Julian Dorey Podcast - [VIDEO] - Black Ops Mercenary: China, WW3, CIA Ground Branch, Survivor’s Guilt | Dale Comstock • 189

Episode Date: March 4, 2024

(***TIMESTAMPS in Description Below) ~ Dale Comstock is a Special Forces Operator, CIA Pipe Hitter, Black Ops Expert, and Mercenary. He has served in Delta Force, the Green Berets, & CIA Ground Branch Unit. Currently he is a mercenary-for-hire around the world making money. EPISODE LINKS: - BUY Guest’s Books & Films IN MY AMAZON STORE: https://amzn.to/3RPu952  - Julian Dorey PODCAST MERCH: https://juliandorey.myshopify.com/  - Support our Show on PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/JulianDorey  - Join our DISCORD: https://discord.gg/Rr6hqgf2  JULIAN YT CHANNELS: - SUBSCRIBE to Julian Dorey Clips YT: https://www.youtube.com/@juliandoreyclips  - SUBSCRIBE to Julian Dorey Daily YT: https://www.youtube.com/@JulianDoreyDaily  - SUBSCRIBE to Best of JDP: https://www.youtube.com/@bestofJDP  DALE LINKS: - INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/officialamericanbadass/?hl=en  - WEBSITE: https://www.dalecomstock.com/  ***TIMESTAMPS*** 0:00 - The China Threat; China Drones & Submarines 9:25 - Digital Mula; Army going soft?; CIA Ground Branch Polygraph story 22:54 - Tyree W. Case; Polygraph strategy & “beating” polygraph 27:30 - How Dale Comstock met Joe Teti; Stolen Valor Story 41:30 - Chris Kyle; Operators Syndrome 48:00 - Survivor’s Guilt; Tragic Helicopter Crash Story 58:05 - Fallen friend’s memorial story 1:07:03 - Undercover Mission in Iraq 1:12:07 - Effects of War on Iraqis long term 1:25:53 - Courage vs Confidence; Israel Hamas; WW3 1:36:37 - Protecting Kids; 4th Turning 1:50:22 - Dale’s pessimistic view of the world; Living Dreams 1:57:00 - Dale’s Hero; Greatest lesson story; Courting your woman every day 2:06:15 - Meaning of Life; Joe & Dale’s hilarious training clients 2:17:10 - Sad story of Dale’s client; Why Dale no longer bodyguards 2:24:43 - Working security for billionaire; Rich Hollywood lady 2:35:51 - Kosovo War; Desert Storm; The Coldest place ever 2:40:29 - Dale’s work CREDITS: - Hosted & Produced by Julian D. Dorey - Intro & Episode Edited by Alessi Allaman ~ Get $150 Off The Eight Sleep Pod Pro Mattress / Mattress Cover (USING CODE: “JULIANDOREY”): https://eight-sleep.ioym.net/trendifier Julian's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/julianddorey ~ Music via Artlist.io ~ Julian Dorey Podcast Episode 189 - Dale Comstock Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, guys? If you're on Spotify right now, please follow the show so that you don't miss any future episodes and leave a five-star review. Thank you. was to go in dressed up as an Iraqi. So I drive in, the assaulters all get out. They're running into the compound and there's a little kid standing outside, about two years old, little Iraqi kid. And when he sees all these assaulters barging into the compound, coming after his dad, he just lost his shit in the street. I'm out of the vehicle.

I got my weapon in my hand and I see this kid and all I can think about is my own son, right? I remember my son when he was two years old, same height and everything, you know, and just ran over and I picked this kid up in my arm holding him i got armor on got my weapon my long gun in my right hand i'm holding my left hand i'm like it's okay little buddy everything's gonna be okay i'm not sure he understood me or not but i'm thinking we're gonna go in there they might just kill his dad right now you know i don't know what they're gonna do depends on

what kind of fight he puts them i gotta hold this little kid you know what do you think of of china and all that and the reason i asked that is because i i'd kind of go in either direction on this one so for a long time i felt like no one was talking about china and i would always be like are we not gonna look at this right and there were plenty other people out there saying the same thing but it wasn't like a mainstream thing to talk about the growth of China and stuff like that and what threat that could pose the United States. And then over the past year and a half or so, it's become totally in vogue to talk about. I don't know why that happened, but you kind of have two camps with this. You have the camp of Andy Bustamante, who's been on my show and and now he's been on like every podcast in the world,

where, you know, from his perspective as a CIA case officer, who he's allowed to say, like he worked in Asia, that was a place he spent a lot of time, you know, China is the biggest threat we got in front of us, they're gonna overtake us, yada, yada, yada. That's, that's why I feel like taiwan is is not long for this world if i could take my family to taiwan in the next two years so they could see how beautiful chinese culture is i would take them because after that i won't be able to take them wow yeah i'm for all it's not just me saying it right but but if you haven't heard it before look for taiwan to get taken by china in 2024 and then you get the other camp which is more like the peter zion camp he's a foreign policy

strategist online very big and he talks about how china's demographics are covid actually backfired on them they're gonna have a famine inside of 15 years or something like that. And I hope he's right, to be honest. I mean, I don't hope for famine on people, but I mean, as far as like China not being a threat, I hope he's right. And I hope Andy's wrong, but I'm kind of like in between the two where it's like, yeah, you have Xi Jinping, who's a communist, really psycho, let's call it what it is. And he's got such this grip on power that now you know he's paranoid and this is usually how these guys go and it's it ends up going the wrong way but on the way there you know they're buying up so many things around the world they have so much influence

around the world now on the way to say a crash of the ccp if that's what it's going to be in 15 20 years could we have enormous problems i tend to think yeah we could that's what it's going to be in 15, 20 years, could we have enormous problems? I tend to think, yeah, we could. But what's your thought on them as a global threat, if you will? Yeah, I think they're the number one threat. Like, for example, I just came back from the Philippines. And there was already, they just had a clash, the Filipinos and the Chinese along the straits there. Literally, they both ran into each other they just had a clash, the Filipinos and the Chinese along the straits there. Literally, their boats ran into each other. They had a clash?

Yeah. I mean, literally, yeah. Literally, two boats ran into each other, right? Because they're both claiming the waters there belong to each other. And so that happened. That just happened a few days ago. The Chinese are literally dredging up the seafloors around Taiwan. They're disrupting the areas for fishing, the reefs and things like that.

They're literally taking the sand from the bottom or from around Taiwan, and they're building islands around other areas, strategic islands, if you will. We also know that apparently Indonesia has already recovered several drone submarines that have washed up around Indonesia from the Chinese. We're actually doing underwater surveys, surveying the waterways. So, okay, doing surveys, doing reconnaissance. Okay, we all do that, you know. But kind of interesting that this is actually happening at the same time. You know, there's this rift between Taiwan and China, and now there's a growing rift between the Philippines and China. You know, there are some, you know, I think Chinese people for the most part are actually pretty good people.

I say that. It goes back to, you know the people in power man um the decisions they're making because not all chinese are bad i got a lot of friends that are chinese and they're okay they're not there's nothing wrong with it the communist party only controls i think like 6.9 percent are of the country is a member of that party yeah and who who knows how many of them are unwitting members too right like the people they're just living under the control it's not their fault yeah no you know and so um it always comes back to the freaking politicians you know and uh there's got to be a reckoning one day so i mean the entire rural population just needs to stand up and say enough's enough all

you assholes in charge you're out you know you're we're starting all over you know and you're gonna do this right i think that's the only way it's going to change but uh it's never it's never happened in history um everything just keeps collapsing and rebuilding and collapsing and as long as there's what the three p's power pussy and you know and money um it's it's never gonna it's never going to end. My wife speaks Mandarin, Cantonese, Old Chinese, English, Sundanese, Bahasa. She speaks six languages and got a sixth grade education too, by the way. But she's worked quite a bit over the years for Chinese families. I was like a lot of Indonesians.

She was a maid you know and uh and from all reports you know for the most part they were always pretty good pretty good people you know um to her and uh and i like i said i've known a lot of chinese it's not not an issue with those personally it's just at the higher levels you know and um it's no different from our country from the chinese from the russ. But I do think they're a threat. I think they smell blood in the water too. I think they see what's going on. And I think that's why I'm kind of thinking we may not see the next election. We might be in a world war before then.

I hope you're wrong. We're already in a war. Actually, we're already in a world war. Well, it's all proxy, war by proxy. Well, yeah, fifth generation, man. Right now, it's proxy wars. It's a different Well, yeah, fifth generation, man. Right now, it's exactly, it's proxy wars. It's a different type of war just because it hasn't gone ballistic. Well, it has gone ballistic and it has gone kinetic,

not to the level that we normally would expect in a war, but we're in war. It's literally a war. And things like social media, TikTok, these are all parts of the psyops campaign. These are all tools. They're a form of weapon, if you will, to manipulate minds and garner trust and garner people, get people on their side and just throw everything in disarray. We talk about TikTok here in America.

It's geared towards knuckleheads. But when go look at tiktok in china it's like you know they're actually educating and training their kids you know it's all programmed man you know and uh there's definitely there's hardcore programming happening around the world right now it's a very fascinating and scary thing yeah but that it's it sucks like i've used this phrase or terminology whatever you want to call it before that is really tough to rectify but it's kind of true it's like our democracy is used against itself so like we love that we love democracy we love freedom that's awesome we try to we tried and i don't think we do a good job but we try to like spread that to the rest of the world you look at china rule, that shit's terrible.

The one advantage they have is right there. Because they have total control, they can have all their little kids watch fucking Einstein and science experiments and stuff and get excited about science and math. And our kids just look at titties, right? And think about that, though. Think about what that does across a population to the mind. And like, obviously, you know, kids who are teenagers, they like that stuff. But if that's all they're watching, you know, and the younger kids as well, if that's all they're watching, they're just watching mindless stuff and going, boop, boop, boop, boop. Whereas in China, oh, they shut you off at 830.

You're not allowed to access it again. And you're watching science and math. Yeah. What do you think is going to happen? Right. There's a lot of merit to that, you know. I think it's really – how do you navigate that, right? On one hand, how do you – you're right.

We enjoy freedom, democracy, you know, on all those types of things we look we don't i don't want to be controlled you know for example i mentioned uh digital currency you know to me that is that will be the ultimate enslavement and you won't even know you're being enslaved you know once you have digital currency um they can regulate everything you do where you go when you go um social credits blah blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But that's why I'm dead set against it. And I know a lot of very wealthy people that are dead set against it also because they know now their wealth is going to be managed and controlled. It's going to be hard for them to do anything with their money. Now, that's a good thing. If the wealthy people, if you're

right about that, your anecdotal experience with the different people you deal with, that's a good thing. You need the wealthy people to not be about that stuff. Yeah. And so – but on the other hand, I just feel like, man, we are – our society has so eroded, man, over the years to – I mean, look. I mean we got school districts now saying, oh, you don't have to pass a passing grade to graduate. Yeah, it's fucked up. You know? What the?

I mean, what is? Yeah, you can't. You know, we're living in this world where it seems like everybody just doesn't want to make everyone else feel bad. And I'm with you. I don't like making people feel bad. I don't like being a dick to people or anything but we're we're so afraid of hurting people's feelings that we're not it feels like we're we're eliminating standards on stuff yeah that's a problem yeah that's a big problem everybody gets a trophy everybody right good right you know what this is not something

new either this actually was one of the reasons i retired out of the army in 2001. um i remember i was working at the thirdrd Special Forces Group headquarters. I was a group assistant ops and CO. So I had a little bit of admin time, and I was getting ready for retirement. And I remember at the time it was General Shinseki. He was Secretary of Defense. He came down to Fort Bragg. He went to a ceremony, USOC ceremony.

He had all the green berets there was their event they're all wearing green berets and he was like wow look at all the green berets you know and right there he made the command decision that everybody in the army will now wear black berets because it looks so cool and they were like sir the rangers wear black berets i don't care everybody gets black berets like, the black beret is something you earn. The green beret is something you earn. Actually, the green beret was awarded to Special Forces by John F. Kennedy, right? So it was a presidential citation award.

So you can't just take that away from SF. And so now all of a sudden everybody gets to wear a black beret because he thought, well, everybody, it will raise their self-esteem. I go, what a bunch of bullshit, you know? And they wore them like pizza hats. They didn't know how to wear black. And then now the Rangers were slighted. Now they got to go to a brown beret, you know? And then things like that started setting in, right?

Then they lowered all the standards. If you graduate, you didn't have to pass a physical fitness test to get out of basic training. You could just show up, and it would be your squad leader, team sergeant, or platoon sergeant's job to get you in shape. Like, wow. Then it went a step further. I had a water team in special forces. We did water infiltration. If you're going to be on a water team, you probably should know how to swim, right?

And so the rule came down, oh, guys don't need to know how to swim right and so and so and so they so they're not the rule came down oh guys don't need to know how to swim anymore to get into special forces like who we talk who why was that and who we're catering to you know so you're telling me a guy can show up on my team today and tomorrow my team's got to do a real world water mission but you know this guy can't swim what am i supposed to do with this guy? He's not combat ready. He's not mission ready. He's supposed to come to me ready to go. So all these things started happening even back then, even so far as I remember one time. So it's illegal for you to put a military weapon in a privately owned vehicle, and so i had a new private um we had

to draw weapons we're going to do a parachute jump so we had to go around the headquarters building get him he gets his weapon i didn't know he did this he took his gun and got into his truck and drove his truck around to the company area by the time he showed up i already got the phone calls you know hey private so-and-so got a weapon in a vehicle and ah crap that's a big deal in the military by the way um so crap you know he's a new guy he should have known better okay whatever so he shows up and normally what you do is like you you know look he's a new guy he didn't know you know him out yeah you chew his ass you make him do a bunch of push-ups until you get tired right you know and so you're gonna be dumb i'll make you strong you know start pushing your way to china get going drop down there just all right and so you know and i remember i did that because i could have been worse i could

have gave him an article 15 um it really messed him up and so i got him doing push-ups and i had this this girl there she's a e5 she's the uh uh she's an illustrator for us right she makes all the powerpoint presentations and uh and so yeah that was her specialty right it's like wow you know powerpoint specialist right but anyway i'm i'm her boss i gotta put up with it right so whatever i guess we all got a job and she gets mad because i make them do push-ups and she i outrank her by quite a bit she's an e5 i'm an e8 and she's like getting on my ass about it. That's wrong, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, where did Army do come from?

Because this is what we do, especially in infantry. It's better to make a guy do push-ups than do something really stupid to the guy. I mean, he's learning. And well, anyways, that went sideways. And next thing you know, everybody's scared. The chain of command like, hey, you know, Comstock, you know, do something else. And I'm like, what?

You know, what am I supposed to do, you know? And so I ended up, you know what I had to do? I made him go home for the weekend and write an essay on accountability and responsibility, right? Can you believe that? And he had to give it to me on Monday, you know? And he couldn't even write, you know, poor guy. He wasn't too smart, you know.

You know, I just realized, man, the Army is just starting to fall apart. And that's when I made the decision I got to get out and do something else. It's not trending anymore. That's a long time ago, though, too. Yeah. It's not recently. No. That's right.

And I saw it. I saw it a long time ago. I saw it trending. So I made a decision, yeah, let me move out. And this is not the Army I grew up in. This is not the Army I joined up to be a part of. And I can see how it's affecting everything from combat readiness to morale. It's not about war fighting anymore.

It's about political correctness and all this other crap that has nothing to do with going out and fighting, fixing it, and finishing the enemy. And so, yeah, here we are. nothing to do with going out and finding fighting fixing it and finishing the enemy you know and uh so yeah here we are yeah now joe when i had joe in here so my first deployment was iraq and the first time that i actually pulled the trigger shooting at somebody was at a hotel that we were staying at and our hotel got attacked in the middle of the night by a bunch of douchebags that showed up outside shot rpg's nut hotel and i ran up on the roof with a bunch of other dudes and they were across the street in an abandoned building and you could see their muzzle flashes it was like whack-a-mole he talked about the whole process because his his situation as you well know you're good friends with him was very unique in that he was well trained guy in the military did his time and in

the army and the Marines yeah for like 12 years but he never had to go into a combat zone right and so he goes to get recruited by ground branch and he was like I think you guys have the wrong guy like I haven't even seen war and then you know he gets recruited makes it and goes through and ends up you know obviously doing the kind of stuff that you've done for years too. But you had talked about after 9-11, contracts started coming in and you were doing a lot of work shoring up the defense of nuclear power plants across the United States.

But when the work ended up going beyond that, did you have to go through a whole process again similar to Delta Force like Joe did? How did it work for you? No, because I was already qualified, so to speak. The only thing I had to do was polygraph test. It's amazing how many people fail polygraph test. A lot of people don't like it. It's not fair, but I'll tell you what,

polygraph tests work pretty good. They work pretty good. It's not a lie detector test. It can't tell if you're lying. Polygraph tests are designed so they... What's the word I'm looking for? Monitors. The cop's out there. Here they come.

