Jocko Podcast - 214: How to Overcome Our Natal Defects. Patton's General Instructions and Keys to Victory

Episode Date: January 29, 2020

0:00:00 - Opening 0:07:32 - Patton's General orders and Keys to victory. 1:41:50 - Final thoughts and take-aways. 2:16:45 - Closing GratitudeSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

This is Jocko podcast number 214 with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good evening. Dear George, at 0700 this morning, the BBC announced that the German radio had just come out with an announcement of the landing of Allied paratroops and of large numbers of assault craft near the shore. So that is it. this group of unconquerable heroes whom I command are not in yet but we will be soon I wish I was there now as it is a lovely sunny day for battle and I am fed up with just sitting I have no immediate idea of being killed but one can never tell and none of us can live

forever so if I should go don't worry but set yourself to do better than I have all men are timid on entering any fight. Whether it is the first fight or the last fight, all of us are timid. Cowards are those who let their timidity get the better of their manhood. You will never do that because of your bloodlines on both sides. I think I've told you the story of Marshall Torrein, who fought under Louis XIV. On the morning of one of his last battles, he had been fighting for 40 years. He was mounting his horse when a young aide-de-camp, who had just come from the court and had never missed a meal or heard a hostile shot, said, Mr. Terrain, it amazes me that a man of your supposed courage should permit his knees to tremble as he walks out to mount.

Terrain replied, My Lord Duke, I admit that my knees do tremble. But should they know where I shall this day take them, they would shake even. more. That is it. Your knees may shake, but they will always take you toward the enemy. Well, so much for that. There are apparently two types of successful soldiers. Those who get on by being unobtrusive and those who get on by being obtrusive. I am of the latter type and seem to be rare and unpopular, but it is my method. One has to choose a system and stick to it. People who are not, themselves, are nobody. To be a successful soldier, you must know history. Read it objectively.

Dates and even the minute details of tactics are useless. What you must know is how man reacts. Weapons change, but man who uses them changes not at all. To win battles, you do not beat weapons. You beat the soul of man of the enemy. To do that, you have to destroy his weapons, but that is only incidental. You must read biography, and especially autobiography. If you do that, you will find that war is simple.

Decide what will hurt the enemy most within the limits of your capabilities to harm him, and then do it. Take calculated risks. that is quite different from being rash. My personal belief is that if you have a 50% chance, take it. Because of the superior fighting qualities of American soldiers lead by me, will surely give you the extra 1% necessary. In Sicily, I decided as a result of my information, observations, and a sixth sense that I have that the enemy did not have another large-scale attack in his system.

I bet my shirt on that and I was right. You cannot make war safely, but no dead general has ever been criticized. So you have that way out always. I am sure that if every leader who goes into battle will promise himself that he will either come out a conqueror or a corpse, he is sure to win. There is no doubt of that. defeat is not due to losses but to the destruction of the soul of the leaders the most vital quality a soldier can possess is self-confidence utter complete and bumpuous you can have doubts about your good looks about your intelligence about your self-control but to win in

war you must have no doubts about your ability as a soldier what success i have had results from the fact that I have always been certain that my military reactions were correct. Many people do not agree with me. They are wrong. The unerring jury of history written long after both of us are dead will prove me correct. Note that I speak of military reactions. No one is born with them any more than anyone is born with muscles. You can be born with the soul capable of correct military reactions.

or the body capable of having big muscles, but both qualities must be developed by hard work. The intensity of your desire to acquire any special ability depends on character, on ambition. I think that your decision to study this summer instead of enjoying yourself shows that you have character and ambition. And they are wonderful possessions. Soldiers, all men in fact are natural hero worshippers. officers with a flare for command realize this and emphasize in their conduct dress and deportment the qualities they seek to produce in their men when i was a second lieutenant i had a captain who was very sloppy and usually late he got after his men for just those faults he was a failure

The troops I have commanded have always been well-dressed, been smart saluters, been prompt and bold in action because I have personally set the example in these qualities. The influence one man can have on thousands is a never-ending source of wonder to me. You are always on parade. Officers who through laziness or a foolish desire to be popular fail to enforce discipline and the proper wearing of uniforms and equipment not in the presence of the enemy will also fail in battle. And if they fail in battle, they are potential murderers. There is no such thing as a good field soldier. You are either a good soldier or a bad soldier.

Well, this has been quite a sermon, but don't get the idea that it is my swan song because it is not. I have not finished my job. yet signed your affectionate father and that right there if you haven't guessed is a letter from general George S Patton to his son George as the day unfolded and as you can see from the letter and also if you know anything about Patton at all he was well known not only for his skill in battle and as a tactician and as a leader but also well known for his ego. Let me read this part again.

The most vital quality a soldier can possess his self-confidence, utter, complete, and bumpuous. And what bumpchewish means is proud to a degree where it's irritating. So it means what it sounds like, right? And he's saying that's how you need to be. He continues on. You can have doubts about your good looks, about your intelligence, about your self-control,

but to win in war, you must have no doubts about your ability. as a soldier. What success? I have had results from the fact that I have always been certain that my military reactions were correct. Many people do not agree with me. They are wrong.

Now, that's obviously very contrary to what I think, which is the most important characteristic for a leader to have is humility. So we're actually saying the exact opposite things. I mean straight up the opposite things. He's saying the most important thing is self-confidence, but he isn't just say self-confidence. He says utter and complete and bumpuous. That's what he says. That's not humility.

So where does this wash out? We have to remember that Patton's career was not unblemished. And this is the thing that I'm going to keep kind of tying this back to. A lot of the things that I think, You remember when we did Chairman Mao, and we talked about Chairman Mao and his methodology for winning in guerrilla war, and everything that he said was aligned with what I say. And one of the key components of that, maybe not everything, but a lot of what he was saying, and I'd have to review it again, but a lot of what he's saying. But one thing that he absolutely said, Chairman Mao, father of communist China, said all throughout that, you know, the leaders in the field need to make decisions, they need to step up, they need to lead. And what he's talking about is decentralized command.

And what puzzles me about that is because he recognized that you needed to have decentralized command for a military victory, right, to win. But then he never transposed that idea of decentralized command into his government. And we actually do know that centralized government doesn't work any better than centralized military command than centralized business leadership.

It doesn't work. So he never made that connection, apparently. And sometimes when I read about Patton, if you know about Patton and you know about his career and you know what happened to him, sometimes you, it hurts a little bit to know that this guy who was such a great patriot, who was such a great

tactician, that if he could have applied some of his principles of leadership on the battlefield, if he could have applied those to his interactions with other people, he might have ended up in a much better position. And we'll get into some of that. Some of the things that he did, one, there was an attack on a place called Fort. Driant in the fall of 1944 and I got this little I wanted to kind of summarize it and there's a thing called the Warfare History Network that summarized it very well. It said the entire operation gradually settled into a stalemate with the Americans unable to achieve any further gains and the men hanging on desperately to what had been won in the hard fighting food, water and ammunition were running out

and the men holding positions underground were exposed to the dust and fumes of the tunnel by October 9th, Patton's attitude about the attack had changed completely. He said, the show is going sour. We will have to pull out. It had quickly become a no-win situation for the Americans because both daylight and nocturnal assaults had failed. Daytime attacks were vulnerable to the deadly fire that rained down on Fort Driant from the adjacent forts.

At night, assaults were quickly broken up and driven into confusion when the German squads emerged from their underground tunnels. The third army suffered 64 men killed 547 wounded 187 missing assumed captured so and not achieving the objective. So that's not good, right? So the idea to think that everything I think of is correct and there you go even Patton guess what he had to do he had to go okay. This isn't working. He might not like to admit that, but he doesn't work and do well. Let's just not do this. Another thing he did. he orchestrated a raid on a P.O.W. camp called O'Flaug 13B. It was in Poland. And there's, I'm not going to go into the details now, but he actually thought that perhaps his son-in-law was a prisoner there.

And so he organized this, this raid. And a guy named Abraham Baum conducted the raid. 300 men went on the mission, of which 32 were confirmed killed in action and another 200, over 200 were missing or taken prisoner, and only 35 of the 300 made it back to friendly lines. So that is not good. And then on top of that, here's where I look at and I say if he would have had more humility. And once again, I got to say this, right? Because I talk about humility all the time. There's a reason that I talk about humility all the time.

Okay, in the dichotomy of leadership, can you be too humble? Echo Charles. Can you be too humble? Yes. Yes, you can. Can you have too much confidence? Yes, that becomes arrogance and ego. That's bad.

The reason that I talk about humility so much is because it is the of the two leanings that people can make in the dichotomy most of the time, most of the time, it's they're too confident. That's most of the time, right? Because if you have someone that's moving into a leadership position, they have to have some confidence to get there. So therefore, a person in a leadership position is going to lean towards having confidence, which is going to lean them towards if they're going to be either not confident enough or too

confident, they're going to lean towards too much confidence, right? Because the person that lacks confident, well, they're not in a leadership position. They didn't work, they didn't maneuver to get them. They didn't believe in themselves. So they didn't really get there. Are there times where you have to talk to a leader about, hey, you need more confidence. You need to be less humble. Absolutely.

There are times. But Patton clearly was an example of he leaned towards. Too much ego too much confidence. So what I'm saying is, and that was part of his power too, right? You get around someone that's super confident about things and they're like, oh, no, we're going to make this happen. And you go, yes, we are. I'm following this guy. So confidence in ego is a positive thing.

It absolutely is. Too much of it. And you can get yourself in trouble. Let's look at what happened towards the end of the war. Patton got relieved of command. They moved him out of commanding combat troops, and they moved him into a position, which was a, it was like a, what's that word?

It was like a figurehead position. Okay, cool. They put him in his, he was, they put him in charge of the 15th Army, which sounds really cool, but they were actually just responsible for capturing the history of what was happening. So we're talking low impact job.

No, and by the way, no command in the Pacific, because they were still fighting and he wanted to go to the Pacific. He didn't go, didn't take over any major troops. Didn't even go. Didn't even go to the Pacific Theater. Not even in charge of like the occupation army in Germany, not even in charge of that. So think about that.

Here's this guy. And because of his tactical prowess, he did great. on the battlefield, but as soon as they could, they shifted him over and put him out to pasture. Why is that? Because of its ego. So that's what bums me out is because if he would have just had some humility to think, how am I going to play this game a little bit better?

You know, how am I going to interact with my superiors, with my superior officers? How am I going to interact with them? He probably would have, if he absolutely, I should have probably, he absolutely could have ended up being the supreme allied commander for sure, but he didn't. So that being said, of course, there's all kinds of things we can learn from Patton. And who knows? Maybe he was writing this. Maybe his son wasn't a very confident person.

Maybe he was trying to bolster his son up in this particular letter. But there's a lot of things that he wrote. And, I mean, there's a lot. And it's awesome to read. But the last time we covered letters. of instruction one and two to his troops this is again going back towards the towards prior to D-Day and we might as well just jump into letter of instruction number three now this one was was very very tactical and by that

I mean very I should see shouldn't even say tactical because tactics is good very specific talking about you know types of armor and what to do in very specific situations so I'm gonna take a little bit less from this letter But there is a bunch of things in here that are relevant, are powerful, and things that anybody that's in a leadership situation can utilize. So this one's a little bit, I'm jumping around a bit. Skip, I shouldn't say I'm jumping around, but I'm skipping more stuff in this letter. But you can find these online if you want to.

So one of the things he says, to begin with, haste and speed are not synonymous. By this, I mean that hasty attacks do not produce speedy. successes or speedy advances because hasty attacks are not coordinated attacks. Haste makes waste. So rushing to get something done, not effective. Haste, that's what he means by haste, which is weird because I think, when I think of the word haste and I don't want to dive into like the etymology of the word haste. But I think it has a little bit of a, nowadays, I think it has a little bit of a positive

connotation, right? Hey, we need to make haste. We need to move quick. Like it's a good thing. But I think even just this. short time ago, it's more aligned with the idea of haste makes waste, right? Like, it's more like rushing. Because rushing doesn't have a positive connotation, right? When you say, hey, you need to rush. Yeah. Like, no one says that. Yeah. No one says, hey, rush with your homework to your kid. You don't say rush.

