The Team House - SEAL Team 6 Operator | Trey Lindsey | Ep. 349

Episode Date: May 31, 2025

A 20-year Navy veteran, Trey Lindsey served 18 years as a Navy SEAL, including 13 with SEAL Team 6, undertaking numerous combat deployments. He's now the CEO of Gallowglass Guardian Group, providing tactical and security consulting for law enforcement, military, and civilians. Trey is also a Louisiana POST certified and NTOA instructor.Find Trey here:website: http://3gstrategicconsultants.comSwag Store: https://www.3gmerch.com Knife Company Website: tsgblades.com (Should be live within a week or two)Email: [e-mail]- gallowglass3g / theetl3 / tsgbaldesStrategic Partner- Do A Little Good Foundation (https://dalg.org)Jacquelyn (Jacki) ReadAthena Defense Groupwebsite: https://www.athenadefensegroup.comInstagram- Athena Defense Group--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Today's Sponsors:GhostBed⬇️https://www.ghostbed.com/houseFOR 10% off! For ad free video and audio and access to live streams and Eyes On Geopolitics...JOIN OUR PATREON! https://www.patreon.com/c/TheTeamHouseTo help support the show and for all bonus content including:-live shows and asking guest questions -ad free audio and video-early access to shows-Access to ALL bonus segments with our guestsSubscribe to our Patreon! ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouseNew merch, patches, and stickers! ⬇️https://theteamhouse-shop.fourthwall.comSupport the show here:⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouse___________________________________________________Subscribe to the new EYES ON podcast here:⬇️https://www.youtube.com/@EyesOnGeopoliticsPod/featured__________________________________Jack Murphy's new book "We Defy: The Lost Chapters of Special Forces History" ⬇️https://www.amazon.com/We-Defy-Chapters-Special-History-ebook/dp/B0DCGC1N1N/——————————————————————Or make a one time donation at: ⬇️https://ko-fi.com/theteamhouseSocial 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/RemixSample"Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio"00:00 Start01:15 Childhood dream sparked by Rogue Warrior.04:58 BUD/S taught "eat an elephant one bite at a time."10:16 Unique entry to SEAL Team 4's deployment.16:03 First deployment's focus: direct action raids in Fallujah.34:58 Joining SEAL Team 6: A natural progression.40:24 Key role in Jessica Buchanan hostage rescue.1:11:08 Post-military mission: enhancing law enforcement safety.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support.

Special operations. Covert Ops. Espionage. The Team House. With your hosts, Jack Murphy and David Park. Hey, everyone. Welcome to Episode 349 of the Team House. I'm Jack Murphy.

On tonight with our guest, Trey Lindsay. Trey served in the Navy, first in law enforcement, before he went over to Seal Team 4 and then Seal Team 6. served on deployments around the world and now works as a training organization and knife company involved in law enforcement. And also he's the guy that I end up working for once or twice a year. So that's how we know each other and just know him to be an all-around great guy. And we're really happy to have you here on the show today. I appreciate it, brother. Thanks again for having me on. Yeah, man. So start at the beginning. Tell us a little bit about how you grew up and how that took you

towards the Navy. No, absolutely. So I grew up in a small town in rural northeast Missouri called Canton. It's about two hours north of St. Louis. And I joined the Navy nine days out of high school. And people often ask me, like, hey, why did you, you know, how long did you, you know, before you wanted to become a seal or this and that where he actually did it? And for me, I was 12 years old. I read the book Rogue Warrior by Richard Marcinco, the first commanding officer of Seal Team 6, and I was hooked after that. So I read it in between the summer of my six and seventh grade years. And so, yeah, after that, that's all I wanted to do in my adult life growing up. So I joined the Navy nine days out of high school and then the rest is history at that point.

Yeah, so you went in first, you know, before special operations, you went as a Navy police officer. I mean, tell us about that. Yeah. So, again, I wanted to be a seal, but I guess I always like kind of joke now that my recruiter got me pretty good. So after 9-11, the mastered arm rate, the Navy cops, they were like a critical source rating. So I had to go to to my first duty station for a year before I was able to screen for a special program. So, I mean, it all worked out in the end and kind of like I'll cover later on in the podcast,

you know, like just really how being a Navy cop mastered arms has helped me a lot with what I'm doing post-military life. I never dreamt they would actually come full circle the way it has, but it's funny how things just work themselves out like that. Tell us about what that, you know, profession actually entailed that you did for a year

before going to the teams. Yeah, so it was a lot, very heavy in physical security. So obviously, you know, 9-11, already happened. I joined in, you know, 2002, you know, right out of high school. So Afghanistan was already underway, but it wasn't Iraq did not, you know, the invasion of Iraq didn't happen until March of 2003. So a little known fact, I think the majority of the initial Shokkanah ordinance that was, that was dropped during the initial push, initial invasion, actually came from one of the, one of the duty stations I was in physical security of, you know,

at the time in the southwestern Pacific. So again, it was just kind of, of multiple shifts, you know, we were pulling, you know, constantly when they were bringing ordinance to the aircraft, you know, some of the aircraft of the Air Force base, but also on some of the carrier battle groups that were pulling in the port, they would pretty much, you know, have all these, you know, weapons systems stockpiled and they would, you know, they would, you know, take off, take off from there. Then once the initial invasion happened, it was just a steady flow of that. So that very heavy in physical security. Some, you know, law enforcement act, aspect of things, you still have, you know, things you're dealing with on base, but really was,

you know, a little different than your typical law enforcement job, you know, in the civilian world that, you know, the men and women, you know, who are serving the communities are sworn to protect have to deal with. Yeah, I mean, it's super important stuff when you're talking about these huge ordinance facilities and we're all aware now of some of these like sabotage campaigns that are across Europe and you get one bad actor in there and the whole thing goes up. Yeah, no, exactly. Exactly. So yeah, very, very strategic, you know, location. And so you get a taste for Navy life here, but your dream, since reading Rogue Warrior is still the SEAL teams. Absolutely.

Tell us about, you know, getting into buds and kind of that experience. Yeah, so I was fortunate enough where I was at. There was actually a Naval Special Warfare unit located over there. So I was able to do all my screen, you know, testing and like a little bit of an interview. It really wasn't too terribly much of one. to go to Buds initially, but I was able to get on my paperwork squared away, passed a PT test initially to get my package in. Then when I got orders, I did one more PT test 30 days prior to me transferring.

So from there, yeah, that pretty much takes me to Coronado, California, you know, in springtime of 2004. How'd that treat you? I mean, the Buds has definitely experienced where no one wants to relive it again. So, I mean, looking at it, you know, as a whole, which is completely overwhelming. But when I teach a lot of like the leadership and team building courses now, I talk about, you know, just how to eat an elephant one bite at a time. And I always like to use the buds analogy. You pretty much take it one evolution at a time, make it to your next meal.

And then just, you know, keep, you know, always put out, be a good teammate. And then just, you know, never, you know, never forget what the end state is, the end goal is. So I started with class 252. Like I said, checked in May of 2004 was fortunate enough to make it straight through that same class. So I got to, like airborne school and we still went to the Army Airborne School and then SQT and I checked into SEAL Team 4 in the fall of 2005. So, okay, before we move on, favorite bud story? Oh, gosh. So, yeah, it's one of the, one of the, with the leadership and team building stuff I'm doing now.

So I had this acronym, you know, I kind of, you know, I heard one evening when I was on third phase. It's called Fitfo. It spans for figure it, you know, you. you know what out, you know, fitful mentality. So, and the backstory that is, so I was on watch, you know, 20 years old, you know, in third phase out at San Clemente Island. And, I mean, looking back, I was such a dumb ass at the time, such an immature kid still, you know, even though it's, you know, get ready to graduate buds.

But anyway, so I'm on watch one evening on the quarter deck when the classes, you know, rest of the class is asleep. And we're only getting maybe four or five, six hours at the, you know, very, very most. Most of the time, it's about three to four hours of sleep per night. And so anyway, I'm on watch. and I get a call from the instructor lounge, the quarterdeck area. The instructors had their own, you know, barracks,

you know, birthing areas, you know, where they're kind of a lounge area. They can kind of take a little break from students when the work was over. And so, you like, get a call, and it's the senior instructor. So, again, he starts, you know, kind of proceeding to give me like an order of like,

hey, bring so many glasses of orange juice, you know, some of a glass of cranberry juice, you know, like ice. He starts having as a whole grocery list of items. He's wanting to bring down there. I think, I mean, they're making, cocktails, of course, you know. So, you know, no exactly what they're doing. It's having some adult beverages. So again, it's me being the dumbass kid, you know, at 20 years old at the time.

I started this coming up with the dumbest questions you could possibly, possibly think of at the time. And it was one of the senior chiefs, the same rank I retired as. And so it was a senior instructor on the, on the island at the time. And again, I started asking him, like, well, a senior, like, where am I going to find those things at? You know, I'm on watch. Should I have someone relieve me? And he stops me mid-sentence. And he says, hey, look, motherfucker. You better figure it the fuck out or else. And be best to stop that mindset. If you want to have any success in this community whatsoever, click.

So again, in that moment, not going to be the reason the class was woken up and put in the surf zone for surf torch. We can talk about surf torch a little bit later. But what did I do in that moment? I figured it the fuck out real quick. Let me tell you. So again, I was running around scrambling, trying to find stuff as fast as I could and get it over there.

And so I finally got it all put together, you know, ran it down. and the instructor lounge, knocked on the door, you know, stayed in my name and rank and what I was there for, and dropped it off, and he's like, get the fuck out of here, go back to the quarter deck. So I ran back and then enough said, but again, as funny as that story was at the time, looking back, still to this day, it was probably one of the biggest life lessons learned I have.

