Jocko Podcast - 435: Get Up and Aggressively Attack Until You Win. Lessons from A Marine Named Mitch.

Episode Date: April 24, 2024

Lessons from Mitchell Paige. Enlisted Marine involved in endless battles in the 1040s.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

This is Jocko podcast number 435 with Echo Charles and me, Jocco Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good evening. The night we moved off the beach inland somewhere around Henderson Field. We were to beef up the small perimeter which had been held by the other two regiments. Our friends at the beach told us to expect to see some activity after dark, as they had just told us about the way the enemy harassed them at night. just as we were starting across an open clearing near Henderson Field, washing machine Charlie, the Japanese observation and spotter plane we had been told about,

dropped his greenish white but very illuminating parachute flares right over us, lighting up the entire area like daylight. Naturally, we hit the deck immediately and not a soul moved. A moment later, the booming from a seaman. sea lark channel came the horrifying red hot naval gunfire ripping up trees and causing the earth to move under you as each big round came crashing ashore this was our baptism and that right there is an excerpt from a book called a marine named Mitch written by Mitchell page who who served as an enlisted Marine was eventually commissioned.

And he was born in Charlie Roy, Pennsylvania, August 31st, 1918. His parents were Serbian. They had immigrated to America from overseas, and he was the youngest of three, older sister, older brother, spent his teenage years in the Great Depression. doesn't talk about that too much in the book gives some kind of basic background but as he's growing up he sees some it's interesting he sees some some violence and whatnot but it turns out that the military looks like a pretty good option and we're going to get into it get into his life and you're going to hear some stories that you won't forget here we go one day after high school was over, I kissed my mother goodbye. My very close friend, Johnny Holler, was two years younger than I,

wanted to go with me. Mother packed a bag of food for us, and Johnny and I set out for Baltimore. We started walking, and the next day we arrived in Baltimore after being given several rides by people on the road. The recruiters told me they could not accept me until the end of August because I was just 17, and besides, I needed to put on more weight. So on that hot summer day in 1936, and I started back to Camden Hill. This was the greatest distance either of us had ever been from home. We walked many miles as we were embarrassed to put our hands, to put up our hands to flag a car or a truck. Once we came to a stream where we stopped for a rest, I washed out my socks and put them on a rock to dry. Then I bathed myself. Johnny laughed at me when I told him, you had to check your socks, shoes, and feet if you're going to walk long distances.

On my 18th birthday, I was back in Baltimore, alone this time. I passed. the physical examination, but I had to eat about a dozen bananas and drink several glasses of water as I still wasn't quite heavy enough when the doctor started the examination. I had my left hand on a Bible and my right hand was raised facing the American flag. My spine tingled as I repeated the oath administered to me by the Marine Corps officer that day in the recruiting office in Baltimore. Quote, I will uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States of America against all enemies whomsoever foreign or domestic I was given a train ticket to Paris Island

South Carolina for my boot camp training there were other new men on the train also and we quickly got acquainted we talked about our new adventure and all the fun we were going to have but that all changed when we were met at the train station in a little town by some Marines known as drill instructors or DIs I never realized anybody or anything could be so rough our drill instructors were truly tough men I can recall corporal Ambrose D webb he would put his nose against a recruits nose and say if you don't shape up I'll kill you and we all knew he meant it one night about zero 200 he made us get under our bunks roll a heavy marching order then carry them outside put them on our backs and then we had to

double time into the swamps He marched us right into Ribbon Creek while standing on the bank screaming, Down, you dumb bastards. Drown, you dumb bastards. Drown! We had outstanding men and knew what March discipline meant by that time. The first man in the water marched straight through. The rest followed, and as a consequence, no one was hurt.

We were dead tired when we finally got to bed in our barracks that morning, and Revely sounded a very short time later. a very favorite practice of corporal webs while we were at the rifle range was to march us out to a very sandy area where he ordered us to stand a detention

for an hour at a time. By the way, that's the worst. When I had to go to like, you're going through basic seal training. You you got to like do pushups and burpees we didn't do burpees. They do them now. We did eight count bodybuilders. Whatever. They're doing calisthenics. That's how you're getting crushed.

When I went to officer candidate school? A lot of it was stand there at attention. Don't move. And I would much rather take the burpees and eight count bodybuilders or whatever. What is the position of standing? The hands in your side. Oh, at your side. Your feet are together.

You're looking straight ahead. It's like that. It's a normal military position of attention. You can't like loosen up or nothing. Stay still. Stay still. It's not fun. Back to the book.

With our shirt, with our arms and necks exposed since we can only wear an undershirt, The thousands of sand fleas were all over us in our nostrils, eyes, ears, and hair, web paste back and forth around us, pounding the palm of his hand with a stick screaming, If you move a muscle, I'll kill you. Check. Look, obviously, I'm not going to read the whole book. Fast forward a little bit. Graduation from boot camp was the highlight in my life to that point. Fast forward a little bit.

When I enlisted, when I had enlisted in Baltimore, the commandant of the Marine Corps was Major General John H. Russell. On December 1st, 1936, when General Russell retired Major General Thomas Holcomb became the 17th commandant of the Marine Corps. As years went by, the old salts used to say, and how many commandants have you served under? It was wonderful to know that I was no longer a recruit. I was now out serving with other regulars from boy to man. So again, this is 1936. So, you know, this is the Great Depression is going on. And there's no war going on.

And he gets assigned to a ship. He gets assigned to the USS Wyoming in Norfolk, Virginia. And they set sail out into the Atlantic. And he goes, you know, through San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Guantanamo, and through the Panama Canal, out of the Pacific Ocean, goes up the coast of Mexico, ends up in California. Going to the book here, pick it up. The next day, February 18th, 1937 was a cool overcast day. and we were off San Clemente Island, which is 65 nautical miles off the coast of San Diego where you and I live.

And it's also where seals get trained, not only in basic seal training, but also in some advanced training, you go out to San Clemente, so San Clement Island has a special place. Of course. In our hearts. So here he is.

Overcast Day. We were off San Clemente Island, when at 1042, a powder charge of a, five inch shell exploded in a breach which had not been properly closed at that precise moment on gun number 13 starboard side marine captain edward j trumbull and five enlisted men were killed ten others were seriously injured and one died a few hours later i helped a man to the sick bay whose arm had been blown off the shoulder it was a horrible sight that was the first of many terrible sites i would be experiencing in the next few years years. So that's one thing they do at San Clement Island is you can you can bomb it. So they do naval gunfire out there and that's what they were doing I'm sure at that time. So then from there he gets onto another ship the USS Showmont goes to Hawaii goes to Guam. So he's on this

USS Showmont C-H-A-U-M-O-N-T and he says this on the 19th or sorry on the 19th of June 1937, we steamed into Manila Bay past Corregador and into Manila Philippine Islands some 1500 miles from Guam. As the tug eased us into the dock, a loud cheer and laughter came from the greeters as the stern of the ship moved in closer. A marine private had lowered himself over the fan tail of the ship and under the letters of the ship's name, he had painted the following. So, you know, the name of the ship is the showmong.

And that's written across the stern of the ship. And so this Marine in the middle of the night had gone over the side. And he had added letters underneath to make a sentence. And the sentence that he wrote was, Christ help all us Marines on Navy transports. And then he says this. Only a troop passenger would understand his reasons for doing this. And I was a troop passenger on three Navy ships.

Two amphibious ships. One aircraft carrier. He says, and here's what they were dealing with. One canteen of fresh water a day to brush your teeth and wash your face. Salt water showers and sleeping quarters that were stacked so high, so deep and so close together, you never knew whose foot or hand would be in your face. Anyone with claustrophobia would never have survived. The chow lines were unbelievable.

It was one continuous line that snaked all around the top side of the ship from about 0,500 for breakfast. It's just, I was just laughing as I read this because that's exactly what it was like for me on a ship in the 90s. This was interesting. Fast forward a little bit. The total strength of the United States Marine Corps at that time was 17,000. The total strength of the whole Marine Corps, 17,000, which included all the officers and men stationed all over the world. Our pay then as a private was $21 a month. 20 cents was deducted for the name.

Navy each month for our hospitalization. So actually, I was receiving $20.80 a month. So a little bit more. Our commanding officer was known as Miles R. Thatcher. He was better known to all enlisted men as court martial Thatcher. It was said that Colonel Thatcher held the Marine Corps record for the greatest number of Brig Bays awarded for accidental discharges and for failure to salute. What's interesting about that is even though they had this super strict commander,

they were still out just like being young Marines and getting after it. Pick up a little fast forward in the book. I can recall one big brawl in the Dreamland cabaret when about 200 sailors, Marines, and civilians turned on one another while blowing my whistle and pulling sailors and Marines apart I felt someone pummeling my back and the back of my head I swung around and quickly I could see a ballerina flopping to the floor as I had accidentally clobbered her with my elbow I picked up her I picked her up and deposited her behind the bar and told the bartender to put some ice on her head I was glad that the night was over I was worried about the ballerina but she was all right the next day nothing but a sore head

So these guys are just out brawling he ends up going from Manila and heading for China And on October 25th, 1938, I went aboard ship in Manila and we sailed up to Hong Kong for a few days. And then to Shanghai, after we hit the Yangtze River, we then steamed along the muddy wangpu River to Shanghai, which was about 16 miles from the sea. We passed numerous Japanese warships and all looked as though they were itching for a scrap. That's 1938. One day I was browsing around in the Oriental bookstore, which was located at 164 Victoria Road, in Tiansin. I saw Lieutenant Chidster perusing a book. As I walked over to say hello to him, I noticed he was looking at a book entitled Opium.

He asked me what I was reading, and I told him I had just purchased a book about Genghis Khan. Previously, I'd purchased a book about Marco Polo, the Venetian traveler. Lieutenant Chidester said he was reading all the books about dope he could lay his hands on. The next day when I came off watch and walked into the guardhouse, the sergeant of the guard told me that Lieutenant Chisdester wished to see me. When I went into the small officer of the day's room, Lieutenant was reading the book about opium. He told me to sit down and then started to tell me why he was so interested in books about dope. He said, someday dope will be the ruination of the... world dope will do the people's dope dope dope will do do dope will do do do do do do do do do

do do do do do do do do do do to the people's and bayonets won't do it will kill millions without wounds cuts dismemberment mutilation or bloodletting but rather it will kill by destroying the mind he told me about the horrors and the tragedy he believed would beset the world all mankind through the use of narcotics he told me how the Japanese had introduced their red pills into China. He said the Chinese had recently instituted a law that Chinese manufacturers of dope

and the Chinese peddlers of dope would be shot. He gave me a real education on opium, heroin, and morphine. He moves again. I went to Chin Wang Tao on the coast where I went aboard the USS Henderson or more familiarly known as Hendi Maru,

to any sailor and marine who's ever traveled to or from the far. East in the 30s and 40s so he's on another ship back across the Pacific back to Honolulu fast forward San Francisco through back through the Panama Canal back to Brooklyn granted Navy granted leave goes home for the first time mother read several letters to me she had received from the old country wherein it was feared that Serbia in Serbia that they too would be in another war Prince Paul of Yugoslavia was reported visiting with Hitler and many of the high Yugoslav Air Force officers

were mingling with German officials and military personnel. Mother said she was certain that the country was being sold out to the Germans. When my leave was over, I was ordered to Philadelphia Navy Yard for duty. So he shows up there. I've been promoted to corporal September 10th, 1940. And again, just trying to give you some sense of what's going on in his world as being a peacetime Marine during the Great Depression. Fast forward a little bit more.

Captain Mahoney called me into his office, handed me a sheet of paper as he reached out his hand and said, congratulations, sergeant. I've been promoted. My date of rank was May 14th, 1941. Goes over. He's now tracking. You know, they're all watching these world events.

