The Team House - Damn The Valley: the 82nd Airborne in Afghanistan | William Yeske | Ep. 246

Episode Date: November 20, 2023

William (Will) Yeske is a combat veteran who served 11 years in the U.S. Army. He is a serial entrepreneur who brings significant expertise in marketing, IT, and project management. He currently runs and operates a marketing company, No Limits Marketing Group (NLMG), founded to help small businesses survive the COVID-19 pandemic. It uses a combination of modern marketing techniques coupled with a non-lethal targeting framework learned in the military to provide clients with winning strategies. Will was also a founding board member of a Veteran non-profit, Rally for the Troops (now part of Racing for Heroes) and has worked on other veteran-based projects. He is currently attending Columbia Business School while running current business projects, creating new possibilities for future endeavors, and parenting his two children with his wife, who is also a US military veteran.Get "Damn The Valley" here:⬇️https://www.amazon.com/Damn-Valley-Airborne-Arghandab-Afghanistan-ebook/dp/B0CK4RPQFH?ref_=ast_author_dp--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Today's Sponsors:Barbell Apparel⬇️Black Friday deals happening right nowhttps://barbellapparel.com/teamhouseHello Fresh⬇️https://www.hellofresh.com/teamhousefree---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------To help support the show and for all bonus content including:-AD FREE AUDIO-AD FREE VIDEO-Access to ALL bonus segments with our guestsSubscribe to our Patreon! ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouseOr make a one time donation at: ⬇️https://ko-fi.com/theteamhouseTeam House merch: ⬇️https://teespring.com/stores/my-store-10474963Social Media: ⬇️The Team House Instagram:https://instagram.com/the.team.house?utm_medium=copy_linkThe Team House Twitter:https://twitter.com/TheTeamHousePodJack’s Instagram:https://instagram.com/jackmcmurph?utm_medium=copy_linkJack’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/jackmurphyrgr?s=21Dave’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/dave_parke?s=21Team House Discord: ⬇️https://discord.gg/wHFHYM6SubReddit: ⬇️https://www.reddit.com/r/TheTeamHouse/Jack Murphy's memoir "Murphy's Law" can be found here:⬇️ https://www.amazon.com/Murphys-Law-Journey-Investigative-Journalist/dp/1501191241The Team Room Reading Room (Amazon Affiliate links):⬇️ https://jackmurphywrites.com/the-team-room-reading-room/Intro music by https://www.youtube.com/user/RemixSampleWant to sponsor the show?Email: ⬇️[e-mail]#82ndairborne #afghanistanBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support.

Hey, folks, I just want to take a minute to ask you to go in rate this podcast, let the Team House know how you think we're doing, go and rate us on whatever platform you're listening to this on, whether it's iTunes or Spotify or whatever else. Those ratings really help us out, and we really appreciate the feedback to let us know what you like and what you don't like. And if you do like the Team House and you'd like to support us, go check out our Patreon page and you can actually support the stream as well as get access to our team house. and you'd like to support us, go check out our Patreon page, and you can actually support the stream and well as get access to our bonus segments and bonus episodes. Yeah, if you're going to give us a great review, please do. And if you're going to give us a not-so-good review,

why don't you just send us an email and we'll talk about it. Special Operations, Covert Ops, espionage, the team house, with your hosts, Jack Murphy, your hosts and David Park. Jack Murphy. Hey, everyone, welcome to episode 246 of the Team House. I'm Jack Murphy here with Dave Park.

And our guest on tonight's show is William Yusky. You got it. All right. The book is... Damn the Valley. Damn the Valley. Damn the Valley. We're really happy to have you in studio tonight.

Thanks for coming in doing this. You thought I was remote for a little while. I did. I thought this morning that you were going to be remote. Shocker, he shows up outside the door. Wait, hold on. We would always much rather have you in studio. But I'm glad it worked out.

Same. Same. Same. So Dave read this book. So you're going to have to lead the questions here, man. Yeah, well, I mean, the book's phenomenal. And right now it's rated. Oh, yeah. Hey, quick shout out to barbell apparel.

Dave's wearing the shirt. I'm wearing the pants. Looking good. There you go, stretchy. Really nice stuff. They sent us a whole bunch of clothes. They're the sponsor for this show. We're really happy to work with them.

So please go check out barbell apparel.com slash team house. See if there's something there you want to pick up. A lot of really nice clothes. Well, okay. I only been wearing the clothes for one day. What do you want? No, I wore the jeans this week, and I really like them. What else do you want me to say, Dee?

Well, the stuff that I sent you over email. Oh, so there's stuff that I actually have to pull up on here and read. I can't just say it that I really enjoy the clothes. I mean, first off, I love barbell. I've been wearing it for years. I'm so happy they're a sponsor. I'm taking over the read now because you're doing an abysmal done. Hold on, hold on.

Do you want to get it from the guest? The guest weighs in? I've worn barbell before. I actually, not even kidding. Like, the squats and stuff, cross-bit gym, like right next to the athletic gear? I do. I love it. I have leisure.

I'm glad you're here because I haven't used it to work out yet. I've just worn their, like, casual wear. Oh, no, it's legit. It's good stuff. Here we go. All right. Hey, guys, ever struggle? You don't have to read it verbatim.

What the fuck do you want to be, Dick? You're new to sponsors. I'm so glad you mentioned about Barbell and how much you love it because they're having a Black Friday sale. And if you go to Barbell. Barbell apparel.com slash T-Mouse, you can get a great deal on chinos, jeans, T-shirts. Their hoodies are amazing. Look, these clothes are really, really, really, really good-looking. They're very comfortable.

The jeans, the pants, they're flexible. The clothes are fantastic. And Dee was keeping this to himself. He never told us about Bargall. No, never. Until I got them as a sponsor. Now it's pretty much all I'm going to wear because, honestly, the clothes are amazing. They rule.

And they're cool guys and cool company. Check them out, barbell apparel.com slash team house. Black Friday sales. Thank you. We'll work on Jack's out. We'll get it right next time. Sorry. it's a progression

so I just want to say that your book down the valley is it's the number one new release in the Afghan war biographies category on Amazon so congratulations on that they have history right is it still hanging there it bounces off sometimes it only gives us one rating

but they don't want to be generous and say too it's all right it doesn't matter so we've had Scott me in on too he's number two you're number one it's hanging with some good stuff Yeah, it was like unbelievable the different stuff. That's great, man.

Which, I mean, hey, I'm glad the story's getting out, honestly. It's, it's been good. It's been a wild ride. Man, the launch event, holy crap. Yeah? Were there drinks? Later. Later.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. I mean, so the launch event, so this was at the Airborne and Special Operations Museum down to Philadelphia. Cool. And they, they, it kind of ties into the whole thing. So, I mean, the book, the guys we lost over there from the town, there's actually a paver out front that's dedicated to them.

So it was almost like you have the flag from the front cover. And that was the major part with this, is that that flag that's on the front cover, one of the guys contacted me, Brian Erickson. And he had that flag with him. He took it back with us. And that was sort of in formulating this whole thing. It was like, hey, man, him handing that thing over, he had tears in his eyes.

You know, I mean, it really meant something to him and stuff. But it was, and that was some of that stuff was what really pushed me to dial it down the way that I did. I think that's probably the only reason why it's doing on how it's doing. It's putting yourself with a fire. I still think it needs more, but I mean, it's, you're always going to think that. Sure. You're always going to think. But it was like coming home.

I mean, that flag, bring that flag down there and the other guys that donated our. like there's Lee's backpack down there and that PMAG. Our old Sarr Major's uniform top is down there, which is the UCP deltas, which was only what fielded by, it's only fielded really for one battalion. I know some other people got them here and there, but it wasn't. The ACUs that have the brown in it. Yeah. I call them shit CUs.

Yeah. But yeah, there was that down there. I've got, man, I've got assault packs and like different, there's a Mayflower rig that I had. Oh, yeah. And, oh, I love that thing. So that wall on the back cover here. I have one right up on that shelf over there. That's actually what I was going to say.

I was like, I noticed the, I was like, oh, dude, that's a Mayflower rig, man. Which I know it's with velocity systems now. Yeah. They made awesome stuff. And here I am, you know, as the RTO, when we were at the Ardenob portion, hucking over walls like there were nothing. Just due to how much more mobile I was than having to wear the taps rig that they had. Or, you know, my old saw rig was an eagle. I ended up selling it off to one of it's like I'm never going back to that position again

that's horrible uh so pass that off to uh one of the other guys Zach Morton um but I always had that extra gear just because I mean saw stuff is so it just sags yeah so much weight and I was carrying 800 on person and then another 400 in my assault pack oh no I wasn't messing around um but yeah yeah that was uh I always had something that was but no that's awesome they of Mayflower rig over there. Yeah. It's pretty cool. Good stuff.

So to answer your question, yes, it is also number one in Afghan war military history. Boom. Two categories. You know, and one of the great things, I mean, there are a lot of great things about the book, but one of the great things about the book is that, you know, the conventional military story has not been told enough, I think, post-G-WAT. Like, we always hear from, you know, S-F. and rangers and and you know

Cag guys and seals and whatnot but but conventional forces were really out there hooking and jabbing on a daily basis without relief generally without the assets the air support

all the stuff that you know you sort of the concierge concierge services that that spec ops had yeah yeah yeah um No, we would literally, I mean, the same, we would, we were building target packages. We were doing Fid mission out there.

We were living with the Afghan police, like right outside the village, just constantly that by with and through. But really, you know, a lot of it was just us, although we did have a good, we had a good. The police commander that was with us was, he was good. He was really good. He was like one of the ones that were like, hey, you need to do something. Like just let me know when and where. You know, I got this. Or he'd be like, hey, we got a guy over here.

Pretty sure he's Taliban. like we just need a QRF at this time. And we worked really well. Like, I mean, he was all about it, but he was, he kind of had a little bit of ax to grind on his own. Like he was an Afghan commando that went through their whole pipeline and was tired of seeing the corruption within the Afghan police force. So he resigned his commission over there and went over the A&P,

which at one point he had handpicked guys so we could actually trust them. They were good dudes and would go out on patrol with us. But over time, things got more and more deadly over there. The guy started, hey, my mother's sick. Yeah, right. That whole game made you.

Oh, I got to, like, even our turp, one of the saddest stories is that our interpreter, awesome guy. We had them from Helman that he pushed forward, you know, and all those guys, they have their names that they're given over there. And I don't know what it is, but Italian fashion designers. And we had Gucci, Armani. Yeah.

It was, uh, someone else, but Gucci, Gucci was the guy, man. And, um, I mean, he had already, the Mexican standoff. He was the one who kind of diffused that situation. That was, that was nuts. But so there was a one with a suicide bomber where this guy lit himself off. And the, uh, A&P was wounded that had been there with us. And Gucci straight up snatched this dude's AK up and was like pushing villagers back. Hey, get back inside and stuff.

And we're like, yo, man, like, hey, dude. like, stay within sight of us. Because there's probably QRF coming and they're looking to kill someone who's brown. They're looking to kill someone who looks just like you. He was way to an AK out there. Like, we got this now. Yeah. But like, awesome.

Like, he was legit. He was a good dude. I mean, you know, he had worked with SF a bit and everything. We could tell that, you know, we could trust some of the gun and stuff around you. But that's not normal. But yeah, no, what you're saying, I mean, conventional forces, a lot of times they get marginalized. Yeah. I feel marginalized to bring the story forward.

Yeah. Market is full of softbooks. these days. Yeah. Yeah. And you, uh, so this is your story. It's the unit story. And then you also, you know, you have other people's like individual stories kind of broken out. Yeah. In here too. Yeah. There's no way I could have done this whole thing from me. I mean, there's situations to where like with, um, Ross when he got blown over the wall, you know, he was the only one out there for five or so minutes, you know, as we're getting people out to him. So, since it is in a chronological order,

and we generally sort of use that format. Let's sort of start with you, your origin story. How did you grow up and how did that lead you to the military? Smalltown, Connecticut, not far from here. Actually, Thomaston. Little tiny place. Matter of fact, it's 15 minutes from Torrington where Jocco grew up. That's crazy, right?

But yeah, just a little small town, Thomaston, Connecticut. Their big things was, they used to see Plymouth Hollow, like way back, 1800s. And then they renamed it for this clockmaker who's like Henry Ford of clocks. So he just manufacturing process. There's right in the middle of town, a clock tower on the factory. It's kind of central to the whole New England manufacturing town. But my dad had a business there with springs and stampings. So tool and dye, spring stampings and everything.

It was him and two of the partners. And one of them was actually in the reserves, but had been in Vietnam. And I want to say it was something having to do with armor, because there was a story with him on a tank at one point with them coming back in, and he had switched spots. And the guy that he switched spots with, they were coming back. Things are over, right? They got the word, hey, this is done.

Sniper freaking capped him. And it was like, holy crap, that could have been me. So, I mean, it really got to the guy. But, yeah, so, I mean, that's kind of where I grew up, like small 8,000 people in this town. And when I was a kid, I know we're going to go into the military thing really quick. I might as well just segment to there.

No, no, talk. This is your time. You're saying. No, no, I mean, but, um, no, he, uh, he invited us out to these war games. I've never seen him do this. Like, even in, I've never seen them do it to this extent. But this is where, at least I thought, you know,

public was allowed. They're throwing some grenades and they're, they got this little M-16. pit for kids to come up and shoot and of course you know what seven or eight year old I almost burnt the barrel off the ns 60s like sitting over there hey kid come off the line and we could um we could actually pick up the brass and lynx was probably just the guys like yeah man let the kids do it yeah right take out of it we don't have to pick it up um but my cousin got in trouble I remember this specifically my cousin got in trouble because we made him a big

bandelier belt and he went into school they were staying with us at the time he went into school and the teachers like this was back this was when they first started getting weird about that type of stuff yeah yeah we're probably roughly the same age like columbine happened while we were in high school yeah yeah yeah yeah i was oh i'm 41 so yeah i'm 40 okay so we're right there dang man but yeah so bandolier got tossed out of uh tossed out of uh tossed out of class they're not even there's why would what are you thinking guys like come on empty Yeah, just a bandelier of blanks. Yeah, exactly.

I mean, they're not even really blanks. Oh, yeah, there's shells. They expended shell casings. Yeah. Yeah. So is that, did that kind of peak your interest in the military or? I don't know if it was either maybe that kind of got out on the radar. Because, I mean, I always, like, we were talking before.

I was always fascinated with war books, specifically Vietnam stuff. You know, some World War II, but really the Vietnam stuff. And it was weird because, you know, but when we got into the Argonaut Valley, Argonaut Valley is just a weird, and we can get into that later, but the terrain there and stuff, there was some section where you were coming through canals

and like the grass and stuff is coming over you, and I'm getting this like, man, this is like what it must have felt like in Vietnam. Like, this is weird, like crazy. So even my petunits are, same stuff. You know, come through the pomegranate orchards, the grape fields and everything, and you're just mucking through things. We're having a, there was a portion of three months to where

there's no showers, no anything. Like we didn't have, C-Bs came out and saw how we were living in the other like, oh my God, like people, what are you guys doing, man? Like, when's the last time you had a shower? I don't know,

three months ago, we routed the patrols through the freaking canal so we can, you know, get some of the funk off. But it would go from, you know, you get those smells, then they go away.