No, you say, hurry. You need to say move faster. But you don't say, you don't say rush. Because that means you're to miss something. Yeah. Almost like rush means hurry with the note that it's like in a bet in a negative way. Or in a like a non. And so I think this at this time period, haste had that connotation as well. So he's saying haste makes waste.

Continuing in an armored division as in an infantry division, attacks must be coordinated. And the infantry and the tanks and the guns must work as a unit. Success depends upon the coordinated use of guns and the. tanks. So what does that mean? Covered move. That's what it means. Work together as a team. All your different elements in your company, in your team, in your business need to work together. Wouldn't that seem obvious? Wouldn't it seem obvious? Yeah. It's not obvious. Well, it's obvious. It's hard to do. People don't do it like they should. Yeah. One of the many things that seem obvious

when you say it or when you're not involved in it, but then, yeah, when you're inside. You know, that's why in leadership strategy and tactics, when I was talking about what to do as a new leader, and I say, like, read this before you go into a meeting. Read this when you go to bed at night. Because you can't just read it, oh, cool, this. Okay, I read through them now. I'm good. No, you need to embed it into your brain. Read what?

The laws of common. No, the section on page 158 of leadership strategy and tactics. And the reason that I know that is because people said, oh, I just answer. I go, hey, go to page 158 of leadership strategy and tactics. Yeah. But you can't just read it one time, be like, okay, no, you need to embed those things into your brain. Yeah. It's kind of like this, right?

How long does it take to embed in the brain that, oh, we need to work together? Move here. When tanks are advancing, they must use their guns for what is known as reconnaissance by fire. That is, they must shoot at any terrestrial object behind which an anti-tank gun might be concealed and take these targets under fire at a range greater than the range at which an anti-tank gun is effective. In other words, at a range of greater than 2,000 yards. Actually, that's not even really covered. It's kind of a little bit of cover move, but that's being proactive.

Yeah. Right. Hey, there could be an anti-tank gun over there. The anti-tank gun has a range of whatever, a thousand meters. At 2,000 meters, I'm hitting those targets. Oh, somebody hit me up on it on Twitter and said there was a name for that type of shooting, and I can't remember what it is. But it's shooting where you think the enemy might be.

In tank versus tank duels, the first round should be armor piercing. If this fails, the second round must be white phosphorus and short so as to give our tank a chance to maneuver. Because by keeping its gun laid on with smoke, it has a better chance of getting in the second telling shot than has the enemy who, when he emerges from the smoke, does not know the location of our vehicle. armored infantry should make a violent attack using all its men and weapons. So that's a cool one. You fire your first shot, cool. The second shot, you got to put some smoke out so they can't see what you're doing. You should have hit him on the first shot.

If you don't, you're good because you're putting some smoke where you still know where he is, but he has to look through this giant smoke. And so when the smoke clears, he doesn't know where you are. And you're getting another round on him. We used to set up our magazines with something called a party mix. So do you have different types of rounds for your weapon? And so guys would put like armor piercing rounds, like the first couple rounds, armor piercing rounds.

The second couple, they'd ever do their own thing because like the second one would be like a more of a anti-personnel type round. That's going to, and this is against the Geneva Convention. it's not called an expanding round because it doesn't expand but there's rounds that we have that tumble when they hit so it'd be some of those

then some tracers at the bottom like all kinds of they can mark you just got set up a little party mix yeah we do that with shotgun chills oh we do we do you look at this guy oh tactical echo coming in hot with the shocking chills

it's just anyway okay well you know what I'm saying that makes sense or you understand that I understand that I understand what you're talking about this one I'm saying tactical coming in hot That's what we do with shotgun shells.

What party mix do you use, my friend? Educate. Buckshot, bird shot, slug. You know how like you'll have one after the other, you know, so they're like different. You can see how they feel or whatever. Yeah. So what do you have in your home?

Double. Okay, okay. For the shotgun? Yeah, yes. Double that's what you're going with. Yeah, that's what we're going with. Okay. Both three and two and three.

The whole magazine is filled with those? well, they're not, that's what I have, but yeah, that's what I would, yeah. So you don't go like three deep, I've got a slug? No, no. Okay. I think it's just for fun when you do the party mix. Yeah. Or in my experience, you know, my vast.

Yeah, there we go. Yeah, no, no, no. The party mix is not for friend, for fun, Echo Charles. In my experience is for real. There's a reason for it. You have to think through it. There's a bunch of different reasons why you could set things up a different way, right? Yes.

I would think so, yes. You could. I understand. Check. This is welcome to the podcast. This guy got a gun and now it's all, bro. Check. Tell, let me know.

I'm standing by here. Tell Patton what's up. Oh, check. I probably just shut down. You ever say anything about that. I know, man. I'm over here trying to bond with you and Patton, but we're one. All right.

It is more important to get, it is more important to get the information back. fast than to get it back secretly. Therefore use clear with a limited code for name only. This is interesting. So you have encrypted radios, you have codes that you can use. And what he's saying is like listen and sometimes especially now, especially in the past, that would make transmitting information a lot harder. It takes power away from the signal. Sometimes it just takes time to encrypt the message. And what he's saying is like, listen, it's more important that we get the information back there than it is that we keep it all secret. It's just an interesting point to me because it shows the importance of fast communication

of letting people know what's happening. This is obviously something you have to be careful of, but it's an interesting point, just the fact that you have to keep information flowing as quickly as possible. And at this time, keeping it moving fast, would Trump keeping it secure? In tactical situations, because obviously there's strategic situations. I mean, we broke the German Enigma Code. We broke the Japanese code. And that was massively important for us to win the wars.

So continuing, whenever German anti-tank guns have gotten our tanks, it has almost always been our own fault. In spite of years of instruction, tanks will go up. Obvious tank lanes, such as cart tracks, open river bottoms, small roads or path or long hedges, all of which any intelligent anti-tank gunner will have a range to cover. Isn't that brilliant?

Like when you're looking at the terrain you can go on, oh, look at this path. If we go down that path, guess what? The German gunners are expecting you go down that path and they're going to be waiting for you. It's also an interesting idea of ownership. When we lose a tank, it's almost always our fault. Next, the German anti-tank gunner is a good shot.

We are better shot. He is unprotected. We are behind inches of steel if we use our heads and our American ingenuity and initiative We have nothing to fear from the German anti-tank guns You know what's crazy? This just hit me as I'm reading this He's saying these things specifically because guys were scared of these German anti-tank guns And I'm just thinking about it from a tanker's perspective when you're in a tank you're all claustrophobic you're locked in this thing and it's this weird it's this weird it's this weird it's this weird dichotomy because in one sense you feel really protected and in another sense you feel

completely vulnerable you feel protected because like all these little bullets aren't gonna hurt you you know some mines aren't gonna hurt you but then at the same time you know one big hit and there's nothing you can do about it you're gonna die and so that's an interesting thing he's addressing that that thought that can go through someone's head is like okay yeah I feel protected but also one hit and I'm dead and the way that the way that when our when you when your armor gets pierced by an anti-tank gun like the the picture being in a tank and there's just hot metal spraying around and they're gonna kill you like it's an awful thing to picture

is it hard like okay when you're in the tank said it's kind of claustrophobic is it it's like hard to get in and out of there like a tank takes a little while. Yes. Especially if they get hit with a mine and you know these big giant steel doors. Imagine how hard it is when that thing gets bent a little bit. Oh, yeah. You're not getting out.

Oh, man. You're going to panic in there. Well, I'm going to panic in there for sure. Yeah, or even like if you. Yeah, it's a nightmare. And not that this would happen all the time or whatever. I don't know, but like if it just tips over or something. And it's like, oh, shoot, we got to get out of here.

And you're like kind of stuck. Yeah. No, it's horrible. Yeah. But at the same time, it's like just it is protected. That's what he's dealing with here. That's what he's talking about here. And it's the same thing, you know, with these big IEDs that the enemy makes

where you think, hey, I'm protected, I'm in a tank, but one of those big giant IEDs can do some damage. Next, armored battles against infantry and anti-tanks are short and violent. They take great strength of mind and both physical and moral courage. because of this violence and the speed with which they are terminated. When once launched, tanks must close at their best speed just the same as infantry, and also just the same as infantry. They must fire while closing.

Next, every effort must be made to attack the flank, or preferably the rear of the enemy. In executing such an attack, we must use all means at our command to prevent the enemy from stopping these turning movements. So this is exactly what I was talking about. Think about this. Every effort must be made to attack the flank or preferably the rear of the enemy.

So that's brilliant. I talk about this all the time. You don't want to attack your enemy head on. You want to attack them from the flank, right? Clearly he understood that. However, you can look at his history and he would attack. he would attack his superiors, his people around,

you know, his peers, he would attack him. Instead of developing a relationship, instead of coming from the flank. And it ended up putting him in a position where he didn't get the final command that he wanted to get. So, yes, my goal is to think about Patton from a tactical perspective

and then take it one step further and apply his his battlefield tactics to leadership. And I wish he would have done that. Here he says to summarize, and here's where he kind of route. I skipped a bunch of stuff, but to summarize, we must take great and calculated risks in the use of armor, but we must not dive off the deep end without first determining whether the swimming pool is full of water. That's the dichotomy of leadership.

Yes, you have to take risk, but no, you don't just jump in. This is a good one. You must never halt because some other unit is stuck. If you push on, you will release the pressure on the adjacent unit and it will accompany you. That is really smart, right? Someone next to you gets bogged down and you stop to help them. And now you're going to get bogged down too. Yeah, you're both bogged down.

Yeah. So don't do that. This was Dean Ladd going into Tarawa. and the order was for all the Marines, if someone gets hit, keep going. That's what we need to do. And thankfully, for Dean Ladd, his men didn't obey that order. But if everyone didn't obey that order on that day,

they never would have made it to the beach. So that's not just a one-on-one. That's the same with units as well. Next, troops are never defeated by casualties, but by lack of resolution of guts. Battles are won by a few brave men who refuse to fear and push on. It should be our ambition to be members of this heroic group. So you're never going to lose a battle because of casualties.

You're going to lose because of lack of resolution of guts. More casualties occur among those who hold. Holt or go to the rear than among those who advance and advance firing. That's default aggressive. We're not going to run back. We're not going to stop. We're going to be default aggressive and keep maneuvering. Finally, all of us must have a desperate desire and determination to close with the enemy and to destroy him.

Desperate desire. I kind of just breeze through those words, but think about what those words mean. A desperate desire and determination. to close with the enemy and destroy him. Boom. He's got a little section here called common tactical faults. It is nearly always a mistake to occupy obvious cover. This is particularly true in sparsely wooded country because the woods are clearly marked on maps and in the enemy possession.

And they will almost invariably be subject of concentration. We used to see this when I was running training. We put guys out on reconnaissance. And they're doing a reconnaissance of some target. And if there was, you look up at like a hillside and there's like one little group of shrubs, you can take your opposing force guys and go, hey, go check out those shrubs. And there's like a 60% chance. There's the little seal squad or little seal fire team sitting in there with a camera. and you just walk up there

and it's like, gee, big surprise. There was three outcroppings of brush and you're in one of them. What a surprise. So that's what he's saying here. Don't take the obvious cover. When the fire starts, bayonets should be fixed.

They encourage our soldiers and discourage the enemy. When a platoon or any other commander moves to the front to reconnect. Noiter during a firefight, he must not move to the rear to disseminate information he is acquired, but rather the unit must come up to him. The site of officers moving to the rear has a disturbing effect on the troops and serves no useful purpose. That's a brilliant little thing to think about.

