WEBVTT

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Special Operations Cobert ask me and the Team

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House with your hopes. Jack Murphy
and David Bark. Hey, everyone,

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welcome to episode two hundred and fifty
three of The Team House. I'm Jack

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Murphy here with David Park and our
guest on tonight's show is Travis Sandford.

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Travis served in the Air Force as
a SOUTE Special Operations weather technician and we're

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really happy to have him on the
show. We've been wanting to have one

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of you guys on the show for
quite a while, so I'm really glad

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that this could happen. Welcome,
Thank you, Travis. Yeah, yeah,

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I know somebody should call like animal
Control because I think you guys might

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have caught a unicorn. Sounds like
trying to get a saute guy on any

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kind of show like this and talk
about what we do. It's hard to

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do sometimes. Oh, We're glad
to finally make it happen here. So

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Travis, I'll start off asking the
question I asked most of our guests about

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your origin story. If you can
tell us a little bit about how you

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grew up and how that took you
towards the Air Force. Yeah, so

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I grew up in Central Missouri,
Jeffson City. You know, I wish

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I could say I grew up in
you know, played sports and wanted to

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join the military and knew that was
the path was going to take. But

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I think for a lot of guys
that was not the case. You know.

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So I played baseball basketball all through
high school with the dream of going

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on and playing in college. I
actually went to college for a year here

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in Kansas City, where I live
now, as a fresh seventeen eighteen year

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old kid away from home for the
first time, really kind of just lost

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my mind. I think I was
more interested in girls who was in my

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class and what I was doing on
Friday night than what I was supposed to

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be concentrated on in the classroom itself. So I think I got a one

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point eight my freshman year first semester, which led to academic probation for the

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second semester, And as second semester
didn't work out that way either, I

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ended up actually getting I went to
junior college even I lived in an apartment

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off campus, and I remember as
by April we got a notice on our

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door about having like a Party's right, we just kept having parties over and

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over again. This apartment complex kind
of gave us a warning, and so

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we didn't have a party for a
few months. And we're like, we

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thought, you know, as young
kids, like, well, they probably

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forgot about it by now. We
could probably have at least one more party,

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like in the springtime. So we
had this party and it was a

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tiny apartment and it was probably shoulder
to shoulder, and the next morning we

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just got a thing in our door, like you have two weeks to get

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out, and I was like,
oh shit, Like so didn't want to

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like tell my dad I got evicted
and have that discussion. So kind of

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lived down in my car for a
little bit, kind of couch surfed in

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the semester, and I remember my
dad had come up and saw inside my

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my suv and saw all my stuff
and he was like, what's going on.

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I was like, Dad, I've
been got couch surfing since April,

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and he was like, what the
fuck are you doing? Like come home?

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Like. So, I ended up
moving back to jeff City and got

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a job on a landscaping crew.
You know, shout out Sam Gaines,

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uh hard working man, but you
know he kind of put me to work

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and that was some tough work.
And I think at that time I was

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like, you know what, like
I got to do something else in my

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life. I can't be you know, building brick walls and mowing weedy and

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every day. So I was like, well, I'm going to join the

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military. And at the time,
like I didn't want to do anything tough,

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like I'd been doing manual labor,
and I was like, I want

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to do the easiest, most pushed
job, get me some a C.

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So I was like, I want
to do an Air Force right, like

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that's what people say. Uh.
So I walked into through his office and

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he was you know, did the
ASVAB and scored fairly well on that,

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and so what do you want to
do? I was like, I don't

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care, man, I just want
I want a job I can set in

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the air conditioning, like, you
know, straight up, like I don't

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want to do anything crazy outside.
Uh. And So I got a job

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as like a just a normal Air
Force weatherman. So I for the first

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few years of my career I predicted
in for casted weather out in Davis monthan

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from Wyoming down to l Paso.
And that's really where, you know,

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my journey kind of began. Like
I was kind of like a fish out

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of water there. You know what. After a few years, I I

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was pretty athletic, pretty strong,
and we had a commander come in.

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His name was Colonel Don Shannon,
and he was a prior sautee officer and

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so he'd just taken over command and
you know, we'd done pt and he

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kind of pulled me, you know, aside and was like, you know,

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do you like what you're doing,
like you enjoy being here, you

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know. And I was like sure, yeah, yes, sir, Like

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I didn't quite know what to say, and he's like, I'm gonna be

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honest, like I think you could
do something else, like there's you ever

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heard of like saoti And I'm like
no, like not really. This is

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like kind of like pre like Internet, you know, two thousand, Like

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we had Internet like two thousand and
five, six seven around that range where

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I wasn't googling things every day like
you do now, right, So he

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kind of just gave me like a
quick breakdown, was like here's what you

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gotta do, like you know,
obviously got to learn how to swim,

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talking about the asstock test and how
to prepare for it, and didn't know

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how to swim. I mean I
grew up swimming lakes like I could survive,

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but I wasn't like a great swimmer. So I started training and I

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remember we had an officer from the
Naval Academy and she swam and I was

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like listen, like I need to
learn to swim to take this test,

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this asstock testing. You know how
far you gotta swim? And I was

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like sixteen hundred meters, you know, and she's like, okay to me

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to the pool. I literally could
not swim two laps, but I would

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just like have my head above the
water. I gas out and uh so

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we started from the basics, you
know. So I had my head in

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the water, blowing bubbles like you
learned as a little kid, and learned

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to swim. And then went and
took the asstop which is like a little

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like free cursor kind of tests if
you qualify, and that was at Scott

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Air Force Base, and ended up
qualifying and from there you kind of get

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orders and you know, you start
your journey along the sautee path. So

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you know, that's kind of how
I got started. You know, how

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it ended up was nothing what I
thought it was going to be when I

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first joined in two thousand and five. Spoken up, I just want to

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clarify for people who might not be
falling along SAUTI a special Operations weather technician,

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right, and so you went,
you went from being a weatherman in

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the Air Force. Can you tell
us what that training pipeline is, like,

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I mean, do they give you
a crystal ball so you can prognisticate

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or how does that work? So
week one, they give you like a

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giant rock and they tell you to
go outside and set it on the ground,

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and like when the rock gets wet, you can tell them that it's

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like rain and things like that.
No, but yeah, so from the

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weather perspective, it's a very atmospheric
physics heavy, you know. So that

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was probably the toughest you know challenge
of mental course. You know, through

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it was like having to understand air
masses and physics and you know how you

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when you look at weather, it's
like a three D thing, you know,

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so you have to be able to
kind of visualize that. And so

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it ended up being you know,
right about a year worth of training just

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in like the classroom to understand whether
I was down in Bloxi, Mississippi during

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Hurricane Katrina, and so that kind
of derailed training a little bit. I

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was right in the middle of it
when Katrina hit, and so we sheltered

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in place there and kind of had
a few months deway. But that was,

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you know, probably the most you
know mentally challenging part was just getting

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through that that weather school. Did
anybody at the school, uh for Sea

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Katrina? Oh? Yeah, for
sure. That was when when it was

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coming like we have to do like
these handmade charts where you're kind of like

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going through and figuring out like pressure
gradients and things like that, and uh,

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they were kind of everybody was pretty
dialed in to know it was what

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was happening when they made the call
to kind of shelter in place, when

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all these other bases were evacuating around
Just like that was kind of like I'm

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glad that I was just too dumb
and stupid to understand what was happening,

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because like here we are, like
on the coast, just setting in a

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building and hurricane train is going on
outside and the base is flooding, and

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you're just like I'm just here chilling
watching the DVD player, right, remember

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the old DVD players that the portables. You know, I'm just like no

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idea what's going on outside? And
so how long is the the like the

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weather technician, the standard weather technician
course, Yeah, so the standard one,

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like we just come in as a
conventional weatherm and it's probably eleven months.

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If you're not having those interruptions,
that's wild, you know. So

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it's it's fairly long. You know, it's not not a quick turnaround there,

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especially if like you get washed back, you know, which could derailly

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U six weeks if you each wash
back and then is that is the qualification

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that you guys get out of that? Is it similar to like what a

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civilian meteorologist would be if when you
see them like on the if they are

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I don't know if they're mediaologist or
just talking heads. But is it the

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same type of thing or is it
more intense? It's the same type of

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understanding, I would say, like
you know, most of them you see

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on TV, they have a four
year degree, you know, like so

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they might understand a little more of
the science part behind it. But you

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know, weather is about patterns.
Like once you understand the physics of stuff,

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then you start to understand the patterns. You know, Like so whenever

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I was forecasting from Wyoming down to
El Paso, each location, so Fort

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Carson, like all those different bases, you understand where the mountains are and

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you understand like historically, if we
get wins from this direction, it's going

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to cause afternoons understorms because you get
upslope, you know, you know things

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like that. So understanding just the
pattern, you know, makes forecasting a

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little bit easier, which you know
that kind of helps you you're on a

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fob for six months, you can
kind of understand those patterns a little bit

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better as well. So there's a
lot of pattern recognition that goes with like

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knowing what the local what's happening locally
correct? Yeah, yeah, and then

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you know, a tough part about
that job too, is getting the general

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public to understand the differences between watches, warnings things like that. Like it's

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just a lot of misconception, right, and so if like you put out

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a weather watch, I'm not saying
that it's going to happen. I'm saying

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that we have like basically all the
ingredients to happen, you know, especially

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when we were talking about severe weather
like but severe weather like tornadoes, things

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like that, Like one minor detail
is missing, it's not going to happen,

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you know. And so sometimes like
that minor detail is unforeecastable, you

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know, like it's just there's nothing
out there to predict it. So that's

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why you get the watches in warning. So the warning is like, hey,

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it's it's imminent, it's going to
happen. Firstus a watch is you

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know, hey, could just saying
like we got everything's favorable, but I'm

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not saying it's going to happen.
Just to connect the dots for John Q

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Public, I know this is kind
of an obvious question for you, but

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why is it so important to have
weathermen in the Air Force? Like what

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is the task? Why are you
doing this? Yeah? I mean thinking

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where I started there at Davis mothing
like you're protect protecting all those assets on

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the ground. You know, you
think of every base that you're forecasting for

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has ground assets, has personnel assets, you know. You know, probably

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one of the most impactful things while
I was in David Mothin just being a

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typical weather person, was around the
fourth July for Cannon Air Force Base.