Then they start coming back and you're like, uh-oh. Yeah. It's got to be real bad at this point. Yeah. Some of those smells like once they get in you to, like it's that, fungus the fungus among us well but after a while you don't smell yeah you don't everybody else yeah

yeah yeah then when it comes back yeah that's when they're red flagging it um no my my cousin joined the marines and then i was going to join the marines right out of high school uh took the asphab and whatnot and they're like we want you as a uh it was a satellite like a ground satellite technician and i'm like a ground satellite technician but now going back i'm like oh you want I mean, as an RTO with a sack can out there. We need help. Right. But, you know, I was talked out of it.

I was talked out of going. Parents were like, hey, you know what? Look, we support you want to do that. But really, we'd like for you to go to college. We'll support you on that side. And then if you want to go to as an officer, like our full blessing. Yeah, that sounds pretty good. All right, let's do it.

Why not? Let's go do the college thing. and three months or three years later I think they had enough of the wild bill and they're like yeah this ain't panning out man I think I think we're done paying for the college and I'm like oh my grades are good

they're like yeah but they wouldn't even let me stay at the dormitories I just kept getting in trouble yeah you gotta stay off post well that's when you know you need to go in the military and that's exactly what I need to party at that level you like you've got to

Yeah. Yeah. You got to go with the pros. The military is only a place for you. I honestly, I should have listened to the heart. I should have, I should have, I should have, when I was 18. That would have been the best thing for me at the time was that, that discipline, quite honestly. Man, I get it.

That's for sure. So when you did decide to go, you know, you had kind of thought about the Marines part of that. Was there a reason you settled on the Army? Yeah, I wanted to go to Special Forces. That was the, I mean, 18 X-ray pipeline. and I was like, hey, Afghanistan is winding down. They're still doing stuff over there, but, come on. It's 2008 at this point.

Like, who's still in the fight? And I was like, oh, I mean, Green Berets, you got language training, you got all these different schools and stuff. They're in different segments all over the world where there's a conflict or not, like supporting that end. Like, heck, yeah, like, that's, I'd rather go that route. Marines, you can't choose your job. Have the shot at it.

No problem. I got this. Yeah. So, as we were talking before, You know, started up, what, left in March. And crazy enough, the fun part was the, I had this neighbor cow. And he would, you know, I told him, hey, I'd walked his dog at one point. That's how we got introduced.

One of my friends was his pharmacist or something. And he was like, hey, can you check on on this guy? He lost his wife recently. And he was talking with him. You know, hey, thinking about joining the Army. I'm like, ah, you're going to hate it. All right. Why did the army once in Vietnam?

Like, you're going to freaking hate it. All right, cow. This is just the stick, you know? Yeah. So finally it comes down and I get it. And I almost as like this. Like, hey, guess what cow? You know, I signed on the dotted line.

He's like, well, it's great. You're going to love it. What? Let me tell you something. And he pulls me in and he opens up this bottom. drawer. He was old Mac V. Saw. Oh shit. And I'm like, dude, what? Like, you've got

to be kidding me. And he's, oh, yeah, and he's showing me stuff, uh, like, yeah, we were on Fort Bragg and our freaking stuff was the, the green top with dungarees on the bottom and stuff. And like, just certain things and everything, when I started going back, it was like, I was a ranger. Hey, there's no

Rangers on Bragg. And then if I'm, well, there was Rangers on Bragg at one point, like when they weren't actual regiment and stuff. Hold on. Like, So this was early war when it was in there, but it's just crazy. You know, and here it was it. And I was like, why did you, you know, try to talk me out of this old time? He's like, I just want to see if you're going to stick with it.

You're great. Man, cow, come on, dude. But, yeah, so it was signed up. And, you know, it was a delayed entry program. Did basic training. I mean, that was the whole basic training. You know, it was a little older at the point anyway, 26. Seeing a terrible.

Oh, man, at that point. For basic. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my God. These kids, I'm just laughing to myself as their shark attacks happening. It was like, man, like, terrified. This is okay. All right. This is nothing, guys. But started to realize the, you know, who would push it. You know, who are the ones who are carrying their weight?

Who was the turds who would stay away from. So, I mean, you get that end of things in there. And, I mean, it was really, they had a mission to freaking drop us out. there we started 80 some on and I think it was like 46 of us in basic training like they just kept yeah from the AIT part from the whole thing or just from basic yeah AIT that was our yeah the day one of AIT the guy picks up the trash can by the door throws it out there in the middle of the freaking I was on guard actually that time and he's like I hear him come in he's like here we go bam just throws it up in the

air right in the middle of the you know boom just loud metal trash can Welcome to AIT. Get up! It was, all right, it's not going to be any different. And, you know, it wasn't. Yeah, I mean, that's the interesting thing about that, like one station unit training that the Army runs is that basically it's just a really long boot camp. You know, that I feel like in other services, when you take that break

and go from your boot camp or your basic training to your, you know, your career school, whatever it is, you know, you might be treated like a plea, but you're still like, okay, you're not in boot camp anymore. But in the one station you're training, like, you're a boot the whole time. Yep. Good times. Yeah. Fort Benning.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. And you were right across the street there, right? At one point. At Benning? Well, I was, yeah. I did the whole thing. And then I got assigned to 375.

So I was there forever. Oh. Yeah. Oh. that was not ideal I did I had to go to selection just to get off of Brent

I'll get off of Bennett yeah yep fun fun times so now had you enlisted as an 18 X rate at that point?

Yes yeah and so funny funny story I can read contracts because I was like hey wait what is this right here

well if you don't make the course you don't get the $46,000 I'm like eh no no no that's the only the only way you're getting me is that. They're like, well, no, that's non-negotiable. That's how that goes. And I'm like, no, I'm getting the 46,000 no matter what. Like, or I'm walking. Like,

so we're at MEPs. And that literally ended up being, like, I had to hold over to the next day because they were, oh, we got to do something here. Like, I don't know what they did. I still end up getting it. And everybody I know that went into the program where, how did you get the freaking bonus? Smart? Very smart. Right? So, so. So, so. You go to your basic, your AIT, and then airborne. And how is airborne for you?

School falling. I mean, hey, man, like, just, just, all you got to do is keep up. Yeah. Like, that's just a fall overrun and go through that. It was a good school. I mean, in the way of, I mean, to teach anybody that feet and knees together. You know, hey, kid, if you ever got to jump out of the window because the house is on fire, feed knees together.

Yeah. What do you mean, dad? Don't worry about it. Just keep your feet and knees together. But, yeah, I mean, that was, that was no big deal. And it was just added to the, you know, the next step was Sopsy, you know, ended up over at Bragg. And, you know, Sapsi was a great course, honestly.

I don't, the 82nd always looks down on those Sopsy guys coming over. You know, I got the whole, what do you think you're better than us and everything? And I'm like, no. Like, I got removed from, I was supposed to leave for selection. gotten hurt during one of the land-down portions during so and I can shoot I can show you on my leg man my leg comes down and it's like my calf comes down and it's like something tore out of my leg at one point yeah crutches and everything and I showed up to the deuce but I was like I can't walk in there on crutches like there's no way so it came in of course the next next day we're doing you know running up our dens I didn't you know it wasn't a crazy face it was only eight minute but I'm like oh this was bad choice not to let them know I was on profile

Yeah. You know, with that point, you don't want to be that weak guy. I got to do another ad read copy. You get to do another ad read. Dee, I need the actual attachment, though. It's not in the email. That's what I'm telling you. We're all fucked up on these ads today because I just want to make sure I'm reading the new one, not the old one.

It's a weird day. It's a weird day. It's supposed to be remote. Yeah, so where were we? Sopsy and we have the cadre of Sopsy, one of the Black Hawk down guys. I'm trying to think actually, I never cleared his name, so I'm not going to go ahead and say that. But man, the intensity, just like, I mean, the people they had out there, him in particular, though, like that was kind of the same thing. Like in basic training, we had a guy from regiment at one point.

And that's where the, I mean, that smoke session, the naked smoke session came about. Oh, yeah. Yeah, you got to read it, Jack. Yeah, naked jumping jacks. Yeah. Yeah, naked, naked all of it, burpees and all the hell. Yeah. But, yeah, I mean, he always just kind of drove at home more.

And same thing with holes. For people who might not be aware, because I don't, can you tell us, like, what the Sopsy acronym stands for and its purpose. Yes, special operations, preparation and conditioning. And it's really just like, I mean, it's the, if you go to, I guess it's someone for someone

who's really, really, really green going in. Because, I mean, they do the exact same thing when you're over at selection. They're teaching it all over again. I guess it's just a little bit more extended and it kind of give you, like, again, a little more conditioning. You know, I mean, it's just a month-long suck fest.

or I think in my case It was a month and a half I mean they just beat the crap body a little bit more Some people get hurt A lot of people just drop You know it's just it's a weeding out process But really I mean a good course I love the poor everybody always says

They hate land nav And those were my favorite times I'm like dude you're walking through the woods Nobody's in your ear Like yelling at you That's a freaking cakewalk at that point Just don't leave your rifle Yeah

Hit your points Yeah and make sure there are no bees. I think I'm ready. So the other sponsor for tonight's show is Hello Fresh. Hello Fresh. With them, you get Farm Fresh, pre-portioned ingredients and seasonal recipes delivered right to your doorstep. Skip trips to the grocery store and count on Hello Fresh to make home cooking easy, fun, and affordable.

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It's great, isn't it? They're freaking awesome. Yeah. I mean, the convenience end of things and you have the different meals and you can choose from stuff it's killer i also like that you know it basically teaches you how to cook stuff that you never would have even thought of yeah yeah you're just like like the different uh you know i had kind of the same thing like so when i was in school like there i did a little bit of um oh i guess it was part of the undergraduate but like you were attached to a business and then it was a chef

there i was doing the marketing end for some celebrity chef but he would come up with this stuff for like lunches for us and i'm like dude like kind of like ridiculous stuff like five ingredients or 16 grand like how and he's like dude it's all about the combo man yeah it's you know and they do that yeah yeah for a little fresh they put this stuff together and it's freaking delish yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah just for your ads man i know i know d we shire him for average right better at it than i am that's for sure so were you at all you know so you you go um from sopsie you know you have your heart set on being special forces you go to sopsie you go to sopsie you go to sopsie you go to you get injured and in anybody who's been any kind of selection to tell you there there is definitely a luck factor uh there's definitely a luck factor that you get through it with no injuries uh especially at the ripe old age of of 26 yeah 26 yeah um so we're you know and then you're you know going over to the 80 deuce going down the road were were you at all um like did you feel defeated at all or i had the

boo-boo lip yeah I had the boo-boo lip but I mean I had that whole like I was pissed because of why and how you know I mean they literally just mass cut everybody off at the knees from Med Hold and I was like I just got here like are you kidding me like and there's like well there's malingerers you know I mean they weren't wrong yeah it was like I think it was like 400 people got me I'm like how in the heck did you have this many people sitting in like how did this even happen right right I like just just unbelievable I can't I couldn't believe this the amount so I got it and then if you go to appeal it of course I was just like man I'm just gonna like let the chips fall I'll go do a

deployment over there and I'll come back I knew where I was going I mean they were like hey you're headed over fourth brigade and I was like all right just like the whipping boy of division you know I mean they were fourth rega was just back to back to back and I got there it was the same day as their Christmas ball and because they like shifted us around and it's like you end up at brigade and then you know the battalion and then finally you end up at your company and you've been sitting there what uh i think i went in late because i knew better and i went at one and i joined everybody else around three and we're sitting there and we didn't get to see the first art and at bravo company until holy crap nine o'clock at night this

dude rolls up and i'm like yeah how nice um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um But I mean, he was straight up in his class A's and stuff. You smell whiskey on his breath. And I'm like, man, you just came back from the ball. Like, you've got to be kidding. Like, you don't want to be here. I don't want. Couldn't we just do it.

I've done this in the morning. It's just that conventional, like that set of it where this happens every time. Yeah. It's like, this makes no. The common sense just went, you know, out the window. It's good training, though, for when you have to wait on the word. It is. It's like, and all that stuff.

And that's the thing is like, you don't see the value of it until later on. And you're like, oh, I was, you know, I mean, that. patience in that end of things like when you're fully kidded up or like they scratch the bird for the eighth jump in a row and you're like oh my god you're just being conditioned yeah so when you got to the 82nd was there a deployment on the horizon for them they i think they were they had they knew they were going to iraq because they were going into iTC so intensive training cycle and then not even a month after that there's just like all right refit jr tc and then you're just like all right refit jrTC and then it was all right two months we're heading out to iraq and then there was uh switch orders

um so president obama they had the surged into kandahar and president obama did executive orders reassigning us essentially from iraq um to do an advise and assist mission in afghanistan we're just like next people deploying so they're like all right that sounds great 80 second ever more and advise and assist this is awesome like you just took a bunch of infantry bubbles and said you know you're doing training mission with Afghans. It's going to be interesting. I mean, it was. Helmand province was like your standard.

Like when we got over there, there was nothing for us to do. They didn't know where to put us. Like, I mean, we went into, you know, we flew in, Canada Har, right? And they just like, all right. So then we found ourselves up and down the highway in Helman, you know, operating on a lash.

And this was the big like 2008 general McChrystal surge, right, that we're talking about. about right around that time frame yes yeah so McChrystal was the ISAF commander at the time and then that was um so our lieutenant colonel battalion commander had been his aid at one point so we were out there trying to get a mission you know and it was the brits didn't want us to be involved in marza right right the Marines didn't want us involved in marja so he's like hey i got a bunch of perjurers i'm trying to get him into a fight they're doing nothing going up and down the highway

was like, oh, I got something for you. You know, we're going to be moving into Kandahar. Like, sounds good. You know, what do you got? And we replaced, uh, is it 5-2? It was fifth ID, strikers. Okay. Um, that were already in the Argonob.

And I could tell just doing the left seat, right seat. I mean, when we refitted in Walton and stuff and they're like, well, it's going to be light everywhere and we're establishing the outpost out there. I'm like, uh, okay. You know, and just doing the left seat, right seat and see. seeing how the other guys were spooked and stuff during stuff you're like all right something's up we're going into it and then ultimately like the first few weeks when we were down there we had found one and we did a controlled debt on one but I

remember looking at there was a cow out there I mean livestock just ever but there's a cow out there and they blow this thing up and this cat didn't even flinch and I'm like okay this is normal yeah this is not good this is not like those little observations of picking up on that. I'm like, this is not a good thing. Yeah. And sure enough, I mean, that just, they pulled back. They knew they couldn't take us in any sort of direct action type thing.