Hey, I'm going to go up and find out what's going on. In 40 minutes, send someone to this location and I'll tell you what's going on. Or send this squad up after me and I'll tell you what's going on. Next, and again, I'm skipping a bunch, but these are the key points. There is a ridiculous and widespread fear among all our troops that they will run out of ammunition, particularly small arms ammunition. In my experience, this has never happened. Troops should remember that if they save ammunition, which they could have effectively expended against the enemy, for some unforeseen contingency, they will also save the lives of a number of enemy who will participate in the contingent.

agency. So he's saying get some. I can tell you that a guys in Ramadi ran out of ammunition. Even though he may not have experienced it happened. It happens. The, uh, that little story I've told before about Mikey Mansour making this video. Yeah. And me showing up and everyone said, go, go watch Mikey's video. And I'm like, cool, I go watch Mikey's video. And it's him going, we're in the mule. And he shows it to me. And of course, I'm Mr. Serious. And I say, Mikey, there's a firefight going on. What are you doing?

Taking a video. And he's like, I was Winchester, sir. And I was like, cool. You're out of ammo. Right on. Guess makes a video. But yes, you can run out of enemy. Out of fire ammunition.

So maybe not 100% agree with that on that one. The necessity for using all weapons to their maximum fire capacity. during our attacks cannot be too strongly impressed on the soldiers any gun that is not firing is not doing its job in the assault where marching fire is used by the infantry every gun machine gun and mortar must fire so yeah I mean that's what he's talking about I think even even to the previous point he's talking about these assaults where you have a massive logistics train right behind you so you're not you should really shouldn't run out of ammunition unlike you know what But we were doing where you might not have a logistic train right there behind you. You might be kind of stuck out in the city somewhere for a little while. So yeah, get some with the guns. At the close of a fight, it is very desirable that our own dead be removed from view as rapidly as possible.

After this has been accomplished, the enemy dead should be removed with the same reverence we accord our own and given a proper burial. Next, there is a regrettable tendency on the part of company officers. and non-commissioned officers to accompany the firing line as if they were members of a well-trained chorus simply keeping position. This attitude of mind and the actions resulting from it is impossible in battle. Officers and non-commissioned officers are there for the purpose of seeing that all the weapons of their respective little commands are functioning. They cannot see this by simply accompanying the movement.

They must direct it. this is the thing about this that that I think of and and I've talked about this before with Stoner Seth Stone who is the Delta Patoon Commander and Tasker Brewser and him wanting him staying exactly where he was supposed to stay according to the standard operating procedures while executing maneuvers on the battlefield there's like a there's like a predetermined place where everyone's supposed to be and And I was watching him. He'd be in like the perfect predetermined place, but the predetermined place that you're in doesn't always allow you to see what you need to see as the leader.

So you actually, just because that's the standard operating procedure, there are deviations that you can make and that you need to make as the leader to make sure that you can see what's going on. You can see what the next maneuver is supposed to be. And that's sort of what he's talking about here. But what he's saying is you aren't just going along with the movement. You've got to make it happen. It's the same thing I was saying Stoner. Like, hey, once the call gets made, it's not just they're going to execute it. You've got to direct it.

You've got to get a control of it and make it go to the right place. And then he says this. Key point in this letter, as in those preceding it, I am not laying down inflexible rules. I am simply giving you my ideas. So even this guy who thinks that he's so smart and thinks that all of his military intuitions are 100% correct. and will be proven out in history to be the right call. Even this guy is saying, listen, I'm not laying down things that you can't adapt from. I'm just giving you what my ideas are.

And then he says, I must and do trust your military experience, courage, and loyalty to make these ideas tangible. There are many ways of fighting, all of which are good if they are successful. So even the great, what's that word, bumpuous. Yes. General Patton is saying, I know I told you like I'm right all the time, but do what you got to do. These aren't these aren't inflexible rules. Do what you got to do.

And he wraps this one up. We are now entering the final stage of a great war, of a great victory. This victory can be obtained by the maximum use of all weapons, both physical and spiritual. It is the duty of all commanders to see that their men are fully aware of the many vile deeds perpetrated

upon civilization by the Germans and that the attack with the utmost determination, ferocity, and hate. I am sure that every man will do his duty and I'm therefore sure that victory is simply a question of when we find the enemy. So it's interesting

that he's actually telling them you need to attack with hate. It's a different level. This is total war. this isn't like oh well you know attack with some dislike we're going to attack with hate and that's how he wraps up that was letter of instruction number three this is letter of instruction number four now they're starting to make some adjustments he says the acute supply situation confronting us has caused the supreme commander to direct that until further orders the third army with its supporting troops and those elements of the ninth army

placed in the line will assume the defensive, which you know he doesn't really like very much being undefensive. It is evident that the successful accomplishment of this mission will require particular concentration upon two points. First, this change in attitude on our part must be completely concealed from the enemy who, should he learn of it, would certainly move troops to our front and oppose other allied armies. So he's saying, look, we can't let them know that we're going on the defensive because then they'll just, you know, you know, you know, know, back off and go attack somewhere else. And he says, second, we must be in possession of a suitable line of departure so that we can

move rapidly when the Supreme Commander directs us to resume the offensive. And then he says, in order to carry out the requirements of paragraph 2A, which is the one I just read, we will not dig in, wire or mine, but we will utilize a thin outpost zone backed at suitable places by a powerful mobile reserves. We will further ensure that all possible avenues of tank attack are registered in all of our batteries, whose guns can bear counterattacks by our mobile reserves should be planned and executed to secure a double envelopment of the hostile effort with the purpose of not only defeating it but destroying it. So that's pretty.

What he's saying is it's kind of the same strategy that the Russians take when people attack Russia, which is, look, we got a little line of defense. When we get attacked, we're going to back in a little bit, back off a little bit, and then, you know, back off a little bit more. Then they attack in, back off a little bit more. And then when the time is right, we'll surround them and destroy them all. That's what he's saying. But he's saying, look, that's why we don't have to dig in.

We're putting a thin line of defense out there. And then when we get attacked, we'll just back up. We got strong defense further back, but we're just going to back up. We're going to lower the enemy in, and then we're going to envelop them. Very simple. The other thing that's good about it is when you're not dug in, as soon as you get the order to attack, boom, we're going on the attack because we're not dug in. Which is, again, something I talk about in leadership strategy and tactics,

which I wish Patton would have read my chapter. Sorry. Speaking of ego. There you go. Revealed. I wish Patton read my chapter. about don't dig in. Because how often did Pat and think,

hey, this is how we should do something and when he didn't, when he got told another way, instead of saying, okay, I understand, okay, we'll go for it. It was resistance. It was okay, well, we'll do it. But he didn't like it and he let that be known. Which, again, look, I get it. I'm not going to just do what somebody tells me to do

if I don't agree with it. No, I'm not saying that. And there's time, it doesn't make any sense whatsoever. you know, then maybe there is a time we draw the line in the sand. But these were big giant operations where it's like, okay, we do it like this, we'll do it like that.

No, we should do it my way. And so much resistance. And you're going to end up doing it anyways, by the way, that he just didn't develop the kind of relationships that he needed, and he didn't gain the kind of trust that he needed up the chain of command

where they put him into senior positions where he could have had even more impact. Don't dig in. Don't dig in. around your ideas, don't dig in, even on the defense sometimes. Which I hesitate to say, because let me tell you, let me just make this note. If you're in a truly defensive position, dig in because the enemy is going to attack you. And you don't want to be, you want to have a place that you can get good covered from the enemy attack.

So I'm not saying never dig in. I'm saying most of the time, don't dig in. All right. Now, this next section is from something that Patton wrote. I want to say he wrote it in 1924, 26, something like that. But way before World War II, but it was after he got done with World War I. And once again, I'm not reading the whole thing, but I think the name of this essay, we'll call it by General Patton, was the secret of victory.

And this is where you kind of start to realize that Patton was a really smart and educated individual because he's a very eloquent writer, especially for a guy that swore so much. But very eloquent writer, and we'll go to this here. Despite the years of thought and oceans of ink, which have been devoted to the,

elicidation of war, its secrets still remain shrouded in mystery. Indeed, it is due largely to the very volume of available information that the veil is so thick. So everyone's been trying to figure out war for a long time. And because so many people have written about it, that's what makes it hard. It's one of the things that makes it hard to understand is that so much stuff has been written about it. And by the way, that whole opening letter to George,

like we could have just broken that entire thing down. Maybe we should have. But when he's talking about you need to read history. So he goes on here. War is an art and as such is not susceptible of explanation by fixed formulae. So war's this crazy thing. And it's you can't just say, okay, this is what war is. No, it's an art.

It's like trying to explain art. Can you explain art? Can you explain why someone likes this painting but not that painting? But the other person likes that painting but not this painting. You can't explain that. You can't explain why universally most people like this painting. Universally most people like this song, right? You can't explain that.

Otherwise, guess what? People would just go, oh, cool, I need to make a hit song. No, just produce one. Yeah, the formula. Yeah. No one can describe what makes a good video because Echo Charles, you're here. Sure. Now this is something you are cleared hot to talk.

talk about, right? Okay. A little bit more than weapons load out. Yeah, probably, yeah. So if it was, hey, we just need to make a good video and it'll go viral. Right. Yeah, that's, yeah. Right.

Right. Cool. Hey, Echo, go make a viral video. Do you me a favor? Just go make a viral video. You can't. Yeah. You can't do.

You literally can't do it. Yeah. Actually, that's a good comparison because there's so, and especially now and probably more in the future where there's going to be a lot of information about a lot of people, or a lot of people going to start writing about it, you know, or write more about it about What makes a viral video? That's like the end of the day. Yeah, it's a perfect thing because everybody wants to make a viral video.

Oh, yeah. That's the deal. Everybody wants to make a viral video, but you can't just open up the formula and say, okay, cool. What we need to do is it needs to be 38 seconds long and needs to have this type of soundtrack and he's have this type of visuals and this type of voiceover. Good. Okay, produce it. Boom. Gangman style or whatever that was.

Gangam style. How did that, right? How did that end up being? one of the most, it might be the most viewed video of all time, right? I don't know. But it's up there. We know that. I know for at least three months of time, my little kids between the ages of whatever they were, six and eight were walking around the house, singing gangnam style.

Yes, sir. Yeah. And I'm saying, wait, hold on. Let me play Black Sabbaths for you. Please. I don't know. Yeah. And even when people do try to make the formula.

It's like super ambiguous. And guess what? That same guy, okay, well, we made Gangdom style. Just make another one. Yeah. No. I don't even think there was another one.

Yeah. I mean, that's like a group, right? I think that's like a music group. See, we don't even know. Yeah, yeah, that's kind of the point. No, it's a guy. It's a one guy. Yeah, but he's like a music artist.

He's an artist or whatever. I don't think it's just some comedy dude. No, no, no, it's not a comedy guy. He was a legit, like a pop guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he made that song, but then he tried to make another one. And it wasn't, you know, you just can't, he didn't, there's no form. There's no formula.

Just hit. So same thing with war. And here we go back to the book, away from Gangnam style. We're going back to the book. Yet from the earliest time, there has been an unending effort to subject its complex and emotional structure to dissection, to enunciate rules for its waging, to make tangible, its intangibility. One might as well strive to isolate the soul

by the dissection of the cadaver as to seek the essence of war by the analysis of its records. That's a pretty powerful, right? You might as, in order to find out what makes war, war, it's like looking for the soul in a body. And then he says,

yet, despite the impossibility of physically detecting the soul, its existence is proven by its same. tangible reflection in acts and thoughts. So we know we exist. It's there, but you can't open up the body and find it. So with war, beyond its physical aspect of armed hosts, there hovers an impalpable something which on occasion so dominates the material as to induce victory under circumstances

is quite inexplicable. So sometimes things happen in war that victory is achieved and no one can really even understand how. It's inexplicable. He goes on, The Great Warriors were too busy and often too inapt to write contemporaneously of their exploits, save in the form of propaganda reports,

while what they later put on paper as biographies were retrospects colored by their vain strivings for enhanced fame or political conditions then confronting them. So when these great warriors wrote, it was afterwards, because they didn't have time to do it while they're fighting. So afterwards, and then they kind of got a little ego involved, which here's you got General Patton calling everyone out on their ego. Or there's some political situation going on. That's why they wrote it a certain way. So you don't even get the truth from the warriors themselves because they don't have time and or they do it afterwards, in which case it's colored,

or I should say miscolored by their ego or their political environment that they're in. With the efforts of historians, the case is even worse. Those who write at the time are guilty of partisanship and the urge of hero worship. So even someone that's a historian, right, and they got those problems. In peace, the scholar flourishes.