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They were having a Fourth of July
like celebration event, but that earlier that

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morning, you know, everything was
shaping up to have a Haley event there

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later on in the afternoon in the
evening, and so I kind of put

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out a watch. The watch turned
into a warning kind of late afternoon,

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and that base commander like I was, you know, an E three.

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The base commander from Cannon like called
my desk and was like what are you

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doing? Like it's funny here,
like you're putting out a hill warning,

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like I don't have to cancel,
you know, the event I'll have to

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put up, put away the S
six teams, I have to do all

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this stuff, you know, and
it's like you kind of like either got

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to stand by your your forecast or
kind of crumble, you know. So

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that point, like I kind of
stood by it, and sure enough,

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thankfully it hailed that night, and
like I was smart for at least one

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day. Yeah, And unfortunately it
seems like in that type of job you

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can go from zero to hero or
here real quick and no time flat,

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right, yeah, yep, yep, So better be sure about it,

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yeah, you know, and if
you're wrong, you better have a good

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sense of humor because you're gonna hear
about it. Yeah yeah. So,

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uh, you go to this at
SoC sort of pre preparatory school pretesting and

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take us a little bit through the
saute training and that pipeline and how that

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how that differs from being a conventional
weathermen. Yeah. Yeah, So the

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pipeline that I went through versus where
it is now is a complete one eighty

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And so I was kind of like
this new generation of SAUTI to where they

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had these seats in these schools but
it wasn't like a you know, a

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very clear path from dot to dot. It was we have seats, We'll

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send you these seats whenever they're open. But it wasn't very fluid. And

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so I showed up to Herbert Field
and I actually before I even went to

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any courses or anything, there was
a training mission up here at Fort Leonard

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Wood where the one sixtieth was passing
training and they needed people just a fast

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rope onto a building so they could
just do some elevators over and over.

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And they're like, well, we
got this new guy, a couple of

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new guys here. They don't really
have any experience, but like we can

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send them up and they can be
bodies. And like I've never fashion opened

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my life. And so I show
up here. I go to the Fort

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Campbell. They got me connected with
an instruct or at Air Assault for like

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two hours and we go on the
tower and just imagine, like he's Air

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Assault. You know, grunts are
just kind of like having to be able

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to go down the tower tower at
all for a few weeks, and like

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fresh Air Force guy shows up.
I go straight to the top. He

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gives me like a quick five minute
Okay, this will be going to do

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you feel comfortable, Let's roll and
I just started going down the tower and

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that night, my first time fast
roping out of a live helicopter was at

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night with the one sixtieth on top
of a roof somewhere near Fort lennar Wood,

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Missouri. You know. And it's
like just doing stuff like that where

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it's like you just had to adapt, you know. So went to that

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school, went to a couple of
shooting schools right off the bat, before

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I even did any kind of conventional
training. So I went to Rifles Only,

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which is down in South Texas.
Like that was my first shooting school.

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I went to went to an Avalanche
Astatsment school and Jack then whole got

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avalanche certified, and then I went
to the STTS with some special tech training

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swater and so that ended up being
about six to nine months where you're small

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unit tactics, heavy weapons insertions,
you know, and full mission profiles.

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So once you graduate there, you
graduate your five level and you're pretty much

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deployable, you know. So you
know, look back, it's a lot

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of training, but also not a
lot of time, you know. So

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it was one of those things like
it takes. They had to be really

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selective on who they picked, on
who they can put in those situations,

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because it's not like you're getting this
two year training pipeline like they do now.

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Like now it's you're in a pipeline
for two years, right, You're

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going to school school, You're as
trained as you can be. Whereas you

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know, my first deployment, I
show up and like I'm questioning, like

248
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I don't know if I like,
if I'm qualified to be here, you

249
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know, like there's things that I
hadn't even experienced yet, you know.

250
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So that was kind of what was
unique about that time that I went through.

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It was like they were just starting
to set up the pipeline, they

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were just starting to implement things.
But I was like probably a year or

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two early, so, and so
I was kind of like a guinea pig

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almost. What had SOO W T? Because you said an officer spoke to

255
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you or somebody who had been there
and spoke to you about it. What

256
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had it been prior to this?
What was the vision for what are what

257
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is a weather guy doing in the
Special Operations community other than telling little birds

258
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that they can they can't go up? Right? Like, Yeah, and

259
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then how how was it changing as
you were there, because I think you

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know, you're talking about a pipeline
sort of like similar to what CCT or

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pj's have, but they didn't have
that set up for you guys, but

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they envisioned you in a role that
you hadn't been in before. Correct,

263
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right, correct? Correct? Yeah, So you know, pre nine to

264
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eleven SAUTI was a lot of you
know, kind of one sixtieth support.

265
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You know that you went with where
the one sixtieth went. You were,

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you know, that dedicated asset.
And then nine eleven happens, and you

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know, I'm not positive what picked
off having the SAUTE on the ground at

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each individual FOB, but at some
point it did, probably in that six

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seven timeframe where now we're starting to
be on the fob who are starting to

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you know, you know, run
with teams unilaterally. You know, you

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start having sauteas get assigned to those
CESAR missions, you know, any kind

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of mission on the ground. Now
we're putting that scenario. And so I

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think that when that happened, they
realize, Okay, now we need to

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figure out a pipeline, Like we
can't just be put these guys in here

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to have these piece milled training plans. We need a structured training plan and

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saute. We didn't become our own
career field probably around until like two thousand

277
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and nine, Like we were a
shred out of the conventional weather. So

278
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they put like a j designator on
our job code or MWS and and you

279
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have that jay just signifying you're a
jumper, you know. And so once

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we got the designating career field,
then the pipeline could stand up, and

281
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then they can kind of break away
from you know, traditional weather. Right

282
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and why what is the benefit or
what was the vision of having a sutia

283
00:19:18.680 --> 00:19:25.400
guy off the fob right it running, you know, whether with the QRF

284
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or with on target. Why do
they want that? I think it came

285
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to fruition, moving away from just
your weather, you know, peace,

286
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you know, because you don't need
to have a weather guy on a mission

287
00:19:40.920 --> 00:19:44.359
if we're talking just traditional weather like
you see on TV. You know,

288
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where weather comes into play. You
know where South Tea came into play was

289
00:19:48.720 --> 00:19:52.839
a lot of like environmentally connissense,
you know, so you know mission planning

290
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things, you know, so I
remember, you know, one mission,

291
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you know planning we were going to
do a river crossing, you know,

292
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and we're just looking at imagery,
and so you go to riverine courses.

293
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We understand like natural depth points in
a river based off how it's meandering,

294
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you know, so you can kind
of help the teams be like, hey,

295
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like I know this is advantageous and
you want to cross here, but

296
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like I don't know if I would, if we've never been there before,

297
00:20:15.079 --> 00:20:18.039
Like this wouldn't be my first choice. And here's why, you know,

298
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because I know I'm going to get
natural pulling, you know, around this

299
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this bend here, and you know, maybe we look, you know,

300
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somewhere else. So I think they
were trying to bring that environmental piece into

301
00:20:29.279 --> 00:20:33.200
it to help them a mission planning
side and kind of prevent you know,

302
00:20:33.559 --> 00:20:37.319
having to cancel a mission you know
on the zero hour, having to push

303
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if you can just get in the
forefront of things and get there you know

304
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sooner, h makes me planning easier. So in a way, you guys

305
00:20:45.759 --> 00:20:51.240
are expanding to like the old pathfinder
role of like the density of soil on

306
00:20:51.319 --> 00:20:55.680
an airfield or the old the old
UDT is what is the beach like?

307
00:20:56.000 --> 00:20:59.839
But you're like this is like mid
mission stuff what's this river crossing going to

308
00:20:59.839 --> 00:21:03.599
be like? Or what are these
areas like? So it's all environmental factors

309
00:21:03.640 --> 00:21:07.119
now that you're trying to figure out. Yeah, yeah, and I think

310
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now you know now that they're they're
changed to the queer field is called special

311
00:21:11.000 --> 00:21:15.079
reconnaissance now, so it's no longer
called special operations weather, so it's not

312
00:21:15.200 --> 00:21:19.200
special word connaissance. So you know
they're they're going to Arslick, They're going

313
00:21:19.319 --> 00:21:25.039
to these different schools that are more
aligned with what they were trying to do

314
00:21:25.640 --> 00:21:29.039
back then, you know, And
so I think they're going to go that

315
00:21:29.240 --> 00:21:33.359
route, you know, throwing up
a ua V and doing summer constance in

316
00:21:33.400 --> 00:21:36.799
the u a V. Like.
So you know, we were Raven certified,

317
00:21:37.039 --> 00:21:41.079
like we were constantly just looking for
different things that tie to our name

318
00:21:41.160 --> 00:21:45.720
to say, this is a capability
we can provide, right, you know,

319
00:21:45.119 --> 00:21:48.640
whether it was the Raven, whether
it was driving schools, like any

320
00:21:48.799 --> 00:21:53.920
anything you could do just be an
asset to a mission beyond just traditional weather.

321
00:21:55.119 --> 00:21:57.400
Right, And so, so how
are you feeling about all of this?

322
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Going from initially the that just wants
to sit in the ac Now they're

323
00:22:02.400 --> 00:22:06.000
getting you like jocked up to go
out on missions, right special ops guys.