They're coming for you for you should have talked about the c4 earlier coming to get you um you know but you know i think it's pretty accurate and uh can it be defeated yeah very difficult to feed polygraph polygraph tests but uh are they pretty accurate i think so um i've had my experiences with them and uh i won't i can't go into what happened with me but again because i'll be telling wade what i need to be talking about but um that was the only hurdle but most guys even fail that the numbers of people that fail that is astronomical some of the guys you think are some of the oh this guy's a shoe and for sure he's, he didn't make it either? Holy crap.

Is there like a normal, a common thing that'll trip them up every time? Like, oh, did you try weed in high school and they try to say no? Or is it something different usually? Usually it's something different, something more egregious. You know, you could, for example, OPSEC, operational security, right? Speaking out of turn or speaking about something you're not supposed to talk about, especially if you've signed nondisclosure agreements, but you bring it up. Guys, if you're still watching this video and you haven't yet hit that subscribe button, please take two seconds and go hit it right now. Thank you.

I remember I got on one polygraph one time. I brought up something. The question was asked, have you ever talked about? Thank you. I remember I got on one polygraph one time. I brought up something. The question was asked, have I ever talked about something that was classified to somebody else? And I thought about it, and I was like, no, not really. But as I'm thinking about it, I'm thinking about one time where I did, but I thought, no, it was okay to talk to him about that. And after I got done with the whole test, okay, we'll let you know the results. The next day I got a phone call and here's a funny story. So I'm really beat up mentally. I'm beat up, right? This was

hell on earth going through one of these damn tests, right? And I come back to North Carolina and my wife's like, how'd it go? Oh my God, oh, my God. She said, that was hell, man. I said, oh, I don't even know what happened, right? And so I go in my bedroom, and I get on a computer, and I look up polygraphs, right? And I'm on a site called antipolygraph.org. And my wife walks in, and she looks over my shoulder and says, what are you doing? I said, I'm trying to figure out what just happened to me, right? And antipolygraph.org, right?

Because I didn't have any idea, right? And she goes, you sure you should be doing that? I go, why? She goes, well, what if they're why? happened to me right and a polygraph.org right like because i didn't have any idea right and she goes you sure you should be doing that and why she was what if they're why they're not watching that you know and i get the phone call sir why are you on no no no the phone call was hey congratulations you're good to go you know we'll call you back in a few weeks you know come and talk to us oh okay good oh wow all right i didn't think i made it but okay i guess i made it now about six weeks later i I get a phone call. Hey, I need you to come back up here and do this again.

There was a problem with one of the answers, questions. And I'm like, what? I thought it made – and I thought about, do I want to do that again? So I do. I go do it again. And – Do you have the tack in your shoes so you can step on it and pass it? No, check this –

You ever seen that trick? Yeah, yeah. That doesn't work. That doesn't work. That doesn't work. So I show up, and I'm not even on the machine. I'm sitting there waiting, you know, and it's a different guy this time, different interrogator. He's really nice.

The first guy was a total asshole. Total asshole, man. Oh, my God. And this guy's, like, really nice. The whole Mutt and Jeff thing, right? And he goes, so, he goes, he goes, what'd you think about the last polygraph? I said, I didn't like it. I didn't like it at all.

And he goes, oh, sorry to hear that. And he goes, well, let me ask you something. When you went home, did you go to antipolygraph.org? Dude, my jaw hit the floor. I'm like, how the fuck did he know that right and uh i looked down and i had a choice and i'm thinking do i lie or do i tell the truth and then i kind of define i go yeah so what right and so he goes i don't blame you he goes why would you take an exam without studying right but yeah that's right you know so yeah that's right you know and he didn't even hook me

up he just asked me a question he goes let me ask you something he goes did's right, you know. And he didn't even hook me up. He just asked me a question. He goes, let me ask you something. He goes, did you ever share classified information with anybody? I go, well, yeah, I told my captain who also had a clearance, you know, that, you know, something we used to do because it was related to what we're doing. And I was just showing him an idea that we could implement, you know. And he goes, oh, that's no big deal. Okay, you're good. And that was it. That it holy shit i went through all this just for that right but uh yeah they're they're pretty i yeah

they can be pretty nerve-wracking um and some of the stuff people confess to would blow your mind um again i'm not the liberty to talk about it, but polygraph test, you know, I would say try to avoid it, especially if you're guilty, because you're probably going to get bopped. Yeah. Yeah. A friend of mine actually, who is not guilty and is sitting in prison, life without parole, he's been there for 26 years. He took the polygraph test because he didn't do it and at the end of the test the polygraph the polygraph examiner got up and shook his hand and said it's nice to shake hands with an innocent man wow which is really powerful we're trying to get him out of there i did an episode on it yeah 159 and he turns to the sheriff and says hey i got a question for you and

the sheriff i think says what's that and he says what's the penalty for perjury one of my homies is on trial he didn't do it they made me say I didn't want to say that and do we know have we seen this do we know who the sheriff is yeah what's his name John Hamilton the sheriff's lane Brian said he that this wasn't true and so they let Brian get back on the stand to say what he said to the sheriff pretty damn credible now I have someone here who I think could help clear this up a little bit, and I'd like to bring him in if you don't mind. So we're going to have to move that table in a sec. But Alessi, can you bring him in?

But they're not, I understand and agree with the fact that they're not admissible in court because there are variables that can go wrong and that gets to a weird place because then it's it becomes circumstantial you can't prove exactly if not that then this right but you know from a government standpoint i hear everyone talks about the same way i've talked about polygraphs no one likes them yeah they suck but i get why guys were gonna go do the types of shit that a guy like you is being sent in there to do has to be or joe or any of those guys andy jim like the the stuff that they have to do you gotta have a whole extra level of security that maybe the court system doesn't allow you know what i mean because it's just so sensitive and i gotta imagine

they're so worried about at all these different places you know what if we get someone who's turnable or who has maybe has something on them that is that is a vulnerability that an enemy could well you know like you said they're not they're not 100 accurate and here's the other thing right they cannot tell if you're telling the lie or truth it's up to the polygrapher to make that decision right he's got to read it and go hmm in his estimation you're being deceptive that's the word not lying you're indicating deception okay that's the word they use it indicates deception indicates deception indicates you're telling the truth so it's always him that's making that call yeah right other people can review it

you know because they you know the way it's set up you ask a question it correlates with you know the uh you know the graph you know and this question what you know i see a spike here and i see a drop here and then another spike here you know and they they line it all up but i also feel like you know there's another component to this thing is you know looking at the guy's body language you know um some guys don't do well under pressure like that you know and they could get anxious, you know. Not only that, I found that when I take them, sometimes my mind wanders and I overthink it and it make it worse. Like, no, this is not related to this comp stock. Stop thinking about that.

But I'm thinking about that because I'm connecting things. Like, no, they're not related, but I want to because my mind's all over the freaking place. And then, you know, the freaking thing's going all over the place, you know, the charge. Whoops. Yeah. So, you know, I believe there's some of the freaking place. And then, you know, the freaking thing's going all over the place, you know, the charge. Whoops. Yeah. So, you know, I believe there's some of that too. And that's probably why it's inadmissible in court. But like you said, you know, sometimes it's a good way to see, you know,

how bad somebody really wants to be a part of whatever they're doing, an organization, whatever they get into. And you get a better idea if this guy's telling the truth or not. But some guys can beat it. You can beat it. There are guys that have done it. What was the name of the FBI? I think it was the FBI.

Robert Hanson. Yeah, Hanson. He got away with it a long time. Didn't he just die? I think he just died in prison. Yeah, he did. He was in Florence Supermax. Yeah. Yeah.

But he had a lot of training from the russians too yes they were training him how to do that you know and uh are you trained on how to pass a polygraph now no i mean look i could i could wing it but i'm not sure i'll be successful right the whole pucker factor roll my toes and bite my tongue you know fucking think about porn something whatever right i don't know if that'll all work or not you know wow um yeah shit gets wild how did you how did you and joe initially meet each other by the way joe ted i um actually the first time i met him was uh downrange i believe afghanistan i think is where we met and maybe um i also worked so again while i was doing this contracting stuff i had my own company i was also the ceo for another company and uh and i was

running a project for this company and joe came in as one of the subcontractors that's how i met him there as well um so i've over the years, I've known him in passing, doing different projects, whether it was government related or corporate related or something like that. And then just kind of following and tracking him over the years. And then I was actually the first one on Discovery Channel. Then he got an opportunity to get on Discovery and we talked about that. And there's a lot of, and I'm going to just go take this opportunity real quick to talk about Joe, man. There's a lot of what I call derogatory information out there that's not true. I happen to know it's not true.

So when people, you know, they say Joe's a fraud, he's not a fraud. There was one guy, and I'm not going to mention his name, but he really had a hard-on for Joe because Joe got on Discovery Channel. He didn't. And long story short, they went into litigation. All kinds of stuff happened. Joe won the court case. I came in as an eyewitness because I heard what the other guy was going to do. Oh, you were on the case.

What happened was they asked me if I would come in and be a witness because I actually heard what the other guy was going to do. He told me he was going to intentionally wreck Joe's career and his life. He was going to set him up. And I'm like, why would you tell me that? You don't know me that well. But he thought we were bros. We could do that. And so I just realized, well, maybe this guy's got a little beef going on.

I don't want to get in the middle of it. And then when I found out what this was leading to it's leading to, and Joey spent a lot of money trying to defend himself. This guy had gone out and, and he really, he, he launched a disinformation campaign, you know, special forces, right. And, and a lot of people bought into the lie. Um, and then they started to accuse me of, you know of wrongdoing and being a traitor. And I'm like, you know what? You're not going to find any BS about me. I've been transparent about everything I've ever done. If I've done something wrong, I have no problem admitting that. But I said, I'm not going to stand here and watch a man get prosecuted and persecuted over some lies because

this dude over here is a jackass, right? And so I offered. I said, yeah, I'll be willing to come in and testify. As soon as I did that and I signed the affidavit and everything, they wanted to drop the case to settle on a court. They did. Yeah. And they did.

And they lost a lot of money. Yeah. Got their ass handed to them. A lot of legal fees on the way to that, though. Yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah, that overwhelmed them, Joe, particularly. Fucking crazy way to that, though. Yeah. My God. Yeah, that overwhelmed him, Joe, particularly. Fucking crazy.

The experts, everything. Yeah. I mean, I had a chance to talk with him and some people involved with that case. I didn't realize you were one of the witnesses, too. But we just literally just recorded with him right before, again, where you are coming in now. And, you know, there's a lot there. Obviously, when you win the case and you sign it, you still sign away some silence rights. So there's things he can't talk about that would really help him if he could.

But he addressed it on camera for a while. I mean, Alessi, that was like the first 25 minutes of the episode, something like that. Yeah. And I was glad he got to go as deep as he did on it. It was deeper than I thought he would be able to but you know there i have a special place in my heart for for people who do a lot of do a lot of hard things that other people wouldn't and usually like very brave things and then people try to take that from them yeah and it's it's a shame this this is one issue with the military that i run into on the internet sometimes where and sometimes they're right. Sometimes guys will

totally bullshit and lie about stuff. And I get that. You don't want stolen valor and the military is going to come and attack that. I get that. But when you have blank accounts like this, which is what this was, that's where this guy you referred to started. And then there were other people who got involved after him. When you have blank accounts who people don't even know who they are making up bullshit rumors, and then the whole internet runs with it. And then there were other people who got involved after him. When you have blank accounts who people don't even know who they are making up bullshit rumors and then the whole internet runs with it and then the military runs with it because the internet ran with it and eats their own, that pisses me off. And I had – when he first came in here, he was on a roll doing his whole thing and then I'm looking and I'm like, fuck, he's got to get to his plane. We weren't going to be able to address it. And so the episode obviously did really well.

But I had a bunch of military guys reach out in the DMs about it. And I'm going to give them credit here because they were reaching out to rip him to shreds. And these were guys I could check who they were. They used their real name. I could verify at least their background, stuff like that. So there were some real fucking people reaching out. I'm not just talking like some regular infantry people and every person i went right the fuck back at him and i said do you know this do you know this do you know this have you checked into this did

you see where that came from and none of them had an answer for it and to their credit i didn't have anyone fight back on me on that and they're like oh shit i'm sorry i should have checked that out yeah so you know i'm not i'm not i'm not gonna rip those guys i appreciate them actually looking at that but i'm like damn that's how fast that can spread yeah you know and yeah and like i said you know i when i saw this going happening to joe i said joe you're gonna do anything yeah i just i'm not gonna waste my time with this crap you know and he didn't and i said that's a bad idea man he's gonna the damage will be too severe when you try to recover and he lost a lot man but honestly i

know joe i've known joe man since what 2002 2003 somewhere in that range um for a very long time so 20 years man and um i know joe is when he says he's gonna do something he's gonna do it yeah he gets it done the guy you know he can back he can walk the walk talk to talk he's never you know they try to beat him up for, you know, stolen valor. Well, you were never in combat, but you call yourself a combat vet. I'm like, well, he saw combat in, you know, in Afghanistan. So was that making him a combat contractor? Come on, you know.

You know, stupid petty shit like that. And sometimes I wonder, man, what are guys thinking, you know? They're so full of hate and jealousy. And I experience it, too too from time to time. I bet you do. I get people, everybody's trying to come along and blow out your candle hoping there's burns brighter. And it just, I don't get it. And unfortunately, a lot of times in the military, that's what you get.

You get a lot of haters. And especially when you're successful. When you're successful, the enemies come with that. And there's always someone out there that's going to, you know, they got a hard-on for you because whatever. They think they're better than you or they should have got something. They didn't get it. They don't understand how you were successful. Whatever.

Maybe that's just the human condition. I just try to move on, ignore that stuff to a point until it gets know, it gets really personal. And now I feel like maybe they're affecting my business or could affect my business or my welfare, my family's welfare. Then I have to push back and fight back. But you mentioned stolen valor. That's actually a big problem. So this just happened to me in Bali. This is kind of an interesting story. So my guy I know says, hey, man, I just met a marine lieutenant colonel retired he's he's indonesian but he was in the u.s marine corps um came to the united states like age of five or something like that no blah blah and uh and he's here in bali and uh and showed me his resume go

wow pretty cool man the guy was infantry you know marine Lieutenant Colonel, retired, all these things, good English. And so we hired him for a couple of projects. And I got him a job at this one place. And he was supposed to help with developing a security plan for a big New Year's Eve event. And I said, oh, you're in good hands. He's a Lieutenant Colonel. He knows all this stuff, out planning, blah, blah, blah. You're good. Well's a lieutenant colonel. He knows all this stuff, off planning, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know, you're good, you know.

Well, that never materialized. And I'm like, and then the whole security plan went to shit on New Year's Eve. It was bad. It was disastrous. And I'm like, how did that happen? You got this guy, right? Well, this turns out this guy, I'll name his first name. His name is Chris.

Turns out he was stolen. So things started not adding up after a while, right? And one of my friends that lives there is a former force recon Marine, a really good guy. And he goes, this is not adding up. He goes, I don't believe the guy was force recon because I was force recon. He goes, I don't remember this guy. You know, no, no, no, no, no.

So then I said, you know what? So I checked with, there's a couple of guys that do investigations, particularly in stolen valor, and they're on my internet. And I contacted them. I go, hey, can you look up this guy? They came back. Turns out the guy spent four months in the Army, basic training, got kicked out for cause, was a private. He was in the engineers, couldn't adjust to military life, whatever it was. And so what he did is he photographed,

photoshopped his face on, you know, dress blues, you know, Lieutenant Colonel leaves and all that kind of stuff. The whole resume was bullshit, you know. But now he's got a job with a client that I referred him to making really good money. And he's supposed to be a security guy. And the guy doesn't know anything about security,

which is obvious from the New Year's Eve event. Right? And so I felt obligated to go to the owners of the company because they've been very gracious with me. I'm their consultant. They have my canines and all this stuff. And I go, this guy here is not who you think he is. And I show them the evidence. And they were sitting on the fence because they're civilians.

And they're like, we don't understand all this stuff. I said, bring him in and we'll ask ask questions he goes you ask the questions me so i'm gonna ask the question so he sits down and i go i said dude i said listen you were lieutenant colonel right yes marine corps yep i said what did you do i was an infantry i said okay what are the five paragraphs of an operations order everybody knows that and it's not it's not uh the branch dependent right because we have to work together sometimes and he. And it's not branch dependent, right? Because we have to work together sometimes. And he goes, well, it's different for everybody. I said, no, it's not different.

I said, what are the five paragraphs, right? And he couldn't answer. I go, come on, dude. I said, I'll start with the first one. I'll give you a hint. Situation, right? And he couldn't work it out, right? And he kept, what are you asking me all these questions?