It's basically the problem solving mindset, like, you know, figuring things out. So, and that was 100% true as far as you have to have the fitfo to figure out the fuck out mentality to, you know, have any success in the SEAL team, but alone just in life in general. I'm still using the fitful mentality to this day as far as getting you know you know getting my keeping my training company up and running getting our knife design company you know uh up from our initial release done and also the some of the

collateral duties i have in the uh the law enforcement world get getting my texas commission on law enforcement license as well so again you we could we could we could spend you know hours upon hours talking about bud stories that's probably one of my one of my favorite ones as far as what still sticks to me to this day one of one of the life lessons learned i got to ask you you know follow up where the hell did you find cranberry juice and orange juice and all of this. A good place for it, probably the galley, the chow hall, you know. So, okay. A couple of things that had to go elsewhere to find it, but it was, yeah, it was pretty, it was more streamlined than I originally was worried it was going to be. So, and then you

mentioned surf torture? Yeah, so surf torture, all that is, it's just, you know, it's a means where the instructors can take a little break and they just let the elements do the work, you know, for the class as far as trying to get, get guys to quit. It's an evolution where you just lay in the lay in the Pacific Ocean off, you know, the Buds Beach or wherever you're at if you're out in St. Clemency Island. And again, like the water is never warm out there for folks who have been to Southern California. I was a summer hell week. So maybe it was a little bit warmer, but I think mid-60s was the warmest the water ever did get on us.

So, again, it's just a time frame where the instructors can take a little break and just let the elements do the work and get guys to quit if they want to. Get that attrition rate down. Exactly. Exactly. All right. So I won't make you tell Bud stories all night here, Trey. We'll have to do a separate one just for Bud Stories. I got plenty of them.

I know. I feel like we all have more stories about selection than, like, you know, Oliver Stone has about Vietnam, you know. Yeah, exactly. So you check into Steel Team 4. Tell us about that experience. Yeah, so it was a little bit different than what other guys, other brand new guys had experienced just because Team 4,

SEAL Team 4 was deployed at the time. So as me and the rest of my, you know, classmates from Buds and SQT, I mean, there was literally like, I think, two SEALs. There was like a chief, you know, it was in like the mastered arms shack, kind of doing an administrative work. And there was maybe one of the guys.

So we got formed out to trade at the training attachment on the East Coast with the different cells. So I ended up going to the, one of the assault cells, you know, on CQB and like the, and also mount, the military operations and urban terrain, South Special Operations and Urban Combat. So I got to do several trips with them there,

seeing other steel platoons from other East Coast teams go through. So, again, obviously, when we got back to, you know, we checked back in, you know, to Team 4 after the guys got back from deployment, it was, you know, the new guy games all over again at that point, like we figured it was going to be. But it was really interesting. I think overall, looking back, it was a good experience, just getting to know different guys from your team

and, you know, being kind of role players opt for for them and just kind of actually doing some of the runs with them as well. So that really, at least for me, that definitely helped out, just kind of get a jump start on, at least the assault CQB portion. A little bit of OJT before you really started. No, exactly, exactly. So it was good. It was really good overall. So the guys come back and at what point do you get put on a platoon?

So almost immediately. We were pretty much, we're going to be slated. I knew I was going to three troop and a fox drop platoon. So, sorry, Echo Paltoon, Echo Paltoon. I ended up switching on my second go-around. But, yeah, so we knew what Paltoon, what, you know, a troop we were going to. It was called task units at the time.

We, it transferred over to troops right after that. But, again, you know, looking back, it was, you know, like the guys came back in for like late fall timeframes. We had a couple months of kind of like, you know, the pro-deb professional development. We didn't have a whole lot going on. And after the first of the year, we start our ULT, our unit level training.

So we were hitting the road early. you know, you know, of 2006, you know, we were, you know, going to Fort Chaffey, you know, and other places, you know, some of our ground mobility out in the, out in the Nevada area, one of our training sites. So it was just a nonstop. And it's, I mean, still to this day, I still have a crazy work schedule, you know, with what I'm doing. And kind of people tell me, or ask me, like, how do you, how do you like, you know, travel so much? It's like, it's all I've known since 2005. I've never been in one location more than like six months out of the year. So it's just a constant flow. I guess I'm just, you know, used to it. So that's all I know now. So I don't know

what I would do if I was, you know, in some place for several months straight. I know if I was home here, I would absolutely drive my wife insane, you know. I want to ask you, you know, like what type of dudes land on a seal platoon? Like, who are some of these guys, you know, you don't have to mention anyone by name if you don't want to? But like, like, what are these personalities like? I mean, it's definitely type A personalities across the board. You know, that's kind of be expected. You know, you have to be, you know, a type A to have any success in the SEAL teams. Really, like, everyone had, you know, somewhat of an athletic background, some more than others. Definitely everyone had, like, a huge sense of patriotism, camaraderie, and just wanted to really be a member of the team.

Look down to the individual shooter level, the platoon level, you know, tasking at troop level across the board. So I just, like I say, highly motivated, very, for most part, you know, very trustworthy guys. and just guys that you'd want to, you know, go down range with, you know, serving your country, you know, and in harm's way with. Hey, guys, our show is sponsored by GhostBed. Check them out. Please, they make awesome mattresses, awesome pillows, awesome bedding. Ghostbred provides high quality and super comfortable award-winning mattresses crafted in the U.S. and Canada. Did you know that 60% of U.S. adults report being too hot when they're trying to sleep? That's me. I'm a sweaty little baby. That's why we designed all of our products with cooling features so you stay comfortable and asleep all night long.

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And thank you for supporting the companies that help support the show. ghostbed.com slash house for 10% off made in the U.S., made in Canada. Shout out to our brothers in Canada. They rock. Check them out. I love Ghostbed. Thanks, guys. And I mean, at what point did you find out where you guys were deploying to?

It wasn't until, I want to say, probably springtime. We deployed the fall of 2006. So, yeah, my first one was to Fallujah Iraq. So it was a, you know, a little over, your average, you know, a little over six months deployment. We had a condensed, you know, ULT and ProDV and also said, you know, like squad integration training just because of like kind of the deployment cycle. Like after that, we went back to like the East and West Coast teams went back to a, I think a two year, like, you know, every six months. It was pretty got back from deployments. It was pro

dev, then ULT, unit level training, then all kind of squatter integration training, but still called that and then deployment. So, but we only, we were on 18 month cycle. So it was just that much, that much faster. So you guys got to Fallujah, if my chronology is right, a little bit after the Marines went in there and kind of like cleaned the place out. Absolutely. So what was it like when you arrived in Fallujah, sort of what was the atmospherics? Well, I mean, the guys that were already in country coming to convoy to pick us up, you know, the Humvees and other other armor equipment got hit by IAD and our lead turd gunner got, you know, fragged pretty good from it. So that was kind of like, hey, you know, all the new guys, welcome, welcome to Iraq, you know,

you're in the war zone now. This we're playing for keep. So that was definitely, you know, not that I didn't, I wasn't already thinking that to begin with, but yeah, definitely kind of was a realization immediately right when we, right when we pretty much hit the deck saying like, hey, you're, you know, the guy in the airfield had already, you know, gotten word, you know, someone from our, our joint operation center had like let them know that, hey, like a convoy's going to be late because they got hit with an IED and they had to do a, you know, a Casabak bird, you know, casualty evacuation bird for our lead turret gunner.

And what was the mission like when you guys got there? So we were, we were had a Iraqi partner force we were training, but it was mostly direct action raids we were doing. So they wanted us to have, you know, so many Iraqis, they would take, we would take out with them or take out with us. And so they had like a couple of guys doing the training of them and the other guys, the rest of the guys were doing operations. You know, some of, some like kind of sniper over and stuff, but it was mostly like it was the direct raid, the kill capture operations we were doing. Any of that kind of stand out in your mind?

I mean, there were several of them that definitely, definitely, you know, could have got a little, little sporty, little spicy, but it wasn't until after I left, because I was on the first writ bird out, the really interesting place bird. And then so it was like probably about half of our platoon, or half of our troop,

other guys from Team 10 and contingent. that we're going to be ripping, ripping out with us. So they went out on target with the rest of our guys, and then a good buddy of mine was killed that evening, literally like a day after we left. So that one, I talk about that every so often a little bit. That one still kind of stings to this day as far as, you know, because we hit so many compounds over the course of that six months.

And then sure enough, you know, we lose a guy in one of the last ops, you know, of the deployment, let alone with not even like, you know, almost half the guys being gone, not there for it either. So, you know, kind of looking back, I say if I could have, I told this story before as well, if I could have one redo in my entire career, I would go back and ask not to be on, you know, the first rip bird flight out. Because again, I totally understand, like my leadership's point of view, because I would definitely would want it to, I wanted to stay. But I was going to be going to sniper school, you know, within like, you know, less than a month of getting back. And then straight into lead breacher, explosive breaching school. So my professional development,

I was going to be gone for a good portion of it. So ended up, you know, taking, you know, being my first deployment with a busy pro-dev being one of the first guys that had rip out, you know, which again, it was about half of us. But if I could have, you know what I could have one redo over again, I would turn back time and make sure I was on that off for when everything went down. Yeah, that sucks, man. It always seems like it's the last damn mission on the deployment. Yeah, exactly. So, yeah, we had a guy, you know, you get fragged pretty good, you know, from the IED. first, you know, first, you know,

one of the, I think maybe the first night we were in country, I think it was the second convoy they did overall. And then, yeah, like in the direct action rate, they were going after a group of Al-Qaeda militants that shot down an American helicopter the previous day. So it was just, just bad, but hey, you know, freaking lessons learned, life lessons learned at that point. Yeah, man.

And so you get back and go to the sniper course. Is that the one in Indiana? Yes, correct. Yeah. So some of it's, you know, they do like the east and west coast, will do like their, again, it's different now. I think it's all like one big school, but like, you know, pick like photo image capture and they had like the scout.

It's almost like a, you know, scout sniper, like sniper light. And then if you pass both those, then you would go on to the full, you know, sniper training pipeline in Indiana. And what was the sniper course like? It was definitely challenging. I mean, I don't see the shooting itself was, was, you know, hard at times. But it was the easiest. It was like some of the stalking, just the,

overall like field craft you know I was you know born raised like I said in rural northeast Missouri so I spent plenty of time out in the field you know hunting and into it just like my grandparents you know farm they had in rural northeast Missouri close to where I grew up but it just the overall like field craft and like being you know you know covert clandestine about things too is probably one of the biggest things again the shooting stuff was was challenging by all means but I'd say like the actual field craft for me especially some of the stalking was what I, you know, it was the most challenging. And at that time, were you guys still, like, building out the big bear suits, the gilly suits?