324
00:22:07.240 --> 00:22:11.960
Yeah, yeah. I mean once
I made the decision to do it,

325
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it was kind of like I was
all in, you know. And

326
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then once you go through training for
a while, then it's like you have

327
00:22:18.200 --> 00:22:22.359
that young man's mindset where like I
don't get in a firefight, like it

328
00:22:22.440 --> 00:22:26.559
was a failure. Now I'm older, it's like that probably wasn't a mindset

329
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that we have, right, you
know. So I was amp. So

330
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I remember I graduated like I wanted
to go to cob Like I get aside,

331
00:22:33.519 --> 00:22:36.440
I want to go to Cobra,
I want to go to Anaconda,

332
00:22:36.680 --> 00:22:41.240
like I wanted to go to the
hottest spots, you know. So I

333
00:22:41.319 --> 00:22:47.680
remember I was supposed to go to
Chapman in twenty ten, and so I

334
00:22:47.799 --> 00:22:52.799
think was it decemberish nine is when
they had the car bomb right around right

335
00:22:52.839 --> 00:22:56.000
around the area, yep, And
so they changed it. So I was

336
00:22:56.519 --> 00:23:00.400
going to Chapman until that happened and
they changed I remember I was driving home

337
00:23:00.720 --> 00:23:03.839
to Florida from Missouri and I got
a call the Hey, we're changing up

338
00:23:03.880 --> 00:23:07.720
your location. We're going to send
you to you know, Balam of God,

339
00:23:07.839 --> 00:23:10.720
Bob Todd, and I'm like I
never I heard of this place,

340
00:23:10.839 --> 00:23:14.279
Like what the damn it? Like
I'm gonna go there and like it's gonna

341
00:23:14.359 --> 00:23:18.119
suck, and like ended up being, you know, an awesome deployment,

342
00:23:18.200 --> 00:23:22.640
you know, so happy that I
actually got switched together. What was when

343
00:23:22.759 --> 00:23:29.240
when you're first showing up to these
teams and you're the weather guy, which

344
00:23:29.640 --> 00:23:33.720
again is sort of a relatively new
thing that people are getting thrown. How

345
00:23:33.759 --> 00:23:37.920
did people respond to you? What
was the reaction? Uh? Yeah,

346
00:23:38.079 --> 00:23:42.680
I mean, as you could probably
imagine, it was a tough, tough

347
00:23:42.799 --> 00:23:47.359
sell at first, you know,
just to kind of paint the picture,

348
00:23:47.440 --> 00:23:49.599
you know, for people to try
to understand. When I showed up in

349
00:23:49.640 --> 00:23:53.680
twenty ten to Fob Todd, I
was with a Marine Special Operations team,

350
00:23:53.960 --> 00:23:59.240
a team that had been training together
for at least a year, and all

351
00:23:59.279 --> 00:24:03.200
of a sudden, an Air Force
guy one. Like that's tough in itself,

352
00:24:03.279 --> 00:24:06.039
Like you're you're an Air Force guy. Like a lot of you know,

353
00:24:06.480 --> 00:24:10.480
O DAS Seal teams, MARSK teams, like they're not even stinking the

354
00:24:10.519 --> 00:24:14.599
Air Force has ground guys. You
show up and so you have that hurdle

355
00:24:14.680 --> 00:24:17.039
to get over. I'm like,
okay, you're an air force guy,

356
00:24:17.119 --> 00:24:19.319
like you know what, you probably
just work the computer or like what are

357
00:24:19.319 --> 00:24:22.720
you what are you going to do
here? And then you tell them like

358
00:24:22.759 --> 00:24:26.680
you're a weather guy too, and
like there's just questions galore like kind of

359
00:24:26.759 --> 00:24:30.599
like this, like well I don't
get it, like what are you going

360
00:24:30.680 --> 00:24:33.960
to do for me? Whenever we're
you know, on a direct action,

361
00:24:33.160 --> 00:24:37.640
Like what's what's the point of having
you there? You know? And so

362
00:24:37.720 --> 00:24:40.759
you're kind of having to explain that. I mean, you know, sometimes

363
00:24:41.000 --> 00:24:42.039
like I was saying, like I
was there in Afghanistan in the summer,

364
00:24:42.799 --> 00:24:47.200
there's not really a reason for me
to be there. And that's where we

365
00:24:47.319 --> 00:24:49.759
got to think outside the box,
like how else can I help you?

366
00:24:51.039 --> 00:24:53.720
You know? I think that's what
made good saute operators versus bad ones was

367
00:24:55.319 --> 00:24:56.680
you had the ones that were like
this is my box and I'm want to

368
00:24:56.680 --> 00:25:00.279
stay inside of it. And then
you had the ones like, know what,

369
00:25:00.480 --> 00:25:03.160
like my direct asset, you know, when I'm bringing the team,

370
00:25:03.200 --> 00:25:07.000
Like it's not valuable right now?
What else can I do to make myself

371
00:25:07.079 --> 00:25:10.440
valuable? You know? And they
go out and they seek that. And

372
00:25:10.480 --> 00:25:14.000
the ones that did that, I
think had great great deployments. Ones that

373
00:25:14.119 --> 00:25:17.240
didn't could have rough deployments to where
you know, they kind of get looked

374
00:25:17.240 --> 00:25:18.839
at as like, hey, you're
just a paperweight to set some of the

375
00:25:18.920 --> 00:25:22.599
talk. So what were some of
those like holes that you were able to

376
00:25:22.680 --> 00:25:26.279
fill? I mean you up on
the fifty cal. What kind of stuff

377
00:25:26.279 --> 00:25:29.559
did they have you doing? Yeah, So that's the great thing about the

378
00:25:29.759 --> 00:25:36.279
Air Force training was they understood that
aspect. Like so when you think of

379
00:25:36.400 --> 00:25:41.440
how how the teams set up everyone, let's let's talk about oda. You

380
00:25:41.599 --> 00:25:45.640
have your Bravo, your echo,
whoever, your delta. They're good at

381
00:25:45.640 --> 00:25:48.799
that one specific thing. But we
all know, like you don't go to

382
00:25:48.839 --> 00:25:52.680
the delta to say, hey,
can you load some crypto into the radio

383
00:25:52.759 --> 00:25:53.960
and help me do this? Like
it's very like, hey, this is

384
00:25:55.039 --> 00:25:59.440
my lane. This what I'm good
at, that's your job kind of thing.

385
00:25:59.559 --> 00:26:02.640
And so the Air Force understood that
and like you know what, like

386
00:26:02.680 --> 00:26:07.240
we're going to set these guys up
to where anytime they show up, they

387
00:26:07.319 --> 00:26:10.880
can help heavy weapons, they can
help you know, a Bravo, Like

388
00:26:11.119 --> 00:26:15.319
we understand radios, you know.
So you know I carried the one seventeen,

389
00:26:15.400 --> 00:26:18.720
I had the one fifty two.
I could do sat coom and get

390
00:26:18.799 --> 00:26:21.920
sat com up pretty quick, you
know, and a lot of times our

391
00:26:22.000 --> 00:26:26.200
radio equipment was you know, a
little better than some of the army stuff

392
00:26:26.240 --> 00:26:29.480
that they were running, better than
the MARSK guys stuff they had, and

393
00:26:29.599 --> 00:26:33.839
so was able to be you know, pretty capable you know comms guy and

394
00:26:33.960 --> 00:26:37.559
my own right. And so once
I showed I could do that, you

395
00:26:37.599 --> 00:26:41.759
know, So the kind of the
key to it is you show up and

396
00:26:41.839 --> 00:26:47.519
you kind of assess the situation,
like you know, it's kind of like

397
00:26:47.559 --> 00:26:49.359
you figure out who the alphas are, who the decision makers are, who

398
00:26:49.400 --> 00:26:52.119
are the people that are going to
have influence, you know, like your

399
00:26:52.200 --> 00:26:56.480
team leaders, your team sergeant,
and he's saying, okay, now,

400
00:26:56.559 --> 00:26:59.880
how can I get around them to
show them something that they're not expecting,

401
00:27:00.319 --> 00:27:02.880
right, you know. And so
that's what I did, Like I kind

402
00:27:02.920 --> 00:27:04.519
of assess that, Okay, you
have your you look at every team,

403
00:27:04.559 --> 00:27:07.880
there's always one or two, maybe
three or four people that they're they're the

404
00:27:07.920 --> 00:27:11.640
physical guys. They're always in the
gym, they're lifting. They just want

405
00:27:11.720 --> 00:27:15.240
lift weights on the appoyments, get
jacked, right. So I was like,

406
00:27:15.319 --> 00:27:18.839
okay, well I just went through
this pipeline like in pretty good shape.

407
00:27:18.960 --> 00:27:21.519
I'm gonna go work out with them
so I can prove that I'm not

408
00:27:21.599 --> 00:27:23.680
just the Air Force to do like
I'm fit, like I can lift,

409
00:27:23.799 --> 00:27:29.240
I'm strong, but check that box. Then you see the guy that calms

410
00:27:29.240 --> 00:27:32.920
guy, he was out every day
just Tom checks all the time. And

411
00:27:33.000 --> 00:27:34.720
so I just took that upon myself
like hey, like go ask questions like

412
00:27:36.319 --> 00:27:40.200
you know who's gonna who's who's your
backup? Like you know who's who's second,

413
00:27:40.279 --> 00:27:44.000
and understand what he does, like
hey, what what's your problems?

414
00:27:44.039 --> 00:27:45.119
And he's like we have every four
we mentioned like I'm the only one that

415
00:27:45.160 --> 00:27:48.039
can load crypto, and I was
like, oh man, I got to

416
00:27:48.119 --> 00:27:51.160
kick thirteen. I could load some
crypto for you, Like let me jump

417
00:27:51.240 --> 00:27:53.119
on that, like I'll load these
these twelve radios for you, no problem,

418
00:27:53.240 --> 00:27:56.680
just like go chill out, and
so like you do that. So

419
00:27:56.799 --> 00:28:00.000
like once you impacted all these decision
makers, then comes down to the mission

420
00:28:00.079 --> 00:28:03.039
plan, Well where were we going
to put the Air Force guy? And

421
00:28:03.079 --> 00:28:07.079
it became a point where it's like
I want to like, yeah, I

422
00:28:07.200 --> 00:28:08.799
want him on my element, you
know, because they knew that I could

423
00:28:08.839 --> 00:28:12.640
do so many other things, you
know, outside of just my mission set.