What's going on here, right? He kept deflecting, right? And I told one of the owners earlier owners earlier i said watch he's a classic sociopath i said you will not get a rise out of this guy he'll be very calm his hands will be calm classic sociopath and he was he was really stable and i said you know just let me work on him right so we did that for a little bit nothing happened okay he worked in a in the uh command staff section correct there's actually six levels right s1 s2 s S2, S3, S4, S5, S6, right? S1 being personnel, S2 intelligence, S3 is operations, S4 is logistics,

S5 civil affairs, and S6 signal. And so I said, okay, so you're a staff officer for how long? And he answered, and I said, so what staff section were you in? Which one? And what is it it he couldn't answer that question either right so i knew i had him by the balls he had no idea he didn't do his work and uh so we went round and round for a little while and finally he goes okay okay all right i don't exist what does that well like what does that mean he goes i don't exist

he tried to pull the old you know the military uh military, you know, destroyed all my records and stuff because I was doing secret operations, right? That whole shit, right? And then he asked if I could, asked for them to ask me to leave the room so he could talk to him in private. I said,

I'm going to humor him. I'm going to step outside. This is going to be funny. Then he's trying to tell me he's a secret agent. You know, they ripped off all this stuff. I'm a totally secret agent, bro. He doesn't exist,

but he's got himself on LinkedIn and all these other social media sites with his dress blues on, Colonel stuff. So right there, I popped him right there on the spot, and they fired him immediately. See, that's the stuff you do have to call out for sure. Well, because he's making money, a lot of it. He's taking a job from somebody else that could have had that job. He's a stolen valor.

And I've seen enough of these. I've seen so many of these guys. They're everywhere. And I've seen enough of these. I've seen so many of these guys. They're everywhere. And I'm on the lookout for them. And you can't bullshit a bullshitter, you know? And things just started not adding up after a while. And I go, this guy is not who he says he is. And boom, there he is.

And he had a U.S. passport. And actually, technically, he could be deported because even though he's Indonesian, he doesn't have an Indonesian passport. He can only have one or the other, right? But he hightailed out of town really fast so we can catch him up with him and have immigration handle him. But they're everywhere. There's a lot of that going on, you know? And people are out there making money lying about their military service.

And it's disgusting. It's sad. And I have no tolerance for it, you know? I don't know why some people, I mean, I guess like some of the lower level guys who do it, like that example, like it's just typical fraudster doing their thing. But there's other people. I don't know why they feel like they have to embellish their stories. They were already big. I mean, you talked about it you you knew chris

kyle back in the day and obviously he's sadly passed away that was really tragic and you know a lot of people know his story as it's been told through hollywood now and yeah the guy i mean i've talked to people like the guy legit was like a unbelievable sniper that was all very real but i i think there were a couple different things and and one of them was it had nothing even to do with the battlefield but like he went on and i've seen him tell the story maybe you did it on like opie and anthony or something you can find a video of it but he went on and told a story about like how he beat the shit out of jesse ventura or something which never happened and and j Jesse's in like a tough spot

because then the guy died and he's like a folk hero and everything. But Jesse was, I guess, righteously suing him before he died. And then years after he died, he won the lawsuit. And it sucks because now the guy's got a widow and like, oh my God, are you beating up on like jesse's in a lose-lose right but i see stuff like that and i wonder i mean you can't ask chris now but i'm like why did you why do you have to say that you didn't no one would have given a shit if you hadn't beaten up jesse ventura like what do you think that is that some of these guys usually after their career obviously feel like they got it oh i gotta tell people i did that yeah um a lot of weird things happen to you when you leave the service particularly if you retire you know imagine this if you're in special operations you're three times more likely to die within

two years than the average soldier um why because you're used to traveling 100 miles an hour every day and all of a sudden you're in the civilian world doing three miles an hour. And so what happens? I've got a lot of friends that have committed suicide, drug overdoses. They start looking for that fix, that adrenaline, right, that they were so used to. They look for it. It's called operator syndrome, right, allostatic load. And so you're under this allostatic load for all these years.

It becomes the norm. It's like being on drugs all these years, right? But a good drug, good high, for good reason. And all of a sudden that's gone. And now you're going, I need a fix, you know? And so, you know, guys go down the wrong road sometimes. Sometimes it's drugs, sometimes it's alcohol or some other, you know, adrenaline rush thing that they're going to do um or they just get really sedentary and they just you know and it just they just pass you know for me um i've never had a problem with drugs or felt suicidal or depression um i always jokingly tell people i always go back to the well and take a drink because that's what kind of keeps my it's my sanity you know so i do these other operations singleton operations on my own like going and recovering people um but it's not never really all the way out in a way never i'm never really on the way out right it's true um my dad you know my dad was in the army i remember he's in his 50s

um he looks at me one day he goes son he goes if the army would take me back today he goes i'd go back in a minute you know and i couldn't understand that why would you do that you know but now i understand it right um i wouldn't go back because hell that'd be a hell of a pay cut um you know and more not only that you know my liberty and everything their business is a booming yeah and so um but i i get it right because as i started out in this in this program is you know the military culture is so different from the civilian culture. Man, it's almost hard to explain that, right? The camaraderie, the brotherhood. This is why I said when people talk about racism, I don't know what military they're talking about.

Maybe it's, I don't know. In combat arms, you're not going to find that. Very little of that. So it's like the best, it's almost like the best university to go to in the world. In fact, I used to recommend people go into military all the time. It's like the best college in the world to go to, man. You'll meet the best people, the best friendships. And so you get used to that.

And suddenly in this other weird world where you're around weird people that lie, embellish, pretend to be who they're not, you know, and it feels very unusual. And so you naturally want to gravitate back to that culture that you grew into, right? But you can't because they won't take you back because you're like me, you're like too old. And so you look for that, you look for something to fill that gap, that emotional gap. And for me, I still like to do scary, dangerous, risky things, but for the right reasons, for good reasons. And so every now and then, yeah, I get the phone call. Hey, man, would you like to go hunt some terrorists?

Oh, yeah. For a couple of weeks, yeah, I'd be happy to do that. But I need to be back for this when I get back for a podcast. Oh, yeah. For a couple of weeks, yeah, I'd be happy to do that. But I need to be back for this when I get back for a podcast. Oh, okay. Or can I do the podcast downrange? Oh, you can do that down. Okay, cool. But no, it's like that. And you never get enough of it because for me personally, I feel like it's part of my DNA. I was raised in that type of culture. As soon as I graduated high school, I went back into that culture. After I retired the military, I got back into the culture anyways. I'm always trying to keep my hand on it a little bit somewhere. I'm trying to stay in that culture because it grounds me and it's a familiar place that kind of helps me keep my sanity in an insane role, you know?

Hey guys, it's come to my attention that many of you are unaware that we have multiple other channels on YouTube and have for a while in at least two cases. So the first channel is at Julian Dory Clips, which we've been posting on for over a year. It has mid-form clips and short-form clips going out every single day day and it is huge to help us in the algorithm when those clips do well so please go over there and subscribe the link is in the description the second page is at julian dory daily which is a brand new page with different editors posting exclusive content that is also mid form and short form clips that link is in the description and finally we have a page called best of jdp which we put on ice for a while, but we just hired another editor to bring back.

It is a shorts-only page. He will be making shorts exclusively for that channel. Once again, the link is in the description. You can check out all three down there in the description, and I hope to see you guys subscribe. Thank you. And so a lot of guys, I think that's what happens. So they either go down the wrong road, drugs, alcohol, other weird stuff, get in trouble, or they go suicidal, or they just become depressed, or they just fade away. They talk about the days of glory. A lot of guys are defined by who they were and not who they are today.

And by the way, I never go around telling people that I'm a former Delta Force operator. I don't define myself with that. I define myself as who I am today. That's all that matters. Being a Delta Force operator, being a Green Beret, being all the things I've done in the past were just stepping stones to where I'm at today. What am I today? I'm a businessman. I'm a life coach.

I'm a father. I'm a husband.'m a life coach I'm a father I'm a husband you know I've got a I've got a PhD oh you got a PhD yeah you didn't know that no

surprise that's awesome yeah I got a doctorate in alternative medicine natural health I got a master's degree in business and organizational security management

I speak several languages I can go on and on and on but I that's who I am today. Everything else was behind me. I never looked back. I look out the windshield, not through the rearview mirror.

And there's a lot more to see to the front that I want to do. And that's how I see myself. And so I don't live with regrets. Um, you know, um, there's, there's been things that have happened to me in the past that were, you know, I didn't really, I wish it never did happen, but they happened and I don't dwell on them. I don't look back. I don't let it. You've never struggled with that at all. You never had any battles with PTSD. Yeah, actually. Yeah, I actually had, um? Yeah. And I don't, you know, I'm not embarrassed to say that because...

You shouldn't be. You know, PTSD is not... You know, my PTSD, I think Joe mentioned it. He talked about, like what happened with Mike Donatelli on Discovery Channel, right? Mike died in my arms that night.

I was the guy... Oh, that's right. You were there. Yeah. I was the guy. Oh, that's right. You were there. Yeah, I was the guy out there when all that happened by myself. And things like that, when things like that happen, that has a pretty profound effect on you. What I suffered from there was survivor's guilt because Joe and I, I mean Joe, but Mike and I had switched places the very last second. And Mike got on the helicopter instead of me. And I watched the helicopter crash that morning, 3.30.

And I remember running down there by myself. Nobody to help me. And when I found everybody, the bodies, you know, it was a pretty gruesome sight. And Mike was the only one to have survived but barely and oh he survived on the crash i didn't know that yeah and i i can say that because i've already told that to his parents his father right because originally his father thought he died instantly and this might be an interesting story to share with everybody I think it is I think it might be important as well so I'll just kind of give you a little bit of the background so Mike was a Green Beret Ranger he was in Delta Forces a

operations manager not an operator but it still doesn't matter he and I had a lot in common I was a professional boxer he was a Golden Gloves boxer we both had you know Hispanic wives we had the same number of kids same age there was a professional boxer. He was a Golden Gloves boxer. We both had, you know, Hispanic wives. We had the same number of kids, same age. There was a lot of similarities between us, you know. And so we're doing this show, Discovery Channel. You know, we're actually all co-producers along with Joe. And then we made that decision that fateful night that we would change positions.

I would be on the ground narrating the scene. Mike would get in the helicopter. He would just drop the rucksack. That was my job at first, but we thought for the betterment of the show, it would be best to do it this way. Because I have a background in high-speed and technical driving, off-road driving, things like that, right?

And Joe was saying the same thing. It's like it could have been me in there like it was like this yeah it's just random you were you guys were on the ground yeah so um so what happened you know i go down there i do i do what i can do you know i find mike i'm you know he's unconscious he's barely breathing um he's a mess he's alive but he's a mess and uh this is a really eerie story because I had already found the pilot earlier. He had been decapitated. And so I moved on, looked around, found Mike laying there. And if you can just imagine, it's 29 degrees out right now.

It's in the desert. There's no illumination, no moonlight. I'm wearing a coal miner's light on my helmet, on my head. It's all i got to see with i have a thin jacket on it's very cold because i wasn't expecting to be out there that long and i'm soaking wet with jet fuel from the knees down because as i was running through the sage brush you know the the fuel tank apparently had ruptured when this thing just literally disintegrated there was nothing bigger than a shoebox left in this helicopter. And so jet fuel had been doused everywhere.

As I'm running through, I'm soaked in it. I find Mike, and, you know, he's not doing well. And I ended up grabbing him by his torso. He was wearing like a brown fleece jacket. And I had to roll him to his side to clear his airway because he was choking on his blood teeth all kinds of stuff and um and when i did man it's like one one it felt like i was rolling a bag of potatoes but two he was soaking wet in jet fuel my gloves were soaking wet jet fuel blood whatever and then so i'm trying to manage his airway and i still have a third guy that i'm looking for the uh the cameraman i know he's out here somewhere i I don't know where because, you know.

Anyway, so as I'm sitting there, I'm trying to control Mike. There's no help coming. I don't see anybody coming. I don't hear anybody coming. I'm in the middle of this desert. And I remember yelling out really loud, I've got two. I'm missing one. I need some help.

Those are my words. I said that a couple of times, hoping somebody would hear me and dial in and come to me and help me. And so this is when the weird thing happened. So next thing I know out of the open desert, the open desert, I see a woman approaching me at a brisk pace. She walks right past me within arm's reach easily doesn't say a word doesn't stop doesn't do it walks right behind it walks behind me and i'm like what the hell i'm trying to hang on a mic so you don't roll over and i'm trying to turn around to look and i can't really see her yet and i hear her gasp and she turns around and briskly walks right past me back out into the

open desert where she came from what i thought And I thought, that is some weird shit. So I turned around and looked at what is she gasping about? And I looked back and there's the cameraman. So I balanced Mike as best I could on his side. And I reassured him, hoping that maybe he could hear me. I said, Mike,

I'll be right back, brother. I said, I got one more man I got to check on, but I'll be right back. He's going to be okay. So I get up. I run back 15 feet, something like a little i know he's right behind me and he's laying on his back he had basically been um what's the word i'm looking for basically been halved by the fuselage went up between his legs and so he was dead right so it didn't take me long to figure that out cameraman yeah so i run back and I'm still managing Mike, but he's slowly slipping away. And probably within 30 seconds, you know, we're about five minutes into this thing right now. He's gone.

And then the first medic slides into home base with the aid bag. Arp, you know, do what you got to do, but it's over, you know? So anyways, that's kind of the event, some of the things that transpired. But one of the things, and so when I talk about my coaching, I do a lot of coaching, right? And I talk about stress management and the leadership, self-governance and things like that. One of the things that happened was as the sun started coming up, all of a sudden now the highway patrol showing up, the fire department um the faa oh my god man like 50 cars showed up right now getting out and the fire marshal gets out he's older guy and uh and he walks over to the pilot who i had covered up his torso uh with something

i can't remember was like a white piece of styrofoam or something because no need to look at a guy laying on his head on him right right? So, and he just loses his shit. He's like, who did this? Who put that? He's going crazy, man. And then he's, now he's screaming and he's literally crying. He's coming, he's very hysterical. And I, what the hell?

This is a fire marshal. He's pretty senior and he's losing his shit out here right in front of everybody, and he's really yelling and barking orders, and I finally just looked at him and go, hey, shut the F up. I said, if you can't compose yourself and do your job, get the freak out of here.

I said, you're not helping the situation. You're hurting it, right? And I pretty much had to fire him up to get him to come back to, you know, sanity and get and get him back you know get him back in the right mindset but um you would think a senior fire marshal has seen worse than that yeah yeah but anyways he just really came on on the ends um finally what happened was so there's a big investigation blah blah blah somebody made a mistake of well. Somebody made a mistake. Well, it wasn't a mistake. They were trying to be kind to his parents and say, hey, he died instantly,

which was not true. So I wrote the book. I already had written my book, American Badass. I was almost complete with it. And I thought, you know, this would be a good chapter to start the story with, not because it's a grueling story, but I thought there was a lot of things that we could learn from the story about, you know, for example, when I found the pilot, I saw him in the distance, right? I remember it's really dark. And I see him laying, what looked like he was face down, head towards me. I run over to him, I grab him by shoulders and I roll him over. And when I roll them over, I realized he doesn't have a head and it caught me by complete surprise, right? And I kind of

stood up and gasped and I was stunned because that's not what I was expecting. And I remember, remember I talked about my OTC instructor, Mad Max earlier, right? Mad Max, he was really hard, but he did it because he loved us and he wanted us to live, right? And he used to always tell us, don't run the situation. He said, don't let the situation run you, you run the situation, right? Run the situation, don't let it run you. And the other thing he would always tell us, do something, God damn it, even if it's wrong, just do something, but don't stand there, right? And I remember when I rolled him over, I was kind of like stood up in kind of shock. I remember those words coming across my mind, you know, run the situation. Don't let it run you.

You've got to continue on, right? Continue mission. Charlie, Mike, you've got two more guys out here. So that's what helped me compose myself again. And so I went back to work, you know, rather than standing there going, you know, what happened? It was like a nightmare. I mean, think about it. It's dark, you know, and it's cold and it's just, wow, it's crazy. So I thought I'd open the story because there are a lot of other lessons learned in that thing, right? That I thought people should know and understand, you know, when it comes to self-leadership, governance and courage and things like that. So when I wrote the story, I mentioned

somebody survived. I didn't mention who. I said, yeah, one guy was alive, blah, blah, blah, but this is what happened. Well, maybe a week later, I'm still in LA with my management team, investigation still going on. I get a phone call from his wife, Mike's wife, and she's got me on speakerphone apparently with the lawyers and I start asking all the questions. Who made the decision to change seats? Blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, you know what? I said, that was a group decision for the Betterment Show. You know, we all had equal authority. We're all co-producers, you know, nothing nefarious going on there, right? So now we're thinking, okay, lawyers are going to try to sue everybody, looking for all the pockets, right, to put their hands in, including mine. And I'm thinking, now what did I get into?

