guy in the planet.
[02:20:09] I live on a houseboat on Pine Flat Lake.
[02:20:12] Six miles from Sequoia.
[02:20:14] How do you beat that?
[02:20:15] Tough to beat.
[02:20:16] I was talking to Dick couch.
[02:20:19] Okay.
[02:20:20] And we were talking to each other.
[02:20:22] And I hadn't got back to him for a couple of weeks.
[02:20:24] This is what I happened to say.
[02:20:25] I'm sorry.
[02:20:26] Dick, I dropped my phone in the lake.
[02:20:29] It's a pine flat.
[02:20:30] He said, you know what?
[02:20:31] If you drop your phone in a lake, something's going right.
[02:20:35] That's like a good flat.
[02:20:37] Yeah.
[02:20:38] And that's it.
[02:20:39] That's it.
[02:20:40] It's been great.
[02:20:41] And great to be a connector with John and his family.
[02:20:44] All of them.
[02:20:45] Gene didn't get much ink.
[02:20:46] But Gene is the real brains of the outfit.
[02:20:49] And the reason he has nervous about going cruising.
[02:20:52] The real story, buying the backstory.
[02:20:55] The man who's going in is where Gene worked.
[02:20:59] And she was a school teacher working.
[02:21:02] They managed to find in the summer type.
[02:21:04] Good.
[02:21:05] Look at him woman.
[02:21:06] And she's still got it.
[02:21:07] And she had lots of suitors and John did not want to leave her on a tender.
[02:21:12] I left my car with her when they went on the cruise.
[02:21:15] I didn't want to leave with my other roommate.
[02:21:18] Great to have a great family.
[02:21:21] John's got a great family.
[02:21:22] And when I first went to got orders to Lake or since it's well, New Jersey,
[02:21:26] I just want to get in and out of New Jersey without meeting the Jersey girl.
[02:21:30] She changed my whole perspective to Jersey girls.
[02:21:33] We have three lovely boys and eight grandchildren.
[02:21:37] So now I'm tired and we're just traveling in the country because we're one lives in the Chicago area.
[02:21:42] We've spent some time with one lives in Boulder and his family.
[02:21:45] We've just spent a week with them.
[02:21:47] We're out here in California because my oldest son and his family are out here.
[02:21:51] So we're out there.
[02:21:52] Out here visiting them.
[02:21:53] So great family.
[02:21:54] Great family. If I can add about Jean if I add one little trivia thing, she sort of a celebrity.
[02:21:58] Other than the fact that on our ID card and military ID, it says commander Jean far.
[02:22:04] I don't know how she got that but other than that.
[02:22:07] You ever go to Jersey mics?
[02:22:09] Yeah.
[02:22:10] Sub's.
[02:22:11] There's a picture in there of the original.
[02:22:13] He's laughing.
[02:22:14] The original Jersey mics.
[02:22:16] It was on in point pleasant, wasn't it?
[02:22:18] Right.
[02:22:19] Yes.
[02:22:20] I burst up higher than I had in 1970 and there was a picture of the original Jersey mics.
[02:22:26] And they add on to it now.
[02:22:29] Work there and bought it out.
[02:22:31] But there's a picture there of the beach, a point pleasant.
[02:22:34] And there's a girl as a yellow or red.
[02:22:36] The bathing suit.
[02:22:37] I guess red.
[02:22:38] Yeah.
[02:22:39] Anyway, it's a girl in a two piece bathing suit.
[02:22:41] That's his wife.
[02:22:42] Well, that's how it's said.
[02:22:45] That's going to be the most Google picture after this.
[02:22:47] After this podcast comes out.
[02:22:49] You're welcome, Jean.
[02:22:51] Well, look, we've been going for a little over two hours.
[02:22:54] Now, probably a good, probably, I mean, this is just a good place to wrap it up.
[02:22:59] Barn any, got anything else, John?
[02:23:02] I just like to say that I think my time in the Navy,
[02:23:05] I was a best part of my life, especially that six years on his act of duty.
