Cleared Hot - Powered By BRCC - Tim Kennedy - Fear, Challenges, and Resilience

Episode Date: June 10, 2024

Tim Kennedy is a US Army Green Berets and Special Forces sniper, former UFC fighter, and serial entrepreneur. Join us as we dive into Tim's philosophy on facing fear, embracing challenges, and the importance of preparedness in every aspect of life. Hear about his experiences in multiple combat deployments, his time as a professional MMA fighter, and his work with Save Our Allies, where he helped save nearly 17,000 lives during the evacuation in Kabul. Tim's entrepreneurial spirit shines through as he discusses founding Sheepdog Response, his mentorship program Apogee Strong, and his bestselling book, "Scars and Stripes." From intense combat stories to the rigorous training regimen of elite warriors, Tim offers a no-holds-barred look into the mindset needed to thrive in high-stakes environments. Wolf 21- Check out what they have to offer for the best sleep of your life: https://www.thewolf21.com Use Code: "clearedhot" for 30% off of your 1st order The Speed of War Comic Series: https://www.thespeedofwar.com/ Check out the newest Cleared Hot Gear here: https://shop.clearedhotpodcast.com/  

Holy smokes, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. I am straight off the plane from France. What an amazing trip. On that note, you may have noticed there's no Friday episode. I have one recorded. Internet connectivity kicked my ass a little bit and timing. So this week, there's going to be a Monday episode, a Wednesday episode, and a Friday episode. Before I get into who is today's guest, let's talk about the sponsor and why I was in Normandy in the first place. That's right, black rifle coffee.com. What an amazing brand. They spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to bring veterans back to hollowed ground from World War II on the 80th anniversary of D-Day. And we did a jump into a battery. We went to Omaha Beach. We went to the American cemetery there. We went to

a variety of towns that were key in the invasion, in liberation of France. And it was amazing. I think it was the last thing on my bucket list. So even though I'm looking at their website right now, and it says there's a father's day sale. You can use code, Dad 30, click on it if you want to. You can go look at all their coffee roasts. They're a pair of their gear, coffee bundles, coffee samplers, all of those things. Yeah, let's assume that you have a coffee low bird in your life.

your dad's a fan of it get him some coffee but don't do it because it's good coffee and do it because they're good people and it's an amazing fucking brand and I couldn't be more thankful of the trip I just went on while on this trip I finally was able to wrangle Mr. Timothy Kennedy

for an episode I don't know how to describe him he is an a fictionalto of violence is UFC fighter born and raised actually She, not too far from where I was, just a little bit south down in the Paso Robles area. Different path in mine, for sure, with the Army, Green Beret route, variety of schools, mutual friends that he served with at the same time. The number of people that we know from the Special Operations community overlapping is unbelievable.

He does amazing things. And we sat down while we were just off the beach in France. and asked him a few things. So let's just get into that. And then there's a Wednesday episode, and then there's Friday. Episode number 339 with Timothy Kennedy. Enjoy. I'm looking at danger close now.

Oh, one a minute. You know what time it is? It is five. You're supposed to plot your cool watch. Oh, it's inside. It's still wet. I can run and go grab it. No.

I missed the opportunity. God damn it. Not that we have anything to do with these watches. They're just awesome. They're just awesome. Why have you been avoiding coming on the show for years? Let's just open with the easy ones. Yeah.

I mean, frankly, I don't like you. I don't like spending time with you. And now that we've been trapped in a house as... In Perry? Yeah, as roommates. It's become clear and evident that that position was well-founded. Is there any cooler house than the one that we have? No, we got the coolest house.

We have the coolest house. We have the coolest crew. In France. Yeah. It's that berm right there that we can see on the other side of that is the Atlantic Ocean of Normandy. That's pretty freaking cool. Do you think that if World War II is going to happen again, that we still have the young men and women with the sack to do it again?

Do you think we still have it? I think every generation asks this question. And yeah, we do. I think so, too. And not even am I hesitating and saying yes. You know, like I think the guys coming back from World War I, you know, like coming back from the hell that was that war, trench warfare. You know, like they're crushing dudes with their helmets and, you know, like full on charges into machine gun fire. That was the first war that they could kill at scale.

You know, or like the machine that is the war machine had been truly coming around the corner. of perfection. And those guys came back hurting. And then they're like, though, you guys can never handle war. You bunch of sissies. You little, you know, you're poor. That's the worst thing you got going on right now is you're struggling through the depression. What do you think the suicide rate was after World War I? Do you know if they've collected data on that? I don't think they have. And if they did, they would be higher or lower than the 22, which I don't necessarily agree with that number because of how they gathered the data. It was a really incomplete data set over a short period of time. You think it would be higher or lower though? I could be

similar. I feel like for some reason it would be lower and I don't have any data to support that. I don't think they were necessarily that harder, but I think life was harder. So I think you're right there. Well, if life was harder and they were just used to that, would the experience of war have less of an impact on them? them. Because if life is easy, I mean, you have the experience of war, and you come back to easy, does that scramble your eggs more? Man, yeah, so when when baseline of trauma is fighting for your existence and baseline is here. Maybe I don't have enough calories for today. Yeah, like we might starve to death, you know? And maybe my entire family of six, which also is a good

idea, maybe not to have six kids in that era, but who am I to judge how you live your life? Well, half of them died in the first three years of their life. So, like, you had to have six. That would fuck me up more than war. Your own children dying because of malnourishment and your inability, not because of lack of trying to provide basic necessities. And by no means I'm my proponent of any of the current forms of medicine. But the 1910 to 1920, 1930 level of medicine, you had kids not just dying of starvation,

but of like some pretty basic health problems. Yeah, penicillin is pretty good It's pretty handy Vitamin I, bupropin Is pretty good sometimes Not that you ever probably took that when you were fighting Yeah, I do think we have it There's a lot of people to include myself

Sometimes if I'm being honest That we'll talk shit about the younger generation Mostly because I have kids And they deserve it sometimes I... One of my favorite conversations When I was at Bud's instructors we would sit there and look at the students and say,

did our instructors think about us the same way we're thinking about this? And they absolutely did. I think so, too. And that's why I think we're going to be okay. I don't want to see our world press that way, but I do think if there was a draft, which, was it you saying that we're... Oh, we can't talk about that data. Why?

The IRR stuff? Yeah. All right, send it. I don't even know what that means. I'm not active duty. I can stay at all. I want you to give you trouble. Well, we'll whisper it to me and that I'll say it.

Okay, we're the closest that we've ever been to activating groups within the IRS to come back into service without any, without wanting to. And would this be to meet baseline criteria for military manning? Yes. Like strategic level, uh, crisis mode right now in staffing. When you have like general population of Americans and three quarters of them aren't eligible for service, your population of available candidates to just fill jobs is greatly reduced. But then when you start looking at guys like you that go into special

operations, that that is selected from what should be this larger pool. Yeah, it's a subset of the bigger pool. Yeah, and as those pools start shrinking, it gets really tiny when you start looking at, like, do we have enough people to select for seal training? And then you're like, nope, we do not. We don't have enough pilots. We don't have enough nuclear engineers. We don't have enough infantry. We don't have enough range. Well, Rangers are like the only people because. Marines. Marines are the only military branch that has hit their recruiting numbers over the last 10 years. They got great uniforms. God, dude. They also have the best of, uh, uh, a spriticor that I've seen.

Yeah. Once a Marine, always a Marine. You can pick him out because it's a red car. Trucker, probably, Corvette. In the modern area, it used to be a Mustang. But yeah, Navy is, Navy is hurting.

I think the Navy's been under 25%. Navy at large. I think the Seal Pipeline is still doing okay, but yeah, what you're talking about, that cascading effect. And then the Army, I think, has been under, Air Force has been under,

and I don't even know how Space Force on the special operation side in the Army you know we're talking to Command Surgeon Major yesterday and you know you heard him he's like we're shuddering team rooms you know we're like talking ghosting

a fuel like a company here's the problem though nobody understands what that means until you need that room full of people and they're not there yeah and not just bodies not just sacks of human blood sitting in a room but talented trained, equipped, prepared professionals of violence.

And that takes time. I was going to say, I think the last stat I saw, it was one year 300 people got their trident, 301 people got out. And if you're looking at that on paper, like, okay, that's a net loss of one person until you multiply the experience and the time. And then you need to sit there and go, oh, shit.

Like, it's cool that we have the bodies. And I actually think one of the healthiest things, I forget what we were, I was on one of the panels that we did. And I didn't have the chance to say it because somebody else was making a really good point, but I was thinking about, I don't know if it was in between resiliency or talking about suicide or moving on and not being defined by your job. I think it's very healthy for people to remember that they have an expiration date and everything that they're doing.