Oh, yeah. Yeah, you had your gilly shawl, your gilly suit. You know, I had several different options depending on what you wanted to wear. So, again, like, we were fortunate enough. I was going through in the summertime frame. So we had, you know, thick vegetation. It was a whole lot easier than guys that had to go through in the wintertime, but with no foliage or anything else. Of course, we got to worry about poison iv at that point, time.

I think, you know, probably two-thirds of the class, I end up getting poison ivy really bad. But, again, just the price of doing business, it's the nature of the beast. Biggest takeaway from sniper school, aside from stalking, I guess. Tactical patience. Definitely, you will learn tactical patience there, you know, in an extreme way. So you're doing your stock, you're in your hindsight.

You're just waiting for that right moment to when you need to execute, when you need to do an engagement. So I'd say, yeah, definitely tactical patience, was the overall biggest lessons learned and theme from going to sniper school. And then I think you mentioned, was there a master breacher course? Yes, I went to like lead breacher course after that. Again, like guys were saying like, hey, some of the older guys, that make no sense, you know, because usually like the snipers were doing their own thing, breaches would do their own thing.

But again, I was just kind of dual trained where I could be the lead breacher on an op or I could, you know, be the sniper role, doing the sniper overwatch or some of the, you know, kind of like longer containment, you know, operations we would do. How'd you like the breacher course? It was fun. I mean, explosives are always fun, you know, no matter what. So, again, really, I like the breaching aspect is the problem solving. Because again, you know, just you truly learn to kind of really like be able to like read

the door when you like to, you know, you do like your, you know, calculation of what's charged, you know, or charges you need ahead of time, you know, have a, you know, specific, you know, SOPs for one and sometimes a little bit of, you know, a little bit of leeway on what exactly you could use. So it was definitely kind of the ultimate, you know, problem solving in the moment. figuring out which charge you use, how much explosive net weight you need to have, and then even what type of explosives. And kind of going from there, just, you know, using your tradecraft, you know,

when you're out on operations. At this point in time, I guess we're still in like 2006, 2007 around then. Was the training starting to move more towards like urban environment to sort of simulate the environment you guys were going into, or were we still like trying to blow down trees to build an abbey? and that kind of thing. It was definitely heavy in the urban aspect of things, but we still never went away from the field craft,

you know, aspect as well, though, especially what happened in, you know, a summer of 2005 in Afghanistan with the, you know, the lone survivor incident with the,

you know, the, you know, the operation red wings on that one. So, yeah, again, always lessons learned on that one.

Because, yeah, we're doing a lot of direct action raids and more built up areas, but we still could find ourselves out in a rule environment or even a rule into an urban environment. and getting an engagement there. So definitely had to be proficient in all aspects of the operation you could come across. So you're moving along at a pretty steady clip here as a young seal going from doing your first

platoon, sniper, breacher, and then going back to your platoon and going through the whole train-up cycle again? Yeah, correct. And then actually I did an augment with SEAL Team 8 as well to Iraq for a little bit. when we were doing some of the counter-arm rating insurgency stuff, you know, back during that time frame. So, yeah, I ended up doing a little bit of an augment with them was a good experience and then deployed again the fall of 2008 to back to Iraq.

And, you know, it was different troop than what I was assigned to initially. But there was like a contingent of guys from our troop that were going to go augment the guys of their troop. And then our troop was then kind of doing the U-COM deployment. So that was actually, again, it all worked out. it would have been nice to stay longer in the war zone and get more experience. But, you know, being able to do some of the stuff throughout Europe and really kind of get ready for our selection course for the command coming up. You know, I started in 2009.

So tell us a little bit about the counter Iran mission, because that's an interesting one. So it's, I mean, obviously, Al-Qaeda of Iraq, you know, they were the big, you know, big ones here going after. But they just had such a negative Iranian influence, especially some of the areas where we were working around, like the, you know, the eastern side of Iraq. and also even Baghdad itself. So I know a lot of guys who did, you know, operations in Sauter City, you know, it was pretty much, you know, the slums of Baghdad. I mean, you're most skilled. A lot of guys that did any work around Baghdad are familiar with Sotter City. And it really was some of the, some of the explosives that they were coming up with, the Iranians were coming up with,

specifically designed to defeat some of our armor system. So we were on hot and heavy, you know, doing the counter Iranian, you know, insurgency mission. So you guys were trying to, like, disrupt the IED networks? Yes, that was the biggest thing. You know, we got a lot of, like, the financiers and, like, the senior leaders. But again, it's just, you know, the more, the more, you know, operations we would do is pretty, it's pretty crazy to see this how, how some of the senior leaders, you know, the counter-Iranian, or the Iranian insurgency were tied in with the current government in Iraq.

It was totally a sticky situation all around, depending on, depending on what, you know, part of the country you're in. Yeah. How did the politics interfere with your operation? I mean, sort of the local politics. Like, did they try to, like, shut down some of these missions, or did you run into that? They tried to a little bit,

but it seemed like we were definitely were, we were insulated from a lot of that aspect of things, just because it was so important at the time. And, like, Iraq had already been kind of spiraling out of control for a while from probably, you know, 2005 on. And didn't, you know, even if you want to call it stabilized, it didn't really didn't stabilize to, like, you know, 2010, 2011.

And then obviously, during the troop withdrawal, the whole world saw that under the current administration at the time when they were going to pull everyone out and then like the ISIS just came in there and started wrecking shop and then sure enough contingent of special operations were right back in there. You know, saving, you know, saving what was left of Iraq at the time. And then you mentioned going over to European command. Mm-hmm. What were you guys up to over there?

So we were doing a lot of like just training operations more than anything. It's like bilateral exchanges, other, I can't remember some of the acronyms. But it was basically like working with our NATO allies over there. So I went to Poland for a solid month, you know, work with the Polish drum, awesome, awesome dudes. And it went to Estonia for three weeks after that, you know, within a matter a couple days. So again, really good experience. And you always have like your, you know, your embassy evacuation that could come up, you know, you could do out of there. among other operations, but really more than anything focusing on training.

And then for me, just getting, you know, making sure I was in good shape and right, you know, mindset, getting ready to start the selection process for the command coming up. Yeah. What was it like working with some of the NATO partners? Like, I mean, Gronm is known to be very professional. The Baltic states also are known to be pretty hardcore. Yep. No, like I would deploy with the Gron guys in a heartbeat.

You know, I was, you know, kind of fast forward years later, I did a little exchange with the SBS guys and I was going to be deploying with them when I was a team leader at the at the command of one of the squadrons and I was going to have one of my junior guys go with me as well but that ended getting shut down like your shut off last minute which is a which is a bummer like I've told guys before there's again there's two two units I really would like to have deployed with number one is our Delta forest you know brothers you know our counterparts from the army and then and then also our our SBS you know our UK brothers as well so I had like we we had it all lined up but same time frame, but we were going to be, you know, having a contingent of our,

of our troop deployed with some of the, the, the D-boys down, you know, south of where we were at. But again, it got with some of the manning issues and kind of like the withdrawing of forces, you know, they didn't even deploy all their guys. So we were the first ones to get cut. But like my number two, my assistant team leader, he just deployed with the strike force, too, you know, doing like the Iraq, you know, in Syria, you know, kind of direct actuary. And he said that was one of his best deployments he ever had. So the guys were great, super talented, you know, it's very, again, looking back, if I could, I would really like to have, you know, one, did a deployment with them and then also deploy them with our SBS brothers, which came close both times with both units, but this didn't, didn't, it wasn't quite how the cards were going to fall for us, unfortunately.

So it sounds like in this time, you're already thinking about screening for the command. And you had this idea in mind really since the moment you joined the Navy, it sounds like. Exactly. Like I said, like when I was 12 years old, when I read the book Rogue Warrior, Richard Harsenko. So yeah, I screened in the summer 2008, you know, screen positive. It was still old team four of the rest of my deployment cycle. Like I mentioned before, I deployed Iraq, and then you come for a little bit.

And then checked in to start the selection course in the springtime of 2009. So what was the screening process like? Again, it's, you know, PT is obviously a big factor on there. But like when guys, you know, asked me what was harder, you know, like, you know, Green Team, the selection course for development group or or buds, me personally for me, I would rather do at a minimum, I would do first phase of buds, including Hell Week again, before I did the six weeks of the basic, you know, close quarter battles.

Really? Yeah, just to the, again, it's looking back. it's all the stress you put on yourself. You know, again, like, you're not learning anything that it's, no, technically some stuff it's new, yes. But the instructors are demonstrating and telling you only once, but they're telling you exactly how they want you to do it, and then this perfection is demanded.

And then so, again, you're doing, you know, halacious PTs of a morning for, you know, several hours, and you're just getting right into doing the house run after house run and then classes divide and a half, half guys in the house, half the guys in the range doing drills and we would flip-flop in the afternoon. Yeah, I've heard guys say even dudes that are not super fond of the SEALs say at development group, they have a very robust, you know, counterterrorism, CQB program.

Yeah. So, again, that's one of the biggest things we are judged on. I mean, yes, you have to have other, you have to be competent and other, you know, core SEAL skill sets. But the CQB aspect, you know, again, like, I don't know, people ask me all the time in the civilian world, what's CQB mean? Like, like room clearing, you know, like structure clearing, you know. how to do it safely with potentially, you know,

you know, heavily armed packs inside there too. And again, this, you know, kind of, you know, coming full circle, never when I was going through the selection, and then, you know, you know, just doing, you know, staying on the deployment grind at the command, I never thought, you know, it would pay off, like the way it has post-military life, being able to do something I'm doing with the civilian law enforcement training.