[02:23:10] And it's been a privilege in an honor to have served in support of the United States.
[02:23:16] And I think more people should feel that way.
[02:23:20] And I, to go through, do that.
[02:23:23] And the people we had that we led, hopefully we made a positive impact on other people's lives and made it better.
[02:23:31] But it's been a privilege and honor to serve our country.
[02:23:37] Carl.
[02:23:39] Get away.
[02:23:40] I remember, as you talked about the question about people's attitudes,
[02:23:45] and we came back and so forth.
[02:23:47] My brother was killed in action in 1968.
[02:23:54] I was in my last week off, Canada School.
[02:23:57] I hadn't, we were getting ready to put on the bar and be for real.
[02:24:04] And then they extended us four weeks and moved, 16 instead.
[02:24:07] But I met his body in San Francisco and escorted the body from San Francisco.
[02:24:14] The police pay Oregon.
[02:24:16] And in spite of what was going on in the country then, it was the most moving experience you can imagine.
[02:24:23] The way the airlines handled his body with respect.
[02:24:28] How they put him on first.
[02:24:32] Took him on, I'm sorry, put his body on last and took it off first and we landed.
[02:24:37] How the captain held all the people in their seats until my brother was off until I was actually the aircraft.
[02:24:43] And since I've been retired, I've done a lot of traveling.
[02:24:49] John, see more of any in our own and Jim more than me they like.
[02:24:54] But I see a lot of good in America in spite of what the news programs may put out even today.
[02:25:02] The 24 new cycles are a problem.
[02:25:05] I see good people out there that are, and I don't see racism at all.
[02:25:11] I see good people doing good things being kind to each other and particularly young old man who they have got no reason to be kind to you.
[02:25:18] And that's me.
[02:25:19] And I see it in every state I've been.
[02:25:22] I've no bad experiences.
[02:25:25] And I've driven probably 200,000 miles to last five years around our country.
[02:25:31] I've even been a Honduras.
[02:25:33] It's still made a lot of good people.
[02:25:36] I just like to say I've enjoyed this and I'd like to thank my son Eric. He's one that taught me and doing this.
[02:25:42] I'm not big on going out and telling him what I've done and things like that.
[02:25:46] So I'm glad he took the, you know, took charge of it and came through and you know,
[02:25:52] talked to Helen and got this arranged and I've enjoyed the two hours that we've spent here with you.
[02:25:59] And I've looked at some of your broadcasts and enjoyed them as well.
[02:26:03] So I'm going to thank you for having us and I want to thank Eric for helping to range it for me.
[02:26:09] Absolutely. Thanks to Eric and, and thanks to both of you.
[02:26:14] Obviously, thanks for coming on and sharing your story and sharing the story of what you all did.
[02:26:21] More important. Thanks for what.
[02:26:24] Thanks for what you guys did for America.
[02:26:28] And, and for going out and holding the line.
[02:26:44] And on top of all that,
[02:26:49] qualc has pawed in right hand with psychology and so is what I'm talking about.
[02:27:07] By growing with that Verbal design and even making sure both of them with their��va
[02:27:16] Thanks for coming on. Thank you John. Thank you. And with that Carl Nelson and John
[02:27:25] Far, Seawolf's have left the building. Always good to hear those stories, man. I'm glad
[02:27:34] we're able to capture them. This is a unit that was founded and commissioned in Vietnam
[02:27:41] and then decommissioned in Vietnam. The whole life of the Seawolf's was in Vietnam.
[02:27:47] That's it. I'm pretty sure most highly decorated, naval air squadron in history, which
[02:27:55] is also kind of crazy. So, good to be able to pass on these capture, these stories, appreciate
[02:28:06] them coming on here. These guys were always ready to go. Echo Charles? Yeah. I'm thinking
[02:28:16] that we should probably do our best. So, we are also always ready to go. What do you think?