And they were just like, all right, that's fine. We got time. We'll just wait for the next one to show up. And they just pulled back and sit in, you know, a lot of anti-personnel minds. Yeah. You know, first one was, first one that we had that hit us down there was day after Christmas. December 26th. And that was specialist Jason Johnston.

I had just stepped over the initiator for that maybe 30 seconds prior you know and they were flowing in and there was guys our standard thing was to put them up on the rooftop to get Overwatch so we were putting a gun team up there and that was Will Ross and Jason Johnson were the first two that were traversing this wall

and EOD had been through with a mind sweeper first cleared it you know and we're walking the footpath into this thing and I can bring it up but it's your standard courtyard and there's some rooms back here and I'd come in and then stayed on the concrete

came across this way and was on the far end over here and the guys are all coming in the squad and Sir Thomas was near the rear with the dock and it was maybe mid-patrol when Private Tower he hit the initiator

and it was like crack pow! And this thing was a pressure place? Yeah, so it was those the hockey pucks. And I mean, there was, so there was already a high iron content in the soil out there. We had, oh man, we had. So the detectors couldn't pick it up. They had to constantly calibrate the detectors for the iron stuff and the soil content.

There was, we had radio issues to where you couldn't, you couldn't reach it. Like, oh my God, bad, real bad. Because of mineral deposits. That and all of the different walls. Like, I mean, you are orchards and you have walls like just on every single bit. I mean, you have your wavelengths and stuff are all getting broken up. So we were using,

they had just gotten in the 117 golf, which was using digital. And even that was having issues. But, I mean, it was a little better when you put up the nodes and stuff, but it was still, I mean, you had to throw the long whip up. Like most of the time,

I'd already have it up two or three and just bundle on the top so that I can just flip it open, you know, at a moment's notice and stuff. But yeah, I mean, I came in and I'm calling it up. I've got the long whip up and watching them come across and go boom. And it was just, you know, I got on there.

And they swore it was a false call. They were like, they didn't believe me at first. And I'm like, hey, guys, like, we just hit an ID, you know, our location in my last frontline trace because I had sent it up right before we went in there. And I'm like, I know we have at least one urgent surgical. I can hear him screaming on the other hand. Like, I'll get back to you. And from there, handed off the.

the radio pack to the LT and just went into Karen Tauri who it I mean his leg was separated below the knee um right to begin with I mean he was missing missing some fingers you know that was a whole break the ice thing with him once because I mean Doc was on it doc got shrapnel to the face he was behind Thomas Thomas had flattened him you know he's went big 250 pound bear of a guy and flying backwards and like pummeled ponds which was our doc you know just flattened him back against the wall and Ponce is like you know he's dazed strapped into the face he just got squished by his squad leader and they're like you know get up here we need we need you know medic on this and he's uh you know turn kidding towery and stuff and he's half he can half see so i come up

to assist by then he already had a lot of it done so it was just like hey like I you can hear Ross screaming from the other side of the wall like hey we need someone else out here and Ponce was you know he's like hey continue care with him make sure his turnicets are good and stuff I'm going out and Thomas kind of grabbed him was like no

that we need to clear it yeah like there might be another secondary you know fair enough so he kind of turns around and like me and him are working on Tauri during this time and he's like finally like hey I'm going out there and Thomas is like just going his footsteps goes out

so I'm with Tauri now kind of just checking to see blood sweep is there anywhere else he's bleeding out of you know his hands messed up um talking with him and he's kind of giddy at this point you know i mean he's going into shock but uh made made a finger joke because i'm missing one myself you know there was a few of them i'm like welcome to a club man he just started laughing but um you hear ponds from the other side of the wall i need someone else out here i'm like oh my god man like in this there's this I mean, this squad has just been rocked. Yeah.

Like guys, they're trying to put up security. This squad leader took a big bruns of it. He's freaking out. And I go to Thomas. I'm like, dude, like, his team leader come over and took control of, his team leader was John Colt, took control of Toweries, the Catterty. And I'm like, I'm going out there. And same thing, Thomas, like, right up in my face.

Like, fuck, no, you're not. Yeah. I'm like, dude, I'm going out there, man, like, freaking. You know, and he was like. you get blown up it's on you man i'm like i don't get ponds went out i'm fine like and just went out what i came up to man that was rough like so johnston was directly over the charge when this thing went off and quite honestly if he hadn't been um that was really meant to be a squad killer yeah you know if he hadn't been on top of it probably would have taken more people out like from that

How long had you guys been in the Kandahara area at this point in time? So we got brought in, I need the exact date. It's in these books, man, but I want to say mid-December, because we'd only been there two, three weeks when this had happened. We had refitted Walton for a little bit. That's when I moved out from a machine gunner position into the RTO, which I've been gunning for the whole time anyway. Like, well, I wanted to be an 18 Echo.

So I was like, hey, man, this is like the perfect freaking on-the-job training. And the guy that was RTO at the time, Hammer, he did, he hated that job of the passion. Yeah. He said, I'm out here shooting radio waves instead of bullets. Like, stupid. You know? But yeah, no, I wanted to. I was like, I saw the value in it.

And I liked, you know, being in on the different briefs. Something they're like, dude, you got to be on, like, everything. I'm like, I don't care, man. I'd rather be out there than sitting, sitting back at the fob or freaking in the rifting. Like, forget that. Yeah. So what was, you know, you're out on this patrol. What was your mission in Kandar?

What did they tell you guys they wanted you to do? I mean, stop enemy movement through, you know, and it's like be that stopper. Okay. You know, I mean, this is, a lot of this stuff is coming to Joe level. Right. Like, this was, I'm sure there was other mission sets in there. I know, like, in going through and pulling it apart and stuff,

hey, why didn't we have these assets? Why didn't we have? You know, and it was like, honestly, some of these guys didn't even know it. Like, I was talking before on how we were cut off in a way from brigade pushing down resources and stuff because of our relationship with brigade and battalion. There was issues.

So, I mean, maybe we didn't get fielded everything we needed. I know that Colonel Jones did end up pushing down. I mean, we got dog teams. We got more EOD and stuff so we weren't waiting around. We had a few EOD teams. I think there was like three. I mean, they pushed the stuff, but it just wasn't. You have to look, Jayada was new.

Just where we were in that time, the type of fight that was, it was not something we were used to. Definitely not something used to as a conventional force, that's for sure. But, I mean, even Task Force was having the same kind of issues. Um, they were very active in that area. Like we had them for a bunch of stuff too. Um, it was kind of cool to get the, the manuscript back and see all the black lines. And you're like, oh, oh, okay, that's who is there. Okay.

Uh, yeah, all right. That's who is there. And then even some of the stuff was like, yeah, it's like, this is in Wikipedia. They know that capability exists. It's like, this is ridiculous. Yeah. And they're just like, well, it's our job. Yeah.

It doesn't change the story, though. so when you guys would generally go out was it sort of presence patrols recon by fire did they have specific like villages or people they wanted you to shake down like was there a general flavor to the operations lots of pleasant uh the presence patrols I mean just but you have to look at what we're coming into everybody hated us out there because of who was there prior I mean we didn't get this on before but before we came on I was talking to him about our left sea right seat you know we literally saw them calling fire on these two guys digging in the riverbed you know and kaya was just coming and like what was that man like what um this is the stuff that was happening you know they didn't care they had search and destroy painted on the side of their strikers they were going in with uh I think it was counter gorilla tactics when it was supposed to be a coin fight.

So really they didn't know what to think of us when we got there, rightfully so. They're like, who are these guys? We know they're different, but like, okay, they're just going to stay. Same thing. You're going to start ripping us out in the middle of the night or freaking not caring who gets in the way. And that wasn't the case. It took a while to show them that.

And once some of that kind of turned to where they did realize that we're there to help, and they're really quite honestly like i know one of the villages um in particular meanjoy we always laugh about that one you know oh manjoy okay you know thursdays but um meanjoy they i mean they were just getting they were getting pulled out of their beds at night you know and beat up freaking or something hacked off and whatnot you know so it was like just getting that night's sleep without having to worry about that because they knew we were out there patrolling so we'd either run R&S patrols out of

one of the empty empty compounds or something out of the village there was one night really started to change like when they were like hey come and stay in the mosque like whoa what? Like no no no that's okay like but like they were just like hey we want you to be safe and we know you're going to be out

running the patrols just they're not going to fire into the mosque but stay out of the mosque and that's okay quite honestly we'd rather get in a gunfight you know that's yeah yeah But yeah, I mean, and that, like, after that stuff started happening, I mean, that's when you started having tripwires and stuff go off that were, you know, when villages started also becoming hit by these things. That's when you knew, you know, we were having a positive effect on them, but then it was starting to turn towards them. Some of that, hey, okay, you are friendly towards the Americans.

So, and a lot of this was, all that was, the epicenter was Diacche. So that was where all this stuff really started. It was all flowing out of there. That's where things were, you know, we were finding cachets out there, putting stuff down wells. That's where that suicide bomber showed up at a T intersection. I mean, the cover picture.

When they decided, hey, like, this is the epicenter. This is where everything's coming from. CO was like, we need to establish compound down there. So we're already, we had started out in the beginning at Copware along with third platoon and they left second platoon back at Johnston as like a QRF and close off that back channel because there was a high speed avenue

there was a highway bazaars and stuff was really populated down there. It was right by Gondigan and we can get into that in a minute but they split it out so then we ended up switching with second down to Johnston second kind of it was to give us a break the work parties at Copware where we

Ridiculous. Establishing that cop is insane. They brought in Hescos and like there was no contractors to fill it though. Sort of like, well, fill up our hand. I'm like, first, sorry, you freaking kidding. With your K-pots? Yeah. They had seven dudes 24 hours on shovels that would rotate through to fill a Hesco. They filled like one in three days.

And that's when I went on a mid-tour. I was like, thank God I'm going freaking mid-tour. Like, I'm out of this sucker. How long was the tour designated for? So it was September to September. So it was a 12-month tour. Yeah. Yeah.

And then can you walk us through what you mean by cop, what it means to establish a cop, and what in the world is a Hesco, and why do they suck so bad to fill? I want to fill, yeah. I mean, they're great. I mean, holy crap. As far as, you know, that's a lot better than sandbags.

Oh, yeah. Right? Yeah. You know, you just all of a sudden, boom. Oh, how'd that get there the next day? There's, all right. So what's the progression here? We've got Hescos, cops, and.

Yeah, so they would look at an area that was, you know, unruly, as it were. Rowdy. And say, we need a presence there. And Halliburton's not going to do it. KBR. Yeah, KBR is not going to do it. Jimmy Chow Hall right there. Boom.

So. Go build us a little city. Yeah. Or go build us a thing. Bob Cop established. Okay. Yeah. So, I mean, that was, man, what, mid-December, freezing our butts off.

Got the word, hey, we're going into the Argonob. And the commanders, this is the spot, a radish field, middle of freaking the valley. That's where we're going to go. But expected heavy resistance. And, you know, hey, we're not going in with any snibble gear. You know, this is the packing list. You got stuff ripped out of your packing list. I'm like, come on, man.

Like, really? Like, but what if? And sure enough, what if happened? Right. So I remember, oh, man, like cuddling up, burning commonweer to stay warm. It was freezing. It's so cold. And it was something like three to five days to where it was just, yeah, no resupply.

You're sitting out there out of this compound in the middle of nowhere, trying to provide security. All right. when's our stuff getting here and then all of a sudden all this stuff comes in uh and i can't i honestly like for that stuff i don't even remember if it was sling loaded or a convoy actually made it out there but yeah all the this stuff all comes in either flatbed or flown in i can't remember on that part but um putting these up yeah you just i mean you can see pictures this huge hesco wall around it so hasco you have a wireframe with like a burlap on the inside and you just fill it with the earth around you.

And it's, I mean, what? What's the dimensions on those? What's the square? I feel like it's like five by five. I feel like it's like, yeah, I think it's something, it's something like that. I almost want to say it's even a little bit. But I mean, you have a good footprint. You can lay across those bad boys or see it up there.

I mean, yeah, that's one of the. Yeah, they're basically for people who have not seen a husko before, it's basically a collapsible wall. It's like a heavy cloth surrounded by almost like, a fence in a way and you unfold it, you know, and then you fill it with dirt. So it's, it, you basically create the cage around it. Yeah. Gives the structure, you know, where it can fill that up with that amount of poundage.

Um, and that burlap can hold it with that thing around it. Yeah. Um, which I mean, like, yeah, if you go to the social media, this is damn the valley book, you can see there's pictures in there to where you can see those hescos ain't filled. You can see the shadows in them and stuff. And you're like, And at one point, somebody shot a goose off off at us.

So, I mean, it's, you got a Carl G round or recoilus. Someone shot one at you? Yeah. Where'd they get a goose from? It was a, sorry, it wasn't, I just said goose. I was a recoiless, but like, yeah. Like a SPG-9. Yeah.

And just during the, I was at where for this one, but that was, yeah, I think that was during a Sarnbrunc Horse's memorial ceremony. And they just went into a full-on. Yeah. Like, wow, talk about a time to do that, man. I know that we had the FO up there and they were calling in. I was back on the radio hearing all this come through at Johnston at this point. I was like, oh, man, freaking, they got to a tick while they're down there, you know, for the ceremony.

Because we were just, just enough guys to man the towers. Yeah. You know, and they sent everybody down there. And I was like, yeah, I'll hang back for this one. Yeah. I'm like, damn it. So the Army learned to really. you know, important lesson during, well, not even Vietnam, prior to Vietnam,

with the Indian Fu, they said, you know what? Whatever the French did there, we want to keep doing. So they usually, when setting up these cops and things like that, they usually find the most low ground, indefensible area that they can and then put American troops right, you know, right there so that you're surrounded by high ground. It wasn't that bad. It wasn't that bad. It wasn't. And we had, so we actually had, we had an O.P. that we manned. So I think it was 165 that we had, and Battalion HHC had scouts up on 160. So they had, you know, 240s and some sniper rifles and stuff there. And we had kind of the same deal and a javelin, you know, for a fact, because, like, one night they had guys.

So at night they'd sit there on the clue, and you see all sorts of stuff. I mean, one night there was an Afghan bear that was following our patrol. Oh, yeah. Yeah, hey, a yellow bean. We had a Spanish guy, Hector Trejillo. Hey, there's a yellow bean out there. What are you talking about, man? A yelly bean?

And the other guy gets on the clue, and he's like, holy crap, dude, that's a freaking bear. And they're watching this thing track us. And they're like, hey, hey, stop moving, man. This thing's moving, like, right above your patrol. But, like, these are the things you hear about. There's, like, one of the guys found a dead, like, a lynx or a snow leopard out there. Oh, really? Yeah, I got pictures of it, man.

I'm like, the guy sent in, like, terabytes of freaking pictures. Yeah. The publisher was like, hey, you know, do you have 30 pictures? And I'm like, yeah, sure. I had like five grainy Facebook pictures out there. I had nothing. But putting it out there, I was like, guys, look, I got a book deal. I want to get you guys into it.