Again, yeah, it's just kind of funny looking back, you know, 20 plus years, all the lessons learned, just kind of how I wear I got to, where I'm at today. And it's all just kind of the cards that fell in place, you know, one by one over the years. So other than the CQB, what other kinds of training do you go through in Green Platoon as you're kind of getting spun up for, you know, the top level? Yeah, so you're doing, you know, you're doing, you know, integration stuff with the 160th,

you know, the helicopter, you know, squad or the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment. So again, you talk about guys that are the top of their tradecraft right there. guys are absolutely phenomenal from 47 pilots to the, you know, the hawks, the little birds, not to mention, you know, the DAPs, the direct action penetrators, you know, crew for the Black Hawks rigged as gunships and also the A's, the A8-6s. So doing a lot of integration stuff with them and certain aspects. And then you're doing quite a bit of jumping, skydiving with sort of certain like military free fall profiles. So against I say probably besides the CQB portion, jumping, we usually get a couple guys per class as well that can not meet the standards and have to either get recycled through or they go back to their,

you know, their original command, you know, within the seal team that came from. What do you think it is that gets them on the free fall course? Usually it's zing out the exits. And I mean, I've told this guy before, too, I had a fairly healthy fear of jumping. Like one of the biggest, I guess, failures if you want to talk about, you know, I would admit during my career, I went to Othai Lakes Military Free Fall School of the Navy you put on and I failed out of it. So I've seen the exit.

So, and that was definitely in the back of my mind, you know, going through our, you know, Green Team, the selection course when we were doing our, uh, our jumping there. But, um, again, there's just, I think I've, hopefully I was able to help a few guys that were struggling potentially as well throughout the years. It wasn't until I truly understood the relative wind and how you're exiting the aircraft, whether it's a side door or a ramp. And either you're symmetrical or you not and how you, like, an arch and, you know, again, hit the relative wind is what really kind of like it just, it just all clicked for me at one point time. So again, I was still, you know, struggled a little bit during a selection course for the command or doing the jumping stuff. But it was able to end up making it through. But it wasn't until I got to the squad and started doing a lot of jumping to where I was like, okay, it's all starting to make sense now as well. And even more so when I went to like free fall jump master school, it definitely kind of like tied everything in together with me.

And so when I was getting ready to turn over my team with the incoming teammate, actually one of my guys, you know, it was really awesome dude. I had a lot of respect for it. But I kind of recommended that to him because he was. he was, you know, he was proficient at jumping, but you can just tell he just was not as confident as I was like to see him, you know, and be. And then, so I kind of suggested that to him as hey, man, I would really, I would really go, you know, recommend you go through military, you know, the free fall JM at some point in time, jump master school that the command puts on just because I think it will help tie things in a lot, a lot, you know, better, better for you and you'll

just be more confident at jumping. And he's like, and the only reason why I notice, you know, I don't think you have, you know, as much confidence as you could have. because I was you about six, seven years prior to that. So hopefully I was a semi-positive influence on him as far as that aspect. After getting through all this training, you sign into the command. Now you're in the big leagues, man. What is it like making that jump from a SEAL team to development group? And so people ask me that a lot.

Like what's the difference? You know, still team four versus, you know, team five or even, you know, obviously the command, you know, Debt Group, SEAL Team 6. So I would say this. So if you have, you know, two or three platoons deployment cycles underneath your belt and the, you know, the East and West Coast SEAL teams or SDV Team 1, still delivery vehicle team one, you're considered like a very experienced guy where it's, again, I did my two platoons, you know, started the selection process going through a green team. And then I get to, you know, squadron, and I spent the majority of my career out over there. And I was a brand new guy again, you know, it's just like literally, I was like the least experience. And so it just, I think it's overall the experience level, just the, the mission set itself.

And it's really like for the selection process, you know, green team, it's just perfection is demanded. You know, it's, they have so many, so many, you know, just, you know, sets of eyes watching you. Like, you really can't get away with a, with a whole lot, especially early on doing some of the, the initial weed out phase of things. So I'd say just the over again, it's, it's like when I was having my interview board, you know, when I was did like my screener initially to try to get orders. to go to Green Team, go through the command selection process. I kind of like on my interview paper, like I said, like, hey, like, why you want to come to command? I'm like, it's the natural progression for strong operators.

So you kind of just keep going up in that trajectory. So again, like quite a few guys I know on the East and West Coast teams definitely kind plateaued out a little bit. They had the talent level. They definitely could have went to the command and been very successful over there. So again, it's just, you know, it's just one big competition as far as, you know, the trajectory up as far as experienced level goes. And again, it's just, you know, you're one of the tier one units.

You know, you're going to be getting a call when things really, you know, when shit really hits the fan or some of the higher profile operations happen. And so what's it like, I mean, you partially answered this, I think, but already like, what's it like getting to a squadron? And again, I imagine all of these guys are A-type personalities, like they're super dialed in, super intense all the time. what's it like hitting the ground running on this squadron? So even to your point, Jack, even more as far as hitting the ground running.

So like I was just, our squadron was deployed when we got through our selection process. So yeah, like the command master chief, he wanted us to take the holidays off. So right for the first year, we deployed overseas with the squadron. So again, you talk about just being thrown right to the fire and being like, hey, you were a tier one operator. Like you are, you are expected to know what's going on. So it's definitely, definitely, you know, a lot of things we've, you know, covered some in green team, but not to the extent with the high level of training. And again, just talking about the experience level, you know, from like, you know,

the troop chief, you know, the team leader is on down. It's just like I've told so many people this before too, like looking back, it took me a couple of years to get removed, you know, kind of in the civilian world and kind of looking back and like the talent level that that place possesses is unreal. everything from like the operators, you know, like, you know, the leadership, the, you know, even like the supporting assets, you know, all the different, various departments, like everyone at that, at that place, at that command is truly at the, uh, the tip of the spear at the top of their game and all facets. So if you're not, you can't pull your weight, you have to move on.

So, um, all right. So tell us about gearing up for that first appointment. Oh, gosh. Again, it was, we went through, you know, the selection process. and then had a little time, you know, for the holidays. And then it was, it was, you know, I think the second, no, it was, it was, you know, I guess it was a couple days after the first. Yeah, we caught a rotator bird and, and I'm over there, and flew over and joined our, joined our squadron. So it was, you know, kind of what I, what we were kind of talked about, you know,

where we were told, you know, what was going to be expected of us and everything, everything else. So it was, it was quite the experience, you know. I mean, definitely, you know, you talk about just, you know, walking in someplace where you are just, you know, you feel so small, even though you just went through one of, you know, consider one of the hardest selection, you know, courses in the U.S. military, you still feel like you don't know anything, you know, when you're there just because of the talent level of guys that are, that you're working with. And, I mean, it's, again, the, the big jump from the SEAL teams to development group is that now you guys are charged with going after, like, nation level HVTs, as opposed. to like these are the bad guys in town. Yeah, I say like a lot of like the national, being like one of the national mission forces, it just ups the game that much. And also the scrutiny, the scrutiny that comes with it as well.

So yeah, like I said, like when we were going through Green Team, perfection was demanded. And yeah, it was, you know, perfection was demanded in the squadrons, you know, to the highest extent for everyone from your team leader, from, you know, your other senior leaders all the way down to, you know, the guys that were just, you know, a year or two, you know, ahead of you as far as as you know time in the command you know you just you don't you don't have what let your teammates down like when i talk about some of the uh leadership and team building aspects you know i cover in the civilian world and some in the domestic law enforcement world too but i talk about peer pressure peer pressure being the ultimate double-edged sword you know like where you had guys that were you know

like had were negative peer pressure completely i saw like just ruined derail you know completely derailed careers you know for that matter but then positive peer pressure like okay you can accomplish extraordinary feats just because you don't want to let your teammates down. So again, like talking about the ultimate ultimate double-edged sword. Yeah, yeah. It could be a hell of a positive or an extreme negative. Yeah, there's the pressure, but there's also the aspect of like, you're my boy, Blue, you got this, you know. Exactly.

You don't want to let your teammates down. Yeah. Can you say where you went on that first trip? It was East East Afghanistan. It was one of the strike forces over there. So with the squadron I was in. Cool. And from that time frame, like now that you're in the big leagues,

any missions that kind of like jump out at you that were interesting or noteworthy? Yeah, so we did several deployments through Afghanistan. There were always going to be spicy at a moment's notice. But for me, I was very fortunate if I was in the troop that conducted the Justice Buchanan hostage rescue raid in Somalia in January of 2012. So again, it was just how it worked out with the rotation. Again, very fortunate. Everything went very well that night.

It could not have gone nearly as well as it did. And just out of respect for the guys, you know, still going in harm's way, doing the job. I really don't like to cover very, you know, specifics of the operation. But I do like to talk about a lot of the lessons learned. I do that a lot when I'm teaching some of the law enforcement. But I'll disclose a little more in a closed environment to really kind of hit home some of the points. but I always like to talk about, you know, when I'm doing my initial PowerPoint slide

for some of the CQB courses I teach is, you know, the definition of advanced tactics. We heard that in Green Team all the time. All advanced tactics are is knowing the basics, knowing when it makes sense to break the rules, and then be able to articulate why you broke those rules. So it was definitely like that operation really highlighted. I'll cover again without saying too much.

You know, even though we had, you know, the most state of the art, the military aircraft, you know, reconnaissance aircraft overhead, We have the latest and greatest of weapon systems, optics, MBGs, the reggae guys had thermals. But even though we had all that, the tactic we used to clear that objective and save those two hostages, it's one of the most basic tactics that every infantry soldier is taught a young age. And every small unit, you know, special operations tactician is taught at a young age with some of the kind of the small unit tactics we work on. So that always mentioned when I'm teaching the courses as far as like, hey, never underestimate the importance of that tactical teammate position.