[02:28:23] Do you go? Yes, I agree. So, we're going to stay capable. That's kind of the deal. That's
[02:28:28] the gig. So, what do we do? We're working out? We're reading, obviously. We're doing
[02:28:34] a lot less gigitoo. Thankfully. Come on, you gotta be thankful for that. Always think.
[02:28:39] There was a time where we were doing a lot less gigitoo. We don't like that at all.
[02:28:43] Capability hits some challenges. All good though. We're back. We're doing gigitoo. We're
[02:28:47] reading. We're working out. We're maintaining relationships as well. Forget about that
[02:28:52] good and stuff. So, through this path that we're all on, you're running into some pain.
[02:29:00] Unfortunately, it's the truth. It's reality. Pain is part of it. We'll say pain and suffering.
[02:29:07] Okay, I'm overstating that because it is an level of suffering because you're going to suffer
[02:29:12] regardless. If you're not on the path, you're going to suffer those consequences. I'm not
[02:29:16] being on the path. If you're on the path, you're going to suffer what the path gives you. So,
[02:29:21] so you're going to need to melt. We've got help. Jockel fuel supplementation for your body
[02:29:28] and for your brain. So, first thing we have is Jockel discipline go in a can, in a powder,
[02:29:35] and in a capsule. So, it's being a cans. These are your energy drinks of today. The real
[02:29:42] energy drink modern updated, upgraded, upgraded, upgraded, beneficial, benevolent, benevolent.
[02:29:52] Yeah, benevolent. That's it. They're good. They're good for you. Energy drink that you get
[02:29:57] all the front end benefits of the energy drink and then you get back end benefits rather than
[02:30:01] back end detriments. As it were back in the day like where you're going with that.
[02:30:06] Like that. So, yes, discipline go. You can get them at. Wa-wa. You can get them at vitamin
[02:30:10] shop. You can get them on Jockelpill.com. Also with Jockel has this stuff for your immunity,
[02:30:15] stuff for your joints. Stuff for your additional protein that you might need. Keeping mine,
[02:30:22] this additional protein, milk, it's called milk is the best tasting protein that there
[02:30:32] is. In fact, even if you would restart ranking, just straight up desserts. Like if you
[02:30:38] just started ranking desserts, straight up. It's in the game. I mean, it's beating. There's
[02:30:43] a lot of desserts in my opinion. It's straight up beating. Right? And legit desserts, too.
[02:30:48] Yeah. That it's beating. So, let's see. There's a whole genre of cakes. In fact, most
[02:30:54] cakes are getting beat by milk. In my opinion, I usually think cakes are dry. Okay. So,
[02:30:59] you're correct, actually. And usually, a little case study. So, my mother-in-law is in
[02:31:04] town. Cool. And she likes these things. They're almost like shortbread cakes. And they
[02:31:11] come in this lavish container. Like half of them are coated with, I don't know what
[02:31:17] to call icing or whatever you call that. You know, when that at some point, it was soft
[02:31:21] and now it hardened. And now it's a shell, but it's like, anyway, I forget. I forget what
[02:31:25] they're called, but they're whatever. I'm like, okay, cool. Yeah, she did. And so, my, did
[02:31:30] you get that hitter. You know, I got into them. Okay. Just to see what up, you know? They
[02:31:35] look good. Yeah. So, I was like cool. And I eat one. I was like, yeah. It's like, of course,
[02:31:40] good. Do you mind I wasn't evaluating it like this at the time? But I'm like, cool. Good.
[02:31:47] Thinking back on those things, whatever they were called, Mocha's better. Mocha's straight
[02:31:50] up better. Mocha's better. Oh, yeah. And I'm talking about this front end taste. Yeah,
[02:31:54] it's straight up better. Oh, yeah. Just stuff sheer pleasure of drinking Mocha is better
[02:31:59] than those cakes. And I think the cakes weren't like, all these are like surprisingly junk.
