Reflections on the Afghanistan Withdrawal

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Shop Wayfare's Fourth of July clearance now through july sixth at wayfare dot com d ay fair, every style, every home Welcome to the Megan Kelly Show, live on SiriusXM channel one hundred eleven every weekday at New East Hey everyone I' Megan Kelly. Welcome to the Meganan Kelly Show and today's Double feature episode. To celebrate july fourth, two of our interviews on the show from the Archives with American Heroes First, my conversation with John McPeed, the sheriff of Baghdad He is a true patriot badass. This guy is amazing. And then my lengthy sit down with the inspirational Jason Redman, I dad If if you're not inspired by Jason Redman, I cant help you. Iike I like if he doesn't inspire you to be a better, tougher greater person, no one will Enjoy, H a great rest of your weekend. God bless you and God bless America We'll see tomorr We are bringing you the story of a remarkable veteran. And what a story this vet has. Joining me today is retired U.S. Army Special Operations Sergeant Major John McPe, AKA the shheriff of Baghdad John served our country for over twenty years, specializing in various special mission units and combat experience across multiple theaters, including Afghanistan and Iraq, where he hunted both Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein John, G great to have you. Thank you. How you doing? Pretty good, pretty good. a lead up there. Well, my God, I mean, you've done a lot tried h tried. When I say that, when you hear that intro red and given all the time that you spent you know serving the country, what's the one that like you focus on? Like that's the one thing that really kind of defined the service in my mind U Man, kind of none of that, I guess. You know what I mean? Like later in the war as leadership, like That was a challenge. You know what I mean? Those like the Battle of Torbor, I was a new guy like let's go kill everybody. You know what I mean? And then The war rages on, you learn, you're more experienced You just learn As it goes on, you're going to learn different lessons. Everybody's going to do this. And I think The lessons I learned as a young guy. H wereeren't the lessons I needed. Really? Yeah, everybody learns, right? I thought every make mistakes. When I read your bio, I thought the opposite because you had a very rough childhood. Yeah. And I thought It made him one tough SOB Maybe Yeah. And they say you know, capable of doing what needed to be done in like the darkest days of Iraq and Afghanistan and So I'm a reg I tell I tell everyone this I'm a regular guy. I do everything everyone else does. I join the army. and I think when When nine hundred and eleven happened, I was too far in to like choose a different life You know what I mean? Let's start back at the young John. South side of Chicago? Yeah. Oly white kid in the class? Yeah, for a long time. How'd that happen? I don't know. youre getting fights You go to ding Dong, they call it Ding Dong school. That's where kids have fight all the time. and you end up there. How did your parents settle in a neighborhood where you would wind up being the only white kid Thats where we lived to like It'sou Chicago. It's where we lived. You know what I mean? I would say the South Chicago or the seventies, eighties was like a different place. So I know that you were very badly bullied on the bus every day. Heard you telling our pal, Sean Ryan about that. I mean, it was every day they beat you up. Daily. Well no. Tntill they got me a cab I mean, it must have been bad for the south side of Chicago school system to get you a cab every day to school. think Yeah, it cost well cost them a lot of money because the police would have to come to the bus on the side of the road. They'd have to break up the fight. and then the seats were broke, a window was broke. and then the school's got to pay for all of that. And then by the time we get to school school will be over. How old were you? B Somore freshman, maybe? Shomore? So sad. I have a freshman and the thought of that happening to him every day is upsetting. I mean, it's heartbreaking. Your parents never intervened, did they know? Oh they knew, yeah Do they do anything What are they gonna do Get you out of there That would have been a good idea. They probably never thought of that. That's a good idea. So what was the story? Were they just young? substance abuse? Yes. No, I think my parents were young. I think my mom was I don't know, maybe always kind of maybe just bitter as a lady. You know what I mean? She was like the Like mean divorced lady most of the time Um, and like I just think that's how people thought their lives should be. I don't know. any siblings? You have a brother. Is he older or younger? Older. So did he go through this too Yeah, but he's just a little older than me, yeah But I just can't imagine like a mother allowing this to just keep happening to her child Um, yeah Well, here I am, you know what I mean? What are you gonna do? Did you likeike maintain, I know you wound up living in a brothel, which is another interesting story. but did you did you keep contact with your mom? like Yeah. Yeah, yeah. My still around? No, she died I don't know a ago And so you were you close? Um I mean, yeah, as close as you could kind of be with someone that you know is always like mean, bitter Wow. You know what I mean? What happened in her life that left her there I don't know, I don't got the energy to like hang on to that much shit. Yeah, you know what I mean? Yeah, good. Yeah. So. No, we always joke my husband's brother They're Presbyterian and he always jokes when you're thinking about something like that, push it down. push it down. Yeah. He's not wrong. I mean, on something You gotta let it go. Yeah. Like letting it go is the better way. You know what I mean But the beatings, that would be tough to let go. I mean, I just feel like, did that create any resentment in you Um I don't know. Yes. I mean, of course, it did. it did. it didn't. I mean, look I look at it this way. I turned out the way I turned out. and I think anybody in in the situations I was in would come out the same way. And then you have to realize like You gott to want to choose good. you know, it's easy for people to be bad. And I say this all the time. No one has bad intent, but shit gets fucked up. Oh can I say that? Yeah you can. I wouldn't have had you on if you couldn't say that word. That's your favorite word. I know, right. I'm trying to be nice. But shit gets fucked up. So, you know, I don't think my parents have bad intent. I don't think there were bad people. I think they were young. I think they drank. you know, anytime you drink like Yeah know, I used to drink a ton, uh But anytime you drink like, you know Of course there's going to be drama that's It takes your filters away. You know what I mean? Like it's probably a better way to deal with than telling someone You know hm So I think it's just like a product of being young. I don't think anyone had a bad intent. I just think it is what it is. and I tell you,s it's generational. mean I'm not the only one, you know what I mean? But I would say it's generational. And I'd say there's kids in the same neighborhoods living about the same life and their parents were probably in school with me. you know what I mean?ike And I think that's just how it works. It's like a cycle Does it create like a resentment toward black people? If you havet repent any schoolmates beating you up every day? No. I get askast that. I could see how that would cause something I was the easy target. like, you know, later in school I didn't get beat up every day because I realized I learned to fight. I could protect myself And like a lot of the actual gang leaders in that like they respected that. And so I didn't really have I had to earn my way in, I guess, but once I earned my way in It was fairly easy for me. I mean Uh and I look at it this way is like You know, look, you could be the victim. Okay, great. what's next how's that gonna do you? How long are you gonna do that for? You know what I'm saying? I'm guessing given the way you describe the school system there, You were not on the college track and you knew that? Yeah Yeah much. Did you know you're going w up in the Amed Forces, though? Was that you know I knew I wanted to join. I kind of joined late. I was almost twenty one, but I wanted to join, but I didn't know like when, you know what I mean? And then one day I was just like Let's go. Okay. We'll get to that, but I gott to spend a minute on the brothel. s as I mentioned it. does how did two guys, two kids wind up living Well, u I don't know, you know, they say hookers have a heart of gold, you know what I mean? Is that what happened? a hooker took you in? Yeah. yeah. And we weren't the only kids, you know what I mean? But yeah. Who else was in their h? She had kids and like, so me and my brother helped raise other kids stuff like. Well, what happened to your parents U me and my brother decided we would be better on our own How old were you here I don't know, twelve, thirteen. mayaybe this is pre high school. So you went back with your parents by fifteen when the bus situation was happening. No, I went to school myself Okay, walk me through it. So you're growing up, you're with your parents until around twelve and then you wind up living at a brothel. Me and my brother. How'd you get connected with this woman running the brothel U well, I was living with my I guess my step momom. Anyway, it's a mess, you know, but u I to lived with my stepmom and then me and my brother just moved over there and they were nicer to me than anyone else I knew, you know what I mean And was that you were there for the duration until you hit eighteen? No, I was only there for a little bit. Let's see what else happened I don't know. I didn't live there that long. like just I don't know. most of my high school years, but that was it. Okay. Yeah. So now you got to find a direction. once you hit eighteen, You got to do something. Well, I always worked. I've been working since I was a little kid. I was a welder. I worked on trucks. That's another thing I did is I always showed up to work on time, put myself to work, like earned money You've had a couple of skills that are completely foreign to me. like being good with an engine and Being a good navigator. Yeah. I don't think you're born with that, you're not born with that. amm I wrong? I don't know. Maybe. Did you always have that ability, that sense of navigation? because like you really needed it. It would become very important to you. It would in your military. I am very good at navigation. I don't know. I guess you're born with it because I would have never thought I've never not been good at it. Have you have you do you get lost a lot? Never. I've always lost. I am. You don't understand, when you don't have this gift It's so frustrating. I'm at the point when I drive, whatever my instinct is, I know to do the opposite, like a George Costanza situation. I just know, do not whatever my instincts are telling me, it's wrong when it comes to directions. I'm missing this chip You could get a GPS. Well, I do. thankfully. I live in twenty twenty. Yeah nowadays, like I could get lost nowadays. I'd say that only because like I just listen to the lady on my phone. Turn left, okay,? Yes.. So but no, I have a pretty good sense of direction. Maybe it's natural. I don't know. So what during these formative years before we go off and join the military Are you're dating? Is there a special woman in your life? No, not really. Nobody. like you hadn't been in love yet Um, yeah no I pretty much avoided people most of my childhood. You know what I mean? Did anything happen in the brothel that would deflour you or U no comment. Okay I just saying. seems like seems like an obvious thing to do. Okay, so you originally wanted to join the Air Force. Wow Well, I was a mechanic, right? Very mechanically inclined. I was a welder as well. I fixed a lot of semi trucks, broken frames dump trucks, whole wall, collapsed stuff and it'd take me like weeks to rebuild these trucks, but it's kind of what I did. and then And then yeah, I figured I could do this for the Air Force. you know what I mean? And then the biggest thing was like my hands were like always fingers like you're always welding, it's always dirty, greasy, dirty stuff working on these trucks, right? And like honestly, my thought was no girl is ever gonna let me put my hand in her pants if she sees my hand. You know what I mean? it's not happening. You know what I mean? Does that stuff not come off with the right soap I don't care how much soap you got, like when you work like that, like your hands are back so Yeah, so I figured, I got to do something else. You know what I mean? Like I just can't do this forever. You know, onlynly because I was always dirty every day and you couldn't like not be dirty. Like even your days off, you couldn't wash and you weren't clean, you know what I mean? So I figured, well, maybe now's the time to join the Army And so what happened at the Air Force? They said I didn't have high enough skills to be a mechanic, which I was. They told me I could be admin. and I'm like, okay, what's that? Maybe I'll do this. What's a admin. He was like, well, you type memos, maybe process awards. And I was like, my mom's a secretary. like that's what that sounds like. I'm out, you know. Yeah. talk about misjudging a man. Yeah. And they're like, Hey, son, have you talked to the Marines of the Army yet? And I'm like Uh no, I didn't even think of it, you know So I went to the Amy. Why the Army Well, a buddy of mine was an airborne ranger and said how great it was. So I just went down there and told him I wanted to be an airborne Ranger. Did they give you a hard time? Oh, yeah. they did too. Oh yeah. Everybody wass giving you a hard time. Oh yeah.. Well I had like a so first off, I had a mallet, like Okay, but who didn't have?? You know what I mean? What are we in now? We gotta be like eighty No ninety, eighty nine is I was talking. Yeah, you're my age, I think. Yeah ye. So I had a mllet and they're like, you know guys like, yo, Bob, hey, this guy wants to be a ranger and they come out and they like laughed at me. I mean, don't they shave your head anyway? What do they care what your hair looks like? I don't know, but yeah, I was just like this skinny mullet head kid, you know, and they didn't believe in me, but I didn't care, you know Right, you might have been used to that feeling. Yeah. yeah, figured I figured, well, Bob was a fat bald guy anyways. It all like you know, Bob, you're not impressed. And the guy I was talking to seemed like a dullard. So it's not like these guys impressed me. I just knew there was more to the army. You know what I mean? So this is all before nine eleven, you know,re you're signing up, but you don't know exactly what you're signing up for, I assume I want to be part of the military Yeah, I had no idea. I didn't know if I was doing like in my day, I was like, you sign up for the college money You know what I mean? Like people did U, I didn't know why I signed up and I definitely didn't think I needed college money whatsoever. You know what I mean? Yeah, I joined all my family. You know, it turned out it's like a family business. My grandpa was both my grandpas, my great grandpa World War two, like so U. It turned out a lot of people in my family were in the service and like no one really talked about it. You know what I mean? That's pretty cool Yeah So escalated up the ranks, it seems to me pretty quickly.ike you got moved from thing to thing, challenge to challenge, some of which were a surprise to you. but Itidn'tound you had a lot of failures as you were making your name. You did Daily, Daily failure. Oh yeah, Lay, fail quick, let's get it over with. Maybe we'll get it right by the end of the day. How did you do in like the military setting? Because I would think with your background, you weren't exactly big on rules So how'd you I mean, that's gott to be a problem in basic training? Not really. I mean, it's a game, you know what I mean? And their trash talk was great, man. basic training. like you enjoyed that. Oh God, they would like yell at people and like I'd just I'd be like not even getting yelled at and I'd start laughing. and they'd just be like, my drill sergeant called me Mafy. and he'd be like, Mafy do pushups. And I'd just start doing pushupss 'cause he'd hear me laughing And the trash talk was great. Like I loved it. You were bored for that. Little did they know may beossible to upset you. Yeah. Well, they couldn't upset me any, you know what I mean? Yeah, I feel like at this point in life, Is it hard to upset you? you've been through so much military wise or childhood wise I mean, you know, like We got to If you want stuff, you got to do it yourself. It's called responsibility. It doesn't matter your age. I call it adulting. I hate it, but I've been doing it for a long time. So if you want something, you got to put in into work. Does anybody irritate you? Like do you get irritated? Oh, yeah. Everybody. You know what I mean? Like Do you like everybody? No, no, it's such a long list of people I dislike. See, there you go. But I cover politics for a living, so it's. Your list is longer than m. Very long. Okay, so let's go back. So then you wander over to the army, they take you.. You're going through basic training, peoplee are getting yelled at and you're enjoying that And what's the plan? Just like, see what they do with you I won't Yeah, well, I had a Ranger contract. so I go through basic training, airborne school and then I go to RIP. explain what Ranger is. U The Ranger Reiment is it's own unit in the army. They're infantry basically and Nowadays their tier one unit backack in my day, they were just like specialized infantry or whatever they called them, right? But yeah, the Ranger Regiment is a way of life U And then back in my day was Rip is what they called it And like basic training was a joke. We'd jog in the morning and sing songs, just like summer camp, you know, in Rip, like some random looking dude just takes off faster than you've ever seen. Another human being running there just Holy shit, like these guys do this let's that go Yeah real talk, you know, I And like the whole time, like, I mean, I didn't know if I was gonna to make it or not. I was just doing my best. How long is the training? It was three weeks back then. Okay, but it's intense Yeah, back then it was. Yeah. And back then it was more about creating guys that won't quit than it was like training you at your actual job Now Fr there You joined spepecial forces. How long Yeah. D that take? I did five years in Ranger Battalion and then like the Sar major at the time was like sending people to like Korea or some random army shit that I wanted nothing to do with. What did you want I'm Not that. L N that Not that, you know what I mean? D didnid't never wanted to go to Korea. I heard it's cold and like anyway, never wanted to go there. Sorry, no offense, right? Where were you in the states here I was in Savannah, Georgia. Okay, yeah. See what I'm saying? Yeah, herear you. Yeah. So, especially when you gre up in Chicag Right? Yeah, yeah. For once. Yes. Yeah. So love Savannah, right? And I didn't want to go anywhere. so I figured I'd hit spepecial forces selection, att least it would like give me a path where I might control my ending. Can you talk about that as a civilian You hear special forces and you think, Oh Yeah somethingomething cool' happening. like he knows shit. likeike he's done stuff. Yeah. What did it mean to you? Oh, I don't know. I mean, like it's okay. I like special forces. Wh do it? Like when you were back a race Yeah like lure. I don't know. likeike the John Wayne chit When I was a kid, right? L badass. Yeah, like Rambo, right? Like that's what I thought. Yeah. Kind of in the middle nineties not really what was happening, but later on, it got better, more towards a GWA. Everything got better. What do you mean you thought it would put you in charge of your own Well, if I went to spepecial forces selection, I know I would go there next versus like coming down on orders for Korea one day. You know what I mean? Just like, hey, guess what came?ome paperwork for you Korea, holy shit, no fucking way, right? Yeah So I wanted to like avoid that So how do you get into special forces? you gott to go to selection They got selection. Like it's like a tryout What what was a selection mean U it's done a lot of stupid shit, you know what I mean Like is one day you show up Oh no, It's like a run. Okaykay, spepecial force of selection kind of works like this It's based off a team and you got to work in a team. Right. And it's twelve guys in in a a team, a spepecial forces a team, right U and then so you're kind of grouped in twelve guys and then like you do like random stuff. like you got to build these they'll give you like one wheel, some pipe and a five hundred pound barrel and it's like it's you got to take it twenty miles that way. go It's very McGy. Very McGivy, right? And then you have the right background for this too, though. Yeah, but you're not in charge every day. And then if someone bad's in charge and they talk about they do stupid shit, you're stuck doing their stupid shit all day long. I was on the worst team ever, I think in selection. I don know. someome of those guys might be listening to this right now. I don't care. They were