Like when when things went very kinetic, you know, very dynamic, very quick, I still remember hearing our, my troop chief's voice in my ear like cool, calm, collected, saying it's like, hey, target ID, damn it, guys, target ID. Just because your buddy's shooting doesn't meet needed to be shooting. So again, we got to count, you know, we got to own every round we send down range because we had two innocents, two hospitals we were saving. And then also kind of talk about the personal SOPs always talk about, you know, with the courses, you know, personal standard operating procedures. they never miss an opportunity to learn from either your mistake or somebody else's mistake, whether it's a real world operation training, you name it. So my biggest personal lesson learned, personal standard operating procedure lessons learned from that one is I never left the wire from that point forward without some sort of a handheld thermal

because we had zero alone, we had a thick cloud cover rolled in, right, the last, you know, like from our, from our PR operational rally point. And so we pretty much, you know, we kind of fanned out in a certain, you know, formation where we knew the pilots were, sorry, pirates holding the two hostages were roughly in the same type of formation. So, yeah, the wrecky guys were with either handheld thermals or their fusion goggles or night vision and, you know, thermal combined, you know, goggles, you know, capable. They were kind of calling out heat sources, you know, with a rough direction of travel and rough distance. But it was, it was a fairly helpless feeling not really being able to see even like where heat signatures were right out there. So that was my biggest lesson to learn on that one is I definitely wanted to, from that point forward,

I enveloped the wire without a handheld thermal. And that's because it was so foggy, you couldn't see anything underneath. Again, it was zero loom, cloud cover rolled in. Gotcha. There's not a whole ambient light in the country of Somalia in the bush, you know, in the middle of nowhere. And just like the vegetation was super thick. So again, even like looking just underneath your NVGs, looking at your buddy to your left and to your right, you know, or even in the formation, you couldn't, you could see.

like the glow from them and maybe a little bit of the outline, but you'd have to shine your laser illuminator to really be able to see them. So really, I couldn't, you know, most of us could not tell at all where roughly even the, you know, heat signatures were coming, you know, from distance-wise and rough location unless you had a thermal capability. Either built in your MVGs or like a little handheld thermal. And so you guys pulled Jessica Buchanan and there was a European national? He has a Danish guy. Yeah, Paul Fisted it. Yeah. We're working for a Danish demining company when, uh, when, when, when they were taken hostage. And I got to ask, like, what's that moment like when you repatriate an American and a friendly

national hostage? I always think of, like, you know, the Kurt Mews rescue in Panama where, like, all of a sudden there's these soldiers there pulling you out and saying, we're American soldiers, we're here to bring you home. Like, that's got to be a good feeling. Oh, no, absolutely. It was definitely the highlight of all our careers, hands down. And we were, again, we just, you know, she ex-filled her and the other, the Danish citizen

and Paul, they, you know, took one of the first helos out. And we didn't, you know, didn't hear anything else from her for, you know, several years. But then after the fact, she ended up coming back to the command and we were able to host her and kind of like have a big, big debrief. And tied in a lot of like our questions we had. Also kind of her, you know, her questions she had once we were able to tie the stories together. So I thought that was very beneficial and like just such a sweet girl, such a sweet gal. So that's really cool. Yeah, just, you know, just a wonderful, wonderful human being.

And I bet it also offered some closure to that event for everyone involved. Yes, absolutely. Like, again, initially we did a little meet and greet. We're in one of our commanders conference rooms. And, I mean, she immediately, like, she was going to, like, start talking to begin with, and she completely just broke down and started crying. And, like, the thing that she was able to get, you know, word she was able to get out, you know, because we, like, took her to the memorial wall

that she saw the pictures of guys that have been killed throughout the years, you know, at the command. And so, yeah, she kind of, like, we were barely, able to hear her get it out the words out she's like i couldn't live with myself if i would have seen one of you one of your photos up there on that memorial wall so again we told her like hey it did not work out that way you know so you know yeah yeah so hey just hey everything worked out fine we're all here and let's uh you know it was well it we also reiterated to her the day it was all the uh the highlight of all of our careers so we were more than happy and more than willing to to go uh you know per ourselves in harm's way to bring you back home jessica so

i think i definitely made her feel feel pretty good about uh about things I think she wrote a book about her experience, and I have not read it to tell you the truth. Yeah, I used to read it as well still, too. Yeah, it's called Impossible Odds. Yeah, yeah. I watch the 60-minute interview. She's done several times, or she did several times. It's a pretty good interview.

If folks have not seen that yet. So if you just Google Jessica Buchanan, Haas's Rescue, 60 Minutes, it'll pop right up on YouTube. I'll check it out. that is a super cool story. I get it, man. That's awesome. Thank you. And after that,

what was kind of like the next step in your career as an operator at this point? So right after I deployed to Afghanistan again later on that year after we did the Haas rescue for Jessica. But then after that, actually was for a pre-team leader, I did a little like a professional development. I went to our clandestine operation squadron. It was a good experience doing some of the unilateral surveillance stuff we were doing. Then went back to the squadron. I was a member of before and did my, you know,

rotations at assistant team leader and team leader. And then I finished my career off back at our clandestine operation squadron. So, again, I'm looking back, I really cannot, you know, really can't ask for too much more as far as, you know, just being able to, you know, just getting the various experience of attitude. Again, talking about everything, how it's all comes full circle, the several of the former our clandestine operation squadron. And I do quite a bit of a, like, surveillance training for domestic law enforcement. So again, between like the tactical training, shooting, something like that are like kind of small unit, you know, small team, you know, tactics courses and also the surveillance.

It keeps the schedule pretty full. And one of the gals is one of our female operators at the, at the, at the, in our clandestine operation squadron is a good friend of mine, Jackie. She runs a senior defense group. We, we, you know, team up a lot to, to host, you know, and put on some of these. surveillance for domestic law enforcement blocks. So again, I got to know initially like Jackie was going to try. I thought Jackie and I were going to be co-located. We're going to be able to both hop on here together.

But I completely got my dates mixed up. And yeah, she's back in California. But we are going to be linking up again coming up in the Denver area here in July for several weeks for some training we're putting on. So yeah, definitely recommend our guys to go check out Athena Defense Group on Instagram and then she's got a website that's, you know, pretty pretty well put together too. So she's an awesome gal.

When we're doing our introductions, I always bring it up. You know, I kind of say my piece as far as background is. And I said, I don't want to steal Jackie's thunder. But who in here has seen the Lioness series? And usually about half to two thirds of the, you know, the class, you know, tending raises, you know, their hands. Like, okay, like, Jackie is your real life version of the Lioness. She was in one of three programs that, you know, that series was written based off of it.

So that always gets guys his attention right away, you know, when they're like, oh, gosh, yeah, this guy, this guy, here's the real deal. So, yeah, Jackie's an awesome, awesome gal. And, yeah, it's a pleasure to work. And it was good to work with her while we're on active duty together. And it's, you know, just as good if not better, working in the civilian world together. Yeah, put us in touch.

And I would be more than happy to have Jackie on this show one day. Okay, absolutely. I highly recommend it. Yeah, Jackie is, Jackie is awesome. We'll square that away. I always joke with guys as well. So can I compare Jackie, you know, like, you know, again, being a female in like pretty much a man's world.

You know, she's definitely, definitely an alpha all in herself. But as far as, as trustworthy and just, you know, you know, a team player she is. So I always can make the comparison, you know, when, you know, your small, you know, tight-knit group of a group of friends, I use the, that movie The Town with Ben Affleck and Jeremy Renner. When he goes into, when Ben Affleck goes into, you know, the place we're staying at and talks with, you know, Jeremy Renner's character. And he's just like, hey, like, I need your help. You know, you can't ask any questions. you know, we're going to hurt some people.

He says, you know, your car or mine, you know, or whose car are we taking? But Jackie's in that same category. I was like, Jack, I need your help. You know, we got to go do some stuff. It's a little bit questionable. And she would be like, all right, we'd be taking your truck or mine, right? So she's definitely definitely in the club. You know, she's definitely within the sister within the brotherhood.

That is for sure. So you said you did some time as assistant team leader and then team leader? Yeah. So in the squadron, I spent, you know, not quite a decade in over. all. So, yeah, again, being an assistant team leader after being out of the loop for a little bit in our clandestine operation squadron, it's, it was fairly easy to come back. And it just, again, it's how funny how things work out, like I keep mentioning. So that, when I came back, the, the assault squadons were actually taken over some of the, you know, unilateral surveillance

mission that our clandestine operation squadron had been doing. So my troop was designated as the, you know, the sensitive activities, support activities, you know, you know, clandestine, you know, capable assault troop. So I was able to help out a lot, you know, with, with some of the transition, just coming from coming from that world and then deploying to the same spot, you know, that I, with my assault squad, and that I just deployed the previous cycle with, with our clandestine operations squad. That's a lot of capability in one troop, isn't it, to have guys that can free fall in and clear an airplane if need be, but also can do all of this sort of clandestine surveillance work. Yeah. So I won't, I won't

mention his name because he likes to keep a very low profile with some of his stuff he's still doing post-military life but one of the most well-respected operators at least in my time I was there said it said it pretty good one time you know he was a team leader in one of the squadrons and went to our clandestine operation squadron and went back as a a troop chief for that same assault squad and then finished his career retired out of the clandestine operation squadron but usually the guys you know they would say like oh it's an essay you know it's a you know it's a unilateral surveillance troop you know you know you know sensitive activities troop but then he's like no no no it's an assault troop with a sensitive activities capability.

Like there's a difference, you know, so it's pretty much all-encompassing. So definitely a little bit different than just a, and quote-unquote, sensitive activities troop. So no, it's an assault troop with sensitive activities capabilities. Yeah. And it's also interesting to have, like, the sort of continuum of targeting kind of encompassed

and all-encompassed in one organization like that, that you guys can probably do the intelligence gathering, the mission planning and then the execution of the mission itself, if you were called upon to do that. Yep. So, yeah, we look to kind of the fine, fix, Phoenix exploit, analyze. And even some of the deployment cycles before that, and we were doing some of like the more of the remote outstations

with some of our, you know, inter-aency counterparts as well, doing like an assistant team leader, you know, also the team leader during those rotations where, I mean, you're the senior military guy, you know, on the ground on some of these operations as the team leader. And really from like the whole aspect as far as professional development, you couldn't ask for anything more because you understood like the targeting aspect of things, you know, how you actually, you know, target packages even get brought up, you know, from like intel reports and various locations, you know, various, um, uh, even assets, if you will, both, you know, you know, technical, you know, physical, you know, human intelligence, you name it. But you really learned the, uh, the whole targeting process from like, okay, we have a bad individual we're going after. Okay, we start to build a pattern of life on. him, you know, and then from there, package, you know, the, you know, the concept of operations goes up, you know, you're doing all that, you know, as the guys are helping you with it. You know,

your intel analyst plays a very big, very big role and other, you know, specialized positions within the small team you're working with. But, I mean, you talk about like this, the ultimate professional development. I mean, you understand the whole process pretty damn good. Or you have to understand it, or you're not going to ever going to get out the, get out the door to go to the opposite. You, you know how the process works. So. And then becoming a team leader, I mean, what's that experience like? You're in charge, right? Yeah, no, definitely the highlight of my career, you know, overall.