As a matter of fact, I mean, I think the only picture in there is the author picture of me, which one of the other guys took. Like, that's everything else. I think there's one other picture in there that I show up in. But I tried to get as many of the guys from First Battoon in the book yeah yeah some of the pictures in here like go pretty hard man yeah they're uh infantry stuff that makes my little pee-p hard you know you guys are going through the patties and everything hardcore there's and i some of the stuff that guys just snapped i'm like yeah dude like how i didn't even

know i didn't see anybody snapping these little shutterbugs out there you never know everybody's got i do have one that i took and it's up it's i need to find the original because i want to go back I'm going to colorize the blossoms. But there's a pomegranate. This looks like it does look like Vietnam. Hardcore.

Yeah. 100%. And I've got a ton of it. Like if you guys look at the drive and I'll show you later, I'll give you like access to it or some. There is like, there's a ton of those pictures like that coming through.

Just. Yeah, we'll put some of those, like some of them up on Patreon and stuff for our subscribers to see. Because it's, there are things. in here that it's like Jack says like there are things in here that when you think of

Afghanistan you don't think about this like you don't think about guys waiting through canals no with vegetation around them Helman province was our that was your typical Afghanistan dry desert moon dust to feel like Lawrence of Arabia you're sitting on Tatooine you know where the guys rolling by with a digital do do do do do you know you hear it too you hear it but that was our first like I mean even the um I mean again that first firefight was Halloween that's why the book was released on Halloween crazy enough this year it was on a Tuesday but Halloween was our first uh firefight in Hellman province's first platoon the majority of us and we just rolled up on the Afghans took off they decided

hey we're asking partners yeah yeah yeah yeah hey we're close enough to the house we're only a mile out see you and we're like now we're gonna clear the culverts and do it right I don't feel like getting blown up today and we come up and they're their their highlux is like smashed into the wall of one of those villages you know one of the mud huts out there and we're like yeah all of a sudden we're taking incoming you know you're here and the gunner's like oh crap like we're in it and uh we were a truck number two and we had a mark 19 mounted with a 240 and in front of us is uh one of those cougar you know the v holes. It's massive.

This is a raised road. And the guys were so close. They had a squad size element with a support by fire in the wood line. They knew what they were doing. Bounding up, using the village's cover and Sabaun these two poor freaking Afghan police. They must have been so happy to see us roll up.

Because they were right there. Like as soon as, so I tell the LT, I'm driving vehicle number two and I tell the LT, I look over at him. Like, hey man, like, we need to get thing into the fight like can I go around use their vehicle as cover and get us out there it's like don't get us killed a little lieutenant smith little guy and um we come around and as we're coming around they were so close the gunner of the vehicle couldn't traverse the 50 down wow all right and he does

the first thing comes to his mind he scoops up the drivers uh and i was like when i heard this and i went back started kind of AAR and I'm like there's no way this happened it's just like those superhuman moments that happen in battle and um I caught it from uh sarnin rush which was one of the hdc scouts he was underneath he handed the driver's saw up he like threw the saw up into the turret with this dude and he like one motion jumped up into this turret and smoked two dudes just sarin can or uh specials cannon at the time you know and i'm why like i see this happened as I'm coming around the guy just like like eyes as big as saucers

and just like cut down right there and it's like oh my god like holy crap this is awesome you know like this is war now yeah and we pull out in front and coaler starts getting on the mark 19 hitting the freaking wood line you know where we're catching all this machine gun fire

from they had set up you know out there and we're pummeling that bomb that wood line 100 yards back giving them to breathe the first Well, the first few were like right in front of us. It's like, caller, Jesus, getting it on target. Gets it out there and it's reaching out. You know, and they dismounted.

And I mean, it was, it was like the perfect L-shaped ambush. We'd roll right through free support by fire. His gun went down at one point, the mark 19. Something happened to where he, someone had put the dang rounds in upside down or something in the box. I don't know. he had to switch over and just stick to the 240 you know at one point after we went through the first box because that's it you know it was like stick with the 240 freaking keep hitting them you know but yeah L-shaped ambush rolled right through um the medic actually as they're assaulting uh saved one of the one of the enemy you know the team leader sarnant Anderson comes up and checks the dude dude still alive you know he kicks the weapon away and um saved this guy. And I'm freaking pot.

Like, come on, man. He's just shooting at us. It's like, dude, it's not to save him. We're going to freaking interrogate them. You know, and, um,

see a little Balfi field care and stuff out there and roll them up afterwards and stuff. But yeah, I mean, through, uh, through a few guys in the body bags and it wasn't everybody. You know, he took three or four bodies,

tossed them in there, threw him in the trunk. And this was, we were, we had been coming back from, there's like a three or five day. So we just wanted to get back. And we had been told,

you know, hey, the Brits have a little, little Halloween party going on tonight. And we're like, dude, we're all right. And we roll up to the next checkpoint. Like, what are we doing? Our platoons aren't sure enough. Just throw the bodies at the bottom of driveway. We're out of here. You know, guys get out and they throw, you know, the body bags down to the very bottom of the hill.

And they're like, good luck with that. And he just took off down to lash. Then, you know, within the next hour, we're sitting around a campfire with the Brits telling war stories. and shooting the shit, if you will. But definitely following general order number one, right? Definitely. Always, always. So how, you know, because we kind of went to your time in Kennehar, but up in Helmand,

like, how often would you guys get into ticks? That was weird. So Admon got into some rowdy stuff before we even got there, and there was nothing. Uh-huh. So the Brits were rolling around in soft skins all the time, and they were just getting lit up. left and right. So Gurkhas were out there and they had like just crazy stories and you'd see stuff come back all shot up and whatnot. Like I felt bad for the guys. I'm like, man, you guys are going out like little light skin, no armor, land rover defenders. That sucks. Hey, why

did you have us roll with you man? Like come on. Like we want to get into it too. They probably won't even. It's like they'd get on the radio. You'd hear it. Hey, circle squares are coming back off. You know, and that's the patch of the 80 second is, looks like a circle with a square. so they didn't want to mess with us you know that situation in particular was really we rolled up on that so that was just by chance

there was another and this happened the night of the Mexican standoff actually can you tell that story the Mexican standoff oh absolutely along with that's where I was just like waiting right into it I know that's a great

oh my God I had to I mean I had to put it all in there you know and I was like man like I can't remember who said they're like dude you're like you're gonna put that stuff in there too I'm like yeah absolutely if I can't look at myself and doing something stupid like that so um yeah earlier our our little element they kind of chunked us up and they had us sitting back and they went forward to go clear out uh papazai out there so this was a joint there was afghans afghanos commandos brits like our

guys were going out there from third and from it was mainly third and second but there was some of the first everybody was out there and who we got coming in got someone talking on there no somebody somebody just talk about the Halloween gun fight

which I think you're okay yeah we're behind a little are we behind okay no no no no I like I see that and I'm like all right yeah yeah I Oh, and I Yep, I threw myself off track No, that's okay So

Yeah, yeah It's Papa's eye So clear not Papa's eye And so the Afghans actually ended up hitting They hit an IED coming in there To where I mean it just You're a high locks With guys in the back of a truck

Yeah Like the pressure in the air is just like ripping apart You know's G. I Joe's when you're messed around as a kid Like arms, legs, freaking just stuff everywhere you know um yeah i mean to have a

human ripped apart like that and they said the vehicle just by like flying over theirs like they just see this thing and body parts fly over there holy crap yeah we're in the rear like and that's all we heard but then it just went into a vehicle recovery ops and they were just sitting out there

trying to pull one of these max pros out and just ended up into the seven two hour um it's goat fuck of the mission so we're coming back on this thing everybody's sleep deprived everybody's been up we have been rotating through in our truck but i mean really like nobody slept um just i don't even know how that happened because you would think priorities of work you'd be like hey sleep but i think we were just down to like a three-man crew in the truck one was on the radio one was in the turret the other one was supposed to be sleeping

but it's so freaking hot right like our uh temp like the thermometer on the watch was reined out at 140 degrees. Wow. Like, it's when you're just, you're sitting there and you're seeing the salt. Yeah. Yeah,

yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you're just like, I know I'm sweating right now. I can't feel myself sweating right now. It doesn't feel like it, but I feel like I'm in an easy bake.

Like, I better be drinking water. Yeah. Um, so we're coming back and everybody's like nodding out. You know, and I'm like, I'm good.

I've never fallen asleep. I feel super awake. You know, backsteed. They're definitely racked out. T.C. is kind of like, you know which is uh sarn hackers and he's he's kind of bobbing out i'm like hey man don't worry

about it dude i'll be fine you're driving yeah i'm driving yeah i'm good nesbit's in the turd nesbitt's you good man yeah yeah i'm good i'm good right we're in this convoy man and you think like i mean this is you know convoys and sometimes you get like slow down all right go and there's that long snake yeah we're right out in the middle of the slinky long desert like this big stupid convoy coming out there's no tactical anything like this is dumb and you're going down and i'm like tracking behind this truck and all of a sudden next second it's you know and that truck is right there those red lights and i'm like and the uh i know the gunner was asleep because he had that stamp on his face and um yeah i

smashed into this ranger and i mean afghan bowling pins just boof like out of the back of this thing and i was like oh my god i just hit this truck you know no armor on this thing and an up-armored humvee which is i mean i don't even know like how many tons is this is this is this five tonne like I have an idea. Something like that. At that point, like, I mean, you're just, just ridiculous. It was like that final iteration before they said, all right, Humvees, we can't slap on enough armor on a Humvee to make it actually on the road or whatever. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, this is a handy ass view. I crushed that whole, that whole bat right up to the cab, you know, and I didn't know at this point if, you know, what happened to these guys. And I'm like, oh, my God. And Akers is a whole, you're just freaking. And these guys are starting to collect themselves and stuff. And I'm like, do I get out?

Yeah. Do we go to assist? Like what happens here? Do I get my insurance information? Yeah. Hey, Guyco. And you're like, and you're like,

USA, yeah. You're in good hands. Says his Afghans and everybody else to sleep, you're like, they totally just backed up right into us. Super fast. They knew what was up. Yeah. But the,

the commander comes over and he's yelling at them and they're lining up. and they're starting to like rack their weapons and stuff and I'm like oh shoot the guy in the gunner turret he's getting freaked out and he's like dude oh like hey what's going on here man like are we going to shoot these freaking dudes like are we about to get into a fight he's starting to freak out see his leg shaking um and he comes the commander comes up to my window and he pulls out his pistol and he get out and I'm like I look over to Ackers and he's like do not whatever you do do not get out of this freaking vehicle that is an order i'm like all right like we're in this so i actually like i mean you didn't even notice it but i'm like down there

put the thing in a four high and i'm like all right here we go freaking one on the foot one on the gas like get ready to freaking punch it and mow these dudes over like start looking at your exit options and um out of nowhere you know i mean I can't see what's going on outside of there. And this was actually, this was the first mission, Lieutenant Demaris, which took over in the Argonaut was on. But he was back with Lieutenant Smith. He was kind of showing them the platoon and everything.

And they come running up to diffuse the situation with their interpreter. And he's just making it worse. The interpreter is? Yeah, the interpreter. He's like fumbling on his words. He's never been in a high stress situation like this. They're getting nervous. The commander's got a pistol out.

I mean, what do they use pistols for? in Afghanistan. It's how they executions. You know, I mean, that's that is one of the weird things about Afghans. Was this the A&A or the A&P that you guys were working with? So we had a truck full of commandos on this one. Oh, commandos. Okay. So like A&P was there with us too, but this was

this was commander, like Afghan army commandos after that. Oh, God. And his commander came up and pistol whip the other guy, which is what saved the freaking, between that and... Wait, the A&P commander? The A&A commander. The A&A commander?

Bam, the other guy, the other commander that was, you know, lining guys up and escalating this. And this other guy came out of nowhere and just like cracked him and was like, you realize y'all are about to die kind of thing. But there's, Gucci came up. And he, I think he was the company's interpreter at the time. And he just diffused the whole thing. You know, he got right at like a pro. Just immediately talking straight at the guy. Hey, he's going to be severely punished and all.

You know, throwing whatever smoke up their butts that he could, that he knew the cultural. traditions and stuff behind, but man, that was the first time saved by Gucci, you know? Yeah. That guy was legit. Yeah. Yeah. So were any of the Afghans? One guy busted like one guy.

Yeah. And that was it. Like, man, talk about, they could have been way worse. Yeah. So for people who might not be aware, when we're talking about high luxes or rangers, it's kind of the same truck. It's a coma. Yeah.

But it's a small, it's a small Toyota truck. They don't sell high luxes. I don't, in the U.S. It really is. I think, is it a Tacoma body? Like, I thought it was the, I mean, I think the Highlox is basically a Tacoma that runs on diesel fuel. Is it? And yeah, they don't sell them here.

Yeah. No, yeah, not the, yeah, not the diesel drive train and stuff. Oh, man, that would be so cool. I know, I've looked into it. Many others have looked into it. They don't sell them here. I built a Cummins Wrangler at one point. Like, actually, when I was in the Q-course.

Yeah, I took a 3BT. What if the motor slapped it in? It was a 3.9 liter or something like that as a bread truck motor. But same concept. Yeah, yeah. Freaking awesome.

38 miles to the gallon on 35 inch tires. So, it's doing okay. It was not bad. No. No, yeah, even these days. Yeah. So, so did they go back to base with you guys?

Or like, did they feel off? No, no. Everything was like, they all, they came back, they came back to lash they were yeah you know either based out of there like right before there was kind of just smoothed out yeah um you know i didn't as a joe i didn't really see yeah and that kind of segued from that to walton you know there wasn't too much more time there yeah i think we were there another three weeks or so after that and that's when we had the marching orders forward and it was like all right well this has been fun not and uh we're done with this highway

like we're going somewhere else this is going to be great it wasn't until it wasn't so did you when you guys were up in helman did you have any casual police within your was it your company up there or was it yeah so yeah we didn't we didn't take anything from from up there and i don't remember anybody from any of the other petunes i know like it was it was kind of even out there we were even separated like there was two platoons staying so headquarters they don't want i think it was no it was second platoon again that's right Second tune was out of Lashkarga. So there's a little small compound out.

Like they have a corner out there as Camp Diamond. And that's where the U.S. would stay. And I think that they, we kind of took that compound over from National Guard. So like we had a bunch of their whole man. I'm trying to think of the acronym for the name for the equipment that they leave behind the stays in country. I remember grabbing a bunch of that because like we were low on machine guns, man. like saws. It was actually a congressional launch right before we left because of we're like, hey man, like we're down on firepower. Like what is up with this? And somebody

said something to their congressman and, you know, they tried to try to make sure we're going to get it right. T and E, T. T.T.T.E. Something like that. T and E or BII is another term for the vehicle equipment. No, yeah, it wasn't BII. I can't remember the name of the, but yeah, somebody out there knows it. Yeah. And I know. Extra guns. Yeah, it's the equipment that belongs to the base, basically any soldiers that deployed to that particular base fall in on it. Yeah.