424
00:28:14.119 --> 00:28:17.400
Now I know that like JATAK is, I mean, it's a very

425
00:28:17.440 --> 00:28:22.480
specific skill set. Those guys are
highly trained. But as you as an

426
00:28:22.480 --> 00:28:26.359
Air Force guy dealing with weather and
air coming on to these teams, would

427
00:28:26.359 --> 00:28:29.279
they expect you to bring that capability? And is that something that the Air

428
00:28:29.319 --> 00:28:34.759
Force worked in eventually? Yeah,
I didn't really get those questions, you

429
00:28:34.839 --> 00:28:37.680
know, a lot as far as
you know, bringing air assets, you

430
00:28:37.759 --> 00:28:41.200
know, because everyone all those teams, they had their own j Tech okay

431
00:28:41.599 --> 00:28:45.839
a signed to them, so okay, second deployment they would have an Air

432
00:28:45.920 --> 00:28:48.599
Force controller assigned to the team already, so you know, that was kind

433
00:28:48.599 --> 00:28:51.839
of nice. But in the first
deployment of the Marines, they had their

434
00:28:51.839 --> 00:28:55.880
own j Tech, their own air
you know, and so they didn't expect

435
00:28:55.920 --> 00:28:59.839
that. One thing that did they
come with the expectations when I show up

436
00:29:00.160 --> 00:29:04.039
is maybe getting different mission set,
you know. And so my second deployment,

437
00:29:04.200 --> 00:29:07.200
especially like they knew, like when
I showed up, like it was

438
00:29:07.240 --> 00:29:10.759
probably for a level two. But
then they also want to use me.

439
00:29:10.839 --> 00:29:14.640
Since I'm there, I could get
off base sometimes a little easier than what

440
00:29:14.759 --> 00:29:17.319
they could, you know, so
if they had restrictions on what they could

441
00:29:17.359 --> 00:29:21.839
do. I remember my second deployment
in twenty eleven, the team was having

442
00:29:21.880 --> 00:29:25.359
trouble like really operating, like they
were there just to train you know,

443
00:29:25.480 --> 00:29:29.279
commandos or just train you know,
the local A and A, and they

444
00:29:29.359 --> 00:29:32.079
wanted to go do something, and
I was like, well, like there's

445
00:29:32.119 --> 00:29:34.759
a pretty diverse lotty system. You
know, A couple of clicks away,

446
00:29:36.079 --> 00:29:38.039
like we could throw a can up
together, I could say, I need

447
00:29:38.079 --> 00:29:42.319
to go assess this lotty system.
We could put something in place to kind

448
00:29:42.359 --> 00:29:45.240
of get off base, you know, and so we kind of do some

449
00:29:45.319 --> 00:29:48.200
little stuff like that so that you
know, anytime you can do that too

450
00:29:48.279 --> 00:29:52.440
and help them out, you know, that buys you some rapport as well.

451
00:29:52.680 --> 00:29:56.759
Sure, I think it's I think
it's important to tell people who are

452
00:29:56.839 --> 00:30:02.039
civilians who have never been out there. I think there's nothing more frustrating when

453
00:30:02.079 --> 00:30:06.519
you're when you're overseas, uh in
a combat zone, to be, for

454
00:30:06.640 --> 00:30:10.759
whatever reason, to be stuck on
your base a mission, and everybody wants

455
00:30:11.000 --> 00:30:14.240
in the fight. And if you
have a mission, or if you have

456
00:30:14.440 --> 00:30:18.160
leadership that is less inclined to let
you leave the base, Like you say,

457
00:30:18.839 --> 00:30:23.440
just hav any excuse to go out
to get out the fire, maybe

458
00:30:23.519 --> 00:30:27.400
do a little recon by fire.
I don't know, right, you know

459
00:30:27.960 --> 00:30:33.039
a reason maybe you know, walk
into an a CRP, right, Yeah,

460
00:30:33.119 --> 00:30:37.079
exactly. Yeah, that that's a
huge asset. I want to ask

461
00:30:37.160 --> 00:30:40.440
you about your first mission, but
first I just want to real quick tell

462
00:30:40.680 --> 00:30:45.440
people out there about our patreon.
For folks out there who are interested in

463
00:30:45.480 --> 00:30:48.519
maybe getting these episodes add free,
you can subscribe to our Patreon. It's

464
00:30:48.559 --> 00:30:53.200
only five dollars a month and you'll
get all these episodes add free and help

465
00:30:53.240 --> 00:30:56.319
support the channel we really appreciate.
Yeah, just a few dollars a month,

466
00:30:56.359 --> 00:31:00.200
a coffee a month would actually help
us in a way that we could

467
00:31:00.519 --> 00:31:07.160
stop using YouTube for our ads and
just give everybody ad free content content.

468
00:31:07.279 --> 00:31:10.680
But yeah, so please track it
out. The link is down the description.

469
00:31:11.759 --> 00:31:12.920
So, Travis, could you tell
us a little bit about your first

470
00:31:12.960 --> 00:31:18.640
mission out with more SoC on that
first deployment? Yeah, yeah, so

471
00:31:19.319 --> 00:31:25.079
about March of twenty ten, so
I'd only been there for maybe roughly a

472
00:31:25.119 --> 00:31:30.200
week. We ended up just going
to do like almost a little CRP.

473
00:31:30.480 --> 00:31:33.559
You know. It was supposed to
just be one of those little you know,

474
00:31:33.759 --> 00:31:38.559
leave at about two three in the
morning, park the the Humbies,

475
00:31:38.680 --> 00:31:41.799
just a couple of clicks away from
our objective and we're just going to walk

476
00:31:41.839 --> 00:31:45.839
in, just do a CRP that
morning and kind of come back, but

477
00:31:47.200 --> 00:31:51.680
quickly kind of turned you know,
a different route here pretty quickly. So

478
00:31:51.920 --> 00:31:56.880
we end up clearing a couple compounds
down this valley. And then as we're

479
00:31:56.920 --> 00:32:00.720
moving up the valley, myself,
the team leader sniper in some an a

480
00:32:01.640 --> 00:32:05.400
went up on top of a hill
to provide overwatch while the team is going

481
00:32:05.480 --> 00:32:08.839
to bound to the next set of
compounds. And so this is probably you

482
00:32:08.920 --> 00:32:15.160
know, just before before twilight,
you know, the morning Nautical was was

483
00:32:15.160 --> 00:32:19.640
about to feed in and so we're
up there and right around that time,

484
00:32:19.799 --> 00:32:22.680
we started taking fire from the compound
we're trying to clear. And so as

485
00:32:22.680 --> 00:32:28.000
we're taking fire one one, this
is the first time I've been shot at,

486
00:32:28.359 --> 00:32:32.039
uh so, first mission, first
deployment, started getting shot at for

487
00:32:32.119 --> 00:32:36.839
the first time. And that distinct
crack you here when like rounds are close,

488
00:32:37.319 --> 00:32:39.960
like I remember that, Like it
just makes a very distinct crack noise

489
00:32:39.960 --> 00:32:45.359
as it's going over you that you
know, we kind of talk about when

490
00:32:45.400 --> 00:32:46.160
I joined the Air Force where I
was like, I just want to send

491
00:32:46.200 --> 00:32:51.000
the AC. That was probably moment
where I was like, bro, you

492
00:32:51.119 --> 00:32:54.160
just want to set in the fucking
AC. How did you find yourself here?

493
00:32:54.440 --> 00:32:58.000
I could have been we right now, I could have been weed.

494
00:32:58.400 --> 00:33:04.400
Yeah, so kind of had that
you know, you probably just wasn't more

495
00:33:04.440 --> 00:33:06.680
than just a second or two.
But yeah, I remember I had the

496
00:33:06.759 --> 00:33:09.279
saw. So I start firing back
at this compound. Well, our sniper

497
00:33:09.559 --> 00:33:14.839
was a little too far over death
laid of the hill and so he had

498
00:33:15.119 --> 00:33:16.759
kind of had his head down.
We're taking direct fire in the round that

499
00:33:16.880 --> 00:33:21.319
hit the hill and then kind of
bounced up into his helmet and he took

500
00:33:21.359 --> 00:33:24.440
an impact to the head. And
so I remember the team leader was,

501
00:33:25.000 --> 00:33:27.920
you know, kind of yelling like
you know, we have it, you

502
00:33:28.000 --> 00:33:31.160
know, from the shots down.
I look over like there's still just you

503
00:33:31.240 --> 00:33:34.480
know, taking shots at it,
and he just laying there, lifeless,

504
00:33:34.480 --> 00:33:36.920
and I was like, I remember
just having like a second moment of like,

505
00:33:37.839 --> 00:33:38.880
well, I don't know what the
fucking suipps to do, you know,

506
00:33:39.079 --> 00:33:42.599
So you know they tell you to
shoot back, you know, like

507
00:33:42.640 --> 00:33:45.880
anytime you take casually shoot back,
you know, that's option number one.

508
00:33:45.920 --> 00:33:49.559
But too I was like, you
know what, like I've got to go

509
00:33:49.640 --> 00:33:52.359
do something. And so I remember
I left my little you know hole that

510
00:33:52.480 --> 00:33:55.240
I had dug, you know,
my fighting position, and kind of ran

511
00:33:55.359 --> 00:34:00.680
over and grabbed him by the ankles
and it kind of pulled him back behind

512
00:34:00.759 --> 00:34:05.640
death laid. So we got enrolled
over myself and the team leader had come

513
00:34:05.680 --> 00:34:07.119
over and tried to assess it.
I remember had some sheers, so I

514
00:34:07.159 --> 00:34:09.559
took my shears and kind of cut
off his kit. So I knew we

515
00:34:09.599 --> 00:34:13.960
were up on top of the hill
around carrying like I needed make him lighter.

516
00:34:14.559 --> 00:34:16.920
So I cut his kit off and
called over to A and A,

517
00:34:17.320 --> 00:34:22.639
so they took his torso and then
I grabbed his feet and we started going

518
00:34:22.679 --> 00:34:25.639
down to the bottom of the hill
to meet up with the medic. And

519
00:34:25.719 --> 00:34:29.760
so as we're going down to the
bottom of the hill, you know like

520
00:34:30.840 --> 00:34:35.559
over time, you kind of you
know, the memory is a little foggy,

521
00:34:35.639 --> 00:34:37.119
but like it was a decent side
phill, you know. So going

522
00:34:37.239 --> 00:34:40.960
down, my legs are pretty you
know, burnt up and you know grip.