[02:32:05] No, no, no, no. They came through for what they were doing. Yeah. This is better. If
[02:32:10] you start graphing all desserts, like Mocha is in the upper percentage. And there's
[02:32:18] and it's absolutely good for you. Yeah. So, there you go. That's the good news. I think
[02:32:24] the, you know, be little for the, for the design. It's going to get a Nobel
[02:32:31] E price. Right. And then you put that stuff together. It's hard to make that stuff
[02:32:40] taste so good. It's not easy. Yeah. I would think we like to iteration after iteration
[02:32:44] after iteration to make it taste that good. It's not like, oh, cool. Here's, you know,
[02:32:48] the ingredients put them in their now taste good. No, it's hard. What's weird is like,
[02:32:53] I didn't think about that. And when be little was kind of explained. I was like, oh,
[02:32:57] I make sense. And then I realize, oh, shit, that applies to a lot of stuff then, because,
[02:33:02] okay. So, we're doing like flavor testing for the energy. This is for, is this for your drink?
[02:33:07] You know, we're, we're doing some, we're doing some, tasting stuff. So, he's like, hey,
[02:33:13] what do you think about this is before when we're doing great for whatever. There's like,
[02:33:16] what do you think about this? I was like, I want it to be like more, more. Like, I need
[02:33:20] more of this particular flavor, whatever. Here's like, okay, cool. Here's the, but keep in
[02:33:25] mind that intern does this to it. And it's like, oh, man, this is like a balance. It's a
[02:33:29] balance. So, you got a balance at perfect. Yeah. And sometimes straight up, and this
[02:33:33] would have been with that particular flavor. He's like, sometimes it simply won't work,
[02:33:38] given what you're trying to do. They have just simply won't work. Otherwise, you got to
[02:33:41] either add sugar, which, that's the main thing. You just got to add sugar. It's worth not
[02:33:45] there. We're not doing exactly right. So, the same thing for milk, same thing for like, those
[02:33:50] more bars like everything on the calm man. You guys got some, you have a task. It's a hard job.
[02:33:55] Oh, yeah. But I think that no bill eats Christ is going to go to be little. Yeah. And the
[02:34:02] joccal fuel, uh, what, what do they, the food team, they're making, they're making it,
[02:34:07] yeah, makes it up FedExing it to me. So, if you want any of that stuff, go to joccal
[02:34:14] fuel.com. By the way, look, we know that shipping can be expensive. And we know that there's
[02:34:19] other, let's say global organizations in the world that offer free shipping. If you're a member of
[02:34:26] their little club. Okay. Cool. And that's good. I'm not taking away from that. That's a good
[02:34:32] business model. We know that we have to offer some things that we can also give you the equivalent
[02:34:38] value. So, check it out. If you subscribe to any of these things, you don't have to pay for shipping
[02:34:43] shipping is free. You know what I thought of actually just now about the some global organizations
[02:34:50] in the free shipping situation. Yeah. You pay a membership fee for that. Also, we're not as
[02:34:56] neither free. It's not, it's not fee free at all. If you buy nothing. Yeah, they scammed you.
[02:35:03] You still paying. You're still paying. Guess what? You're still paying. So, that's kind of the
[02:35:09] better, what you call it like the superior. No, in this. Hey, if you don't, and that weird, they trick you.
[02:35:17] Hey, that's money and it's free. It's one of those switcheros, you know. It's like,
[02:35:21] no, you're not free shipping. Now, just for the ability to have free shipping, just pay us a membership fee.
[02:35:28] So, it's a good exchange. All right. It's a good exchange. The catch.
[02:35:32] Yep. There you go. Vitamin chop. You can also get it out. You can also get it out while
[02:35:35] off for the drinks. And people are asking a lot about a lot of other retailers across the country.