Yeah. That the military is going to replace you. You're so replaced. But if you don't remember that or if you think that you're not. Like I didn't lift my head up a little bit. from metaphorical perspective and think about after the military until I got hurt. And then I was like, okay, this is the first time I've ever had to think about not being able to do my job. Maybe I need to consider other options. I don't know what it would have looked like had I not gotten hurt.

I would have, well, I know what I would have done. Just gas pedal fuck into the floor until the wheels come off. Yeah, until I wake up in a rubber room one day and wonder what happened and try to find somebody to blame and then look in the mirror and be like, hey, dickhead. Yeah. knowing that you're replaceable is super healthy it's hard on the ego though and that's good though it's almost everything in life I think should be hard on the ego

yeah it should but we want I want an 18 Bravo that's gonna look at that wall right there and be like I can run through that you know and he can but he needs to think that he can but there's a there's opening over there is an opening there there is an opening there do you want an 18 Bravo that would run through the wall or stop and be like, hey, or do you need both? We need both.

You have to have both. You have to have a dumb guy like me that's going to be like, yeah, I'll run through that wall and kill everything on the other side of it. You don't take those rangers just up the beach here at Point the Hawk. We're like, yeah, I can climb that, you know? Or that, that, they hop over the side, the MG 33, not the 240 sound of t-t-da-t-t-t-t-t-tit-t-tit-t. It seems like he has twice the cyclant.

It is. What is that thing Huckin? 7-6-2s? Yeah. At that rate of fire? What would have been your move? You're the first guy on the ladder, Point to Hawk. Yeah, I just find like a fat guy.

No, I mean, like, you're the first guy up. And I had never been there. This was probably the last place on my bucket list to be able to see all these places. Tomorrow, we'll check it off when we go to Omaha and the American Cemetery. I had heard of Point to Hawk, obviously a much deeper in steep tradition

in the Ranger lineage in history, which I didn't come from. You went to Ranger School, right? Yeah, but that's not the history of the Ranger Regiment. I understand that. I'm just saying, I told you about this. We used to send people for DUIs. Yeah, yeah, whatever, you know?

I always make a very clear distinction. I feel like you're baiting me. I'm like, you're baiting me. It's like, yeah, yeah. I don't understand. I'm a Ranger. Point to Hawk is mine. I have, you went to Ranger School. Yeah, yeah. Ranger School.

I'm not saying that you went to a Ranger Battalion. I explained the difference between the tab and the scroll to you. Take him. Yeah. Which is wild that I know the difference between that. Probably because I fucked it up in front of a Ranger and he corrected me. but I knew about that. I mean, our lineage, or my lineage,

I think it would have been the Scouts and Raiders before the UDT probably did some obstacle clearance, some... Not probably, they absolutely did. Hydro reconnaissance, right? But it's like hinterland to the water. So point to Hawking and be like, hey, I don't maybe drive your boat up that chain. I'm not going up that shit. It was, I mean, I'm looking down right where that monument is.

And just looking over the sides. And there are some areas. where it's like you have a little bit of deflade and it's scooped out. But if you lift your head up, for me to that fence was the beginning of a German pillbox. 10 meters? That's what I'm saying. So what's your move? Ranger Kennedy is number

one up the ladder. Do you just switch over to your 1911 and a grenade and get some or do you get a couple buddies? Like what do you do? Yeah. Like, speed surprise, violence, of action. Like, we learned that from the Nazis in the Blitzkrieg. I don't think there's any other way.

The frightening part about that whole entire assault was the 48 hours that they had to fight without reinforcements. Yeah. You know, they're trying to take two batteries, like 155 meter guns, millimeter guns, that one of them is pointed at the beach. Yeah. Like, you don't take those, everybody's going to die. And the terrain, it couldn't have been, like the oscillations, the little bit, and there was grass, and of course, just overlapping field of fire by reinforced concrete bunkers. Dudes running around in gray uniforms. system there too, right? Yeah, that's right. Jesus. Yeah. It's a nightmare. Yeah, two days. Have you, were you ever in a tactical situation? Because I was thinking about this too.

They were there for two days unsupported, but they literally had their backup against a wall. I mean, they couldn't maneuver. I don't think I ever got into a tactical situation where we could not have maneuvered. Their back was against the ocean. So really they had hold the line or move forward. Yeah, like soon to in the art of war, like rule number one, don't do that. And those guys were like, we have no choice, we have to. I think the stats were 200 and it was either 250 and 275 went up. 225 went up. And 90 continued.

So the rest weren't all killed, but it was either a combination. 70% casualty rate. Yeah. Amongst the Rangers that climbed point to Hawk. And casualty, it's not just dead. It's your battle ineffective. Yeah, combat ineffective essentially. It's wild, man.

I stood there and it was like. Yeah. It wasn't the wind, take my breath. You and I have no problem talking. You're better at it than me. But I was a loss for words. I stood there and I just couldn't imagine. I still can't.

I was talking about it today. So today we were at St. Mary Glee. That's right. And Jack was asking me questions about just being here. Every place we've been so far, but I can't stop myself thinking about it from a tactical perspective. Yeah.

Like the dude on the roof at the church. Who, for people who don't know the story, do we know how he was injured? Was it flak? So when he parachuted out and got hung up on the church, I think it was from hitting the church. I mean, but then he played dead. Yeah, played dead. They eventually cut him down. He was captured.

Atscapeed four hours later, which is the move for anybody who's ever been captured. need to get out of there quickly before they can formulate a plan. And then, and then continued to fight and kill, kill, completed the war. And wasn't that the same guy

that came back and married one of the daughters from that area? From the mayor's daughter. God bless him. Yep, there's a street named after him. So five jumps in airborne school. Yeah. Jump number six.

I was in holding pattern to go to Special Forces selection. I had just finished that course, Sopsy, and you have to stay current as a jumper. And we went and jumped at St. Mayor. My jump number six was as a SWIC student at St. Mayor. Where was their actual drop zone supposed to be? Because I feel like they didn't intentionally drop them over the church. They did. Yeah. All of those few. So the city wasn't the size that it is now. Okay. It makes Like if the church is like the epicenter and everything's kind of built around that,

you had two blocks in every direction. So like there and the goal, because St. Mayor is the closest city between the port of Sherberg and- Which is where we are now. Yep. And the beaches where everybody was, like if you didn't take that city, you're screwed because that is one, the egress for retreat and that is also the reinforcement routes. to the beaches. These, and, you know, these are, like, rooted American, like, being stationed at Fort Bragg

for so long. Like, I heard these stories, like, and some of them were like, the fish was this big, because it's just been generations of troopers. Maybe the fish was that big. It might have been. Yeah. With these dudes, you probably was. You walked down some of these streets.

Yeah, I stole a line from you today. I'm like, yeah, they threw their balls over their shoulder and then got after it. I mean, who knows? I mean, that guy could have gotten injured on the flight. when their plane was eating flack. I mean, if the choice is you burn to death or explode in the airplane or jump out over a city, I'm going to at least go out over the city.

As we've been, I've been overwhelmed by the French appreciation. Yeah. You know, every time that, especially when we're in uniform, people are just coming up and thanking us. And then when we walked off the drop zone, you know, carrying our parachute. Yeah.

You can hear them applauding us when we exited the aircraft. The moment I got under Canada. I know it felt uncomfortable by that. It was weird. Because we were larping. Yeah. We were larfing.

We had to admit it. We larked yesterday. Total cosplay. You more so than most, you had full face paint and a mohawk under that hat right now, which I deeply appreciate. This bad boy right here.

But yeah, we had to come to grips of the fact that we were larping. You're still actually in the military, so for me it was hardcore larking. I could not be more proud of, cause playing the greatest generation. You know, if imitation is the best form of compliment,

then, I mean, I will imitate the things that these men did. Well, how many French men and women did you see in American uniforms? They're everywhere. Everywhere. Most of them. I'm talking full, like, airborne with helmet and, like, camouflage face paint on. All, I mean, some of those outfits are a thousand euro to get all that stuff together. And they're spending their money to pay tribute.

and honor and recognize the sacrifice of Americans that liberated them. Do you think we will ever have a celebration of anything we did in our time in military like it's happening over here? No. I don't think so either. No. Like the, what? The Battle of Vermont, Fallujah, Sauter City, you know, the Erzgan Valley.