In war, the soldier dies. So it comes about that we view our soldiers through the eyes of scholars and attribute to them scholarly virtues. So since it's the scholarly people telling it, they paint these people to be scholarly, and that's not always the case. Seeking obvious reasons for the obscure,

we analyze their conduct as told by historians and assign as reasons for their success apparent, trivial things. So he's saying, look, we look at someone in the past who was a great warrior or a great leader, and we say, okay, they were a great leader. and we say, okay, they were a great leader because of this or because of that, because that's what some scholarly person wrote about. Trivial things.

Music has a myriad, music has its myriad of musicians, but only its dozen masters. So with painting, sculpture, literature, medicine, or trade, or videos. Many are called, but few are chosen. So that's what he's saying is that these leaders are the same. same way. Like there's there's people that make music. But these combat leaders, there's not too many of them that actually rate, you know, Beethoven or Tony Iommi. Sure. Nor can we concur wholly with the alluring stories in the advertising sections of our magazine, which point to the golden path of success to all and sundry who follow that particular phase of home education

that they happen to advocate. So just like the get rich quick scheme is not going to work, these little thinking that these little leadership things that you learn, okay, they're not really going to help you as much. Knowledge is power, but to a degree only. Its possession per se will raise a man to mediocrity, but not to distinction. So you can be smart, you can learn a lot, but that doesn't mean it.

Doesn't get you there. And the funny thing, as you read this, There's a whole, this whole thing is like an egotistical writing, right? Because he's saying, listen, there's normal people. And then there's, you can have knowledge that'll get you so far. But to truly be the master is pretty rare. And is he implying that he is an master? I'm getting that implication a little bit.

A little bit. In our opinion, indeed, the instruction obtained from such courses is of less moment to future success than is ambition. which prompted the study. That's interesting, right? So if you're a person that says, hey, I want to be a good leader, I'm going to reach out and start trying to learn how to lead, is that ambition that's going to make you a good leader,

or I want to make a lot of money, so I'm going to do this thing, and that's going to make me more money. It's the ambition is more important in making you actually successful than the course that you bought. Interesting. In considering these matters,

sight should not be lost of the fact that while there is much similarity, there is also a vast difference between the successful soldier and the successful man in other professions. Success due to knowledge and personality is the measure of ability in each case. But to all except the soldier, it has vital significance only to the individual and to a limited number of his family and associates. So success is important. When you look at any other profession, it's important to be successful because a person can take care of his associates and his family.

Right. So that's very important to be successful for your family and for your associates. And then he continues on while the soldier, while with the soldier success or failure means infinitely more as it must of necessity be measured not in terms of personal honor or affluence, but in the life, happiness, and honor of his men and his country. Way heavier, right? And let's face it. You know, that's kind of, we. We hold military people in high regards, even though, I mean, you can find out. You can go, look, you know what the Admiral of the Navy makes, the chief of naval operation makes? You can go look it up. He's making, whatever. He's making like $113,000 a year.

You know what I mean? And he's in charge of billions of dollars worth of equipment. Whereas somebody that's in charge of a medium-sized company is making probably 10 or 15 or 20 or even 100 times. That's probably a hundred times more than what the chief of naval operation makes. But we hold him in high regard. Why? Because this guy isn't just protecting or taking care of, you know, a company. He's taken care of his troops and he's taking care of the country.

So that's why being a military leader is held in high esteem. Rightfully so. You're not just judging someone based on their amount of money that they make. continuing on, hence the search for that elusive secret of military success, soul, genius, personality, call it what you will, is a vital interest to all of us. Beyond question, personal knowledge is a fine thing, but unfortunately, it is too intimate. When, for example, we recall a railroad accident, the picture that most vividly presents itself to us is the severed blue-gray hand of some child victim.

Not the misread signals which precipitated the tragedy. So with war experiences, the choking gas that strangled us sticks in our memory to the more or less complete exclusion of the important fact that it was the roads and the consequent abundant mechanical transportation peculiar to the Western Europe, which permitted the accumulation of enough gas shells to do the strangling. So we get caught up looking at this one small outcome of the problem, but we don't look at it from a strategic view. We don't see the big picture.

He says a British writer has said the characteristic of war, and by the way, I'm not reading this whole thing. I'm jumping through parts of it. So it might sound a little bit disjointed, but it's not as disjointed when you're actually reading it. He continues in another little part here. A British writer has said the characteristic of war is its constant change of characteristic. But as is ever the case with amorphism, his remark needs explanation.

And here's his explanation. There is an incessant and constant change of means to attain the inevitable end. But we must take care not to let these inevitably sundry means, past or predicted, attain undue eminence in the preemptive. perspective of our minds. So what is he saying there? He's saying you got you got these things that change about how we're going to achieve some goal and those things you can get caught up in those things. They can attain undue eminence so you can believe that they're more important. And then he says since the beginning there has been an unending cycle of them and for each its advocates have

claimed adoption as the sole means of successful war. So all the time new war, This is the most important thing. This is the most important thing. This is the most important thing. And then he says, yet the records of all time show that the unchanging ends have been are and probably ever shall be the securing of predominant force of the right sort at the right place, at the right time. That's the most important thing.

You get the strongest force at the right place or the right time. That's how you win. All these other things that we're talking about, they're fake. And again, this is according to Pat and we could argue about those. I'm telling you what he's saying. Is that the most important thing is to be to have the strongest force at the right place at the right time It's hard to argue with that Continuing on in this scholarly avocation

Soldiers of all important nations use at the present time what purports to be the best mode of instruction The the applicatory method The characteristics of some concrete problem are first studied in the abstract and then tested by applying them with the assumed forces and situations in solving a nagilus problems either on the terrain or a map representation of it. So what he's saying there is the normal mode of instruction is you look at a map, you look at where you're going to maneuver your forces, and then you figure out how you're going to

apply your forces and you play a little game of chess on a map or on a terrain model. or even walking the train actually physically doing it. And then he says this. So that makes sense, right? We understand that. You're going to look at this, see how you're going to maneuver your pieces. This method not only familiarizes the student with all of the tools and technicalities of his trade, but also develops the aptitude for reaching decisions and the self-assurance derived from demonstrated achievement.

Okay, cool. So by doing that, by looking at a map, by looking at terrain, by going out and walking through the terrain, by going out in simulating combat, you're going to increase your, what does he say, your self-assurance, your aptitude for reaching decisions. That's going to happen. It's going to make you better. But then he says, but as always, there is a fly in the ointment. High academic performance demands infinite, intimate knowledge of details and the qualities requisite to such attainments often inhabit bodies lacking personality. Man, that's a crazy thing to think about, right?

That you got this people that are willing to study and willing to work, but what they miss is they don't have the personality. They don't have the charisma. So they're smart, they're book smart, right? That's the term that gets used. Yeah, book smart. And that's a thing that comes out as a negative, right? Someone says, oh, you know, he's really book smart. They don't say that like, oh, he's super book smart.

No, that's who he's talking about. He's talking about people that are book smart. And then he says, and also the striving for such knowledge often engenders the fallacious notion that capacity depends on the power to acquire such details, not the ability to apply them. So you've got someone over here that can memorize what's in the book, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they can take what's in the book and apply it. You notice that in jiu-jitsu, right? You get someone that understands the move. Yeah. But you got to learn it.

You got to know how to. Well, look, Jiu-Jitsu is an interesting example because you can take someone and teach them the move and they're going to get it and they can achieve a good level. But the people that can go next level are the people that can take those things and apply them in different ways, different situations, different scenarios and then create things out of it. That's the difference between a world, not even, but this is, I think someone can be just a good applyer and be a world. champion in jiu jit-to like someone that studies and is great and knows the moves they can be a world champion yeah but to be like the elite of the elite yeah you got to have that next level you got to be able to take those things and apply and create next level yeah and not to skew

this thing towards making videos or nothing like that that seems to be the topic well you know but you see the end with a lot of stuff like where do you see this with weapons as well Sorry, bro. Any way. Videos go. Anyway. When, you know, like sometimes and then, okay, so you run to this on YouTube where it's like, okay, you can look, you can look up videos on how to make videos, right?

Okay. And then, so after a while you can kind of discern, okay, this person just read the directions, you know, you know how you get that impression from somebody. And it doesn't matter if it's necessarily video. It can be a lot of stuff when it's like you just get the impression that they read the directions. And they did it good. They did it clean, perfect. but you can sort of tell

versus the guy who's like maybe a little bit more creative with it or you can tell they understand the whole comprehensive thing and then they can add their own personal little element well the example that I use which I've used before is you can take a flyer and put it up in a guitar center

and say hey I need someone that can play you can pick the most complicated songs ever and you'll get 20 people that will call you up and they'll actually be able to play those songs and yet they're all working regular jobs because they didn't have that thing, that creative thing. They learned the mechanics of the job, but they can't create something new.

No offense. I mean, I wish I could play guitar like that. I can't. But that's what separates. That's why there's people that are incredible musicians, guitarist, technicians. Maybe musicians is a start. Does musicians imply that they got that creative spark to?

I don't know. I mean, to me, yeah. I don't know. Yeah, maybe. Okay, well, depends on who you ask, I guess on that one. I guess you've got incredible technical musicians that can play any song on whatever instrument,

but they don't have that little thing. And that's what he's talking about. They're book smart. Yeah. What about, you know, you get these, okay, you know the old school art, right, that real valuable art, like, you know, Picasso and all these. Then you have these master.

Forger's, where are they on this whole thing? Yeah, good question. Maybe like a little above. I mean, I think they're like the technical guitarist that can lay down the riff. Exactly. You can't tell the difference, but it doesn't really matter because they can't create something new. Right. So if you're a master forger, that's great, but you're not going to be remembered because you didn't create anything.

So creativity is what we're talking about here. Which again, you know, when we went over the Marine Corps man, tactics with Dave Burke. Think about how often they talked about creativity. Good deal, Dave. Yes, good deal, Dave. Think about how often they talked about creativity. Yeah.

And I've been talking about it since day one. I think it was on the first time I was on Tim Ferriss, I said, combat is an exercise in creativity. And it is. And that's what he's saying. Yeah. So the master forager essentially will always have that limitation, no matter how good, no matter even...

Yeah, unless he can break out, right? And you know where I thought you were going with? this was like the modern art, you know, where it's just some random thing and, and you can look at it and go, well, my four-year-old could have created that, right? Yes. And then there's other people going, and wait a second, you're missing something here. That this is why this is creative. This is why this is important, whatever.

And what's interesting also is when people, when you, when you're that good of an artist at drawing things, you have to get that good at drawing things realistically before you can break out and see them from a different perspective, I think. I'm not 100% sure. Yeah, I don't know about that one. I mean, not to say that that's not true, but it's one of those things like, are you saying earlier,

there is no formulae there. Even in evaluation of art, really. I mean, we're all trained to understand that this is a well-known critic of art, but is there even such thing as a critic of art officially? Yeah, not really. No. And it's weird, too,

because like with music, there's music that is so popular that I can't see. stand and most of the music that I like is not popular. So what does that mean? It means you're special, bro. Obviously. I guess that art is in the eye of the beholder in many cases.

One might say, yeah. Well, yeah, because some people, they don't, and maybe I misunderstood what you meant when you said the artist has to be able to draw like really good first before they break up. But a lot of artists, I mean, from what I understand, and they don't necessarily know how to like draw that good. It's more of just their like the idea behind the result kind of thing. You know,

I don't know. I'm not sure. I think people just go deep and they just go deep in their head and they're like, hey, you know, they invoke like everything in them. Yeah, I guess that's a good point too because like with some of the old like punk rock bands that really like had a big impact,

it wasn't because they were good musicians. It's because they're emotionally raw, right? And they just, people heard it and went, whoa, this is a different thing. And so you could be totally right. And that's the same thing, right? You don't necessarily have to be a fine artist before you start drawing crazy stuff, right? Or drawing abstract stuff, let's say. Not necessarily true.