[02:35:43] We're working on all of them. We got the team is out there all the time. We're getting our,
[02:35:50] our phone rings all day long, which is awesome, because people want the distributors, the stores
[02:35:55] want to have it in there, and we are getting it in there. We're being strategic. We don't want to
[02:36:02] outdo our supply chain right now as we build out our logistic capabilities. This is a military
[02:36:08] operation, right? This doesn't mean we're going to be overly cautious. I mean, we're going to push
[02:36:13] the envelope. And we've been pushing the envelope. You know, there's been sometimes,
[02:36:15] it's been a little bit thin on the logistics train, but we're still pushing forward, but we don't
[02:36:19] want to totally overwhelm our logistic train. So we are, we're getting there, it's taking a little
[02:36:24] longer than we want it to, understood, but we want a solid base to get there. So if you, we're working
[02:36:34] on it, and we will be worldwide. We'll be nationwide pretty quick. We're working on it. So
[02:36:40] everyone can have the benefits. Yeah, yeah, it's true. It's kind of bad with all the benefits
[02:36:44] just in my cupboard. Also, origin, USA, this is where you can get your American made stuff.
[02:36:52] Danum for jeans. Yeah. The boots got wallet and belts and whatnot. Yeah. You did so stuff.
[02:37:00] Yeah. By the way, since we're talking about nom today, if you don't know this,
[02:37:05] the seals in nom, much of the time were jeans. Why do they wear jeans? Because they were
[02:37:12] more comfortable, more durable, and better. So you can see all kinds of pictures of the seals in
[02:37:17] nom. You can see them in the Macong Delta. We're in jeans. And guess what, we have a pair of jeans
[02:37:28] based on that history. And they are called Delta 68. And I'm talking about 1968. Is there anything
[02:37:36] good that Delta 68? It's going to be very hard to find. They're, they're the most comfortable
[02:37:41] jeans you will ever put on your body. And by the way, they're also as comfortable as whatever else
[02:37:45] you could put on your legs as a human. There's nothing more comfortable. I probably would agree
[02:37:52] with that if I had some, but oh, that's a bummer. That's completely my fault by the way.
[02:37:57] That's my fault. I should have had the whole world revolver on you more.
[02:38:03] Probably right. Well, actually technically, all in where you shark fin shorts, which are from
[02:38:08] origin by the way. I don't know if they, I think they might be sold out of those, so that's a whole
[02:38:13] lot of story. But unless they do have Giz and Rache cards for Giz to as well. All kinds of
[02:38:18] Giz to stuff, compression stuff, like all kind of all made America too. By the way, I know I said
[02:38:22] that one time, but the way I said it is indicating that it's not as big of a deal as it really is.
[02:38:26] Not to get crazy here, but if you need a G, get an origin G for sure, get a Rift G. Because it's
[02:38:33] next level. It's another thing. It's another, it's another, it's a complete elevation from whatever
[02:38:40] kind of G you've ever worn in your life. The Rift G is a totally new ball game. It's freaking awesome.
[02:38:45] So if you, if you need a G, get yourself a Rift G. Well, yeah, so yeah, again, origin usay.com.
[02:38:51] Well, check out all their stuff on there. Because a lot of stuff for me to go down the list right now
[02:38:54] and say all the stuff is going to take a long time. So go on there. Check out how they kind of
[02:38:59] patience right now. No. And believe me, I'm patient to be sitting here with you freaking time
[02:39:03] and time and time and get it. You've put me through this, but it's all good, bro. I understand fully.
[02:39:07] Yeah, nonetheless, that's that's what it is. Also, jacos is stores called jacos store O.G. Since
[02:39:15] day one day five. Not day one day five. Uh, so you go to jacosstore.com is where you can get this one equals
[02:39:24] freedom shirts and hoodies and hats. Some rash cards on there. Get after it. Shirts, hats, tank
[02:39:30] tops. Good. You know what that means? You say good. If you know what that means, you want to
[02:39:36] represent that's where you can get your shirts and hats and hoodies. You've got shorts on there as well.
[02:39:42] So yeah, a lot of good stuff on there. We also have a free shipping subscription situation.
[02:39:49] And it's not the kind you got to pay for a membership just to have it. You get a shirt every month.