He sees the Uislav get bombed by Hitler. And now we kind of get into it. Sunday, December 7th, 1941. I was sitting in my tent in New River, North Carolina, when the news on the radio was interrupted with a special bullet and the Japanese were bombing Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The news went around camp and a flash as it did around the country in the entire world that day in December.

All men on liberty and those on leave were recalled immediately. There were very heavy casualties in Hawaii. We learned, as everyone seemed to have his ears glued to all the radios in camp that day. In addition, we learned that the Japanese had also struck at all of our other. bases in the Pacific and in the Orient, all 16 officers and 178 enlisted men at Tianzan and Peking were interned that day by the Japanese a short time after that.

The first announcement, Captain Mahoney and Sergeant Bill Agee, who had just returned from Charleston, South Carolina, came charging into the tent. The captain's first words were, well, this is it this time. and we all knew it was too. We, fast forward, when we learned that we would be the first to be going overseas, I thought how nice it would be if we'd only be able to continue to listen to what was my favorite radio program, as it was also for practically all the Marines in New River, North Carolina, so they found out that they're leaving.

This was a little side note as well. Well, it's not a side note. in October 1941, Chesty arrived in New River, North Carolina, and took over as the commanding officer of the 1st Battalion 7th Marines. So you got Chesty Puller. Get to hear about him. Our battalion executive officer was Major O'Dell M. Connolly, an outstanding officer in every respect.

We all had absolute confidence in Major Connolly, and I personally was very happy to have such capable leaders as he and Colonel Hanneken. On the 4th of April, 1942, I was promoted to platoon sergeant in the Marine Corps. My machine gun platoon went aboard the USS Fomahalt, which was a cargo ship. Also aboard was a naval construction unit of CBEs.

At 0400 on the 10th of April, 1942, we sailed out of Norfolk and out into the Atlantic. What's a C-B again? So C.Bs, it stands for Construction Battalion. So in the Navy, they have, they need to build things. And so they formed this group called the Construction Battalion. Their nickname is C.B. And their symbol is like a little B.

But they're all, and they still exist to this day. And they're really, in a way, kind of the group inside the Navy, that is likely to spend time on the ground in combat because they build things in an extremist situation. So for us in Tasking to Brouser, I had CBs with me. And they, so their job in our camp in Camp Mark Lee in Ramadi.

So if we needed something to be built, they built it. So if we needed a bunker built or we needed tables built or we needed a building built, they would build it. Like they would build a building. You know what I mean?

Now it doesn't, it's not up to code or whatever. Right, right. I mean, it's structurally sound. You know, it's two by fours and there's no sheet rock. Yeah. But it's got plywood on the inside. And then these guys, actually our CBs, would go out and just build out whatever we needed to. So they, when we would set up in a combat outpost, if we needed a little extra, who knows, maybe a little planning space, they'd go out into town and go down there and build it.

Yeah, yeah. They, when Stoner was over in Camp Corregador, they were in this building called Full Metal Jacket. You seen them in a movie film. So this building was called Full Metal Jacket was all blown up. This is over at Camp Corigador, the first of the 506th. And these soldiers and Marines and seals are living in this building called Full Metal Jacket. And I remember one of the first things.

So when we got to Ramadi, pretty early we went over. They needed help over in that district of Ramadi. Eastern Ramadi wait who who needed help well there was a lot of enemy activity all right and so everyone knows there so when we showed up we we killed some IED in placers like almost out of the gate yeah and Colonel Gronsky who's been on the podcast we were I'm literally in the the in his tactile operation so the brigade tactical operation center we'd been there for a little while but a very short period of time and when we got there Marines had just had a massive IED in this place called firecracker and four Marines got killed it was terrible and the Marines kind of liaise with us and

said hey we've got this area where there's a lot of IED and placements do you can you help us and we're like sure and so BTF Tony took some guys they would have set up a sniper position and killed IED and placers in that vicinity where they had just lost those Marines And I was in talking to Colonel Gronsky as these reports are coming in, hey, there's been multiple engagements of IED in placers and, you know, Colonel Gronsky's, are those you guys? Yeah, sir, those are my guys. And he said, we could use your guys out in Eastern Ramadi in this place called the Malab district. So I said, Roger that. And so we put together a package of guys to go out to Eastern Ramadi.

And at first we took a big group like probably we probably took 20 guys for the first series of missions that we did out of there But when we got there we needed a place to stay So where we stayed was this place called full metal jackets and at that time It was dirt floors just mosquitoes just hotter than hell It's just sucked. It was nasty Mosquitoes like a sand fleas or something and it had moon dust. You know what moon dust is?

Yeah. Have you been to a place that has real world like real world moon dust? No. So this had moon dust everywhere in Camp Corregador and the moon dust

was just all over the place. So this place really sucked to live. So we ended up conducting operations for a period of time out there and that's actually when we had the blue on blue. So all that stuff. So we conducted a bunch of operations.

We ended up having that blue on blue now we go back to we take I take all those guys and we go back to Western Ramadi when we get back to Western Romadi which is which was called shark base which we changed the name to Camp Markley after Mark got killed so now we're back there and we you know we debrief the the blue on blue we set up standard operating procedures to make sure it doesn't happen again all that investigation gets complete so now it's we're back we got to get back in the We'll go do our job.

And now it was, okay, we need to send an element of guys back over to Corregor. And this ended up being detachment Corregor, debt core. So debt core, which Seth took six guys, seven guys, out to debt core. And Mikey Montserra was one of them. J.P. Donnell was one of them. So that group of guys, I think all the other guys are still. in some of them are out but anyways it was that group of guys they go back out there so now it's just them but now they're going to permanently live there and they're in this freaking barracks that

is sucks so we explain that to the cbys and this whole story that I just told you is my love story for the cbs yeah yeah because then the cbs go back go out there they load up a truck and go out there with all kinds of plywood and air conditioning and rewire the the thing and get it all set up and and the and everyone built in these big kind of empty rooms everyone built their built their own little bedrooms yeah so so mikey monster or his life good is it's like mikey's mansion or something like that and everyone had these little basically built these little you know built a nice a lot more comfortable they put flooring in because it was dirt yeah so they put plywood down the so the cbs did that the cbs also

so one of the the CB chief great guy and so we got mortared and the mortar round hit by our tents and but luckily thankfully I don't know how it didn't hurt anybody but it blew up our put holes into our big we had a big water tank you know like a 10,000 gallon water tank a big giant water tank and so it put big holes in it was ruined and somehow my CB chief went out and found somehow he went out and found another tank and brought it in a camp and got it all hooked up and you know I was talking to him and I said hey man I thank you like he got it up in a day or whatever two days and I just went and I was okay and again this is my like love story for the CBs and so I said hey chief I was like Hey man, I really appreciate you getting that done.

That way guys can fill up their canteens. And he's like, hey, it's no problem. I'll do whatever I got to do to take care of you guys so you can go out there and kill these bad guys. He said, because I don't want no more boom, boom in the camp. And I said, I hear you, man. I don't want any more boom, boom in the camp either. We didn't like that boom, boom in the camp.

And so, yes. So that's what CB's do. And their motto is, we build, we fight. Yeah. And we certainly gave them the opportunity to build the fight in Ramadi. They did a great job. So legit. Fricking like that even the even kind of and I'm kind of slowly, not slowly,

but overtime painting this picture of like how it all works. You know? And it's like these are massive, massive operations obviously where like you have a whole, their whole job is just to just build shit. Yeah, yeah. And so this is what. And we had whatever. We probably had 30 vehicles.

So we probably had 10 home Vs, a big two. two big six buys, little like SUVs. Those guys maintained all those vehicles. Yeah. So, and it's a big deal when you're maintaining a Humvee that guys are going be driving in that their lives are dependent on, it's a big deal. You can't gun deck the, the freaking maintenance on it. So they're doing all that.

We, I think we had 17 diesel generators in there big, not like a camping generator, but, you know, a generator that's the size of a small truck. You know what I mean? So we had like 17 of those. All the air conditioning units. These guys just, they were working around the clock. They worked around the clock. I think we had six Cs.

It's crazy. And then their boss, their boss technically was this master chief. So when you're a master chief Ceeby, you're kind of just, you're, you're, you got a lot of power. Yeah. You know? So if we needed something and my chief could go to that master chief, that master chief would take care of us. Yeah.

Yeah. He was just a great guy. They were just great guys. Yeah, that seems like you'd be a, I mean, obviously there's a lot to it, but that seems like that would be such a legit job where you could just just hey let's just build that thing yeah and it's very cool if anyone's listening to this and you're let's say you're 16 years old and you like carpentry or you like working on cars or you like heavy machinery you can go in the army for sure and there's you know you can be an engineer but the cb's is

a definite option and their job your job will be like diesel mechanic or heavy equipment operator so when you if you want to get a skill You can go in the CBs and you can get that and it is it's I don't know what it's like now It used to be a little bit hard to make rank because it was such a good like you you're even Recognizing that it's a cool job. Yes, and so since it's a cool job guys stay in it and since it stays and it gets kind of the ranks get filled up so sometimes it could be a little bit hard to make rank But our Cs were great and the young enlisted guys like the E4s E5s those guys were working 24 hours a day like it would just never stopped because we had so much work for them to do so those are the CBs construction

and there's another thing about the CBs that they have to kind of improvise adapt and overcome yes so they're gonna like where do you get a 10,000 gallon water tank in Ramadi Iraq in the summer of 2006 yeah you know like how do you do that you got to figure out you got a wheel and deal you got have relationships with people you got to be able to trade stuff yeah you know he probably I don't know what he get he made he might have given away a truck I don't know you know he did something He did something yeah he did we had to do yeah he was also strong bro Yeah his nickname was biggie and he would he would he would he would just rep Warm up rep 315 honest honestly

Like I do one 35 in a warm up he would be doing that with with three 15 oh damn was a huge huge Huge like and like like what's the what's the style where they're not lean but they're definitely not fat they're just huge yeah yeah he wasn't he wasn't fat he was just like a large human almost you know maybe he's not quite the same species as we are you know what I mean like he's that much different yeah where you're like this is not you it's not normal to bench 315 just wrapping it out by the way this isn't either the food's not great that you know you're not Your own weird hours.

Yeah. And he's just in there just jacking. Just how his body is. Just jacked. So, yeah. There's my C-Bs. Yeah. That always seemed legit like the idea of these guys.

And there's a lot of guys like that. And there's actually TV shows like this too with the guys with the cars. We're like, hey, let's just put a roll cage on here or whatever. They'll just, because they just know everything about it. They just know how. You know, that's their skill, you know? Where, yeah, just like how you said, where it's like, hey, let's make a, let's make a tower right here. And we're like, wait, we don't have that much wood.

All right. Well, I'll go find. some shit to build this actual legitimate tower you know it's like man that's kind of impressive and that's that was that was a cool thing it's like just having that skill set yeah and me having access to it oh we for instance oh we want to put a observation tower here cool yeah give me a few days yeah i don't have any wood i don't have any this but i'm going to get it and you're going to have your freaking tower sir cool that's i like it so check out the c b's good all day good thing man All right. So these guys are now setting sail out there across the Atlantic. On May 8th, 1942, we arrived in Pago Pago Pago Pago. Pago Pago. Pago.