523
00:34:42.199 --> 00:34:45.679
You know, my forearms are pretty
smoked, and I remember having like

524
00:34:45.760 --> 00:34:49.360
a thought of like I just need
to like take a break for a second,

525
00:34:49.440 --> 00:34:52.320
or I'm going to like fall over
and collapse, and kind of had

526
00:34:52.360 --> 00:34:57.920
that mental voice in your head that
was like you suck it, like this

527
00:34:58.079 --> 00:35:00.719
is about something bigger than yourself.
You'll be fine, you know, kind

528
00:35:00.760 --> 00:35:05.599
of moments. And so we got
it down there, and I just remember,

529
00:35:05.719 --> 00:35:10.000
like sheered chaos kind of happening,
and when something like that happens,

530
00:35:10.559 --> 00:35:15.880
you you start making decisions that aren't
normal, you know, and it's not

531
00:35:15.159 --> 00:35:20.480
like natural. And I remember I'm
holding the wound on top of the head,

532
00:35:20.480 --> 00:35:22.360
and like that's what the medics she
said, Hey, just hold this

533
00:35:22.639 --> 00:35:24.480
galls here. He made a little
doughnut and he's like just hold this.

534
00:35:25.039 --> 00:35:28.519
And he gave me another guy that
the task of like I need you to

535
00:35:28.760 --> 00:35:32.320
squeeze an air every five seconds,
but he was so distraught he couldn't,

536
00:35:32.320 --> 00:35:35.719
like he wouldn't squeeze the bag.
And so I remember the medic being like,

537
00:35:35.800 --> 00:35:38.599
dude, like what the fuck,
Like squeeze the bag. And so

538
00:35:38.679 --> 00:35:40.599
I remember just being like you know
what, like I got it, Like

539
00:35:40.719 --> 00:35:44.480
I can do this, And so
I kind of pushed the other guy off

540
00:35:44.519 --> 00:35:46.159
because he was obviously just kind of
like, you know, out of it,

541
00:35:46.239 --> 00:35:50.719
Like you've seen his teammate in that
that situation. So did that.

542
00:35:50.960 --> 00:35:53.960
So we're calling in a metavac.
Medavac comes to land and you know,

543
00:35:54.280 --> 00:35:59.480
helicopters can't land, you know,
anywhere outside of just open field, right,

544
00:36:00.199 --> 00:36:00.760
and so they're like, hey,
we're gonna have to throw him on

545
00:36:00.800 --> 00:36:04.599
a stretcher. But met somebody to
go transfer them out there. And I

546
00:36:04.760 --> 00:36:06.880
was like, you know, fuck
it, like I'm here, like I'll

547
00:36:06.960 --> 00:36:09.239
do it. And so I remember
I grabbed a couple two A and as

548
00:36:09.480 --> 00:36:12.800
I took the tors so this time
they took the feet and we kind of

549
00:36:12.920 --> 00:36:17.880
ran the uh the litter across the
field get the turnover. I gave the

550
00:36:19.159 --> 00:36:22.920
h the airborne medic the vitals and
they kind of took off and kind of

551
00:36:22.960 --> 00:36:27.719
ran back. Grabbed my my M
four, uh because the the saul was

552
00:36:27.719 --> 00:36:29.559
still at the top of the hill. I remember I put my M four,

553
00:36:30.039 --> 00:36:31.239
you know, in a vehicle that
had driven up because I had the

554
00:36:31.280 --> 00:36:35.239
mark nineteen on it, you know, so they were providing SUPRESSI fire.

555
00:36:35.320 --> 00:36:37.760
So I just got in and grabbed
my M four and kind of jumped into

556
00:36:37.840 --> 00:36:42.320
the compound and got back into the
fight, and uh so we probably fought

557
00:36:42.360 --> 00:36:45.119
a couple more hours, you know, to the point where it just kind

558
00:36:45.159 --> 00:36:47.119
of like nothing drastic happened and just
kind of died down. It was kind

559
00:36:47.119 --> 00:36:52.400
of one of those firefights where it's
just we fought and they decided they didn't

560
00:36:52.400 --> 00:36:53.920
want to fight more. You know, probably took a couple of casualties,

561
00:36:53.960 --> 00:36:57.880
and I was like, this is
enough for us, and so I ended

562
00:36:57.920 --> 00:37:00.320
up walking out. And I remember
like walking out, we get you back

563
00:37:00.360 --> 00:37:04.480
to the fob, sitting down,
and like guys are kind of walking by

564
00:37:04.519 --> 00:37:07.360
and like your good job, Like
good job man, Like you know that

565
00:37:08.159 --> 00:37:14.199
impressed this with what you did.
And I had no idea like the impact

566
00:37:14.239 --> 00:37:15.840
of the weight of the situation,
you know. And I just remember like

567
00:37:16.000 --> 00:37:21.400
we didn't have a shower. We
had a water blower and a water bladder

568
00:37:21.440 --> 00:37:23.519
and a water hose, right,
and it was like over top of a

569
00:37:23.559 --> 00:37:27.320
wooden palette with like a tarp around
it, Like that was our shower.

570
00:37:27.840 --> 00:37:29.960
So I remember going out there and
I had blood all over me and my

571
00:37:30.039 --> 00:37:31.920
gloves were just buddy. I remember
just standing there like trying to rinse off,

572
00:37:32.039 --> 00:37:37.320
and you know, and then I
had that adrenaline dump right after a

573
00:37:37.440 --> 00:37:44.840
firefight and it's like just exhausted.
So I like racked out, and probably

574
00:37:44.880 --> 00:37:46.679
about three or four hours later,
I get woken up, you know by

575
00:37:46.719 --> 00:37:50.280
the watch guy and said, hey, we've got a phone call, you

576
00:37:50.360 --> 00:37:52.599
know, and obviously like the Air
Force, like they're tracking the mission,

577
00:37:52.920 --> 00:37:54.760
you know, so they knew I
was in a tick. They knew,

578
00:37:55.079 --> 00:37:58.800
you know, I was on the
ground and everything, and so I answered

579
00:37:58.840 --> 00:38:01.639
the phone and it it's uh,
my captain and he was kind of like,

580
00:38:02.639 --> 00:38:06.119
dude, like what's going on?
Like how come you send me her

581
00:38:06.159 --> 00:38:08.519
after action? And I'm like,
I'm I'm too tired of this. I

582
00:38:08.599 --> 00:38:12.880
don't I just want to go to
sleep, and he's like, all right,

583
00:38:12.880 --> 00:38:15.719
would shoot me over an after action
report? And so like I remember

584
00:38:15.840 --> 00:38:19.559
like looking at the team lead who
was writing up his ar there in the

585
00:38:19.639 --> 00:38:22.239
talk, and I'm like, hey, like can I just like copy your

586
00:38:22.280 --> 00:38:23.639
ears over and send it? Like
I just want to go rack out.

587
00:38:24.760 --> 00:38:30.239
So I copied it over. He
had kind of written about what had happened

588
00:38:30.280 --> 00:38:31.639
on top of the hill and had
rang up and like kind of grabbed him

589
00:38:31.639 --> 00:38:36.159
and stuff, and so I send
it go back to sleep when the phone

590
00:38:36.239 --> 00:38:38.719
rings again and was like, holy
shit, dude, like hold on a

591
00:38:38.760 --> 00:38:43.119
second, like let's let's take a
pause here, like can you give me

592
00:38:43.199 --> 00:38:45.159
some details like what happened, you
know from your own words? And like

593
00:38:46.159 --> 00:38:49.199
I'm like, fuck, did these
guys just want let me sleep? I

594
00:38:49.320 --> 00:38:52.280
was kind of getting irritated, you
know, And turns out like they're just

595
00:38:52.360 --> 00:38:58.360
trying to get information because like you
know, or post deployment stuff, you

596
00:38:58.400 --> 00:39:00.400
know, And so I kind of
went through that. I was so young

597
00:39:00.480 --> 00:39:02.320
my first mission, my first deployment, Like I had no idea, like

598
00:39:04.039 --> 00:39:07.559
what do you that stuff meant?
You know, whenever you're providing those ars,

599
00:39:07.639 --> 00:39:10.719
like you know, and so a
couple of weeks ago by, and

600
00:39:10.840 --> 00:39:15.320
like obviously they kind of do their
due diligence and provide more and more details

601
00:39:15.360 --> 00:39:17.599
and they start to have, you
know, witnesses and you know, accounts

602
00:39:17.679 --> 00:39:21.960
getting you know, pulled in and
stuff like that. But but yeah,

603
00:39:22.119 --> 00:39:28.079
that was my first exposure to you
know, the deployment was was that that

604
00:39:28.199 --> 00:39:31.719
situation now then? So that didn't
come that didn't One of the reasons they're

605
00:39:31.760 --> 00:39:37.599
investigating all that too, is because
you actually had people that you were working

606
00:39:37.639 --> 00:39:39.880
with a team and an officer who
is trying to do right by you,

607
00:39:40.079 --> 00:39:45.199
correct. Yeah, yeah, like
they were trying to figure out the details

608
00:39:45.239 --> 00:39:49.519
to like understand like what did I
do? Was their witnesses to see it,

609
00:39:49.760 --> 00:39:52.519
like you know and all that,
and so you know, I know,

610
00:39:52.679 --> 00:39:57.679
the medic had written up a citation
kind of thing, and the team

611
00:39:57.800 --> 00:40:00.400
leader and you know kind of went
through all their due diligence was there.

612
00:40:00.559 --> 00:40:05.199
So uh yeah, But me being
young, you look at that, You're

613
00:40:05.239 --> 00:40:07.119
like, well, I don't understand, like what the big deal is.