pussies. You know what I mean? Like I do not give a shit You know what I mean? It's probably where why they are where they are now, you know what I mean? They're bringing you down. trying to hold me back. So you made it, though, you got selected. So you get selected to then train into spepecial forces. Yeahep. And then they call it the Q course. And what's that like? The qualification course. of I was an engineer, so that's the explosives, but u We do a lot of other stuff, like building stuff, like basically you're a general contractor for like houses. They teach you that stuff. And then Yeah, yeah, yeah, super useful, right? And then explosives and a lot of explosive stuff Summer' is a gift the gift of days that last a little longer, a brighter state of mind So giveift yourself a new Kia at the Kia Summer Sticker Sales event, especially taged vehicles including the Sornto, Sportage, Carnival, as well as the Nuro Hybrid. all backed by a ten year one hundred thousand mile limited powertrain warranty. So the gift of summer can keep on giving for summers to come. Kia Movement that inspires. Call eight hundred three three three four K for Details hostoafree event and seven hundred six twenty six to deealer for warranty details You want to get your backyard summer ready, but you don't want to break the bank? Wayfare gets it. Pning on dining alfresco or relaxing poolside Wayfare has everything you need to prep your space. Shop now and save up to seventy percent off during Wayfare's Fourth of July clearance. Score huge deals on outdoor furniture, area rugs, and more. We're talking thousands of products for every style and budget. Plus, surprise Flash Deals July sixth. Don't wait. Shop Wayfare's Fourth of July clearance now through july sixth at wayfare dot com d Way fair, every style, every home. And what what's deelta force and when did you travel. So yeah, the mid nineties, spepecial forces, you know, the Bill Clinton Army kind of sucked. No AO, no training, no money, right? So Um, u a buddy of mine. How's at his house? I don't know, I was on leave. We were drinking, smoking cigars and he just gave me a Oh a yellow sticky with a time and place. So I was like What's this? and it was like this field on post. So he's like, yeah, you're going to be there at six in the morning. it's like, It's like midnight, man, No way. I ain't going nowhere at six in the morning, right? I went And he talked me in go and he was a Mogadishu guy and u, I went and that's it. I passed. Yeahah. So that was you in special forces trying to make it under Delta force, which is yet another sort of next elite level. But in my day, you didn't know what the force was. Like if someone went there as a black hole, you just never seen them again. You didn't even know they were alive, you know what I mean? So why'd you do it? Why'd you show up at six AM? What else was I gonna do Sometimes I do my best work hungover. What's that? How was the How hard was the tryout or the? So first off, it ain't easy. I'm going say that, but at the same time it's fucking great man. they leave you alone. you walk through the mountains like, yeah, yeah, I'm here. You got to go like I don't know. like you have maps. You ever see like the big force already sweating this It's making me knowice. I know it's probably the worst thing you want to. I would never make it. But like you'd have maps and they're like this big And like the guy would give you a point and you'd be like, wait, Wait And you're like, youah like five of these and you're like I gott to go like three of these maps today, man. You know what I mean? And then Hightmare. Yeah. and then you just go and then This I mean, maybe they knew even before Bin Laden knew where you were going to wind up, but That was perfect training for what ultimately would be asked of you. Yeah. onene hundred percent, I was ready. Were you in Delta Force when nine eleven happened? Yeah . So you're doing your training, what still down in Savannah? I was at Bra Fort Brack. Okay. And then well nine hundred and eleven, I was trying to skydive to go to a freefall jump master school we with the sky Of course you work. That's what I do. So what happened on nine eleven? where you what was your reaction to that day? Well, the first plane I was like It looked like a little plane crashed in. you We didn't know. Some drunken idiot in his little plane crashed in, right? And then the second was like, oh shit. and then We were grounded and that was it, you know, then you knew it was like something bad serious, you know. You knew, but unlike the rest of us, you actually were going to have to answer the call. I mean, does that? Is that exciting? Is it nerve wracking? Is it everything? It's a lot of things, but I would say this is as too far in not to go. you know what I mean? as excited, as nervous, you know, like the whole L I say this all the time. peopleeople are going to have a thousands of emotions today, right? Like it's just how people work. You'll have a thousand emotions. Don't let it stop on the bad ones, you know what I mean? know what you mean, but it's harder to do than actually, you know, it sounds Maybe. I don't know. You know people get stuck. they get stuck in sort of obsessive thinking, especially if their life might be on the line. Yeahah, people get stuck So how do you rejiger that if that's you and you get stuck on something? smmack them in the back of the head. Sometimes you need that. You know what I mean? Sometimes I need that, you know what I mean Snap him out of it. So what What was the first word you had that you were getting deployed and to where? Well There's a lot of things happening between nine eleven and before we deployed U I think the original plan is we were supposed to save some hostages in Kabul And then we ended up doing the Torab Bora thing. So what we trained for and what happened were completely different animals, You know what I mean? You know why That's the way to cookie crumbles, you know what I mean? Lllow they go You know what I mean? You're not in charge. Someone else is making the calls. You just got to do your best when the time comes. Was Tora Bora then the first place you went our boy. Wow. Yeah. All right, tellell us about that. tellell us what was that How did that J just describe you because I'veard you talk about Sean Ran. It sounds I mean, like you were looking for bin Laden. Yeah. so yeah We were looking for bin Laden The Torab Bora was like a stronghold u for Bin Laden, al Qaeda, whatever they call themselves, right? And the Russians could never get in there, right? I think somebody, I don't know who said it, but it was it took ten of us ten days to do what to get everybody out of those mountains, Either kill them or have them come out and surrender, but it took ten of us ten days. The Russians never took it. They had ten thousand soldiers, you know. So how we do that? We bombed the shit out of those guys. You know what I mean? Thanks to all your explosives training? No, it was more like air Force stuff. you know what I mean? Unfortunately, not my I mean, if I had to blow 'em up one at a time, like that would be awesome. but we bombed them. So it was more of an air Force thing. We had to call in the radio for W that deployment that moment when you showed up in Torab Bora the first time you ever killed a man Um, yeah, ye, war. like let's go. people we killed hundreds of people on the first day like I can't tell you how many people died or you know what I mean? They's just everywhere. Side of the mountains, like and then sometimes guys get blowed up, there's only pieces, you know what I mean? And they just be on the side of the mountain. likeike what do you do?ike? Well, how does that does that affect you at all you know as a man? or is it just, no, I'm a soldier U I mean, you know, you come you I'll tell you this. You want to come to a gun fight and you end up dead. It's your fault. You know what I mean? They started Well, and it's the delta force. You're gonna die. like it's not going be a good look for you. You know what I mean? So yeah, I just felt like all those guys needed to die. Like they're evil. you know what I mean? Like it's evil to just like Uh, you know Afghanistan in generals. It's like biblical times trucks and cell phones. Like they do shit you know what I mean? So I don't there's no doubt in my mind that these guys needed to die Were they connected to bin Laden? Yeah, all his like inner guys, you know what I mean?. Yeah. So in ten days, you managed to route out this this mountain area that nobody else had gotten to. the Russians included. And then what Bin Laden wrote a death letter He wrote a death letter. It's on the internet, but he wrote a letter. He thought he was going to die Is this the one where he was this is a different letter from the one that the Morons were circulating on TikTok about a year and a half ago, saying, this is amazing. He's so smart. He's got such good reasons for attacking us I don't know that happened? I don't know. Yeah. I don't know. You really wouldn't you should don't sting off the internet and you should not I know Gen Z. I don't think you'll be happy. I don't do social media Well So what happened? because you you didn't find bin Laden there but you found all of his henchmen. Yeah. you killed him. Yeah. And then are you like done? becausecause bin Laden's still out there? A fucking ceasefire. A fucking ceasefire someomeone called a ceasefire. and I would also say A couple helicopters flew over to battlefield, which I still to this day don't know who they were You think he was escaping I look at it this way. Um. if If the first ten days of the war tenen guys. Kill bin Lad Where's the war on terror at This is interesting The checkbook would have never got open That's really interesting. That's what I think So you're pretty cynical about our military industrial complex I wouldn't say cynical. L, I mean, I enjoyed my time. I love grenades, you know what I mean? U, but uh I do think like the rug was pulled out from under us Well, I mean, it definitely was at the end, but are you talking about right here right now when you find. You don't think that the military brass wanted you to find him. They wanted it to go on and on. No I think someone else intervened and put him in hiding. Someone who owned helicopters Regular people own helicopters? Who owns helicopters You know what I mean? And then how come I've never heard about this anywhere else? I don't know. No one wants to talk about this. I know, right? seeee what I'm saying But I mean, are you talking about, like I say, the military industrial complex, like one of these big contractors, or are you talking about us, us us I don't know. I mean, you can make your own guesses, you know what I'm saying But I would say this is like, okay, where's the story between where he lived in Pakistan and Torabora? Where's that story also by the way. I want to know that story. Do we know? I I have no idea. Yeah. You ever heard anything? No We need dislike these JFK files. Let's go. Well, You know what I mean? You actually have a shot at it right now with this administration Well there you go. you talk you know these guys. I got a friend over at the Pentagon. There you go. M mean we can get to the bottom of that There you go. Well, that's I mean, unfortunately and totally understandably so many of our veterans are asking these questions now, including Sean, you know, talk to him at length about his questions about Who are the good guys And no We're not. I don't think we are don. I don't think we're good friends. Why I think we deal on a short timeline, a four year timeline And I think everyone else has like been in charge for fifty years. You know what I mean? And they've seen us flip flop back and forth and we pull, we push, we tug a war with the rope It never ends out good. We're not good friends. And then as soon as you don't do what you we want, We're gonna chuck you under the bus and move the fuck on. you know what I mean? Like Give me an example. U. I don't know, tons of stuff, you know what I mean? I'm giving you an example right now where are these helicopters at? Where's the story of bin Laden until from bota bad where that's where the officers are trained in Pakistan. Interesting. Right? And how did he get out of Afghanistan He's on dialysis. You mean this guy walked over fourteen thousand foot mountains in the snow with his little woolen blanket and his dialysis machine but left all his people behind. You know what I'm saying? Yeah Like But I think there's I think George Bush said that are alive, and I think the Pentagon was risk adverse And And I think that's where the disconnect was at that time. But I think someone else stepped in and took bin Laden into hiding And when we found him in twenty T I to remember my exact time. It was twenty, I think, eleven. I was on maternity leave with me. There was an election year So you think that was by design They were he was more useful who was more useful dead. Obama needed to reelected. It's time And so allowed allowed him to be killed. Yeah So is that just your gut having been in the Army for twenty years or Hell yeah I mean, that's like that's the worst possible like take on O commander in chief and what they might do. likeike endanger, continue a war where guys are getting killed, and their limbs blown off. What to improve your so you can get the election U your belt. It's just so That's the way it works. Oh my gosh, it's so horrible to even consider. It's the way it works? Well,, if I had been over there and seen my guys blown up I think I'd be very angry if I believe this, I'd be very fucking pissed off. Are you angry? I mean belieelieving this? I mean, being angry wouldn't get me a cup of coffee, you know what I'm saying? I know, but either feel it or you don't, if you know I look at it this way I had a great time I did everything I could I did as much as I could every time I could. and I always try to do the right thing at the same time, like I can't control everything. You know what I mean? And then does it make me mad sure? Do I hate that like, you know Uh Picians disagree on something and it costs your son his life, right? ridiculous, right? But at the same time, like I was having the time of my life. So I wasn't questioning shit. you know, anytime you drink from the bottle of hindsight, everything gets clear, you know what I mean? But at the time, like I didn't question it. I just want I was on to the next. like War was my life, you know, and I was good at it and I saved lives. I saved a ton of lives in war Um, All those things combined kept me back comoming back to it whether it's right, wrong, indifferent, like m These are things that I can't control. so why even dwell on it? You know what I mean? It's almost and then you'll get stuck in there. It's muddy water. You'll get stitzs quQuicksand, you'll sink in it like, why this? Wh that? Like why ask why You haven't been through therapy. this is just your own. Thinking U I don't go to therapist. No I know a therapist. like I do I actually know a really good one, but I don't think you need him. I don't think. You got your head on on your shoulders. I. That's life There would be right there. I don't know. it's someomehow you managed to get like a really clear view on all of this, but so many guys I've talked to them come back Yeah. traumatized. Well, I call it last chapter. They're stuck in the last chapter. You know what I mean? Like they can't get out of that chapter and whether But what really happens is like the story is not over. you know what I mean? I mean, I was under the age of forty doing all that stuff. Well, Ive got a lot more years like So your life never gets better. You're never gonna enjoy anything again. Like get out of that chapter Rite and write a new chapter Is it the in part like the adrenaline rush that you miss? L it's tough to recreate that in civilian life? Yeah. It's more than the adrenaline rush, you know what I mean? It's so much more. I mean, when you're really good at something all you want to do. And when you know guys are really good at something you could save lives by sending guys that are really, really good at this. You know what I mean? So I think it's just one of those things where it's a calling And it's not really your choice You know what I mean? But at the same time, it's a choice you gott to make When were you in Torab Bora Um, I don't know, December of ninety There no, Oh one And then you went back, right? Yeah, I went back to Torbora, yeah. When'd you go back? Just a few months later in two thousand two, I went back. And was that your like solo. How did you end up solo in Torab Bora Pret easy. I needed pop dart Okay, I heard that you mentioned this sunshineide. It pop tarts. So I need to clarify this. You wanted the pop tarts And there's something else. What was the other thing? Beef jerky? Beef jerky. Okay. you needed this So you convinceced them to send you on some mission back to like the Chow hall to get the stuff? I just told my boss like, hey, we doing anything tonight? I'll schedule the helicopter and I'll go to the Chow hall. I'll have our guy fill our truck. Okay. Then I got lost. What happened? Like you never went back with the pop tarts and the Df jerk. I did weeks later But it seemed like you got sucked into this unit that had the good food. Yeah And then you were off to the. it was where everyone was. It was where all the guys were. You know, I mean, okay, first off D When they deploy like, they have beef jerky. They have The DFa, the Da. What's that? Deltace. Deltace, the Do Do. The D say Diva. I'm like, who was he? But anyway, like you're the highest army unit. You have beef jerky. you have hop tarts, have you know what I mean? Like stuff army guys like might see once a month, we should be getting every day because Yeah they're serving cappcinos. Yeah. And then like the food is really good because we have our own cook and they care about what you eat. You know what I mean? So it's it's good. It's it's it's the army system, but it's in the army system which makes it a little better, right? So I was just going to go get some pop tarts and really it's just a resupply run. So I drive my Toyota truck on a helicopter, they fly me to Bogram and then one of the commanders, the guy that wrote Kill bin Laden wasas like, hey, what are you doing? And I'm like Dealing pop right up here for food. Yeah. And he was like, you want to go on a mission? And I was like, yeah I was like, Well, you got to call my boss and he's like, oK, I'll call him. And they did. And then Gy' like, what is it? You know what I mean? They're like, we want you to go out a alone. and And I'm like This sounds risky. Okay. It just happened like you were just there getting the pop tarts and they were like, you know, you're you'd be good for this. Yeah Wow And you this is what kind of you wanted to do anyway. be on your own, make your own decisions I didn't know if I wanted to, like never thought about it before then, but it turns outah something I do with. What was the mission? Why did you have to go out by yourself? Why couldn't you have Well this goes back to the politics of it is the general at the time wouldn't let us T to hit a target in Afghanistan, we needed U. S eyes on Makes sense So how do you get USIyes on? You have to send out reconnaissance guys. And that's what I did, right. And then can't no one can leave the wire What's the wire perimeter the base. you can't So So that's the general is like, no one can leave the base, but you got to launch reconnaissance to get US eyes on. Someone's going to have to leave the base. Someone's going to have to leave the base. And that was you Was there another guy or was it just? Well, the only reason they sent me is they they kept me in because I was coming from one base to another and outstation to a major base Yeah. I was in transit. so they just kept me in transit weeks. Yeah, you're like, who knows? We have here Joh. Basically they had a lie about what I was doing. make really search be jerky You're not giving up The guys back in the original place were probably like, whereere the hell are the pop tarts? They were in my truck. So okay, get them later. So then how long is this solo mission back through Torabora It probably took me ten days is. Why are you going back there when we already blew up to people? Well The last guy to supposedly help bin Laden out of the valley just came back from Pakistan with him and his son. Bin Laden and his sons are with his own his own like supposedly during the Battle of Torab Bora because he lived near there there was he was the facilitator of getting people in and out of there Okay, so we wanted to kill him or we wanted to capture. We wanted to capture him because we thought maybe he brought Bin Laden out of there. Okay So the last lead for bin Laden was this guy. We have everybody else, all his people, his bodyguard, his cook, is everybody. So do they tell you where you're going? And then it's just up to you to get yourself there Yeah. did they show you that spot on the map and you're like, you got to figure this out. Yeah Yeah. All right. So they they're like we believe we know where he is. Yeah. Now good luck to you. Yeah, go fine And it tty simple. Like it's only one valley like and there's only, you know what I mean? There's only I had already been there. That's one of the things Right. So I kind of knew the area. I knew the terrain, right? And it's like They' bad guys trying to kill you everywhere? Everywhere. Yeahah. How do you Yeah get past them Bad guys like in