And then about two months later, I'm back in L.A. I'm in the gym working out one day. I get a call from her again. And she's like, hey, Dale, in July we're going to have a birthday party for Mike, a celebratory birthday party for his life. And it's his birthday in memory of Mike, a memorial. And we would like for you to come to that. It's in Pennsylvania. And so I'm like, well, how can I say no?

And I said, of course, I'll come there. So that day comes. It's a beautiful, sunny day in Pennsylvania. You know, green pastures. I still remember that day. I land. I get in a rental car. I drive a while.

I finally get to the location. And his wife was Cuban and Mike was Italian. So when I got to the location, imagine all the Cuban side of the family and the Italian side family all come together. They got a circus tent out in this open pasture. They've got bands playing, a big memorial for Mike, you know. Like there are probably 500 people there, you know, jumping around, kids playing, just a lot of activity. I mean, it's like a, I don't know, man, it's like a carnival, right? So I pull up and there's cars parked everywhere.

And I find one open parking spot just happens to be right there in front of everybody. And I thought, did they reserve that for me? Because I was late getting there. And so I remember sitting in the car. I turned it off. I'm looking at all this going on. And I was very nervous, filled with trepidation. Because I'm thinking, I don't't know is this an ambush i don't

know what's happening here right now right and uh what am i doing here you know and and so i had to reach deep down and go you know what you have an obligation man go out there you have responsibility to the family and face the music whatever happens happens just deal with it so i get out of the car and i'm walking across this open pasture, probably 200 yards across, and then everything stopped. All the activities stopped. Everybody's facing me, and as I'm walking towards them, everything stops. I'm like, holy shit.

And then the father comes out, and he walks out in the open field and meets me halfway. And it reminds me of the movie Braveheart, right? The two armies lined up in the field and the leadership walks out in the center. You know, they have a parlay and the father walks out and I've never met him before. And so I get out there, we stop. And the first question, the first thing that was uttered was from him. And he asked me, he goes, I have a question to ask you. He goes, the person that survived the crash, was that my son? Now I'm like, damn, do I lie or do I tell the truth?

And I thought, you know what? Out of respect for him, I'm going to tell the truth in respect for myself. Because I sure hate to lie. And then later on, he finds the truth for whatever reason right so i said yes sir i said your son you know he he didn't die instantly he died in my arms um literally i held him i did everything i could for him that that morning you know and i'm sorry to say that and uh he looked at me he shook my hand he hugged me he goes you know what he goes because if there's anybody i wanted to be with my son on the way out it was you he goes i thank you for being there for him

he goes i want to welcome you to my family consider yourself a part of this family and then as i turn around and watch with all of a sudden everybody comes out they got my book american badass they all want autographs and stuff you know it's crazy right and yeah and suddenly you know it wasn't like a solemn affair it was a festive affair celebratory about mike's life you know and we sat around bonfires at night talking and you know and i really felt like you know i'm welcome here you know and i didn't think okay this is not going to be a torture session i'm not going to get ambushed or killed or anything like that. You know, I felt like, you know, they appreciated that one, I had the balls to show up and two, to, you know, be honest about, you know, what happened with Mike, you know, and three, they, they were happy that he didn't die alone, so to speak, you know?

And so that's in the book, by the way, that's in the first part of the book, but there's, there's a lot of lessons to be learned from that, I feel like. And we started out this conversation, this segment of the conversation about PTSD. So that was one of those things. It took me years to get over survivor's guilt. Literally, I would wake up every morning and I had a cement truck parked on my chest. That's the first thing I thought about, Mike, you know? And why him, not me?

Because I remember standing there looking at him that night, just standing there, before the medic even rolled up and came sliding in. And I'm thinking, that's supposed to be me. That should have been me. You know, that's a hard pill to swallow, you know, when you realize that man just died in your stead, you know. Simple decision, and he ends up, you know, laying there instead of me. And I thought, man, you know, how do you, how do you,

how am I going to cope with that? And it took a couple of years, literally every morning waking up with a cement truck parked in my chest, you know, and it's a bad way to start the day. It has a negative impact on your physiology, psychology, everything. Your performance is really hindered by that. And I knew that. I knew I had to get over it and move on.

And why do I have survivor's guilt? Because I'm a moral person. I'm a good person, okay? And I felt like, you know what? I don't want to see people die for nothing. And I felt like in this case, I should have been dead, not him, you know, because now his family's here without him. And his little boy was only about two years old. I don't even think the boy even understood what was going on.

I remember that. It's like, oh, my God, you know. And so I vowed I got some help, you know, and really the help was nothing more than me just talking about it like I am to you. And when you talk about something like this, what ends up happening, you arrive at your own answers and conclusions, right? You just sort it out. And that's what I needed. I needed a sounding board. The psychiatrist didn't guide me. He would just ask me a question.

How do you feel about that? And I thought about it and I'd answer the question. And I go, yeah. That's how I kind of worked through it um but uh i vowed that moving forward from that day on i would do the best that i could and be the best person i can be um in honor of mike and particularly i don't want his family ever to look at me and go what a bag you know this guy gets to live and my husband's dead he's a total turd um i don't ever want them to think that. I want them to know that I'm a good person. I'm going to do righteous things, good things for people,

and in honor of him and his son and his wife. So, you know, I think Joe may have talked about this before. You know, PTSD, look, I have no problem sleeping at night for the many guys I let the air out of. They had it coming. It was either them or it was me. Just say let the air out of? Yeah.

That's a good one. That's a nice way to put it. I might use that. That's a nice way to put it. Instead of making them leak or something, right? Leak to death. Let them deflate. But anyways, I don't really sleep over that man because i know what i

did was righteous um it's righteous you know and um these are the same people that shit man you know they're brutal man what they've done to people and so i have no problem with that um the the part that always hurts man i think maybe i'm not i'm speaking for myself but i imagine that it's probably true for a lot of uh combat veterans is the hard part is when you see innocent women and children hurt or killed, right? That was always the hardest part. Man, when you go into a room, you know, and you got three or four women huddled up in the corner with their babies and kids screaming, you know, in horror and terror because you're coming in the house with guns and you're going after their fathers, their brothers, uncles who are bad guys, you know, and these son of a bitches put their families in harm's way like that, you know. But you hear them screaming.

All you can think about is your own children, you know, your own family. What if that was my family? It's heartbreaking, you know. I remember I had to do a um i had to do what's called ctr close target reconnaissance it was broad daylight it's in takrit sodom's hometown um there was a strike force lined up and we're going to hit this one particular target in this neighborhood which is a bad neighborhood my job was to go in, dressed up as an Iraqi, blend in in a pickup truck.

You was an Iraqi? Yeah, I had to dress up as one. I had to look, I had to blend in. If I don't, I'm going to get killed, right? Yeah, I don't know if you're blending in that well. No, no, no. Actually, at one time, I actually had hair and I had a beard.

I looked like, I really did look like an Arab. Really? Yeah, black beard and everything. My face was much slender. Yeah, I got pictures of it. It's's pretty crazy right and uh so i drive in and i i pid was called pid positively identify the residents and which is hard to tell because all the homes are connected right just one long row houses and compounds and walls but i pid the car his car location okay there it is that's that's

it i just got to remember exactly where it's at because I'm going to go back out, and I'm going to bring the assault element inside. They're going to follow me in, right? And I'm going to direct them to the target. And so I find PID it. I go out. I link up with the main body. I go, okay, guys, I got a PID.

Ready to go. Roger that. Follow me. And here comes the cavalry. And we go rolling through the neighborhood. We go rolling down the street where the target was. and I'll be damned, the car was missing now, like, shit, and all the houses look alike, and I was like, it's got to be this one here, and pretty close, right, and so I just hit the brakes, and it was, I was right, I got the right house, even though the car wasn't there, and the assaulters all get out. They're running into the compound and there's a little kid standing outside, about two years old,

little racky kid, you know, and he was doing something. He had a ball in his hand or something, little cute little kid, man. I still remember. And when he sees all these assaulters barging into the compound, coming after his dad, right? He just lost his shit in the street. And I'm out of the vehicle. I got my weapon in my hand. I'm pretty sure any minute now, we're going to have the horde come down on top of us. It's going to be ugly. And this little kid's standing there screaming. But I'm trying to pull security up the street because the guys are behind me going in. And I see this kid. And all I can think about is my own son, right?

I remember my son when he was two years old, same height and everything, you know? And my son, by the way, he's 36 now. He's a Green Beret. He's a Ranger. Follow my footsteps. That's awesome. And so the father in me just ran over, and I picked this kid up in my arm, you know? And I'm holding him. I got armor on. I got my weapon, my long gun in my know, and I'm holding him. I got armor on,

got my weapon, my long gun in my right hand. I'm holding my left hand. I'm like, it's okay, little buddy. Everything's going to be okay. You know, and I'm, you know, I'm not sure he understood me or not, but I'm thinking, fuck, we're going to go into that. They might just kill his dad right now. You know, I don't know what they're going to do. It depends on what kind of fight he puts up, you know, and I got to hold this little kid, you know, but it's those kinds of things that you never forget because you can directly relate to them. Because if you have kids and family, there it is, right? And those are the hardest things to forget and overcome.

And they stay with you for a very long time, if not forever. You can see I can still remember it in great detail because, you know, our memory, our long-term memory is, you know, it's based on emotion. The more emotional it is, the longer you remember it, right, in better detail. And I can remember that like it just happened, you know. And, you know, a little kid bawling and snot coming out of his nose. He's screaming and, you know, and he's not even my kid, but he is like my kid, you know. And I got a job to do. And, you know, what if I got to fight kid, but he is like my kid, you know, and I got a job to do. And, you know, what if I got to fight?

You know, it's just crazy. Right. These are decisions sometimes we have to make, you know, in combat. And sometimes I think that's hard for people to appreciate. They see the movies, but they don't really see. They can't replicate that. You can't. And you can't really you can't see into a man's heart.

Right. You know, what's going through his mind at that moment in time and the emotion. Look, we're not heartless murdering, you know, I use the term psychopathic killers. You know, at the end of the day, you know, just like I told BBC, you know, I said, you know, the guys that were on my strike team, you know, doing the mercenary work. I said, you know what we are? I said, we're professionals. We're fathers. We're husbands. You know, we're men of moral character. You know, we're good guys, you know, going after the evil that's in this world. We're not the bad guys, you know, because

they try to compare us to the Wagner group, which are a bunch of criminals. Literally, they're criminals right out of the prison, hired to be mercenaries. And I try to explain that to people. It's like, just because I'm a warrior doesn't mean I'm an evil person. It doesn't mean I'm a murderer. I'm the one, you know, if you could read my tattoo, you know, I'm the horrible thing standing before the temple, the stone fight above the cathedral doors. I'm the dreadful spirit summoned, not recorded. I'm the necessary hour that you, once I arrive, you want me gone, right? You never need a soldier until you need a soldier. And then after you use it, you want us out of there, right?

We're despicable in a lot of people's eyes. And it is what it is. You know, at the end of the day, I enjoy what I do. I enjoy doing the righteous things. I believe I'm doing, you know. Do you ever think about, you know – and this isn't a you problem. This is a general problem that war creates. I don't – if I knew how to solve this, trust me, we wouldn't be sitting in a podcast right now.

But do you ever think about the effects that it has on those innocents around there. I mean, there was a story, and I really got to go check this because this is like the third time this has come up on a podcast, and I can't remember whose it was. But I know my buddy Ryan Tate, who was a Marine chasing Al-Zaqawi in Iraq, when he was in here, he told a story about these kids during the door-to-doors. And what I can't remember if this is one of his door-to-doors, because he used to do that when they were going through Iraq after the invasion, they had to go door-to-doors because he used to do that when they were going through Iraq after the invasion. They had to go door-to-door and find people. Or if it was a story that General McChrystal told about another door-to-door.

Either way, the point remains. And the story goes when the soldiers went in there, whether it was Ryan or some of the other soldiers, can't remember. But when they went into one of these homes, there was this like seven-year-old kid or something like that. And he just looked at them with just dead behind the eyes eyes. Like lights are on. No one's home. Just like, oh, it's just what it is. And he proceeded to get down on the ground and put his hands over his head and lay down prone with his face down.

And, you know, he didn't speak English. But they were going over going, no, no, no, no. We don't need you to do that. And they like pulled him up and he just looked at him like dead to the eyes again. And they're like, get out of the house or whatever. And he like walked outside as if – cool customers. If nothing is going on, this is just another day in my life. And the way Ryan explained it was, the fuck you think that kid is going to think us when he grows up?

We're there doing a job. We're not bad people. We were told to do this job. There's a lot of shit going down. Zakari, Al Zakari's recruiting all these people to be terrorists. They're unfortunately hiding among the populace. We're trying to stop all these bombs and IEDs from going off. We're trying to save not just American lives, but Iraqi lives.

But we are the big, bad, you know, metagons coming in there, knocking down doors, doing our jobs. And these kids look at us and the image they see is horror. They see these are the – and that's not what it is, but that's what they think because they're young and that's what they think it is. These are the terrorists invading our country. And then that kid grows up and I'm not excusing what he does, by the way. I want to be very clear about that. Like you reach certain ages, like you make decisions, right? But I try to look at the root cause and say,

well, how can we fix that in the future? Because that kid grows up, he's 22 and he's a terrorist. He wants to blow people up. Well, actually, you know, it's been my experience. And I know that the guys I go, went out with, the things we used to do, we actually would go out of our way to console and comfort children.

We would actually bring candy, anything. We would segregate them with their mom, keep them together. Here's some candy. We tried very hard to show them we're not the bad guy. And in fact, we try to show their elders or whoever we're going to roll up, if we didn't kill them, respect and restraint, especially in front of the family.

We never tried to abuse them in front of their family, right? And we actually never really tried to abuse anybody. And I found, for example, one time we had this kid, his dad was a general and involved in a lot of bad shit. We had rolled them both up. The kid was actually 18, but he's still a kid. He was young. And he was just mortified.

We had him handcuffed, you know, gagged in the back room. He's laying on the floor, you know, while his dad's out there getting, you know, the third degree. And I looked at him. He's laying there kind of shivering. And I'm like, you know what? I walked in there. I sat him up, took his, you know, gag out of his mouth, gave him some water,

pat him on the shoulder and told him it's going to be okay. And so I tried to do that. I went that far, and a lot of guys did. There's still the human side of us, right? I can do a lot of damage, but I can also be a very humane person as well. And I get it, man, because I have my own children. I'm not a monster. None of these guys are.

And there's scenarios like that where you find, hey, you know what? Yeah, you're under suspicion right now. We arrested you. We think you did bad things along with your dad. I you're scared i see the fear in your eyes you know maybe that's a good thing but i also want you to know that uh you know my heart says in my heart i believe that you're probably innocent and uh you know here have a drink of water take a breath you know and then we'll let the games begin again you know take a break for a minute so i try to so i try to change i try to change the you know like you know show him there's he doesn't have to he has to necessarily be in fear for his life it's just

you know be respectful do the right thing and if you didn't do anything wrong don't worry you know um we're human and we'll hopefully recognize that you're a good person and nothing will happen to you or we'll recognize you're a bad guy and nothing will happen to you or will recognize you're a fucking bad guy and you have bad things are going to happen to you. But it's hard to deal with a lot of stuff. Man, I was in Afghanistan. So I remember every morning, not every morning, but every third morning around 430 when the Taliban and others would go to prayer call. Right. They always prayer at 430.

Sun was up and it was like on the way to prayer call, they would go, let's drop a couple of mortars on the Americans, right? And so the mortar assault attacks would start, and then I'd have to get out of bed, call, come over to the radio, incoming, shit, and I'd throw my shit on, run out of mortar pit. And we'd dial in the mortars.

We'd turn fire, you know, blah, blah, blah. And then we had an OP observation post, basically a small encampment on the top of the hill. And there was probably 25, 30 of our guys in there, Afghans. They're sandbagged in there, and they lived up there, and their job was to pull surveillance of the entire valley. They're on the highest point, right? And they were covering us. We're below them about 3,000, 4,000 feet. The total elevation was about 9,000 feet.