Yeah. But yeah, so we... No. That's a table of organization and equipment. Man, are we getting tripped up on our own acrony? We are. Yeah, we are. That's actually one of the things that there was one person who read this thing,

and it was an author, and it was like a good reads four stars. So I was that curious. And she, like, very quickly like, oh, no, no, no, no, like, you know, I'm not. I'm actually genuinely curious. Why? Like from the civilian standpoint, and she's like, honestly, I love the book,

but the acronyms, like, thank God you had the guide in the back. I tried to keep it, but I do know, like, in the beginning, like as I'm trying to familiarize with, it can be a bit daunting.

Yeah. You know, that's that tough. But it's also, it's also very difficult, I think, to write or talk about it. Military without using it.

Without using the acronyms. Yeah. Yeah. There's a few things, though, in there to where, like so in certain parts to where guys it goes from last names to first names and that is like I mean by the end of it we did have that type of familiarity and stuff it wasn't it kind of was like everybody

realized at one point hey man like there's no that end of the discipline end is no longer you know you're tight you can anticipate your moves matter of fact it was anticipating each other's moves to the point to where when the replacements came in we're like like, um, liability, man, like,

you know, we would almost, and it was the wrong thing to do quite honestly, but like shone them a little bit. We had one kid. First, first patrol out with us.

Yeah. You know, and thank God for him. It was buried too deep, and it only shattered his ankle, you know, and he's out there, you know,

screaming in the middle of the night and stuff. And me and Doc are like, oh, this is, this is going to be bad. And you get up and,

what's wrong? You know, it was just buried too deep, shattered his ankle. It reminds me of, was it the thin red line or, you know, an old, like, World War II movie or whatever, where nobody wants to know the Cherry's name until he's... Oh, it's in a band of brothers when, yeah, the new guys show up. Yeah, it's like, they were interviewing one of the actual World War II veterans, and he's saying, like, you don't really want to get to know them too well because you'll miss them if they get killed. You know, you'll feel bad.

Yeah. Yeah. No, it was starting to, I mean, at one point, like, I was approached by the platoon sergeant, like, hey, man, like, I'm going to have to rotate you back into the towers, like, because we just don't have the personnel. And I'm like, hey, man, like, I get it. Yeah. Got to do what you got to do. Yeah. So when you guys, you know, we talked a little bit about when you went down to Kandahara and then when you established the cop.

But when you guys got down there, was the patrol that you told us about? Was that the first sort of? the first time that, you know, it's like you took casualties. It's the first time we took, yeah, and that really took the wind out of the sails because, like, you go from that high moment from Helmand. Right. To where you had this picture perfect ambush. And it was almost like, man, like, we really, I mean, we were a rowdy crew. Yeah.

For sure. They definitely, um, they definitely could lay down. I mean, that's the whole reason why direct action. Like, we had a few times to where people, we got into a little bit of a tick with them and stuff. But they, yeah, they didn't like messing with us. Yeah. So yeah, but yeah, that was the first one that was, you know, it did. It took the window out of sales.

And Johnston was kind of that guy that it didn't matter. He had been there from the prior one. So he was like, there was this hierarchy to where, you know, even if you were specialists, but if you had a freaking deployment patch, right. You know, they ran that whole, you know, hey, it doesn't matter if you're the same rank. He's got a deployment patch. He's got experience like F you. Right.

So, but he didn't, he wasn't, he wasn't. that would hold that over your head. He was just a really personable guy. You know, you talk to him about really anything. He didn't spread stuff around any rumors and stuff. So for him to, for that to happen to him,

and he had actually pushed to be there. He had something, like he had a, which is why he had a beard. So he had a shaving profile. Our first sergeant was like an old guard guy. Freaking out about it, I bet. Oh, my God.

Well, he didn't want him to go forward with us. He was like, you aren't going nowhere, Johnston. You're a gas mask, won't seal if they hit us with mustard gas first order why is that troop hit he wearing a gas mess of formation oh my god mac probably would have you know if he thought about that he probably would have had him wearing a mask um but yeah you know he's uh he's tell him to hide out

kind of thing and everything and this kid actually went to start major and was like look man like I know I had like they straight up had a skin sample at the CDC trying to find out what this was and it was from prior deployment they were up in the mountains yeah so he had something like from this kid's fault I'm like yeah and he wasn't getting ingrown stuff like that because of that it was just he had a nasty reaction and it was a disease thing on his face they're trying to figure it out so he went to the uh sarah major so command serge major pucket and he was like you know send me forward the guys like like it come on man and he's like well does it is it hampering you or you know okay fine like

and he kind of pulled mac aside like dude this guy wants to go you got experience like let's let him go um you know and he joined us out there and then that yeah you know and really um that one that one affected uh mansirr major puckett to you know i mean and i i took that side in there and that was a rough chapter right that actually got put into their really last minute and it's morgue scene where Puckett realizes who got hit oh well yeah and there's you know that was we had guys coming back from mid-tore it was uh James Lee I think Hammer was with him um and Brunk yeah and Lee was like I was his team leader like let me go you know and identify the body kind of thing because they had been talking

in a towery and he went in with pocket and i kind of got that end of the story from them it's just you know it's heart wrenching man like and then to have that to see someone so uh pocket was somebody that i mean he jumped into panama he's got a mustard stain i was gonna say that name sounds very familiar uh his family's got a little bit of a military pass too but i mean he was just that hard charging picture of what we held in nCO to be i mean right right during the train up for all of this they were pretty intense but the thing the thing that differentiated him and the rest of the command team over with us is that they're always out there with us they're freezing their butts off with us like there was a incident to where we had one guy go down from hypothermia um and we bring them back in

and there's you know pocket there making sure we're okay on everything else sleeping alongside of us out in the stuff you don't get people that do that you know or when you do you know it's the real deal yeah you know they're trying to get a feel for the man and see really they're not sitting up on the hillside drinking the all right the troops right pins on a map man pins on a map well i mean but i kid you not like later on like we're out on a patrol and you hear you're like oh cool we got i sr like they're looking out for us and then shh a star major's wondering why your sleeve are rolled up and it's like are you freaking kidding me right now like you're supposed to be eyes on around us and you're worried about our freaking uniform infringements like are you

real-time intelligence turns into real-time oversight private get your hands out of your pockets dude like when it goes to that that's when you know you're like oh my god yeah yeah you so who was it then because you mentioned when you guys took that iED that you were calling back and they didn't believe you was it the ground force commander that didn't believe you was it back of the talk that it was back of the so it was back of the company talk it was more like they knew the boom happened it was just like that disbelief of like how's he so calm did that really just was that really them like did they actually you know but then it went into i mean it went into high gear um you know and catching some of the story end from some of the guys that were there they

afterwards like we're like i can't believe it just and even talking about it like they ran to us and you know you're thinking you know these guys are crafty enough to where absolutely yeah set some stuff in explode it if that's their SOPs to like run through a freaking minefield to get to you make sure you're all right heck yeah lay out some trip wires or some other stuff absolutely and they were I wouldn't put it past I mean the teams we had out there were the replacement teams were good um the minds were that simple in nature but that's what works and that's why you know i mean it was simple in nature but you can look at

to where they make cuts and tree lines and stuff to where your natural you know your eyes were naturally moved to that spot like hunting techniques that you use on deer yeah and stuff and just get you to flow into it naturally now those were the the minds that they were putting on the footpaths and stuff were you guys experiencing eFPs we didn't footpaths or not footpaths couldn't go for it like you couldn't even go that was like we had a big patrol map overlay yeah and like that was one of the biggest struggles was like okay like check our points here all right well no no we've been through here before you'd be out and you'd be like well wait a minute I remember that over here

like we're in a bad spot like we need to either back or freaking go this way or you know we've been yeah I shouldn't have said to the past I meant more like dismounted avenues of approach and whatnot like so they had those where you guys in your vehicles where you also experienced experiencing EFPs at that point in time? When we hit Argonob, like, we did nothing vehicles. That was probably, take any vehicles off. Heck no, like, yeah, once we were there in place, everything was light. We walked everywhere.

Okay. And, I mean, it was a small, it was a small A-O. Yeah. Yeah, you know, you would not want to, you wouldn't want to take vehicles into the Argonab. Yeah. Like, even just getting, um, getting some supplies into Johnston. Most of the time our mail would come in once a month on a sling load. And they'd drop it out in front of the, you know, out in the field.

And that was it. That's all you get once a month big trywall would come in You get one of one full of water and one full of one full of mail So yeah fun times So then what uh so we're back you know at your cop now and like what are your oper I know that you guys are short-handed there You're manning the towers providing security but you're also still patrolling patrolling constantly and what was the climate like during these patrols in terms of enemy activity and whatnot uh the psychological mind fuck that would happen because there really wouldn't i mean you just had to stay you had to stay hard postured you know and because the second you either

we had one towards the end to where it was like let's go out there looking messed up we even tried we asked the ceo you know because we occasionally would send people back into Kandahar we there was one time I think it was two months prior where they sent the LT out there for like food money stuff or something we ended up at Kandahar for some reason or other and they were trying to go to the PX out there to get the unit patches that were incoming we're like dude let's slap those bad boys on there because you know that they always try you after that like let's show them what's up so the new unit doesn't have so bad and the CEO would not let us do he's like no you are not all the right

you know I find out about it freaking but what are you going to do um but yeah they would they would just ghost they would just pull out and disappear so like one one in particular um you know we came up and the guys were preparing themselves to you know blow themselves up they had vests ready to go they were shaving themselves yeah we straight up just run across them in this orchard we were out with second squad with uh bobby mussel squad and the guys scooped up their a case and and i was like oh that was dumb got online and you know came through and we found there was a cache like 50 detonators sitting up in this like hole of a tree holy shit yeah and like in an area like that like it actually died down for a little bit um just due to the cache we found but yeah like i mean that was

it was all either by chance or like there's another one the chapter battle shits um the squad leader that should have been the title of the right right the same same squad i don't know why that was the absolute worst squad to piss out they were already anger squad like these guys rolled hard all the time and i mean anything like yeah it was just it like they would be up your butt um but yeah so they're out there and uh muscle sorry muscle just he had his nasty case of dysentery and um we came in we're going to run you know rnss patrols split it up and just run four to six men, you know, while leaving the rest in Overwatch back.

And this was actually out of Manjoy. And he's, he's taking a squat and the team leaders are putting security in. We have a machine gunner and a grated deer on top of there. And I'm below him with a dock and we're just, you know, we had just gotten there. So I'm radioing in our front line. Hey, we're in the compound over here, this and that. And we hear this cracking through the trees. like what the heck

and it clacked off a conced off of a tree limb that was hanging like right past the wall went around the corner boom pineapple grenade a guy still actually has the spoon

freaking he was using it as a key fob for his Jeep but yeah this grenade goes off you know and here's Bobby down you know he was just taking crap and he's still got it flowing out and he's ripping it up and throwing his kid on i've never seen anybody in one motion you know do something like that and um he throws it on and immediately

just straight into stack up on the freaking door you know and above us uh he's trying to shoot down in the orchard it's mad minute at this point they're firing up with a k's and he's firing but he can't traverse the gun low enough once again and this is a 240 all right so 23 pound yeah that's right hill i got the freaking pounded i said 29 before at the book launch and he's oh man you'll get torn apart actually yeah i know right hold on was it a limo or a bravo yeah yeah and god forbid you get the uh the uh the like the uh fee per second whatever it is like the velocity of the round there are people we've comments on our videos like every day well actually like the guy who is actually waiting the trolls are waiting right now they're like correct

Oh, he corrected himself. Correcting the guy who was actually in the firefight, like slaying bodies. Well, actually, I think that the caliber is okay, dude. But we love you guys in the comments. Right, right? Not all. No, we love you all. We love you all.

Every single one of them. So he's trying to fire down in there, but he ended up shoulder firing, you know, this 240 to get it down. He's getting splinters to the face, and he thought it was it. He thought he was done. He's versus Staples, James Staples. And the other guy up there, Chris Wiesner, who's the great of deer. And he yells down to his team leader, you know, Hammer. Hammer, I could see why Hammer was a hard ass.

But he goes down, Hammer, we shoot. Damn, man, freaking let him fly. And he hadn't, he hadn't fired the, man, he hadn't fired this thing in so long. And it went so far wide. Like everybody, it just, it was the weirdest, the whole. whole gunfight just went total silent and you see this thing as soon as it went out of the tube you know total silence way over the village just and you hear it in the background and then it just lights back up you know and he figured it out from that point and found his mojo and just went full cycle like i think

he put like 12 rounds down into the you know the compound next to us that we're that we caught this fire from everything in there when they flowed out and into there there there was like uh it was you know like a small barnyard in there there was cows and chickens and goats everything was dead like just all over the place all the livestock of these people basically their livelihood and they flow in first door they kick open that's out back as hammer you know was behind muscle he's coming up and in the doorway of the next door materializes an old dude with two kids clinging to his legs. You know,

a hammer had that split second decision. He looked at his hands, you know, and muzzle punched the dude and got him down on the ground, you know, like, took him out, but... Yeah. Talk about the right thing. Yeah.

You know, and having that positive ID, like, that was... Because people wouldn't have faulted them either if you just smoked them right there, but honestly. You know, it's a hard decision. Like, people don't understand how fast things like that happen.

And you can go from hero to zero, and nothing flat if you make the wrong call either way. Yeah, especially because later on there was a whole thing to where, I don't know if it had any deals with hesitancy with any of our incidents, this particular one. But later on, there was stories of like things circulating to where one guy went to jail. Not in our company. This was someone that knew somebody over in regiment, actually,

where he cut down some squatters. They had just been fired at from this position, and they're shooting at the compound. And it's clear that these freaking dudes are the ones that were, just doing the shooting at him. And of course, what would any machine gunner do? Brat! Yeah.

And he went to freaking jail for that. So when you start having the second think, whether you take the shot or not, that's bad news right there. Yeah. Bad, bad news. Yeah, it got tough. I remember, I think we've talked about this before,

but I remember an S-F guy in Oregon, probably around that time, telling me that any time they fire their weapon, there would be, what's the investigate, the 15-6? 15-6. Oh, yeah. not a 156 they probably

because that's an informal inquiry but they probably did a sworn statement we started doing those two in Iraq but understand Jags doing that to protect you yeah soldier yeah yeah that's not that's not because they're trying to fuck you that's because they're trying to like keep you out of trouble

but it's wild when you start ripping down the red tape there's a legal document for every shooting yeah is this a war yeah and that's and that's the thing is that like you know we've had like a J-Taxer FO CCTs on like the the whole the litany of things that they had to read in order to clear fires like troops in

combat yeah we are we have identified we are taking effective fire we have identified that there are no civilian that was a lesson later on actually learned by our CEO to where we had up on our opi we had guys one night on the clue positive ID on a bomb in placement team watching these guys put in the bomb night eight we got three four guys here and like let's hit him with the javelin man we're freaking spun up we got him on lock like let's do it and ceo's like hey get hold on and we're call up to battalion you know even though he i know and he goes back and was like i should have just freaking told him like take it yeah that was his authority at the time but he's like let me double check with battalion and he did and they're

like oh we got snipers across the way let them try to take it well nobody told them yeah talk about a freaking unprepared for one. Snipers didn't have any rifles up and ready to go. Yeah. And they take this shot with an unsilenced 240 in the middle of the freaking night. What do you think happened? Yeah. There's your bomb team gone.