Pago Pago. Thank you. In American Samoa. Yeah, actually, it would be pronounced Pongo, pongo if I'm not mistaken because you add the N sound and the G. Okay. We'll check with Tulsi. Yeah, yeah. Check with Tulsi to come from now. Dude, she tightened me up on that podcast. Remember that? Tightened me up. Yes. I said Samoa. She's like Samoa. But remember and I don't know if I said this online or offline, but sometimes you can be kind of seen as a poser because that's like the authentic way to say it So if you're someone, you're gonna say Samoan right but then usually people just say Samoan you know you know like you don't I did howley didn't want to like start China

You know what I'm saying I wasn't over there you're you want to stay in your lane on those stay in my lane But you know it's weird it is funny though that I think America might be the only one that does this you know only country that does this where if you say like a non-English word or whatever and you say it with the accent like people like look at you whatever like it's funny you know what I'm saying yeah but I think all other countries they say it with accent like they try to say it the proper way but we don't or we we don't we just say Samoa wait what yeah exactly right or like even like you know you or order like you go to Mexican place you say taco right or burrito right but it should be burrito really right but if if jaco's over here hey oh man

Yeah, let me get a water and a burrito like people would be like chocolate what the hell you know like they'd be like kind of looking at you funny So we we don't do that we don't do that my kids took Spanish yeah in high school Oh yeah and I think they didn't like to be do you know they didn't want to be the gringo that's so they would speak Like full Spanish but full gringo right. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's pretty funny. Yeah, it is yeah because they because you learn a lot of Spanish you know growing up in San Diego and now you're taking Spanish one, two, three, four, five and six because they start taking it in six years. So you actually know a lot of Spanish, but not even attempting to pretend as if you're

going to say burrito, you know, they're not doing that. They're just like burrito. So I always got a kick out of that. It's the, well, my mom is from Canada, right? So Canada. Canada. But you know, there's French. They speak French in Canada, right?

A lot of the time too. So when she would say the French words, she would say it with the French accent. And for whatever reason, I would, I'd be like, but you don't have to try to impress me with your bilingual French words, you know, but after a while I realized. You're seven years old. Put your mom in check. For real. But after while, I realize, wait a second.

That's like my bias, I think, you know? Because, you know, when people like, it's almost like you can sense when people try to do that. It's almost like they're trying to impress you with their like, I'm so worldly, you know? That's what it feels like. I don't know. I'm not saying that's what happened. Yeah, there's some people that are probably straight up trying to be respectful to the native language, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah, you'd think, yeah, you'd think so.

I'm sure there's a bunch of reasons. And there's some people that would think it's disrespectful to try and use that accent when you're a howling. Yeah, like who you think you are kind of a thing. Yeah. And then, but here's the reality of it when you really kind of detach. You're like, bro, you better start using that accent because that's how you learn the language way better. Because you know how they say when you're a little kid, it's easy to learn languages way easier. Yeah.

because you don't build like lingual like habits or whatever so but then after the age of like 18 or so um you you can't get rid of the accent apparently you know so it's like bro you better try harder otherwise bro you're not going to learn that language good you know so it's like a better thing to try to use the accent bro why are we hated on that I don't know it's weird I'm sure there's like this big web of reasons I guess here's what I'm gonna do I'm gonna kind of stick to my howling ways so here we go back to the bulk of on May 8th, 1942, we arrived in Pongo, Pongo, American Samoa. There was very little news that we could get aboard the Fulman Hall, which was their ship. However, I did learn at Pongo Pongo Pongo that Corregador had surrendered on May 6th. And with that, approximately 17 officers and 1,474 enlisted men of the 4th Marines were captured. From Pongo, Pongo, we sailed around the beautiful islands, and on May 10th, we disembarked from the ship and went ashore in Higgins boats through a beautiful harbor at the little town of apia so imagine this you're you know you're you're you're part of america the the badass best fighting force in the world

you get on board your ship and when you get off your ship people had surrendered and corregador by the way that's a place what's what's interesting about this is he knew those but he'd been to those places because remember he'd gone all throughout the southeast Asia when he was in the Marines prior to the war kicking off. So he knows what that means. That's got to be a little bit horrifying. Now they're there on Appia, and he's got so many cool details. I mean, they're out there.

This is sort of you get into the, they're out there living with the natives, hanging out with the natives there. Very cool stories that he talks about. And of course, on top of that, back to the book, each day we held machine gun drill. And I would scout the area. All the men were so enthusiastic and everyone seemed to be learning this, Samoan language. This was very relaxing time in our service and it was hard to believe that we were at war.

Again, these are dudes like, where's he? He's from freaking Pennsylvania. And now he's in American Samoa. Or now he's in Appian. He's just beautiful. About the 15th of July, we received information that Admiral Gormley had directed that the 7th Marines be ready to embark on four days, notice with 90 days supply and 10 units of fire per weapon.

That particular message, naturally created quite a bit of interest among the officers and the non-commissioned officers as to where we would be going. I was very disturbed that we were unable to get any worldwide news. I miss the news so much as Seimo Scott and several other members of my platoon were always after me to give them my predictions of what was happening next. And then going to this, but he's a very well-read guy. You can kind of use, you know, he's in the bookstore.

He talks a lot about history and he studies. history and he goes to places he's learning about their culture he's a very interested guy he's a very curious guy and clearly you tell from the book that he's someone that everyone kind of respected his opinion so as world events are happening plus he's an older marine lived in Asia he knows these things you know you know much when you've been to a place your knowledge of that place is exponentially more than when you've heard about it yeah so when someone says oh when you meet someone and and they say you would he live

and I say San Diego and they say where in San Diego I always say have you been there because if they haven't been to San Diego it doesn't matter what I'm about to say yeah yeah you know but if they've been to San Diego you're like oh we can narrow it down and we get but if they haven't been there so here this guy's been all over to all these different countries and he's well read so he's got knowledge but there's no news coming in back to the book my men were very ardent listeners and occasionally in training lectures I would cite certain references and quotes one of my favorites for instance I reminded them of what the old French general told his troops before they engaged the Germans in battle in World War I.

Quote, there is no studying on the battlefield. It is then simply a case of making use of what one knows and in order to make a little possible, one must know much. Trying to get these guys to study and be ready. When discussing possible carelessness in combat, such as neglecting to move from cover to cover, or failing to keep down low. I reminded them of the great German soldier statement, Bismarck, who once said, Some say they learn from experience, but I prefer to learn from the experience of others. Our marine amphibious warfare doctrine had proven itself over and over in previous wars and campaigns.

So again, this guy's not a combat veteran at this point, but he is a senior guy and he's trying to get his individuals train up, Trying to get them to move from cover to cover. I used to have that when I came back and I was running training and I'd see guys walking in our urban training. I'd see guys not standing by cover. I wouldn't feel sick. I'd feel sick. Guadal Canal.

So now we're going to get into it. We arrived in Esperito Santo under escort on September 12th. The next day, Admiral Gormley ordered the 7th Marines to proceed to Guadalcanal. So at dawn on the 14th of September, we left Esperito Santo escorted by three cruisers plus several destroyers and mine sweepers. There appeared to be some disagreement between rear Admiral Kelly Turner and Major General Alexander A. Vandergrift, the commanding general of the First Marine Division on Guadalcanal as to where exactly we were to land. According to a Navy chief in the radio shack, Turner wanted us to land about 20 miles east of the perimeter. But General Vandergriff wanted us closer to the perimeter. In any event, the weather was quite heavy.

And at dawn, about 545, we went to shore. So it's even these guys, like the troops, they hear about these little disagreements. And the chief in the radio shack who's listening to them talk. He's spreading the gossip about what's happening. Two of our destroyers were lobbing shells in a nearby, I'm fast forwarding. Two of our shells were lobbing shells into the, nearby jungles harassing the enemy while we were carrying the crates off the beach so they went ashore up into cover under the trees then suddenly we heard anti

aircraft firing all over the place someone yelled that enemy Japanese zeros were coming in to straf us I jumped behind some big crates I was getting ready to move as a plane went zooming over us it was one of our own and it was a great misfortune that we had crippled one of our own aircraft I'm sure that was an unusual incident with all the new people around. Nonetheless, I knew then why all our friends were constantly scanning the skies and why our ships wanted to pull out of the area as soon as possible. This was Guadalcanal,

British Solomon Islands, America's first offensive since the day the Japanese launched their infamous attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7th, 1941, some nine months earlier. Now, I read about their baptism, right? A moment later, the booming from sea. dark channel came the horrifying red hot naval gunfire ripping up trees and causing the earth to move under you as each big round came crashing ashore this was our baptism as I lay there on the ground at Guadalcanal I wondered how many of those ships pounding us at night I had seen previously in Shanghai and other ports in China I wondered too how much that flying steel that came at us from hundreds of shiploads of scrap iron the Japanese hauled out of our country before the war

I also thought about all those steel mills back home in Pennsylvania that had practiced practically all that scrap iron originally. Just as the first rays of dawn were creeping into the sky, I felt it was safe to sit up. As I looked around me to ascertain that weird noise and thud was, I saw it just a few inches from where my outstretched feet had been. A bluish-looking chunk of steel, about 11 or 12 inches long and about 4 or 5 inches thick, lying on the ground as I said to some of the men near me hey look at the look at

the gift tojo just sent me I reached over to pick it up and I quickly released it as if I was bleeding from the tips of all of my fingers there wasn't a spot on that chunk of Japanese naval shell fragment that I could touch without snagging my skin on its razor sharp surface if it had dropped on any part of me it would have undoubtedly severed the part completely from my body it was a miracle that not a single man And my platoon was hurt during the bombardment of hundreds of five inch, six inch and eight inch shells crashing into the ground all around us. That's just, I told you about this before. When people think of shrapnel, they think of little tiny pieces of shrapnel.

And when you have a small, if you have a little 60 millimeter mortar or a 40 millimeter grenade that gets shot out of a 203, like what you see in the movies, you know, what's underneath their emerald. 16 they'll have a grade launcher that's a 40 millimeter grenade the tiny little fragments from that 60 millimeter tiny little fragments you start getting into these five inch six inch eight inch guns and we got hit with some 120 millimeter mortars and the freaking jagged 12 inch long piece of metal that are a half an inch thick they're heavy yeah they're heavy and just like he's described They're all just sharp. It's a

It's Way different than what you think. Yeah. And look, any frag can kill you, right? I mean, you get hit with a tiny piece of frag But it goes into your a order Or it cuts one of your veins and you bleed out. Sure, it can be bad.

Or obviously it hits you in the brain or hit you in the head But man, you see those big, giant piece of frag And I think Laif, had one, Laf's guys had one that landed like next to them. I had one. The first time I saw that, we got mortared and I killed an army guy and but I was behind a wall

and but it killed an army guy but we found frack and that was the first time that I realized the complete horror of indirect fire and of what those artillery shells and mortar shells do and why they're so devastating. Yeah, and I told you this before,

where like shrapnel, when you think shrapnel, you're thinking, oh, you know, like maybe like an empty aluminum can kind of comparatively speaking, like aluminum can twisted and kind of ripped up and like kind of thrown at you really, really, really hard. And you're like, you got some, you know, flackjacket on, you know, or something like this. You'd be like, okay, you know, you might get scratched up for sure.

But yeah, you don't, I never did anyway, obviously, you know. But yeah, the reality, especially when you said, yeah, sometimes they're like the size of a hammer or something. I'm like, dang. And you consider how powerful those explosions are. It's like, bro, it's like someone literally shooting a hammer at you. Yeah. And it's going wilding.

It's super hot. Yeah, yeah. And hot. It's a nightmare. Yeah. And, you know, I've gotten mortar too with little mortars. And they seem real, real kind of. they sound kind of weak.

Like you can tell like I'm 60, even an 80 millimeter mortar, 80 millimeter mortar is legit. 60 millimeter mortar, it's like a cracking sound more, but 120 millimeter mortar, when it hits, it's a massive explosion.

It's a shocking explosion. Way more than a 60 millimeter. I would have to remember what the explosive weight of the, but it's probably 10 times. is bigger. Oh, damn. So it rocks your world.