Yeah, it's all everywhere. Even music, like, you know the guy? It's super impressive where these guys, like, they make. Mayor may not even be a homeless guy, but they're on the street all the time. They've got a bucket. Yeah. And they're like tapping the bucket and they're like doing all this stuff. And it sounds really like dope.

But it's like, I don't know. Like is it reaching everybody? Well, definitely not reaching anybody. Everybody. I posted up there was some guy. There was like a bunch of bombs. I mean bumps in San Diego. I was out for dinner and they were playing bluegrass.

You ever seen? Someone with the It's like a like a broom pole or whatever a broom Brum stick into like a upside down wash bin with a string on it and it's a bass Okay, well it's like what you'd see in the olden days. Yeah, and then there's someone was plucking a banjo and someone else was playing guitar Right, and these people were clearly they were homeless people, you know, they were probably between the ages of I would say maybe 20 to

26 so they were pretty young and and I was walking and I just heard him and I was thinking man this band sounds good right and I get up and I see they're just completely homeless and they were jamming and I actually posted it on Instagram and you know

when we got done and my son I was with my son and my son was like those guys were good and I said yeah I know that was impressive and what does that mean that means well your question was are they reaching everybody no they're not reaching anybody they're reaching literally four people

we're standing there watching them right so what's better so is um so okay I was having this debate this is a long time ago with Tim Tim Ford so he was like saying Timbo Timbo mania he was making music or whatever and he goes deep

you know with his music like what he's saying lyrics if you will and something like whatever and he and so we're talking about it like what's better music right and he's like oh like I think basically his premise was underground rap is better

than you know popular rap now and I had no dog in the fight but I was just kind of more just taunting him a little bit and he was really emotionally dug in on this one and so I was like okay I was like well how do you prove that you know just because you like

it better doesn't mean overall it's better you got to be able to measure it so i'm like okay so little way it was the song go dj you've heard that song go dj anyway it's a real popular song at the time and i happened to like it and i was like no go dj is better than all your underground rap i just said it to trigger him i'm not saying that's a fact or nothing but but i used the measurement tool i was like okay how many albums have you know you guys sold like or how are we going to measure it you know and he we couldn't really hit the nail where he couldn't really hit the nail in the head as to why it was better, why underground rap is better, you know, but I sort of had some, a leg to stand on because I had the measuring tool, you know, but at the end of the day, I think, which I didn't say in the

argument, because, you know, it would have been kind of a cop out given what we're doing. There is no really way to tell. That's what I'm saying. It's like, it's all art. Just because it reaches, just because a bunch of people, I don't love go DJ. That's not a life-changing song, but if it's on, like, we're going to enjoy it. Then there's, so there's that side of the spectrum, right? Like, I don't know, maybe, uh, what's your name?

Britney Spears, something like this, you know? Some of us think Britney's pretty deep, but whatever. I'm just saying it's on this side of the spectrum. A lot of the time. And then on the other side, it's like, I don't know, something like super deep that not many people know about, but the people who do know about it. It's like, man, that's my life song kind of thing, you know? So it's a spectrum there, but who's to say what's better, you know?

Well, yeah, it's, well, I think I'm to say what's better. No, of course you will. Of course you are. Yeah, so I guess the whole point of this entire divergence that we've just taken is that just like in art and music, there's a spark that you have to have. And it's the same thing with leadership. And so now he continues on with this thing that the people, that the more that they learn, the more that they learn from the books, the better they're going to do. And he says this, obsessed with this thought, students plunge deeper and even deeper. Their exertions and meshing them more until like mired mastodons

They perish in a morass of knowledge where they first Browse for sustenance Like I said, Paton's a good writer. So you picture these big giant mastodons that you know Fall into this more this giant pit of knowledge. It's just too much for them and they die That's what happens this young leader that's just trying to read everything and this is coming from a guy that tells you to read everything. When I say that, I mean, Patent's telling you you need to read. But what he's saying is like, you can go so far into that.

You're, you just end up, well, perish in a morass of knowledge. And he continues on. When the prying spade of the unbiased investigator has removed the muck of official reports and the mire of self-laudatory biographies from the swamp of the world war, then the skeletons of many such military mammoths will be discovered. And what I love about this is as I've as anyone knows from the books that we cover on this podcast I've said since day one oh, why don't you cover this book about the great war this book about World War II or this this this book that was written by this great historian.

I'm like oh no I like first person accounts I actually like first person accounts as often as I can from like the frontline soldiers of course I like the generals too and the colonels that's great but I like to hear what the front lines have to say and that's what that's part of what like about his idea that just reading from this from this high altitude doesn't necessarily give you the information you need he continues on beyond questions no soldiers ever sought more diligently oh sorry he says amidst their mighty remains will lurk the elusive secret of German failure he's talking about World War 1 beyond question no soldiers ever sought more diligently for pre-war perfection

They built and tested and adjusted their mighty machine and became so engrossed in its visible perfection, in the accuracy of its bearings, and the compression of its cylinders that they neglected the battery. When the moment came, their masterpiece proved inefficient through lack of the divine afflittus, which is a divine inspiration, a divine thing. And that is the soul of a leader. So the Germans were really rigid in the way they prepared things. And again, this is his viewpoint. But it's a pretty good viewpoint that the Germans in World War I coming out of that Prussian, coming out of that, that Prussian mentality,

like this is the way we're going to do things. But they forgot that you got to have a soul. You've got to have the soul of a leader. And that's what happened to him. That's what he means, the battery. Like, where's that energy come from? Guess what? The soul of the leader.

And he says this, truly in war, men are nothing. A man is everything. In acquiring erudition, we must live on, not in our studies. So in order to acquire great knowledge, you have to live on the studies, not in them. We must guard against becoming so engrossed in the specific nature of the rules. boots and bark of the trees of knowledge as to miss the meaning and grandeur of the forest that they compose That's a really complicated way of saying don't miss the forest for the trees He fails the simplicity there as has been pointed out the secret of victory lies not wholly in knowledge

It lurks invisible in that vitalizing spark intangible yet as evident as lightning The warrior soul. That's where he's saying the victory lies. The warrior soul. We shall now seek to evaluate and place in their just ratio the three essentials to victory. Inspiration, knowledge, and force, which he also calls mass. We may therefore postulate that no one element, be it soul, knowledge, or mass, is dominant. That a combination of any two of these factors,

gives a strong presumption of success over an adversary relying on one alone, and that the three combined are practically invincible against a combination of the other two. So here's the important things. Inspiration, knowledge, and force or mass. And he actually, I've not covered him now, but he gives some examples of where these things were important through history. I'm not going to cover them right now. But these three things are what you need for victory.

He says, man cannot live by bread. alone and that as a man thinketh so he is have been for generations drone from countless pulpits as the texts for prolix and unconvincing sermons until cognizance of the phrases has been somewhat dulled yet they contain an infinity of truth and i think you say this a lot it means like when you something that gets said all the time cliche yeah there's a reason the cliche is a cliche, right? There's a reason people say it. Yeah. Because there's some, what does he call it? There's some infinity of truth in there. Right? So that's what he's saying. So these things man cannot live by bread alone and as a man thinketh. So he is he. Those are cliches, but there's

truth in them. War is conflict. Fighting is an elemental exposition of the age old effort to survive. It is the gold glitter of the attacker's eye, not the point of the questing bayonet that breaks the line. Oh, that's good. I'm going to read that one again. It is the cold, I said gold. It is the cold glitter of the attacker's eye, not the point of the questioning bayonet that breaks the line. It is the fierce determination of the driver to close with the enemy, not the mechanical perfection of the tank that conquers the trench. It is the cataclysmic ecstasy of conflict in the flyer,

not the perfection of his machine gun, which drops the enemy in flaming ruin. Yet, volumes are devoted to armaments and only pages to inspiration. So the actual man, the human element, is more important than the bayonet, then the tank and then the aircraft and then the machine gun. And yet we talk about all these are, you know, there's books written about these different weapons of war, but not enough written about the soul of man. Continuing on,

since by necessity, limitations of map problems, going back to this whole idea of figuring out things on a map and we're doing a terrain walk, since by necessity, limitations of map problems inhibit the student from considering the effects of hunger, emotion, personality, fatigue, leadership, and many other imponderable yet vital factors,

he first neglects and then forgets them. Crazy, right? You look at this map and you figure we're going to maneuver your people and you think what you've read about, but you forget about the thing that I try and talk about all the time, which is human nature, which is understanding people, understanding people, understanding hunger, emotion, personality, fatigue, leadership, and all these imponderable things. Those are what you need to be concerned about as a leader. Going on, obsessed with admiration for the intelligence which history is ascribed to leaders past.

He forgets the inseparable connection between plans, the flower of the intellect, and execution, the fruit of the soul. He's getting an A-plus in an English class right now, isn't he? the inseparable connection between plans, which are the flower of the intellect, and execution, the fruit of the soul. You got to have both. You got to have both. Yes, you've got to have plans,

but then you've got to be able to execute. Continuing on, since the historian, through lack of experience and consequent appreciation of the inspirational qualities of generals fails to stress them, he does emphasize their mental gifts, which since he shares, he values.

This guy was smart like me. This guy was educated like me. That's what made him so great, just like me. Sometimes people say that even if they aren't necessarily that, you know, will be like me and you're alike in this way. And then they'll say some cool quality that you have, you know, just sort of implying, yeah, I'm like that too. Yeah, I'm like that too.

And that's what this is, right? Oh, the historian says, oh, this guy was very educated like I am. Yeah, yeah. And like you said, it doesn't always necessarily, but he was well read. Sure. And that's what they stress. Doesn't stress the inspirational qualities of the general.

Doesn't stress that? Because he focuses on the fact that the guy was educated or the guy that went to Oxford or the guy went to whatever, West Point. Is that because it's more concrete? It's definitely more concrete. But it's also, it's a shared value. It's like what you just said.

You go, you know, this guy was smart. Like when someone, somebody does something when when another seal does something cool. I'm like, yeah, we know he was in the day. Yeah. Just like me, dude. And it continues on. Hugging the notion of intelligence, he pictures armies of incident pawns moving with the

precision of machines and the rapidity of lights guided in their intricate and resistless evolutions over the battlefield by the cold effulgence of his emotionless celebrations as transmitted to them by wire and radio through the inspiring medium of coded messages. Oh, that's just a get some, right? That's what they picture, though. And, you know, this happens today. This happens today with, I just was just responding to someone on social media that was implying this exact thing, that, oh, well, you know, Jocko, you were only been in charge of elite

teams, of seals. And so guess what they are? Those are incident pawns moving with the precision of machines and the rapidity of light. Like, no, bro, actually. But that's what people think. They're wrong. Continuing, doubtlessly, he further assumes the same superhuman intelligence will translate those somber sentences into words of fire, which shall electrify his chessmen into frenzied heroes.

who heedless of danger shall dothlessly translate this stillborn infants of his brain into heroic deeds. So if you think you can just put out the word and now everyone's just going to go execute it with undeniable tenacity and vigor, you're wrong. Continuing on, shrewd critics have assigned to all manner of things. Oh, sorry. Shrewd critics have assigned success to all manner of things. And here are some of the things that they assigned success to. Tactics, shape of frontiers, happily placed rivers, mountains, or woods, intellectual ability, or to the use of artillery. All in a measure, true, but none vital. So, yeah, you can be successful from all these different things. And the shrewd critics say, oh, you were successful because this or you were successful because of that. You are successful because of your tactics or your frontier or the river or the woods or whatever and it continues nor is it even the speed of the operations that the secret lays But in the inspiring spirit with which they so inoculated their soldiers as to lift weary foot so sore men out of themselves and to make them march forgetful of agony That's the difference according to Patton In considering war we must avoid that

adoration of the material as exemplified by scientists who deny the existence of aught they cannot cut or weigh so the scientists look at it and go well if you can't see it doesn't exist you can't weigh it it doesn't exist so therefore we're not going to give any credit to these things that we can't exactly wrap our hand around the magic spark As a mirror shows us, not ourselves, but our reflection. So it is with the soul and with leadership. We know them, but by acts they inspire or by the results they have achieved. So you don't see them.