So I was in our troop chief position for our clandestine operations squadron for a bit as well, too. Again, it just, that would have been, you know, probably the highlight of my career. But just unfortunately, it was learning like the COVID time frame and then just kind of had like some stuff on the personal side. I decided to retire. So didn't get to do nearly as much real world operations. I was hoping in that position, but as far as, you know, being like in a teammate or an assault team, you know, it's just, again, like, talk about the talent of that place, like just looking like every one of my guys, you know, from like I was at Echo 1, down to like my Echo 7, you know, at number 7. So I just every single dude, this was just a phenomenal, you know, physical specimen, number one, number two, just the, the talent, you know, overall, like, whether it's like for CQB, shooting, jumping, you name it. I mean, it's, they say, you know, they say, you know, you know, team leaders should only have to make, you know, at the command, like slight course corrections here and there, you know, and that's, that's 100% was my, my case as well.

Though I know, some guys have to deal with some problem children that, uh, that causes more, uh, you know, more effort and, uh, you know, kind of, uh, you know, have more of a, more of a negative light, but, you know, it's, it's, for me, at least, I couldn't have asked for any better guys, you know, that work and work, you know, I worked with and when I was a team leader. So even as the assistant team leader, I got, you know, quit, you know, I was one of this, I think the senior number two is senior assistant team leader in the squadron for one full rotation. So again, it was, you know, guys would come to me for a lot. I think, you know, hopefully I was a positive influence to them. And again, it's just, you know, just still to this day,

just blows me away, just the talent of that place. Still, yeah, they even, I was fortunate enough to this past January, one of the cities I'm in quite a bit of my old squadron was doing an urban training event there. And I got to see a lot of guys that were, there were my you guys when I was an assistant team leader and team leader that they are now team leaders or assistant team leaders running the show so that was just phenomenal to see so and so you finished your career in the clandestine squadron I know that stuff's like pretty hush but what what are you allowed to say about that just it was our biggest mission set depending on where we were at was like being able to unilaterally conduct conduct surveillance whether it's physical technical you know

using other other other assets other electronic means that was the biggest thing that our troops specifically there was other troops that have other other mission sets i won't go into but for ours specifically it was the ability to um basically you know target you know underneath the uh you know kind of uh you know the you know the cover of something you know other completely like non you know non you know action arm type of a military you know element operation where everyone referred to as but it was it was really just like the fine fix aspect of things is what we really concentrated on. Yeah. And then talk to us a little bit about retirement. Like you must have had some moment in your career of like surrealism, you know, that you went from being the 12 year old kid where

reading Rogue Warrior to being a team leader and then, you know, master chief, troop chief, pretty wild experience. How did retirement take place for you? When did that moment come where you're like, you know what? I'm ready to move on. Yeah, well, I was a senior chief at a time. It was actually doing a big surveillance block. But without going to any actual specifics, I just got to the point where I was on the fence, hey, like, I really need to figure out, hey, am I going to be retiring? Because I was coming up on, I was less than inside of the year from hitting the 20-year mark.

I was like 19 years and change. And it was actually, you know, where we live out now, majority of the time in Dallas, Texas, we were on a work trip out there of all places. and it just kind of like it is, you know, all came to me, you know, once. I told my wife, I was just like, hey, you know, I know you said I had to get there on my own whenever I was going to, you know, retire or what? I just got there. So, yeah, like after that trip, when I came back, the following week, I put in my retirement

paperwork and then still had the position for like several more months. Just why they were doing some manning shuffling around and everything else. But I was starting my prep to retire at that point. And it was a long process. So I'm sure you saw it as well, too, where you're, you know, separating out, retiring for everybody. It is definitely not an overnight. You're not just giving your two weeks notice

and then walking out the door like you are in the civilian world potentially. So, but yeah, once I was, once I got there, I was so ready. I could have walked out that day, honestly. So I've had a hell of a ride, you know, looking back, you know, wouldn't trade my experiences for anything. But they say when you're done, you're done. And you'll know when you're done. So like I've had several buddies since then, you know,

or getting ready to retire, you know, or getting ready, you know, kind of like on short final, they said like, like, dude, we didn't realize what you were saying, you know, initially when you said like, hey, when you're done, you're done. But like we definitely do now. So I hope like get some good advice during their transition period. It's really important, isn't it, to like know when you hit that point to like be able to identify that? Because again, like there's definitely guys that I, you know, still have, you know,

crazy amount of respect for that were really burnt out. They should have retired years earlier. But they're just like to kind of, no, I wouldn't say you know, you can never get comfortable at that place. But at the same time, I think guys were just, you know, they were a point where like, okay, I can pretty much hit the cruise control and like kind of ride this for a little bit longer, even though, you know, they're not really, really all that happy. You know, they're ready to move on, but there's, again, I wouldn't use the word of

afraid, but I think there's just a lot of apprehension with guys getting out or when they get out, especially when they have 20 plus years then. And who the hell wants to say, I don't want to be on the team anymore, I mean. Exactly. At the point where you just, you lose that fire in the gut, which I, really that was really for me. I was just like, hey man, like the juice is no longer worth to squeeze. I feel like I was going 120 miles an hour in my entire career. I'm just kind of like, you know, but I got to the point. I was like, no, you know, I think I'm good. I think I'm ready to move on and

try something else in life. That's cool. So you retire and tell us about post-military life. I mean, kind of what are those first couple of years like after retirement? Yeah, so I retired officially in October 1st of 2022, but I've said this before when folks have asked and I'll say it again, like, in my experience, we're talking to a lot of other guys. I think my transition, the last, you know, X amount of months I was in and then transition in the civilian world was one of the smoothest and easiest I possibly could have had. Again, I was fortunate enough to do quite a few urban training events

where we would be hosted by, you know, local, state, and federal law enforcement teams throughout the area. So we'd always would try to give back, either host them at the command, you know, if they'd come out and train or even on location, we would provide, you know, training for them, depending on what they want to work on, whether it's shooting, CQB, you know, you name it. So I kind of had been put out a little bit of feelers, you know, months prior to when I was going to be dropping my, you know, had to make the decision.

And again, this happened to be in Dallas when I finally, you know, made that, made that decision. And one of the good buddy of mine, he's working for Garland PD. He's one of the SWAT or the lieutenant over SWAT. And also he's the current president of the Texas Tactical Police Officers Association. I told him I was going to be dropping my retirement paperwork. When I got back, I was ready to move on. The first thing he said to me, he's like, hey, man, let me know when you just want to start

teaching for us. You know, we'll get you on the books as soon as you're ready. So I was able to get good. I pretty much started my, I'd already had the idea for my company, the name, you know, everything else I wanted to be doing, you know, when I was doing my undergraduate, you know, program for my online degree with entrepreneurship through American Military University. But really wasn't going to like, obviously, you know, launch it until I knew like, this is how much time I have left in the military and going from there.

So I, you know, submit them in Texas, my articles of formation, like literally like a cut, I think a day or two after I got my, I got my retirement paperwork approved back from Big Navy. So I knew like this was going to be in my last day. And I really didn't do a whole lot with it for several months, but is after, I want to say, April, May-ish timeframe of 2022, I put in for like the outside employment through the command, you know. So, again, if you're on, you know, just burning terminal leave, there's still, some employment restrictions, but you're able to do quite a bit of stuff. You just have to ask

permission for it ahead of time. So I was able to actually start working for myself and my company just burning excess terminal leave. I didn't do like a skill bridge, another transition programs. Once I had all my VA stuff squared away and everything else, you know, even like starting to working for myself, even before I had my retirement ceremony, had that in June of 2022. And then like literally just burning, you know, the excess leave I had at that point time, just coming a little bit here and there in between work trips I had lined up. so many people told me is like, hey, it's a big change. You know, you did, you know, over 20 years in the military, you know,

right at the high school. Like, you need to take some time off, you know, like six months, two a year, maybe do a little work here and there, you know, and really kind of figure out what you're going to do. Yeah, I didn't listen to any of that shit. So I literally got my retirement. I took my wife into the command for one last time on September 30th of 2022, got her dependent, you know, retiree ID.

I had to get rid of, I had to get rid out of several programs in the clandestine. Operation Squad and I was in and then turn on my access badge, got my DD-214, and then went and got my military retiree ID at that point. They gave me a temporary badge, you know, I hate this badge out, just leave it right on the top of the badge readers. You're driving out. Did that. And literally three days later, I'd already had it lined up. I did a three-week work trip. And that's, you know, 72 hours after I officially retired. So I went out to Denver, did some training out there for a week, and then went to Dallas Fort Worth for a week and then down to Houston for a week. Sorry, not Houston, not St. Antonio.

I'd already done a Houston trip previous to that. So, yeah, again, like I totally understand. I totally get why, you know, some folks want to do, you know, six months a year, you know, sabbatical, you know, hiatus, but that was definitely not me. Like literally 72 hours later, I was on the road again, really hit it hard. So I've been going nonstop ever since. Yeah, you needed something to do with yourself to keep you occupied. Absolutely. Got your Navy veteran hat from the PX and you were. Yeah, I got like, you know, company logo of that.

I wasn't going to get any, like, in the Navy. I'm just messing with you. Yeah, exactly. So your company, you have a training group. Tell us a little bit about that. Yeah, so it's Gallaglass Guardian Group. And then I get asked all the time, the name, what's like the namesake, you know, what does it mean? So Gallaglass was a term for Scotch Irish mercenaries from the 13th to 16th century, from the North, Norse Gaelic armies, kind of where some of my family lineage is, is from. You know, my dad's obviously the last name, Lindsay Scottish, my last name. My mom was, her maiden name was Brennan for Irish.

So kind of had the tribal areas of Scotland and Ireland and the family lineage. So again, the Scotch-Irish, you know, gallaglass warriors were Scotch-Irish mercenaries from, you know, kind of their version of Special Operations Forces during that time. And once they would leave service, you know, military service, go back to tribal areas and protect the chiefs and the tribal villagers from criminal elements and foreign invaders or sometimes they would be hired by another foreign, you know, tribe to help protect the tribal areas in the same capacity. So not quite what I'm doing to the, you know, to the tea, but I mean, it's very similar in a

lot of ways as far as some of the tactical training. We do a little bit of security, you know, assessments and things like that, but really like our bread and butter is the tactical training for domestic law enforcement. We do some civilian training as well, trying to get a little bit more involved with that. And I started doing a lot more of leadership team building talks here recently as well, various presentations. I have a big PowerPoint. I can do almost a full day of stuff or I can do like, you know, kind of block it in. It's just several hours at a time just depending on what the clients are, you know, wanting what they're asking for.