And so what was happening on the backside of the mountain, there was a village below. Taliban were hanging out there, right? And they would come at the backside, and then they would snipe and attack ROP up there. And they'd take out some of the guys, and then they'd go back down the mountain, back to the village. And it started becoming problematic. And I started getting a little frustrated about it and i thought you know all right i'm done with this shit so i took one of my patrols and i said let's

go up there we went up and i went over to the side of the mountain where these guys are coming up and i kind of figured out okay which trails are they coming up they'll come up here they'll come up there they're using this trail they're sneaking up to this point, and they're shooting from this position, RPGs, SVDs, sniper rifles. I said, okay, I'm going to ambush. I'm going to set them up with booby traps so the next time they crawl through here, they'll blow themselves up. So I started putting in booby traps. Started mining the area with hand grenades, tripwires, things like that, and got it all set up pretty. And I'm the only one who knew what those things were. I kept my patrol back. I didn't want them walking around in there and set one of these

things off and kill us all. So I managed all that and then we left. I had to go back to the U.S. like a couple of days later. And so I leave, I'm gone for 30 days. I come back. My cohort, my partner was still there. And by the way, he committed suicide. He's a former Green Beret also. It's just the pressure. One day he just killed himself in his front yard in Southern Pines, North Carolina. But great guy. What a great guy, man.

He was just always laughing. It's just good. Never saw that coming either, man. But he was still there at the time and i say hey dude so you know he's briefing me when i show up i go how's everything you know blah blah hey by the way you know how about booby traps work you know getting the taliban he goes yeah you got two kills i go really because yeah you killed a goat okay and he goes and you killed a 13-year-old kid. I'm like, huh? And what happened was, all right, so what happened was there was another attack by Taliban. This time they called in 155 Artillery Strike, right, Americans.

And they bombed the shit out of this whole area, which was where all my booby traps were, right? So it's a big mess. And after it was over, this father said, I'm going to send my 13-year-old kid up there to recover spent brass, you know, unexploded ordnance. Because what they do is they salvage it, you know, and they sell it, you know, whatever, right? That's how they make their money. It's very poor.

So he sends the kid up there. The kid's walking around, walks through one of my booby traps and kills himself, right, in my booby trap. And then he sends a second son up there a little bit younger. He goes and blows his leg off, right? In one of my booby traps. And so they actually found, uh, one of the boys in a garbage dump down in our, in our base camp. And I was like, what the frick, you know? And, uh, really crazy, right? Some, and so I'm trying to get my head around this whole thing. And now I have to question myself, you know, was it all worth it?

You know, I put the booby traps up because I'm trying to save these men who also have families that are being sniped, you know, from Taliban. And so what ended up happening was I ended up, you know, getting a couple of kids hurt and killed, right, trying to protect these men who also have kids. And it was a dilemma, right? It's a real moral dilemma at that point, an ethical dilemma. I was like, what do I do, you know? And so when I found out about the artillery strike, I went up there and took a look, and it was just a mess.

I said, okay, you know what? I'm just going to take all this out and uh that's it so now i got a problem because now i'm i gotta walk out there and find these booby traps and it's the terrain doesn't even look like the same anymore from the artillery strike and i'm thinking holy shit i found i actually found one hand grenade barely hanging from a tree with trip wire i mean i made a comment in my book about you know all it took was a bird to fart and this thing would have blown up in my face, you know. So I'm up there sneaking up on grenades and stuff and grabbing them

and then throwing them down the side of the mountain towards the Taliban, you know. I finally cleared the area. But, you know, that's one of those things, again, where you look back and you ask yourself, what was the right answer? You know, that's a hard one because, okay, kids dead, kids maimed. But soldiers are dead, soldiers are maimed, they got kids, you know. That's a hard one.

You know, that's a really hard one to get your head around. Those are the kind of things that stick with you. Not shooting somebody and watching a bad guy die you know it doesn't bother most soldiers um it's the it's the collateral damage yeah yeah you know i feel you and so did you ever did so it sounds like though you never anybody you ever purposely pulled the trigger on you never had any second guesses about any of those you always were pretty comfortable all right yeah i know who this dude is yeah absolutely man you know look that's good i mean you know who you're fighting and when it's coming at you with a weapon it's like easy yeah easy peasy you know um

but you know it's the collateral damage like you said you know the the bodies the kids the women you know the screaming you know and the and the identity is like, man, it's like my own family, you know? You start relating to that, you know, and it's like, ah, it just really becomes overwhelming. That's the part that you carry with you for a very long time. And the horror that goes with that, that's more terrible than killing bad guys, you know? That's worse than actually fighting for your own life,

honestly. killing bad guys you know that's that's worse than actually fighting for your own life honestly um that's scarier and more horrifying than me actually getting along with a bad guy and it's gonna be me or him you know that part because that route that relates to a whole different level you know you know my heart my emotional being it's like you know because my heart, my emotional being, it's like, you know, because my family is what matters, you know. I don't matter to this bad guy. I don't give a shit. If he kills me, I kill him. You know, we're both going to die doing what we signed up to do.

But it's all the other people that didn't sign up for it. That's who you feel bad for. But, you know, you move on. I don't, you know, I've learned to cope with stuff like that. You have to. If you don't, man, it'll eat you up. You know, and some people it does. And they can't cope with it.

And they kill themselves, you know. Just lost another Delta operator not too long ago. Committed suicide. I saw you hear that. Yeah, you know, and Green Berets, you know. I've known a lot of guys that have just offed themselves. They just couldn't cope with things anymore. You know, you can't blame them.

Go, well, you signed up for it. You know what? You better be damn glad somebody signed up for it because if you're asking to sign up for it, shut the fuck up, right, is what I say. Oh, yeah. So, you know, because what we're doing is – Fuck anyone who says that. Yeah. We're here, you know, We're doing a job, man.

And it's not just a job. When people come up to me and ask – like it happened this morning at the airport. Guy was, hey, thank you for your service. And I'm like, no, you know what? Thank you and thank America for giving me the opportunity to fight for this country. I look at it as a privilege, all right? You don't have to thank me for that shit. I'm honored that I'm allowed to do this, right?

I look at it differently you know um i don't need you you know patting me on my back going good thanks a lot for being courageous i'm not courageous man i'm confident okay that's the difference right and so you know and i always tell people there's three types man there's you know there's the guy that's fearless who's too dumb to realize he's in trouble does it anyways when we were teenagers we we were fearless right right? Jumping off the houses, snow banks, and shooting each other with BB guns, you know? Stupid, right? But we're fearless. A courageous guy,

in spite of his fear, does something anyways. That doesn't mean he's fully in control of what's going to happen or his faculties, right? But he's doing something. Okay, that's okay. Me, I'm not a courageous guy. I'm just a confident guy. I'm really confident in my skill sets, what I'm doing. I enjoy the fight. I feel confident that I can win.

And so that makes me more dangerous than a courageous guy because I'm actually in control of my faculties. I'm in control of myself, and I'm controlling the situation. It's not controlling me. So that's how I kind of approach everything I do in life. And, you know, it's taken me a while to learn all that stuff. But, you know, that mindset is what allows me to every day, you know, continue to prosper and to live on and to live a fulfilled life and not look back at a life less fulfilled or with any regrets. You only get one shot at this thing, you know.

Some of us get a longer shot than others. I look at a lot of my friends, like Mike, like his life was cut short a long time ago, you know. And so every day you got to make it count. And I can't look back. It's what's happening today. That's all that matters today and looking for the future. But for right now, I live for now. Well, I'm glad to hear you have that perspective after you know such a long career doing this and everything because i know it's easier i guess the parts for you that are easier when you're killing bad guys but all the other things the human element of the war zones you're in and the things you have to see and

whether you wonder if it was all for good or not in certain places that that's hard. But again, just like I said about the guys earlier, when I talk in general about Iraq on this podcast or something, guys are there, they're doing their job, they're doing the best they can. And when they bring humanity into it, I really do appreciate that. But we're talking about some of these themes on what happens to people who grow up in these environments that you're in and you wonder what they're going to think about you or or what their political beliefs are going to be on on the basis of the poverty and war-torn areas that they grow up in and you know right now we are watching yet another war break out in in in gaza between israel and what's supposed to be Hamas, but naturally everyone else around there gets dragged into that.

And, you know, there is a fuck ton of propaganda from both sides on this. I see it online. I mean, you'll see stuff like Hamas holding up plastic babies in someone's arm like it's real and it's not. And, you know, you'll see Israel talk about, oh, we're taking out a ton of terrorists, but really're targeting one guy and it's like oh should they be bombing this how many kids have to die in this war and i can't imagine being in these types of rooms making those decisions you hope that it's it's humane people doing it though you know but what's your thought on that? Do you have any experience in that theater, I guess,

what's going on there? And do you have any hope for any type of peace in our lifetimes? It used to be statistically every 22 years America was at war. Now it's like every five or 10 years we're in a conflict. Like I said earlier, you know, man is a warring ape. I had to take an aspirin real quick. But, well, first let me kind of backtrack a little bit, you know, about humanitarianism, things like that, right?

You know, in Afghanistan we used to do what was called med something. I can't remember now. But basically, we would go out with a truck full of bandages, medicine, the medics, the PAs. And we would go to these villages, and we'd set up security to protect us. And then we'd invite all the villagers to come out and whatever your sickness is or whatever you need help with, you know, our PAs, our docs would look at them. We'd give them medicine, you know, treat them, give them little first aid kits, you know.

We did that quite a bit. And there were times I remember after we, you know, had the whole village out there, they're all happy, you know, you know, we got them squared away. We would leave. And right after we left, Taliban would come in and literally take everything away and beat the shit out of everybody for taking any kind of aid from us, right? And they'd take all the medicines and stuff like that. You know how we know, because we'd send a drone, fly drone back over and we'd watch it go down, you know? So, you know, watch it go down, you know. So, you know, to your point about, you know, what will the children remember? Well, they'll also remember that, you know, they've been, who the bad guys are inside the perimeter as well, right?

It's not just the Americans, but, you know, I think they'll know. And even right now, you know, I don't want to be political, you know, Hamas, right? So, you know, there's enough reporting out there showing, you know, that a lot of Palestinians are not happy with Hamas because they're actually taking their humanitarian aid, you know, and doing stuff like that. So already, you know, a lot of the Palestinians are going, you know what? These guys are actually the bad guys. Again, I'm not trying to, I don't want to get in the middle of this thing. Not my fight, not my, you know,'t care that's let them fight their own thing like you said earlier you're not we're not the world's policeman anymore and uh and honestly i think

about my son you know like i said he's he's a green beret um and i sure as hell hate to see him get killed somewhere find some stupid ass-ass war for somebody else or for some politics and bullshit, right? And I'm convinced that Ukraine – we're involved in Ukraine just because there is a side – there's a capitalistic side on that. Sure. Always is. And there's people profiting. And we know – I'm not going into politics, but we know who's involved in that stuff. People are making money with their investments in that country.

There's a lot. It's not just Ukraine either. Yeah, no, it's a lot, right? And so, you know, I think about, you know, my son, although he signed up to be a soldier, he didn't sign up to be slaughtered, you know, so some other politician, his kids can get rich. And so that's why, you know, I've changed my tune quite a bit over the years. I don't regret having been a soldier. I'm happy to be a soldier.

I like it when we do good things. We save people's lives and we help people. But I'm not a happy camper when I see shit like happening in Mogadishu with Bill Clinton or what just recently happened in Kabul. That is bullshit. And a lot of white lives were wasted for these politicians to profit. And that's the end of the story. And so we'll always be at war. We'll always be at war because it always comes back to money, power, pussy.

At the end of the day, you know, men are always going to fight for that. And there's always going to be a new dog that grows up, wants to be the alpha, and he's going to, you know, and it's going to continue on in perpetuity. 12,000 wars plus since the dawn of man, you know. We're always fighting. And what do we fight over?

We fight over what? Power, land, money, procreation, control, you know? Yeah, and there's also, there's such a tribal aspect that still is so inherent around the world. I mean, my naive ass sometimes will have the thought of like, damn, with all all this connectivity now can we get out of tribes and then you go online and you realize there's even bigger tribes on there yeah you know because people feel like they have to be a part of something it could be everything it could be something from you know a group of political beliefs religious beliefs some type of power belief you know we certainly see a lot of that in countries around the world. And something in humans, despite the more information we get access to, and the more

people we can get some access to, to understand even just a little bit about their experience, we still don't get out of that, out of that protocol. And what ends up happening to me is we see dehumanization all the time on every every side of things too yeah you know it's and listen i get caught up in it too we sit here on a podcast and microphones talking about a couple wars happening around the world regardless of what of our opinions are on the sides involved right now as we talk there's people just getting fucking murked and killed including innocent civilians all the time yeah and you and i admit it i lose sight of that sometimes and then i think about people who don't even stop to think about losing sight of it and they'll just they'll just

keep politicizing it or using it for whatever their team wants to do you know what i mean yeah no you're right i've said this before people want to belong to something they want to belong to a group it doesn't matter what it is if it means you, you know, being a part of, you know, David Koresh or, you know, some cult group, being a terrorist group, being a part of a football league, whatever, man, people want to belong. And whoever will accept them, they'll, that's why a lot of terrorists are young men. They're easy, man. They're malleable. They're easy to, you know, they're looking for something. They're looking to be a part of something. They can easily be shaped, a way of thinking can be shaped, and they're easy to recruit. You know, I mean, what was it? Jim Jones, man. You know,

think about that. How do you convince over 900 people to drink poison Kool-Aid and kill yourself and your kids, you know? You know what's crazy? I'm glad you bring up that example because I, and I'm someone who should be way more educated on that case than i am but i i know the basics of that i did see a documentary on that back in the day but like he convinced all these people to kill themselves and it sounds so crazy and out there but i wonder if i'm crazy looking at this world now and looking within our own country and saying to myself, oh, my God, we have plenty of people who would be ripe to fall for something like that. Absolutely. Mass hypnosis, right?

So look at World War II Germany. They convinced the Germans that the Jews were bad. Yeah. And what was it? Quick. Quick. Yeah. the the jews were bad yeah you know and what was it uh quick quick yeah yeah they said if you repeat a lie enough times usually within 30 to 90 days people will believe it's true even in the face of facts right they call it information escalation bias in the face of facts they will still deny it it's like but here's the information and they still deny it people are uh it's

programming and uh and the politicians are great manipulators. They understand, again, the human condition. They understand how to manipulate people's thoughts and mindset and convictions. I mean, let's look at – let's be honest, man. If we can be honest here. Not everybody's going to agree. That's what you're here to do. Think about this.

How do we go from protect the children to now going, yeah, pedophilia is okay. We can change their sex, let kids change their own sex, take the kids away from their parents if they don't want to agree to change their sex. How do we get to this point where we think that's okay as human beings? I mean, I just don't get that part, you know? But it's all because of this manipulation, right? It's a mass machine that's been working for a very long time. It's been brainwashing. I actually think it goes all the way back to, remember, Dr. Spock, you know, don't spank your kids.

I think he probably had a lot of it, had his genesis all as far back as then. You know, it is a form of programming. And, you know, people that are going to stay above it are the critical thinkers that really stop and think there is very hard and do their analysis and go, you know what? This is bullshit. You know, and if you have any moral beliefs and even now, right, they're trying to, you know, this is why there's such an attack on the nuclear family and religion is they want to remove the moral courage that we have that's, you know, we're trained into our children. We want to remove all that, you know. Now they're actually saying, you know, the children really aren't your children. They belong to all of us.

Like, what the fuck? Who came up with that idea, right? It actually was Hillary Clinton that said that one time. time remember it takes a village to raise a child she started that bullshit right because africans said that right so she thought that was a good idea and oh yeah you know yeah a village takes a village to change to raise a child you know like now that's that's morphed into like you know you're into we own yeah you know and and so the education system right you don't have you don't't get to say what we teach your kids. That's our job.

No, no. You work for me, dumb bitch. When I refer to that, I'm talking about the head of the education system that's making all these stupid calls. At the end of the day, my kids are my kids. Your job is to teach my kids the fundamentals, reading, writing, arithmetic, et cetera. Not anything else outside of that. When it comes to other stuff, that's my responsibility as a parent. But they're taking all that from them.

And why? Because they know that the children are the future. They also know if they can control the children, control their minds now, they've controlled the next generation. And me, they look at me as the old dog. I might still get in their way. They might want to take me out. But, you know, eventually I'll be gone.

It's like, okay, that troublemaker's gone. We don't have to worry about him influencing the future. But I never thought that I would ever see the times that we're living in now. I look back in history. You know, we've had, you had, as we go through history, we had the generation of the hippies. We thought that was, oh my God, look at these hippies, drugs and open sex.

We look back into the roaring, what is it, 30s? 20s. 20s, yeah, 20s, 30s. 30s weren't too great. Yeah, right? It's like that. It's a pendulum, yeah. but we're at a place now where this is bigger than you know you know prohibition alcohol and smoking pot and fucking in the in the public you know this is like okay now we're really going after you know um you know the base man of humanity our children man man. And I fear for my kids, man.

I wish I could be around for them and protect them, but, you know, I'm fearful for what kind of life they're going to have. I think we're going to be all right. And, look, there are things I see out there, and I'm one of the, I'd like to think, the even-keeled guys trying to take things in, look at what's wrong, look at what's right. Not that I always know, but I do my best to be as balanced as I can with not being overly optimistic but also not being pessimistic, right? So to get in between those two ways. But you look at some current trends.