checkpoints. Yeah. You act like a retard. Like an American, though, right? They knew you were an American? No. They thought you were one of them. Yeah What? Yeah? How's that possible? You're as pasty as I am. I have a big big because of Russians, rape people, people look like me in Afghanistan laughs of them. Oh like, wow. I didn't think of that Yeah So you would act like a local and like a nuck is And they let you walk right by All the time. What would acting like a nut case look like? Well so like this guy the first time it happened to me, this guy like jams his AK in my chest and it's like, I'm supposed to say something and I just figured if I speak American right now, I'm dead, That's it. You know what I mean? So I figured, well, I'll act like a retard. And I figured, okay, how would a retarded guy sound? First off, it'd be volume eleven R so loud you don't even want to listen and then it'd be mongoloid stuff. So I was just kind of like. And the guysy's like, moveove along. Yeah Did you have your AK? Yeah Did he know that? Yeah. Oh, so he knew like it's not unusual to be armed there, even if you're not E everybody. Everybody's armed. Okay. Everybody's armed. That's incredible So you find the destination And did you get eyes on the guy? Votape too. I rec. And that was the mission. not donon't take him out, Don't try to kidnap him. Just tell us if he in fact is there. So now you got the evidence Was that moment likeike, when you saw him, you're like holy shit. Did you know it was him first of all, or you it could be some rando? Well, when I was I was in a truck, I was in with a bunch of people, no one knows I'm American As we drove by, put my video camera under my arm and I video camera the house And like dude was on the front porch, luckily. So you got a good shot of him. All of it, yeah, all of it. gotot everything I needed. Are you sure because I would imagine in the moment, I've been sort of not in this circumstance, but' Not long ago did this undercover video of somebody and I was like, I hope I got the shot. You don't know until you can go check it later. But this is a very important shot to get. Dude was on the porch. It was perfect. You knew you had it. Yeah Did you recognize him? U no, I didn't know. Okay. I didn't know. You found out later that you did in fact get the guy. Yeah, correct. So then did we get him Okay. And do you think it was instrumental in getting us to bin Laden So It wasn't. It was not Madam CIA analyst whose name we still don't know is not using that particular information and figuring out where Bin Laden was I don't know what any of that means, but it did not help. He had no idea. Okay All right, so What does that mean for you? An? Does that make you feel disappointed about it? or like? Well, I always thought, well, I thought at the time like A they were going to find out he was like dead in a cave later. You know what I mean? I just figured we boom the smithereens. It might be hard to find the parts, you know what I mean U So and then I figured one day the truth will come out. I kind of always knew that. So Well, when you heard about the raid and you saw Barack Obama on television that night. Yeah, what was your reaction? I thought it was great. You did. Yeah. I thought it was great. I mean, for whatever reason Obama had, I thought it was great. And then I can tell you this if I was commander in chief, the minute I heard that, I'd be like, go smoke that fool now. You know what I mean? Y and the discussion Normally in these ads, you expect somebody to ask you to buy something But this is something different I'm Julian Barnes, and I'm a reporter for The New York Times I'm a national security reporter and that means I'm reporting on military operations. These are fast paced, quickly moving situations What exactly is happening on the ground is often shrouded in mystery. But we turn to trusted sources, satellite imagery, and expertise built up over years in order to ferret out the facts that wouldn't otherwise come to light. I'm here to ask you to seek out a news source that does firsthand ed reporting If it's your local paper, great. If it's the Times, thank you Because where you go for your information matters Hi, I'm Angie Hicks, co founder of Angie. From roof repair to emergency plumbing and more, when you use Angie for your home projects, you know all your jobs will be done well. Angie, the one you trust to find the ones you trust. Find a pro for your project at Angie. com Rob O'Neill was Our first Memorial Day in depth interview back in when we launched the show, we didn't have a video yet. it would have been Memorial Day of twenty twenty one right after the show launched And that story is just unbelievable. Just to hear it told firsthand He's controversial now. Some people don't think he should have said it was him and blah, blah blah. What do you think steals, you know what I mean? It's always fucking drama with those guys You know what I'm saying? I adore him. I really admire him so deeply. ye, I'm not buying into any of that drama. All right, so now He wasn't done. likeike you're not done. the war is still going on. And then you wind up going to Iraq. Yeah And I think that was like the Yo, were they were gearing up You know what I mean? We're We're trying to do this. there, we're gearing up for Iraq. I mean, that's a nightmare Like when you look back on that one, What do you think? Iraq? Yeah. I loved Iraq. What? No one says that Why? I don't know. I mean, you their mind. You have an interesting take on it. and I'd love to hear your take on Saddam Hussein because, you werere making some good points I hadn't considered. Saddam, man, like we should have left him You should have killed his bastard sons and told him, playay along or your're next. and. Yeah them dudes needed to go. But he was kind of a fan of the Christians. He was, he was. His inner circle was all Christians Uh touched his food, washed his butt, like all Christian, all inner circle. and it's because of the martyr thing. You know, if you're a Muslim, you kill yourself, you're a martyr, you go to heaven. You know what I mean? As a Christian, you kill yourself, you go to hell. So he surrounded himself and put up with the Christians. That's why Iraq was pretty western even back then because he allowed Christians to have their own areas, do their own things, right? And then You know, ISIS allows none of that, you know what I mean? Yep. And we had to mess with it So did you You did go on a mission where you you got you tried to get him. I tellell me again what it was. It was like the woman, his affair partner's husband. Yeah, is we rolled up everybody that met Saddam. You know what I mean? And then we used to say, look, we're in the army, like, you know, in the, you know intelligence agencies, they give polygraphs and they determine their rating as sources. and like they'd be like, this is an unreliable source. You know what I'm saying? And we'd be like, I'm in the army, I'm pulling every thread. Let's go. I don't care And we go check it out anyway, mostost of the time they were U o Fight a shock. Yeah, goo figure Uh, but yeah, u Dom had like a favorite Sex lady. I' never even heard of this. I heard you say Shan R because she was not hot. Yeah. L like I don't know what thing got going, but like who knows what she was doing? When in closed doors Yeah, there's no talent. She must have a real pro. You know what I mean? That's all I could think. She. She had to know something about something, but like you would think like I don't know, like You just assume she would be attractive. I don't know. I didn't know what. I of would. Everyone pictures the affair partner as somebody who's very hot. The wife could maybe or maybe not. none of that happening here. My maybe had some hot ones. I didn't see them. Yeah had different taste. Maybe she had a routine. We have no idea. She obviously had something. Okay, so, but it wasn't her you were looking for Her husband. she was married We were we couldn't get to her because it's hard to get to women in Iraq. So we had to get to the husband. See see what I'm saying. And what information could we get from the husband? I don't know. mayaybe Saddam kind of, you know, was honey potted a little bit. He told his favorite honey pot I don't know something, you know. And as as an Amy guy, not an Intel guy, I'm like, let's go. Y let's into this. I'll do it. Yeah, I don't care. And do we get him Yeah, we got them Did he know anything Yeah, they didn't know shit. You know what I mean? Like they didn't know shit. But we did get them and yeah, it was okay, this is this is kind of legendary, but U I was across the street in a minivan and I was kind of watching this shop Um, I had two Iraqi guys that I would use and then I had the assault force kind of park on the corner close to the shop And then, um Enough time went by. We were just waiting and waiting I told my guys to start fighting in front of the store if too much time went by. So they start a fist fight in front of the store. then come out like what's going on out front of the store And the dude came out and literally put his back to like the van door or the assault force. And I'm like, yo, open the door. It's that dude right there and they grabbed him and then It was over and people were like looking for him. No one even knew he was. Everyone had been watching the fight. Wow. And then later my boss was like, man, we're so lucky that dude started the fight. I was like, that was our guys What at was trying to speed this up a little bit. Sart what I mean? Yeah, it's hot in the back of the van. You don't have to do the interrogation or you do U I've done a lot of Okay They don't always send in like the dark arts guys from the CIA to do that crap. Like that's that's us too U Th those guys are Trump change You know what I mean? They' to Gitmo only. Yeah. Okay. Yeah So how do you make a guy like that talk? And by the way, How do you communicate with one another? Do you have a translator there? Yeah, you gott to have a tb people to speak the language. yeah. What do you mean easy? How is it easy? U Everybody talks. They do. Oh Are you getting you torture them? What do you do? You don't kind of do shit. It's easy. What Yeah, fear and common sense is a powerful tool, you know what I mean? Most of the time like Think about this. okay, This is every human being. this is me, this is you. look There's stuff that you're gonna die with that you ain't telling no one about Everybody does that Does that make sense to you? I don't know I'm kind of an open book, but okay, yes, I I am tooally true. There's secrets people keep to their grave, right? That's basically what I'm saying, right? And then there's other shit like What's your cousin's car look like that you just ain't holding It ain't worth like getting beat over. It ain't worth fighting over, like it's a little white car. like This is a small point of order, but did he know that the wife was having an affair with Saddam Hussein The entire time. He did What do you do?as he Was he okay? with that? I was just kind of curious what the sex dynamic? I would imagine he felt lucky to be alive every day. Right You know what I'm saying? Yeah, he'd be a very easy guy to get rid of and then you could have the side piece whenever you wanted it But I guess he could anyway. so what's the point of killing the husband I don't know. So he gave up whatever info And did we find Saddam Hussein after that shortly after that. Yeah, we were lookook, we had to run all these man hunting is like a sweater When like you have a yarn on a sweater, you pull it One of those threads is going the arm' going to come off. One of those threads, you pull it out forever. It doesn't do nothing. You know what I mean? So we're going to pull every thread. This is the process. Yeah. So when you Was that the biggest thing that you did while you were in Iraq, would you say? Like the most No, serious thing? No. No. What what else did you do? Aarawi was serious days. Oh my go, that was dark. That was the dark stuff You were over there with all the beheadings and all that? Oh my God. I mean, does that scare you? You're only a man. You're a man I mean, I don't know. I wasn't really scared, but I did get a sword off a Zarkawi truck that was like a Roman short sword and I'm like there's pictures of me, I get my shirt off. I'm like, I don't know if you've ever seen this, but I wanted I would have cut one of their heads off, you know what I mean? Like but No, it didn't scare me. You know, Zark Kaowi was a bully and he liked to pick on the weak. He didn't wantan to pick on us You know what I mean? And then, you know, u Yeah, Th our cowi days were great. Foreign fighters was great. I mean I don't know, I loved it all, but like the foreign fighters, like you just show up in front of the house H my guy get on the bullhorn, they'd start shooting. We'd level the house, you know, like Those days were great. I mean Yeah I think those days were great because that's when the military finally let us take the gloves off and be like, okay, you guys do this your way. You know what What year is this now zero six, seven? Yeah, it was our cow I was six. You know what I mean? But they'd finally start to let the gloves come off, you know? think L I think we were We were throttled a lot through a lot of stuff. But I feel like through the Zarkawi days, no one gave a shit how we were getting it done. You know what I mean So how long were you over there? O how many deployments do you have? I think I got ten and then like I got a bunch of like the surge and the stay lates and shit like I went back and back Ten appooyments And then as a SRM major, I spent a lot of time there, but it didn't really count as a deployment I as back and forth So then what? Like how does it end For you they just send you back home before the fight is done? Or did you fight all the way to the end of the No, I was a SAR major. I retired in eleven. You're getting older. Yeah. It it'll let you surve forever, really, right? Oh man, you're only young so long, you know. But I'll tell you what, with stem cells and shit, I could have stayed another ten years if modern science was hitting So interesting to talk to you and hear you talk about how fun it was because it seems like the hell of war and the trauma that guys have, the PTSD But there's something about like, what is it? Is it working with your comrades in arms? Is it like doing the thing that you've been told to do and you're really good at it and you love that? Is it all? like what is what is fun I mean, Why be ashamed of tryrying your best No matter what that is, I think And I think that's really what it boils down to. I mean, yeah, I could be ashamed. Did a lot of people die? Yeah, a lot of people die. D D you be ashamed? Some of the wrong people die, sure. You know what I mean? Did innocent people die? sureure, but like this is war. And essentially war is you kill the bad guy and break his shit. so we can't use that shit against you If I was told to go do that, why am I the bad guy in this? I'm not, you know, you know what I mean? I'm just doing my best on a daily basis, you know? And then at the end of the day, I always se it as I'm in the army, I take orders, let's go And a lot of times I likek those orders, you know what I mean? What was the What was the Brotherhood dynamic? Oh, u man, you would think It's kind of interesting. You would think the Brotherhood would have been strong, but like the war like buildilds bonds, you can't You can't get anywhere else, I guess. You know what I mean? Like, u You'd think like there's always a brrotherhood, right? Well, we talk about the brrotherhood, but I would just joke about sealrome, you know whatm. So having said that, I think there's like guys that I'm like I was in combat with that we have a bond. I think there's certain people I have bonds with over different stuff I think that bond, the brotherhood is is just, you know, the experiencing U best and worst of humanity at the same time. And when your life is on the line, it just adds so much more to it, I would think Like you're risking it all together and any one of you might not be there the next night. Yeah. I mean, I always say like I I always say, well, I said this to my guys too, but we all gave Uncle Sam a blank jack Get ready. Don't be mad if it's cash, But don't be mad for somebody when their check is cash because they died doing what they loved. Can't be mad at that either Were there any women in your unit U Maybe. You're not allowed to tell me? I don't know. Can women be rangers? I don't know. That's a good question. I think so these days. I don't know. like I don't know how it works.. Did you ever have to deal with that dynamic out in the field? Like are together? Yeah. justust seems so weird to me. I don't know. I know nothing. I think women have very niche roles and can have very niche roles U I've worked with women. I've had women partners. They were great But I think there's a role for them and they're not like the one you send, you know Zarkawi, right? There's other stuff they do. So yes, have we have women, always have women like and yeah I mean, I think there's more women on the planet than men. I don't know why thats. Well, I just I'm curious about back to your dating life now. Can you meet a woman somehow? or you're like, how do you fall in love? How do you like Man, I'll tell you this is I started out married at nine eleven been divorced several times. It's a hard life. you know, I don't think I think it's a hard life because no one understands like your level of commitment And I I say that in a way like You're choosing something that might cause your death over and over. People don't see that as rational. But they don't understand. You know what I mean? But So say I would say this is like being married was like being in prison. You could call home. You ain't going there anytime soon. You know what I mean? This's is how it works. What do you mean? I don't think I get it. I get it. That's how marriage works in the army. Like when you deploy a war, you could call home You get your one thing call call home Yeah. Yeah. callall home like once a week. They're to be together a whole lot. Yeah, but you ain't you ain't going home. Yeah. You know what I mean? And that's tough on anybody. would I would say this only guys that had perfect relationships, their marriages survive the war You know what I mean? And I'd say the Bkca guys end up divorced. Do you have kids? I do How old are they? I stopped keeping track when they turned over twenty one. How many kids do you have? I have two. Yeah. Are they good? Yeah, they're good. They're good. They're good people. Are they going the into the military? My son was in the Army and works for the Amy now. Okay So when it all w when it ends, you know, Iraq eventually ends and Afghanistan ended disastrously and recently Yeah Is that a moment for reflection on what it meant, what role you played, whether it was worth it? or no, is it just I'm a soldier? I did my job? Next chapter. Well, it wasn't worth it I mean, everyone can see that, right? It'ounds just me. I don't think it was worth it at all. I had a great time I would say None of it was really worth it in a strategic sense, in a tactical sense. You know what I mean? L honestly, But the reality is is like man, I had the time of my life and I I would want anyone to know like people People like to thank me for my service and it's like, I did whatever the fuck I wanted. I don't actually need any thanks. You know what I mean? Like a kid who is like a cook getting mortered and Fucking wherever in Iraq nightly that kid needs to be thanked like I just I was just doing what I do. Well, how do you reconcile it with stories like, you know, Marcus Latrell and what happened to him? And he's definitely got some lasting PTSD from that.' been a rough rideer back home A Yeah, I don't even get that. I was out alone all the time. like I was out alone in Afghanistan. I don't get how being the lone survivor. I just don't understand that story only because I was out alone all the time. It didn't happen to me. You know what I mean? becausecause of the decisions I make on the ground. Well, you're not blaming him. I'm not blaming him. I'm just saying it' so that's so foreign to me. I don't even understand it Beause I can tell you this, the Taliban could come after me There'd be a whole lot of dead bodies for sure. And I'm just onender Ive that. Imagine if there was two or three of me. I mean, there's one of the worst stories of the war and what he went through is It's st awful. and it's not just him, you know, I Was it last year? No, it wass two years ago. we talked to Dakota Meer He's doing great now. You know, he came back. He won them was awarded the Medal of Honor and wanted to kill himself? L he There are tough, tough guys, not these are not men So they don't process it the way you do. I think if you could somehow teach this. It would be extremely valuable, right? I could teach anybody this. I feel like anybody could use this. peopleople who have different traumas. It would start by me locking you in a room and beating you first. Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. I know exactly I might sign up for that. I think people would. Don't touch the money maker. No, of course, of course. No bruises, no marks. I'm a pro like I've done a bunch of entg, but how I got this. I mean, like, is there some sort of toughen you up John Camp There isn't. I mean, the shirt? No. What does it read? Team SOB? Yeah I called you tough SOB, same thing. So this is not something I can sign up for so or I can go learn. I don't have any skills this this You're missing an opportunityership leadeership. C canan it be taught? I think so. I think so. Most of my guys, if my guys killed somebody, I brought them all in a room, I made everyone have a drink. I made sure I told them, they did exactly right. You know, this was expected of them, right? Like this is your job. Someone should thank you. And I think if all that happens on the spot, you're less likely to carry the guilt with you later. So I believe a lot of this is A frramed up poorly a long time ago. Yeah. And then I believe guys ride the haall pass for a long time. and I call the haall passast booze, but some people do drugs, some people do, I don't know what people do, but for me, my haall pass was booze. You know what I mean? And then still drink or no, no more? Well, I'm training for worlds right now Currently not drinking. World's in what Ju Jitsu? Oh wow. you ex military guys, Ju Jitsu. Why is that I don't know, Ju Jitsu It's the hour of my day where I don't have to look at the phone. It's sometimes there's minutes where someone's actually like choking the lib and shit out of me. Oh I hear. And the stubborn side of me is like, I'm not giving it toem. You know what I mean? Isn't it involuntary? No. What? No. When they choke you out? No. Yeah, No. It's not involuntary Okay, I got to learn those mo. If you make me give it to you, I'll give it to you. othertherwise, you could choke the shit out of me and I'll just ride it. You know But when I'm in real survival mode, someone puts me in trouble. I gota think about what's next, my leverage, my everything, control my breathing, my heart rate call that real survival mode? like It's u I'm so thankful for that. It's u It's a clarity of somet. I know what I mean? It of it. Yes, I. So it's like, you know, like high, like, you know, I do cardio. It doesn't make me high ever. I've always hated it, but like Jiu Jitsu is a I don't know. Sometimes when I'm in real survive, I don't gott to think about my phone. I don't gott to think about my life. Are you always going against somebody who knows what they're doing? Is it usually an instructor or another like Well participant because I class or because I travel. I hit I think twenty eight, thirty different dojos a year. I just walk in and A you worry about like out matching somebody to the point where you're gonna hurt them and sue or I'm not gonna to hurt anybody cause permanent damage? No. I'm a recovering lawyer. This is how I think about these things Uh no, not all it's Ju jitsu. Like look, this is un. A hurting somebody? there's not there's hurting somebody. Yeah I'm not gonna Well, yeah, but stop Is it like Yeah, as you get better at it, right? Like this is the point of submission. If you thought I was gonna hurt you, you could tap Okay. So that's your escape button That's like the The safe gesturet don't hurt me anymore, please. I've had enough. Yeah, you just tap. So what are you doing now I'm training for worlds c w for money Oh, I teach people to shoot Okay Okay. oh yeah, because you were a sniper. was We didn't get We didn't go over that. No, no. No. Yeah How many guns are you own Seriously? I couldn't count. More or less than JD Vance's mamma had in her house when she I don't even know how many that had. I think it was nineteen. Oh yeah anything, You know what I mean? Where are you live in? I live in Ralei, North Carolina. No, where specifically? Give us the street No I'm kidding. I'm kidding So you settled in the warmth? Well, I live near Fort Bragg still. Okay. You know what I mean? And you work with them and do you do anything? I don't do anything in Fort Brag. I try not to What do you do it for fun? Like how do you let your hair down? I do ju jitsu. I off road with my buddies. I got one of them side by side off roads. Yeah, I do that. Do Does this guy who goes in the side one put on a little white scarf and a little leather helmet? He'll get it muddy. You know what I mean? I wouldn't bring white on these trips But yeah, we normally off road in the Arizona mountains yearly. Yeah, we go to this place Crown King, oldest bar. There's no dirt. It's all dirt roads, no pavement. stay up there in cabins and it's kind of like, I don't know U we off road, we drive. I eat cheeseburgers. And I drink whiskey and then sounds right on bad. I do that all weekend. I don't shower either. I don't even care E Let's go. we're four wheel and. So you'd shower just not on this particular trip. Yeah. but I four wheel. man you know, and I just I love teaching people to shoot. It's kind of like the thing I'm really good at. Wow. Yeah Um What do you think? I know you're not, you don't really watch the news D you follow politics at all? Like, what do you think of Trump? What do you think of Peteh is the top guy at Pentagon? Yeah, well, first off, talk to Pete. I need one of these Pentagon jobs. tellell me I shouldn't be I will. The deputy of spepecial Operation. Is that what you would like? Hell yeah, let's go. I'll make a call. Oh man. but look, I like Trump. I like vans Oh. I like what they're doing And like, what can I say? L I think they make good inherent decisions like for long term, which we're not really used to here know what I mean? But I think they're all good. I don't watch the news or nothing, but I think they're good so far. I think I thought Trump made great policies last time You know what I mean? What Have you seen enough of Pete to know what you like about him? Oh man, I got a ton of buddies that know Pete. everybody loves Pete. you know what I mean? Like That's all I needed to hear. And you know, like the Pentagon. U We ain't w want a war lately And you know, these generals will be like, oh, well, he was just lower enlisted saying that. But like, yo, I watched you guys every day make bucked up decisions. I try to tell you and you'd be mad at me, you know what I mean?ike Not that I was always right, but like, Sometimes you're wrong also and it's the I think it's the hubris of the Pentagon that needs to be taken down a few notches. You know what I mean? Yeah. And like anyway. Yeah. so I would happily serve this country and make everything better, you know what I mean? That's awesome. Oh need We need guys like you raising your hands. Thanks Well, I love that you came in to tell us your story. It you're such an interesting man. I love you I love everything about you. What a character you are Thank you. I hope we can find a way to get you back cir. Let's go. Let's go. Let's call Pete. Pete, where are you at? Let's Let's call DJT and see He's got something for Call him right now? Get him on the line. I'm in. Whether you want to hear or not, thank you for your service.re're welcome. Thank a pleasure meet you.. Thank you. Yeah, all the best of you. Didn't I tell you? he's unbelievable. What a guy, John McVe, thank you once again. You know, it's just incredible the stuff that our troops go through and the different mindsets that they develop along the way, right? It's our honor to talk to him. It's our honor to talk to all of our troops who have served in battle. And if you're into what you heard today, you should go back and listen to the earlier Memorial Day shows that we've done since we launched The first one was in twenty twenty one and that was Rob O'Neill We've done Marcus Latrelle, we've done Dakota Meyer, recipient of the Medal of Honor. It's just these guys are They're living life around us. They're kind of back to normal to the extent one can be with having these incredible backgrounds, so it's well worth our time to take a moment to learn from them and remember what they and our other troops have done for us while we've been sitting at home in our air conditioning, right? So that's what today is all about, especially h honoring the fallen. We do that here. thank them and their families for their service You might not think about oil and natural gas, but it's a big part of your daily routine. From the soap you use to your toothpaste Even your bedsheets. More than six thousand everyday products are made using oil and natural gas. Companies like Eergy Trfer work behind the scenes, safely transporting these resources across the country through a network of underground pipelines Learn more at ittakes ennergy d. com Normally in these ads, you expect somebody to ask you to buy something But this is something different I'm Julian Barnes, and I'm a reporter for The New York Times. I'm a national security reporter and that means I'm reporting on military operations. These are fast paced quuickly moving situations What exactly is happening on the ground is often shrouded in mystery But we turn to trusted sources, satellite imagery, and expertise built up over years in order to ferret out the facts that wouldn't otherwise come to light. I'm here to ask you to seek out a news source that does firsthand based reporting If it's your local paper, great. If it's the Times, thank you becausecause where you go for your information matters. We want to bring you the story of a remarkable veteran. who stared death in the face and lived to share. H incredible lessons on leadership. Bravery How to overcome any obstacle No matter how devastating it may feel in the moment Lieutenant Jason C. Redmond joins us now Jay, welcome to the show Meg an honor to be on. Happy Memorial Day, everyone Oh gosh to you too. It's so great to talk to you and to see you again. Do you remember when we met Absolutely. Mbe SL Foundation dinner in New York many years ago when you were still working with Bill Hmer. Exactly right. And I never forgot you. I've talked about you to basically every Navy seal who's comeing this show. And talked about you with Laf Babbin and his wife Jennna Lee and all these people and just have been thinking about you because your story was so incredible. And back then, it was still pretty close in time T when you first were injured. You know, that was what like twenty ten? I'm trying to think of the year U two thousand seven. So I think I was still active duty. I think I still was trying to get back operational when I went to that dinner because I didn't retire until twenty thirteen Yeah, I remember that. and it was like, just your whole story was so incredible. And of course I've met so many people over the years. and I've met a lot of vets too, veterans in active duty And honestly, I can count on one hand, the number of people who really stand out to me where I'm like You've got to hear this story and you're one of them So I'm truly honored to have you on here and to be having this discussion with you today. Great to see you Likewise, thank you A, Okay. So you grow up, you from a very early age, I think it's fair to say. I mean, like well before you actually signed up for the Navy at age seventeen add your eye Was it on the Navy in particular or just the military It was both. The Navy kind of came about a little bit later. I mean, still young, I think it was about fifteen. I mean, from a very young age, I mean my parents tell me when I was about three years old, I always just talked about service based and what I like to call in American society protectors U And I was always interested in, you know, that protector mindset. When I was three years old, I wanted to be a firefighter that as I got a little bit older, my grandfather was a decorated B twenty four pilot, you know, I had learned about him, great uncle along with my grandfather on both sides served in World War twoI My dad had been an Army veteran serving during the Vietnam War and had been a paratrooper and jump master and riggor. and that's where he had encountered SEALals for the first time. and started learning more about special operations, started learning more, you know, I was kind of the GI Joe era. So GI Joe was cool to me and definitely the the special operations guys within the GI Joe universe And it was about the time when I was maybe fourteen that my dad said, Hey, you should look into the Navy SEALals. Having spent some time in the Virgin Islands, I was pretty strong in the water. and he said, hey These guys are tough. They're some of the best. He said, you know how to swim. He said, you're a little crazy You should check them out. They'd be perfect for you. And And was right. I don't know what it was and I'm not I'm not probably the likely candidate that most people would think of, you know, I think when people think of Navy seals, you know, they they see a picture of Jaco and Jaco looks like he's chiseled out of granite, you know, and he is the Hollywood version of a seal and I like to joke that I'm not. I was like five foot nothing Especially at that age. I was I was probably I don't even think I had hit five foot back then. I was probably ninety five pounds when I decided that's what I want to do And everybody was like, there's no way you'll ever make it. And I don't know, that just created fuel to my fire and And I just said This is what I'm going to do and set my sights on it and started training and you know, the rest, obviously leading up to joining the Navy when I was seventeen on amazingly enough, coincidentally, september eleventh, nineteen ninety two is the day I joined the Navy when I was still a senior in high school You are the guy who says, say I can't say I can't. L there's no better fuel for your fire Th those and then those but that message It's a fact. And you know, and that's a good thing. I've come to learn as I get older, there's a balance there. You know, you've got to balance reality with where we're at because when I was younger Man, that was the catalyst. I mean I would do just about anything if you told me, hey, you can't do that. I mean, I just had to prove and I think some of that Who knows had to do Maybe I was a smaller guy, so I felt like I had to prove that I was big enough or whatever to do it But I tell you, back then, it was definitely a fuel that enabled me to make it through training and to overcome a lot of the impossible odds. As a matter of fact, I was told right from the very beginning, when I went to the recruiting station in Lumberton, North Carolina, where I was living at the time And I walked in that door probably the first time I might have been fifteen probably probably fifteen and a half, basically. And I walked in that door and I said, Hey, I want to join the Navy and I want to be at Nal And boy, they took one look at me. thiss five foot, nothing, you know runs And they were like, you'll never make it as a seal. And they basically the recruiter chased me out of the office And of course that didn't deter me. I came back and He would chase me out again And multiple times that happened fununny story. I almost went and joined the Army because I got frustrated that they wouldn't let me, you know, that this guy wouldn't even give me the time of day So I almost joined the Amy to become a ranger And I ended up failing the airborne physical because they said, oh, you can't equalize because I had ruptured my eardrum when I was a kid And when I you know, thankfully my dad had been in the military, he said, Well, why don't we go send you to a specialist and they can because I knew I could equalize. I had dove, I had done all these things And sure enough, I went to a specialist. By the time that it all transpired, I tried to explain to everybody, you know, everything happens for a reason And by the time this had transpired, there was a new recruiter in the recruiting office in Lumberton, North Carolina, Henry Horne, who I got to link up with last year after all this time and thank him in person. But Henry Horne was the new recruiter and he said, Hey, you wantna be a seal? come on, man And he helped me get into the Navy, He put me on the path to become a CEL. and I got to give a lot of credit to Henry for that Mm, he must be so proud of being that guy in your life and the life of the service you know industry in our country Can I ask you How So when you actually did sign up because I understand you officially were allowed to join when you were seventeen So what was your physical stature then? because it's interesting to me. You always do think of these guys being bigger and you do picture like a Jocko going in there and them being like Right this way, sir, yes, duh, of course, we belong together So I probably hit somewhat of a growth spur in you know my junior senior year, but I was definitely not that big. I mean, even even today, you know, I'm five eight and about one hundred seventy pounds. So I'm on the average seal, a lot of people don't know though. the average seal is only about five ten and one hundred eighty pounds This this Hollywood version of the Arnold Schwarzenegger type just is not necessarily the case. I mean, seals typically are lean, muscled and, you know, usually they'll have you know a larger upper body because they have strong muscular endurance strength from the From the gear we have to carry and our ability to have do a lot of activities with our body weight and gear. So your ability to pull yourself up a ladder, your ability to pull yourself up ono a rooftop, any of these different things are marked by what we have to do, especially when you're going through training. So yeah, when I went through training, I think I was probably five, seven. I might have grown one more inch. And I started training at eighteen. So I was eighteen years old. I was five, seven. and I think I checked into buds at about one thirty five. So I was one of the lightest guys in the class That's inspirational though. There' probably a lot of guys out there thinking, oh my gosh, maybe I maybe I too could be a seEL Yeah. o one hundred percent. And I'm not one of the smallest. I mean, believe or not, like I said, I'm on the smaller end of the spectrum, but we've had seals. I think the smallest I ever heard was about five, two. Um And obviously we've had great big, huge guys. there' it's not normal. The big guys really have a hard time making it through training. The amount of pounding on their joints ends up breaking them for the hundreds and hundreds of miles that you run and the amount of body weight strength you have endurance you have to have to be able to do twenty thirty pull ups, to be able to do fifty dips, to be able to do hundreds and hundreds of push ups. It's really hard on big guys joints. My my little my little guy went my My nine year old was listening to me prepare for you and we were talking all about the seLals and training and he wanted to know if they make you do O handed push upps. Do they make you do any of those Yes, and I actually when I I broke my arm in training and I had to do a lot of one arm push upps because just because I had broken my arm did not mean that I that I wasn't still getting yelled at and dropped to do push upps and do things Wa, wow. It's so that's so good you know, but I think you tell me, but it seems like whatever the heype, whatever the stat you', the number one thing, the reason you made it as a seal was that attitude. It's that attitude. likeike that just never say die, I will not quit. There's something different in the guys who make it through as seEALals versus everybody else because they have that thing that just it will not let them quit That's right. I think there are two things that enable individuals into special operations. Number one, that we like to call it the no quit gene I mean, the Navy has spent millions and millions of dollars trying to figure out how do they increase the number of graduates from SEL traraining and All these things they've done going all the way back to World War twoI when they started training Um They reallyally the attrition rate has stayed roughly the same. It has been around seventy five percent. So seventy five percent of the people that start training do not graduate U you know, we often talk about it's the no quit gene. Everybody gets pushed to the point. Everyone has a breaking point and in seEL training, they push you to that point and they teach you how to grind through it and keep going. Your brain will tell you you have to stop. Your brain will tell you if I don't keep going, I'm going to die. But the reality is your body can keep going almost ten times further beyond that And So it's the ability to endure that gets you through training But the other thing that I think special operations guys, they have the ability to process massive amounts of informations in a very chaotic environment and make rapid decisions. And there's a lot of people that can't do that. I mean, when we send guys into, you know imagine a hostage rescue scenario where they're now having to make entry into a room where there are bad guys in the room that are shooting that shoe. you very quickly have to assess that situation, identify who's bad, who's good, who do I need to shoot? who do I not need to shoot? who do I need to protect? And all of that's happening in milliseconds. And there are definitely guys that make it through training. unfortunately, they don't have the ability to process that information at that rate and sometimes they end up going away just because of that. So it's those two things that I think truly make excellent special operations, know people, they make great seals Hmm, you know it kind of reminds me of,m I was talking one time to the cooach, the head co coach of the Minnesota Vikings And he was saying when he recruits quarterbacks, he does need you know, an agile, you know guy who can actually complete the plays and knows how to throw the football and has sort of a physics, a basic knowledge of physics physics