You know, when we won Bogram, the time that we took back Anaconda, what's the celebration here? I mean, it might be cool if we went to Baghdad. and Iraqis were wearing like AOR1 camo. There's Matt. He's cooking you guys sausages, right? Yeah. Matt's cooking us sausages. That's Matt best in the background.

But like Iraqis are wearing like AOR1 and bump helmets. They're cosplaying us. It'd be cool. I don't know if it would be. This is not going to happen. I think they would be v-bitted. It's terrible. I mean, what does that say, though?

What does that say about what we dedicated years of our life too. I mean, the best years of our life. You know, like our youth was lost there. We didn't liberate any countries. I think, depending on who you are

or how you thought about it, you might have been able, if you did some mental geometry, you might have been able to get yourself to a place that said you were going to liberate a country. I never thought about that. So I can only speak for me.

I never thought about what we were doing is liberating a country. It's more like going to a place where we needed to be to stop this spread of, of what I consider it to be evil. Yeah, same. So I don't know.

Maybe there shouldn't be any expectation of it, but I have talked to a few older French people on this trip. They expressed to me concerned that the younger generations have less of a connection to the day. Yeah. And it means less to them, which I think that's natural too. And I think that's happening in the U.S. as well with our cohorts time period and service.

Yeah. some of the boomer generation of French people. They're like their parents. Aren't we boomers? We are boomers, yeah. No, no, we're Generation X. Our parents are boomers. Okay.

So if you can't work a cell phone, you're a boomer. That's right. Okay. Cell phones came in at the end of them. Cell phones came in at the beginning of ours. I still remember mine. The flip screen with the pull the teeth on the little inside. I didn't call anybody the first months because I only had 60 minutes.

Yeah. And they rolled over. So the next month they had 120 minutes. But three weekends. Yeah. People are like, that's weird. If you're like having unlimited data, like, no, motherfucker. You're counting your message.

You're like, A, three times. C, they go down to. Anyways, I was about to spell a bad word for you guys. Just use your imagination. Yeah. But those, what would be the grandparents, looked up in the sky. And they saw canopies for the first time.

of their lives. They've never been told about it. They've never read about it. It's never been in any book. I never thought about that. They, they saw something that had never been done before and their, their parents never told them about it. They had never, friends that never, is not in any book. It's not in any movie. It's not ever. Like, it's commonplace. Like you're, you know, super famous Goddiver. What these people saw was something that they'd never seen before or heard ever existed. And they looked up and they saw green canopies and Americans coming down with M1 and Thompson's tucked underneath their arms and they started slaying everybody in a gray suit. We have the Germans thought when they looked up.

Nine! Nine! You know? I mean, at some point math comes into this. I mean, D-Day was planned the way that it was. And it's not like they planned that invasion thinking, like, hey, this is going to go awesome. It was math. Like, we're going to throw numbers at this. At some point, I mean, I haven't been to Omaha.

We're going to go there tomorrow. But again, I'll view it from a tactical perspective. At some point, as the people defending that, you have to realize you can't stop it. Then what do you do? Well, like the British did at Dunkirk, they try to strategically retreat, regroup, and reposition. And that is where, you know, the enemy of your enemy is your friend. And that's where the Russians came into play. Because as the Eastern Front was the Russians were just there, you want to talk about,

numbers as they're just throwing bodies. We'll take one gun for every three guys. Third guy, just pick up the gun from the two dudes in front of you because they'll be dead. Similar strategy to you, Craig. Yeah. Not a whole lot of seems to have changed. No, it's working. Yeah. It's a battle of attrition. What, uh, so you've been here a couple times. What's, what's your, I was going to say your favorite, but maybe that's not the best way to describe it. What's the most memorable location for you? How many times you've been here? One every time has been different. I wasn't here for the 75th anniversary. And so and now at the 80th, you can feel the War II veterans that are here are rock stars. Like it's as if how crazy was yesterday.

Yeah. How do you even describe that? I mean, so there was two World War II veterans. One legitimately carried a fucking flame thrower. on Iwo Jima, 75 pounds, he said you get six squirts. That's not a good weight to squirt ratio. Well, I mean, I similarly have a six squirt max, and it's about 75 pounds. All right, I'm going to leave that one there for other people to dissect their way through. But, so he went Iwajima. Then I think he came over to Europe, right?

And at your re-enlistment, there was the Vietnam veteran, the Pacific Theater veteran, and the WW2 European theater veteran. Yeah, that's the guy I talked to the most. Which one? The World War II European veteran. Yes. This was his first time back. Wow. Oh, no, I'm sorry.

It was the Pacific Theater guy's first time here. Okay. The other one said he had been back more times than he could count, and he loves or loved 99. first off the guy asked for a glass of wine to begin with like sir you get it out of the fuck you want dude this hilarious i walk up i'm like sir would you like do something to drink he's like yes like would you like uh water beer wine uh liquor and he's like um the wine i'm like all right do you want white or red he's like how much do you want he goes yeah i'd give that like just tell me one to stop. And when you're done with that, I will give you more. He was flirting with all the girls.

He's 100 years old. I know. She, he was shown a picture from him tandeming last year. I can't, I mean, there's a zero percent chance at the 90th anniversary. Any of those guys will be alive. All of them are close. Even if you came in at 18 or lied about your age, you're in your late 90s right now. That's what I was going to say that you can feel on this one and specifically with those guys. And I think other people recognize that this is maybe their last chance to see these guys. Now, but they got mobbed. Like how would you even I mean, we had to do crowd

control. We were, we had jumped. LARPed. You know, for life a better job. And selected tactically advantageous terrain, both high ground and shade, dominated with numbers, pushed everybody to the side. And

these two men are wheelchered in. And I don't think people noticed until that I think they were a couple that was singing. dress as American servicemen. Yeah. There's a man and a woman singing in French, which honestly, that was cool too, watching people like swing dance and they'd switch back and forth

between like French and English. They said something, I'm assuming, because I speak zero French, something along the lines of there are two living veterans that are over on the other side of this, we'll call it the grassy knoll. Yeah. And it got wild. You had, you Sergeant Major a little bit. Yeah.

You got your, uh, your Sergeant Major hat on and yelled at the crowd. Well, I mean, it's so sweet that though the French people were so overwhelmed with emotion and excitement. Yeah. They just wanted to walk up, touch them, and say thank you. And they're obviously like the French distance, like personal space thing isn't like Americans. Proximity comfort? Yeah, yeah. So, and then mixed in with the excitement of motion, they just started overwhelming, you know, these 100-year-old men.

men and uh one that's amazing but two yeah i had to use the nCO voice yeah but how cool is it we had to erect like caution tape barriers and then have people standing in between that and the number and i heard the same thing because sarah recruited me to stand in one of those positions and light people on fire with my eyes um the number of they all opened with the same thing it Thank you so much. Fuck, man. I mean, honestly, it's like you're choking back tears just listening to the talk and express gratitude. I hope that we don't ever lose that, man.

I also wish that people who younger, I'm going to make a broad statement, so it's probably going to be inaccurate to a degree, but the younger people who, I don't know why they are saying this, and maybe they're being coached or taught that are saying that the United States sucks, for lack of a better term, or it's founded upon bad principles, or it's, it's, founded upon bad principles, or it is oppressive in nature, they should be forced to listen to those people express their gratitude for risking everything to liberate a country that they may never go back to.

That to me is the most impactful expression of what it means to be a U.S. service member. The level of patriotism by a random French person on the northern coast of France is a thousand X than any student. I guess, well,

we got some patriotic people. I mean, you live in what I'm going to call relatively patriotic state. Montana, too. No. I think it really... There's still bastions of freedom

in Montana and Texas. I really think they're losing miles per gallon on the number of flags flying from some of these trucks. It's like, hey, man, you're really, you're committed.

I like that. But you're also knocking off like five MPG. They don't care. Yeah. Every building in St. Mringley's,

had a flag on it. More than I've ever seen in the U.S. They had banners going back and forth. I mean, it was so freaking cool. So cool. Have you been to the American Cemetery? I have. I don't know if I'm looking forward to that or it's just going to be horrendous to see that marker of loss of life. Like that is probably the last thing on my bucket list is seeing that. Yeah. There's one that just there's one cross and inscribed in the stone of that cross is that one cross represents those that were never recovered. And they don't, you know,

they've assigned a number to that and it's their best guess. And that one gets you. Because you see thousands of crosses and then there's one that's separate from all of them. And it's just like, we don't know how many people this cross represents. These are the ones that we know. This is the one that we don't. And that one just, I'm not ruining it because I want you to read it.