Some of it I hear i think it's crazy some of it i think is overblown and people will use some minority incidents to then make it the oh my god this is what it is just to just to cause a ruckus but there's no doubt especially in the immediately post-covid era this is some weird shit going on as as like a society we're in a weird place people were locked in their homes for a year year and a half whatever it was and all kinds of things happened after that including by the way the stunted development of an entire generation with schools i'm so lucky that i and i think about this all the time that i was not even still in college when that was going on i mean alessi you were in college that totally that fucked up your entire four years what what how old were you when

when covet started it started sophomore year when i was 20 and then yeah it's pretty much that and then just derailed everybody and you were online classes like the rest of the way right well it was hybrids they did some in person and then online and then a lot of people like the rest of the way right well it was hybrids they did some in person and then online and then a lot of people like myself kind of decided to hack the system and we're just like we're gonna go online but go live somewhere else right and like i will say there's good to that i enjoyed it i got to be miami but also you realize but then you also realize a line yeah but then you realize if you're doing stuff online it's very easy to not get anything done and get distracted. So my attention span went from here to down where it's just like I could be doing something.

I can confirm that. I could be working on something, doing an exam, doing whatever. And I could also be watching YouTube. I could be looking at this thing, looking at that thing. And it's just like I realized as much as I didn't want to, it'd probably be best that I was in the classroom because then I'd be focused. Yeah. And also, I got to give guys like Alessi some credit though. As much as I didn't want to, it'd probably be best that I was in the classroom because then I'd be focused. Yeah. And also, I got to give guys like Alessi some credit though. Like he was someone who said, well, I want to – this is a weird comfort zone.

I want to get out of here. I want to be somewhere else. I want to go do things. And to the kids who did that and had the presence of mind to do that, great. When I was his age, I would have never thought like that. I'm like, all right, that's fine at some point. And you don't know what that does to you. So you see that and you're like now even think younger think about the five and six

year olds who didn't get those year and a half worth of like learning the the fundamentals of reading and the basics of math and extra you could say something to that effect about almost every age level and we've seen it even affect test scores average test scores coming out of this thing and so i say all this because there's a book i've talked about a bunch on the podcast before so apologies to people who have heard this before but most of the time i bring it up people have not heard of it so i'll ask you as well have you heard of the fourth turning no okay so i'm gonna go through this the light, so we don't have to bore people with the whole thing. But essentially, there's this book written in like maybe, they have this cognitive bias where they think because of their knowledge of history, they can predict the future. And what they don't – and it's not everyone, but what they don't often realize is that when they're predicting the future, they tend to change the patterns of what's already happened.

And humanity is just one pattern over and over again. The circumstances and variables change, but the patterns stay the same. of what's already happened and humanity is just one pattern over and over again the circumstances and variables change but the patterns stay the same so what these guys did is they basically went like this they went here's the pattern and they just airlifted it like this and said so that's probably what's going to happen do with that what you will i we're not going to say exactly but like it's going to follow this and the pattern they found they looked it was you know they looked at this on a global scale but especially with with America being like the empire of the moment. They realized that these generational curves happen on these 80- to 85-year segments.

So to give you a quick example, Revolutionary War, 75 to 83 – 1775 to 83. Approximately 80 to 85 years later, later civil wars 61 to 65 in the 19th century and then approximately 80 85 years later world war ii 41 to 45 right and then 80 to 85 years later lands a smack dab on 19 on 2020 to like the 2030 segment so right where we are right now what happens in 2020 boom covet breaks out whole changes. So we're kind of in the middle of this period. But what they realize is these cycles happen because there's four generations that happen across those 85 years. So you always have these four types of generations, and you are then always going to have four types of eras that happen in those generations. The generations are 0 to 21, 21 to 43, 43 to 64, 64 and older, okay?

And each of the eras that happens is like, I'm going to change the names, but it's like the boom, the awakening, the stormy clouds forming, the crisis, right? And so every time that there is a boom, the people who are 0 to 21 are what's called the prophets they're like the so it's our boomers right they're growing up in a good time it's post-war america's at the top of its game innovation's happening all this shit is happening and then whenever you get to the next part the awakening the boomers are always coming of age and now they're getting a little jaded by stuff right and the awakening is when you start to culturally turn in on yourself and figure out if all this makes sense if we're the baddies or stuff like that so you think about exactly what you just talked about a few minutes ago you think about the the hippie movement and rock and roll plenty of good to come

out of that as well but also you know certainly some some trends that it's like okay why are we sitting around doing acid all day right then you have the period where it's like, okay, why are we sitting around doing acid all day? Then you have the period where it's like the storm clouds are brewing. And when this happens, the hero generation is always being born. So the millennials – I'm a late-end millennial. We're supposed to be the hero generation. I'm not so sure about that to be honest. But four generations before us, the last hero generation was the greatest generation i'm not so sure about that to be honest but four generations before us the

last hero generation was the greatest generation world war ii and they are born when the storm clouds are coming and they are coming of age 21 to 42 when the crisis happens every time every time that crisis period happens though you have the people who are in charge are the 43 to 64 age area right so that's who's going to be well it's supposed to be who's going to be president he's a You have – the people who are in charge are the 43 to 64 age area, right? So that's who's going to be – well, it's supposed to be who's going to be president. He's a little old right now, but you get the point. Like the CEOs of companies, the people running the military, whatever, and they are what's called the nomad generation. So they're the generation after the boomers, the generation after the prophets who were born during the awakening and because their parents are often boomers or late end silent generation i'm keeping it in today's times right there there were trends

that happened there where the parents didn't connect with the kids enough and so then they now that they're raising kids like the gen xers the nomads when they raise their kids they either like over connect or they disconnect completely. And you have a different parental child relationship, which forms the last generation here, which are the artists who are the zero to 21ers born during a time of crisis. So it's mostly Gen Z right now. And you see that they're changed by a completely jaded world that they're born into and often on the average have an odd type of traditional relationship with their parents and so what happens you have the nomads in charge the gen xers right who are kind of that generation that was trying to find their way

and then the youngest generation who's the most impressionable are the people who maybe had some of the wrong patterns when they were grown up they They grew up in a time of crisis. Their parents weren't necessarily the traditional parents, etc. And you have this perfect storm of like, oh shit, we got to make it through this. And the people who got to get you through it are the middle generation, who's supposed to be my generation, the heroes who kind of get you to the other side. So I say all this to say, while I see issues with my generation, the quote-unquote hero generation, and I see the issues that are normal for this pattern with the other two generations around me, I do kind of wonder if on the other side of this, we will find that way because we do still – even if there are some patterns that you've laid out that are forming that aren't great for freedom, we do still have some great freedoms in this country that other places don't have. We can see things like in this pattern, maybe a CCP fall in their influence around the world. Maybe Russia along with them not have as much influence as they were hoping to get and see more less openly, you know, totalitarian type

regimes, more democracies win out. The optimist in me tells me that's what's going to happen. The pessimist in me does worry about the things you're talking about, though, and saying, like, okay, is this a phase we're going to grow out of? I tend to think we will, because the pendulum shifts a lot. And I feel the pendulum speaking out a lot more from your type of direction on that type of stuff right now than I would have five years from now. And maybe that's not such a bad thing. Yeah. Interesting.

I'll have to get that book, by the way. Fourth Turning? Fourth Turning. Fourth Turning, yeah. Yeah, it's interesting. Okay. It's a wild read. Yeah.

That was a lot to unpack there. Sorry. No, but interesting. Yeah, I tend to think that things are cyclic as well. It's quite kind of felt like we're kind of in an apocalyptic era right now. Things are not looking in my mind anyways. And this is partly my intuition, my experiences, my worldview, that this is not going to go well, I don't think.

I could be wrong, but we'll see, I guess. You know, brace for impact is all I can say. And I hate to use that mindset, but, you know, I've kind of resigned myself to the idea as many people from my circles, and when I say many from my circles, guys like me are preparing for that, have been preparing for it for years um you know

we're we're we're prepared for whatever happens if it means a revolution a civil war a civilization a civil war it leads to a revolution i don't know yeah but uh you know but it's really again it's the it's the manipulators on the top that are pitting everybody against each other, and they're using misinformation, malinformation, disinformation to manipulate. And unfortunately, too many people are not willing to do the critical thinking skills, not willing to really do the analysis and come to their own conclusion. They're happy with other people giving them the conclusion that they want them to have. And anyways, so here we are you said something earlier that uh we're talking about you know kind of changing gears real quick go for it you were talking about um you know moving to miami during you know covid so you can which is funny right

florida whoo-hoo i love florida man um you're in panama city that's a whole different i know right you're there because of the because of the navy team there, right? No, no. I just, no, see, my problem is women, man. So I met my ex-wife here a long time ago. I was doing something. And she keeps you coming back? Yeah, this one brought me there in 2007. We're not together anymore. That turned into a train wreck. But I do like the area. I like the demographics. I just like how it is, man. It gets a little wild starting in March when spring break begins, but outside that.

That's how I know better of the city. I like it there, and it works for me. But to your point about the Navy, yeah, there's a Navy base there. In fact, tomorrow morning at 8 o'clock I've got to be there and give a speech to the Marine combat divers course graduates. You know, they're graduating. Invite me to come and give a little motivational speech. Oh, that's awesome.

Yeah, I'll be dog-ass tired when I get there too. I know that, but I'll work it out, drink some more coffee. Yeah, we'll be dog-ass tired when I get there too. I know that, but I'll work it out. Drink some more coffee. We'll get you some. But you were talking about when you moved to Miami, it's hard doing online schooling. You kind of like get a slack. You got distracted. When you said that, it made me think of something.

I talk a lot about success. What are the three tenets for success? One of them is you have to have purpose, right? What is your purpose, your mission, your goal? What do you got, right? Right. And so in your case, go to school, graduate. Two, you got to have a plan.

It could be a shitty plan, but you got to have somewhere at base to start with, right? Okay, what am I going to do? Okay, this is kind of what I want to do starting with this plan, and we'll develop as we go. The third thing you have to have, which is the most important thing you have is passion right you've got to have passion desire to see it through its end to see the mission through do the planning and get her done right and what happens is um when we when we lose our motivation right and we get distracted you know because suddenly something interesting is on tv or you know somebody rings a doorbell and it's like ah you know i can get back to this later

on um people will lose that that's just that's just part of humanity and what gets us through that moment where i lost my motivation i don't feel like doing it today there's one thing that gets us back on track and keeps us on track which most people don't have and this is what I again I thank my military life in the culture too and that's discipline discipline is doing what you need to do

even when you don't want to do it and so I share that with you and everybody that's listening out there you know that's been the story of my know, um, you know, that's been the story of my life. There's a lot of things I didn't want to do. I got tired.

It's getting harder. Um, you know, I lost the passion starts to wane. And when it does, what keeps me going and keeps me on track is the discipline, um, the discipline to do it in spite of that. And it all goes back to what's the goal. You know, if I believe in my goal and my purpose and it all goes back to what's the goal you know if i believe in my goal and my purpose and i'm fully committed to it then the discipline will be it'll be easy to get me there but if you take on a goal or something you're not really 100 dedicated to nothing will

work for you um so i i'm that's why i was kind of thinking about what you said already i wanted to kind of expand a great point just a little bit point. Just a little bit, you know, discipline. And this is what's lacking, I think, in large part. Most people just lack discipline. Why? Things start getting hard and they give up, right? Ah, it's just getting too much. And they divert and they go somewhere else.

Did you know that 99% of the population, only about 0.01% to be accurate, lives the life, the dream life, a life fulfilled. Most people will never live the dream life. If I asked you this, if I said, I can give you your dream life, what would it be? Describe it to me. Tell me, you know, I want to put this, blah, blah, blah. And then my next question is, well, why aren't you doing it?

And then what comes out is the dream killers, right? That's what I call them. Okay, well, I'm married. I got this. I got that. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So we make excuses, right? And this is the difference between those that live the dream life and those that never reach that point.

And unfortunately, most people, in fact, this is based on actual surveys um there was one survey i was looking at 76 percent of the respondents that were around my age when they were asked what is the biggest regret in life 76 percent sorry said they regretted having not lived a life fulfilled not doing things that you know for example i wanted to go scuba diving or i wanted to go cancun i want to visit visit grand kids more but i didn't do that right because dream killers got in the way. And then they did another survey where people were like literally on their death beds, you know, in the final throes of life and asked the same question. And almost 99% of the respondents said the same thing that the other group said, right? They never lived the life fulfilled. There's always something that got in the way. There's always something, an excuse. And, you know, sadly, man, people shouldn't have to go out like that.

You know, a quick story about my father. My dad was my hero. I'm not going to lie. My dad was my hero. When I left the Army, I called my father every weekend right up until he died in 2012 just to say, hey, Dad, how's it going? Sometimes I called him for advice, maybe I had an issue. Hey, Dad, what do I do about this? Especially when it came to military stuff, he was always there for me. I always had an answer. But I think about some of the life's lessons that he taught me.

And I remember growing up in Germany, and my dad would come home from, you know, this was back in the day of the Cold War. And he'd come home late in the evening, and he had the green army suit back then. We call them pickle suits, right? The regular green fatigues and the black combat boots and the baseball cap. He'd come home and sit down at the dinner table and he'd pull out a shoe shine box and he would literally sit there for about an hour and spit shine his boots. I mean, they were like glass.

Every night, man. I mean, without exception. That was the first thing he did before he had dinner. And I would just sit there and look at my dad and watch him and listen to him, you know? And, you know, we'd have these conversations. I was only about seven years old at the time. I remember one time he told me something that I've never forgotten. It's about leadership. Uh, and we're kind of going into leadership and discipline. He said, he said, son, imagine that you've got a chain link fence.

Um, it's 10 feet high barbed wire on top cement on the bottom. There's no door. Um, it's a big 10 box enclosure and you're standing in front of your platoon and you want your platoon to form up feet high, barbed wire on top, cement on the bottom. There's no door. It's a big tin box enclosure. And you're standing in front of your platoon and you want your platoon to form up inside that box, in that cage. He goes, how do you get them in there? How do you do that? And I remember thinking, I still remember this day thinking, well, you know, helicopters, no, cherry picker, no, catapult, no. You know, I'm trying to think, I don't know, dad, you know, how do you get them in there? He goes, it's very simple.

He says, you call your platoon to attention, attention, platoon to attention, fall out and fall in on the other side of that fence. You let them figure out how to fall in on the other side of the fence. And I go, that's genius. You put it on them, right? And so that was actually my first leadership lesson from my father. And like I said, he was, you know, you know, he was the guy that, you know, he taught me a lot about discipline, self-discipline and, you know, and actually the

greatest, I want to share this too, because I think it's something that will resonate with a lot of people. My dad taught me my best lesson in life after he passed away. The greatest lesson I've ever learned from my father was after he passed away. And lesson i've ever learned from my father was after it was after he passed away and so here goes the story um 2011 he called me and he said i got bad news i got cancer blah blah blah you know and he he did finally pass away um it was a very long drawn out death and it was a struggle for sure but But I remember, we thought he was actually cured from the cancer, he had a very rare stomach cancer. And not too many people in my family get cancer. He got it and then after he recovered,

within about a month he came down with a very bad lung infection, which turned into a heart attack and then put him in ICU. He spent three months in ICU. He spent three months in ICU. I spent three months in ICU with him. I never left. I slept with him 24-7 until he finally passed. And, man, I tell you what, that was devastating because this is my hero,

and now he's gone. I remember thinking, now what do I do? My confidant, my leader, my hero is gone. Who am I going to call to now? And then I thought about it. I was like, you know what? You're it. You're the gone who am I gonna call to now you know and then I thought about like you know what you're it you're the patriarch and you people are gonna come to you your kids you got to be the the shining example the same guy that your dad was and so immediately I had to take on the responsibility of the burial you know the services I had to get the casualty affairs office from Fort Bragg to talk to my mom about you know, the services. I had to get the casualty affairs office from Fort Bragg

to talk to my mom about, you know, the benefits, death benefits. There's a lot of stuff, insurance, you know, a lot of things goes on. I never had time to grieve, ever. To this day, I've never grieved over my father. I wanted to, but I never could, especially at that time because everybody else was grieving. And I thought, well, somebody's got to take charge and we've got to make this happen and put my dad to rest. So I did everything. We had the memorial service. It was late at night or late in the evening. And the color guard there, they did the, you know, the 21 gun salute and everything else that went along with that, you know. And then when it was all over, we were standing in the back of the church, you know, passing, shaking hands, cond with that, you know. And then when it was all over, we were standing in the back of the church, you know, shaking hands, condolences, you know.

And my mom, my sister, and I were standing there, and a woman walks up to us, and she introduces herself. She says, I'm so-and-so. I'm a nurse. She goes, I read that your father passed away, and I felt like I need to come here and share something with you about your father. And I thought, oh, shit. You got kids together? He owes you money?