and instinctual knowledge of physics but he was saying, Some of the guys can't remember the playbook They don't remember everything that's in there and when to call which play depending on how the guys line up in the field. F less dangerous, obviously than what you do But it was kind of a similar thing where it's not enough to have the physical capabilities There has to be this mental thing that you either have or you don't have. And if you don't have it, it's as much of a deal breaker as not having the physical strength Absolutely. and sometimes it will become the deal breaker. I mean, you know, there are a lot of guys out there that are strong. mean I meanet a lot of individuals they will say to me, o, you know, they're anywhere from professional athletes to, believe it or not, I meet a lot of high level business individuals in the financial market that will say to me, I definitely could have been a seal And you know, I laugh at a, the arrogance of that statement, but and maybe maybe they do have a little bit of the financial. I mean, the physical ability But do you have the ability to process information and continue to execute when you're in the middle of a firefight or after you've, you know, flown in, taken fire, Mbe you've jumped in and now you're patrolling long ways. Maybe you've been in a firefight but you feel you even get to the target building. now you're in the target. you you know, you're in a firefight. you have people that are wounded, now you're trying to move people out, you know, now you've got civilians are trying to take care of along with your wounded, while things are still blowing up around you and you've still got to process all this I mean, that was all stuff that I experienced in my career. and there are some people that can do that and unfortunately, there's a lot more that can't. they just high pressure environments they shut down. prorofessional sports is the same. You put people off and talk about the the high level games U, you know, like the Super Bowl or the NCAA championship games and how some of the players just can't manage that stress and that overwhelming pressure H Yeah, you can see it when people choke. I mean, in sports, we have an opportunity to see it in a way we don't in military where you can see who's a choker and who's not, who performs at that high level in the most stressful of circumstces and who doesn't Now wait, this is a stupid question, but I have to ask it So are you telling me that even in my own exercise life, which I will grant you is more limited than it ought to be. When I am doing the jumping jacks and I am so burned and my legs are on fire and I'm like, I've got to take the next eight out. and I've just got to like bend down for the next eight, I'll come back. after an eight B pause Are you telling me I can just keep going? Are you telling me that like if I would just get mentally tougher I can do it straight through. just keep Freakaking pushing Absolutely. Belve it or not Most people could if you had the fortitude and the ability to endure the pain and the discomfort, you could probably push yourself right to death. You could jumping jack yourself to death It would take a long time There'd be all kinds of alarm bells going off in your brain probably days before you got there Um, but It is amazing in the resiliency of of this amazing machine we walk around in And unfortunately in this day and age, we are not We are not building that much in our people. We are not we're getting softer as a generation. And you know, every Monday I put out a leadership and resesilience video, I call it Monday of Muster. and this last Monday it was exactly about that. I just finished reading this book called Kingdom of Iice by Hamtham Sides. And it is about the trek to the North Pole in I believe seventeen seventy nine Um, and Absolutely amazing. I read that story and the level of heroism and the level of pain and discomfort and frozen temperatures all the time that those guys had to deal with I consider myself fairly tough guy. and I remember reading it thinking, man, how would I have fared in this So fast forward today We don't have to do a lot of things that really push us. People have to do hard things in order to build grit and resilience. So I really encourage those of you that may be watching You've got to push your kids to do hard things. you have to do hard things. You have to encourage your family to do hard things. Otherwise we just get softer and softer and we'll just, you know, it's human nature. We want to be comfortable everybody, including me. I mean, we all want to be comfortable, but Gritten, I like to tell people the overcome mindset is not something you can just flip a switch and say, Oh, I have to be tough right now. So let me throw my little switch and now I'll be tough It's going to help you an had thing And if you don't do hard things, you will never be able to throw that switch when you really need to M It reminds me of your story about your book. It reminds me of one time I was skiing in this very posh ski resort with my husband and my brother in law, some others. and just the L a downpour of snow came right on top of us. just this huge snowstorm dumped on us. and it came fast. And so before we knew it the snow was up above our knees, you could barely see in front of you. And I said to my brother in law, Ken, I feel like Shackleton And he said Except with no hardship Yeah. exactly right. So like where they've got the ski butlers who are going to take off the the boots when you get back to the ro Oh For me. they warm your boots. I mean I love the resort like that. We love to ski. so anything like that I'm all about, but yeah I hate the cold now and U that expedition. I mean, you are you are in seal training it is the one common thing. You are whack cold covered in sand So I despise the cold. And I just think about these guys, these guys were literally caught in frostbes Um, out of their feet I mean, that's how insane the conditions were and how hard and then continuing to go I mean, there are other people that'd be like, Ohh, I'm I'm now an invalid. There's no way I could get forored. But literally, it wasn't until like bones were exposed where they weren't able to walk at all. I was just fascinated with this story and the level of grit and resilience and And Society, we may never get back to that. I mean, thankfully or hopefully We live we are day we are are things to people like you. This is this is what our children need to be watching and listening to. Guys like you with that same messaging. You know, I'd like to say it's still the military writ large notwithstanding Millie and some of these other guys and the messaging from them. But that's what I have my kids listen to. I don't want them listening to your week We lean into your weaknesses, everyone's sick, everyone's depressed, everyveryone's near suicidal. You know here's another poll to confirm all that. Here, go back on social media to make yourself feel better slash worse. They need to be watching your inststa, Jacos, all these guys who have been through about just grit and mental toughness because it is a skill. like you were saying, it's a skill and you have to practice it Yeah, absolutely. And that's what a lot of people don't I love the fact when people read my book and they don't really know my story. What's out there is, hey, this guy got all shut up and he wrote that sign on the door and he's this tough seal What they don't realize is there's a huge part of the story that most people don't know until they read my book and that's that I failed as a young leader. And I'll be honest, it was that journey building myself back up against really hard odds that really built the overcomeing mindset and all the leadership things that I talk about today And You know, makeaking, you nailed it. Right now in this country, you know, I joke with people about, you know, we're still in the midst of a pandemic And and people would go, COVID? And I'm like, no, the pandemic is the victim mindset. There is a large swath of society that is being convinced you are a victim You know, you there there are, you know, political leaders that want to convince you regardless of your race, creed, color, demographic, gender, gender persuasion, religion, religious affiliation. I don't care what it is they want to commvit to you you're a victim. and there's no way you can save yourself only someone else have to save you or oftentimes it's only the government can save you, which is scary and a dangerous thought itself. I Everything I teach on is on self leadership. You have the power to drive forward and create change in your life And and it is the exact opposite in this victim mindset, but it is pervasive It is pervasive across social media. It is pervasive oftentimes in the media And we've got to break this. I mean, America was built on these on options of Um resilience and grit and self leadership. you know, these individuals that came across here to this country and said, hey, we're going, we're going to figure out how to overcome and we're going to figure out how to make our way And right now we're not there. E, even in the military right now, there's this idea about individualism. and I believe in self leadership, but you have to be part of something bigger. you know, a military unit is working together. It's a whole bunch of leaders who create this unified organism, if you will, that does incredible things. So Fascinating to watch and a little sad. I hope that we can wake up Um, you know, there there is u, you know, I learned the hard way about individualism because when I was When I got myself in trouble as a leader, it was about me I was selfish not was focused on me and I wasn't focused outward And I think there's a lot of that going on in our country right now. You got to take care of yourself, but how does that impact? How do you set the example for your staff, your employees, your children, your spouse your family, your community. we need more leadership and we need more grit Normally in these ads, you expect somebody ask you to buy something. But this is something different I'm Julian Barnes, and I'm a reporter for The New York Times. I'm a national security reporter and that means I'm reporting on military operations. These are fast paced quuickly moving situations What exactly is happening on the ground is often shrouded in mystery But we turn to trusted sources, satellite imagery, and expertise built up over years in order to ferret out the facts that wouldn't otherwise come to light. I'm here to ask you to seek out a news source that does firsthand based reporting. If it's your local paper, great. If it's the Times, thank you becausecause where you go for your information matters. Hi, I'm Angie Hicks, co founder of Angie, and one thing I've learned is that you buy a house, but you make it a home. Because with every fix, update, and renovation, it becomes a little more your own, so you need all your jobs done well. For nearly thirty years, Angie has helped millions of homeowners hire skilled pros for the projects that matter, from plumbing to electrical, roof repair to deck upgrades. So leave it to the pros who will get your jobs done well. Angie, the one you trust, to find the ones you trust. Find a pro for your project at anngie dot com d How do we even still have a military given this mindset amongst the G Zers. Do you think today's guys are coming into the military with this victim mentality and then it gets sort of beaten out of them. Or do you think it just naturally tracks the minority amongst that generation doesn't have the victim mentality, and that's what they're doing there I think there's still a lot of individuals that are coming into the military who have that gritten resilience and want to be part of specific units and certain things. I think the problem is there are parts of the military that're becoming a little bit of a social experiment like hey, Um You know, I'm I'm I'm conservative, but I probably have a little more liberal views when it comes to social norms, like I don't care if you're gay A But In the military, there's no room for individualism You're in the military We all have to fight together. Race, creed, color Democrat, gender, gender persuad, none of that matters in the military. If you want to do that in your off time, that's fine. You can embrace that Bye As a military, we are a unit that must work together. and there is not time or All of that's going distract if we're so focused on a certain segment or demographic of society that we need to, I don't know, highlight or promote. Everybody in the military when I was in We all wore the same uniform. We didn't highlight anyone And u And it was amazing to me. I just, you know, the guys across, the different platoons that I worked, there were different race, creeds, some were religious, some were Christians, some were atheists U you know, a few other religions that were out there, but it didn't matter. What mattered was our ability to execute the mission and you could depend on that person. And I think the military deeply needs to get back to understanding that and understand that the purpose the military is to protect are u Our country protect and defend the United States of America, but which should be the same mission for any country that's out there. And it's not on highlighting whatever is going on in society out there. those are political aims. The military should always be apolitical with a singularity of focus, which is to protect and defend our nation against in all enemies You know This is You correct me if I'm wrong, but this is why the focus by Millie on having you guys learn about white rage or Austin defending handing out Kendy to the troops is so problematic. It's not just a distraction from what you need to be focusing on, which I believe it is It's divisive. It's kind of sending exactly the opposite of the message you need to ingrain in order to be an effective soldier, right? or Frog, likeike you frog man, you you All the messaging is forget that stuff. That stuff is not relevant to us here No, one thousand percent. And I mean, it is the same thing in the military as it's happening in our country. I've talked about this. A lot of political leaders are doing things that are just dividing us as a nation and they want to focus on you know specific segments of time, slavery happenving. It was a terrible thing But there's no country in the past you know, two hundred and fifty years that has made more advances and trying to create equality. I mean It has been a slow process. obviously, but there have been leaders who saw this is wrong. We need to fix this And this idea suddenly that, you know these different initiatives are out there, you know, that focus on America was built on racism U I don't think this is true. We're throwing the baby out with the bath water And there's a lot of incredible things that have occurred. And when we start to talk about the level of success of the American Dream, it has been all race creed and colors. It's been there are more millionaires in the world that have come out in the United States of America than any other nation on Earth And they're all race g, color and genders. You know, and there are some people that would try and say, well, white malesort the majority Well, maybe that's true right now. But Instead of trying to create division, why aret we not looking for ways, you know, two wrongs don't make it right to continue to create division, especially in the military, you're creating individuals now. you're creating separation, you're creating a line of distrust, you're creating potentially even a level of hatred, which is not going to further that unit. It's all about culture. It's all about trust. It's all about respect for each other that we are equal warriors that are trying to get out there and make something happen. It should be the same in this country. So it's disheartening to me And it's crazy to me because I think back to Martin Luther King's speech when he said, you know, I hadd a dream that one day men will be judged by the content of their character, not by the caliber of their skin. Yet our political messaging right now is we want to judge individuals by the color of their skin That's terrible, man. we're all human. We need that We are, in my opinion, moving backwards. We're moving backwards both in the military and both as a nation And that's sad to me because I have worked with Everyone. You know, everyone, when when I lived in the Virgin Islands Um I was the only white kid in my class, but I didn't notice that. I didn't care. They were all my friends Um And we're becoming the society that wants to focus so much on race. I hate the fact that every single form I fill out today is like, well what race are you Yeah mean we should eradicate that and it should just say Are you an American If you're an American, if you're an American citizen, that's what you are You know, I think the only things that maybe they still have that on is potentially medical documents because there is some linkage, of course, to race and nationality, and hopefully they can help prevent that. Anything else that should go away because it's just used as a method to divide us And that should not be the case. man, our leadership should be looking at how to unite us. And right now, all I see is political leadership who's continuing to divide us. And it's happening in the military too, which is Super, super dangerous All let's talk about your experience sort of get the audience through what it was like for you. So you Um As I understand it september eleventh, nineteen ninety two, joined the Navy. Is that right? september eleventh, ninety two That's right. Little Little did you know? I mean, you know, a nine years later What was going to be happening in this country for guys in the military in particular. So you go to boot camp, you do buds training That was January of nineteen ninety five. I I know that This is like small ball for Sales guys to talk about Buds training, but everybody else loves hearing about it. So can you just give us a couple of examples? I was, you just listening Did these guys talk about like your friend Laf and Jacko they were on a podcast talking about how like it's bullshit to talk about buds. like talk about combat.body the only people who want to talk about buds are people who never actually went to combat after Buds. and that's the highlight of their Navy career. Give me a minute on it because I think my sons will enjoy it and I think a lot of people love hearing about just what we put you guys through in order to call yourself a seal. Yeah, training is hard. It's I mean, there's no doubt about it, but at the flip side of that coin, I kind of knew what I was getting myself into. I had researched. I actually served with one of the East Coast SalL units before I went out to Buds. had a pretty good idea of what I was getting myself into U and it is unequivocally hard. Training's broken into three different parts, first phase is designed to weed people out. It is designed to be as hard as possible, physically hard as possible, And so's it's massive amounts of physical exercises and evolutions. Um that are pushing you out of your comfort zone, into that zone of discomfort and pain and forcing you to come to grips with your brain is telling you you have to stop But your body can keep going culminates with Hellwek and Hell Week is probably considered to be One of the top toughest blocks of training in the U.S. military, some say in a lot of our even global military units. and how weak is exactly that. It's a week long. goes from Sunday to Friday And during that week, you will get maybe on average two to three hours of sleep You are constantly wet, coated in sand, you're carrying the boat around on top of your head everywhere you go It's not uncommon for guys to chaave holes inside their inside their legs or inside their armpits or to rub the hair off their head. It's not uncommon for your toenails and fingernails to fall off During hell week Um It's also not uncommon to hallucinate during hell week. I remember U, when I went through Hell week Um, couple of things that stand out Um I remember One, I was in the I was boat crruise go by height So the tallest boat crewers are in boat crerw one U Th those are the studs and and in our class, I remember boat crew one won everything leading up to Hell week. They were the beasts. And we got into hell weeke and on Tuesday night I was in the shortest boat crew by the way, which is called the Surf crew. So for those of you that enjoy that, complete with a little smurf on the front of your boat So And I remember Mike The Book crerew one were like Gods, you know, we were like those guys win everything. you know, they just dominated. And on Tuesday night of Hell Week, which is one of the hardest evolutions that culminates on Tuesday night Everybody in booat crew one quit that night except one guy. And it made me realize they're human too Every single person out there that is like, oh, that guy's got it all figured out. like they never have any doubts. That's BS. Everyone has doubts. everyone has You know, theirre hangus and issues. The difference between successful people is they continue to drive forwardind besides those doubts said man, when those guys quit, I was like I got this Now kept driving forward Um whyy' they quit It's hard. It's miserable. Its you have to dig deep within yourself. and the evolution we were doing is something called steel piers U And what they do is, you know, they