Yeah. That's great. And just imagine these guys. Like I'm sitting here talking about 3 120 millimeter motors hidden outside the wall. Imagine sitting there no protection, no overhead cover for hours and they're shooting hundreds of these things at you. Yeah. That's what these guys are enduring.

And by the way, they just showed up. The battle's just kicking off. Back to the book, for the next several days, it was foxhole digging and manning the line. Nearly every day, at least one Japanese sniper was shot out of a tree. They would tie themselves in a tree at night and try and pick off Marines during the day, which they did occasionally. Their camouflage was superb as they were extremely difficult to locate. The enemy planes overhead were overhead almost daily trying to knock out Henderson Field. At night, enemy warships would slip into C-Lark Channel and try to do the same thing

and lob a few shells into the front lines for good measure. Each night the other battle was the ever-present malaria-carrying mosquito. Then, too, at night, every tree seemed to take the shape of an enemy soldier, and the men were quick to challenge. The password was always a word with L's like Honolulu, which was difficult for the enemy to pronounce distinctly. Even with that, it was dangerous to move around at night. One night one of my gun crew got up quietly and went back

Went to the back of the line to relieve himself And as he returned another man quickly turned around and at point-blank range Fired in the dark killing the Marine instantly His best buddy he went into shock and had to be taken into the battalion sick bay I knew there would be an investigation as soon as the report reached headquarters I was afraid that unfortunate incident might disturb the emotions of the men, thereby jeopardizing our effectiveness as fighters.

However, they all accepted it as a twist of fate. Guys get freaking scared. They get jumpy. You know, you're talking about every tree turns into an enemy soldier. I've told you about this in Ramadi, Humvees, shooting at other Humvees. Think of how crazy that is.

The Humvee has the most distinct vehicle profile of any vehicle. And there would be times where Humvees would shoot at other Humvees because they were just freaking scared and see movement. It's like, oh, and take a couple seconds. And what are you supposed to do? What are you supposed to do now? I see I'm getting shot at by a Humvee. I know, wait, wait a second.

Is that an enemy? Did an enemy get a hold of our Humvee? I don't think so, but they're shooting at us. They're keeping, you see what I'm saying? It's a freaking nightmare. Fast forward a little bit. We had air raids practically every day during the rest of the month. Each night the Japanese observation plane washing machine Charlie was overhead,

buzzing around the perimeter and dropping flares periodically. On the 27th of September, we counted 53 enemy aircraft in the sky over us. The next day, we counted 28 bombers in formation. These raids continued for the rest of the month and for the better part of October. On the 7th of October, instead of a move along the perimeter, We were moving west out toward the Madanikao River. My machine gun, so now they're on move. My machine gun platoon was assigned the mission of setting up on high commanding ground

to lend overhead fire across the Madagau River. On the 12th of October, again, I'm fast for it. Get this book. Just get this book. I haven't said that yet. Get this book. A Marine name Mitch. First person account.

On the 12th of October, we were also making our way back to the perimeter. During the movement, we had an air raid which held us up for some time. I was proud of my men. They may have been young and age, but they were all loyal fighting men. I knew I had the best platoon in the core. When the situation was critical and our nerves were pretty well taxed, someone would always come up with something to ease the tension. Such as, wonder what all the monkeys in the trees do during a naval bombardment.

guys are still having a good time get that gallows humor we were getting some news from the airstrips and all of it was very disheartening there were a lot of casualties and our precious fighters and bombers were strewn all over the fields later that day we learned that actually 49 of our planes had been destroyed on the ground oh this was the biggest loss we had suffered since the campaign started on the 7th of August the Japanese were determined to knock us out as quickly as they could it was really Really disheartening the next day as Japanese ships brought their transports into the channel in bright daylight and calmly unloaded their troops and supplies. What a freaking nightmare.

More bad news arrived. Word had been received that Vice Admiral Gormley, commander of the South Pacific area, had proclaimed that due to the extensive damage suffered on our airstrips and the fact that our ships could not come in with additional men and supplies that the first Marines, Division would have to fight it out alone as there was no other way like how much ammo do you have you know what I mean how much ammo do you have how much water do you have okay we got some rivers okay how much food do you have what about overhead protection what about when the Japanese is coming there start shut imagine what a freaking nightmare this is when the word that you get is that your entire support structure is leaving malaria by the way

Malaria was starting to hit my men as it was practically everyone on Guadalcanal. But there was some encouraging and welcoming news that came along the lines. Admiral Gormley had been relieved. The aggressive Vice Admiral William F. Bull Halsey had taken his place. A cheer went up along the lines when it was reported that Halsey's message was, by God, if the Marines can stay, the Navy will stay. That was enough to lift the spirits of our fighting men. That's what I'm talking about.

A coward, by the way, a coward that's going to just abandon the troops and a man that steps up and says, okay, we're staying. If we're going to leave the Marines, sir, we're going to stay and support him. During one attack while lying flat in the jungle floor supinely, and we were having heavy air attacks that one of my men, William B. Foust would sit alongside me as the bombs were released by the enemy Japanese bombers flying overhead. I ordered Foust to get in his foxhole during the raids, but he always refused as he wanted to stick by me, as he would tell me. He would sit alongside me and pray for us. This one particular time I heard a string of bombs coming down, and as my head was flat to the ground, I could feel that with each burst, we were right in the drop pattern. as the explosions came closer.

One bomb dropped just to our right, and the next one I was sure would be a direct hit on Faust and me. He continued his praying out loud, and the next bomb dropped into a soggy part of the jungle a few yards away from us, throwing mud all over us, making a huge crater in the ground. I told Faust that I attributed our being alive to his fervent,

prayers and then joined and then he joined me in reciting my favorite psalm the 121st to achieve a level of experience of getting bombed to where you're making these calculations of oh yep we're in the bomb pattern oh there's one that's you know a 80 yards that way oh the next one was 60 yards that way the next one's going to be you know it I It's crazy to think that these guys had that much experience of getting bombed. That he's knowing where the next one's going to land. Very lucky, too, that it's hit in mud. Had some guys in Ramadi get ambushed in the middle of a field.

Now, only one of the group, like one squad, or actually one element, one fire team was out in the middle because they had to cross this big open area, left the other element back in the dike to freaking cover for them in case something happened and sure enough something happened but the mortars that they got hit with they basically all went into the mud and detonated so it doesn't put out a big

doesn't put out a frag pattern you lay down and it's like boom it's happening six inches down in the mud so everyone was okay that reminds me of this right here on the afternoon of October 24th a large body of Japanese troops were observed making their way east towards our perimeter. Third Battalion had gone in a position several days earlier.

It was in that position that our battalion had been given orders to fill in and tie in with the left flank of third battalion. Colonel Hanakin had given each of the company commanders their final orders and we were to stop the enemy at all cost to prevent him from taking our precious airfields without which there would be little hope for all Americans on Guadalcanal. stop the enemy at all costs. And when you can, when you understand that tactical picture of,

oh, wait a second, if they take us off this flank, they're going to run through us and they're going to have the airfield. Everyone here is going to die. Our job as a heavy machine gun platoon would be to find the best terrain

for a final protective line with interlocking bands of grazing fire. We came up to our new position in darkness the evening of October 24th, going slowly and carefully along the winding trail, carrying all of our heavy water-cooled machine guns, ammunition and personal weapons, and packs while stumbling on tangled roots. The footing underneath that was difficult in the boggy turf under the umbrella of tall rainforest, lush tropical trees that incessantly dripped rain.

The ridge on top was kunai grass, but hard as cement underneath. Nobody had the strength left enough to dig himself a foxhole. Before we were able to set up our guns, the drizzle turned into a heavy downpour. Fast forward, I told my men to drop their loads while I made a survey of our new position. I was crossing my fingers, hoping that I didn't wander into an ambush or set off a booby trap. I dropped my gear with the first squad and started out with only my pistol in my hand. I crawled along the ground, groping my way forward by hand. When I reached out and felt the ridge dropping away on all sides, I returned to my men and said we would set up along that knoll.

We immediately set up the guns and after the 30 caliber watercooled guns had been in place in their designated positions, I arranged a security watch for the night. We crawled around on that wet ground and I distributed a meager ration of spam by scooping the meat out of the can with my fingers and dropping each man's portion into his outstretched wet hand. In that black, fast forward, in that black cave of night, the only reality was the rain drenching us and knowledge that somewhere in the jungles around us. other men were waiting to kill us. I felt a very deep sense of responsibility for my men and officers. Yeah. That there's a picture of, that a combat cameraman took of guys in TASC and they're going down the street.

You can see they're in, they're in a staggered file. So there's guys on one side of the street, guys on the other side of the street. And being out there. You're watching that and you're, you're literally waiting for the gun, fire to start. It's the, this idea of waiting, that there's someone waiting. And when you're in a city, imagine how many places

can you get shot, it's the same as a jungle. Like where you're in a jungle, where can you get shot at from? You can get shot at from so many different directions. A jungle's actually a little bit more compressed, right? You can't get you're not gonna get shot you can't be seen that far away the the seals in Vietnam they'd get they'd get in enemy Contacts would be like 20 feet away and then when they'd move 20 yards they couldn't see the enemy anymore they wouldn't get shot it anymore In some cases you're in the city like you could get shot from a window that's 10 yards away Or a doorway that's 600 yards away me and everything in between those two is a legitimate threat yeah

Yeah, it's great because you pointed that out a while ago where you were like, hey, you know, I work downtown, right? Standing at the front door outside and it's like, think of all every single, single doorway or window that you can see. Every single one that you can see. Don't care if it's 100 meters away. Don't care if it's like 10 meters away. Like every single one, that's a potential spot for like an enemy person. Yeah. Crazy man.

And where was I talking about this the other day? the the timing you know there was a captain from the army from the first of five oh six and great guy so focused so professional he had he would he would video he had like a camera set up in his Humvee and it was just a video the street he would just watch the video so he would get to know like where the trash was where the doorway was what looked out of place but the first time I went with him into the city he's like oh we're gonna get contacted in 30 minutes start your stopwatch and I was like okay cool you know and sure enough 27 minutes in and it's on so you know you're gonna get contacted you know it uh stoner's element over in craigador got contacted by the enemy 24 straight missions in a row 24 straight missions in a row 24 street street missions in a row. Mm-hmm. You know, I talked to guys from Vietnam,

they'd gotten, again, this was some of the guys in Vietnam, some of the seals in Vietnam. They'd be like, yeah, we gotten six contacts on all of deployment. Look, some guys were more than that, but some of them were, like, that was, that's legit. And here's Stoner's and J.P.'s crew out there, freaking 24 straight missions getting enemy contact.

So that feeling that these guys had, of like, oh, they're out there waiting, Listen, I would absolutely have that feeling the streets. I'd absolutely have that feeling. Makes sense, yeah. Especially watching my guys. For some reason, I never really felt like much like I would get wounded or killed. And this is, you go back to Dean Ladd, Dean Ladd, who, Marine going into Tarawa, and he was on the podcast.

And unfortunately, he passed away. God bless him. But we were talking to him. And I'm reading from his book about he's getting ready to go into Tarawa. And I said, you know, were you nervous? Were you scared of getting dying? And he's, oh, no, that was going to happen to the other guy. I thought to myself, man, that is such a good young man feeling that I absolutely had.

But the feeling, the sickness that you get is watching you see your guys, you don't want you guys to get hurt. I don't want you guys good shots. So you're watching the 450,000 threats that are ahead of you as the platoons walking down the street. And that's what he's feeling. I felt a very deep sense of responsibility for my men and my officers. As I lay there thinking about them, it was so dark that nothing existed save what could be heard or felt. The predominant emotion was probably loneliness and an overwhelming sense of isolation, even though I knew I had the best officers and men in the world here with me.