614
00:40:07.239 --> 00:40:09.159
Like if I was laying there on
the ground, right, I would expect

615
00:40:09.239 --> 00:40:14.199
every one of these other dudes to
come up and grab right, And so

616
00:40:14.320 --> 00:40:17.840
it wasn't I wouldn't think anything like
that, right, And so what was

617
00:40:17.920 --> 00:40:23.559
the result of those ars and the
interviews and the citation stuff. Yeah,

618
00:40:23.639 --> 00:40:30.320
so post deployment for that mission specifically, I was awarded a Bronze Star with

619
00:40:30.440 --> 00:40:36.000
Valor h for that one. So
uh but yeah, one of those things

620
00:40:36.079 --> 00:40:39.639
that I just did what I thought
you were trained to do, right,

621
00:40:39.800 --> 00:40:44.119
Like that's part about being on team, Like that's that brotherhood, you know,

622
00:40:44.239 --> 00:40:49.440
Like it didn't didn't even cross my
mind what I was doing you know,

623
00:40:49.559 --> 00:40:53.199
honestly, like you don't understand training, Like when you're going through training,

624
00:40:53.280 --> 00:40:59.159
like you do stuff like that,
but you don't understand the impact of

625
00:40:59.239 --> 00:41:00.400
it. And then till you're put
in a situation you're like, oh,

626
00:41:00.480 --> 00:41:07.119
that makes sense, Like now I
understand. Sometimes the Cadre weren't just being

627
00:41:07.239 --> 00:41:10.320
dicks. Thing like at the end
of the training day, you're exhausted,

628
00:41:10.480 --> 00:41:15.840
saying, oh, you know,
Dave shot, you got to carry Dave

629
00:41:15.920 --> 00:41:19.000
out to x Phil. You know, like, yeah, they might've been

630
00:41:19.079 --> 00:41:21.880
being dicks, but also like that's
there for a purpose, like right,

631
00:41:22.440 --> 00:41:24.480
sometimes you got to do things when
you're just exhausted and you just have to

632
00:41:24.559 --> 00:41:29.239
turn your brain off and perform,
and so all that stuff just kind of

633
00:41:29.280 --> 00:41:32.760
made sense. So in a moment
it kind of felt like that. It

634
00:41:32.880 --> 00:41:37.159
felt like I was just with my
team in training and they just said,

635
00:41:37.199 --> 00:41:39.960
you know what, like you have
a casualty like move act on it.

636
00:41:42.719 --> 00:41:45.719
So I want to ask you because
you said, this is your first firefight,

637
00:41:45.840 --> 00:41:51.519
and at first your initial thoughts was
wow, like people are shooting,

638
00:41:51.519 --> 00:41:55.280
I'm hearing these sonic cracks going nearby, and then you know, you do

639
00:41:55.400 --> 00:42:00.840
this heroic thing and then you're the
in this prolonged firefight. At what point,

640
00:42:00.559 --> 00:42:06.360
because this is an interesting question about
I think soldiers, airman, marines,

641
00:42:06.480 --> 00:42:10.440
but about human the human capacity for
adapting. At what point during this

642
00:42:10.559 --> 00:42:15.280
firefight did it go from being your
first firefight to just like this is just

643
00:42:15.400 --> 00:42:19.880
what it is. Like we're in
this. I'm no longer astounded, I'm

644
00:42:19.920 --> 00:42:24.480
no longer flabbergacid, I'm no longer
surprised. This is just normal. When

645
00:42:24.519 --> 00:42:29.119
I left the the little foxhole that
I had dug, you know, so

646
00:42:29.159 --> 00:42:32.159
when I made the decision to act, like from then on and some that

647
00:42:32.280 --> 00:42:37.480
point on through any other firefighter had
been in, that moment was always just

648
00:42:37.599 --> 00:42:45.000
that. It's like you started seeking
the violence to where like during a firefight,

649
00:42:45.119 --> 00:42:47.320
like you didn't have that moment of
you know, oh shit or anything

650
00:42:47.360 --> 00:42:52.239
like that. It was you start
seeking, you know, and the closer

651
00:42:52.320 --> 00:42:55.280
calls like that wasn't even my closest
call, you know, but it's like

652
00:42:55.480 --> 00:42:59.480
those things like when those things happened, like you didn't dwell on it,

653
00:42:59.519 --> 00:43:01.239
Like I probably think about those times
more now when I've been out of it

654
00:43:01.440 --> 00:43:06.000
for you know, nineish years than
I did whenever I was in it.

655
00:43:06.280 --> 00:43:09.159
You know, I look back on
it now and it's like, holy crap,

656
00:43:09.280 --> 00:43:14.239
dude, Like right, you're fortunate, like just a fortunate guy that

657
00:43:14.800 --> 00:43:19.320
it got lucky sometimes, are you
saying that it seems more surreal in retrospect

658
00:43:19.400 --> 00:43:22.199
than than it did when you were
actually in the moment. One hundred percent,

659
00:43:22.480 --> 00:43:25.920
Yeah, one hundred percent. Like
you know times where you know,

660
00:43:27.119 --> 00:43:30.519
around would hit a mud wall right
by your head and you don't think about

661
00:43:30.599 --> 00:43:34.559
the moment, like hey, six
inches, like I take that on the

662
00:43:34.679 --> 00:43:37.119
nose, but this time it was
just a bunch of mud hit me on

663
00:43:37.159 --> 00:43:40.119
the side of the face. You
know, things like that where it's like

664
00:43:40.159 --> 00:43:43.280
you kind of shake it off and
laugh about it, you know. I

665
00:43:44.119 --> 00:43:46.880
think that was kind of key for
some of these guys mentally, was some

666
00:43:47.000 --> 00:43:51.360
of those close calls. You just
literally look at it as humorous, you

667
00:43:51.440 --> 00:43:54.800
know, like kind of like you
you laugh and kind of smile through the

668
00:43:54.960 --> 00:44:00.280
darkness, you know, And I
think that helps guys kind of up with

669
00:44:00.400 --> 00:44:04.679
that when you're down range, like
not thinking what could happen, you know,

670
00:44:05.159 --> 00:44:07.920
because I think when you start doing
that now you're going to start moving

671
00:44:07.960 --> 00:44:12.599
slower, You're going to start syconizing
you can't have that mindset and you want

672
00:44:12.679 --> 00:44:15.320
to You went back to that area
with the KANDACT commandos and third Group,

673
00:44:15.440 --> 00:44:21.239
right, yeah, yeah, So
I got to mention when I went there,

674
00:44:21.280 --> 00:44:23.119
I was at first, man,
this is going to be a deployment.

675
00:44:23.159 --> 00:44:25.800
There's no action, We're not going
to do anything. Well, the

676
00:44:27.199 --> 00:44:32.239
summer of twenty ten, Baltimber gob
was a pretty hot spot for you know,

677
00:44:32.360 --> 00:44:37.239
ticks and firefights and so we'd have
you know commandos coming up, you

678
00:44:37.320 --> 00:44:40.920
know, with with different odas doing
missions. So I remember it was right

679
00:44:40.960 --> 00:44:45.599
around my birthdays, right around June. Dad come up and they were going

680
00:44:45.679 --> 00:44:49.440
to run a mission you know,
out to where we were at. And

681
00:44:50.320 --> 00:44:52.480
we were the QRS, so we
weren't even the primary force on this.

682
00:44:52.639 --> 00:44:54.920
So you know, we were kind
of just taking a break, hanging out

683
00:44:54.920 --> 00:44:59.920
on the fob and running QRF and
you know, you always have your benefic

684
00:45:00.039 --> 00:45:02.519
bird. You got the the Red
Cross bird, which you can't put an

685
00:45:02.559 --> 00:45:07.280
armed force on, but then you
got your escort bird, and so we're

686
00:45:07.320 --> 00:45:09.440
like, hey, we can put
people on the escort bird. And so

687
00:45:09.639 --> 00:45:14.239
that was gonna be our play was
We're gonna throw six guys on the x

688
00:45:14.320 --> 00:45:16.400
coort bird. If they need a
QRF to get there first and then we

689
00:45:16.440 --> 00:45:21.320
can just kind of backfill from there. And so I ended up being on

690
00:45:21.480 --> 00:45:24.760
chop one for any QRF. And
so they run the mission and they had

691
00:45:27.280 --> 00:45:30.880
a guy standing behind a four wheeler
like for cover, which thinking about like

692
00:45:31.239 --> 00:45:36.079
I don't understand what he was trying
to do, but took around on the

693
00:45:36.199 --> 00:45:39.840
shin and so had that one had
another guy get shot in the shoulder,

694
00:45:39.880 --> 00:45:43.039
and so it got to the point
where they called for a QRF and so

695
00:45:43.800 --> 00:45:47.119
we spin up and you know,
we kind of talk about those moments of

696
00:45:47.320 --> 00:45:51.280
you know, the pucker moments to
supply one of the pucker moments for me

697
00:45:51.440 --> 00:45:53.559
to where you know, it's just
kind of like poetic. It was like

698
00:45:53.639 --> 00:45:57.559
kind of written, I'm going back
to this place after a few months to

699
00:45:57.599 --> 00:46:01.079
where it was my first firefight.
And I get on this helicopter this first

700
00:46:01.199 --> 00:46:04.960
chalk and we're going as you're getting
on, like don't be by the door,

701
00:46:05.079 --> 00:46:07.559
like, don't be the guy by
the door, right, And so

702
00:46:07.639 --> 00:46:10.280
I remember get on, I'm setting
by the door. I'm like, okay,

703
00:46:10.880 --> 00:46:14.559
wait, the pilot just said it's
going to be a right door exit,

704
00:46:14.639 --> 00:46:15.400
and so I'm like Okay, well
I'm left door, so I'm cool.

705
00:46:15.880 --> 00:46:20.119
Well then they switch it up like
hey, I lz, we're actually

706
00:46:20.159 --> 00:46:21.840
going to go out to the left
door. And so I'm just in my

707
00:46:21.960 --> 00:46:27.039
head like thinking this is like too
perfect, like you know, I can't

708
00:46:27.639 --> 00:46:30.159
can't go out like this. And
the door opens up, and I remember

709
00:46:30.280 --> 00:46:34.239
telling the buddy next to me his
name was Lucas, and I'm like,

710
00:46:34.320 --> 00:46:36.480
dude, like when we get off, like we just need to bolt like

711
00:46:36.599 --> 00:46:39.559
fifty meters and get down just to
get away from this bird. And so

712
00:46:39.639 --> 00:46:44.559
we get off and like we just
be line taking knee get down on the

713
00:46:44.639 --> 00:46:46.440
prone and like I look up and
like we'd be lying in the wrong direction,

714
00:46:47.159 --> 00:46:51.039
like we had gotten off the bird, and like we found ourselves like

715
00:46:51.119 --> 00:46:53.079
twenty five meters from the rest of
the team. So we ended up.