He owes you money? I was like, where's this going to go, right? Not that my dad was a bad guy, but, you know, hey, you know, shit like that happens, right, all the time. I'm like, ah. Damn it, Dad. I've heard about these stories before. They make movies out of them, you know, fucking soap operas.

And so, anyway, she goes, well, she goes, your dad. I've heard about these stories before. They make movies out of them, fucking soap operas. And so anyway, she goes, well, she goes, your dad, she goes, I'm a nurse at a nursing home. And she goes, your dad for the last several years comes by every afternoon, and he spends about an hour with a very old lady who has no family, no kids, no friends, nobody. Nobody comes to see her. She's got nobody your dad comes he brings chocolates and food and magazines and newspapers and he sits down with her for an hour and just shoots the whatever she wants to talk about an hour every day um we were stunned because nobody knew this the only person who was my was the nurse and we're looking at each other like wow how did he pull that off and nobody knew that and then the other part of me was like,

holy shit, that is like superhero stuff, you know? I said, here's a man that didn't want no attention, no credit. He did something out of the goodness of his heart for somebody else, you know, gave them an hour of his time, brought them things that make their life just that much better, you know, especially in their twilight years. And I thought, how the hell do I top that, man, you know? And it inspired me and motivated me, you know? And I thought, man, you know, how can I do something like that? And I want to do something like that, but I don't want to tell anybody what I'm doing.

And I do, you know? And so it's a secret, right? But it's a good secret, and we should all have them. If we all did something like that, we're helping other people, but we're actually making ourselves a better person. The law of reciprocity is at play. When you do things like that and don't expect anything back, it comes back to you as well, right? So I look at things like that that my dad has done for me. Another one that for all the dudes out there listening, I remember my dad one day said, son, he was married to my mom for 57 years.

They never had anybody else, never got divorced. He goes, son, you know how you keep your wife and keep her happy for 57 years? And I remember thinking the same thing. I remember the fence thing, the helicopters helicopters there's a catapult and i go uh give him lots of money and he goes no he goes the way you keep them is you court him every day like it's the first date i go damn dad that's a lot of work but he was right because i watched now when i look back i remember how my dad treated my mom it's like he every day he was courting her man he was right because I watched now when I look back, I remember how my dad treated my mom. It's like he, every day he was courting her, man. He was like always nice to her, very patient, you know. I mean, he had his moments.

We all get them. But very rare, man, did I ever see my dad, you know, get unhinged, you know, with my mom. And if he did, it was really short. But, man, what a lesson learned. That's an incredible lesson. You know, and I thought about that. I said, man, there is a lot of truth to that. And my wife now, right?

I mentioned her earlier. She's Indonesian. We've been together for eight years. And my marriage is bliss, man, because of that advice. And now I don't, you know what they say, how to keep a marriage, have low expectations? Well, it's kind of true. I have low expectations. I don't expect anything out of her.

And I said, you know what? I'm going to make myself happy. You make yourself happy. Hopefully, we'll be happy together. And if we don't have high expectations, we should be good. And it's actually worked out really well. That's great. I've got a great marriage.

And so there's all these lessons. And lastly, I kind of went off on a tangent again, like I always do. That's great. I've got a great marriage. And so there's all these lessons. And lastly, I kind of went off on a tangent again like I always do. That's good. My brain's slipping because I'm drinking too much coffee or not enough. When people are on the heater, I don't stop them. You go ahead. But I mentioned discipline earlier and purpose. We've got to have purpose in life.

Most people don't have purpose. They don't know what they want to do. They don't know where they want to go. They don't know what kind of person they want to be, you know? And, uh, if you can find purpose, you know, if, even if it means just being a good person, you know, I just want to be a good person, you know, in life, that's purpose. Be a good person. What do you, what do you think the meaning of it all is?

Like this is the deepest, most broad question in the book, but asking someone what the meaning of life all is like this is the deepest most broad question in the book but asking someone what the meaning of life is but you know it's kind of an interesting question because we kind of talked about a little bit in the car too you know about different peril uh you know um what's the word i used um dimensions right so you know there's many dimensions in life and are we really living You know, what's the word I used? Dimensions, right? So, you know, there's many dimensions in life. And are we really living in one dimension? You know, some say there's eight dimensions. We're living in three dimensions right now, maybe four.

But what is the meaning of life? You know, we're all energy. At the end of the day, we're all energy. Everything is energy, you know. And like I said earlier, I'm not a religious person. I don't believe in religion. It's a man-made construct. So I don't buy into that.

I'm very wary of that, particularly, like I said, I'm a Roman Catholic at birth, but I'm the worst Roman Catholic on the planet. Congratulations. Yeah, I don't practice the religion. Do I believe in God? I'm going to tell you this. I believe in a higher power. I don't practice the religion. Do I believe in God? I'm going to tell you this. I believe in a higher power. I don't talk about what my belief system is. My wife is Muslim.

Same thing. She's the worst Muslim on the planet. Booty shorts, boobs, fingernail polish, cigarettes. But at the end of the day, the purpose in life, man, is just be happy, man, and stop worrying about what you don't have and start focusing on what you do have. Be happy. Be happy with the people you're with and get the maximum out of every day. Live for today because tomorrow is not guaranteed. We've talked about Mike.

He didn't know he was going to die on that set. I just was telling you, I can't even pronounce your name, man. Elisa, right? Alessi. Alessi. Alessi. Alessi. Every time I have a guest in here,

and we walk out of the studio, they're like, what's the pronunciation? It's Alessi. That's a tough one, man. I've never heard that one before. Alessi, and then they get it. Alessi. lessee okay i'm just gonna call you a if i forget about it hey a alpha um but um no i forgot my whole train of thought but you were saying that in the car you guys were talking about the dimensions the dimensions and then yeah I don't know. I think you lost it.

But it was good. You were on a heater before that. That was really good. Yeah, I can't remember what it was. But anyways, at the end of the day, what is the meaning of life? Man, be happy. At the end of the day, just be happy. And sometimes we don't appreciate that until you get my age.

I'm 60. I don't consider myself old. In fact, I plan on living to be at least 100. I live like I'm a 20-year-old, literally. I feel like it. No, I really do. That's awesome. And so it's a matter of perspective. I have not bought into the dogma of aging. And in fact, I was thinking about this earlier. It's like the military, they think I'm too old. I'm 60 years old, but I'll run circles around 20 year olds all day long, you know? And, but you know, there's a, there's a standard and I don't make it no more. And I'm

okay with that. I live today like it's my last because it might be my last and I want to get the most out of it. I want to be happy. I want to enjoy my life and not let other people bring me down, not sit there and quarrel about what they got and what I don't have. At the end of the day, all you got is yourself, man. You got your life. And forget all the material shit. You can't take it with you anyways. And it's nice to have some of this stuff.

But what really matters is you. In fact, now I'm thinking about it. Wealth. What does wealth mean uh took words out of my mouth yeah wealth is you know so i always joke about this i talk about tony rhombus and grant cardone these are two guys are always laying in bed looking at each other going i wonder what it'd be like to be dale comstock right and the reason i say that is because yeah they got more money than i'll ever have but i don't want their money i could get than I'll ever have, but I don't want their money. I could get their money if I wanted to, but I don't want their money. I don't want that level of effort to make money. But those guys can never buy my experience. I've lived a very good life.

I've experienced a lot of things and I keep experiencing those things. And therein is my wealth, my experience. The adventure is what brings me the wealth in fact again we're talking about in the car me and alpha over there mr mr a um you know very wealthy people come to me and pay me a lot of money to experience um to vicariously live through me for a moment you know and you know and and so i do these things with them and he's trained oh yeah i don't know what it was i was going to talk about so joe and i last year we trained a couple guys um together what ready for this one was a 20 year old um catholic priest wanted to be a green beret a 20 year old catholic 28 28 right he used to be

to be with you and Joe. Yeah, he was actually one of my coaching clients at one point. He's 28 years old when he contacted me. He goes, well, you know, I've been through the diocese. I'm a Catholic priest, blah, blah, very religious guy. And I go, okay, and how can I help you? I'd like to be a Green Beret, and I'd like to be a coach. I go, now, that's interesting.

You're going to, what, like shoot him and have his graveyards thingy? It's like, that's really funny, right? But he was serious. I said, said okay i'm not prejudiced you know and uh so he came to the training and then this other guy 20 year old jewish guy multi-millionaire right he came to the training so both these guys they paid a ton of money me and joe i'm gonna go into amounts but there's a lot they spent 55 days with me and Joe in Panama City Beach every day 55 days yeah

55 days and we gave them the whole Jason Bourne experience we did everything from night tactical combat swimming into the harbors to

how did you not sell this as a reality show this is incredible I'm working I'm working on it I'm working on it and so you know

combat marksmanship hand to hand high speed technical driving lock picking picking, you name it, we did it. We gave them the Jason Bourne experience. And the funny thing was these two guys shared an Airbnb. They don't even know each other, but we kind of worked it out. They shared an Airbnb together. And kind of funny. They got along pretty good.

I had a couple moments there where they wanted to, I think one of the guys wanted to kill the other guy. Which one? They sorted it all out. Whoa, which one? Well, you know, I expect the priest not to do anything. So, you know, he was kind of cool about it. But the other guy got a little amped up about some shit one day. About a torture session we did.

That's another funny story. Yeah, please do tell. But actually what I want to say about that. Did he take out a bucket and then rag? Well, actually he asked me he actually said hey are you guys going to torture us and we're like no he goes I'd really like to be waterboarded

and learn how to you know what that's like experiencing I said no you don't know what you're asking for no no no I know what I'm asking for and I'm paying for this and I've seen the movies yeah he wanted to experience it I go look man so after a while he kind of pressured us and we thought about okay how can we do this safely, sanely, you know? And so we set up a little scenario where, you know,

they had to do a bunch of street craft, you know, and pick up dead drops, you know, the Jason Spycraft stuff. And then that ultimately culminated with they getting rolled up, right? They get rolled up. Me and Joe and a couple other guys ambushed them, and we bag them and tag them, and we haul them off in the trunk of my freaking car, and we take them to a location and got them all strapped up.

It's like, okay. But the Catholic priest wasn't – he really wasn't – he was not going to get interrogated, right? We kind of used him as – he was a facilitator is what we did. So basically what we did was we had two radios. Joe had one. I had one. I got this guy all hemmed up, and I'm giving him the treatment. The treatment?

Yeah. And so – but the two guys had which circuit breaker left or right yeah right they they had a cover story they had actually i was surprised they actually had a cover story he went so far as to build a website and had business cards and i asked him what are you doing here well i'm here doing this and that you know i'm what do you call himself a um a relationship something enhancement specialist, right? And who is this guy? He goes, that's one of my clients.

He goes, so what are you two guys doing here? And why were you guys out in the woods for three days? What kind of really relationship stuff were you working on, right? You know, little butt boys, you know? So I was putting it on him, right? And he's like, no, no, here's my business card. This is my name and it's his name. And so I would call Joe on the radio.

Hey, Joe, what's this guy's name? And the other guy would lie. We told him a lie about everything, right? So he's not going along with the cover story. And so this guy's getting really mad. Like, that son of a bitch. He's betraying me. He's like really getting amped up.

He's just like acting. Yeah, but he's actually getting mad because he's actually getting punished for it, right? I'm water boring the shit out of him now, right? And he asked for it right i'm water boring the shit out of him and uh you know you he asked for it right and and the guy keeps the other guy keeps lying the priest keeps lying to him and so he's getting really upset right this is this kind of went on for a little while but i had to finally i had to stop because he's getting like out of hand a little real he's getting really really i'm gonna kill that guy and he's cussing he's like really gonna go after the priest and beat the shit out of him right because he thinks the priest and i'm trying

to explain him no dude chill out okay game over index i go listen we set you up he's actually part of the we had a deal i said no he's actually you know he went he just couldn't get in his head that we had set this whole thing up with the priest and the priest was not guilty we made him do that are you wearing like the ski mask and everything uh like the executioner man no he was wearing it no he actually had a bag over his head right he couldn't see and so that was part of the deal right you drowned him with a bag on his head right yeah yeah see how much i see how much oxygen he likes in there um but he did okay you know so he got he got the experience and it took me a while to talk him down.

Like, okay, please, if I take the handcuffs off, you're not going to fight him, right? So wait, there's no chance. This is a safe space. You can tell me. There's no chance there was a third client on this trip that just didn't make it back? No chance. You sure? Everybody survived.

You sure? Yeah, absolutely. You can tell me. No, everybody's lived. No. Joe and I were very careful about it. I said, look, we cannot hurt this guy or any kind of way hurt him, right? We're just going to water him.

We're going to be very – actually, we did it very nice and civilly, right? So as much as we could. You sound like Jim DiIorio, man. I mean, hey, he asked for it, and I tried to talk him out of it, and he's like insisting on it. He really wanted the experience. But here's the worst part of the story. He's a great guy.

Man, guy who's super intelligent, very smart. Oh, my God. You know, just a really good dude. I just found out from Joe yesterday calling me. He goes, dude, you're not going to believe what happened. I go, what? So-and-so just passed away. Oh, shit. Holy shit. 28-year-old, right? And I called his name. The priest? No, the other guy. you're not gonna believe what happened i go what so and so just passed away oh shit holy shit 28

year old right and i called the priest no the other guy the jewish man i called his dad and his dad didn't want to really tell me and over the phone what happened to him you know and uh he said when i come down and see him we'll go out and have dinner but it wasn't it doesn't sound like i don't know what i don't want to speculate what happened to him. But the worst part is, you know, I told him, I told his dad, I said, you know, fortunately, man, it's always the good ones, man, that die young. I don't know how many men I've known that have passed that were just solid, solid dudes, you know. And the world is going to be, you know, we've just lost, man. We've just lost a superhero. We've just lost an angel, you know we've just lost man we've just lost a superhero we've just lost an angel

you know and uh it's in all these dirt bags you know they're wandering the earth and just screwing people and doing what they and those are the ones that should be out of you know taken out and they're living you know and he kind of he said the same thing but um sadly you know it's one of those things again you know when you get my age you start i almost hate to say because it almost becomes the norm you know you start experiencing a lot of especially guys in my age group that are my friends you know and they're dropping to the left or right it's kind of scary you know like you know what am i doing you know i'm good still you know but no um yeah well uh what an experience but uh joe and i i was floored man, when he called me because it seemed like just yesterday we trained the guy,

and he was actually anticipating coming back for more, which is interesting. But, yeah, the waterboarding thing was – Where are you – I'm sorry that happened. That's quite a turn. But you're doing this all in Panama City? We do it in different places. So you find, like like safe houses charlotte charlotte and panama city beach um i'm trying to set something like like this right now in bali um this will be something really cool jungle um water get some

get some tigers in there for sure it's gonna be really good it's gonna be really really good um and i'm i'm working on that right now we'll see how that goes but i've got an investor tentatively that's in all in on it and um if it works out right billionaire client yeah actually so what a boy yeah yeah thank you boris appreciate you brother it's funny right funny shit kind of weird how i keep running these billionaires but uh there's a few out there um how often do you do security for a guy like that is it just as needed like on a major trip like you know no actually um i actually don't do that kind of working more bodyguard work it's none of it no i'll tell you why it's okay for a younger guy however there's

a there's issues with that too i won't do it just because not that I can't most people just don't respect bodyguards you know the clients they treat you like shit you know they treat you like a valet yeah oh my god I got stories below your freaking mind but the problem with these get young guys they become what i call a liberty threat right so here's a guy out drinking a party the night before shows up drunk or not not at all you know he's around the client clients go i smell like alcohol and why are you staring at my wife you know it's just weird shit right that's the problem with young guys um not all of them but that's been my experience and uh so like when i ran this detail in Hong Kong, all the guys on the team were older guys, like literally in the late 40s and 50s, even in their 60s.

All like special forces type dudes. Yeah, SEALs. Actually, one of the guys was a SEAL commander. He was a Blackwater attorney. He's a good friend of mine. He's my personal attorney. Guy's a stud, man. And he wanted to work security too.

He's a stud, man. Yeah, you know. Savage. And others, right? um guy's a stud man he wanted to work security too he's a stud man yeah you know and uh and others right some of our expats from you know australia uh poland germany so i had a i had an international team but there were certain requirements that had to be met guy had to be a certain height certain weight um baldness was an option but most of us were bald and the old man liked that he liked the the look of the security detail right so very much appreciate your theme yeah no he did like it and um and then uh you know so we had you know that was kind of the reason why they had to be big guys in fact i was the smallest guy at the time at

i think 215 about maybe eight percent body fat. I was the smallest guy because we were unarmed, right? So we had to be able to – Oh, you're unarmed. Yeah, you can't have a gun right now. Because you're in Hong Kong. Wow. And even when we traveled, right? So we traveled the world all the time with this guy.