You only know them by the acts that they make happen or things that are achieved through them. Continuing on, like baguettes like, in the armies of the great, we seek the reflection of themselves, and we find self-confidence, enthusiasm, abnegation of self, loyalty, and courage. So this is big, right? And this is, this, and we'll get into it, but here's what you find, self-confidence, right? Boom. This is what you find. Self-confidence, enthusiasm, abnegation of self.

What is that, right? Abnegation of self is denial of the self. This is like, I'm not the most important thing. Loyalty and courage. Resolution, no matter how adamant, made it to knowledge, no matter how infinite, never begat such a progeny. So being firm in your resolution and knowing a lot, no matter how much of those two you have, you never get as much as you get with self-confidence, enthusiasm, abnegation of self-loyalty

and courage. Such offspring only arises from bloodlines as elemental as themselves, the leader must be incarnate of them. Now, this is where we're like, that's a pretty bold statement, right? Hey, here I am a leader in the army. My name is General Pat. My name is, well, he's probably like a captain

or maybe a major at this point when he's writing this. And he's saying that in order to be a really good leader, you have to be bloodline incarnate in you. But then he says this, which is awesome. This is where I get a little, you know, he's starting to move a little bit. out of the box here,

then he comes right back in the box. I had to paraphrase this one a little bit, but nor is the suggestion that birth is the only means of producing such a leader. There are certainly born leaders, but the soldier may still overcome his natal defects by unremitting effort and practice.

Imagine that. What's that the old nature versus nature scenario? That's what it is. That's what it is. I've got a book called Leadership Strategy and Tactics. There's a chapter in there called Born or Made. And the answer is both. And that's the same thing that General Patton's saying here.

Look, you can be born a great leader, but you can still overcome your natal defects just by unremitting effort and practice. That's how you can get good. Self-confidence of the right. So I think this is where he's going to start hammering through. Yeah, so he starts hammering through this list of things. So the first one is self-confidence. Self-confidence of the right sort,

as differentiated from bumpuous presumption based in ignorance, is the result of proven ability, the sense of conscious achievement. Its existence presupposes enthusiasm for without this quality, no one would endure the travail of acquiring self-confidence. So self-confidence takes time. In order to get self-confidence, you have to be enthusiastic and because you have to be successful in things. Self-confidence, you can't just wake up and have it.

It's conscious achievement. It's proven ability. And the more you prove able, the more confidence you're going to get, which is interesting that in my new book, I talk about how do you get someone to increase their confidence? You give them tasks that they can achieve. That's exactly what he's saying. Over time, that's how you build up self-confidence. He continues on here, the enthusiasm, which permits the toil. and promises the achievement is simply an all-absorbing preoccupation in the profession elected.

So when you're fired up for something, when you're enthusiastic, that's what allows you to overcome the toil and the times that you drop the balls that you're learning how to juggle. You just keep picking them up. Endurance two is linked with self-confidence. Mentally, it is the ability to subvert the means to an end, to hitch a wagon to a star and to attain it. physically it presupposes sufficient enthusiasm to force on nature no matter how reluctant the obligation of constant bodily fitness through exercise then he says the expanding waistline means the contracting heart line both in length and vigor and then he says witness napoleon

at and after jenna the battle of jenna which is where the prussians figured out that they need to do Use maneuver warfare and decentralized command, but that's because they got crushed by Napoleon. And I didn't, I don't, well, apparently, Napoleon at Jenna was in good shape, and Napoleon after Jenna, maybe he let it go. So constant bodily fitness through exercise, mental ability to hitch a wagon to a star and attain it, right? That's endurance. Next up, abnegation of self seems perhaps incongruous when applied to such selfish persons as Frederick or Napoleon. But this is not the case. So this is kind of funny too because, right, it would be Patton too.

It's Patton too, right? I mean, Patton has at least a big of an ego as Napoleon or Frederick. But this is not the case, he says. Self can be subordinated to self. The Corsican leading his grenadiers at Lodi subordinated the life of Bonaparte. to the glory of Napoleon. So once again, even Patton, you know, this is a form of humility, right? That's what it is.

It's like everyone else is more important than me. That's what it is. Next one is loyalty. Loyalty is frequently only considered as faithfulness from the bottom up. It has another and equally important application that is from the top down. One of the most frequently noted characteristics of the great, who remain great, is the unforgettableness and of loyalty to their subordinates. It is this characteristic which binds with hoops of iron their juniors to them. A man who is truly and unselfishly loyal to his superiors is of necessity so to his juniors and they to him.

So this is great, right? loyalty up and down the chain of command. You're just not loyal to the people above you. You're loyal to the people below you. You take care of them. And if you take care of them, they're going to take care of you. Once again, it's in the book, Leadership Strategy and Tactics. Next, Courage, moral, and physical is almost a synonym of all foregoing traits.

It fosters the resolution to combat and cherishes the ability to. to assume responsibility, the ability to assume responsibility, be it for successes or failures. We call that extreme ownership. He says, but as with biblical candle, these traits, and that was the last trait, now he's talking about all these traits, these traits are of no military value if concealed. A man of diffident manner will never inspire confidence.

A cold reserve cannot beget, enthusiasm and so with the others there must be an outward visible sign of the inward and spiritual grace it then appears that the leader must be an actor and such is the fact but with him as with his bewigged compare he is unconvincing unless he lives the part so yes the leader has to be an actor but guess what what if the leader doesn't actually believe what he's doing it everyone's going to see through it just like an actor a be-wigged actor beat-wiged that's like a person wearing a wig yeah okay so because i thought when you said an actor meaning someone who takes action but

no no no he's straight up stage a person on the stage the person on the stage has to act and he's unconvincing unless he lives the part and that's way a leader's got to be you got to live it you got to think it you've got to believe it staying character and if you don't believe it, then everyone's going to see through it. Yeah. Yeah, that's kind of true with everybody, huh? You know, people like,

back in the day when I was a personal trainer and you get a personal trainer who's like kind of out of shape, you know? Oh, yeah, yeah. But they, you know, according to them, they know everything kind of thing. It's like, bro, I can kind of, I mean, we can see it on you, obviously.

But yeah, if you feel that, you know, so yeah, you're not going to follow them. You're way more apt. to follow, you know, someone's a fitness instructor. Yeah. Someone that's in good shape. Yes. But more important for me is if you don't really believe in what you're saying as a leader, everyone can see it.

And where this really comes into play, and this is such an incredible thing. And I've talked about it over and over again. And I put it, there's an addition of dichotomy of leadership, that I talk about this. I think it was the Barnes & Noble edition. They put like a section in there that I had written this article about and I talk about it

in leadership strategy and tactics. And that's this. If your goal is to take care of yourself, everyone can see it. And you're going to fail. That's the way it is. Like if your goal, if you're willing to step on people

and crush them in order to move up the chain of command, everyone's going to see it. And you're going to fail. Now look, you might get a couple wins here and there. I get it. But long term, you're going to fail. If your goal is to take care of your team and accomplish the mission, that's what your true goal is. Number one, you're going to be successful in taking care of the team and successful in accomplishing the mission.

And then guess what a byproduct is? You will be successful as well. But the minute you say, well, wait a second, maybe I'll just focus on myself for a second. It's the wrong move. It's the wrong move. What you want to do is say, how can I best take care of my people? That's what you want to say. That's what you want to believe.

That's what you want to do. And if you do that, you take care of your people and you take care of your mission. And that's the way you're operating, everyone can see it. Up and down the chain of command, by the way. And eventually, that will play out correctly. If you're looking to take care of you, people will see that up and down the chain of command. And eventually that will play out incorrectly. Yes, sir.

And then he says, can a man acquire and demonstrate these characteristics? That's these characteristics. Self-confidence, endurance, abnegation of self-loyalty and courage. Can a man then acquire and demonstrate these characteristics? The answer is they have, they can. For, as a man thinketh, so is he. so all these things if you think this way you can become that way and he finishes this out by saying this the fixed determination to acquire the warrior soul and have acquired it to either

conquer or perish with honor is the secret to victory george s patten junior Major March 26th, 1926. So, this guy's got a lot of, a lot of things to talk about. We might be rolling into a third session next time, delivering knowledge. And I think it's just so important to think about these things, especially a guy that's controversial like Patton. You know, there's another quote about Patton, you know, because they called Patton old blood and guts and there's there's a quote about patent that someone else said

it was our blood his guts you know so there's some like that's that's that's a rough statement right that's a rough statement so there's controversy you know around Patton there's controversy about some of the things that he did you know there's the whole episode of him slapping around some of the guys that had left the front lines for various reasons that were not, hey, I'm physically wounded. So some of the guys had some mental trauma, you know, whether they were shell-shocked.

And what's interesting about this is this is one I'm sure we can get into. But I'm reading another book written by a leader in World War II. And I was just reading this section where these guys are coming to him crying. We need, I can't take it anymore. and one guy does it and he's like you know talks to him and you know says get back on the line the next guy comes and you know he's crying he's distraught he's like I need to get off the line I can't take it anymore and the guy says you know Smith just came to me with these problems he did a much better job acting than you're doing so my point and the guy eventually broke down

and just said yeah but I mean I just it's really hard and he says look I know it's hard everyone's having a hard time. You can do this. My point is, when you had, there was people that were shirking their duty. There were people that, look, everyone was scared. Patent says it a thousand times. Everyone was scared. Whether someone actually had, you know, shell shock, who knows, certainly when you talk about

caring about your people and you get somebody in a bad situation, I mean, Dick Winters talked about this when these guys were freaking out on the front lines, how he would handle it. It certainly wasn't by slapping him around. but all as I'm saying is that there's controversy around Pat and yet he's got great you take that controversy as part of what you can learn at least I do and definitely a ton of perspective that he has

so we'll we'll keep looking at Patton I believe maybe not next episode but who knows you never know what that next episode's going to bring I do know this. I did some live gigs around America. Sure. They're over now when this podcast comes out. The last two were Seattle and San Francisco,

which both sold out, which was awesome. So to everyone that went to the Jocko Live shows around the country, thank you. And for everyone that's asked for more, it looks like I'm going to do some more. So Jocko Live, we'll put that out. soon on when these next ones will happen. And the other thing is the leadership strategy tactics and field manual that I talked about

today a couple times. And just want to say thanks to everybody. It's been crazy that the sales have been great. And I know that's all because you all are out there getting after it spreading the word, made it number one in a bunch of different outlets that actually measure this stuff. So believe me that every time. I think about that. I think about everyone that that listens to this podcast

and that spread the word and, you know, bought yourself a first edition. And by the way, there was some controversy. Someone sent a picture on social media and that cover was different and said, you know, I waited as too long and I got the second edition. And I said, no, you're in Europe or you're in England.

I think England, New Zealand, Europe, and basically outside America, there's a different cover. it's still first a dish as of right now. Cool. Why is there a different cover? You know what? I guess they have different styles or something that, hey, this is, they just said, hey, this is the, this is not the way books look over here.

And, you know, I just said, I said, Roger that. I'm not from New Zealand. I'm not from Australia. I'm not from England. I'm not from Germany. I'm from America. And if you're telling me that this is like in the book, it's not that much different, but it's different. But apparently that's normal, you know, and.

Yeah, it makes sense. I don't, you know, I try and keep my ego in check, right? Yeah. I'm not George S. Patton saying, I'm right and history will prove it. I'm not thinking of that. When somebody tells me something, that's a professional in another arena. I go, okay, well, maybe explain it to me, you know. And actually I did say that to them.