I thought about some of the lessons from Sergeant Nagy and Corporal Webb had taught me in boot camp. I thought of all my confrontations with the Japanese in the Philippines and in China. As much as I dreaded killing, respected the enemy in uniform on the battlefield, as I knew I would be doing the job he was assigned to do, and that was to seek out, destroy his enemy. I knew that what we would be facing at any moment was a case of kill or be killed. At about 0200, fast forward. At about 0200, I was startled into a charged wakefulness by what were unmistakably low mumbling sounds. I woke up PFC Schmitty Smith and together we strained our ears. A few minutes later we heard the same sounds again. I was certain I heard a few Japanese words.

I knew that exposing our position by opening fire would not be wise, but then neither would be sitting back and letting the Japanese infiltrate the perimeter. They might at any moment, at that moment, already be preparing to charge our lines. I was so relieved that my men were not trigger happy as was a common thing with so many men. Japanese could be seen everywhere at night. Every limb in a tree took the form of an enemy sniper. Kunigras took the shape of enemy moving towards you. Marines fired thousands of rounds at shadows.

My men were truly hard and professional fighting Marines. I trusted my men and I knew they trusted me as we had worked together for nearly two years as a team. I resolved this matter when I quickly decided to get this over with right now. I still wasn't entirely sure if I was doing the right thing. I pulled the pin from a hand grenade and pitched it over the slow. where we had heard the noise as soon as my men heard that click they too followed suit with a cascade of grenades there were a number of muffled explosions there were also screams of pain bob smitty and i were pulling

pins and letting and quickly letting them over the side just like the old baseball days then silence descended on the knoll and the jungle and that was the end of it so what's interesting about grenades is You, especially at night, you don't know where they came from. So you don't have to give away your position. You can just toss grenades. It's a huck of grenade out there. Fast forward. Throughout the daylight hours of October 25th, we tended to our weapons.

We waited with some apprehension for night to fall. All that day, the Imperial Japanese Navy sent warships down to shell our installations. There were also numerous dog fights all over the skies between zeros and our marine, grum and wildcats. Let's go. Dave Burke. Reports at Colonel Hanikins command post indicated a strong Japanese force had engaged the 1st Battalion 7th Marine

some 2,000 yards south of Henderson Field the night before. That apparently was the main thrust of the Japanese assault mounted by General Massau Mariyama's second Sendai division minus the shattered fourth regiment, a total of perhaps 16,000 men. The division's motto,

and he's talking about this Japanese division, The division's motto was, quote, Remember that death is lighter than a feather, but that duty is heavier than a mountain. For the Sendai Division, feathers flew in great numbers. The mountain proved too heavy. They were pulled off, they were held off by a determined battalion of Marines

under Chesty Puller, with the help of an army battalion under Lieutenant Colonel Robert Hall. Fast forward, while Major Connolly and I had been walking, around our front and I casually remarked that I questioned the reason for our present position he pointed down through the jungles and slopes and said really Mitch there's hardly anything between here and a straight shot right into Henderson field as a matter of fact even Chesty and the army wouldn't be aware of it as they are south of the airport I

then realized the real significance of the piece of real estate that we now commanded I had the greatest respect and admiration for both both Colonel Hanneken and Major Connolly as both were my idea of a real Marine officer, tall, athletic, powerful, lean, tough Marines. I would have gone anywhere with either one, as I knew they were leaders and fighters. When darkness fell on October 25th, I knew the Japanese were definitely coming,

and I knew my orders were that we had to defend our ridge at any cost. I talked with each man, instructing him that we would have 100% watch tonight and to withhold their machine gun fire until they actually saw enemy in front of them. Fast forward and here we go. The bushes rustled and the maddening voices continued their soft mutterings

but still nothing could be seen. Then I dimly sensed a dark figure lurking near Gaston's position. I grabbed a grenade, pulled the peasant, pin and held down the lever ready to throw it. Around me I could hear the others also pulling pins as we did the night before. We heard the ration cans rattle. They said a little indicator, a little early warning system of ration cans on strings. So they heard the ration cans rattle and then somebody let out a shriek and instantaneously

the battle erupted. Grenades were exploding all over the ridge nose. Japanese rifles and machine guns fired blindly into the night, and the first wave of enemy troops swarmed into our position from the jungle, flanking Gaston's gun. Stansberry was pulling the pins out of his grenades with his teeth and lobbing them down into the slope of the jungle. Lippart was skying them overhead like a baseball pitcher.

The tension burst like a balloon, and many men found themselves cursing, growling, screaming like banshees. The Japanese were yelling, Don's eye blood for the emperor Stansberry in spontaneous tribute to president Roosevelt's wife shouted back blood for Eleanor The battleground was lit by flashes of machine gun fire pierced by the arching red patterns of tracing tracer bullets Shaken by the blast of shells laid down no more than 30 yards in front of the ridge by Captain Lewis did as 60 millimeter mortars it was a confusing Malstrom with dark shape

Crawling across the ground or swirling in clump knots struggling men falling on each other with bayonet swords and other violent oaths After the first volley of American grenades exploded the wave of Japanese crowding onto the knoll thickened PFC Charles H. Locke was killed from a burst of enemy Machine gun fire I screamed fire machine guns fire and with that the machine guns opened up and with them all the rifles and Tommy guns in the flickering light I saw a fierce struggle taking place for the number two gun several Japanese soldiers were racing towards Leipert who was kneeling apparently already hit I managed to shoot two of them while the third lowered his bayonet and lunged Leipart was the smallest man in the platoon weighing

barely 125 pounds the Japanese soldier ran him through the force of the thrust lifting him high in the air I took careful aim and shot Leipart's killer. Gaston was flat on his back, scrambling away from a Japanese officer who was hacking at him with a two-handed samurai sword and grunting with exertion. Gaston tried desperately to block the samurai sword with the Springfield. He had picked up off the ground, apparently Leipart's. One of his legs was badly cut from the blows. The rifle soon splintered.

The Japanese officer raised his sword for the killing thrust, and Gaston with maniac strength, snaked his good leg up and caught the man under the chin with his boom docker, a violent blow that broke the Japanese neck. The attackers ran past Gaston's gun and spread out, concentrating their fire on the left flank gun, manned by Corporal John Grant, PFC Sam H. Scott and Willis A. Hinson. Within minutes, Scott was killed, and Hinson was wounded in the head.

Then Joseph A. Pulaski was killed. Stansberry, who had been near me, was him. in the shoulder but the last time I saw him he was still fighting with his Tommy gun ferociously shouting charge charge blood for Eleanor Corporal Petty John on the right cried out in anguish my guns jammed I was too busy to answer his call for help at the center we were being we were beating back the seemingly endless wall of Japanese coming up the gentle slope at the front of the position there were at that point approximately 75 enemy soldiers crashing through the platoon most of them on the left flank but the main force of the attack had already begun to ebb the ridge was crowded with fighting men it seemed somehow i vividly recalled putting up my left hand just as the enemy soldier lunged at me with a fixed bayonet he must have been off balance as the point of the bayonet hit between my little finger and ring finger enough to let me parry it off and as he went by me he dropped dead on the ground the enemy started to melt back down the slope and almost before they were out of sight Navy Corman began snaking forward to treat the wounded at Petty

John's gun James Knobby McNabb and Michael F. Pat Swank swanick were badly wounded and had to be moved off the line Stanbury was still around and didn't want to leave he I crawled over to Petty John's gun what's wrong with it Petty John said a ruptured cartridge which refused to budge I said move over and fumbled with this with stiff fingers broke off a nail completely but somehow pride the slug out with a combination tool which I felt in the spare parts kit under the tripod I also changed the belt fed the belt feed Paul which had been damaged in the rough slamming trying to get the roundout petty John and Faust covered me though the

first assault had flopped a number of enemy soldiers had shinied to the top of a tall hardwood trees growing up from the jungle between the platoon and fox company's position. From this vantage point, they could direct a punishing, plunging fire down in two directions. The men in foxholes along the crest were especially vulnerable. Bob G. John Jock and John W. Price were wounded and helped the back of the line by Corman. I was getting ready to feed a new belt of ammunition into Petty John's gun. My left hand felt very slippery, so I rubbed it in the dirt under the tripod. of the gun then as I reached up to hold the belt again I felt a sharp vibration and jab of

hot pain in my hand I fell back momentarily and flapped my arm and stared angrily at the gun which might have been wrecked by a burst of fire from a Japanese Nambu light machine gun almost immediately a second assault wave came washing over our positions this attack was more successful than the first Oliver Hinkley and William R Dudley were wounded Hinson over on the left gun already wounded continued to fire until all his supporting rifles were silenced he then withdrew down around the hill in the rear of George company putting the gun out of action before he left as I instructed the section had been hit hard with mortars and grenades causing severe shock to all the men one of them being August P. Marquez

all the men on the spur had been literally blacked I casted off, including Lieutenant Phillips, Bill Payne, and John Grant. In the Fox Company area back toward my left rear, I saw Fox Company men pulling out and disappearing over the crest. I picked up a Springfield and fired a shot at them, yelling for them to hold the line. The Japanese swarmed up that 70-foot cliff in great numbers, armed with three heavy and six light machine guns,

a number of Tommy guns, and several knee mortars. I thought, dear God, Major Connolly and his small command post are just over that crest. But here was the only grazing fire I had with my machine gun. So I quickly found Gaston's gun and swung it around towards our own lines, as there was nothing between my gun and the crest but the enemy Japanese soldiers. I fired a full belt of ammunition into the backs of those crouching enemy, praying that they could not get over the crest to the command post. I learned later from Captain Farrell,

who is with Colonel Hanekins' command post, that the word was that the enemy had one of Page's fast-firing machine guns, and the rounds were ricoishing over the line into Major Connolly's position. He had also heard reports that all my men had been killed, and in fact some had been, some had seen me sprawled out dead on the ground before they left the ridge. I learned later too that this information had gotten back to division command post. By 0500 the enemy was all over the spur and it appeared they were going to roll up the entire battalion front.

A second prong of the attack aimed at our front had not fared as well. But my platoon was being decimated. A hail of shrapnel killed Daniel R. Cashman, Stansbury had been pulled back over the hill after being hit again. So just to kind of break that down a little bit, he's in a forward position and back over a little crest, over a little ridge line is the command post. And so the Japanese actually pushed through and they're heading towards the command post. And so he Turns his gun around and has to shoot back

Towards the command post to kill those Japanese And there's ricochets going into the command post The command post he finds out later thought that his gun had been captured by the Japanese This is I we would do jungle training Especially in the in so in the 90s I did jungle training And this is pre nods pre night vision And But you know what it's like

when you're in the dark and all of a sudden there's a flash of light and you lose all your night vision. That's what this is. This is just a scene of total confusion. So now there's enough light. When there's this much fire going on, sometimes you can kind of see a little bit more

what's happening. And I think that's the mode, well, that's definitely the mode that they're getting into where it's almost like there's a strobe light but a strobe light is a consistent timing. This would be like a random strobe light but very close together.

Because even the muzzle flash gives, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop. There's a flash of light with each one of those, so you're going to be able to see something. Even when it's 10 feet away, it's going to light up your area. But the confusion and chaos in this situation is, it's going to be total mayhem.

I continued to trigger bursts until the barrel began to steam. In front of me was a large pile of dead bodies. I ran around the ridge from gun to gun trying to keep them firing, but at each emplacement, I found only dead bodies. I knew I must be all alone. as I ran back and forth, I bumped into enemy soldiers who were seemingly dashing about aimlessly in the dark. Apparently, they weren't yet aware that they had almost completely, they had almost complete possession of the knoll. As I scampered around the knoll, I fired someone Springfield that I happened to pick up.