716
00:46:53.559 --> 00:46:57.920
We linked up, and so the
Marine's what I loved about him. They

717
00:46:59.679 --> 00:47:02.599
said, screw casts, like they
were like the most pushed the fight dudes,

718
00:47:02.679 --> 00:47:07.199
like maybe this team. But we
got there and we met up with

719
00:47:07.280 --> 00:47:09.920
the team sergeant with Teamy the ODA, and they kind of gave us the

720
00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:14.880
lay of the land where they're getting
fire from, and so we just said,

721
00:47:14.880 --> 00:47:16.000
you know, what like, we're
just gonna find them and we're just

722
00:47:16.039 --> 00:47:21.639
gonna like rush them. And so
I remember that our element leader was like,

723
00:47:21.679 --> 00:47:23.000
here, what we're gonna do.
We're gonna like kind of come down

724
00:47:23.079 --> 00:47:27.639
this valley and just rush through this
valley and get on the compound as quick

725
00:47:27.639 --> 00:47:30.559
as possible. And so I'm like
all right, And so like the ODEA

726
00:47:30.639 --> 00:47:35.119
they were just gonna lay cover fire
for us. And so I remember running

727
00:47:35.159 --> 00:47:37.679
across this field, you know,
and trying to get to this compound,

728
00:47:37.760 --> 00:47:40.760
and like rounds are going off around
our feet and like we're kind of just

729
00:47:40.920 --> 00:47:45.559
bounding a little bit. And so
we're bounding and I'm in the prone position

730
00:47:45.079 --> 00:47:47.760
and I look over in the element
leader he's like on a knee with like

731
00:47:47.880 --> 00:47:50.960
rounds going off, and I just
remember like thinking, like, dude,

732
00:47:51.000 --> 00:47:53.480
this guy just like doesn't give a
shit, like, you know, and

733
00:47:53.599 --> 00:47:58.360
so we kind of just you know, bumb rushes compound and clear it,

734
00:47:58.559 --> 00:48:00.400
you know, and there's only like
about two you two guys in it,

735
00:48:00.440 --> 00:48:04.239
and so we kind of clear the
compound and you know, from there it

736
00:48:04.400 --> 00:48:07.280
was over, you know, the
firefight was over, and you know,

737
00:48:07.400 --> 00:48:09.519
the the oda X field and then
we we X filled after that, so

738
00:48:09.559 --> 00:48:14.599
I ended up you know, kind
of funny that I got an Accommendation medal

739
00:48:14.679 --> 00:48:17.679
for valor for that one, which
is weird to get a V device on

740
00:48:17.760 --> 00:48:22.679
a calm medal. But uh yeah, so that was getting off the helicopter

741
00:48:22.840 --> 00:48:27.719
was definitely a little pucker moment.
Yeah. Yeah. Honestly, I didn't

742
00:48:27.719 --> 00:48:31.920
even know that there were VY devices
on comm on common ribbons until recently.

743
00:48:32.119 --> 00:48:36.280
I had never heard of that,
but it's it's been a thing for a

744
00:48:36.320 --> 00:48:42.159
long time. Yeah, yeah,
so I got that, but uh yeah,

745
00:48:42.159 --> 00:48:44.800
I mean, gosh, that was
such a good, good deployment,

746
00:48:44.920 --> 00:48:51.000
got into so many, you know, good firefights. You that familiar with

747
00:48:51.280 --> 00:48:53.159
Yuri Miller. Have you heard of
Ury Miller? No? I have not

748
00:48:53.559 --> 00:48:58.760
Ury Miller. No. So he
was a controller. He's got a silver

749
00:48:58.880 --> 00:49:01.320
Star, a combat and or silver
stars. So he was with I believe

750
00:49:01.400 --> 00:49:07.800
a team out of Port Lewis and
they came and we did like a big

751
00:49:07.960 --> 00:49:14.519
level two and that was a gigantic
firefight and getting a silver star Light day.

752
00:49:14.599 --> 00:49:19.840
But that one, we're in phil
and I remember being on an m

753
00:49:19.960 --> 00:49:22.159
RAP before I got off, and
so I was with an element that was

754
00:49:22.320 --> 00:49:29.119
going to watch a couple bridges there
in Balambar Valve that like the Taliban would

755
00:49:29.119 --> 00:49:30.760
always try to flank from. And
so we were kind of up on a

756
00:49:30.880 --> 00:49:36.199
hill and so I got off this
m rap with the Element. Immediately after

757
00:49:36.239 --> 00:49:40.440
getting off the m rap hit an
ID and so instantly back at Boggering or

758
00:49:40.480 --> 00:49:44.480
wherever, like the Air Force talk
was like it's going out that, you

759
00:49:44.559 --> 00:49:49.000
know, my vehicle was hit with
an IED, right, And so my

760
00:49:49.079 --> 00:49:51.760
buddies in country, like they're kind
of talking on the chat channel. I,

761
00:49:51.800 --> 00:49:52.679
Hey, you're heard from SD,
Like you're heard from SD, Like

762
00:49:53.000 --> 00:49:55.519
I think he's still out there,
you know, kind of thing going on.

763
00:49:55.679 --> 00:50:00.280
But we'd get on and so we're
kind of we get into a little

764
00:50:00.320 --> 00:50:02.559
tick. You know. I remember
they were shooting from us from a mosque,

765
00:50:02.599 --> 00:50:08.639
which yeah, like all these rules
we talk about that range they strike

766
00:50:08.719 --> 00:50:14.559
targets, yeah, and so we
start taking fire. So we get into

767
00:50:14.599 --> 00:50:16.719
this little compound and we're kind of
just monitoring me the A and A with

768
00:50:16.840 --> 00:50:20.840
us. A and a's monitoring their
little two A radio. Well, all

769
00:50:20.840 --> 00:50:23.880
of a sudden, like the A
and A just start packing their stuff up,

770
00:50:24.280 --> 00:50:29.519
and we're like kind of it's just
myself three Marstot guys and an army

771
00:50:29.559 --> 00:50:32.360
guy that was with us. They
start packing this stuff up, and I

772
00:50:32.360 --> 00:50:36.920
remember we go over like hey,
what's going on and they're like, hey,

773
00:50:36.960 --> 00:50:40.199
we just we heard the Taliban sending
like fifty people, you know,

774
00:50:40.320 --> 00:50:44.719
fifty fighters to our location, like
we're not going to stay here, and

775
00:50:44.800 --> 00:50:46.960
we're like you have to stay here, like you don't have a choice,

776
00:50:47.039 --> 00:50:50.559
and they're like, no, we're
leaving. And we were with a walking

777
00:50:50.639 --> 00:50:53.880
distance to the five So that's how
close you know, green space, white

778
00:50:53.920 --> 00:50:58.000
space, you know, we were. And so they climbed out of a

779
00:50:58.079 --> 00:51:00.880
hole in the back of the compound
and walked back to the fob and left

780
00:51:01.000 --> 00:51:05.159
us. And so like we're there, like we can't just leave, like

781
00:51:05.239 --> 00:51:07.880
we're you know, protecting the you
know, flank side of the other you

782
00:51:07.960 --> 00:51:13.880
know, clearing you know, unit. And so we all just picked a

783
00:51:14.000 --> 00:51:16.719
corner in this compound and we're just
like, you know what, like if

784
00:51:16.760 --> 00:51:21.199
they're coming, like they're coming,
that's just the way it's going to be,

785
00:51:22.519 --> 00:51:24.360
you know. So you kind of
have a kind of moment to where

786
00:51:24.360 --> 00:51:27.239
it's like, hey, like this
this is the way it's going to end,

787
00:51:27.280 --> 00:51:29.280
Like this is what we're going to
do and this is our plan,

788
00:51:29.440 --> 00:51:31.599
and you know, we kind of
talked what we're going to do if that

789
00:51:31.719 --> 00:51:37.760
time came. But that's where like
my radio comes, you know, kind

790
00:51:37.760 --> 00:51:39.559
of background came into play. It
was like, you know what, like

791
00:51:39.679 --> 00:51:44.360
I can get sat Com up,
and so I got on Sat one oh

792
00:51:44.440 --> 00:51:47.800
two, made a call back to
bog Room just to let them know the

793
00:51:47.880 --> 00:51:52.159
situation, asked them to relay to
the j Tack because we were out of

794
00:51:52.239 --> 00:51:55.159
line of sight. I couldn't reach
him by line of sight. I was

795
00:51:55.199 --> 00:51:59.360
like, relay to the j tack
the situation like, we don't have any

796
00:51:59.400 --> 00:52:01.639
A and A, it's just us. Can you put a sensor on us,

797
00:52:02.280 --> 00:52:06.480
you know and kind of let us
know how we can prepare. And

798
00:52:06.599 --> 00:52:08.440
so we kind of worked out columns
that way, and so we talk about,

799
00:52:08.519 --> 00:52:12.719
you know, how can you impact
a mission outside of weather. Having

800
00:52:12.800 --> 00:52:17.400
that Tom's background helped us, you
know, to survive that situation. What

801
00:52:17.719 --> 00:52:22.199
was this the same mission where you
walked in on the Taliban lookout towers or

802
00:52:22.280 --> 00:52:24.840
was that different? Yeah, so
this is a completely different one. You

803
00:52:24.920 --> 00:52:30.559
know, So that that whole deployment
was just filled with stuff. So yeah,

804
00:52:30.639 --> 00:52:35.199
that mission there there was a couple
of lookout towers that we're gonna walk

805
00:52:35.280 --> 00:52:39.800
to at night, and so we
left the fob, walked down. You

806
00:52:39.840 --> 00:52:42.960
know, we had our security element, so I was part of like the

807
00:52:43.880 --> 00:52:45.079
the direct action for us. So
we kind of walked in and we just

808
00:52:45.159 --> 00:52:50.280
kind of set up along this wall
and just it was kind of like a

809
00:52:50.480 --> 00:52:53.239
hard to three minutes of just heavy
fire and then that was it, and

810
00:52:53.280 --> 00:52:57.239
then we'd walk back, you know, and it kind of got them.