Yeah. And it's succinct. It's heming ways to the point. Brevity is key. And it is impactful. It knocks you on your ass. Yep. I just stand there, sit there and stare at that thing and try to breathe.

Yeah, it's a wild place. I think so far my favorite has been the reaction to those veterans. Yeah. Jack Carr posted a video of, I believe it was, a high school. It's like 4,000 high school age kids with the, I think he stopped counting at like five to eight minutes of the standing ovation. Fuck, man. I feel like that's how I should enter every room. to lighten it up a little bit.

Why'd you realize? It's Matt. Just laughs in that background. Because he knows. He knows you're a dumbass. Yeah. Let's be clear. I was trying to talk you out of it up until the moment.

Then you made me stand there like an asshole and hold the flag up for you. Which is not a request you can fucking say no to. It was General George. the chief of the army there was the sergeant major of the army and General Donahue and were flanked by every veteran of every war

since World War II, the Korean War Vietnam War and then we had branches of service that from all branches of service that fought in GWAT. That was what standing there when and I'm sitting there with a mohawk and a filthy 13 face paint.

Let's be honest, you could not have been farther out of regs and not a single comment was made about it. No, there was one by the SMA, by the search major. He said, you look rad. And I was like, okay, that's what I mean. That's what I'm talking about. Yeah. That's what I'm saying. Like, that's a positive comment. Yeah. Nobody was like, hey,

you know, this is going to be like publicized and we're going to need you to be in uniform or you can't have that on your face. Yeah. I was kind of watching the forestry. I was like, oh, I got on. Yeah. I need to see him seat him for the first time. It was like water hitting Teflon. He could get shit. No. I think he gets, first of all, the current command of the Army right now, when you look at the staff of General George, there were a bunch of unit dudes up there. I mean, all of those guys are soft. The current Sergeant Major of the Army is one of the most elite soldiers on the Army NCO side that we have ever had in the history. Where did you come from in the Army? Was he a Ranger guy or SF guy? Yes, yes. And a unit guy. What unit, Tim? What do you mean? He was at Bragg.

What does that mean? And then took every single. And then he took every single job in that unit all the way up to, you know, squadron and then unit, and then goes over to special operations, CSM positions. And that's our current SMA. The dude's just like a rock star. He's all the things. to answer the question of why.

Like, my greatest fear is to be a hypocrite, I think. That's what keeps you up at night? Yeah. To my kids, you know, the dad do as I say, not as I do. You know, like, hey, son, you should get to practice as he's sitting there drinking a beer with a fat belly. You know, like, eat healthy, work hard. and they look like they're fucking melted candle wax.

Yeah. Yeah. You want a good job. Sky's the limit for you. Just keep dreaming. And the dude's like a failure and everything. So should we tell kids that the sky's the limit? If.

Would have they're dumb. No. Then yeah, no. I mean, let's be honest. We're not all created this. No, and we're not. And I do want people to dream. But if you tell somebody who's a retard.

And I don't mean like from a medical perspective, I mean, they're just sucking at life. And you tell them they can be anything. The human condition, you know, with, if eugenics is a thing and, you know, Hitler's right, then, you know, we can start pruning. Just for clarity, that was Tim Kennedy that said that. I did not. I preface says this.

These are questions. If the idea that we can select the... You should have to create the perfect human. Yeah. The most optimal human being. But you may. on the beauty of the human condition, which is the Beethoven.

The guy's death, he has diseases, they think he's an idiot. Einstein couldn't speak until he was five. They thought that that guy was an absolute idiot. Meanwhile, he was probably figuring out theoretical physics at that age

and just didn't want to waste this time talking with warrants. He's five. Yeah. Not putting real sentences together until he's effectively in second grade. and one of the smartest guys to walk face the planet. And that's this human thing

where you, I know that you've seen it at Buds where like there's no way that that guy's gonna make it and then that perfect like Greek, Adonis looking dude is the first to quit and you see this little like skin and bones tough as nails guy that just you can't get to the quitter in him.

I even tell people that if we were allowed to bet on the students, as instructors, I would be broke. You would back the show pony. Yep. And then they go run to go have lunch and show pony doesn't come back. Yeah. What, dude?

Yeah. I just bet my whole month's paycheck on you. God damn it. No. I was 150 pounds when I grew. Actually, I gained weight in buds. I was 150 pounds when I joined. Navy boot camp is a, it's a bizarre experience.

I learned to march and fold my underwear and like a knife cutting edge and align it with my t-shirts. I also was not interested in the traditional naval knowledge that they were teaching, so I was very focused on something else. Maybe it was 155 when I started Buds. I gained weight in seal training. That's pretty rad. I just think I had the most access to food I had a while.

I gained weight in Ranger School. Yeah. But I mean, like I was the skinny little bean pole. Nobody ever was going to look at me like, that dude's a specimen. Yeah. More often than not, they'd be like, hey, does your mom know you're here?

Because I know the instructors would ask me that. Yeah, you're a child. Because I was having this guy in my class, yeah. And they're like, but... How old were you? 18. That's wild. In third phase, we were almost getting ready to finish training. One of the

instructors came up to me, he goes, hey, are you in this class? I'm like, fuck, yeah, dude, I did my job. Great man. Yeah. He legitimately, he's like, I've never seen you before. Are you in this class? And he's like, I'm like, I'm like, yeah, instructor gets here as I'm here. Yes, I'm allowed to be here.

I'm totally allowed to be here like three weeks away from graduation. I'm like, yes, mission accomplished. Now, you couldn't have, my God, such a motley clue in my class. Our owner man is still in jail for killing people. Not on the job. He and his wife lured a couple back to their apartment and killed him, cut him to pieces with the Spider-Co. He used to work at grocery stores, so he put pieces of their bodies in the grocery store dumpsters. You like this.

They're a real Jason and Janet Bourne couple. They got rolled up in the parking lot of a hooters in the middle of the night, stealing t-shirts and then upon further inspection the identification cards of the people that they had killed were in her purse the spider co that had flesh and hair still in the serrated edges yeah we had a guy real thinkers there real yeah real thinkers though I think in five years I'm gonna try to get them on the episode just be like so uh ben you want to walk me through that one Looking back, he was a little touched. Yeah.

Yeah. Honor man. Wow. We, yeah, man, we had some, we had a guy who eventually did get kicked out for not being able to. I don't even know if he earned his Trident, but he was one of those people. How do that's the best way to describe this. His mental aptitude was at a place where you were not going to break him or make him quit. But he wouldn't be suited for a special.

Be if you know what I mean. Yeah. But you're not making them quit. Yeah. And then we had to do more comp- People think you come out of Bud's as Seale. You don't know shit at the end of that. You need 18 months of training to be up to speed.

And he really struggled with that. But we had, God, an absolute motley crew of people that they send us all to Fort Bragg right after that for Basic Airborne. You need those, though. You do. But you can't all be like that. No. Yeah.

Yeah. No, I have told people so many times that they would be so underwhelmed, specifically from the physical stature of most. They're just, they look like normal people. Yes, they're easier to spot once you know what most of them. Like, I can spot a team guy from a mile away from clothing. You can probably spot an Army dude or an SF dude a mile away from what they were wearing. Even today, when we're walking around and you're like, reintroducing yourself or people are coming up to you. I'm like, okay, yeah, it's soft package Alpha, soft package Bravo attired. Yeah. Like you can get it.

What's hard to, if people were to line up, though, it's like the horsepower they have between the ears. Dude, I worked with some smart people. I worked with people who's so much more creative than I was and the solutions that they came up with. Like, fuck, man. How does your brain work like that? Yeah.

I just, a friend, he created these online personas that. Like Tinder? Kind of. And they're like, think Twitter accounts on the black web. Oh, God. And he would go as posing as a terrorist of a competing terrorist organization and pick fights with. He was trolling terrorist organizations? Yeah, as in terrorists, and then have those terrorists go meet up to fight each other over things and then like drop bombs on them.

It's the coolest thing. And he's like, I would have thought of that. He's the, I would never, I'm too dumb to figure out how to create an account. I was going to say, I don't know how to use, I can use Google, but I don't know how to use the black web. Unless there's a Google on the black web. What, uh, I cut you up. Why'd you re-enlist? You didn't want to be a hypocrite. And, uh, I talk about all often in all the podcasts, in my book and about, about how important services, how important selfless service is and how important it is to be part of things and contribute to things that are bigger and greater than yourself.