Then somehow I stumbled over into the right flank of George Company. There I found a couple of men I knew named Kelly and Topman. They had a water-cooled machine gun. I told them I needed their gun. At the same time, I grabbed it, and they took off with me. I said, follow me and ordered several riflemen to fix bayonets and to form a skirmish line back across the ridge. I told the riflemen not to be afraid to use the bayonet.

We still had the 1905 16-inch bayonets with the front end sharpened throughout its length, and the back edge, five inches from the point. It was by then, not quite as dark as it has been. Soon dawn would break. I knew that once the Japanese realized how much progress they had made, still a third wave of attackers would come up the slope

to solidify their hold on the knoll. On the way back, I noticed a movement of Japanese on the ridge just above Major Connolly's position and which I had raked with grazing fire earlier. I fired Kellys and Totman's full belt of 250 rounds into that area, and once again the rounds were ricocheting over Connolly's head. But he had no way of knowing that I was doing the firing. He could only surmise that the enemy was now using our machine guns.

As we advanced back across the ridge, some of the Japanese began falling back. Several with them, however, began crawling awkwardly across the knoll with their rifles, cradled in the crudks because they were arms. And then I saw with horror that they were headed toward one of my guns, which was now out in the open and unmanned. Land. Galvanized by that threat, I ran for the gun. From the gully area, several Japanese guns spotted me and swiveled to rake me with fire.

The snipers in the trees also tried to bring me down, and grenades and mortars burst all around me as I ran to that gun. One of the crawling enemy soldiers saw me coming, and he jumped up to race me to the prize. I got there first and jumped into the hole behind the gun. The enemy soldier, less than 25 yards away, dropped to the ground. and started to open up on me. I turned the gun on the enemy and immediately realized it was not loaded. I quickly scooped up a partial loaded belt

lying on the ground and with fumbling fingers started to load it. Suddenly a very strange feeling came over me. I tried to desperately reach forward to pull the bolt handle back to load the gun, but I felt as though it was in a vice. Even so, I was completely relaxed and felt as though I was sitting peacefully in a park.

I could feel a warm sensation between my chin and Adam's apple. Then all of a sudden, I fell forward over the gun, loaded the gun, and swung it up at the enemy gunner, the precise moment he had fired his full 30-round magazine at me and stopped firing. For days later, I thought about that mystery and somehow knew that the man above also knew what had happened. I found three more belts of ammunition and quickly fired them into the trees and all along the ridge. I sprayed the terrain with remaining rounds, clearing everything in sight. All the Japanese fired in the area was being aimed at me apparently, and this was the only automatic weapon firing from a forward position. The barrage concentrated on the ridge nose made me feel as if the whole Japanese army was firing at me. I was getting some help from our mortars, controlled by battalion, with the George Company commander, Captain

L. W. Martin observing. These rounds laid on the spur and prevented the enemy to move up, which would have probably enveloped me from the rear. Other than this, I was still alone as my George company friends were still behind me some distance. In addition to being in this position, I had an immediate need of more ammunition, and I couldn't see any more lying around anywhere. Just at that time, aid came that made me glow with pride. three of my men from my platoon voluntarily crossed the field of fire to resupply me the first one came up and just as he reached me he fell with a bullet in the stomach another one rushed in then and was hit in the groin just as he reached me too he fell against me knocking me away from the gun seconds later bob john jock who had also been wounded earlier came from somewhere with more ammunition just as he jumped down beside me

to help load the gun. I saw a piece of flesh fly off his neck. He'd been hit by an enemy bullet. I told him to get back while I sprayed the area. He refused to lead, to leave. I said, get the hell back, John Jock. And he said again, no, I'm staying with you. I hated to do it, but I punched him on the chin hard enough to bowl him over

and convince him finally that I wanted my order obeyed. He somehow made his way back, as I was afraid he would, bleed to death. Meanwhile, Major Connolly at the forward command post was rounding up a rag-tag force with which to retake the Fox Company spur. They were bandsmen serving as stretcher-bearers,

wiremen, runners, cooks, and even mess boys who had brought some hot food up to the front lines during the night and stayed just in case. Those men, numbering no more than 24, mounted a counterattack up over the crest that I fired some 500 rounds at, that I had fired some 500 rounds at. They found the Japanese machine guns

and several of Fox companies' weapons, including three light machine guns, all in good working order. That counterattack found 98 dead on the spur by actual count. That was about 530 or so. Dawn was already breaking. I was able to observe the progress of that charge

for my position as I was directly out to their front. I also watched quite a few enemy soldiers scrambling back into the jungle, but I couldn't fire in that direction. As I watched that beautiful charge, it gave me inspiration to get up and yell to my George Company fighters with their fixed bayonets to stand by to charge. I yelled out in Japanese to stand up. Tate, Tate. Hurry. Esogues, Esogay, or Isoga, Esogah, Esogah. Immediately a large group of Jaze.

Japanese soldiers about 30 and all popped up into view. So he yells out in Japanese, hey, stand up, hurry. Immediately a large group of Japanese soldiers about 30 and all popped up into view. One of them looked quizzically at me through field glasses. I triggered a long burst and they just peeled off like grass under a mowing machine. At that point, I turned around to tell my friends I was going to charge over that knoll. And I said, I want every one of you to be right behind me. And they were.

I threw the two remaining belts of ammunition that my men had brought me over my shoulder, unclamped the heavy machine gun from the tripod, and cradled it in my arms. I really didn't notice the weight, which was a total of about 80 pounds, and was no more aware that the water jacket of my gun was red hot. I fed one of the belts into the gun and started forward, down the slope, scrambling to keep my foot, sprang a raking fire all about me. There were still a number of live enemy soldiers on the hillside in the tall grass pressed against the slope. I must have taken them by surprise as the gun cut them all down.

One of them noticed, one of them I noticed, was a field-grade officer who had just expended the rounds in his revolver and was reaching for his two-handed sword. He was no more than four or five feet from me when I ran into him head on. The skirmishers followed me over the rim of the knoll, and they too. We're all fired up and were giving the rebel yell, shrieking and catcalling like little boys imitating Marines sounding like there there were a thousand rather than a mere handful They followed me all the way across the draw with fixed bayonets to the end of the jungle Where long hours before the Japanese attacks had started There we found nothing left to shoot at the battle was over The jungle was once again so still

that if it wasn't for the evidence of dead bodies the agony and torment of the previous hours the bursting terror of the artillery and mortar rounds and the many thousands of rounds of ammunition fired it might only have been a bad dream of awful death there were hundreds of enemy dead in the grass on the ridge in the draw and in the edge of the jungle we dragged as many as we could into the jungle out of the sun we buried many and even blasted some of the ridge over them to prevent the smell that only a dead body can expel in the heat the next day i'm fast forwarding the next day chesty puller came up to see me he sat down beside me after we shook hands and he told me about the big attack they had down at the airport on the night of the 24th he also told me that he had just seen Colonel Hanneken at the division command post before he came to visit with me. He told me that he read a report that Colonel Hanneken was preparing recommending me for a medal. He said when he returned to the command post, he was also going to prepare a report for one of his sergeants recommending him for a medal. Chesty went on to tell me that this sergeant was also a machine gunner and that our actions were similar.

I said, wonderful. Is this sergeant someone I may know? He said, I don't know. But his name is Bazelone. I said Johnny Bazelone? And he said, yes. I had made platoon sergeant just before we left the States. And I told Chesty that I had recently seen Johnny.

And we were moving positions. And I had asked him when he expected to make platoon sergeant. And he said, soon he had hoped. I told Chesty that I hoped this would help Johnny get him. promoted to platoon sergeant I had met Johnny originally back in New River North Carolina just after he had joined the 1st Battalion 7th Marines he told me he was better known as Manila John and then I said you must have been in the Philippines and we had a lot to talk about as I told him I had been stationed there

for some time Johnny had been in the Army and I was stationed in Manila thus the name Manila John we had a friendly greeting when I would call him doggy Manila John and he would jokingly call me Cavite Mitch Chesty was admired by all enlisted men and while we were sitting there on the ground price who'd been shot through the face though not very seriously was very anxious to meet him price had bled so profusely it was difficult to determine how serious his wounded been when he was hit In any event, he was patched up now and was most anxious to say hello to that great jungle fighter, Chesty Puller.

Chesty shook hands with him and offered him some pipe tobacco, the only thing he had at the time. Naturally, a kind gesture and Price had refused because he didn't have a pipe. However, he had never forgotten that visit with Chesty, the veteran of Nicaragua and other jungle battles. two years later PFC John W. Price was killed in action. Fast forward here because that's the thing, it's not over.

Like you get through all that and by the way like what part of that do you actually live through? Almost none. Almost nothing that happened do you get to live through? But guess what? Doesn't matter. Fight still on.

Back to the book. that the enemy's back had been broken, at least temporarily. General Vandergriff believed it would be an opportune time to continue the attack. So instead of going west, we would leave the Lunga River area to which we had just returned from our battle ridge to a new front. Everyone said, oh boy, here we go again. You go through all that, get back into a perimeter. Fast forward and pass-up, but they're out on that ridge line.

They win that fight. Great cost, massive casualties. And then they pull back into perimeter. Now they get back in the perimeter like, oh yeah, you're moving west. You're moving out. And everyone said, oh boy, here we go again. The next morning we started out on a forced march across the rivers and along trails near the beach. Fox Company, the rifle company I was attached to, is given the extreme right flank the furthest away from the perimeter.

My platoon was a bunch of patched up Marines with some replacements. Fast forward a little bit. I left the extreme right flank open so that a particular gun could fire into the jungle behind you. it up the beach or out to sea. I got behind the next gun and placed a bayonet in the sand against the water jacket at the point where it could fire up the beach just clearing left shoulder of the gunner of the first gun. I did the same thing with each of the other guns so that in fact we would be an echelon with each gun being able to fire just to the left of the gun in front of it. Everybody knew the plan and the limitations of traverse for the gun.

This is just interlocking fields of fire. We knew the enemy had moved east about a half mile from us and in all probability some might just wander down the beach. As we had suspected, just after daybreak, we spotted some enemy troops moving out to the water's edge. It appeared that they were going to hike down the beach towards us in formation. We could hardly believe it, because this was truly a machine gunner's dream. Perfect grazing fire at troops in formation.

As we were crouched there in anxiety, waiting for a large unit to start down the beach, right into our guns, as surely they were preparing to do, as evidenced by their movements, A single crack of Springfield rifle went off some distance down the beach behind us. The round went up the beach over our heads. Some knucklehead riflemen just couldn't wait. As the enemy started to scatter, all my machine guns opened up and not a single enemy soldier made it back to the jungle.

A little bit the attack continued across the Metapona River, and we were gradually bottling up the enemy. Chesty had been hit that day with a grenade that landed near him. causing multiple fragmentation wounds in his legs, but he did not leave the lines until the next day. By dusk of the 8th, we had the enemy between us, and it was only a matter of cleaning them up. As we closed the knot tighter, some of the enemy escaped through a gap in the army line,

but the rest were cleaned out. On the 9th and 10th, the final push was made, and the area was secured for all intents and purposes, as the enemy had either been killed, and those who managed to escape would find it difficult in the days to come as we were definitely on the offensive. On the 11th, we started back toward the perimeter. Our casualties during the period since we watched the enemy land on the first,

was 21 killed and 61 wounded. We had taken considerable enemy supplies, mostly rice and ammunition. That night was a nightmare. As the Japanese fleet came in and blasted the airports and all the ridges around it including Edson's Ridge where we were dug in in my opinion the most frightening thing in combat is to be on the receiving end of naval gunfire Artillery is the same when masked Every time one of those naval shells came crashing into the island trees were uprooted and the earth shook like an earthquake

This was particularly evident on Edson's Ridge which was in line for anything that was fired over Henderson's field Henderson field our positions felt like we were on jello as the ground literally rolled with each crashing shell twice that night sergeant Bill Payne and I were completely lifted out of our holes and flopped on the ground it was just like being lifted into some dirt by a bulldozer blade a very eerie feeling indeed we continue to move periodically from one position to another this is fast forward more And more army troops were arriving to take our positions in the lines. The patrols were penetrating deeper, seeking out the enemy. It was getting a little quieter around the perimeter as the days went by. However, enemy ships continued to sneak in at night and lob a few shells at Henderson Field and our lines. We still had air attacks, but our valiant Cactus Air Force was shooting the enemy planes out of the skies with great numbers.