And there's also a knife design company. Oh, yes. I actually have a couple of them right here. So, yeah, so TSG blades, so good buddy mine, I knew from Steel Team 4. We kind of had been work on this for a while. And so, yeah, we just had our website. It's not live just yet. It's going to be TSG Blades.

I'm actually going to have a phone call hopefully tomorrow the next day to follow up with our web designer. But this is our initial knife we had made right here. So this is the TSD Blades overt. The large, it's a little over five inches. 100% American made. Our knife manufacturer is out of the Denver, Colorado area, Rebo-Indy Knives. And so, yeah, it's got, you know, the unyclip sheath, you know, whole Kidex thing else. So that one, and then we have, then we have the TSD Blades covert.

That's the smaller one. So this one has not been officially released yet, but the other one is going to be hopefully released on the website here very soon. I have some of them I've been selling in person. That's awesome, man. Yeah, they look great. Yep. And then so for the third one, again, this is literally just a approach. prototype our knife manufacture made after we had a design.

This could be a folder. Basically the size of the, this TSG blades, the covert. This is going to be the clandestine in a folder. That's awesome. Again, it's a pretty printed prototype. But yeah, we're going to be hopefully starting to take orders for those very soon as well. Cool, man. And then let's also talk a little bit about some of the other stuff that you've gotten into.

like there's a bit of like your police law enforcement work that you're getting into and then I mean there's also how we met doing some security work exactly yeah I guess again we've we joke before we got to like start linking up brother you know more than like once a year like yeah like a working you know so either you got to come down when that when j med comes down you know some of the boys we're in North Carolina meet in Dallas or all head up uh hit up north and uh you know the NYC to meet you guys so no so I'm a uh full commission reserve deputy in the state of Louisiana through Richland Parish. And again, just kind of help out with training. I'll work some, you know, coming and going when I'm

traveling through there. But I'm in the process of getting my Texas commission on law enforcement license as well. I'll be a reserve through Allen, Texas PD. I again, talking about like the Navy cop mastered arms, how it all, you know, kind of came full circle. Since I had that, you know, that NEC, that naval enlistment code, in addition to being a seal, I was able to get approved from the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement to go the military police credentialing route that really saves a lot of in-person academy time. So that would normally have to do.

Even if there's a special operations route, you can go of a special operations veteran and then a military police veteran. I was able to kind of shave even more time off. So I've already done all my line. So I'm all of my online requirements. I've done all of my in-person academy except for I need eight hours,

two different four-hour blocks, but I'm getting knocked out next, next Thursday on June 5th and one of the regional academies in the Dallas-Ford Worth area. And after that, I put in my, submit my application to take the exam and just hopefully knock it out the, excuse me, the first time,

knock out the test, you know, that I'll be able to be fully commissions and licensed at that point in time. So, again, a lot of guys have asked me, you know, hey, why are you doing the law enforcement, you know, like actual commissioning? Like, you don't need that with your military experience. But for me, I'm all about this being like a lifelong learner.

You know, and again, when I set out to do something, I really truly intend to try to be, of all possible, the best in the world at it. And I think, like, okay, how do I, how can I set myself apart from other guys doing with similar backgrounds doing the training gig as well? So kind of my thought process was like, hey, if I can have as many different credentials and licenses as domestic law enforcement, when I'm working a shift, you know, helping the guys out, you know, guys and gals out, I'm held to the same standard, you know, same, you know, use of force, you know, and same, you know, restrictions and guidelines, you know, underneath the, you know, the Texas Commission law enforcement or Louisiana Peace Officer's standard in training, like, how am I going to set myself apart? Well, if I have as much real world experience as I possibly can, I'll be able to help translate. that to a lot of the training blocks we do that much more and kind of put that domestic law enforcement spin on things because I mean I've heard a lot of times before people compare like hey special

operations or you know forces you know doing overseas operations versus domestic law enforcement is is comparing apples to oranges but if you really want to break it down there's a there's a whole lot of similarities as well um so one of the biggest ones is okay you have like the military you have your commanders intent you have your rules of engagement in domestic law enforcement and you have your, you know, your chief's intent, your sheriff's, your director, whatever organization you're working for, you have your use of force guidelines, a U.S. rule of law. So you still have your left and right flanks you have to operate in.

And again, if I can, if I can, you know, continue to hopefully, you know, help out, you know, local state and federal law enforcement agencies and kind of really like, you know, curtail, even if they don't take exactly, you know, how we're, you know, some of the things we put out to them as far as different tactics, techniques, and procedures for various operations. If I could just help put a little bit spin and more things for them, and it fits within their department or agencies or policies or guidelines and saves one of their life, one of their buddies' lives,

or an innocent civilian's life, I mean, that is worth every second, you know, that I mean all the effort I'm putting into it. So again, I have gotten, you know, you know, text and phone calls from guys, you know, it's definitely at some point in time I really need to do like a testimonials and get the website update a little bit more. But guys hit me up saying, like, dude, like some of the stuff you showed us literally saved our lives.

This is what happened. So that's a good feeling. You talk about, like, job satisfaction at that point. So again, yeah, hopefully if I can make, you know, I can do that, you really do something I enjoy and make a good, you know, good living for myself, you know, my family, that's, you know, the icing on the cake, but literally just receiving text messages or phone calls from guys that saying, like, dude, like, I don't know.

I'm sitting here like one guy recently was he was involved in two separate shootings. I put through multiple courses. and he like literally hit me up, you know, two separate events about like, you know, two years apart. And he hit me up, you know, saying, you know, I'm sitting here with my, you know, you know, young or two or three year old daughter. And like my wife is, you know, X amount of months pregnant. He's like, I honestly don't know if I'd be sitting here right now if it wasn't for you and some of the stuff you put out. So so just wanted to say thank you. So getting getting calls and texts like that is like it just, I mean, it's worth every bit of the, you know, the effort and the struggle sometimes.

being a small business owner, you know, running it, you know, running, you know, post-military life here. But again, you know, talking about just, you know, always want to be lifelong lesson learned. Right now, I, I always like to break things down. Like the, you know, you know, tactical, operational, and strategic, you know, levels of things. Right now, really concentrating more on the tactical, like the boots on the ground, the end user, getting a little bit of like operational stuff when you have multiple, you know, units, you know, inter agencies, you know, working together in a mutual aid capacity. but with you have, when you want to start bringing or talking about the strategic level things,

those are your policymakers, whether it be like, you know, you know, state or federal, you know, like, you know, congressional, your members helping get legislation, you know, across, or even like, you know, senior leaders from, you know, your various, various agencies, you know, like your chiefs, sheriffs, directors, you know, folks that are really like affecting policy and writing policy. So I would like to get to the point where I have enough experience across the board where I can really, start hopefully affecting at the strategic level as well and like really really help kind of set some policies to where it would keep officers in the general public you know safe that's really it's all it's all about it's all about safety of the general public and safety for the for the officers

doing the dangerous job. Tray there's something you mentioned that I'd like to kind of key off of you talked about being a lifelong learner and I'd love to ask you know someone who worked at your level today what are you still learning about marksmanship what are you still learning about breaching? What are you still learning about tactics? Yeah, they always evolved. So, um, but I teach in, uh, teaching one of the, uh, one of the, like the, the CQB portions. I always talk about bangs. You used to like bangs, you know, distraction devices, diversionary devices in this civilian world. Um, we would call them crashes in the military that made the exact same thing. Well, a lot of times is the exact same

manufacturer depending on, uh, which agency is buying from which, uh, which manufacturer. But again, talk about just, you know, on OJT and always trying to like make the course, you know, better with, with various, you know, various, you know, kind of critiques, you know, you know, kind of, you know, AAR points guys would come up with. And so I remember I was actually down in Houston teaching a course for Region 2 of the Texas Tactical Police Officer Association. I do a lot of a lot of work with. And again, like it was interagency class, you know, he had guys that were like, you know, full-time SWAT guys for major metropolitan area. and then you had guys that were, you know, you know, within like less than two years as a police officer, they got sent to an instructor level of CQB Corps.

So you have a huge training disparity. But so anyways, we were talking about implementing bangs. And there was like, we were doing a deliberate style clearance. And like one of the guy, like a couple guys, like one guy that was actually the one man in the doorway. Guys were getting a little frustration because the gears are grinding, not working together for the first time. I think it was the first day when this happened after we did,

like some classroom portions of things. And really like the one guy, you know, And the number one man was like, guys, what you want me do? You want me, you know, you're going to bang and want me to hold? You want to be banging, clear it deliberately? You want to be, you know, bang and take it dynamically. And I'm just like, stop right there. You know, like, I literally got on my phone.

I'm like, I have to add that to the, you know, the bang portion of the, of the calls. You know, the presentation doing the distraction, they're utilizing the distraction devices. So, and that's just one of like, you know, many, many examples I could give of our far as just, just listening to guys, you know, from the domestic law enforcement. standpoint, how they do things, and how it's like, okay, I can totally see that. Like, maybe I should, like, more for at least cover that in different aspects, you know, is always, always, you know, evolving and making, making the curriculum better and better. And again, like, I've told a lot of folks this as well. I'm over the mindset of everything I teach, everything I put out in a domestic law enforcement

training course, I need to be able to prepare myself and be able to be accountable. if things do not go right, even if the officers did everything correctly, things if not, they do not go right, I could get called to the carpet and get on the witness stand, and I have to justify why I, you know, put, you know, the certain training objectives and the curriculum why I was covering that. That's why I'm so big.

It was a lot of work, you know, leading up to it, but a couple years ago, the Texas state legislator changed the kind of rules for some of the reporting requirements for training, where before it said, like if you, if the course got audited, you had to provide a lesson plan with like the different training objectives and curriculum ahead of time and also the skills test. Then they changed it. I want to say it was September of 23.