I've heard countless stories where the drone operators are following a guy in a vehicle. They go through the whole targeting criteria. They get it cleared. And if the hellfire falls just a little short, the guy bails out of the car and runs. And they just have to let him go because, like, it would take so much time to work through the whole scenario again. Yep.

It's crazy. And the simple fact is, is there were not squirters in Afghanistan. There were maneuver elements. And even if, like, they knew the deal, they would drop their weapons. They would run. They would run to a cache. Yep. They would grab more weapons and then open fire on the troops when the troops were, like, maneuvering on the objective.

Yeah. There were no squirdered. quarters and for somebody go to jail for somebody punished like they're just maneuver elements well we're I mean it's just like life is different out there to where you get the stories of like entire villages like they're pulling up arms from the rear and they're having the women and kids do it and it's like whoa man like you don't realize this stuff happens it's a case of uh the commanders exceeding greatly exceeding our treaty obligations to international law. Like, a guy who is a squirter is not surrendering.

Right. Right. That's a lawful target. Yeah. You know, there's nothing illegal about, but they made the ROE because of the coin and what we're, as you get, well, when you start to model that in the battlefield, you know, like coins, coin worked well with the villagers, like, to a point. But when they start playing those, that end of things, and you know what they're doing.

Yeah. And they know you're a lawful enemy combatant. Yes. That's all there is. And what's funny is like they pick these things from coin. It's like, oh, you know, hearts and minds. But then, you know, talk about like Scott Mann earlier, they don't really want to do hearts and minds because it doesn't breathe well.

They just want to pretend that they're doing hearts and minds enough to, you know, to like to further their career. Yeah. It's where, yeah, there has to be the sanity check where people ask, what are we doing here? And even, okay, no, even the first, the talks with the higher ups that I've had, and even the first draft of the Ford that came back from General Hodges, like they have all echoed it. Like, we went in without a plan, without any way to work out of it. Like, there was no way forward.

Like, why were we really there? And it was just that constant, like, feed the machine. Yeah. And the thing is, what's very frustrating about it is, okay, you know, it was a response to 9-11. We went in without a plan. Fine. The plan is to kill AQ.

And then by proxy or because, I don't know, America was bored. It was really over in the first two years. Yeah, yeah, it was over fast. And then we decided that Taliban was our enemy. And then it's like, let's go chasing webbets. Then it's like, okay, we went in without a plan or the plan was to kill AQ, which is fine. Yeah. then now what's the plan and and the sin in it isn't that we didn't have a plan but we

over 20 years we never developed the plan we just we just developed new acronyms yeah and and I'm sure that there are a lot of bronze star stars awarded for those acronyms and you know the the power points and everything created that's that's the really tough thing I think for a lot maybe I'm speaking just for myself but I find that the difficult thing to deal with or to reconcile is that not that the effort was a failure or anything like that but that we sent soldiers over there

over and over and over again just because like we lacked a better idea. Yeah. Right? Like maybe the better idea was to withdraw, you know, but whatever whatever that idea was, yeah, it's all in the rearview mirror now,

but that we kept deploying soldiers for 20 years just because we lacked the creativity to come up with something else. And here it is again, though. I mean, that's the worrisome part is when you see it, like, just like the continuation of, it's like, what's the end state? Where are you going with this? You can't team America World please forever. Yeah.

Yeah. And a cop, I think, you know, and this is one of the reasons why I think convention forces need to get their stories out there because the cops are perfect examples of what was wrong with our war. in that somebody said this area is important and we need a presence there but the presence is going to be so thin like we're not going to dominate

we're not going to dominate this area we're just going to put a bunch of soldiers out there and Marines out there to be targets you know without the support necessary I didn't really see like where we were I didn't really see it that way

now I mean with some of that with this necessary support I know things would have been a little different with like if we had a CigNet team out there listening. We did have like the, hey, here, Terps, like here's something to listen to them. Let us know when chatter comes across. Yeah, you'd get that. But that's hell of a lot difference when you have. Oh, man, I'm trying to think of the name because I know one of them too.

Because that's the first thing he asked. Like, why didn't we have one of these teams out there? Like the Sadee teams? Sade. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, that's the first thing he asked.

Well, we're with Sade. And I'm like, quite honestly, I'm not sure. I know our company commander at that time probably didn't know about them. I'm pretty sure a battalion commander didn't either. Yeah. So, I mean, there's things that just weren't pushed to us that probably should have been. Yeah. At one point, you know, I know they were running like ground sensors and stuff.

Yeah. There's like certain things that, you know, really essentially what it ended up being overall, though, was we were building these targeting packages for task force. And we were a little bittersweet about it because like when we had like a fully completed package, you call this stuff up and it's like all right you know i'll record on you know drill and it's like bro that's our kill man yeah yeah yeah yeah somebody who's killing our guys like that feels kind of freaking yeah yeah and then all right well we're up tomorrow night you're going back out like dude like like come on man like let us get some retribution here yeah you know for something here yeah yeah

let us do our job be infantry right yeah i know like we're here we are doing a fit mission like and we normally kill and destroy which anybody man like that is one thing with soft and stuff a lot of the guys over there that are worth it will tell you there's nobody that Rex House more like on that when it's something on like an invasion or you just need to freaking pummel something

conventional army on the infantry side is greatly suited at that I mean the armor side too like conventional army can fight wars you know if you you know Man, him off the leash. Like, while you're maneuvered out, you're

Yeah, like, artillery, yeah. Yeah, like, golly, man. You know. Yeah, it's, it's very frustrating. And I know that, like, in your book, you talk about, um, you, you saw like this devolution, I guess, or I don't want to say evolution, but, but,

like, there were leadership challenges, too. Like, right? That, uh, oh, I thought that, like, Trying to remember which one. Well, I'm just talking about how, like, leaders were getting relieved that necessarily should have been. Yeah. So that was, I mean, that was like a whole big thing where, I mean, our, first it was our battalion commander. And sorry major, they got relieved for cause, you know.

And it was, it ended up being told to us, like, the story came down that it was just, it had to do with a racist image in a powerful. presentation that was a black iron chains saying like relieve us from this oppression like so these slides would be put in the they were called like demotivational slides and they were supposed to like kind of break up just with because of everything happening out there you're supposed to break it up well I don't know how that was breaking it up and really that what was told to us and what the scuttle butt between the guys was was that that was a plant like those guys weren't even there for that they had never approved that slide deck it was just someone put it in there and command was like you gotta take responsibility for it i mean it's a pretty gnarly screw up and the whole big thing too

was that they were on this one was also being broadcast back to pentagon type of stuff that didn't go over well yeah that was like an instant sub suboptimal outcomes so you have battalion command getting relieved and then of course shortly thereafter then you have macristo getting pulled out of command as well shortly thereafter so you're having just situation after situation of like this building storm where guys are like what's going on like the the head from command is coming out this is where petratus came in on really where i was able to get a hold of him he he was tracking like he knew um and even Hodges so Hodges had come out uh general Hodges had come out at one point to do the BDA battle drill assessment

on something that happened I had said Gondigan region before that was that highway right there so these guys were operating out of this compound with the Afghan police that it was like an in-cop compound out of Gondigan what was

HHC 1508 and we didn't even we would had no idea they were 850 meters away okay and would have no idea if it wasn't for the Blue Force tracker saying hey like boom like sorry hell's looking and he's like who the hell

who's this so we sent a patrol down there um and the hcc first arm was like I don't need infantry out here telling me how to do my freaking job get lost and we're like dude we just came out here to share TTPs and like find out who the heck you guys were

like we're right over here you might want to you might want to chill on some of this stuff and like push things out so the so the the HACC the headquarters company is out there to do a battle damage assessment? No, no, no, no. They're just out there doing something with the NCOP.

Okay. They had brought in. I mean, they had a talk established. There was like two or three Alaskan tents back there. I don't know exactly what they were doing. Okay. I don't know the whole that was, I was talking to the tenant colonel Ocklander about all that. They were getting their CIVs.

Maybe. Hey, I don't. No, I'm just kidding. So Ocklanders said to be a good, dude. Yeah, I don't know. No, this thing turned into a big. I know, like, I'm like, this thing went nuts. And it very well could have been meant for us.

Because, like, at one point, so the little motorcycle carts came up and it was actually Weisner. It was up in the tower. And he green-lazed them. So we had gotten intelligence that there was going to be V-Bin. So Sarin was like, hey, let's push the C-wire out. We have a road coming across here that we've been. allowing people there's an alternate road around the whole field whatever you know it's an extra 500

meters to walk they can deal with it uh so we pushed the sea wire out so like you could walk through we'd still allow the villagers to walk through but no vehicles so this vehicle came up and it kind of had like this like whoop and it was weird you know it was just like a weird so he greenlazed it and stuff and the guy was there for like another like 30 seconds and he like goes to shoot a pen flare out i mean he's like what's going on it's just like and the guy high tails out of there, you know? And it was like, all right, well, crisis averted, right? We were coming back in from a patrol in the town of Morgan, which was like right off of where our stuff was. There was a few weird little villages and stuff right there. And we're doing the

AAR and so having the skylights up. Holy heck, what was that? And tracers start coming through the air and the tower like because I have uh you know I have the radio that's linked into the towers on me you know as well as one to the talk and one to the platoon and I hear the tower like holy shit oh my god freaking shoot right at us and it's actually these guys down and gone again um but they ended up initiating with the donkey cart or whatever this was you know a little motorcycle cart uh blew a breach in the wall and just started sending in freaking, you know, human bombers, uh, tossing grenades, firing, yeah, they knew where all the bunkers were.

Wow. So, like, afterwards, I'm talking to the kid, like, one of the kids that was there, and these guys thought they were getting rocketed, you know, because they had been at Candarhart the whole time. They, they thought rockets were coming in. They weren't imagery guys. And they were all diving for the bunkers. Well, these guys knew right where the bunkers were.

And that's the first place they went. They flowed in. They went straight to the bunkers and just started. you know, turkey shoot. And this, oh man, I, and it's escaping arena now. I want to say Wade, but I can't remember the sergeant's name. Who, I figured that one out. But he ended up dying in all this. There was Chris, Lieutenant Chris Gecky died in that. That was, I just said that he was, they're not completely sure what happened. but they think that he went to tackle one of the suicide bombers.

And that's, they found him rolled up in one of the tents the next day when they were doing 100%. But we went to, during this, after this happened, it took us a good 10 minutes to get released. Like we were like, let us respond to this.

They are getting bucked up over there. And it was like, hold, hold, hold until it was finally like, we're going. And freaking the platoon sergeant had like supplemented with a gun team and some other stuff. I'm like,

we ran. You know, we ran. down the road and then around the corner into this thing came up to this thing and um they had just moved out and here we come to a smoking hole in the wall and like we started initiating medevacs and um there was this little freaking graveyard it was the only flat spot out there um so here's like an afghan graveyard with all these stones is like grave markers and stuff you get pelted with stones and black hawks are coming in and we're just loading people up on on the birds and me and my

Patoon Sartner, we're directing these things in along with the other guys and stuff. And then when that cleared out, we went in to supplement their security. And that was actually one of the guys. And, you know, I think in the book it was lieutenant, but he was actually had just gotten his captain. But it was Captain Scott Haran that was there. And I think he was with Charlie. He had just switched positions somewhere. And it was just like he wasn't even supposed to be there.

And he had led the basically clear stuff out. They didn't have anybody in the towers. That's like the biggest thing that what happened there is none of the American counterparts were up in with the Afghans. And it had something to do with the base for that particular tower.

The Afghan barracks were down there and they wouldn't allow the Americans to come through the Afghan barracks at night. Oh, interesting. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, re-between the lines on that one.

Yeah. There was a lot of... Panky, Pachabazi, Chihuahuali. Yeah. Yeah, like, so there was a bunch of that down there. That's, that's in there too. Yeah. You know, where they say that this practice was, you know, this is their culture.

That started in the 80s. Yeah. You know, with Muzidine out in the hills. Like, that's not a freaking long-time practice. That's people bored in the mountains. Yeah. Doing messed up things. Yeah.

Yeah. You know, one of the things that really comes across in this, book is really because it is like the losses that that like the basic second was taking yeah um could you speak to that a little bit like how what was the tempo not necessarily just in your company but but just like you know battalion wide or however you guys you know i mean yeah i mean it was across the board there was there was stuff happening all over bravo company uh We were taking some pretty heavy casualties out there. But, I mean, it was, we had one of our guys moved out,

and he was over at Brigade coordinating this. And he's just watching it across the board. He's watching too Charlie. And we're hearing it across the river from us. So we're getting blown up day after day. And we're just hearing gun fights, like, day after day. And we're like, dude, just let me just switch aos, man. Or just let us go over there for a day.

Like, let us roll through there. Let's take some frustration. out on these guys. It was just brutal. Like there's portions of it to where there's, there's a bunch in there even to where guys just blocked out periods of time. I know for me, my time at cop where,

like there's kind of a blank missing. And I wanted, because really after that bomb went off where Johnson was killed after Christmas, it was only a few days until I was loading up to go on MidTor. And I didn't even think about this until later on. And somebody asked me when they were interviewing me and they're like, did you ever like think about that and going back? I'm like, honestly God, it never even crossed my mind. Yeah.

Like now that you're telling me this, like I am realizing that my sheer stupidity, I guess, you know, as this, at that time I was 28 years old, you know, going back into it. I did do a little bit of, you know, I missed my flight. Yeah. out of what Atlanta there you know so I got to stay over an extra because I was flying back from Connecticut so Connecticut to Atlanta and Atlanta took weight you know so I did the whole tactical move of I'm not trying to like not show up but right oh man I showed up too late for today's rip like I guess I got one more night in Atlanta yeah bummer yeah but but yeah there was never any question and going back it was like a you know the feeling

and the need to go back with the other guys there. But really, I guess we had just experienced that. So, I mean, I guess I wasn't really thinking. It had just started, really kickoff in the Argonob. Yeah. But that had happened just before you went on your mid-tour. What was your mid-tour like knowing, like, that having happened and knowing, like, your guys were probably in the shit? Were you able to, like, put it out of your mind?