We had Grumman Wildcats, the dauntless dive bombers, the Avenger torpedo bombers, and the air cobras at Henderson Field. Cactus was Gwadalcanal's code name. The real heroes of all the gravel crunchers, the infantry men, and the cannon cockers, the artillery men, and the mortar men were those fabulous Marine Corps pilots. Like Lieutenant Colonel Howard W. Bauer, Major Marion Carl, Captain Joe Foss, Major Bob Gaylor, and Major John L. Smith. we would stand on the ground and cheer them, cheer them on as they shot the cream of the crop of the Japanese fighter and bomber pilots out of the skies over Guadalcanal each day. At times, we had seen Marion or Joe or John dive into a pack of enemy planes. In almost every instance, they were outnumbered by 15 to 10 to 15 to 1. yet they could be seen buzzing around like bumblebees looping and diving and pressing the attack to keep the enemy fighters from hitting us on the ground we had seen karl foss galer and smith get shot down and have to bail out of their burning planes as we watched the air battles bowler was shot down over the water and was never recovered

bower galer fos and smith were all awarded the congressional medal of honor and carl was awarded the navy cross joe fos became america's ace of aces after he shot He shot down his 26th enemy plane, beating Captain Eddie Rickenbocker's 1918 record of 25 enemy planes shot down. Fast forward a little bit. Things are starting to mellow out a little here. Each day we cleaned our machine guns, had gun drill, and helped Lieutenant Tom Myers get snapped in with us. We went on short patrols around the perimeter. Obviously the rainy season had set in and it was raining nearly every day as Christmas had come and gone. And we were now standing by to leave the island too.

The first Marines had left shortly after the 5th had departed. On the 5th of January, 1943, our 7th Marines went aboard the USS Rachel Jackson. And the 2nd Battalion was on its way to Melbourne, Australia, where the rest of the division was located. So you might think that that's kind of the end of the book. and it's what I'm going to read right now but you know this guy's been through hell obviously all of his guys have been through hell and so it must be over but it's not over

he Mitchell page ends up getting commissioned he ends up being awarded the Medal of Honor so it's him and Basie him and John Bazelon machine gunners so he ends up being awarded the Medal of Honor while he's in Australia and

ends up being in Australia training is Marines getting them ready, getting them prepared. And eventually the first Marine division, he was with them when they joined the 6th Army for the attack on Cape Gloucester, where he saw more combat. And then finally, in July of 1944, and there's so many good details in the book. There's details about Gloucester. Just get the book. But he also, there's like, he's got malaria. Just, you ever known anyone that got malaria?

Yes. It's terrible. But, like, did you watch them get it? No, no, no. So they just had it. Yeah, he told me it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

It's horrible. One of my buddies got it. Oh. He got it in Africa. We were in Africa. I felt bad too because he was trying to do the right thing. And he was taking his malaria pills all the time. And he, when we got to Africa,

there was a we were on a ship and they offered a trip to go climb Mount Kilimanjaro and that was like the mature smart thing to do right the other alternative was to go to I believe it was called the White Sands Hotel oh yeah the club what no it was a whole it was a whole resort town yeah yeah we were in Kenya yeah we're in Kenya this is in the 90s right So we're in Kenya and We end up You know I'm like oh yeah No we're gonna go party at the white sands hotel

So he so by the way So we go out partying I you know we're drinking and partying I remember waking up like past out I was outside Mosquitoes are just feasting on me I'm by a swamp bro I'm by like a You know the white sands hotel Had like uh you know there's white sands obviously have nice beautiful beach And these are really nice hotels

And the You had like little water features Yeah But they were kind of more like swamp features Sure I wake up on buy one of those things Just No shirt

A pair of shorts Flip Flops And just mosquitoes feasting on me Yeah By the way I hadn't taken Any malaria pills in five days or whatever Right Yeah

Meanwhile my buddy Took all his malaria pills Goes and does the right thing You know Does something immature human would do not an idiot we come back to the ship he gets malaria and he was down hard yeah how long does that take malaria to pass or like how long do you have it i don't remember well the thing is it apparently it stays with you it's kind of like a lime disease like that kind of thing where it stays

with you oh that's good and it makes it easier for you to get heat casualties and stuff like that but you know and this guy's like one of my best friends actually so how is i felt really bad uh so So Mitchell Page, he had malaria. He's fighting it. And by the way, you know, when my buddy got malaria where on the ship, so he got, you know, went into sick bay and he's getting water and he's in an air-conditioned space.

And dude, these guys have malaria in the middle of the freaking jungle while people are trying to kill him. So there's that whole thing in there. But eventually, like I said, he is sent back to America when he spends a little bit of time serving out the Marine Corps, then he gets moved into inactive reserve.

Then the Korean War comes up. He gets recalled. So now he's back on active duty, but what he did during the Korean War, we spent his time training the officers and enlisted guys. He ended up writing, he retired from the Marine Corps in 1959,

wrote this book in 1975. Oh, that's when it was published. He had a GI Joe action figure, which was him carrying that 30 caliber water-cold machine gun, which, like he said, is 80 pounds so you know you see an M60 you see Rambo's M60 oh yeah probably 25 pounds or something like that maybe I think the modern ones were like 17 so the one he had the one of the long

brisk probably 25 pounds but a big water cooled crew served machine guns thing is huge 80 pounds same thing that Bazie used but they that's what the GI Joe doll has yeah it's legit yeah Mitch Page it's not a doll and it comes with you I'm sorry action figure comes a little miniature metal of honor Oh, dang. Okay. So he did that and died in his home. November 15th, 2003. He's buried in Riverside National Cemetery in Riverside, California.

And just another, to me, example of what we as human beings can be capable of, right? what we can be capable of, possibly, and importantly, the sacrifices that were made. Just Guadalcanal alone. Just Guadalcanal alone, 29 ships lost, including two carriers, six heavy cruisers, two light cruisers, 17 destroyers, 7100 killed, 7,700 wounded. This is an extreme battle. But these are heroes. These troops go out there, sacrifice for each other,

and sacrifice for us. I need to make sure that we live our lives in a way that honors these heroes. The ones that made it home, Mitchell Page, that didn't. So there we go, Echo Charles. Fantastic book. Get the book.

More just, Marine Corps Marine Corps history Craziness Yeah Yeah Again a lot of these A lot of these

Yet another time Where you know I watch a lot of movies You know that And you know You see a movie character He does all this So it's not realistic

You know But hey we enjoy the show You know We're gonna keep it moving And yeah The show ends It's all good But this is like

This is an actual character In real life Doing real stuff And a lot of times Kind of more crazy Than most of the movies I'm even thinking of right now this would seem definitely far-fetched.

Yeah, far-fetched. If you watch this in a movie, if you watch him, like, racing a Japanese soldier to his gun that's abandoned to get that thing, while there's mortars, grenades,

and machine gun and sniper fire trying to take him out. Like, what does that scene look like in a movie? You go, come on. Yeah, fun, fun. Love it.

But, yeah, that's not really. You're not feeling like this is, you know, we're hyped for it. It's an action movie or whatever. All day, yeah. But you don't think it's realistic.

Yeah. Here you go. It's realistic. Mitchell Page said what? You sure did. So, Semperify out there, devil dogs. Hey, let's do our best. Let's live our lives right.

Let's be better people. You know, you once informed us. Sure. That one of the best things we can do to be better people. is to get after it. Get after it. Physically.

Physically, yes, exercise. And I've narrowed it down even more, by the way, recently into resistance training. What about the cardio training? We love the med-con. We love cardio. We love the whole deal. But if you want to put it this way.

And I'm saying this kind of currently. This is how I'm currently feeling. If you're going to prioritize, I say resistance training. Priority. I say all of it, just like you with the martial arts. Well. Do everything you do. can't well yeah what's interesting is a lot of people that we know are advocating

the same thing everybody from Gabriel dr. Gabriel Lyon right Andrew Huberman okay Peter Atia they're all talking about lifting look they don't call lifting what they call it resistance right right right what do we call it lifting lifting all day lifting and just the the importance of muscle mass yeah being strong which is weird Because remember the old days people would talk about, look, if you wanted to, if you were pure longevity, it would be like do as little as possible, be as small as possible, be as kind of have at least, don't eat a lot. Yeah. Stay out of the sun. Stay out of the sun.

Like there's all these things that you could do for longevity. And it certainly seems like the tide is shifting. And maybe it's, maybe it's not just what, what Peter Tia calls, not just long, not just length, but health span. Right, right. Not just lifespan, but health span. Like, I want to be healthy. Right. So in order to do that, guess what we're doing?

Are we doing resistance training? We are, but we call it lifting. Lifting. Yeah, we're lifting. It's true. Bro, whatever. I used to make jokes all the time. Do you get lifts, bro?

Remember that? Yeah. I used to tell you, actually, it wasn't a joke. I was serious, but it sounded like a joke because of how kind of how ridiculous sounds. But when I get reminded about, hey, I'm so glad that I like lift weights is like one of the main ones is like, you know, you know, the water coolers, you know, those big jugs, the five gallon. You got to change out the watercolour. Every time I change one of those out, you got to lift it in this awkward way or whatever.

And I'm like, this could be really hard for a lot of people. Yeah, I bet it is. But it's not that hard for me because I live. See what I'm saying? Because you do resistance training? Hell, you're resistance training all day. What I'm saying is, look, that's one of the many, I would say millions, millions of scenarios where being trained in resistance training and other stuff is going to,

is going to yield the benefits. See what I'm saying? but to me it goes for it and that's not to mention the psychological emotional hormonal cellular benefits you're going to get from it as well okay I could go into a whole thing not gonna you get it discipline discipline all day here's a here's the thing too and I think a lot of people were into lifting feel the same way like lifting weights I never really felt that it took that much discipline only because you know okay because you like it yes and here's what it is this is especially as a male I

guess I can only speak for male because I'm not a female but when I first got into like lifting weights it was like push-ups first and then lifting weight and you know how like it gives you like this pump right yeah yeah so we are from that so when you're a kid you think that's your muscles actually growing from the lifting 100% and I'm like bro this is freaking awesome all I'm gonna be Arnold been freaking three weeks tomorrow exactly right so it hooks you like that and it hooks you then you realize wait a second this is just like a temporary thing but yeah I could just keep this thing but yeah I could just keep this thing going can you remember that you know when you start lifting when someone

starts lifting and they get stronger like fast do you actually remember that happening to you yes sir I do new it's called newbie gains yeah so be gains I didn't know he had a name for there's a there's a name for it called newbie gains and the and yeah it was but I started like lifting on an actual like lifting program not the kind of like oh there's a dumbbell let's do some crows like an actual program was with my family friend, my friend, Eric Masters, who became a pilot, by the way,

Air Force all day, with his dad. And he was a football coach and he was a sports coach. And it was like, yeah, we were like, what, 15, 15 years old, you know? Testoster. Ready to roll.

In the game. Oh, yeah. And I had been doing push-ups for a few years, secretly in the bathroom with no one looking. Did you tell that you were more jacked than your brother? I wasn't more jacked. Oh, yeah, yeah, my chest.

was more developed, yes. That's the only exercise you were doing in secret? Yeah, well, some calf raises. Come on, man, that's real. JP's into the calf raises. You know that, right? Oh, for real. Yeah.