And I feel like we're living in an era where people are lacking purpose, direction, and motivation. And I do believe that the military is one of the greatest places to build a leader. And I have no real skill. I have the only leadership I know I've been given by the military. and I don't want to be a hypocrite. I wanted to... Why do you think people shit on military service so much? Like when I...

This came up on the... Was it the second... Yeah, it was the second panel we did talking about better ways to describe military service. And I was talking about the post that I would put up. Like, if I was a social media manager for a day, $160,000 degree and you're slinging latte is at Starbucks with your Pollyside degree.

Not that I know that's... That's what it costs, but I feel like it's expensive. We're four years in military, access to the GI Bill, a vocational skill that you can probably roll into a six-figure job. You understand at least at a baseline level, like hard work, communication, how to be on time, how to plan, how to do your job. But it's shit upon. It's as if it's as if it's a last option for people that have no other choice in life.

And for me, it was my first choice. First choice for me. Yeah. Yeah. I had, I mean, full of disclosure, I wasn't ready at 18. to go into an unsupervised environment of college where they would have just kept giving me free money that I couldn't write off if I had declared bankruptcy,

which I certainly would have at some point. That would have been a recipe for failure for me, but that's the piece that I wish people understood. It doesn't have to be a last option. It should be a first. And I couldn't agree with you more. I don't pity them, but man, when I walk into, or you open your phone now on like Instagram

or Twitter or any of those social media apps. And you see this person, like I'm working two jobs trying to pay off my $65,000 student loan debt. That's on the low end of what I see. Yeah. And both of the jobs that I'm working, I can't even afford to exist right now. Like, I can't even afford my bills. And then I'm looking at a 22-year-old that is leaving the service with no debt.

He gets to go to college for free. Yep. And he's making like insane money as a welder. Yeah. You know, he's making $200 an hour welding that he learned to do in the Army. Yeah. And he gets to go to school for free while he's just cashing in checks, you know, making $100,000 a year the day he graduates the Army. Why don't they tell that story?

I don't think the Army or the military has ever been good at communicating what, it does well, well. Maybe we should let other people do it for them then. You know, maybe hand off that to, I don't know. God, I mean, like, honestly, like, the military recruiting can just be stories of people who are successful post-military. Like, every week, just dedicate a week to pick a random person who got out of the military, you know, from the officer's side, so-and-so is now the CEO of a Fortune 500 company.

And how did he get there? what did you do after leaving service? Just think about some of our friends. We'll start with Gavin, right? Yeah. The guy goes from 5-11 to what? Before that was Panda Express, I think. Was it Pepsi?

Yeah. And then comes to Black Rifle. And then go like, you know, off to the next Evan Hafer, here, Jared Taylor, Matt Best, you. Yeah. I would not put myself in that list. I would absolutely put that. I don't a coffee shop, Tim. Evan started a coffee company.

Yeah, the nicest coffee shop on the planet. Do you know what that means? I know how to sign my name on a check. You know, that's all that means. Well, you also know how to balance a checkbook, which is more than the last two generations. Fuck. You could take a week, one person for a week,

and you just rotate through the services, a little blurb on what they did while they were in, and the rest of the week is what they're doing since they've been out. That's all the recruiting that the military would need to do. What did you take from what you learned, and how did you apply it to the rest of your life? You would run out of, there's no way you're going to run out of stories. And I think, I mean, it doesn't really tell the war fighting nature of it,

so you have to have a balance, I guess. Because I wouldn't, I mean, pre-9-11, when I came in, there was a lot of people who joined because they were viewing it as a socioeconomic elevation out of their situation. Free college hated the environment they grew up with in, piece of shit parents were like, I'm out of here. Yeah. And it worked wonders for them.

Post 9-11, you know, I don't think anybody was joined. specifically for the educational benefits, just given what was going on around the world. And I think you have to be prepared for that. Even though I think a lot of what's going on currently, the last stat I saw is like special operations are in 60 countries right now, you with the sustained presence or they're operating.

So I don't think it'd be forgotten. But I think if you, if they could develop a mechanism to tell those stories, I mean, maybe they wouldn't have people knocking down the doors, but I think it would make an impact. Yeah. I mean, you're gonna talk to Joan Donagher, you tomorrow maybe uh maybe uh you're coming too well i mean but you're you're making that suggestion might be well more well received okay yeah you should i could not agree i mean i'm gonna take

all of his talking points and not mention a single one and every time he tries to direct the conversation in that way i'm gonna bring up something else yeah the uh first time i was is a saturday afternoon in fayetteville north Carolina. And I know he had already been traveling abroad that week, came back. He was, I think he was currently commanded the 8th second airborne. He was the, what's the drag? The huge airborne larger than the 82nd that's at Fort Bragg. He was like, asking the wrong person. I know. It was like a three-star general spot. Yeah. And he'd just been hammered schedule-wise that whole entire week leading up to it.

And then we're there on Saturday. We're doing a mental health suicide prevention panel. And he came in, stays for the panel, contributes, stays for the breakout meetings. He ended up standing for like four hours on his day off after he'd been traveling abroad to a bunch of pretty terrible places and then came back to the command role

where he's working like 16-hour days. And then on his day off, sits there for, half the day trying to address why he has soldiers killing themselves. And that was the first time that I was like, this is a leader. And it's a real problem. Yeah. You think it's solvable? Yep.

I don't. Well, you're dumb. I know. And you're negative. Yes. And tell me more. Listen, positive, Annie. This is how it's going to work.

It's not solvable because it is. It is solvable. No, it's a human condition more than a military condition. Okay. So. I think we can make an impact. Obesity is a human condition that has come in the past 25 years. Sure.

So can, is that a solvable thing? Worldwide? Just in America. No. What? Have you? Yeah. Lasiness.

Yeah. You put me, well, I think it's food. It's entitlement. It's laziness. Lasiness, absolutely. Yeah. So culturally, there has to be like, conceptually it's solvable.

In practicality or in practice, I think it's not. Yeah. Because people have free will. Yeah, until I take Matt Best, and I give him a cattle prod, and he just starts walking into every fat person's house. And if he finds something inside the refrigerator, then he's just like, bach!

So let me see if I can unpack this properly. And your plan... We violate a few consequences. I was going to say, yeah, so he's trespassing and just going through people... And torturing people. Yeah. I think you might run into a few policy issues there.

I'm not an expert in the law, but it's easy to say that. Here's the thing. You know the deal. Hard work is hard. There is a very large cohort of people that develop an allergic reaction to that. They will work hard with direct oversight, but if the direct oversight isn't there, they don't work as hard. So I don't think you could get obesity to zero.

You could make a difference, much like in suicide. I would love to say we could get people to a place where they're not going to end their life. And my thoughts on suicide and why people from our community specifically suffer from a high suicide rate have changed. Based off the conversations I've had with people post-military that I never had with them when I was in. Did you guys ever sit around and talk about your upbringing? No. I didn't either. But I've had those conversations with people since I've been out.

And I don't, I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on this. The number of people that I served with that I didn't know came from fucked up childhoods is surprisingly high. So they're bringing that initial trauma with them. You add to the military, the military experience. You heard me say this the other day. I think if you touch war, it touches you back. But that doesn't have to be negative. I personally feel like I am a substantially better person because of my experience.

I truly think I can love at a deeper level. I think I have a greater appreciation for the smaller things. I don't think I have a very high or low emotional range, but I do, I think I can feel the highs and lows better because of that. But I also won the genetic lottery with my parents. They were fantastic. But the number of people I didn't know at the time, but do now know that came, I will just describe it as a traumatic upbringing, whatever that may be. You layer on top of that the requirement of doing what they asked us to do, which yes, I get that's voluntary. And towards the end of when I was in, at least in 2013, they were making more of an emphasis on working your way

proactively through those things, like getting help talking to people, all the traditional things. But if you never dealt with the trauma that happened before you came in, and then you layer other trauma on top of that, I mean, is it really that surprising that people get to a point where they snap? And I don't know how you fix fucked up childhoods.

You're right? That's one of the things that drives me nuts about. I think you and I definitely should. share this passion and hatred for people that prey on others. And I wouldn't just fucking destroy them. I hate bullies. And you can feel it too. You can just see it. Like, okay.