[02:39:55] A little bit different designs. Free shipping on that one as well. But yeah, it's called the shirt
[02:40:00] locker. So that's on jacos store as well. So yeah, if you want to check out that, if you like that,
[02:40:04] get that. And by the way, all the stuff that we're talking about, if you want to support,
[02:40:09] don't give that support to the podcast. This is how you do it. Otherwise, it's like, oh, we
[02:40:15] will run, you know, people are out there running advertisements for stuff. Yeah, stuff that you actually
[02:40:22] don't want registry cleaner for your computer. Right. Look, nothing against registry for your computer
[02:40:30] or drives, but you don't want to hear about that when we're talking about freaking, uh,
[02:40:34] Huey gun chips. And we don't want to tell you about that. What we're talking about Huey gun chips. So
[02:40:40] all the stuff, jacophuel.com, jacosstore.com, originusa.com, if you want to support. We appreciate it.
[02:40:48] You know what's interesting. And this, I was talking to Jill. Our boy, Jill.
[02:40:53] And yeah, and he reminded me of this. And I know this. I know this. Like, it's the back of my hand.
[02:41:00] That's not interesting. Anyway, I know this, but everyone's somehow want to remind it of it. I'm
[02:41:04] reminded of the, like, a better term, interestingness of it. Where all this stuff,
[02:41:11] origin genes, jacostor stuff, jacophuel stuff. This is all stuff that you, that we actually use now
[02:41:19] and have before even, like, these exist. This is it. This is like just the better version. No.
[02:41:25] Like, sure you're wearing right now. Well, that's from jacostor right there.
[02:41:29] Who do you that I wear? Jacostor. The shorts that I wear. Literally, like, these shorts are so
[02:41:34] worn out because they wear them every single day that, like, it has the outline for my cell phone,
[02:41:39] like, on the pocket of whatever. Origins that we're drinking. Origen shorts, though. By the way,
[02:41:44] like, it's all I have jacostor dot com shorts on right now. Exactly. Right. With the digital pattern.
[02:41:51] Oh, yeah. So it's not like, camera. Oh, yeah. That's one of the options for sure.
[02:41:56] So it's not like, oh, yeah, support the podcast by buying some key chains that we sort of just made
[02:42:02] up or whatever, which would be kind of cool. I guess. It seems like they use key chains, but they're not
[02:42:08] an arbitrary thing. That's what I'm talking about with your black belt key chain. Now that was a gift. Yeah. I go
[02:42:13] Charles for if you see him, maybe for Adysa black belt. Don't worry. You won't forget from
[02:42:17] on crazy. He's got it on his key chain. He's like, hey, you, you, you want to hear, let me put these keys
[02:42:23] on the table where they're visible. Okay. Okay. There you go. First off, those are gift from Mike from
[02:42:28] Jitzomega Zee. Okay. What I'm going to do disrespect him, putting it somewhere. All some saying is,
[02:42:34] we know we were all known here in Black belt when your keys go on the table, which is where they always
[02:42:39] go in front of everyone. Anyway, what I was trying to tell our people is that this is stuff that we use
[02:42:48] anyway, even before it existed. So it's about some arbitrary thing. We're saying, hey,
[02:42:52] support the podcast by the way. We'll give you this, this moderately valued thing. You know,
[02:42:56] it's like these are things that are like when you're in the game on the path. They're legitimately
[02:43:01] there. Check. Hey, subscribe to the podcast. Also, check out a juggle unraveling podcast.
[02:43:08] That's me in Darrell Cooper, BC talking about all kinds of stuff. Grounded podcast. We got the
[02:43:14] Warrior Kid podcast. We got juggle under ground.com. That's our own platform, right? We can't just be,
[02:43:20] we can't just be a parasites on these big platforms. Cause guess what? The big platform might
[02:43:26] describe they're going to scrape you off. And now what are you going to do? Start to death. Die. We're
[02:43:32] not going to let that happen. We got to have a contingency plan. If the big platforms decide to
[02:43:36] scrape off us, because we're over there. No, we have our own platform. It's called juggle underground.