JP, you got to watch out, dude. He'll be, he'll be on those calf races all day. Well, freaking, that makes sense. You ever seen his freaking legs? They're huge. Yeah. So that makes sense to me completely. And freaking calf raises, hell yeah, all day.

Well, now I understand, like, that part doesn't matter as much as, like, ankle mobility and stuff. Like, so, you know, I do kettlebells and stuff, and when I did, and it's more than just calf rays. It's like you got to stretch a minute and I do that I do that everyone maybe once a week or something like that But it helps yeah yeah I came home from deployment and I roll so you know J p this is when I was on the plane with JP and I think I'm probably 10 years older than JP Something like that and then his dad is 10 years older than me

and you roll with JP before right yeah you know JP's strong yes right real strong I rolled with his dad And his dad like doesn't really Didn't really know Jiu-Jitsu But he knew some you know kind of But as soon as I like tied up with him I was like oh this is this is like You could see where J.P and J.P was

He didn't have his Quite frankly J-P didn't have his full man strength yet He was 21 or something You know he was strong But he's way stronger now But his dad I was like oh I could see where J-P was going to go Strength-wise

Just by rolling with his dad Yeah You felt the DNA. Oh, the DNA, the fast-twitch DNA. Like, J-P sprinting. Yeah. J-P sprinting back in the day. He just had fast, fast, like holding his Mark 46 machine gun just sprinting.

Yeah. Fast-witch. And his dad, his dad just, same thing. Just pure fast-switch. And his dad, you know, work in construction. He's just a strong dude. But you can sense those genes. So my question is, you're doing push-ups.

Yeah. and calf raises. Oh, yeah. Were your calves and your chest was bigger than Jade Charles? I don't know if my calves were or not. I don't know how effective the calf raise scenario was. But, yeah, chest was more, more devised. And then when we started lifting, I could bench more like out of the gate for sure.

Actually, let's face it. Well, that's because you were sneaking into those push-ups. Oh, yeah, you got to get the foundation. Did you guys share a room? Yeah. So you had to sneak him in the bathroom? Yeah. You were literally sneaking them so he didn't know that you were getting stronger.

Yeah. There's more to it because we would tease each other too. It's like, ooh, trying to get all buff. You know, so there was like this, I don't know, it was like almost like a, for lack of a term, like embarrassing to be like working out until that's what the football team is doing. That's what the team was doing. You know, that's what we were all doing. But like on our own, it was we weren't mature enough, I guess, to start just self-developing, you know. Okay, so you start now officially lifting.

And you get to watch kind of the situation go down. Yeah. Like you get to watch the newbie gains. Oh, yeah, yeah. You get strong because a lot of it has to do with, well, obviously adapting because that's what muscle and strength and stuff is. There's that big part of it because your body's like ready. It's ready to take some action, do some stuff, you know, taking nutrients, your young, all that stuff. And then so the adaption happens like way quicker.

It doesn't get used to it overall, right? So that's in a nutshell. But then on top of it, too, you have balance as well. So like holding weights up. You ever seen someone who's never lifted weights before, especially with like dumbbells or something? It's like, ooh, they're all over the place. Or do dips, do dips with on rings instead of on a dip bar. Yeah.

They're all. Sometimes people, sometimes someone that could do 25 dips, which is, which is a good amount of dips on a dip bar. Yeah. They can do like five and they're all. Oh, yeah. So that's a big part of the newbie gains is the balance just being developed. And once you got your balance down, then your strength can start kicking in even just from the base. You know so even that seems like you're getting way stronger but more than actual muscle like

Contractile strength or whatever it's balanced so anyway that's all these are all contributing factors to the newbie games So we're lifting we're lifting big-time newbie games or regular gains or whatever What you got out you've the the other end of the spectrum of newbie gains is Plateau plateau slash decay yeah because let's say you're not real excited anymore because you're not getting newbie Gaines so you're like well kind of won't don't want to do this anymore then you get loss. Yeah, I don't know who is law. I don't know what loss it is, but you get a loss you're like oh wow I'm weak Yep. Don't let that happen. That's what you got to watch out for yeah at the Arnold's and I was interviewing Arnold and I asked him about plateaus. Yeah And he was like we'd shock our system remember that? Yes, I do have you ever read a book called We have the Warrior kid. I have and in that book young Mark, he's trying to do more pull-ups

and he plateaus at like seven. And he can't, he's seven, seven, seven, he's there. And finally, what, we know what Uncle Jake makes him do? Like, you're going to do 100 pull-ups today. I don't care how long it takes. And it just like shocks the system. Yeah. Next time he rolls out, does nine.

Yeah, whatever it is. So you want to get through those plateaus, man. Throw a little shock into this system. How about the muscle confusion? Yeah, that's what that is. No, but are you doing? down with the muscle confusion? Yeah, fully.

No, I mean, there's such, I think sometimes, and obviously there's a lot to this, but sometimes people will take it kind of too far. So they're doing something different every week or something like that, which, you know, that's a thing. Like you can do that for, you know, but it's not necessarily if that's the only issue that you're trying to address. Yeah, you can do, I don't know, yeah, I mean, it depends on who you are and how long you've been training, but you can do it like four weeks, same stuff, eight weeks, same thing, and

then change up the exercise. And a lot of times you don't have to change up the exercise. Just change up the weights, the reps, the rest in between, the volume, like there's little, just little things you can change that your body's like, whoa, okay. And actually, I found a lot of the times, a lot of times you just implement some good rest in there and then just one small change. It's like your body can adapt to it because it's kind of close enough to your normal thing that your body's like, oh, this isn't like some foreign thing that we've got to spend a lot of resources in time to adapt to. So I can adapt and adapt is pretty quick, you know. You get that little jump. That's what I found.

Cool. Now, we need to lift. I'm going to recommend you also do something that gets your metabolic system moving, right? Some type of metcon, some sprints, some kettlebell swings, some burpees. That's what we're doing. Jiu-Jitsu, yeah, all day. That's what we're doing.

You're going to need fuel as well? I recommend you try and use some clean fuel. I recommend you try and use some jaco fuel. Go to joccofuel.com. Go to joccofuel.com. You guys know what we're making. We're making energy drinks. We're making protein.

We got hydrate. We got greens. We got the joint supplement, joint warfare, super krill. Time war, by the way. Take time war. Take these things. Take them. You'll be very happy that you did.

And your taste buds will be happy that you did. They'll be very happy. Yeah. So that's what we're doing. Go to joccofuel. com. Go to Wawa and get milk. Mok is in Wawa

Go to vitamin shop You can get all of it GnC Military and Commissaries Afees Hanifer dash stores in Maryland Wake Fern ShopRite H.E.B. Meyer Harris Teeter

Lifetime Fitness Shields I guess they're putting a lifetime fitness In Brooklyn I heard Oh right now Yeah Brooklyn New York This is what my dad's from by the way There we go

Maybe he'll go check it out Leave the island for a little bit Go back home No no he's staying on I'm crying They're gonna have Mokin there shields and look you've got a gym you go to a gym you go to a gym maybe it's a jitzy gym maybe it's a powerlifting gym maybe it's crossfit gym if they're not selling jaco fuel you

want them to tell them to email jf sales at joccofuel dot com get on the clean fuel the good stuff the tasty stuff that's what we're doing check it out also origin usa.com check that out for your hunting gear for your jeans your jihitsu gear your rash guards T-shirts training it just everything that you need 100% American made keep keep the economy strong bring the manufacturing back to America by the way yeah we won the wars we won World War II by the fighting men that were out there getting after it but guess who else all the people back here in America manufacturing all this stuff rosy the riveter back here so let's make that happen origin usa.com check that out

Yeah, it's true. Also, Jocko store called Jocco Store. On this path, sometimes we want to represent. Is it what I'm saying? Whether it be a shirt, a hat, a hoodie, something like this. Go to jocco store.com. That's where you can get it. Discipline equals freedom.

Good. We all seen the video. We all seen the video. But yeah, good. Some other stuff on there. Also, on jocco store.com, there's a thing called the shirtlocker subscription scenario. New design every month. People seem to link that one.

If you see something. you like something it's called the shirt locker the okay actually I'm not going to tell you the next design you're going to have to wait and see but yeah it's all on jocco store.com if you like something

get something so you know you need steak once you're lifting working out doing jiu jitz you're going to need to fuel the system also with some steak go to primalbeef.com go to Colorado craftbeef.com

the best steak you can get tasty perfect awesome company These, awesome people, primalbeef.com out there in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia and Colorado, Kraft beef, obviously, Colorado. So check those out. Get yourself some.

Subscribe to the podcast. Check out jocco underground.com. Check out our YouTube channel. Check out psychological warfare. Check out flipside canvas, Dakota Meyer hanging stuff on your wall to keep you in the game. Also books clearly get this book on Marines. named Mitch also I've written a bunch of books you can check those out if you want leadership strategy and tactics field manual expanded a dish it's out you know I've also

written a bunch of kids books some people like you've written kids books right yes I have I think I've written six of them yeah I think I've written six of them way the the warrior kids series Mikey and the Dragons about faced by Hackworth extreme Ownership dichotomy. Do you guys know the deal? Check those out. Also, Echelon Front. We have a leadership consultancy.

We solve problems through leadership. Go to Echalonfront. com. We got an event coming up in Nashville. I think it's sold out. But we also have the muster coming up in Dallas. October 16th through the 18th. We have FTC.

We have the battlefield. We have the council. Next council is June 26 to 29th. It's registered now. Women's Assembly, run by Jamie, our chief operasible. Chief Operating Officer, September 11th through the 13th in San Antonio, Texas. We also have an online training platform to learn about leadership, to learn about life and leadership.

Go to Extreme Ownership.com, check that out. Also, if you want to help service members, active and retired, you want to help their families, you want to help Gold Star families. Check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. He's got an incredible charity organization. If you want to donate or if you want to get involved, go to a member. America's mighty warriors.org. Help Mama Lee.

Help our people. Also, heroes and horses.org. Micah Fink up in Montana. And Jimmy May has got an organization beyond thebrotherhood.org. Check them all out. And if you want to connect with us,

I'm at jocco.com. I'm also on social media, anti-social media, because you sit there and you start looking at that thing and you're going through it and getting mad at people and sending tweets. commenting looking at someone wondered why they got that cool house and you don't

they got a G wagon where's mine don't don't don't fall into that trap if you want to go on there hang out you want to go on there be positive cool don't let it suck you in don't let that algorithm get hold of your brain it's designed to do that it's designed to do that they're making money off of your brain making money off of your eyeballs don't let them be careful we're on there but we're not on there freaking all the time we're not trying to drag you into it at joccoe willing

at echo charles just watch out for the algorithm of course thanks to all the military personnel out there in the army navy air force and Marines out there on the front lines around the world working together as you saw in this book support from the there wasn't an air force at the time

but support from marine corps pilots overhead navy pilots overhead army and Marine Corps working together on the ground, Navy giving support. Appreciate all of you. Thank you for fighting for our way of life. Also, thanks to our police, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, border patrol, secret service, as well as all other first responders. Thank you for being on the front lines here at home and keeping us safe.

And I want to close by reading a part of Mitch Page's Medal of Honor citation. Quote, alone against the deadly hail of Japanese shells, he manned his gun. And when it was destroyed, took over another, moving from gun to gun, never ceasing his withering fire against the advancing hordes until reinforcements finally arrived. Then, forming a new line, he don'tlessly and aggressively led a bail. a net charge driving the enemy back and preventing a breakthrough in our lines end quote that's bravery that's courage that is how victory is achieved then you know we all have our own battles we're all fighting we'll just keep that in mind get up move never cease aggressively attack until you win and that's all i've got next time the zecho and

And Jocko, out.