I watched you yesterday. That bully was like moving in front of people. And then he like pushes that girl out of the way. And you're just standing there like with those laser beam eyes as one of the BRCC staff guys is thinking that he's going to be able to handle this. And I was, I mean, I just

you were about to wear that guy's skin. As soon as he went up and bowed up on him and took the glasses off, I'm like, that's strike one. Like, I'm not going to get up yet. And I'm just watching him for like pre-violence indicators. He never bawled his fist up. He never moved any closer, which to me is largely the indication

of somebody who doesn't actually want any. But like, if he had to balled his fist up, I would have gotten up. And I would have just put my hand. I mean, I would have been gentle, ish. But he would have just gotten a nice little just gently. Gently. Gently to the ground. But

I mean, so probably the number one dude who impacted my steel career, his name was Dave Hall. I mean, in my first platoon, he was like sniper, point man, calm guy, free fall, just like, fuck you Dave. Fuck everything about you. But also, could you write down all the steps you took because I need to do this? Yeah, yeah. And like, like the type of tactician that we got, we did a lot of our, uh, you know, fire maneuver tactics out in an island up in the chocolate mountains in the desert. And, you know, there's knowing a tactic and then there's knowing why you do a tactic and where it came from and where we learned the lessons.

And like, this motherfucker dude was a student of history, military history. Like, God, we would sit down. He would be like, this is where this comes from. This is why we do this. This is variations. I'm just like, who are you? Like, this is fucking amazing. God, I love those guys.

Yeah. Ended up doing. Got it. I think he, I think, yeah, he did it. 20, a lot of time at a organization that you may get attached to in your career, leave it at that you're talking to on the phone right now, which is a very singleton job and came back, ended up contracting for them on their selection course. And God, I think it was three years ago, put a Glock 19 in his mouth. And there were alcohol issues there that I knew they were

present even in our first platoon we drank fucking hard. I mean it was pre-9-11 too. Not that that's really a reason to drink harder but people were I think a little bit more loose because it's like what are we gonna wake up tomorrow and go on top? No. No we're not. Yeah. No we're in Guam. So yeah we're not gonna go on the big mish but dig into his childhood sister had killed himself or herself when he was young. Yeah. Not the best relationship with his parents. You know, join the military as an escape from that. Um, the things that he was asked to do inside of the military, you know, being alone for a long period of time at that particular command doing those particular things in super high stress, high conflict areas.

Divorce in there somewhere. Um, I didn't know it at the time, but he had essentially lost his career due to drinking. And, uh, you know, I'd never had the chance. You know, I'd never had the chance to talk with him about it. But he was the guy, like, he held the standard. Like, you always knew what the standard was because he would tell you what it was. And if you came in, 0.01% shy of that, it's your ass. Yeah, get out.

It's your fucking ass. He, in his own writings of what he left behind, essentially couldn't live up to his own standard. And, you know, they found him surrounded by beer cans. Yeah. guy who came to check the gas of all things at the house. God. It's like, I don't know how you stop that. I mean, there's fucking decades of trauma there.

Yeah, but you also listed a bunch of, you know, negative steps. There's all these little things that... What I left out of that, though, is he deep... So he pursued pretty deeply from what I can tell the non-traditional, psychedelic, very powerful, drugs. He's one of the few people I know that it had no impact on. Like almost everybody, I know they come back and they're not the same person in a good way for a period of time.

I know a few guys who have gone and they stopped drinking for six months or a year. And again, in what he left behind three days. Well, that's very abnormal. That's what I'm saying. So, like, there may be like some genetic stuff going on there as well. But, I mean, that's an example of somebody who brought a lot with them before. going into the military and that's you know the the veteran suicide epidemic i'm not so sure it's directly tied to military service i think there's i think if we brought in the lens a little bit

we might find that some of those people are bringing that stuff with them it might be the military stuff that's snapping the straw yeah but i don't know i don't know how you solved that man and the it is the military uh and it might be that the military that the military and it might be that the is attracting a specific group of people that have traumas in their background. So this is what I've, another thing I've thought of. You, let's say you were picked on, like you just had a piece of shit stepfather. Used to beat the fuck out of you. What would be the one thing that you would want to do?

Never let that happen to somebody else. Oh, here's a machine gun. It's your job to go find people that want to prey on others. Oh, you're really good at this. You seem really interested in this. You know, like, why, of course you would. Imagine being given that opportunity to stop that from cascading down. I think the issue is, in no point in time in that, unless you're proactive,

are you actually dealing with what drove you there in the first place? And that's one of the ways that I want people to realize that they can start dealing with it. You know, that healthy elements of people's lives, like small coping mechanism, Like drinking. Like not drinking. Oh, sorry. That's what I meant. Yeah, the other way. Drugs. Yeah, no, no drugs. Gambling. No, no, no gambling. Hookers, blow. Don't, no hookers, no all of the opposites. So like, you know, this is the SF template I've just given you. That's right. Yes. We have not been great at providing the whole human, the kind of like human optimization approach to the individual. And, you know, like making sure.

that they're, okay, no, you don't have to be at the gym at five o'clock doing some stupid-ass army workout. You can do, here's some great programming designed by some of the greatest athletes on the planet. Pick your poison. Here's a variety of ones that we think are great for your job. This is what, you walk into a chow hall right now. This is another thing that General George and the Sergeant Major of the Army, Wyoming are addressing, like you walk into a chow hall right now. There's poison. There's the worst food imaginable. You know, you go to that fast service counter, there's nothing up there that it's good for you. You walk over to the salad bar. That's not real salad. There's no nutrition there. Is that a cost thing, do you think,

or just efficiency? It's both. That's all going away. All those child halls are going to be changed. So now we're providing them with real nutrition, but teaching them what real nutrition looks like when, you know, we see byproducts of old habits of energy drinks and tobacco as like just the way to get through these long days that we're currently going through right now. What was your average ripets on target? So I have been really disciplined. One, I was an athlete when I was in the military. Yeah.

So how you were able to do that still fucking blows my mind. I didn't use any energy drinks. I used no tobacco. I feel like you would test positive for cocaine if you drank a ripet. It'd be like meth and cocaine. Is that what you'd feel like when you drink a ripet? No, I don't know. We'd stop at like, hey, guys, we're, we're.

at the set point that you just hear, like, you have like three minutes. You better hurry that. The ROP. And don't stop on it either. Last cover concealed. I'm not joking. Yeah, I'm like, all right, man,

whatever floats your boat. Okay, so you didn't take any of those. But every one of the, in showing, this is why I think we could make a difference is because we, from diet to exercise, to alcohol, to gambling, to monogamy, to finances. to gorgeous jaw lines like that. Look at the jawline on him.

He's backlit. Do you have pants on? Yes, I do. Okay. The camera angle, I think, is... But we can't see your legs. You see his legs? He was fast on the beach.

Do you see him running? He had the window to his back. Well, he did have the wind of his back, but... You did. But his back is so sculpted, it's like a sail. Yeah, he was fast. we give and it's going to be incremental changes

but you start providing each of those tools to and those that are with death by suicide that are dying by suicide they're young 17, 25 years old that's like pre prefrontal cortex

being finished forming they haven't been not all the ways to live to deal with trauma. They came with trauma. Now they've been given more trauma. Now they don't have the other additional. I think you time differently too. Short-term stuff seems like forever.

Yeah. I mean, remember shitty days when you're 17 and you're like, this is life. Like that's actually just... This is the end of the world. She broke up with me. It's actually just the afternoon. Yeah.

And she sucked anyways, man. She wasn't good at it. Easy to say now. But like, looking back at that, yeah, you were like, no one's ever lived like this. Two hours later, like, what was I pissed about before? But you got to make it through that two hours. Yeah.

Do you ever, do you ever go to counseling? I, which marriage counseling. Yeah. This is, this is, we've been married 19 years this September, and this is new. Did you go because things were falling apart? Are you going to check up under the hood before they did? Death kind of, like, things have been really, really good. Yeah.

It was, I think complacency kills. Yeah. And when, you know, like when you've had like great back-to-back missions consecutively and then just the wheels come off on the next one. Yeah, you think you're unstoppable and then you get your shit pushed in. Right.

Man, Homeboy didn't change his batteries because like he's just been the hot shit on all these targets. And then, you know, his nods, the worst sound of the world as that thing powers down. And you're like, the worst sound of the world from somebody from personal experience is when your nods hit the floor because you didn't put him on right.

Yeah, and then one of the tubes doesn't work. I don't recommend that to anybody. Don't do that. That happened on my first target ever. Whoa. Ever. First time I did like an offset infill. I had no idea where we were going during the Conop brief as they're going through like,

hey, here's, this is where we dropped off, this is going to be our asthma, this is how long we're moving from, like you're supposed to be paying attention and taking notes and, and like, you're supposed to be paying attention and taking notes and, like, you're going to be, you're going to be, you're going, and, you're like dropping all those pins into your GPS. I did none of those things, and I was the guy that was just following the dude in front of me. Like the most, like ineffective, useless, brand new. You get away with it sometimes, though. Yeah. Until you can't. Until you can't.