[02:43:45] Juggle underground.com. You are helping us build it. Just in case, these people get squirrely
[02:43:51] and they start injecting their behaviors into what we're doing. That's the cool thing about a podcast.
[02:43:59] The cool thing about a podcast is you can do it at, well, if you are doing a podcast
[02:44:06] in an old school way, which is, hey, we're just going to do what we want. Then you can do whatever you want.
[02:44:11] We can literally do whatever we want on this podcast. But what if platforms said, well,
[02:44:17] actually, we don't want you to do that. We want you to do this. Or we're going to put an
[02:44:19] advertisement in there, whatever they're going to do, they can do. Right? So we don't want to
[02:44:24] allow someone else to control what we are doing. So therefore, if you want to help us out,
[02:44:30] you can go to juggle underground.com and we're making, we make another little podcast for that.
[02:44:35] We're talking about interesting topics, adjacent topics, they're costs money, costs $8.18 a
[02:44:42] month to keep it rolling. But if look, if you can't afford that, we get it. We're not trying to
[02:44:48] exclude you from the team. We're not trying to exclude you from the movement. You can email
[02:44:56] assistance at juggle underground.com and we'll take care of that. Appreciate that. So,
[02:45:00] porch, we also have a YouTube channel. By the way, speaking of platforms, we have a YouTube channel.
[02:45:07] This is where I put in a lot of work creatively as the assistant director to many of these videos,
[02:45:13] the good ones. And if you want to check out my work, you want to see what the, the,
[02:45:20] really the pinnacle of assistant directing, you can check some of these videos out on
[02:45:25] juggle podcasts, YouTube channel. Yeah, the epitome is a resort of the pinnacle of assistant
[02:45:32] directing. So my daughter, she's eight. By the way, so keep that in mind. Okay,
[02:45:36] you can be free fly off the handle. So she, you know, she's like, oh yeah, you and juggle
[02:45:40] YouTubers. And I'm like, oh, okay, maybe maybe not, depends on what you mean or whatever. So she's like,
[02:45:47] hey, what is like, well, what does juggle do then? You know, like, why, right, it's books or whatever.
[02:45:53] You say, yeah, but he already wrote those books. Like, what does he do? Yeah, what's he doing now?
[02:45:58] Yeah, like, what does he do? And, you know, eight users all of the here, what do you do? That's
[02:46:02] what you think, right? You think what do you do? What do you do when you wake up? Like, what does he do?
[02:46:06] She knows what I do. I play on the computer all day. You know, is that, you know, kind of
[02:46:10] think she understands. So I was like, oh, you know, whatever he does his thing. She goes,
[02:46:20] juggle hardly does anything. She goes, she says, trade up, you do most like, you do pretty much
[02:46:26] everything. And then it's like, kind of laugh to us like, yeah, you're right. Juggle just talks.
[02:46:32] She's like, she's like, yeah, he just talks like you're the one has to film. You're the one
[02:46:36] has to come on with this. You know, and as, because she sees everything. I do. Yeah. So that's
[02:46:42] her. Next time she says something like that, I'll be like, well, you know, he does he is the assistant
[02:46:47] director on some of these videos. You know, you know, so now we know I am, I am unemployed in the
[02:46:53] individual. My work is, is the pinnacle of effort. Yes. You're doing your part. Check. So yes, YouTube
[02:47:04] channel, we do have one. Also, we have psychological warfare. It's a novel. We made Juggle made
[02:47:10] technically of him helping me through moments of weakness that I might have from time to time.
[02:47:16] Then we extended it to other weaknesses that others might have from time to time. So what should
[02:47:20] do pop that in? You're feeling them all. You're going to skip that work. I'll you put it in.