And they sent me a bunch of other books and said, hey, here's like, this is what books look like over here. Your book will not look like a book even. Yeah. Maybe I'm wrong. You know, I could have been wrong. I could have said, you know what, let's hold the line. And maybe people would be looking at it going, oh, yeah, I'm getting this book.

I don't know. Yeah. Well, it kind of makes sense if you consider the concept, right? You know, like, you know, some cars here, like, if they're super exotic, they'll have the steering wheel on the other side of the road or the other side of the car. It'll be on the right side. Yeah. I wouldn't call that super exotic.

That's just a car that was built in the foreign country. Right, but so, yeah. Okay, period. Okay, so let's say you're shopping for a car. And then you see, like, that's steering well. Really, you shouldn't really make. Hey, I'm not really used to that. Yeah, yeah.

And you could say ergonomically or whatever, but, you know, if you, it's pretty quick to get used to. Or for whatever mental reason. It doesn't even matter. It's like a chasm that needs to be crossed. Yeah, mentally. Tighten that up a little bit. Yeah. But if you go to Australia, brother, that's everybody.

You see what I'm saying? So it's like, boom, we're used to that here. We're used to this here on many different levels. You know, something's bigger than the other. Okay, the car thing that's probably in this side of the spectrum. But unless, book covers, movie posters. When you consider a movie poster, if it doesn't look like a movie poster, like how is that even going to land as a movie poster?

See what I'm saying? Yeah. So that's what we did. So I guess the point is if you got the other cover, you're still good. I'll still be, I'll still give you some knuckles on the first dish. When I open it up, now I might open it up and it might say third a day. That's different.

In which case, you know, let me just, look, I'm not going to, I'm not going to, I'm not going to embarrass you in front of everybody. But I'm going to look at you, you're going to know, I'm going to know that you didn't get the first edition. There's still first edition available right now, but not much longer, I don't think. They're starting to run that second a day. But, so anyways, I want to say thanks to everyone for all that. I'm super stoked and I appreciate it. Now, speaking of acquiring a warrior soul,

which I know is a little bit of a bold statement, it is. But we know from Patton that we can move in the right direction as far as improving our categories that we want improvement in to move us towards being a little bit stronger, a little bit better, a little bit faster, a little bit more of a warrior. Yeah.

Anything you can recommend? That can help us with that? To be able to... Tactical advice for us, maybe? Either conquer or perish with honor. Yeah, we can take jujitsu. And really, that's really what it is, what jujitsu is. I mean, I don't want to say, really that's what it is, but we'll just say that's a part of it.

To conquer or perish with honor. True. If me and you were about to rule, and I, when we go to Shaykent, Because it's part of the deal. It's not a rule, but it's kind of, it's the honorable thing. Respect. What if instead of shaking my hand, I surprise you with like a guillotine or something like that? I conquered, but not with honor.

Well, when I escape the guillotine. Sure. Okay. All right. Then you are going to pay. Right. Then I'm the one who's going to perish. And by the way, if you're, well, I know this has happened to you, but it happened

to me like where somebody's all excited, like all amped up and they think if they're big day. Sure. And so you go to shake their hand and like they either. don't and by the way we're not talking like a formal handshake as if we just signed a NATO peace treaty right we know we're just talking a little bump and roll right slap little little slow little slap bump and roll that's all we're talking about yes but occasionally especially especially this happens if you're going with someone that like is really trying to kill you yeah and then you submit them and then

they're gonna go again but they're so engrossed in like okay I'm gonna make you get you this time they're like forget they're like their minds insane. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. That's, uh, that's good times. Or you can go one step further. I don't think I've ever done that, by the way. I don't think I've ever got so amped up that I like just lost my mind. I think you have. I've done it jokingly with you. No, I think you've done it where you've gotten to the point where you're, you're, you want to go again so bad. Yeah. That you've, that like, I'll, I'll put my hand up and you'll like get reminded and be like, oh yeah, we're actually like friends. Am I wrong?

I could be wrong. I don't know. Overall, you're wrong, but put it this way. Overall I'm wrong. Just put it in a general way. Because as frustrated as I've ever gotten with you,

which is like pretty frustrated. Yeah, like deep, deep engulfing frustration. There was always like a little governor on there where it's like, even like my expressions of frustration, like there's always a hint of like joke in there. Like genuine. I don't think I've ever.

that's not even how I get for it. That's not how I look when I get for real in life frustrated. Like I'll get more quiet than anything. But with you, it's like, and we talked about this before, where you're so like you can take kind of anything. You know, like if I cheat with you, like if I straight up like you're rolling with Andy and I jump on your back and I put a real choke in,

make you tap or whatever. I feel like you can like take that, you know? Yeah. Like you won't be all mad at me, not externally anyway. But, you know, I feel like, you can just take this kind of stuff. Well, externally, there would be retribution.

Yes, yeah, but I'm the same. Severe retribution. But you see what I'm saying? It won't damage the relationship in any way. You know, like, I feel like like, you can kind of take these kinds of things. So it's almost like I'm in like a little free arena. Believe me, it's a good thing.

But I feel, what I'm saying is I feel comfortable to just be like, you know, F you or whatever. I find. sneak attacks on the jiu-tut-tumat, somewhat offensive. Yeah. Yeah, I remember one time you told me that. Yep. I've had a couple people do it over the years, like, you know, like tap someone out and,

like, hey, we were over by the wall and, like, kind of just turn my back to start going back towards the center and have someone jump on my back and, like, put a choke in. Yeah. That's cool. But I'm, first of all, like, I'm going to get out and then I'm, you're going to pay. Right. Because that's just, you know. It's not with honor.

You know what it is? Yeah. And I think what offends me about it is the, like you can tell that their ego has flared up. And they're trying to recover that or whatever. Yeah. And so then maybe it is my ego that starts to flare up. And I feel, but I feel more like it's a, it's a scenario where someone's outwined. Right.

And there needs to be, there needs to be a lesson that gets taught, right, at that point. Yeah, I think you're right. And I agree where. Somebody actually also asked me this on social media recently, which was like, hey, going with a guy. He's grinding his knuckles into my neck the whole time, like into my face. And he's like, so I got on top and just like mounted and like punished him with neon stomach or something like that. Is that, is that bad? You know, and it's a legitimate question.

And I was like, no, that's approved. Like if someone, if someone wants to get all freaking hostile and kind of, I don't want to use the word dirty because it's not really dirty, but it's, What would you call that? What did you call that? What do they call it? In Portuguese, it's like grossa, right? It means like kind of brutal. Yeah.

Like if someone's getting crazy with me like that, then I'll probably put some kind of a, some kind of a slightly increased measure back on them, right? Just slightly increased. Yeah. It's not like I'm going to, oh, now I'm going to break someone's arm. Right. Not at all.

But if you want to, you know, grab a hold of my, whatever, and start squeezing, it's like, Okay, cool. Yeah. Yeah, you're gonna. It's weird because that one's, unemotional, by the way. It's like, okay, cool.

Yeah, I see where you're at. Right. That's not, not cool. And here's how you can know. Yeah. It can be tricky, though, because some people, because there's different levels of that. Like, some people literally don't know what they're doing.

Yeah. They don't realize they're even doing it. Just relax, bro. You know, sometimes like, hey, I probably should have said that to this guy, too. Like, just being like, hey, man, if you get crazy with people, they might get crazy with you.

What you want to do is try and learn and trying to try and try to, have a good time. This is an actual combat. We're just having fun. We're trying to learn. So you should really go with that approach. You know, that's smart. That's a smart thing I say. Because some people don't know. Yeah, they don't know. And then, then there's like this intermediary level where they know, but it's not aimed at you specifically. It's aimed at sort of everyone. You know, you know, the kind of, you know, the kind of, they come maybe come from an environment where it's like that or, you know, so it's like their whole attitude towards any competition is like crush you, kill you,

like, you're my enemy kind of thing. And they just, you just, just have this kind of subconscious attitude about it. So that's how they roll. And then then you get on the other side of the spectrum, which I think is the ideal candidate for the repercussions, is the kind of guy where he's like mad at you, maybe not even necessarily because it's you, but just he's having a bad day or he's just like frustrated

because he's not winning or whatever kind of thing. And then he's turning it up a notch. Like, and how you say he's stepping out of line? And that's what it is. It's like you're you're stepping slightly. outside of like the mutual respectful agreement of this friendly like training slash competition match.

And the other thing is you got to remember is like when I roll with Andy like man we're smashing each other. I mean it's full he's you know we'll do whatever like it's full we might as well be competing for you know the world championships. Yes. Because if there's a chance where he's trying to choke me

and I've got my chin down he'll choke my face. no doubt about it. I'll do the same to him. But if I was rolling with someone I didn't really train with all the time and they buried their chin, I'd be like, okay, I'll go for an arm lock or whatever. You're not just putting your forearm across their mandible and cranking it as hard

as you can to open up a neck exposure or just get them to tap from that. Right. Yeah. You know, so. Yeah. And that's a subtle kind of dance you got to do too with like who you roll with or whatever. But I think generally speaking, there's like an understanding where I think we all sort of understand where, yeah, like that's a subtle kind of.

if you're real close with someone and you already know you guys are used to that competition, you can take it a little bit further. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And then even on top of that, where like, and this I guess goes for people who you're, at least have a good rapport with, whether you're close with them or not, where, okay, so there's, you know, Isaiah, right? He's one of the MFA guys, right? Okay, so we'll roll or whatever, and sometimes it'll go into in this ongoing scramble, right?

So, like, one time he was like, it was an ongoing scramble. I don't know if he was on purpose going outside. of the mat, like outside of the door. He kind of did like to escape, but he went outside of the mat. And I just chased him outside and jumped on the tip-bye. We're out in the, not on the mat anymore over by the water fountain, you know. But I chased them not because no, no, this, it's still on. It was like halfway joking, you know, getting like, ooh, we're still fighting.

But it was like joking, you know. Sometimes people do that like serious, you know, like you're hitting the mop in the corner and they're still trying to go. So here's the important part of this whole thing. If the reason that this is important is because if you and I are in a real fight and you crank my face that doesn't mean anything. I can I'm just going to I'm not like what am I going to do? I'm going to try and bite you right. There's if you're cranking my face, I'm not going to tap to it. Yeah.

So it is not a legit thing unless it opens up a choke, right? If you can make the pain open up a choke, well, then that's fine. I guess what I'm saying is there's things that you could do to somebody. Like here's another one, breaking someone's finger, right? Like I could grab three your fingers if we were in a real fight, grab two of your fingers, grab one of your fingers, and just break it. Does that end the fight? No, it doesn't end the fight.

And in fact, it has not a huge impact on the fight. immediately, right? You know, like it's not going to end the fight immediately. So, therefore, for me to grab it your fingers and try and break one of your fingers is not good

training partner. Yeah. Because it doesn't really impact the the fight. Look, it has a small impact of the fight, but like eye gouging, right? And this is a good one because I've had people

try and gouge out my eyes before. it doesn't change the outcome of the fight at that moment. Look, if you get your finger deep enough, because I have not done this, but I've had friends that have dug in for eyes, and it's definitely, it makes people react, right? But if someone's a trained fighter, it's not this game changer.

It's not as a game changer as a choke is. So therefore, me going, hey, you can just attack my eyes and we're good. that no because if you do that guess what I'm going to have scratches on my eyes and yet it doesn't mean that you could ever beat me it just means that I have scratches on my eyes it doesn't change the outcome so I guess there's the there's the strange part about this we're not the strange part that's it's important because we do train hard we train hard for a reason yeah that's one of the best things about jih Tijuana is you can go 99% you can go 100% and hey if I get

your arm lock you tap if you give me an arm lock I tap cool then we go again if I gouge out your eye, we can't go again. And realistically, it's hard to gouge out someone and I. And it didn't really change the outcome of fight because you'll still be fighting with one eye. Yeah. So anyways. Yeah. And even if you're training for actually fighting or whatever, like outside of MMA, I guess.

But here's a good one, biting off someone's ear. Yeah. Right. You know, Igor. Yeah. That's what made me think of it. So, so Igor, you know, he got into a street fight. Yeah.