Were you thinking about it a lot? I wasn't. I literally was just like different place. Yeah. You know, completely separated. I went on a snowboarding trip and my brother. You know, they did a little family party thing, you know, and stuff. But like it was like, yeah, one week I was at home in the next week I was snowboarding for the week, you know,

and it was the mountains of Vermont and drinking sex and, you know, hooking up and all right. Yeah. back out and yeah I guess not really you know going back into it um you know getting there knowing I came back to the perfect perfect situation no I just it was like I'm just that like oh man realization right right back into it so I fly into where and during the time somebody had lost like a pair of nods or something a serialized sensitive item and of course first starting had the the burr up his butt to uh toss the whole place and he i'm like all my stuff is just strewn about on my cotton like my area back there and we were living um in gp mediums with

freaking plywood floors that we just scrounged up so we actually had a floor it was all just muddy anyway we tracked everything in springtime out there was oh it was bad um you know what my stuff's all over the place and i like i'm oCD and i like stuff like and i had so much shit there especially the RTO like I had like a whole other shelf because I had other tough boxes that the platoon sergeant had and I'm like what the hell is this like I hit the freaking roof and uh Sam hammer comes out and he's like well first aren't freaking they're looking for not so we had to cut your stuff sorry and I'm just like dude really what's the matter man you got a freaking problem and this guy like good dude but like always that like rough neck just infantry through

through. Honestly, God. And I was like, do I pick this fight with hammer? Or do I just, man, it's not worth it, man. Like, this guy, lumberjack, like previous lumberjack, he's a fighter. I'm like, dude, there's no sense in both of us

freaking getting into this thing over here, over this. Like, this is stupid. But I was like, man, isn't, isn't this just fitting? You know, welcome to the Argonob, kicking the deck. Yeah. Like, ah.

So, yeah. Right back at it. You guys also had, like, the counterintelligence issues out there. Like, you're working with the Afghans. You don't know where their loyalties are. You know. Seeing guys come up on cell phones as we're leaving. So you have to start, you know, oh, make it look like the patrols going this way.

And as soon as you're out of sight, be lying out or make a hook. Yeah. Can you talk about, we talked a little bit about the one. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So there was literally, we had brought. brought in contractors to work on.

And I think this was for, it was just base improvement stuff, you know, but some of this stuff was, we had some of this with copware to, you know, with the filling those Hesco barriers and stuff from earlier. So I brought these guys in, you know, build up the towers through the various things around the, around the base that we, you know, didn't want to do, didn't really have time to do, honestly. And the interpreter for these guys, there's always somebody there. to make sure they're not doing anything dumb, messing with anything, sabotage.

And there's somebody watching them, you know, guard watching these guys. And he's kind of chummy with the interpreter. And they're talking and stuff. Well, later on down the road, you know, when we were seeing these cell phones and stuff, we sort of were like, hey, you know, we're going to create this SOP to where we're going to confiscate the cell phones. And we had a cell X machine with us at the time. And we ran it through that. And we got this video off the first.

phone that is one of the kids that's garden, you know, garden the rest of the workers. And he's putting out these leading questions, you know, and he's really, I mean, he's just running this source. And this kid's not even realizing. And he's like, oh, yeah, you know, it's not anything crazy, you know, but it's, we can't see that great at night, really, with night vision. It's not how you think it is, you know, there's, it's grainy, you can't see as far. You can't see as well going through orchards. and stuff, you know, limited visibility. And this guy, you can see he's running this,

and this kid just has no clue. He's let him down this path, this gradual path. And, you know, sure enough, a bunch of the numbers and stuff, once we sent things in popped hot. And, you know, it was they showed up and rolled this guy up and never to be seen again kind of deal. Probably get them to somewhere or something. But, you know, man, you just didn't know.

Always watching. Yeah. Eyes on all the time. even the villagers you see somebody out there, they're just squatting down watching you. You know that they're watching you because they're just feeding information out. Yeah.

Yeah. Were most of the IEDs that you guys were dealing with, were they like pressure triggered or were you also dealing with the cell phone activated? There was everything. They started giving us, we had, and I think they're in some of those pictures with that Thor system to where you had to run, you had to run them in a sequence.

There's a certain way you had to run it and those counter frequencies that they would have for those. They did work when the guys used them but it really, the tradeoff, so people were starting to get headaches. Right. And I mean, we're literally leaving the wire once

and this kid is like, he's Sorgia, I don't feel so good. Like, he's got blood trickling down his freaking nose and we're like, dude, like, these things are bad, you, juice we redirected the first canal and we're like this squad that's like sit down the kids like they're not putting two together he's like sit down in the water until the machine stops working and the fans on these things the cooling fans are like spitting water out and stuff

and it just finally dies out and he's like oh bummer guess we had an equipment malfunction we got to bring them back and there they sat in the back of the talk for the rest of the time but we were just like, yeah, we're not going out there with brain scramblers. Yeah. So these systems that he was talking about are these jammers that are supposed to intercept or interrupt like cell phone signals, radio, same, type, different types of initiations. The thing they didn't tell people, though, when they were using these systems, they're putting out a ton of like radiation.

Yeah, like R. and whatnot and you're already getting some for an RTO yeah I mean yeah the same deal you rotate those positions for that very reason like you get yeah you're absorbing radiation and those like high power radio frequencies so here's these things are strapping on essentially that are constant so the army labs didn't do a whole lot of testing on these systems should have done the full right up eight mice I think it was yeah yeah it worked with the chips yeah yeah yeah oh man so yeah and that was a thing is that like probably a lot of times when you guys went out like the bad guys knew you were going on it was more important to pay attention to the flags to the different like to people that were out there to like patterns of life that was knowing your environment knowing what's right and knowing like what's normal there that was the important thing right it's not you know all these gizmos and everything else.

That was, that was dumb. And how, how did you guys, like, learn that? Did you, would you have,

like, big, like debriefings where people say, hey, I saw this or I saw this? Or was it just a matter of, like, picking it up as you want?

A lot of it was adaptation from the guys. I mean, there was literally, guys were taken, um, oh, there was one of them took a crescent wrench at one point.

And, you know, like, how they usually have a loop on the end of a crest, creset wrench, you know, is the adjustable wrenches. And he tied off some 550.

pull it in all right we're going up to that point walk up pull it in it's that bad there was someone that they had sent out of kids fishing rod those little

so you put a little weight on there because a little bit further distance than the crescent wrench it was all adaptation every single bit of it and then at one point I think it was the last like two weeks or something

we rocked the roads the whole time because anything that was in the roads had been pulled out and we're like all right we're going to take it easy the last two weeks and we were walking the roads and they're like how are you walking the roads and it's like because we know nothing's in them now they pulled it all out to freaking put it out through the whole landscape you know I mean it was still probably just a crap shoot but you know at one point they they pulled out

and there's a picture and our sergeant major had no idea until this reunion and they told them but there's this picture of them right before uh the we had this one portion that they constantly cleared the lock they do the lock patrol line of communications you just always have to have that open and um where he's standing in this picture there was six set in our patrol like in our staggered road column just ready to go just waiting for the right moment and they found him like dug him up and we're like man we've been walking this for like two months now three months now like what the heck they found one on the base like yeah on the established compound i think it was on by the flight line but yeah they dug one up and they're like holy crap like there was so many iEDs out there

later on there was a guy um 2012 they did a survey and they they found that it was the most probable that every 200 yards it was an iED every 200 square yards that's nuts it might have been feet I want to say yards though was the that's still it's crazy what was for like the company

in that area do you know what like the monthly average of like casualties was for you guys literally again because we were apart and I say

I mentioned it in there when we got back to Kandahar hey where's so and so oh man you didn't hear like we were so compartmentalized where we didn't even we weren't catching up like who was

out of the fight you know we're back at Walter Reed yeah and really I mean at one point they they filled the whole prosthetics wing oh no the whole wing at Walter Reed was our guys from two fury it was nuts yeah that was one of the things that I mean there's so many

like individual stories and so many things we could tell stories all night and it's still full of it's that's that's one of the things is the book is just almost overwhelming in the in in that way. And it's only from the platoon level. Yeah. And people are like, well, why didn't you write a company one? And I'm like,

yeah, because there's more of the story and I didn't want to to make it an easy read for one. Like you get any more than that for an infancy guy, they're going to be like, yeah, I'm not reading that. Yeah. You know, like when I well, I mean, that's the other thing. Yeah. You could easily be writing the five volume set, right? Yeah. It's written at a high school

level for that. I started thinking about it like, no, I want this to be able to be picked up by either someone that's in high school that wants to join because this is your full spectrum. Like I show the great, the good times and I show the crap. You know? I mean, you got both in there. Yeah.

And it's really like, hey, know what you're getting yourself into. I, for one, like, I knew for a fact that in the Argonab like my time there and where, I was right where I was supposed to be, quite honestly. Like even all those years ago and like everyone were like, wow, that stuff happened to you. I'm like, it happened for a reason,

man. And I was there for a reason. Yeah. You know, I mean, there's been thing after thing with this book that has just been, it's just affirmed it. It's been very, like, crazy. We're sitting here today off of, you know what I mean? This is. Yeah. It's nuts.

I was going to say that the book is very easy to read. It's a fast read. It's, you know, it's very condensed. Yeah. Like, it covers a lot. I'd love to go back and do a literary version at some point, but, like, it's really. right for what it is it is it's it's it's not um you know sometimes history books uh or you know are can be like exhausting dry boring yeah like you see that this is where this comes

indifferent to where you're getting a nonfiction account and dod approved this is normally something you only get at general officer level but it's not that boring uh you know shoot yourself in the foot like i want to get out of this kind of thing but it's you know i mean it's because it's from us on the ground yeah you know yeah we're down the road you know our or CO at some point will probably come out with that historical version maybe it will be boring he he's a hell of a of a writer I've seen some other stuff he's written now and I'm like man my wind's yours coming out yeah yeah it's this good yeah it's going to be interesting to see all the stories that come out of Afghanistan there's already too uh so Charlie that was across the river that I was talking about taking

firefights this thing um I've been helping him out with some of it and so but it's already inspired him to bring his story forward. There's talking battalion stuff. There's the other patoons. And again, I've told them. I'm like, all right, man, like, I now have an end and I know people. I want to help you bring this stuff out. And if we have something like, I'll, I'll help you bring it to the publisher. I don't care. Like I, I did these hurdles and I did them for a reason. I'm not stubborn, son of a bitch that freaking stuck with it this whole time. So I mean, that's one of the follow-ons is doing, as a military person, we're good at following. frameworks. If you give us a blueprint of what to do and what path to follow, we're very good at that.

And it's really like, I'm good to figuring stuff out. Man, you put me, like I was saying before, they put me in Hardy Hall. And I figured that building out and the whole problem out in two months. They're like, who are you, man? Like, we just set you out. And that was actually the first time I had someone come back and say, like, hey, if you ever thought about going over the Cag side? And I'm like, no freaking way. Are you kidding me? And they're like, no, there's some. There's some, stuff there like yeah and I got told later that's actually I had my packet in um and then you know my now wife had come to me and been like hey I'm I'm pregnant and I'm like I kind of had to put it up and say all right yeah yeah yeah what are you going yeah what are you good because there's only one

at that level there's only one yeah and I was like dude military hasn't really worked out for you at this yeah you know and just see what's up maybe you can do some like more good outside of there so I mean really that's sort of been these last few years in getting out, you know, navigating business school in two and a half years. And Tauson, man, it really would have been two years. I'm really pissed that it wasn't two years. I had a throwaway semester. The calculus professor, they threw us this last minute, um, standardized test, you know, from higher. And I'm like, this isn't even written like the same way that she explained stuff and I bombed it you know so I can test it though I'm like no way like

and I redid it but it was she summered in India so I mean the alternate test was all good and everything and I passed it but at that point business school all those courses were filled up and they're like well like dude like I'm living on GI Bill money right now right I have to keep I can't just say all right I'll take this semester off right so I filled it up with a journalism class oh ha weird how that worked out. It kind of, kind of is. Don't get me. I've never taken a journalism class in my life. I know you never did. I was just going to

dig at you though. But the other one, like digital graphics. So the guy, I reached out afterwards, the front cover and I'm like, hey, you know, what do you think of this? And he told me like, hey, smooth this font to this and changed these lines to this.

And it really made it pop and stuff. And he, crazy enough, another weird thing, he does work. for the National Museum of the Army down at Belvoir. He does all of their documentation and their print stuff and to have that resource to run into that. And then all of a sudden, it's this

and I can reach out to that resource. And he's another veteran too and be like, hey man, like, through this thing, there has been so many different guys that have just they've reached out and they've helped out. And it's been so collaborative. It's been refreshing to see because we do,

you know it. We were talking about some of this before. You see these gatekeepers and we see these people out there. Like, I literally had one with this. Like, with the PR stuff, there's, um, I don't want to go too far into it. Cause like, I don't want to identify who it is. Yeah, exactly. Right. You know, but like, this is what this guy does where I'm at.

And I reach out and it's like, well, what's in it for me? Like literally asked me that. And I'm like, damn. Dude. What? Yeah. Like, your mission said is to help other veterans, and it says it in all this stuff. And I'm like literally talking to you about on how a peer-to-peer support, like talking about curbing veteran suicide and offering these peer-to-peer support groups because nobody in our area is doing it.

And just to talk about sharing our stories together, because it worked out in an instance with myself. And I'm like, if that's the case, sure, let's get some clinicians out here on border. At least let's work towards something, anything. You know, I don't see anything in a veteran community out here That's anything other than the occasional Veterans Breakfast or VFW thing I don't go over the VFW bar, so that's not my scene Yeah, you know, and the breakfast club

I mean, that, okay, you know, it's special for some of those guys But normally you just see the World War II hats Yeah, out there and stuff like our generation doesn't do that into things We want to go to the gym together maybe or like, you know, it's just different Yeah You know, and it doesn't translate and going there saying, like hey like somebody who's fired up about doing that and stuff and just to really quite honestly take a piss on my Cheerios right off the bat and I'm like dude it's brutal man yeah

it is terrible you know I I met with a with a SF guy this week actually who's thinking about going into journalism and wanting to write and it's like we should be like encouraging all of these people yeah no absolutely talk to these people think about doing I'm probably the last guy to give give advice the jaded you know I don't do it bro it's cow all over again I told them exactly that I was like it doesn't pay anything understand that you know

I've had people say oh man you just had a book you're paying I'm like duty you knew man starving artists people think you're Tom Clancy because you know the book yeah it doesn't work quite like that but uh

but no we should absolutely encourage these guys to share their experiences and share them with the with the American public especially because I mean how can they know if we don't talk about it yeah kicking them in the dick before they even get started.

It just leaves that thing of, I mean, you know, yeah, good luck, man. I think that's part of this, too, is maybe it just took the fact that I'm not somebody you want to freaking kicking the dick like that. You know, I just get angry about it. I'm like, what am I going to do about it? Okay, fine. Like, I'll figure it out. And I, oh, I am.

I'm speaking in front of a group that he's actually involved with coming up soon. Oh, you're going to spill some tea, huh? Throw some shade? Nah, I'm just going to mean mug them while I freeze. I won't be petty about it, but he'll know for sure. We'll definitely give them that E. You mentioned the veteran support stuff. How are the guys from First Platoon doing?