Then you're Jessica Lynch. You're like, please come save me. Fuck. Yeah. So you went to marriage counseling. What about personal counseling? No. have you found the marriage counseling be helpful yeah i can't advocate enough for people so i was

married previously for 19 years and 11 months we tried a few times i wish we would have tried more but i also wish we would have gone when the waters were smooth yeah instead of uh what is it's not a tornado in the water what is it hurricane cyclone one of those things we just mentioned yeah But you're in a boat. Yeah, we unpack things that I recognize that there are things that I realize that I'm a lot sometimes. You know, there's a lot of energy. You just now realize that? I do.

I'm just acknowledging that, you know, there's a lot of energy. You're just repeating what the therapist said to you, right? There's a way. There's definitely ripples on the outside of this boat that I'm like, let's go and like all the time. Your boat's more like rectangular plowing its way to. than like those racing ones that they do crew in. Yep. Like I'm a pontoon boat with like huge gigantic engines,

just wrecking everything. So like being self-aware, being sitting on the other side of a person that I've spent a lot of my adult life with and having that perspective be given back to me and then have an intermediary. Intermediary? Intermediary.

That is then taking the things that she says, which is a beautiful perspective and then giving it back to me in like, like intellectually. And I found that really useful and insightful and be like, man, there was a whole bunch of things that like I could be better at. But also recognizing like here's things that I'm good at and I should, in the sustains and improves category, like, man, I'm going to keep working on these things because like these things are awesome. She likes those things. And she, like, I had no idea. She like thought that way about me about this thing.

So like, it's only probably because she told you like a thousand times and you weren't. listening. At least. It's not easy when you're dumb, man. And, uh, like emotional, emotional intelligence is like a whole other level of thing. And like emotional intelligence to dealing with a woman who doesn't even like speak the same language. Like, I don't know what there's, what's wrong with them. But they don't speak English. Again, I would like to clarify who made that something. It's not me. They use words, but like they're not words that mean that mean anything. I'm like, what are you talking about? Like, this makes no sense. I think they're more emotional creatures than we are.

Yeah. Yeah. And I think that drives some of the communication from time to time. Yeah. I think marriage counseling, you know, you can drive your car until the engine light comes on or you can take it in a regular interval and just check under the hood. And somebody could say, hey, like that flywheel or hose is getting ready to burst. You can do something about it.

It doesn't, I mean, my experience with that at least was you can identify problems. Putting in the work afterwards is where it can be difficult. The rubber meat in the road. So never went and saw a personal counsel though. How come? I have a lot of great friends. Like I think on this trip, walking back with you and Matt from Point to Hawk, like, I was talking, you know, Matt, just, man, I miss war.

And I was like, I miss war too, like pretty bad. And then we were talking about things about it. And, you know, like we were just today. you, me, your wife, dove, we're out on the beach in Normandy, doing a little workout, hopping in the water, cold water, going for like a little cold water immersion. That is counseling. That is therapy. And I'm doing it there with like people that I profoundly respect. I do have a real difficult time sitting across from somebody that I don't know. And they're trying to speak into my life. Like I have no rapport with them. I have no respect for them. You have a, they have a degree on a wall that I definitely don't care.

about. I can't remember you said you've never tried. I'm smarter than them. Of course. You know. You're saying all these things, but you've never given it a shot. And again, I'm not like, I don't think counseling fits because everything. I didn't go see, and I don't even know what the guy, I have never seen a counselor about

any of my military experience. I wouldn't talk to somebody for my fucking divorce. Yeah. Holy shit. What we did in the military was very easy. Comparatively. Yeah, I don't want anything to. Are these doves sandals?

No, these are mine. for years? I don't think so. These are his. I'm not. I said if he could take him from me, they could be his. If he could beat you. How is he just randomly wearing dude? He was laying on the couch and they were at the bottom of the base of the couch and I walked over, put them on in front of him and walked away while making eye contact. He's just like, what's happening right now? This is awesome. This was such a great trip. I can't, I'm not, I'm looking forward to tomorrow morning. I'm not looking forward at waking up at 3.m. But I'm looking forward to sitting. on Omaha Beach at sunrise.

I agree with you that even that, for me, is a form of counseling because of the shared backgrounds of everybody. But how do guys do that? One of the things I've noticed, guys will get out and geographically isolate and not necessarily intentionally, but they go back to where they were from.

You know, it's like I'm going back to Kentucky and I have no idea why I chose that state, but they don't have those people anymore. Yeah. Like in that role, I think you might have to try to sit down one because I do agree with you like the guy I was talking to going through my divorce had never been in the military and like but do we never talked about anything military related I was just like hey I'm not sure I'm a good enough person to be a father because

that's what I'm being told like am I fucked up is that fucked up how do you find your true north and all this stuff yeah in it like I think every Wednesday for almost two years I talk it was telehealth because it was the middle of COVID but he certainly didn't have the background that I did. He was not divorced himself. Not had not gone through any of the things that I was talking to him about, but the act of trying to understand

how my brain worked and identify ways where I can interrupt my own thought process, because in the end of it, it's like, dude, you're your own worst enemy. Like somebody's telling you something, that doesn't mean you have to latch onto the idea and make it your reality. But if you don't know how to interrupt that cycle, the next thing you know you're

fucking spiraling the bowl and looking at the Glock 19, like it's the solution. to your problems, you know. It was not easy by any stretch, but helpful, for sure. And I mean, if you're isolated for guys, they get out and they leave the community, I mean, dudes are horrible. I mean, when we're on these trips, you know, hang it all the time. But other than that, it's like, I might talk to you every six months.

Or send you a text, be like, hey, I think you're stupid. Which is literally the entire subject matter of the text. Your skydiving sucks. I just watched that video. You're the one who sends me the videos. What do you think? I'm like, I'm looking for positive feedback. Not like you're just to dunk.

There isn't any. There's none to be given. You can find like one good thing to compliment me on. You don't have to be like, you flare too early, you flared too much. Man, then letting down. I got it. Do you want to be better or do you want to be mediocre? I do want to be better.

All right? I mean, sure. I'm sure your shoes were tied appropriately. Like, fine. Just give me any character. Let's just go off that assumption. I'm just going to critique you if you send me specifically skydiving videos. Anything else I'll leave you alone.

PCP. Praise. Critique praise. payment like the drug. Nope. Like, where are we going with this? I have to talk to millennials and Gen Z's is in that order. Yeah.

Man, really love what you did in the office today coming in like that. Looking fantastic. All right, moving on. You are a pile of dog shape. Yeah, you're sucking a donkey's cock right now. But the way that you do it is not terrible. And here's ways that you could do it better. And last, does that work?

It helps. Okay. So it's possible. That's the number one thing I get talking with companies. They ask me about the term millennials is usually what they use, but I think that's going to time out pretty quickly. It's timed out. So what's the generation before them?

Z, why? Gen Z is now. So millennials are after us. Yep. And then Gen Zs are after millennials. And we're back to gen Alpha's. Okay. So yeah.

So Gen Alpha's are born right now. Like, like, how do I connect with this person? And it's like what you said, you have to take the time from the leader to figure out. I mean, the hammer works great if it's nail time. Yeah. The people you're talking to are not nails. No. No, they're pancakes.

And if you hit them with a hammer, they're going to splatter everywhere. I was a nail. And I got the hammer. And that was. I was also a nail, and I needed the hammer. Many times. Nope. Who've heard over again.

But it's possible. You just have to take the time to figure out what it is that makes them tick. Yeah. That takes time, though. Yeah. But they feel appreciated, they feel valued. Yeah. And both those generations need to feel that they're important and they're contributing. They have to understand the reason why.

You and I, it's like, hey, go take that hill, kill everybody that's on top of it. And we're like, let's go. And we're off. I put some stuff in a, like, a satchel first. I would load of backpack. Now it's like the reason why that hill is important is because of this. And the reason why it's important for you to help us take it is because you are good at this. Let's go.

It's a hard thing. I would have liked that too. I would have liked that. Yeah. But we didn't need it. But I wanted it. Now that you said it like that, I wanted it. And I didn't know that I wanted it.

Well, now they demanded it. And I certainly was afraid to ask for it because I would have gotten the shit beat out of me. It was a different era. Are you worried about military capability in 2024? Yeah. What do you think of the social experimentation being applied to the military? It's not good.