have a like a fire hose that they're missing you. It's it's at night in San Diego Bay, I went through hell week in March. So the temperature was probably in the low fifties U the water temp, I would imagine was probably in maybe high fifties And and it was a large floating steel pier And you were forced to remove all your clothing and fold it up. you were just wearing a small pair of shorts. That was it. and they would You were with your swim buddy in these little metal, I don't know, they were probably like three by three foot squares and the whole class is spread out with their swim buddy and you would have to fold your clothes up and the instructors would say, placeace your you know pants folded up in the northwest corner. And none of us had a compass. and you've already been awake for like forty eight hours, so' It's nighttime. like his northwest So we would try and figure out which way was northwest, and the class would come to a conclusion, this is northwest And you know, you'd mess it up and then you'd get yelled at and they'd force you to lay down on the cold steel and they'd spray you with water until you were shakaking enough. And at some point they'd scream at you to get up and jump in the water And and I remember we'd all run over to the edge and it was like your body was telling you to go, but your brain would like slam on the brakes. and it was so funny, you'd watch everybody. I remember this in my mind. Everybody would get up to the edge of the pier and like come to this stop and be like And then you just have to force yourself into the water and the instructors would like throw your clothes and your boots into the water, which, you know, you're in the bay. So now you're having to dive down in the darkness and find your stuff. And this went on for hours, probably four or five hours Um, and and Um I remember when guys quit They they the steel pier was down below the concrete pier, which was up above where the vans were parked up there. Um, and and There's all There's a method to the madness. I mean, a lot of what SEAL training and special operations training is, it's psychological Um, you know, Sill training is not You don't accomplish shield training through this, it's accomplished through this and through this. Y ability to find it within your heart and to think through the problems So when guys would quit, they would be given a blanket and a hot cup of coffee or cocoa, and they would go sit in the van that was had the heater on And you would see them up there sitting in that van drinking with their blanket on all worn looking down on you while you're getting your butt kicked. And it was so easy to say, man, all I have to do is say I quit and I can go sit in that warmth. and that's Man, that's like life. How often do we find these moments like, man, all I have to do is get a little further. And I try to explain to people, keep pushing. You never know it's always darkest before the dawn And so anyways That's what happened at Bo Ru one All of them, I think got caught up in it and and Nick quit during that evolution. So wow I remember on Thursday or on Wednesday night, I was hallucinating. We were doing an evolution called around the world where you rowe your boats around Cornado Island And well so now you've been awake for what? ninety six hours at least And it's very common for guys start hallucinating. and I was I was seeing fences, chainlink fences out in the middle of the ocean. and I'd tell the guys, we gott to turn. we're gonna hit this fence I was seeing concrete walls that I was trying to steer around Um, I was hearing voices out in the middle. my buddy He was telling me he saw a witch standing out in the water. And like he told himself like Okay, that's not there. So I'm just going to look away and when I look back, it's going to be gone. When he look back, she was still there So he was like, Gys, we gott to ro faster. This witch is going to get us Is it just from lack of sleep? Is that what's causing the hallucinations Yeah, lack of sleep man it is amazing. People really underestimate sleep and how good sleep is for you and how bad it is for you when you don't sleep, how bad your brain starts to break down and your decision making becomes wor and yeah, even in the you're starting to hallucinate I was just talking to a doctor about this and we were talking about how, you know some people They get up at the crack of dawn, pre pre crack of dawn to work out And that's fine as long as you've built in enough sleep prior to that point that you've gotten a good night. You know, did you get your seven hours or did you get four hours so that you could get up at four AM? And he was saying they're completely missing the point because sleep is As important as exercise and nutrition to your overall wellness, your mental wellness, your brain function, your heart function, all of it And so unless you can get the seven hours before you get up four It doesn't make much sense to do that just so you can work out. You need both. you need sleep a thousand percent. this is something that I really had to come to grips with. I mean, I teach, you know something called the Pentagon of peak performance in the base level is physical leadership And sleep is a big component of that. My whole life, I've gotten up early Um But I wasn't getting the I need, I know my body. I need a minimum six hours. seven is ideal for me to optimize And I wasn't getting that. I was running, you know,h, I got to go up at five thirty every single morning Um and and in the last year My cortisol levels were high. I was having, you know, some of these health issues and I I said, okay, I'm going to force myself to get more sleep. and it has reset a lot of things. People just underestimate the power of sleep, especially I meanet people in the business world or guys who think they're really tough and they'll say to me, hey I you know, I get by on four hours sleep at night, and I'm like, awesome, man, congratulations. You are chronically fatigued and nowhere near the optimal self you could be And you'll be dead soon. I mean, really, it shortens lifespan. so it's really you can't sacrifice sleep, but work out and eat healthy that's just dumb, dumb strategy All right, so you u You're in the Navy You nine hundred and eleven happens, you are deployed in Afghanistan, right? In Afghanistan as an officer in two thousand four. Is that correct I commissioned in two thousand four. we went to Afghanistan in two thousand five And this is where you, I think it's fair to say, would face this major leadership challenge that you referenced earlier in which you feel you fell down on the job. Tell us what happened Is a little bit of a perfect storm Um So I came into the Navy in nineteen ninety two into a peacetime military. And there you know, there's a big difference in a peacetime military and a wartime military. I try to, you know, you nailed it when you said when you signed up on nine eleven, you had no clue what was coming. And that is a fact. And I try and explain that to younger guys in Galas in the military U, you never know when something's going to happen. None of us saw nine eleven happening. We went from total peaceetime total wartime within I think two or three years, all of the SEAL teams were one hundred percent combat experienced, and that was one of the goals, obviously So I actually u started school in the summer of two thousand one And nine hundred and eleven happened obviously in September. Myself and a couple of my teammates that were at school together tried to get out of the program like, Hey, we know we're going to war G us out, you know, let us go back to a platoon and one of our most respected leaders who had helped me get commission. I remember prophetically said, reed This war is going to go on for decades. It's like, go back to school, you will get your chance So while I was at school, the community obviously was going off to war in both Iraq and Afghanistan. And one of the things that occurred was Sypifically, the military bases tactics and strategies off the last sustaining combat. And the SeIL team based a lot of our tactics off Vietnam. That was the last time we had seen years of combat Well, when we got over to Iraq and Afghanistan, we quickly realized a lot of those old tactics used in the jungles and Mkon Delta and the swamps in Vietnam didn't necessarily apply quite as well in the mountains in the urban and desert environments thataniously, notot only technology advance for vehicles. So the bottom line our tactics changed pretty drastically. So here I was this ex enlisted guy who thought I was like God's gift to leadership, ego and arrogance kind of got the best of me. And I came back when I got commission in two thousand four thinking, man, I'm a man. I know everything. I'm going to step back. I'm going to be like patent reincarnated or something. And that really wasn't the case. I step back in and technically I was probably one of the more inexperienced guys because I didn't have combat experience and probably U sixty percent of our platoon at that point definitely did And instead of humbling myself and saying and not only that all our tactics had changed. So instead of humbling myself and saying to the guys, young younger guys who might have been more experienced, Hey, man, I don't know how to do this. I made the mistake as a young leader of saying, Ohh, I'm a leader. like it's a sign of weakness if I say I don't know how to do this, which is a fallacy. It's wrong But In doing that, I I started to damage my credibility as a leader. Well A That was hurting me. So and I recognized it was hurting me. So then what was the next thing I did? Well, I start I recognized that I was damaging my credibility. I was stepping on my toes U not keeping up like I should be And I started drinking away my stress U So then I became known as a drunk on top of everything else Um fast forward deployed Afghanistan in two thousand five And the very first mission We were getting ready to transition over. So Operation Red Wings was our troop. Lieutenant Commander Eric Christensen was my boss, A lot of the guys that you will read about that were shot down on the helicopter. And that Red Wings is the lone Svivor story for those that may be familiar with that. if you've seen that movie or watched or read Marcus' book We had him on the show last August with his brother. and it was just an incredibly compelling episode. so they know the story Okay. so so I was a part of the trou ourur sister platoon was a platoon that was on the helicopter for Red Wing that was shot down. We were getting ready to flied Afghanistan to turn over with those guys That following week. I think we were set to fly like right after the fourth of July And of course, on june twenty eighth, the helicopter was shot down. So this was our first introduction to combat That's when I first I met Marcus at the hospital in Lonstel, Germany. We stood watch on Mike Murphy and Danny Detsz's bodies. They had not recovered Matt Axette flew to Afghanistan and the recovery was underway. and that's how our deployment started. So Here I was this knucklehead young officer who was stepping on his toes who now you know, got to got to combat and I wanted to prove myself, you know, hey, reed wings happen, you know, we want payback Which is okay. That's fine. There is a balance as a leader. We have to, you know, it should be the mission then the men or the team that you're working with and you're last on the equation. Unfortunately, I inverted that and, you know, how do I make myself look like a you know a great leader and a great hero. and I mean I continue to make mistakes culminating with a bad call on a mission in in September of that deployment Normally in these ads, you expect somebody to ask you to buy something But this is something different I'm Julian Barnes, and I'm a reporter for The New York Times. I'm a national security reporter and that means I'm reporting on military operations. These are fast paced. quQuickly moving situations What exactly is happening on the ground is often shrouded in mystery But we turn to trusted sources, satellite imagery, and expertise built up over years in order to ferret out the facts that wouldn't otherwise come to light. I'm here to ask you to seek out a news source that does firsthand based reporting. If it's your local paper, great. If it's the Times, thank you becausecause where you go for your information matters Hi, I'm Angie Hicks, co founder of Angie. One thing I've learned is that you buy a house, but you make it a home. For decades, Angie's helped millions of homeowners hire skilled pros for the projects that matter. Angie, the one you trust to find the ones you trust. findind a pro for your project at Angie. com H U, really did damage to my reputation I am very fortunate that No one was injured or killed because of that call But what it did kill was my professional reputation. By the time I got back out of that valley, the guys were like, get rid of that guy. Um, they were calling me Rambo Rd which that is not a compliment. know for those who think Rambo is really cool. It's a cool movie. It doesn't apply in the military. It's kind of what we talked about before. There's no room for individualism, especially a leader is made the sins based on his own glory. that was so I wanted to get in the fight and I saw an opportunity I took it And I am very fortunate that no one was killed because of my decision making. So that that started a whole new journey because there were guys who said kick that guy out And and it was the lowest point I've ever hit in my life. I went and had to stand in front of my commanding officer and explain my actions And I'll never forget he there were guys in that room that were like, get rid of this guy. He's going to get people killed And u and My commanding officer told me to go back to my room and he would let me know the next morning what his decision was. And I went back to my room And and I almost killed myself. I put a gun in my mouth And I started to pull the trigger Fortunately, I think God intervening look I just By about the time I did I looked across at the desk and there was a picture of my wife and kids. and you know, just this voice was like, what are you doing You know, what are you doing? What what what impact are you going to leave behind on them? And I remember I put my gun away, I went and sought out spepecial Operations Chaplain and talked to him We talked a lot and he said, no matter what happens, you know, if they take your trident or, if they kick you out, then you know you've got to figure out what the path forward is. But never forget, for every the end moment in your life, there becomes a new beginning. It's up to you what you do with that new beginning. This's a big part of what I talk on. It's a part of my Ted talk that I talk on part of what I speak on. and he was absolutely right. And thankfully, you know, credit to my commanding officer who did not kick me out, even though he absolutely could have. As a matter of fact, I'm actually surprised he didn't. I mean, here's a guy who's grieving from the loss of eleven teammates only a couple months earlier. He didn't get to go home. He didn't get to go to the memorial ceremony. We had to stay and continue the mission So And now he's got this knucklehead Ensign who's making bad calls. I mean, I think it would have been super easy for him to say, I don't have time to deal with this. nor do nor do I have the emotional and ity to deal with this, but he didn't. He said, you know what, Red, you've done some good things I believe in you, I'm going to give you a second chance. And he He did. I mean, there was some there was some punishment that came along with it. They any awards I was supposed to get, they retracted. I had to sign an unofficial letter or reprimand that was held in the commanding officer's safe. and if I had If I had messed up again, that letter would have gone into my permanent officice record, which would ended my career. and I got sent to the US Army Ranger School. which is probably one of the best things that could have happened to me I mean, it's pretty cool. I mean, to learn how to be a ranger and develop all those skills too, but You emerged out of that with a whole new set of leadership skills I did. Ranger School I'd love to tell people that when I walked out of the office in Afghanistan after getting that second chance, I was immediately like, yes, I'm going I'm going to, you know recreate myself, but You know, sometimes in this life, our new beginnings take time. and and, you know, I talk about this victim mindset. I had a little bit of the victim mindset. I was seeing myself as victim that the guys threw me under the bus And I hadn't come to grips yet with, you know, the only person that put himself there was me, my poor decision making and really selfishly viewing looking more at myself and not outward at the team and the mission and the impacts of that. And thankfully it was at Ranger School that I really started to figure that out. You know, kind of interesting side note in Ranger School, Um I screwed up, I failed to land that test and SeLals are a little bit of anomaly. We don't go through Ranger school that often. And you know there's that great professional rivalry between the Army and the Navy. and a lot of the Rangers, I don't think liked me very much. So they let me know it and gave me a lot of grief about being there And when I failed the land out course, man, they laid into me. They I'm sorry, land navigation. This is orienting with a compass to figure out where you're going in the woods in the dark and all that And and the Ranger School of LandAap course is pretty long. You started in the middle of the night. and I had taught LandAap once again, ego and arrogance I thought, I'll cross this course and I didn't. I failed it. I missed a point. and the instructors were totally heckling me and in the moment I allowed my emotions to get the best me and basically told those instructors what I thought of them And they said, Are you quitting? And I said, Yeahah, I'm out of here U It's the only thing I've ever quit in my life and so I had to go meet with the Ranger Colonel. And and the Ranger Ceronel listened And he said, I think you should talk to one of your CL teammates. and I'll be honest, I was utterly ashamed and embarrassed And I was like, I don't want to talk to anyone. you know, I just want to craw under a rock and like, I guess this is the end of my military career And he said, Hey, I'm friends with a the guy's name is Colonel he was Colonel C KHN Th he retired a two star general and I had become friends with him because he really amazing guy, amazing leader. he saved my career And he ended up calling one of our most respected CEO leaders who happened to be a mentor of mine who had helped me get commission. And he put me on the phone with him. and I remember telling him this whole story how, you know I ended up there. and he said, Rhet, I know all about what happened with you. Did you ever think that you're seeing this as punishment. He said, didid you ever think you might learn something from this? And I said No. And then I told him, I sled But sir, no one's ever going to follow me again. I've made too many mistakes. I don't think I can recover from this. And he gave me the foundational level of everything that I teach in leadership. Now he said, Red, people will follow you if you give them a reason to That's it. That's all leadership is. He said, I don't care how bad you've messed up. It's human nature that if someone is on the winning team, if someone is leading a team, a community, a company to success And they're a pretty good person. you know, despite any mistakes they made in their past, it's human nature. we're going to follow them. We want We all want to be on the winning team. He said, so go back to Ranger school, crush it Come back and give the guys a reason to follow you. And I was like, Roger, that, I hung up the phone and I looked at the Ranger Colonel and I said, Will you put me back in my class? And he said, No, you quit You get to go sit in Ranger School Jail for a month and you'll class up with the next class So for a month, I walked around Fort Benning, picking up trash. and it was probably the best thing that ever going to happen to me because it finally humbled me and it gave me a lot of time to think about I was the problem I was the problem, and it was my lack of my own self leadership selfish leadership that put me there and it really changed Every. I created a new, you know, my three rules of leadership that I now teach. and that enabled me to drive forward, graduate Rang of school and slowly over the next couple of years, build back my credibility as a leader. This is what is so extraordinary about our military and some of the leaders who are in it They somehow know when it's time to temper That extreme discipline and harsh unforgiving training with mercy inspiration and encouragement the best leaders do. I mean, that's just a gift. when you have a guy like that above you who knows you and knows what you need in the moment. whether it's a kick in the pants or a left That's I love that story and I love knowing that there are guys like that out there training the next generation of warriors and that you're out there. usings the same skills to help civilians to try to get through just life with some of these lessons they apply across the board. and our military. I mean, I frequently speak to the military. I've been fortunateough to speak almost all the service