How are the guys from Bravo Company doing? So there has been, there is definitely, you go through a situation like that, you have bonds together. I mean, that really transcend a lot of stuff. There's been issues. I mean, the suicide race, I think battalion is up to 30 people, you know, for suicides at this point. Bravo Company.

I think I put, I know there was, Sergeant Alan Thomas was one of them, you know, and we had talked about that before. To where, really, I mean, nobody knows the full thing. you know nobody knows everything that happened during that incident um but really it was like he went and cleared his neighbor's house you know and shot and killed two people in the neighborhood got into a gunfight you know and then it ended up taking his own life you know most of the guys go to say that you know nobody was there so we don't know but really the way that i look at it is he probably realized what he had just done you know i had seen what breaks me up about it is i had seen sart

Thomas you know and this part's in the I'm pretty sure this is in the book and I had seen

him when I was over in the Q course and we ended up at the same gym he was in Warrior transition unit and you know

he noticed me I noticed him you know I was like hey what's going on man I kind of popped away from my group talk for him

for a little that hadn't seen him in a while and yeah it just it wasn't the same Thomas he was hollow

it was just like an emptiness he wasn't you know Thomas was always the guy that would make you know he would be the one everybody would be laughing at he was a character you know you can't talk about first between you can't talk about Bravo company about talking about that guy

just a good solid dude for that to happen you know has a lot of people go and reevaluate you know and then other people I mean Derek Sergeant Derek Hill he was another one and I was actually after that one

someone had said something at the funeral and it was overheard by one of the wives but they had said I guess I'll see you the next one and they were like yeah that's heavy that's freaking heavy but I mean they decided to do something about it and I talk about that too

on that peer group side of things that was really how they kind of birth operation and resiliency through that and it was so our company was the pilot for that And when you normally see reunions and stuff for like a company, an infantry company, 20 people, if you're lucky, this was like 120 freaking people showed up. It was insane.

And I showed up, I showed up on day two. I had actually like basically got on a plane right after one of my midterms or something. It was like an exam to where I was like, I can't be there day one, but I feel like I got to be down there. But it was really good to reconnect with a lot of those guys and stuff. And really in seeing on how this group was run in that getting guys to open up with one another and like, hey, it's okay to talk about this stuff. And it's okay to show these emotions. And it's okay to cry on one another shoulders.

You know, we were all there together, man. It's not a big deal. But then have those clinicians there on standby in case. you know, goes further or in case it's like, hey, I am willing to talk. And there's one in particular that I'm thinking of that, like, he literally told, told us later on, like, I had been thinking about ending it when I got the invite to this thing. And I was like, well, hey, what's one last time seeing the guys before it'll be, it'll be nice to see the guys before I go? You know, and through this, you know, he kind of realized like, hey, man, like, I want to be part of that change. and I mean he works in the system now

in that like trying to talk people off that ledge and stuff I mean really that huge success story there you know but there needs to be you know I mean there needs to be more right like and this stuff needs to be it needs to be across the board you know I know we just had Veterans Day this last thing and I know Sebastian Younger's doing stuff with vets Town Hall giving vets a voice and stuff but really you know I think that end is really good too

I'm wondering like on why we don't have more of those too it seems to be northeast region you know I'm literally I got his email through one of the guys that you know and that's another thing too to speak to the testament of the guys and stuff there was one of the guys one of the two Fury guys um who was like hey I'm going to this younger event and we had been talking

and I'm like look man if I get you a book you know would you approach him about it and he's like you know what if I can I will and he didn't know I'd already been talking to the guys of the museum about doing an event up there

so I hit them up and I was like hey man like look and really it was more for him on that end because I'm like if he doesn't bring the book I guess that's a lot of pressure yeah but I was like can you get him a side thing

and they did and he you know he got to to meet with him and everything but he I get this picture you know that night of him holding the book with Sebastian Younger there wearing a two Furious

And I'm like, dude, like that support and for those guys to be doing this, like, that's why this is where it is and why group efforts in collaboration with veterans, it's a powerful thing. Yeah. It really is. Yeah. We need to be doing more of this stuff out there. Yeah. We talked about a little bit afterwards about like the frustration of the war and whatnot. And your last chapter of the after effects.

And, you know, talking about the trauma. talk about the frustration, talking about all that. Can you sort of like sum up, sort of for you, at least personally, like what the after effects of all of it is, your time there, the men you served with, the results of the war, things like that? I think a lot of this stuff, we have so much potential. And I think that so many guys, they look at it in reverse. They look at it as we're broken.

and it's not man like you may have been broken down but really you're forged you're forged you've been through so much more stuff than the average person you've seen what leadership under high stress environments looks like and quite honestly like we're at

a time in America right now so we're like we need leadership we need these good leaders like we need to have other vets out there standing up and like doing stuff showing their communities it doesn't even have to be a veteran community like go out there like That was this last summer.

There was nobody, for God's sake, teaching kids soccer. Like, no parent would step up to do it. And I was like, fine, okay, let's go. Let's do it. Like, and these kids gravitate towards that. And they see that end of things. And they see, like, you know, that coach end to where you barked this stuff out and they put in this hard work.

But then you also, like, take a knee next to him. And be like, hey, look, I know you're hurting right now. Or, like, you know, are you okay? to have that other soft side of it too. You're checking up on them and you're making sure that, you know, essentially your little troops are taking care of. Right, right. You know, but these, all of these military skills are translatable down.

And I think a lot of guys either lose that end, you know, when they burn their uniforms, when they get out and whatnot, and stuff. They just don't repurpose it, you know, into the civilian side of things. For me, a lot of it has been using it to drive stuff forward. I do know that I've seen some like correlations to where I've heard with you Hey I was you know my marriage was spiraling

And I was at Columbia and this and that Well yeah I took my graduate level stuff at Columbia too You know and with but I was pushing myself to like hey If if if the possibility is there for me to finish business school in this amount of time And I mean a pretty good one too Like let's try Ivy League Okay wow hey I got some Ivy League stuff under my belt Like what's really really?

possible and just keep pushing yourself um but on the flip side too like i know that sometimes i will push myself over that edge of exhaustion or to where i'm taking out things on my kids um and stuff to where it's like i'm back of high luxes yeah well no it's just like that hyper hypervigilance thing but then also that like i want it done and i want it done now and i want it right and like and it's like they're just kids man like freaking you need to back off yeah yeah not you're You're not your team, a little infantry bubbles. Yeah. Like, they're kids.

Yeah. And they want to be kids. And, like, give them that time to grow up and, like, listen to them. And I've learned so much through watching them, too, just like that wonder in their eyes and not giving the tablets over to them. And, like, keeping them, like, they're five and seven. You know, so, I mean, they're small. But when you're out and you see a parent, now I want to spend the time. And what is that, man?

Yeah. You know? Yeah. I kick myself sometimes. Like sometimes it is necessary. Like, hey, kid, like, you know, all right. Yeah. You got to do something and you're, you know, and I just can't deal with this right now.

Yeah. But afterwards, I kind of look at it. I'm like, damn it, man, you did it again. All right. So having that mindfulness on that. Being self-aware, like, how we act sometimes, it's like just reflex, but having the awareness to know. I mean,

when you call your five-year-old, the new guy, hey, new guy, like, the knife hand, you, yeah,

give him the knife hand. Chicken fucker. Yeah. Oh, crap. But yeah, I think, I think that's,

I think that's very, I think that's very challenging, uh, in all aspects of our relationships that, you know, you have, you have these relationships you're used to in a combat environment. You have combat war.

like you say it's like one foot on the gas one foot on the brake you know until it's time like you're like you never hit the gas the gas is always on it's just you take the break off you're left foot breaking yeah and um and then to to try to you know be present

for for relationships that that don't have anything to do with any of that because you don't like we don't either anymore yeah you know well sometimes it is that snapping like my wife says it and it actually matter of fact it came back in it it didn't really fully hit me until i heard the tom saturday interview and he said something about his wife saying it's not what you're saying it's how you're freaking saying it what do you mean but then when i heard it from him i was like oh oh and i kind of got like it clicked and i was like oh shit yeah like i am i am freaking

just barking out stuff sometimes like or going that route and it sets it off on you know that defensive mode yeah that's something we gotta be aware of you know i mean it's i'm sure civilians you know my wife says it all the time she's a nurse yeah you know and she's like god these veterans come in it's like ugh such a pain to deal with yeah no i i've been in the va and like for surgery and stuff like staying over i like hearing hearing other veterans in the hallway like i know how high maintenance veterans could be like veterans It's going to be understatement. Very, very high maintenance.

How's been your care at the VA? Like, honestly, like, I'm curious. Care is great. Here in New York, the doctors are phenomenal. Yeah. Because they, I mean, a lot of, you know, rotate through other, you know, they're like in other hospitals. Oh, yeah.

Like Baltimore, they have Hopkins and University of Maryland that they're doing all the teaching schools. Yeah. The care is great here. It's getting the care that you're doing. generally, like, if you need a specialist, you have first have to get referral from your primary care, which is a month. It takes a month to get primary care. Then they give you a referral and that takes a month generally. So, so hopefully like it's nothing, you know, that needs to be.

Like when I had to have my arm, you know, rebuilt basically, they had to re-break it because because they couldn't get me into surgery because it wasn't an emergency, they couldn't get me into surgery in time. But when they did, though, the doctors who did it did a phenomenal job. Yeah. The problem is those wait lists,

you know, there are other veterans who are like in such bad shape that you tell them come back in eight months and they're dying in that interim. Yeah. You know, before they get in there. Yeah.

And when I, like, when I had my assault, when that trauma, because it was during COVID, like they were trying to give me virtual appointments month away.

I was, it was, and, it was, it was a nightmare. Yeah. But I, I think the VA has a strategy of, if you have something that's really serious, they'd rather you just die. It's like one less thing. So, so that's why, like, the, like the, the wait list or the month long is, it's sort like a gatekeeper thing. It's like, well, if they can make it a month, we'll see them.

Problems take care of themselves. Problems solve themselves. Exactly. No, I'm just, I know I've been a lot of the same thing. Like the workers, like, it's like the people online and stuff like second and none. I've never had better like actual care there. But then when you're on a, like I'm on a wait list right now where it's like I waited six months. And then they're like, hey, see you in two weeks for surgery.

And I'm like, dude, I'm not even around in two weeks. And nobody called the schedule. Right. Schedule something. Yeah. All right. I'm canceling your appointment and somebody would reach out. Yeah.

And then it's like, oh, we have an opening six months. out there. Yeah. And we have an opening six months from now, right? Yeah. I'm just like, dude. Yeah. So, it's Graham, what's the next book? What's the next project? Honestly, the next project? I'm pretty sure like, knowing the way that I guess things go for me, it's probably just

in reverse. Like, it's the book that I wrote five years ago having to do with my transition experience and like all these frameworks and stuff. I put in stuff like between, quite honestly, I think that the, while transitioning out of the military, that's really where this disconnect first happens.

You know, and now that's where we fail the guys almost immediately. The TAPS program, it's essentially a freaking writing resume plan. Like, that's really it. I've been told it's better today. That's what they tell me. The one I went through was a joke. Yeah. But that was also 12, 13 years ago now.

Okay, so mine was in, my active duty one was 15. 18. I didn't even anything with the reserves at that point. Like I got word six months after I was in the reserves that, you know, all my stuff came back from the VA and they're like, oh, you should have been like medically retired. I'm like, okay, so can we do that? You know, they're like, well, you know, and the reserves just held on to me for the rest of my contract. So I did two and a half years unpaid with the reserves.

They just wouldn't release me. And I'm like, you got to be kidding me, man. I'm showing up the drill and they just used me for tactical stuff. Like, dude. And they didn't pay you? Double dipping. Oh. So you can't.

So it's just better off not to take anything from them. Oh, okay. Yeah, it was a joke. It was like I couldn't believe. I'm sure somewhere down the line, like someone will catch wind of it and get rectified. I doubt. I mean, maybe. Yeah.

Who knows? But yeah. So, I mean, really, I'm probably going to start hitting on that one, quite honestly. Where can people find you? I mean, obviously pick up the book, buy the book, read the book. It's a phenomenal book. Review the book. Review the book.

Leave a review for a book. Yeah. But yeah, no. But where, oh, this is a mic. Where else can people find you if they want to, are you on social media, if people want to follow you? So, I mean, you can do your standard retailers and stuff, but there's also damn the valleybook. Dot com. And that has all of the basically link tree of, you know, you've got your Instagram, your Facebook, your YouTube, you're, I think I just picked up a Reddit too.

But I just constantly put stuff out, like daily, daily content. It's all scheduled on there. And I just put the extra, shove extra things in there that people don't want to hear while pushing the book thing. But yeah, I mean, there's daily pictures from Afghanistan out there. But really, like that's been the whole thing, like building in that whole package. They can go down to the Airborne and Special Operations Museum to where we're, we had the book launch and see the damn flag from the cover it's on display um in the museum down there they can see lee's backpack uh with the ball bearing hole through it and the p-mag

that's split open like i think that's what's really made this special is it's gone i've gone through this process and this extra stuff um but yeah i mean go down to the museum check this stuff out go online to damn the valley book.com i have signed copies on there um if you bring me a sign copy or unsigned coffee, I'll sign it. I don't care. I'll go by stores and sign stuff up if it'll help people buy it, but I just want to get the story out there. Yeah.

But if they get them from the author signed ones on the website, I ship them out, but for every two that I sell, I get one out to the guys that are there. I'm just basically building, I'm just using crowdsourcing on it. I didn't want to go, hey, donate so I can buy 150 books. I kind of feel

I'm that person who's like, I'm not going to take that handout. I want to something in so if it takes my signature on it to be able to get them out there and get them to the guys then okay so be it you know if Netflix wants to be cool you know make the deal and I'll then I'll buy the guys the books but right now Netflix get on it

yeah Amazon what's the other ones no yeah Prime Studios no because I can see I can see this book and books like this you know if you're talking about Two Fury or whatever whenever there's so many good stories out there that they can become

sort of the next like band of brothers type shows yeah and they should be i mean these extreme instances of like you know life death like all this the it has the full spectrum there's so much in there yeah look if somebody can produce lone survivor they can produce this if i if i can write this yeah you get that dan bilzerian guy uh behind it oh god didn't he yeah Reach out to your Hollywood contacts and make this happen, man. There's some people out there tracking, honestly. I've had some things pop on my LinkedIn. Like, hey, you're getting eyes from here.

And I'm like, hmm, we'll see. Time will tell. So next week, we'll be back with Zach Dorfman. Come on on the show a second time. He produced a whole journalistic podcast about spies infiltrating Silicon Valley. So we're excited to have him back on the show. in the meantime hope people will go and pick up the book give it a review

what other people know about it and thanks for coming to this studio man appreciate it thanks for having me guys seriously it's been awesome yeah great so all right we'll see