And, you hear all these people say, you know, you rip off someone's ear. They're going to be done. Guess what? Somebody bit off Igor's ear. And he could, he like, I remember, I was like, bro. And I said, well, what happened? He goes, oh, and I got, I got side control. And then, you know, mount and finished him, you know, with his ear off.

Yeah. Big giant chunk of his ear gone. Yeah. I mean, visibly gone forever. Yeah. Mike Tyson's time. Yeah, bigger than Mike Tyson's time. Yeah, straight up.

So this idea that all just bite this guy's ear, it's like, that's why if you and I were to go to train today and I'm like, you know what? Just to make it more realistic, I'm going to bite your ear off. And then you're like, bro, what are you doing? And you stop. Does that mean I win? No, it means we lost in training. Yeah.

And I got a false sense of security thinking that just biting off your ear would stop you. When the reality is, when it happened to Igor, he just was like, oh, cool. now you're really going to pay. Exactly, right, man. So I know there's some guy that was on the receiving end of that that's probably listening right now going, I wish I wouldn't have bitten that guy's ear because. I know, man.

Heavily paid the price of no one. Because this is the thing. To bring us back to jihitsu, the jiu-jitsu that you train every single day is effective. It's very effective. You don't need to bite. You don't need to pull hair.

You don't need to gouge eyes. Sure, you can add that stuff. It's fine. In a real situation, it's fine. But the fundamentals that you know are infinitely more powerful than these little additional things that you might think in your brain are a game changer. They're not. Yes, I agree. So, Jiu Jitsu.

So we want to train it. Let's go with that premise. We want to train Jiu Jitsu. Do you have any recommendations on what we should utilize to train Jiu Jitsu? Yes. Discipline. But attire-wise, we're going to go G-N-G-Bong-Bong-Bomb. So uniform for a ghee is a ghee.

Uniform for no ghee is not a ghee. It's a rash card. Anyway, best geese in the world factually are from origin. So go to origin, main.com. You don't even have to ask anymore what gea I should get. Get an origin gea and take your pick. I don't care whatever color you like. How about that?

Yeah. And not only can you get geese there, and someone actually just asked this, they saw a picture of Pete and the deco. standing with origin jeans on and said but they they said where do you get those ghee pants with pockets interesting no their origin jeans which are also available at origin main.com made in America from the very the very thread that they are created with was made in America American denim yes well yeah good that's actually only the only jeans I wear yeah some designer jeans too but

the way. I didn't realize this until, you know, I revisited them. It's been so long. Nonetheless, yes. Orginmain.com is where you can get all this stuff. Also, they got shirts and joggers and sweat suits. Would you call them sweatsuits? I guess so. You know, other clothing attire elements. Yeah. So yeah, jeans like Jocco said, also supplements. Yeah. And you mentioned discipline. I thought you're going to talk about discipline. That we sell discipline. The supplement. The Pre-mission supplement. Pre-mission supplement. Discipline in a powder, which you can get Jocco Palmer, which is very tasty.

You can also get the discipline can, which is awesome. And mulk. And by the way, if you didn't know this yet, the vitamin shop, yeah. The vitamin shop in America,

which I think there's 700 stores all over the place, they now have the whole line of Jaco Fuel. So if you want to go and get some, you can go and get some. Get some of vitamin shop as well. Or you can go to origin, main.com and get some there. Yep.

So, yes, milk additional protein in the form of dessert, discipline for your brain and body. It's the same time. Discipline go, the pill, and the can. Can is like the energy drink delivery system. We'll call it. We don't like to say energy drink because energy drinks. generally speaking, are not healthy.

They got the stigma. It's an earned stigma. They got a ton of sugar in them. They got a bunch of nasty chemicals. Yes, but this one does not yet. This one does not. But if you take away the nasty chemicals, all the sugar,

and that part of it. Excessive caffeine. Excessive caffeine. 300, 400 milligrams of caffeine. You do not need that in one can. Yes. Of anything. So take away all those negative things.

you we have everything else is is essentially energy drink material so it's I think it's just a stigma okay it has a lightning bolt on the logo true it's in one of those little thin yeah it is a can oh yeah that's true that's not because it's an energy drink it's because it's tropic thunder yeah and it's in one of those little slim cans because lemon lime doesn't have a it has a it has a little little lemon lime on it on the citrus cyto citrus psycho Just wedge in there in the logo. Okay, okay. Yeah, yeah.

So yeah, exception, little twist there, if you will. Nonetheless, if you like energy drinks, but you're like, hey, I'm not down for all that, that negative noise, boom, right here. That's a delivery system. And also speaking of vitamin shop, you, me, Dakota Meyer, J.P. Dinell will be in the San Diego, vitamin shop on February 8th to kick it with the troops. What day is that? February 8th.

Dang. All right, there you go. Boom. Also, what else we got? Okay, cans, yes. Also, Warrior Kid Mulk. Yeah, I know. Additional protein for the young ones, for the youth.

Yeah. If you will. Best thing in the world for the children. Agree. Strawberry chocolate. And don't forget about chocolate white tea. Yes, sir. If you want a deadlift 8,000 pounds, get it.

Yep, that's true. happens to be certified, organic as well. Also, yes, Jocko has a store. What, we have a store. Happens to be called Jocko Store. Simplicity. So go jocco store.com. Sorry, this is where you can get your shirts and hoodies and beanies and hats,

both flex-fit and snap back truck hats while representing on the path. You know, discipline equals freedom. Good. Stand by to get some. Back to the book. Back to the book. All that stuff. Unless you go there.

Like I said, jococco store.com. If you like something, get something. Represent while you're on this everlasting path. Also, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already. On your iTunes or Stitcher, Google Play. Spotify. You know, all these podcasts. Wherever you listen to your podcast, subscribe.

Yep. And also we have the Grounded Podcast, which we almost just recorded one when we went on this big tangent just a minute ago. But Grounded Podcast, we talk about all things life, Jiu-Jitsu. And you can check that one out. Also the Warrior Kid podcast for kids. And don't forget about the Warrior Kid soap made by Aiden. And the new soap is out. You see the logo? Yes. So dope. It's called, it's called Killer Soap. It's got ingeons. It's got ingredients. ingredients in it that help deter Microbials? Microbes and funguses. It's got all to get rid of that stuff. So if you're a person that does something called Jiu-Jitsu, you probably want some of this.

And you know what's really cool about it? It's black. The soap is black. The soap is black because it's got charcoal. I hear a good thing, by the way. So there you go. Get yourself some killer soap. A young kid who started a business.

No big deal. Started it when he was like 11. Started his own business. Got goats and decided what can I make with goat milk. Oh, I know what I can make. Soap. Killer soap. Which allows everyone in the world.

Very nice. Also, YouTube. We have a YouTube channel official. Where Echo Charles is constantly trying his utmost to make a viral video. He's got the ingredients. He's got the formula. Can he do? Can he pull it off?

I think my hypothesis that'll never be categorized beyond a hypothesis, I think. I don't think you can make a viral video like that. Proactively. You can't proactively like, okay, I'm going to formulate. There is no formula for the viral video. I'd be interesting to find out if anyone's ever said, okay, I'm going to make a viral video and then it worked. I would think that. Actually, you know what, no, there's some people like on YouTube, like YouTube stars or whatever that they can make consistent viral videos.

Well, I guess it depends. Yeah, yes, sir, yes, sir. But I think it depends on what you mean by viral video. Because technically, from what I understand, our video is like, it just comes kind of from this real small source and then it goes viral. So if the platform is already too big. Yeah, I got 10 million subscribers and it gets 11 million views. Is that a viral video? Okay, point taken.

But the thing is, I don't know. Has a viral video ever been manufactured proactively with intention? Yeah. I'm sure somebody's must have. Yeah, I'm sure someone had a really good idea and just came, it hit them and they were like, you know what? And they just record this. It was more of a hope thing. It wasn't a guaranteed thing.

But it was just like, hey, man, this, I don't see how this couldn't go viral kind of thing. And they just happened to be right, you know. But I don't know that there's a formula that someone can follow. Unless in the event of us, us, us, Making a viral video. This is where it's going to be me. That would be you. You're making viral videos.

No, but you're the talent, though. So what they call it officially. You're the talent person in front of the camera. Then we're in rough shape, bro. Unless, yes. You can do some good editing. Yeah. Well, I'm going to do my best.

And so subscribe to that channel. You can watch Echo Charles and I talk about skinny knees. Or what have you? I think that's the. The most, I think that's the best, the funniest video. Might not be the best, but it's, it's pretty funny. I watch it once every two months, and I still laugh every time. Yeah, there's some laughs to be had.

I will agree with that. Psychological warfare, if you need a little help getting over a moment of weakness, you're not alone. You're not alone. I will be there with you. Press play on your MP3 media device, and I will enter. through your ear and give you words of discipline, focus, and will.

So go to psychological warfare where the artist is Jocko Willink. It's any MP3 platform. We also have a visual representation, which you can find on flipside canvas.com run by my brother Dakota Meyer, where you can, he's making, let's just call it, Representations of the path. So hit that up. I got a bunch of books

Leadership Strategy and Tactics Field Manual. Thank you all Spread the word. Write a review onto Amazon and then get Way of the Warrior Kid the whole series One, two, and three, Mark's Mission, where there's a will and way of the warrior kid Mikey and the Dragons for the little kid Discipline equals Freedom Field Manual for the older kid. I that needs to be on the path. The audio version of that is on MP3 platforms as well.

And then, of course, extreme ownership and the dichotomy of leadership. That is the books I wrote with my brother, Laif Babin, laying out the principles of leadership that will help you in business and life. And if you need more help than that, we have Echelon Front, which is our leadership consultancy, where we solve problems through leadership.

You can go to echelonfront.com for that. EF Online. That's Echelon Front Online. leadership training because leadership is not an inoculation. We got the muster coming up in 2019. Where are we going to be? We're going to be in Orlando. We're going to be in Dallas and we're going to be in Phoenix, Arizona.

Go to Extreme Ownership.com. Every one of these that we have done has sold out. These are going to sell out too. So if you want to come and you want to bring your team, go there now. Extreme Ownership.com. And we have EF. Overwatch and EF Legion for almost since the inception of Echalon Front, people have been asking us, hey, where can I hire veterans that know and understand the principles you talk about?

That demand signal grew to a point where we now have an answer to that demand signal. If you are at a company and you want to hire people that understand extreme ownership and understand the dichotomy of leadership and understand the leadership strategies and tactics that we talk about all the time, they go to EF. Overwatch or EF Legion to find people that will come and help lead your company to victory. And if you're a veteran and you're looking for your next mission, this is where you find it. You find it at EF. Overwatch. You find it at EF. Legion. Go check them out. And if for some completely unknown reason, you still feel the need to communicate with us after all these hours.

Then we are available. Sure. On the interwebs, on Twitter, on Instagram, and on Jha Rasta book. Echo is at Echo Charles. And I am at Jocko Willink. And thank you to everyone out there for your support. We couldn't do this podcast without you being in the game,

without you getting some deaf core or some origin gear or some jaco supplements, all of which, those things, they support the podcast. So we appreciate all you troopers out there. Trooping. And thanks to those of you that are out there in uniform, the soldiers, sailors,

airmen, Marines, the Coast Guardmen who protect our way of life every day and to our police and law enforcement, to the firefighters, to the paramedics and EMTs, the dispatchers, the correctional officers, their border patrol, Secret Service, and all the other first responders that protect us here at home. Thank you for that. And to everyone. Remember what Patton.

Remember what Patton taught us, not only about war and leadership. And that is the fact that we all have weaknesses. We all have shortfalls. No one was born perfect. but we can still overcome. We can overcome our natal defects through unremitting effort and practice. And as he told, his own son,

you can be born with a soul capable of correct military reactions or the body capable of having big muscles, but both qualities must be developed by hard work. So don't say, sit back and accept the hand that you've been dealt negative instead overcome your weaknesses capitalize on your strengths by getting out there and getting after it and until next time this is echo and jaco out