academies West Point, all you have to is call me. I will come speak for you guys any and it's amazing. It's so beautiful there. You should go I know, I want to. you know, I mean, I speak army. I wear the Ranger tab. I speak army. Yeah, exactly right Thank you for sharing that with me. That's with all of us. That's a very moving story. That could be the most moving story of the exchange we have. I feel like I learned so much already and we haven't even gotten to the, you know apex of everything that you've gone through. I do before we get to your injury and what happened, Can we just spend a minute on Erica because She's a huge part of your story, and we kind of glance by Well, my wife and my kids By the way, when you told me about that moment when you were feeling like you might take your own life stepped in and stopped you. I completely believe that was an angel. That was an angel was sent to you to stop you in the same way I talked to Dakota Meyer last Last Memorial Day And he talked about the same thing back when he got stateside again, though, for him. And he actually tried, he pulled the trigger. he had the gun, pulled the trigger Angel had taken the bullets out of the out of the gun He thought it was loaded which is like I feel like so many of you guys go through these massive travails and emotional traumas, whether it's while you're serving or the build upp to the serving or just you're so hard on yourself And you're so used to being able to do everything at a high level Right then we have a failure. That's when you really get tested. And I just think every once in a while you need an angel to come P And I agree with you that that God plays a role So I'm glad you had I'm glad you had your faith to get you through All right, so Erica, just to rewind now because we're in two thousand five, I think, when you did Army Ranger Sool and you had all that happen to you five years earlier, You'd been out on the town.ere what town were you in this back state side, right Louvill, Kentucky Louisville, Kentucky And you guys were out a bunch of you and you decided that night for whatever reason you're gonna pretend that you were all there as boxers, that you were there for some big boxing match And you see this stunning blonde with a thousand watt smile from across the room And I mean, man, did you woo her? Y lines. I mean, that they they would live in infamy But I just So tell us how you managed to wooe this amazing woman into ha a drink with you U Well, she ditched me at first. so once again, you know, tell me I can't do something. I hung out with the guys a little more and it was a great big place for any of you that are familiar with Louisville, Kentucky. It was the Phoenix Hill Tavern, which is you know, it was a huge warehouse type bar. had like, I don't know, three levels, six or seven bars in it. I had gone upstairs at some point. I looked across the upstairs bar area and she was kind of across the room standing on top of this, I don't know, elevated structure And there was a guy talking to her and she just looked miserable like I wish this guy would leave And I was like, Yes, here's my chance. So I went up and I kind of jumped up on the platform with her and she seemed rather shocked and the guy seemed rather perturbed, but I just kind of ignored him and finally he got the message and left. and I don't know, we just hit it off. There was kind of a natural chemistry that We talked from that point forward through the rest of the night and ended up linking up with her the next day for a barbecue Um which is kind of a funny story because she didn't mention that she had a young son. He was four months old. Um Um six months old at that time And literally we opened the door and she like handsome to me. hereere, hold, awesome. And And and then she's like, Hey, by the way, we have a new grill. So can you put the grill together So so yeah, that was kind of our first date. I put this grill together for barbecue. get them trained early, I like this girl. likeike this is how it's going to be. You're going to help me with my son. You're going to put my grill together And I'm going to do things for you too. So yeah, I remember I read from your book. your opening line was Adam Hi, I'm Jay How you doing Can I buy you a drink crringed by my lack of wit and charm in the weakest pickup line ever. What the hell? that's the best I've got But you know what? That's really all it takes. Any like faux attempt to be overly clever is usually seen right through. So I think, you know, you did the right thing, obviously because it all worked out So you wound up getting married, You married Eriica. and you had Two additional children, two daughters So those are the three kids and the wife and the family that you referenced when the times were tough and She's still with us. I mean, she's still with you and we'll get to all of that, but I love the story of Erica So Now we're post Ranger schoolchool And you got to go back out there. And is this it was what it was May of two thousand seven. that you were deployed to Fallujia, Iraq. And oh my God, can I tell you, Jay Whenever I even hear Falluja brace myself It's just like all the stories are or just Awful. They're terrible Just so many bad things happened there and it just seems like it went so early and it was so incredibly violent and dark and our guys were just overwhelmed time after time and kept fighting and the sacrificing So I It's already a trigger, I think, for A lot of people who covered the news, you know, as I was doing at that time, never mind the guys who actually lived it So you knew going over there at that point High, high levels of danger here, yes Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we the the U, Joco's deployment was two thousand six prior to us operating out of Ramadia and a lot of the guys were operating prior to us. All Fallusa, Ramania and Habanir are the big cities in the Ambar province And u A lot of the fighting had intensified in zero six and zero seven really heavily. The second B battle of You know, a large battle occurred in Blusion of the six The Abar awakening had occurred, so a lot of the local tribal stikakes finally, I think had enough. And whereas before they weren't really cooperating much with the coalition forces, the American government, the American military machine I think finally, they said, if we don't cooperate with them, we're never going to be able to get our country back. So what started to happen was in zero six into ' zero seven, they started feeding us real intelligence which enabled us to really start going after al Qaeda and insurgent leadership. So I will say as SELals, even though we knew it was, you know a high level of danger It also was everything we had ever trained to know U, you know, at the pinnacle of special operations is direct action missions to take out, you know, mid level and high level enemy leaders and then probably hostage rescue type operations. And you know we got exposed to a lot of direct action going to those leaders, but also even at one point trying to rescue an army an arrmy soldier and a Marine. and I just those moments stood out in my mind like how amazing it was I was part of a unit that had trained to the level that these were the things that we could do. So we had a lot of close calls on that deployment, but it also I was with one of the best troops I've ever been a part of It gave me an opportunity to grow as a leader and learn and really put a lot of the new leadership things that I had incorporated in my life, starting in Ranger School alumnus, very intense combat deployment You were second in command Yes Okay. And you'd been over there for quite a few months when, I think it was September rolled around And you were out on such a mission, as you just described, trying to take down this relatively high level leader Um, and you've been given some intel about where you could find him. And you guys moved in. to do exactly that and what happened To make a long story short, we walked into a very well executed ambush. The initial building we took down, they were not there But we found a lot of signs that someone had recently been there while we were collecting intelligence and we had found IED making components and we were going to blow all that stuff up Our snipers saw a bunch of activity on another building about one hundred and fifty yards away. So my boss had me take dt nine members of my team, myself and eight other members, seven seELals and our interpreter And and move on this other building where we had seen individuals come out of the front door and run across the street into this vegetation U What we didn't know was our number one al Qaeda leader for the Abar province. He had been in our original building we were in and he had moved to that building And he had He had about a fifteen man security detail that they had set up an ambush line and the vegetation across the street and those individuals we saw go out the door. were the last part of his security detail that were part of that ambush line. and And my team and I walked, unfortunately right into that ambush. I mean, we were We knew that there was enemy. We had air assets overhead. We had the Air Force AC one hundred and thirty gunship that we were talking to and hey, can you see weapons? They couldn't see anything So you know, and we had seen this before. We weren't just walking blindly. I mean, we had seen cases where the enemy would hide not recognizing you know, the, you know, technology and things like that U So unfortunately, yeah, we walked into a very well executed ambush. My medic was initially hit, taken a aroundound directly below the knee U And then one of our other guys, Matdty ran forward, grabbed our medic, started to drag him back Matie was shot up the right side two rounds in his leg, one in his arm still managed strong enough to pull himself and and loop back to Back to the tire behind us, there was like a large tractor tire, notothing but thousands of yards of empty Iraqi desert. and there was kind of a large John Deere style tractor tire and then there was a tree mayaybe I don't know, ten yards away from that tractor tire and DJ fell back to the tree. Everybody else was behind the tractor. I was still out front at this point. I was trying to lay down fire when both machine guns turned on me and I was stitched across the body armor I took two rounds in the left elbow, which I thought shot my arm off in the moment I took rounds off my gun, rounds off my helmet. I had my left night vision tube shot off. I took rounds off my right side plate. turned to try and move back to the guys and it was at this point that I caught around in the face. It hit me right in front of the ear, traveled through my face exited the right side of my nose, took off most of my nose, blew out my right cheekbone what was left of the cheek, broke and kicked out to the right U The bullet traveled right under my eye, vaporized my orbal floor, broke all the bones above my eye. I fell in this newfound hole in my face, it broke the head of my jaw and shattered my jaw to my chin. and it knocked me out Um, the guys saw me fall and initially thought I was dead Um Thankkfully you know, a tribute to the SEL teams and how we train, we don't leave anybody behind. And they could have easily said, Red's dead, let's continue to try and fall back or whatever we can do But I was, you know, pinned down probably fifteen yards in front of them while this literal gunfight was happening directly over me U and when I came to I realized I was still in this gunfight. I realized that I was totally unable to do anything. and thankfully, my team lead U, Jay who combat experience feel what we call it JTEC. He is trained to coordinate airirstrikes from aircraft to the ground and Jay coordinated and said, hey to the AC one thirty, we need an immediate put in an immediate fire mission. and unfortunately, we were so close. I was only forty five feet from the machine gun that had me pinned down And that's well, well, well within Danger cllose parameters And the gunship said no way we can bring this. We're going to kill you guys if we do. And so they said, hey, you need to figure out a way to fall back. So gunfight went on for another five minutes or so. The entire gunfight lasted at about thirty five to forty minutes Um Jay called for another one. They said, no. on the third attempt, probably after fifteen minutes, he basically said, Hey, look, You know, if you don't bring in this fire mission There's not going to be anybody left. You know, I got people critically wounded We're running out of ammo you have to bring in this fire mission. It was at that point they basically put the onus on him. They made him give his JTAC designator number, meaning the training that our joint tical air controllers go through that basically say, they have the ability to do this job. They understand all the ordinance, they understand all the danger close parameters And they made him read off his JTAag number or give his JTAag number that basically said, you're acknowledging that we may potentially kill you if we bring this strike in And then Jay did an amazing job coordinating that Um I remember him calling out to me incoming And the aircraft flies at a pretty high altitude, you can hear the gun go off and then there's a delay, probably five or six seconds before the rounds hit the ground. And I remember hearing the you know, whompomp whom of the gun up overhead and the enemy was still firing. So machine guns turning away and all of a sudden you know, explosions incurred in front of us and blew up over us And all of a sudden that gun went cold. That machine gun in front of me that had me pinned out went cold and I heard the enemy try it out to Allah Allah Allah Aar And I remember thinking to myself, stand by, man, like here he comes And sure enough next rounds came in which took him out O enemy out, Jay came forward at this point, grabbed me, got me back to the tire, got a tournquet on me. I owe my life to him. And we ended up calling in I think eight or nine more fire missions before we were able to bring in the metabac U you know, to get us out of there Dad That's Jay's full name Um I think it's okay for it to be out there. So Jay Ali Austin. I was with him this weekend and this was a conversation we had. So this is kind of the first time, but he told me he's okay with being out there more before I had not we had not talked about it or I had not given his name But I mean, what it black I owe my life to him. I love that man U and all my teammates. I owe my life to my teammates and that gunship. I mean, you know, people want to say, Oh, you're so tough, you know maybe, but I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for those guys. I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for that gunship up overhead And that's why frustrates me with the military right now with this focus on individualism Like is the team effort. It is Um, all different, you know, it's all of us together from different backgrounds and different demographics and different racace and creeds and all these different things that come together for a very unified mission. In this case, that mission was to make sure that we all came home alive or at a minimum, you know If I had died, they would have brought, you know, hopefully my body home to Erica and the kids. But thankfully, you know, I was able to hang on and they did a great job fighting in that gunship. So U rightfully so, U, the gunship was decorated I don't feel like our guys were decorated enough. I am going to come back around. It's something I've been talking about with them about resubmitting them for award reviews But but I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for those guys Hm We took some hits, obviously, but we didn't lose a single guy and the other guys There was there was no one The enemy leader got away. He got away long before this gunfight ever occurred. They came out in the ambushed. He managed to sneak out the back of the house, but everybody that engaged us There was no one left to go home and talk about it She got to wait but not for long Not for long. Another team ended up about four months later. finishing the job We got him. we got him eventually So you What next thing you know you wake up where. They take you to the hospital. And it's an incredible story. You sort of coming back to consciousness And starting to process what's happened to you Yeah, so they initially normally head injuries go to Balad, but I was so critical they flew me directly to Baghdad., got to Baghdad and I'll be honest, I dont I don't think I thought I was going to make it U But thankfully, you know, and this is a shout out to the amazing military medical teams and the trauma surgeons. A lot of people don't know that the greatest advances in trauma medicine are made in war. and it's incredible. there are a lot of civilian trauma doctors and orthopedic surgeons and all kinds of anesthesiologists that volunteer to go over to the war zone in these dangerous places and literally some of the best and the brightest doctors in the world end up coming and helping to save are wounded and They're so good. I knew that if you made it to the hospital with a pulse, you had a ninety percent chance of making it at home alive. And I hung on to that fact like a lifeline as I flew that metabac helicopter u drifted in and out of consciousness. So I got there, they saved me. I remember waking up and I was so elated to know that I was still alive. I also was fascinated because I thought my arm had been shot off and I remember learning that I still had an arm. gravely damaged later, they would talk about amputating it and they would keep it. But in the beginning, I was I was happy for that And I remember my commanding officer and my command Mk chief were there in the hospital as I woke up And I remember going to talk and I couldn't talk. And the nurse said, hey, you know, Lieutenant, you're you're you're traped, you know, you're you're messed up. yourour wireres shut and you're traked, you're not going to be able to talk. So I said, okay, give me a piece of paper. And I wrote down three questions. I said I said are my guys okay And they told me that Luke and Matt were out of surgery and that they were going to be okay And I said, okay, has my wife been notified? And that's a funny story or kind of a crazy story in itself. but att this point, she had been notified, although My commanding officer did not know my mental state. and that was a real concern of theirs with this head injury. They didn't know the angle of the bullet. They only knew I had been shot in the face. So they didn't know if I did survive what level of mental Did I have a major traumatic brain injury or anything like that So he would later call her after this and let her know I was doing okay. So that was second quest. And the third question, I don't know why I asked this. I said, do I still look pretty And And they told me now until we know that getting shot in the face would probably be an improvement. and it actually was I used to have like a big old Tom Cruise nose. So two facts, Jay and I were actually joking about this that I had a big old Tom Cruise nose that I had broken and I had a deviated septum that right before that deployment I had gone to see about surgery to fix it And they told me I would be down for like two months. I was like, I'll wait till after deployment. And then and then obviously they shot my nose off. So well I got a brand new nose. Thanks So if you've ever wondered about where your tax dollars from Go This one made a difference I have to tell you, I've been looking at you and I've been looking at your before pictures you actually are better looking now. Your nose is obviously a little crooked, but you just look like a little bit more Grizzly. I don't like the long hair and the beard and like the eyebrows, something's working about it. You looked a little bit more clean cut before and this look is a little bit better for like the Navy CL who serve the I'm digging it. so I think I'm sure Erica backs me up on this, but I think you look amaz.. She likes the longer hair and the beard. Thankk you, Megan, Kelly. I appreciate that. Yeah, it's working for you. It's working for you. I mean, there were easier ways of getting there, but yeah you managed to find your way through So can we talk about the time you talk first the first thing you said to Erica when you talked to her because it's sort of to it evidences your mental state. And while some people thought it was a little surprising, it's a great story about how you telegraphed to her, you were fine Yeah. so so I went from Baghdad where they stabilize and save my life to Bilad And then they moved me to Germany. It was in Germany, I had some more stabilization surgeries and one of my teammates flew with me. and obviously I could not talk. So Erica had and I had not talked at all U she was trying to get everything taken care of with the kids and she knew U, they had told her approximately when I would get to Bethesda, so she was trying to get ready for that And so my my teammate Um, who was there with me was like, do you want to call Erica? And I said, yes Let's do this. I said, you know, you talk to her I'll write down what to say to her. And so I don't remember the first couple of things might have been, Hey, babe, I got I'm sure you've heard, I got all banged up. And the second thing I said, but my wang's okay And u and You know, and Military members will fully understand this because, you know, as