They changed it to where like you had to have one on file ahead of time. So again, it was a lot of extra work for me. I had, you know, work in between work trips while I was back here getting some family time in in North Carolina. But it really forced me to start making some of these, you know, Texas Commission on Law Enforcement template, you know, lesson plans where it's like over at CQB, surveillance, shooting, you know, like a lot of night vision work I do as well. And so I've always passed those off and guys want them.

You know, like the training coordinator will get a copy of it for the reporting standards. But there's even other states. So I kind of had sent that to guys and, you know, what I've done courses through them or with them. And they've actually been able to take it morph it to their state, their state standards. And like it would, you know, they can make their own lesson plan on file at that point, too. So that's definitely a benefit. And it says kind of has that that little bit of extra, extra backing to know that like, hey, a state governing body is, you know, tracking and approved through a training coordinator that you,

that you are actually, you know, going by the lesson plan. And whenever I do, hopefully I get, you know, my test knocked out for my Texas Commission on Law Enforcement, you know, license. And I get commissioned with Allen. One of the first courses I'm going to go to is the 40-hour T-Cole, Texas Commission on Law Enforcement Instructor Training Blog. So because after that, I'll be able to like, I think it's, I have my own control number if I'm not mistaken. And I can actually bottom line like lesson plans instead of always having to run through, you know, like training coordinators for a certain department.

So still a little bit more I got to figure out on that as far as if I still have needed to run it through a department itself. I think that might be the case. But I just would be able to take a lot of work off, a lot of load off of the training coordinators having that call in addition to my, my T-Col, you know, like general peace officers license. Troy, this has been a pretty wild ride, man. Thank you for sharing your story with us. And is there anything we haven't gotten to, anything I haven't asked that you'd really like to talk about? Yeah, I mean, I think we cover the majority of it.

So I mentioned the TTPOA, the Texas Tactical Police Officers Association a lot. I do some stuff with the NTOA, the National Tactical Officers Association. Not as much, but I'm going to be presenting thorough conference again this year when we're going to have it in the end of August and the D.C. area. So looking forward to that. probably do maybe like one z's Tuesdays course of them there's there's several other state um law enforcement you know non-profit organizations that i uh we'd hopefully get more of work with like the h2a the harland tactical officer association the kansas city area that's another one i've

been working on hot and heavy i got to got to get some stuff excuse me i scheduled to them so um that and then i would like to talk just a little bit about you know a non-profit i'm i'm partner with the do a little good foundation they start the dallas fort worth area so i mean even though they're based out of there, they kind of sponsor training and other stuff. I mean, if you look on their website, it's D-A-L-G. That or to do a little good foundation. Google that, oh, the website will pop up. But now, a buddy of mine started that, you know, years ago, is, you know, the founder and executive director,

Russ Spears is his name. And he's just one of the most phenomenal human beings that I've ever met in my entire life. He's a former Navy veteran himself. And then really, he has several different, several different aspects, you know, different like mission focuses where one is like, you know, training domestic law enforcement. Two is kind of helping with, you know, veteran entrepreneurship programs.

And three, it's like a canine, like a, you know, like a service animal for, for kids that have, you know, been like an abuse of homes and things like that. I know there's other stuff he's getting involved with as well. And again, if you just go on their website and look, and they just have some,

this from some phenomenal program. So definitely wanted to get them some more visibility here this evening as well. We'll have links down the description. And I think we also have a couple of viewers. questions for you, Trey. Okay. This is from Corbyn. How often did FITFO apply to CQB? Okay. Fitful applies to all aspects of life. Let me tell you. So, but no, a lot of it is just, I don't say like, hey, a quick decision, like a basic tactic, you know, executed quickly is usually better than an advanced tactic executed slowly or poorly. So again, like you talk about just,

you know, playing pickup basketball, fill and flow, read and react. It all means the same thing. you have to have a lot of the figure-it-the-fuck-out mentality as you go. You still obviously want to have your SOPs and you want to abide by them. So you're not breaking the rules. Like I talked about before, the definition of advanced tactics, just knowing the basics, knowing when it makes sense to break the rules and then be able to articulate why you broke those rules as all advanced tactics are.

From CB, what's your opinion on the MP7? I've heard comments from other tier one guys that it's not liked and used as much at all. Yeah, it was not. I mean, I had one for years. I carried on a few ops, but there's just, you heard horse stories from guys that, if some guys had good success when they had to use it, other guys did not. And it's the round itself. I think it could have been a little bit more, you know, efficient, but if they're like some of

like the actual bullet designs, you know, and ingrains would have been a little bit different. But again, like it's such a small market, like kind of talking with some of the ammunition manufacturers are like, you know, when we try to get additional, you know, rounds, with heavier grain bullets for that. Just like, guys, man, there's only two units out there that's really using it. It's just, it's not worth our time for we'd have to invest. So, again, it was super lightweight. It was freaking so much fun to shoot.

I'll give it that. But again, like, I only carried, you know, a handful of times when I was doing some of the Overwatch-type missions where I had, like, a long gun on my back. I wanted to try to, you know, be as light as I possibly could be. Again, it's just, some guys liked it, but the majority guys just weren't super, super, you know, big fans of it. So I think some better options. now, even though it's a, you know, the pistol caliber versions, but like the, the MPX, I have one of those

through SIG. Love that thing. The, uh, the Nemo Arms, a Mungoose that just came out and just got released. Good buddy mine, we were at the command for, uh, together for quite a bit. He works for Nemo Arms. So, um, yeah, just I haven't had a chance to shoot that yet, but just feeling it, you know, hands on. Like, I would, I would carry one of those before I carried an MP, uh, MP7 for sure, overseas or even domestically. Uh, one more. What was, uh, your favorite rifle or gun? while you were in the teams. Yeah, so my H&K 416 will always be near and dear to my heart, just because, you know, never let me down when I needed it to.

I was hoping it did not let me down, I should say. We got the Neveskis, I think in 20, gosh, what year was it? 2017. I was still in our assault squadron, so got the Neveskis. Those were definitely, you know, a good upgrade. But, again, really didn't, you know, really didn't get a chance to deploy that much with it. Enjoyed the hell out of shooting it, for sure.

That's phenomenal guns, like some of your other. they're awesome, you know, American manufacturer, you know, AR companies, AR manufacturers companies are. But I'd say, yeah, just the H&K416 will always be near and dear to my heart, just because it was it was the workhorse for the tiers, for the tier one organizations for many years during the height of the G-WAT. That's it for questions. Trey, one more time, let folks out there know where they can find you,

where they can find your company. Okay, absolutely. Yeah, so it's my website is 3G strategic consult. Hultons.com. This is exactly how it's listed and spelled out. Also on Facebook, I do some stuff work related on there, but yeah, you just look at my name, Trey Lindsay, you know, should be able to send me a friend request. For Instagram, I have Gallaglass 3G. It has my company logo on there as well. So I do a lot of like, you know, a lot of work related obviously to the 3G company on there. Also have a TSG Blades. You should be able to look that up on Instagram. I haven't posted a whole lot.

I'm waiting for our website to go live before we do kind of our official online launch. And also for Instagram, the T-L-3, that's just my personal one of the whales. I usually tag, if I'm sending a post on one, I'll tag the other one. So guys will be able to pick up on that. And also, guys are interested in getting swag. It's out of the Dallas, Texas area, my swag company. Just on the website, 3G merch. It's how it's spelled out like 3G, then M-E-R-C-H.com.

It should pop up with all the different, you know, various, various, you know, hats, you know, t-shirts, just got some hoodies in as well. Got a, like, you know, like, you know, kind of Yeti-style, you know, cozy cups and have a, have a plethora of other things we're going to be adding as well. So again, yeah, just if guys are interested in that,

just 3G merch.com. Awesome. Yeah, Trey, if you want, you can send us all those links and they will be in the description of this video on the show notes. So if you guys want to follow Trey or any, or get some merch, check out the knives, anything. The links are in the description.

Got it. So on the knife website, it's going to be, we already own the domain. It's going to be TSGBlades.com. It's not live yet. We're having our web designer do the final out of, you know, e-commerce, you know, all the stuff he's got to do. But definitely TSD Blades on Instagram. You'll be able to follow me there. And then TSGBlades, you know, dot com will hopefully be live within the next week or two.

And we'll be able to start taking orders online. Awesome, man. Well, Trey, thank you for doing this interview and spending some time with us. us this evening. Really appreciate it, man. Oh, likewise, brother. I appreciate y'all have me on. Like I mentioned before, do we got to start hanging out more than once a year for a big work you've been like that. Yeah, man. You're welcome up here anytime, man, come smoke cigars together. Okay, that's awesome. Yeah, I appreciate it. Yeah, like J-Med's actually coming down here in a, in June for a bit, you know, later on. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, I'm saying, it's just to go

out there. You can get away for a quick little bro's trip. He's coming on Thursday evening. We're going to be doing some shooting and hanging out on that Friday. Then he's leaving Saturday morning first thing. So just throwing the inside out there. Yeah, I know I might have to work that in there sometime this year. Yeah, thanks again, Trey. And for everyone else out there, we'll see you again next time. Thanks for joining us.

And hey, don't forget to check out the Patreon. There's links down in the description, as always. So we'll see you guys next time. Thank you. Hey, guys, it's Jack. I just want to talk to you for a moment about how you can support the show if you've been watching it, enjoying it, but you'd like to get a little bit more involved and help us continue to do this. You can check out our Patreon. It is patreon.com slash the

team house. And for $5 a month, you can get access to all of these episodes of the team house ad free. The same goes with our affiliated podcast, Eyes On, with Andy Milburn, Jason Lyons, McMulroy. That one, you will also get all of those episodes ad-free. And you support the channel and the show and we really appreciate it. The Patreon members are literally what has helped this company, this small business survive, especially during our early years and you are what continues to help this thing going even as we navigate the turbulent world of YouTube advertising. So we really appreciate all of you guys. There's going to be a link down in the description to that Patreon page and there is also going to be a link to our new merch shop. So,

If you guys want to go and get some Team House merchandise, we got stickers, and we also have patches. And I should mention, if you sign up for Patreon at $10 a month, we will mail you this patch as well. So we really appreciate that. But they're also for sale on the merch shop. And additionally, they got T-shirts up there, water bottles, tote bag, coffee mugs, all that good stuff. So please go and check them out and support the show. we really appreciate it guys thank you