We got a job. Be the most lethal. fighting force on the planet. What does that mean? Like, we have to be the best killers on Earth. We have to be able to win our nation's war. We have to be the deterrent where somebody looks at the American people and the American military and be like, no, like anything else but having to deal with that caged pit bull that just did a line of Coke that's been starving to be let out. And now it's just sitting there like, looking at the, like, that's what we're supposed to be. Do dogs use cocaine? This is a metaphor. Okay.

Or analogy. It was an analogy. I'm legitimately curious if dogs would use cocaine if they could. You could? Can you imagine a pit bull on cocaine? No, that's what I was thinking. I was like, oh, wow, I've never heard it describe like that. So what about people who say only like 20% of the military actually sees combat? So why can't the other 80% be more diverse?

Because... Because that's a misunderstanding, too. People think everyone in the military is... I would say they're all in combat arms, but they think they have a combat role. And that's not the case, as you know. One and 12. And those other ones have to be masters of their craft. They have to be true professionals.

And they also have to work within the system that is the military. And being able to conform and adapt, being able to be disciplined and regimented. These are characteristics that don't exist with certain ideas or cultures that, and those certain ideals and cultures, are oil and water within the military. And I know we want everything and everyone to be inclusive when performance is the only thing that matters. Like there's no equity.

There's no equal opportunity that can exist in this job. That can exist anywhere out. Like if you're a barista, do whatever. If like, you know, you sell records. Like do whatever. But when we're talking about life and death, about protecting this country, protecting its interests, and being the most efficient killers on the planet,

the most lethal fighting force on the planet, all that other stuff has to go away. Yeah. Like, be good at your job. I mean, I think an argument can be made that that environment has to be based around that to provide the space for everybody else, for them to live in those other ways that they want to.

But you can't, I mean, I look at it. Like, if you deviate from effectiveness on the battlefield, it's a matter of time until all this shit ends up at the bottom of the over. In fact that complacency kills, you know, on September 10th, you and all of your peers were like, what are we doing here? Then September 11th happened. Like, you have to keep the edge sharp because you don't know what the next thing is. You don't know what the next Pearl Harbor is.

You don't know what the next October 7th Hamas attack is. You don't. And, like, there were dudes and paragliders that were crossing over the Gaza Wall to go rape and murder a bunch of civilians and kibbutzs. You know, like they took airplanes with box cutters. They, you know, did a kamikaze attack into Pearl Harbor. None of those things had ever been done before. We don't know what the next is. But now we're a nation that is in peace.

And we don't know what the next one is. So we have to stay sharp. I agree with that. Was 9-11? I'll fight you. I know you would. Was 9-11 an inside job? No.

Let's get into it. Yeah. Pentagon, missile or airplane? I mean, couldn't have been both? I don't know that much about missiles. It would have to be a really big missile. But our government is so bad at hiding things. It's not true.

They're so effective. In some things. And they can hide things with like noise and stuff. The CIA is just all sorts of Jason-born operatives. I want JFK. I want 9-11. I want Epstein. I want all those...

People don't believe me when I tell them that the government is not capable of keeping 9-11 an inside job. They're not. They can't keep anything a secret. Epstein, intelligence asset for the U.S.? Not for the U.S., but he was an intelligence absent asset that was blackmailing people for information. Do you think the U.S. government allowed him to do so? Yeah. I think so, too.

I've hosted some interesting podcasts with people. people have looked pretty deeply at it and like none of the shit lines up. It's also not the first time that it happened. You can go back into Chile in the 60s and there was an entire like German rapist colony, pedophile colony that... What kind of shit do you read? Via Valveria. Your Google Internet search history, I feel like it's interesting.

You pull some obscure shit out of your ass. No, D, I'm, it was a pretty effective way of keeping political rivals at bay, and they did it down there for 10 years. There's a guy named Schaefer. You think they'll ever release all the information about him? Yeah. I worry that it wouldn't have the impact that people would want it to because so many people are just consumed with other trivial bullshit.

Dumb and dumbest stuff ever, though. I'm fine to be angry. at things, but be angry at like just, just things. You know, like be angry at this dude that got away and all of his cohorts got away with raping a bunch of children on an island. Well, that just goes back to the

similarity we share in disdain for people like that. Yeah. What do you think the odds are he killed himself? Zero. Convenient timing. Yeah. With the video recorders. Going out. All of them. For like, what,

four minutes? Oh, he's dead. Wow, we don't know how that happens. Sorry, the video footage cut out. Is there earth flat around? Definitely round. Okay. Yeah.

Okay. Bigfoot? I think that there are lots of species that we have not discovered. What about with all the game cameras we have up? I mean, we don't have game cameras. I think there's areas of Montana that people have still never, like, stepped foot in. You think? Yeah.

No. Yes. I just, I was reading an article today. It said remote Amazon tribe connects to internet for the first time and got addicted to porn and social media. I shouldn't you not. I was the title. They got the internet and immediately are like, let's watch people fuck. What is wrong with us as a speech?

And then social media. Can you imagine a society that had never had any access to it and they get social media and just fucking destroys them? Here's a thought. Maybe if it can do that to people, we shouldn't have our kids on it. Yeah, we shouldn't. My kids don't get social media until the summer before they go to college. I can see pros and cons of that. It's enough time for them to work through what they're going to have to deal with while we're there. So great relationship, lots of conversations. and in that summer and year

leading up to leaving for college, they're kind of working through those. But then they don't have to have their identity be digitally false and connected. Well, you use filtered, yeah. Like, scene filters, having this inaccurate view of what they're supposed to look like. Dude, the data is back on image issues,

eating disorders. It's bad. It's all bad. Yeah, especially at that young age when people are looking like, this is what I'm supposed to look like, and they don't have the processing ability to look at the picture and be like,

oh, that's not even real. That's like several filters layered on top of each other. They can't go get a breast augmentation because they're not old enough to make the adult decision about the permanent change that they're going to make to their body. But we're going to allow them to have a digital device

that is going to change the rest of the way the rest of the world views them. It's just as bad. So, like, no, they can't have it. Yeah. It's trash. Burn it. throw that thing the ground. We should go eat dinner.

Dude, I'm starving. What do you hate most about our country? Entitlement. I think it's the ebbing flow culture of entitlement, which is infused with laziness and obesity, like every problem that we're struggling through

right now, I think when you boil it down into one attribute or characteristic, it's entitlement. What do you love most? The diversity. I really take pride in being able to listen to somebody that says something that I wholeheartedly disagree with, down to my core, to the essence of my being. And they have every right to say it. And they have every right to believe it.

And they're so dumb and they're so wrong. And God bless them for it. You know, like, you got that right because of the men and women that jumped out of these planes here on these, on this soil. I also wish that people understood that understanding does not equate to agreeance I'll talk to people I love having conversations with people that I don't agree with

because I want to understand what they're saying it doesn't mean I agree with what they're saying or understand their thought process that's what I'm saying but a lot of people won't even take that time they don't even want to hear it like oh that's what you think of fuck yourself sometimes I want to say that it's like okay that's what you think but why do you think that because I want to understand

how they view the world it doesn't mean at all that I'm going to agree with him And yeah, I think that's one of my favorite things too. Like to me, the First Amendment is not about what I get to say. It's about what I have to tolerate other people saying, whether it fucking boils my blood or not. What do you want to close with? From France, from Normandy, France, 2024, 80th anniversary.

I hope that Americans could, I mean, just to the smallest amount, appreciates history and its significance as much as the, men and women are here in France today. I wish every high school history class had a day like today. I wish every college, every university had a D-Day celebration on June 6th. They don't. I could walk into any history class in a university and ask any students sitting in that American history classroom what happened on June 6, 1944, and they would sit there with a blank expression

on their face and tell me that it is Pride Month. because that's what you do in June. You paint things a rainbow. No, motherfucker. You celebrate the baddest dudes and the baddest chicks to ever... Dude, those girls that were, like, wearing dresses and their little cute hats

jumping out of parisps, like jumping with parachutes in to infill as agents behind enemy lines. Unsupported. Just nothing. You got what you got on you. It's like, hey, good luck. Yeah. What a swear day.

Fuck, man. So sick. June's also men's mental health awareness month. That gets lost to. Yeah. Dude doesn't need help too? Yeah. It's okay.

Fine. That's a real downer, Tim. We're going to have sausage right now. Matt's sausage. You're going to put Matt's sausage in your mouth? I am. That's going to be warm. It's going to be large.

It's going to be delicious. And filling. Okay. I got the gloves, too, because I wanted some steak. All right. Sweet. What do you think? Finish it off with first to score?

Yeah. Ha ha ha ha ha