service members, unfortunately with IEDs and everything else, I mean, that is a fear, you know, obviously And and it was kind of a running joke. So when I told her that it let her know immediately that He's okay. His sense of humor is still intact. U So as is the Wang. So good news on multiple fronts Absolutely. I love this too. This is from from your book Uh, when you when you were talking to Gil who was the one who is answering the questions for you. Your wife has been notified. I spoke to her myself. I try to not. I want to thank him, but the trick of my wire job preclude that Gil then adds in response to your third question. and the guys wanted me to tell you, you never look pretty Great It feels good to be insulted at certain low points in your life. It's actually a pick me up It's one of the great It's one of the things I missed the most now that I'm out of the military, especially in this day and age where like we've created a once again the victim mindset. you know, o my God, if you say this about me, I must be insulted. Even though half the time people say things that are injust. Oh my God, how dare you joke about I don't know, anything Tod U and in the SL teams, there's nothing off limits. I mean, we would poke fun at anything and everything, including when I was injured. I got, I mean, one of the guys showed up in the hospital, I'm wired shut with my face blown out and he showed up with beef jerky. self I mean, that's the type of humor. And I mean, you know, This life is too short to take yourself that seriously and that's I miss that the most. Yeah Yeah, I can see why So you, I mean, we're not going to go through it all, but you did. you thirty nine surgeries Yeah, forty when it's all said and done, although Erica, also known as the long haaired admiral, tells me that the last two don't count because they were kidney stone surgeries, but I'm like, I've had forty surgeries since I was wounded. So I mean, was that I not to ask like another dumb question, but like was that dramatic is Sir like A surgery Of any kind, I've just had C sections, but I mean it's traumatic And just that alone, never mind after a massive injury in a battlefield and you know, the emotional trauma of all that How did you handle that many times in and under the knife? So it's interesting. I mean, you know, I tell people once again A lot of people assume that my battlefield injuries were like the worst thing that ever happened to me, but that failure as a leader, you know, God works in mysterious ways. prepared me to deal with all this adversity that journey back, having to take small incremental steps to build back my credibility and reputation, the leadership lessons that I had built in myself. And when I was in the hospital, I told myself, He hey, man, this this is no different from that journey. now it's a medical journey. I said this medical buds. which Buds is the acronym for seAal training, basasic underwater demolition, seEL training. I said, this is medical Buds You know, you don't have to like it, but you have to do it and we have to go. And I wanted to be operational again. So I knew I had to go through all these surgeries if I even remotely had a chance at doing that U so every surgery, the doctors used to laugh because literally I would be in the post op. And one of my very first questions after they would tell me how the surgery went would be I'd write out. When can we schedule the next one? Let's get it on the schedule now Um, because I wanted to just you know, churn and burn. I wanted to try and recover as quickly as I could, which ended up t, you know, battlefield injuries are really dirty. I had a lot of infection problems. There were a lot of setbacks. I mean it ended up taking almost four years to put me back together Yeah Well, I've gotten ahead of myself because immediately post the massive injury before the thirty nine forty surgeries I'm kind of with Eric. I don't think we can call the I they wereen count the stones. Um, you Posted the infamous sign. The sign, the famous sign, not infamous. That kindot something bad Um And that's how You came to be so memorable my own life hearing that story after meeting you when your face was still pretty banged up was just incredible. I mean, it was just a true inspiration to me as a human and it's inspired countless of numbers of others since then So just set the stage for we're going to read it, but just set the stage for where you were And what made you realize You needed to post a sign like the one we're going to discuss. So I'd probably only been in the hospital about a week. I would seven days give or take. And I will admit I struggled a little bit in the beginning. I think there's this big spike of elation like I survived. And then the reality kind of set in that I am really messed up. Doctors were telling me it was going to be months to put at a minimum Um, or Let me rephrase that, doctors were telling me it was going to be years to put me back together whereas I thought it'd only take a few months The prognosis was not good. My elbow was totally destroyed. I had no use in my left hand. There was massive nerve damage. Obviously the massive amount of damage to my face U and I just, u I was kind of struggling. I felt like a monster Um, you know, I was really scared beforefore I saw Erica the first time, I was really scared. She is a rock star. That's how she earned her name the long haired Admiral and she didn't bat an eye. so I had her, but I was kind of struggling with where do I go from here? How do I overcome this? You know pain and I'm disfigured, I felt like I'd be a monster for the rest of my life. And u And I had some individuals that came into the room and we had a short conversation and then I guess I maybe was drifting off and they were talking amongst themselves. And if any of you have been in that, you know in between awake And you're not quite asleep. You can still hear twilightounds the TV's. Yeah And I caught bits and pieces of their conversation And u And I don't I don't fault them. There are some people that are like, how rude? How how could they have that conversation in your room Military hospital is a really hard place to be during a time of war. There are young men and women that are blown apart, missing limbs, traumatic brain injuries. It is very overwhelming to see this many young people And they were there and I think they were caught up in this And they started having a conversation about what a shame, what a pity. We send these young men and women off to war and they come home broken and battered and they'll never be the same. And then they left and Erica had gone down to get a cup of coffee or something. So I was in my room by myself just thinking about this. It kind of woke me up and was I was both angry and Like, is that going to be me? Am I going be this A Broken veteran. Um, you know, that is never successful again. amm I going to be like Lieutenant Dan from the movie Forst Gum? you know, to to getgin into the movie hookers and booz, Lieutenant Dan not Not you've got new legs, Lieutenant Dan And u I wrestled with it for a few minutes and then I went back to everything that I had been through And what I try to explain to people is that The victim mindset focuses on the negativity it focuses on it's unfair, you know, I'm never going to be better. We focus on the immediate here and now not recognizing that the greatest gift you have in this life is you have a choice. No one forces you to lay there and feel sorry for yourself. I don't care what situation you're in. As long as your brain is still working You have free will and you have the ability to decide how you're going to handle this situation, no matter how bad and uncomfortable and unpleasant it may be And it was in that moment when Erica walked back into the room, I said never again, That is never gonna happen again. From this point forward, I will never feel sorry for myself again. and I will not allow anybody else to come in this room and feel sorry for me And I asked her for my pen and paper and I wrote out this sign And it set attention to all who enter here If you're coming in this room with sadness or sorrow Go elsewhere. The wounds I receive, I got a job that I love, doing it for people that I love, defending the freedom of a country I deeply love I will make a full recovery. What is full, That's the absolute utmost Pysically, I have the ability to recover it and I'm going to push that. about twenty percent further through sheer mental tenacity This room you're about to enter is a room of fun, optimism, and intense rapid regp If you were not prepared for that And we signed it to management. and the original sign was put on a regular piece of paper that I'd been writing on. But later Erica went and bought a lar that large orange red piece of poster paper and we transcribed it word for word, put it on the door A teammate tact has tried an end it and a New York firefighter wrote a blog about it and it went viral. It went all over the place, It was all over the news T date, you know, it has been written about it in multiple books. Secretary Robert Gates wrote about it. First Lady Michelle Obama wrote about it twice in her book Becoming Michelle sent me a handwritten note on how much it moved her And it is now Itir me an invitation to the White House to meet President Bush who signed it and we had it framed and dedicated. I didn't feel like it was mine. I felt like it belonged to the hospital and the other wounded warriors. and it now hangs in Walter Reed in the middle of the wounded Ward and continues to motivate and inspire other wounded wriars now it's been amazing. I mean, I don't know. hundreds of thousands of people who have written me and said, Hey, I put your sign on the door. I have cancer. I've been injured or my kid has been injured or my kid has cancer. you know, thank you So You just never know the power of positivity and choosing to drive poward despite the hardship and adversity we face and that's what that sign is. People will follow if you give them something to follow. He like who knew? Who knew that maybe your most important role in these conflicts would be helping severely wounded guysuys coming back No hope understand that there was a way out began with attitude and the decisions about how you'd handle what happened to you who would have access to you and This your most vulnerable time Right? I mean, I'm sure we have no idea the number of peopleeople you've helped, even outside the military, as you point out, people in cancer ws say who read that message and remind themselves I have a choice here and the choice I make really could be the difference between life and death It really could Well, and to lift up those around you, that was one of my big goals. Like I wanted to set the example for my kids. I wanted to set the example for Erica. I wanted to set the example for other wounded warriors around me Um And I think that's such a powerful thing because you can't We may not be able to change the situation we're in Um You know, we've got to navigate through that. We've got to navigate through the pain and the misery and all the things that were. but we we definitely can exange, we can be What I like to say it's one of the shirts we created, be the light in the darkness, Be the light. you know, in those dark times U so many people are waiting for someone else to come save them or someone else to help them, will you do it You know, you do it, you be the life man And it'll help. It helps with your mindset. You know, you start pouring some positivity into yourself. It's amazing how much it makes an impact. You may not I try to explain to people, that's part of the overcome mindset And you may not be able to get back what you lost I meanet so many people who that's what their focus is. like I want back my health or I want back my relationship or I want back my business or whatever it is I've lost. And that may not be the case but a willingness to drive forward you're going to take that DN moment and create a new beginning I read in your book about how it was when you saw Erica for the first time post injury And it was actually kind of shocking because you were writing about how unfortunately, there are a lot of cases where the wife or the girlfriend comes in and sees the severely injured soldier pieces right out of there I mean, that's horrifying So there was, you know, in the back of your head some concern, you know, given how badly injured you were in the face and so on. and obviously what was going to be ahead of you guys. Is she going to stick with me And Erica was solid the long haired admiral came through. She came through a huge It wasn't a thing. But I know you were worried about. You said, dont don't bring the kids right away. Like I don't I don't want them to see me like this. So how was it? Because obviously when you first saw your kids, you didn't look like you look now. you definitely looked closer to right after the injuries. So how did they handle that Good and a lot of that, I got to attribute to you, you know, Eric and I were really locked on. I mean, I think that's one of the as a couple, your ability to be unified in your decision making and, you know, her and I discussed, how would we handle this U, you know, it's been something that's been a common theme throughout our marriage U so much so ninety nine percent of first off seLals have almost a ninety percent divorce rate. spepecial operations pretty close. Wow, guysuys who are wounded have almost a ninety nine percent It's just very hard on families to to sustain these type of injuries And Eric and I talked, Okaykay, well how are we going to manage this? One of the things we said and we were fortunate enough to have family to help, we weren't going to change the kids' schedules. The kids schedules were going to stay the same. We had family that came in. if they had dance and soccer and school, they were going to be there U So they would be home. Erica stayed up at the hospital on the weekends, family would bring not in the beginning. I didn't see the kids for probably three weeks. And there were several things that I told I said I wanted One, I was really U someome of the original pictures are not out there I think if you dig deep enough, there's some surgical journals that have pictures of me in it. but My head swelled almost to like the size of a basketball U I look pretty grotesque U you know, stitches just stretched on my face and I told Erica, I didn't want the kids to see me until they had done some more surgeries and some of the swelling had gone down And I was in, you know, ICU at the beginning. I also did not want them to come into the room I wanted to walk into the room where the kids were. I wanted it to be like a family room and I wanted to walk in. So that was my goal to get well enough and strong enough that I could get up and walk into the room. So that took about three weeks U And then the other thing Erica was super smart She u she knew the kids wanted different toys that they had talked about. I mean it's now September So she went and you know, normally they would have had to wait till Christmas, but she went and bought My son wanted a Um and Nintendo DS one of the girls wanted a baby doll I can't remember what the other what Sierra wanted But u But Erica went and bought those things for them and then had me give them to them in the room that I walked into with them. So And I tell you what, that I learned over the next couple of years, people often talk about unconditional love. and I think you can build unconditional love with your spouse, but You learn what unconditional love is through your children. Your children have unconditional love for their parents, especially when they're young. You are their world And Even though I looked messed up, my kids love me. and there was a lot of healing that occurred over those couple of years, especially with my youngest daughter because my My middle daughter and my son, they went back to school by the time I got home, but my youngest, she was only three So she was home with me and she became and I had not been around her whole life And she became my little buddy. She would climb into bed with me as I recovered and we'd watch cartoons and And man, I think that was very healing for me. I needed that because I was so worried about would my kids be afraid of me and the way I look. And you know, they just, I'll never forget. I went to pick my kids up at school one day and my daughter was like five she in kindergarten. somebody was like, what happened to your dad And my daughter, matter of fact, is like, he got shot off he got all shot up. He's fine. You know, I mean just a standard dghter of a five year old Yeah You know, especially when they're young They have that healing power and there is something almost angelic about them in moments And I really believe it's like Someone said it to me this way and it madeakes sense Closer to the other side. than we are They're still closer to the other side And I think they still have that Helo effect. around them and on us is something sort of magical about really young kids when you're down, you're blue You're struggling And I'm so glad that was you're so lucky to have your three year old with you during those moments. I'm sure she was a healing balb The rock star Erica too. those are all great stories about her. And I'm so glad thank God, this doesn't end with And she just left. You're still together. You're still right? The family's still intact Yeah, I mean, I got to, I mean in such a credit to her, you know, she became my best nurse even though I had nurse in home nurses in between surgeries, you know, for the first eight or nine months, I was a mess. I'm in a wheelchair. I've got metal hardware coming out of my arm, what's called an external fixator. I was traached for seven months and two days. They're feeding me through a stompach tube Erica was doing those things. She was helping to clean my trick. She's drying up meds and grinding up food so that I could eat And I recognized the burden. I mean, I became like a fourth child to her to take care of me. And and I'm just so thankful how strong she was because never once did she ever say Why did you do this to us? Why did you pick this job that, you know, that this happened? because that would have been devastating U And if she thought it she never said it.. So man, she is a leader in herself and we're an amazing team I Re excited right now. We are working on we're almost on with a relationship book called Invincible Marriage becausecause it's a question some people have. How did you do it? You guys made it through a special operations career, You made it through wounding. We've run a business together. We've had business failures together. We have three amazing kids U, you know, so yeah, I'm really excited to get that book out there and hopefully help others, you know, build a strong invincible marriage also Oh my gosh, you both are welcome on the show when it hits. I would love to help you promote that I feel like everybody will buy that. That's such a great. I mean, think of how we tell ourselves, we outside of your marriage, tell ourselves, Oh, this is really hard. Oh, he didn't empty the dishwasher. Oh, it's annoying. You know, he didn't show me enough emotional availability. This is what, you know, you hear My God If you don't even understand what the challenges are, I had no idea about the divorce rate amongst the wounded. I want to ask you in the time we have left be remiss if I skipped. the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan because everyveryone who served there like yourself had some thoughts on it and some had some real trauma Um when we when it happened and just sort of the abandonment of it off the translators, you mentioned that was one of the guys with you in Iraq when you got hurt How did you process that whole thing Well, I got involved as much as I could. I think I think that's going to be viewed and in my opinion probably one of the greatest failures. I think the way we withdrew from Iraq was poorly done, which in my opinion directly led to the creation of ISIS in Iraq. Um and then we repeated the exact same thing except that I exponential scale in Afghanistan. and In Afghanistan, I think we had done so much of a better job, you know, helping the people, there were so many people that had embraced this newfound freedom apart from the rule of the Taliban I mean, there were women in leadership positition. There were women in political positions. There were women leaders in the military. Commerce was starting to grow and thrive in Afghanistan again And we had basically convinced these people like, hey, a free Democratic Afghanistan is a real thing and Um, Yeah, when we pulled out of there in the way that we did, I mean, just just I I don't understand I mean I mean You can't tell me that there weren't senior political leaders who are saying this is not going to end well why we didn't maintain forces in Bogam. We knew Bogram, Bogram was protected. how did we ever agree to allow the Tiban to provide some level of security How did we ever you know, who in their right mind allowed this to occur with you know, American citizens that were left behind. I mean trying to get people in the Karsi airport. That's how I got involved. Lieutenant Colonel Scott Mann had created a group to try and help. He wanted to get his interpreter out and there were a lot of special operations guys, Chad Robenshaw, Tim Kennedy, a lot of these guys did amazing things. and I ended up working with Scott.