[02:47:25] It's going to tell you why you should not do that. It's good. If you want something to hang on your
[02:47:30] wall, get something cool to hang on your wall from Dakota Meyer flipside canvas.com is going to
[02:47:35] send you a bunch of cool designs. Check them out and you're supporting Dakota Meyer. And if you're
[02:47:41] doing that, like your whole day is good in my opinion, got some books. Final spin. This is not a book
[02:47:49] about leadership. Their mayor may not be some leadership lessons in there. It's more a book about
[02:47:55] life and death and the journey that human beings go through and the pitfalls that they fall into
[02:48:05] and how they rise out of those or don't. Do you check that out? It's coming out. If you want to
[02:48:12] get the first edition, you're best or no. Because you know the publishers like, well, you know,
[02:48:17] we don't want to invest too much in that to become, you know, it's like, okay, cool. So they're not
[02:48:22] going to print enough. You're not going to get one unless you're in the game. Getting the game also
[02:48:26] leadership strategy and tactics field manual. The code evaluation protocol discipline because freedom
[02:48:30] field manual. There's a new version out that has my head on it, but it's bigger than my original
[02:48:35] head. Sure. My head is grown. Way the way you get one, two, three and four, Mikey and the dragons
[02:48:43] about face by hack worth, which I was honored to light the forward four extreme ownership and the
[02:48:51] dichotomy of leadership. The first two books I wrote about leadership with my brother, Lave.
[02:48:56] Babin, we have Escelon front, which is a leadership consultancy and what we do is solve problems.
[02:49:01] Through leadership, we have an online training platform, EF online dot com. On there all the time,
[02:49:08] courses on there, get your team aligned. You know, I don't need to come out to your location.
[02:49:13] Good deal. They've burked us and need to come out to your location. Lave Babin doesn't need to
[02:49:17] come out to you. Okay, where are we in your location? Virtually. Check that out. We have some
[02:49:25] some live events that we do. One of them is called the mustard and is two-day leadership seminar.
[02:49:34] The next one is in Phoenix August 17th and 18th. And then Las Vegas, October 28th and 29th,
[02:49:40] go to extremalorship.com if you want to get in the game there. We have something,
[02:49:46] I don't even know if this will be out yet. We have the FTX, which is a field training exercise. You learn
[02:49:51] tactics. You apply the tactics with laser weapons. You apply the leadership tactics that we talk about
[02:49:58] all the time and they will be ingrained into your brain when you are done with the field training
[02:50:03] exercise. Massive lessons learned and if you want to help service members active and retired.
[02:50:07] Their families, gold star families. Check out Mark Lee's mom. She has a charity organization.
[02:50:13] She gets one of the things that she's doing is getting medical treatment for service members
[02:50:21] that the government doesn't cover and she'll cover the whole bill. So if you want to help
[02:50:27] service members get those medical treatments, you can donate or get involved at americasmightywariors.org.
[02:50:36] And if you want more of my grueling ruminations or you need more of Echo's hypnotic hypotheses,
[02:50:45] you can find us on the other web on Twitter, on the Graham and on Facebook, Echo's article,
[02:50:50] Charles. I am at chocolate willing. And thanks once again to John Far and Carl Nelson. Thanks to
[02:50:55] John Son, Marine for getting us linked up. Thanks for sharing your stories, gentlemen. And thank you
[02:51:01] for your incredible service to our great nation. And thanks to all the sea wolves themselves,
[02:51:08] that flew in Vietnam and risked their lives and sometimes gave their lives for their brothers in
[02:51:14] arms on the ground. And to all our military personnel and veterans around the world.
[02:51:20] Thank you for what you do and what you have done to protect freedom and our way of life.
[02:51:28] And the same goes to our police and law enforcement firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers,
[02:51:33] correctional officers, board of patrol secret service and all first responders. Thank you for
[02:51:39] protecting us when we need you and to everyone else out there. You never know when the call will come
[02:51:49] and you never know how much time you will have. In fact, you don't know how much time you have.
[02:51:57] So don't wait, don't hesitate, don't procrastinate instead like the mighty sea wolves
[02:52:05] of helicopter attacks squadron three, go out there and get after it. And until next time,
[02:52:14] this is Echo and Jocco out.