You carry like knives or something? You can't even carry a knife. Actually, in Hong Kong, it's illegal to have a knife. You go to jail for that. What about a bat? Nope. No bat? Nope.

No Louisville? All you guys are kung fu grip man that's all you get ran so but it worked that was enough um pretty intimidating we saw you know team of pipe hitters you know big ass dudes and um it was actually a funny detail that particular one because he was chinese um very nice guy older guy he was 56 58 something like that i was just a little bit i was 52 at the time and uh his wife was a 32 year old mexican model that a boy big boobs that a boy yeah i didn't like her i'll just i'm just gonna say that part right he did though so i don't know anyways i'm gonna go down that road but anyways, she had a little German,

he was German, spoke German, but I think he was from Hungary, midget, right? Gay, homo, sexual. And so, he's a little munchkin, right? And he was always accompanying her like a little lap dog.

He would sit on her lap in the airplane, right? In a private jet. Wait, is this like her, is this a friend? This is her friend, her little best friend, right? And he was like,

he like literally stood on her lap in a private jet, like a little freaking doll. And he was a little gay midget German dude, right? And then you had this whole international bodyguard team of black guys, white guys from all around the country, bald heads. And when you see us all walking down the street, it's almost like, what the fuck is going on here, right? And yeah, it was really, it was bizarre, but it was an

experience. But the problem was, like I said earlier, I don't like doing this kind of work because, you know, it's problematic. You know, you're treated like crap usually, you know, especially when a 30-year-old, two-year-old thinks she knows more about security than you do, you know, and she's talking down to you because whatever and then she's putting

the moves on, you know, one of your younger guys that you hire, you know, on good faith, you know. Oh, no.

I don't like it. I don't want nothing to do with it anymore. Now, if somebody calls me and goes, hey, comps, and I've had this happen,

hey, comps, I got to go to Africa. I got to pick up a bunch of money or diamonds or whatever. Can you come with me? I'm in. Yeah, no problem. Because we're traveling together. I don't have to feel like I'm going to get bossed around by somebody. We're on the same level, but I'm going to help kick somebody's ass for you if you need it. And that's it. I'll do that. But as far as running a security detail, bodyguard detail, it's not for if you need it and that's it um i'll do that but as far as running the security detail bodyguard detail i'm um it's not for me well how do you prepare for something like that like the job in hong kong like what what besides putting the team together of like

savages what are you getting his full itinerary and figuring out what floors you got like how what's the approach it just depends it's all different right so um you know in this particular scenario you know we he tells us what he needs hey tomorrow morning pick me up at zero seven whatever and i'm gonna go to my office you know okay roger that we always assemble the entire team at his uh residence um he had three drivers always on standby. One for him, one for his wife, one for one of his sons. They all had three different cars. They all drove Rolls Royces and nice high-end cars. And so we were all tasked to cover down on somebody, go with them,

and then just accompany them the entire day. So we were kind of just at the beck and call, but usually we work pretty long days. You know, we might meet up at seven o'clock and we may not get back to bed until 10 or 11 o'clock that night and then do it again the next day. But once you do it enough times, you have a routine, you know what the old man wants or whatever the wife wants, you know, and a lot of times they'll WhatsApp you or use Viber or whatever application you're going to use. So we use that as a means for communications.

Other times, yeah, it's more, you know, if it's a more robust security detail. Like I used to run presidential-level type and ambassador- level security details, put those together. Those require a whole lot of security personnel, cars, limousines, a lot more logistics that go into that. And then I've done singleton work where it's just me and the principal. I drop them off, put them to bed. Don't open the door, sir. I'll see you tomorrow morning. Roger that.

That type of thing. So it varies. It varies. But it can be very complex, very complicated, a lot of moving parts, or it can be very simple. I've done both. I was covering down on a – actually, not too long ago, a few years ago, I was covering down on a multimillionaire. She was 31 years old in Beverly Hills. And the craziest story, I actually went out to California. I was on the TV series SWAT. So I was on one of those episodes, right? And I get a call. I'm not going to name names, but I get a call from a very

famous guy. He goes, hey, my friend's in a lot of trouble. Somebody stole over a million dollars worth of jewelry from her. And she's scared to death because they threatened to kill her, this and that and that. And would you be willing to cover down on her? Okay. Here's her number. Call her. She goes, what's your cost? I hate to brag about this, but I was probably the highest paid bodyguard ever in Los Angeles. I was getting paid $2,000 a month plus pass-through costs. She gave me a BMW 750 Li. She put me in a $15,000 a month apartment right underneath hers. It was an amazing job, right?

But – and holy cow. Wait, $2,000 a month? A day, I'm sorry. A day. I was going to say. Sorry, sorry, sorry. That wasn't that high. Yeah.

I'd be an idiot for working for that. Anyways. I think there's a few people paid more than that. But it was just me and her. I was covering down on her, you know. And, you know, she had a real threat against her, an active threat. And it was a very convoluted story. I'm actually going to write a book about it.

I won't mention her name. There's some things. I'm not going to expose her. But the story will be real. And, man, just all this. What was the was the backstory like what was the type of threat are you well yeah so long story short um there's a very notorious gang based out of chicago and one person from this gang was a woman, essentially befriended her, my client, talked her, conned her into giving her over a million dollars worth of diamonds because she goes, oh yeah, this is my husband. He's a billionaire. My fiance, he's a billionaire.

I'm going to marry him. I want these diamonds for the wedding. And my client believed her because she talked to the billionaire. He had no idea what the freak was going on. By the way, he was married and had kids in London, right? And this chick, turns out this chick was a hooker, kind of call girl, and set him up, set her up, stole the jewelry. And now she goes back to the gang. My client sends a guy that knows this gang to go talk to him, go, hey, just give her the jewelry back and she'll drop it. And they were like, no, you tell this bitch if she doesn't shut up, we're going to rape her and kill her in an alley, right?

And they're not – and look, I had a lot of people involved. Chicago gang – what do you call it? Gang unit. I've had California Marshals, LAPD. A lot of people involved in this thing, right on up to government agency. And they're like, if the guy says it, believe him. He's going to do it. I'm like, holy shit.

These guys are joking around. So I ended up getting armed. I had my cousin out there brought me my father. My uncle's 45, brought body armor. I was like, all right, this is no bullshit here. So she was scared to death. Me, not so much. But that whole thing turned into, you know, all this weird.

I went from being a bodyguard to now I'm a private eye to, you know, now I'm doing the Mutt and Jeff thing, you know, with the billionaire. I've got them in Starbucks, you know. And I'm trying to politely tell them that you should probably pay her that money because you've got a wife and kids in London. And if this comes out this is gonna be a problem and she's gonna go to la time you know and you know i find myself in this really weird world all of a sudden but the weirdest part was first of all she was very attractive

31 years old never married no kids and she fell head over heels in love with me oh no oh yeah oh yeah would this have been wife five if that had happened? It could have been. But no, it would have never been because as nice as she was, dude, you got to think about it. I'm like 50. I think at the time I was 56, and she's 31. 31? Oh, bro. And she had money?

Dude, she gave me a BMW 750LA. All due respect to your current wife. I'm sure she's lovely. What are you doing? You know what? That's why. What? My wife is broke, but I tell you what. I love my wife. And at that time's lovely. What are you doing? You know what? That's why my wife is broke,

but I tell you what, I love my wife. And, uh, you know, at that time we weren't married yet. And I just, I told this girl, I said, listen, first of all, I don't like your friends. Um, cause they're super way to the left, man. They, they, in fact, when they all met me, when they all met me, she introduced me me she introduced me right it's like okay you know this is my so-and-so he's you know my security and uh he's in the army he's a veteran that's what they look like what and i was like are you kidding me they like never met a veteran before right and they were like oh my god you know and it's like this is so cool yeah exactly right we had these big conversations on the couch in the lounge because they didn't have it none of

them had jobs they just sit around all day bullshitting and they could only talk about four things it was either about a wine hotels um wine hotels money and oh yeah other women's fucking shoes and dresses right it's like you're telling not enough critical thinking for you huh yeah you know and then if they ask me something about the military you know and i start to explain it then they just kind of drift off into another conversation. I totally lost them. I'm like, what the? Like really short attention spans.

But they were just so weird, man. I mean, they couldn't stop talking about Trump. I'm like, really? Can we just have another conversation? And it was all bad, bad, bad. So anyways, I told this girl. I said, look. I kept asking her.

I said, how long do you need me for? And she kept saying, forever. And I wasn't sure what that meant i thought ha ha ha yeah no no really how long forever huh right and i started realizing no she's actually serious she's actually like wants to now now did she ever use the words and listen very carefully did she ever use the words prenup no dale i know right my guy what are you doing well look i made it pretty clear i was like you know what i said i finally i just finally said you know i i kind of took this thing as far as it could go we're not going to get the diamonds back there's no more threat against you you really don't need me even though you pay me a lot of freaking money you know and uh you know i got the weird phone calls in the middle of the night.

Hey, I need you to come up to my apartment. I need to talk to you. 2 o'clock in the morning? Is that the beginning of a porno? Yeah, almost, right? So, yeah, I started to turn the neck on shit. I go, yeah, I'm never going to get paid again if I keep doing this kind of crap, you know? And so I had to wear it all out, you know?

And so finally I just told her. I said, you know, tomorrow morning I'm going to leave. I got to go. And she said, okay, and I'll have the limousine waiting for you. And I show up in her apartment in the morning, I'm getting ready to leave. And she's waiting for me. She's sitting on the counter and her legs open. Come here, let's just say goodbye and stay with me one more night.

You know, let's go to, where does she want to go? To Palm Springs, to a resort. Let's go to Palm Springs and just spend the night there. And then tomorrow I'll put you on a private jet and fly you home. And I said, you know what's going to happen, right? I said, we're going to go there and do it like rabbits. I said, and I'm still getting on an airplane tomorrow morning, right? I said, so let's just knock out the bullshit.

You know, I said, I'm going. I'm going home. And I'm going back to Indonesia. I'm going back to, you know, the girl over there. She don't have nothing, but that's okay. I don't back to Indonesia. I'm going back to the girl over there. She don't have nothing, but that's okay. I don't want the money. I said, in three months, we'll be at each other's throats. I said, yeah, any other guy might jump all over this.

He'll be a millionaire overnight with a hot wife. I said, sorry. I said, money's not that important. And this life, this culture, this place you live in is not for me. We can joke about it, but that's a real joke. No, I literally walked away and never looked back. And she's never contacted me since then. She's never talked to me, even though I tried to reach out.

Hey, how you doing? She won't have it. Was this like three weeks ago? No. I'm kidding. No, no, no. No, I don't. That chapter's closed.

Good for you. But that's the world of bodyguard, man. It got really strange, man. And there comes a point where it's like, okay, you know, there's a fine line between being a professional and then it's getting too personal. She had me sitting down on a couch in the lounge, and next thing I know, she's sitting on my lap.

I'm like, I'm supposed to be your bodyguard, and you're sitting on my lap. How am I going to react and get the gun out? Which one? I don't know. We'd go eat, and I'd try to post up somewhere where I could pull security. What happened?

Sit right here next to me. Okay, what do you want? She'd order everything on the menu. We probably never spent less than $1,500 a night on dinner. Oh, my God. Yeah, it's insane, right? That kind of money. Must be nice.

Yeah. And then she was like, hey, she had a BMW 750 Li, a white one. I like BMWs. I got a couple of them. And she goes, you know what? She goes, I'll tell you what. I'm going to buy me a black one. This one's yours.

Basically, she was trying to keep me around, you know? I didn't keep none of that shit. And I just walked away with my paycheck, you know, and I just called it a day, man. She's a great girl. I'm not bashing her. It's just, you know, sometimes you got to – I guess it comes with age and experience. You kind of got to weigh it all out. It's like is it really worth all that?

100%. It wasn't, man. At the end of the day, I'm where I want to be. I'm right where I want to be and where I need to be. That's great. You know what? I forgot to ask you. This is off topic, but I forgot to ask you about this earlier real quick did you so when you you

got out of the army in 2001 or how special forces in 2001 were you in the kosovo theater when that stuff was going down that's the only one i missed that's the only one missed because right then i was transitioning out kosovo happened that's the only campaign i've missed since 2000 um since i joined the army actually 1981 um i have been in every campaign that the u.s government has been involved in um with the exception of kosovo but kosovo is more about like bosnia that's i kind of put that in the same space right bosnia kosovo space. Bosnia and Kosovo. Yeah. I don't feel like I really missed out on anything. It sounds like it was low-level combat anyways, more aerial-type stuff. But I've been in every other campaign since that.

I mean, Desert Storm was really fast. What were you doing there? That one I can't talk about. Oh. That one I can't talk about. Okay. But that was an interesting one. Coldest I've ever been in my life was in Iraq.

The coldest? The coldest. Man, that desert can get super, super, super cold at night. Really? Yeah. Yeah. And it gets super, super hot during the day in the summertime. Like how cold were you talking?

Well, let me put it this way. I was wearing, besides my military fatigues, we had this thing called bear suits okay that says a lot they were patagonia bear suits they were a fleece line and they're thick man you wear that i was wearing that at about four layers of clothes i had so much clothes on i looked like the michelin man if i got in a firefight i couldn't fight and if i got shot i automatically had a band-aid on i wasn't going to bleed out it was that much stuff it was that cold ski gloves ski mask um holy smokes was it cold because it's desert you got rock and sand out there no no cloud cover it gets hot during the day in the summertime in the wintertime not so much remember this really yeah i remember this was january i know yeah now summertime it gets so hot that when you're walking in the summertime,

I remember walking, waving my hands, and I'm walking, and the palms of my hands were burning. That's how hot it was. Yeah. It's crazy heat. Probably some of the coldest times I ever experienced was in Iraq. Sure was. Wow.

Yeah. But, yeah, that was interesting times too. Saw a lot happen there. A lot of stuff, man. Imagine being in the middle of a desert and you can look in any direction at any time, all night long, 360 degrees, 10, 15, 20, 25 miles away from you. All you see all night long, nonstop, is tracers going up, air defense artillery,

all night long going up. And you see, boom, flashes on the ground from bombs coming down, you know, all night long. And you see that for weeks. And then after a few weeks, you start seeing less and less tracers going up, right? I've actually watched an aircraft get shot down and come spiraling down flames, just like in the movies, you know, World War II, you know?

Yeah, that was an interesting time. And since we're talking about that, you know, everybody said, oh, there was no weapons of mass destruction. Yeah, you keep on believing that shit. What? I got a letter from Department of Defense saying that I've probably been exposed to nerve aging because I was downwind from one of the sites. Well, the nukes.

Huh? Nukes. I don't know about nukes. Yeah, yeah. That's what people are always talking about, nukes. But biologics, we knew they were working on biologics. That's different. Yeah.

Well, actually, I think when they talk about WMD, they're talking about biologics as well. But it was there. You got a letter saying you were exposed to something? Yeah. When did you get this letter? If I ever start twitching or doing anything weird, I need to go to VA right away. But that was a long time ago. That was a long time ago.

That was a long time ago you got that letter? That was right after I retired. So circa… 2002, 2003? Yeah, something like that. Wow. Wait a minute. That would have been good timing to say that wow that yeah well wait a minute that would have been good timing to say that because they were trying to sell everyone that there were wmds at

the time well um so if they're sending that this was this was based on all kinds of analytics and computer modules and shit like that but you've never twitched right i'm twitching right now my leg's shaking that's play from all this caffeine yeah probably you've got a lot of coffee there man holy shit yeah i usually have a little bit during the podcast but god damn you're plowing it listen dude we just did how long was that like five and a half hours or something yeah something like that this was this was awesome joe obviously sold you well he's like you gotta talk to dale i talked to you once on the phone and i think i thought this was like months ago now. I think I told you.

I said, we're not going to have a problem doing a couple podcasts when you come in here. So I'm glad we finally got to do it. And thank you for trekking through and getting up to Atlanta Airport to do this as well. I really appreciate you for that. But awesome stuff, man. You've had a hell of a career. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.

Of course. And we will put the link to your book down in the description below. Are there any other links you want there? You can go to my website dalecomstock.com i provide a lot of trainings and stuff like that got it um instagram stuff like that all right yeah hit them up hit up dale you got to hear it all day today so we'll make this two episodes i'm sure sure so this is the end of the second episode but everybody else you know what it is give it a thought get back to me peace thank you guys for watching the episode. Before you leave, please be sure to hit that subscribe button and smash that like button on the video.

It's a huge help. And also, if you're over on Instagram, be sure to follow the show at Julian Dory Podcast or also on my personal page at Julian D. Dory. Both links are in the description below. Finally, if you'd like to catch up on our latest episodes, use the Julian Dory Podcast playlist link in the description below. Thank you.