811
00:52:57.280 --> 00:52:59.880
You know, I think we killed
like two guys on that mission, but

812
00:53:00.159 --> 00:53:01.519
it turned into they started shooting at
each other, and you know, so

813
00:53:01.559 --> 00:53:06.760
you're just sitting there under mvgs like
kind of watching them panic and shooting at

814
00:53:06.760 --> 00:53:08.760
each other and try to figure out
where it was coming from. So we

815
00:53:08.880 --> 00:53:12.840
walked back through the fob that night. And what was funny is the next

816
00:53:12.920 --> 00:53:16.239
day, the Taliban has their own
associated press, right, and so we

817
00:53:16.320 --> 00:53:22.000
are kind of picking up some of
these these news articles. Apparently that night

818
00:53:22.039 --> 00:53:24.360
I must have got a combat jump
in because the Taliban was saying that like

819
00:53:24.480 --> 00:53:29.800
we had jumped down behind enemy lines, we had you know, had a

820
00:53:29.880 --> 00:53:34.079
coordinated attack on the tower and all
this stuff. But we actually just walked

821
00:53:34.119 --> 00:53:37.440
there but the whole point of that
mission was to just create some you know,

822
00:53:37.639 --> 00:53:40.280
fear amongst them, which is where
now like they didn't want to keep

823
00:53:40.320 --> 00:53:45.000
guys there, Like you know that
the watchmen were refusing to stay there in

824
00:53:45.079 --> 00:53:47.840
the watch tower overnight because they were
afraid it was going to happen to them.

825
00:53:51.320 --> 00:53:55.599
You you talked about a couple of
times where you thought where you thought

826
00:53:55.760 --> 00:53:59.880
in a way that the end is
nigh right, And we can talk about

827
00:54:00.440 --> 00:54:06.280
when you're in an exposed firefight and
that you're just operating on you know,

828
00:54:06.519 --> 00:54:10.599
on reflex, but when you're in
a lead vehicle driving down a road that

829
00:54:10.719 --> 00:54:15.599
you think is like full of IDs, when you're in a helicopter that you

830
00:54:15.719 --> 00:54:20.920
think is under fire and you're coming
out that door, when you're sitting there

831
00:54:21.000 --> 00:54:23.519
in a compound, you know,
with a handful of guys and you think

832
00:54:23.599 --> 00:54:27.639
fifty A and A are coming in
your position, Like those are the times

833
00:54:27.719 --> 00:54:30.719
it's sort of like reminds me of
sort of like the imagery of D Day

834
00:54:30.159 --> 00:54:36.320
when guys are coming off the landing
craft knowing that these German positions are focused

835
00:54:36.480 --> 00:54:43.719
on them. How is that different? How is that anticipation of violence and

836
00:54:43.760 --> 00:54:49.079
the anticipation of harm to you different
than the actual act of being in a

837
00:54:49.119 --> 00:54:52.000
firefight, where you feel like you
may or may not have you may have

838
00:54:52.159 --> 00:54:55.159
a little bit more control over this
situation. Yeah, yeah, I think

839
00:54:57.000 --> 00:55:00.159
once you're actually in it and you
have control. Like that's where like that

840
00:55:00.719 --> 00:55:07.320
we talk about training, you talk
about some of the most I don't say

841
00:55:07.320 --> 00:55:10.079
impactful, but like the highest level
training you can get, Like the amount

842
00:55:10.119 --> 00:55:15.079
of money that the military puts into
us to to trains those situations. It's

843
00:55:15.239 --> 00:55:20.920
money spent, you know well because
like it just you drop it in training

844
00:55:21.000 --> 00:55:23.679
mode, I think is when you're
not active, Like that's where the mind

845
00:55:23.760 --> 00:55:25.920
starts to kind of race and kind
of take off. You know. So

846
00:55:27.000 --> 00:55:30.320
when you combat that, you know
some self talk. You know, I'm

847
00:55:30.320 --> 00:55:32.920
not sure if you're big on self
talk where it's just like kind of those

848
00:55:34.000 --> 00:55:37.639
moments where like you're waiting and it's
like you have to remind yourself who you

849
00:55:37.760 --> 00:55:39.360
are, you know, where you've
been, what you've done. You know.

850
00:55:39.440 --> 00:55:43.480
So I did a lot of that. You know. Sometimes you gota

851
00:55:43.519 --> 00:55:46.519
pump yourself up. I remember like
telling myself like uh, sometimes like going

852
00:55:46.599 --> 00:55:51.719
into it, like the remember the
movie jar Head to where like Jamie Fox

853
00:55:52.000 --> 00:55:53.440
was like, you know, kind
of recite as I walked through the valley

854
00:55:53.440 --> 00:55:57.159
shower, does I feel no evil
because I'm the badest motherfucker on the bass

855
00:55:57.199 --> 00:56:00.400
field, on the battlefield. Just
stuff like that they kind of get your

856
00:56:00.519 --> 00:56:04.280
like you have to have that kind
of mindset, you know, going into

857
00:56:04.360 --> 00:56:07.480
it. So it's like kind of
like that prep you know, kind of

858
00:56:07.559 --> 00:56:10.119
talk, you know, whether you're
you know, prepping just to push off.

859
00:56:10.519 --> 00:56:13.960
You know. I think that's kind
of like the most tense moments when

860
00:56:14.000 --> 00:56:16.239
you're sitting there and like you're supposed
to be getting three hours of sleep,

861
00:56:16.840 --> 00:56:21.400
but one you know where you're going, you know, going into nervestan.

862
00:56:21.480 --> 00:56:23.039
I was like that, right,
you know, just knowing the history of

863
00:56:23.159 --> 00:56:29.039
nervestan and how you know, traditionally
it produces some pretty heavy, intense firefights.

864
00:56:30.000 --> 00:56:31.880
You know, I should have been
sleeping, but I was more or

865
00:56:31.960 --> 00:56:37.039
less just sitting there going over scenarios
in my head. You know, if

866
00:56:37.079 --> 00:56:42.239
this happens, I do this,
if this happened, Like just constantly playing

867
00:56:42.320 --> 00:56:45.800
in my mind what could potentially happen, and those moments that are right at

868
00:56:45.840 --> 00:56:49.880
the edge, like I said,
like being in the left opening door,

869
00:56:50.199 --> 00:56:52.320
you know, it were coming off
a tail ramp by a helicopter when you're

870
00:56:52.320 --> 00:56:57.000
expecting him an enemy fire. Did
you find yourself engaging with self talk?

871
00:56:57.079 --> 00:57:00.519
Did you find yourself just like shutting
down, just like like just shutting down

872
00:57:00.599 --> 00:57:06.480
completely and just engaging in the mission? Yeah, just quiet, Like the

873
00:57:06.599 --> 00:57:09.559
brain just kind of goes into like
a silent mode, you know, and

874
00:57:09.679 --> 00:57:13.559
like that's why, you know,
sometimes it's hard to remember, you know,

875
00:57:13.719 --> 00:57:17.320
some of these small minute details because
you're in that you've kind of just

876
00:57:17.400 --> 00:57:22.159
gone blank to what's natural, right, you know, an ability to kind

877
00:57:22.199 --> 00:57:24.639
of turn that on and turn that
off. And you know, you kind

878
00:57:24.639 --> 00:57:31.000
of talk about veterans and you know
that mental aspect of you know what veterans

879
00:57:31.079 --> 00:57:34.760
go through. I think sometimes it's
coping with that. You know, the

880
00:57:34.880 --> 00:57:37.360
guys that come off team for so
long that they're so used to going to

881
00:57:37.480 --> 00:57:43.159
that to that zone they do that
in the civilian world or this this life

882
00:57:43.199 --> 00:57:45.760
where they don't have to, and
kind of get yourself into some some sticky

883
00:57:45.840 --> 00:57:50.440
situations and trouble and it kind of
that's down the bad road. Yeah.

884
00:57:50.519 --> 00:57:53.199
It's interesting because you know, we've
talked a lot on the show about you

885
00:57:53.280 --> 00:57:58.079
know, being in that moment when
you're the aggressor or when you're being aggressed

886
00:57:58.159 --> 00:58:01.480
upon. But there's a totally different
mindset, like I said, like when

887
00:58:01.519 --> 00:58:05.760
we look at the veterans in World
War Two coming off those landing vehicles,

888
00:58:06.000 --> 00:58:08.559
they weren't gonna shoot anybody from the
landing vehicle, right like they were.

889
00:58:08.920 --> 00:58:14.280
They were just there to survive getting
off the landing vehicle. And you mentioned

890
00:58:14.280 --> 00:58:17.599
it talk about the helicopter, like
you have no control whether you get off

891
00:58:17.639 --> 00:58:22.480
that helicopter or not is up to
whether some dage, you know, some

892
00:58:22.639 --> 00:58:28.639
taliban has a PK trained on that
door as you're getting off. And those

893
00:58:28.679 --> 00:58:31.400
are moments that I think, I
feel like are a lot harder for veterans

894
00:58:31.440 --> 00:58:36.920
to deal with in hindsight than the
moments when you've got your gun up and

895
00:58:37.039 --> 00:58:42.239
you have a chance to actually fight. Now. Yeah, yeah, for

896
00:58:42.360 --> 00:58:46.320
sure. Like I said, those
those you start thinking of those poetic ending

897
00:58:46.400 --> 00:58:51.119
moments, you know, before you
kind of go into that blank stare.

898
00:58:51.880 --> 00:58:53.519
You know. I don't know if
you guys, did you guys see a

899
00:58:53.519 --> 00:58:57.880
lot of guys yawning too. Yeah, Like I think that was the koping

900
00:58:57.960 --> 00:59:00.960
mechanism. Yeah, sleeping sleeping before
the mission or trying to. Yeah,

901
00:59:01.199 --> 00:59:06.079
and and and the yawning. I
think whyn't really really distress, but too

902
00:59:06.360 --> 00:59:12.960
it's I think it's also like indicative
indicative of them disassociating from the RAM from

903
00:59:13.000 --> 00:59:16.320
the actual effects. It's like I'm
bored, Like they've convinced themselves. We

904
00:59:16.400 --> 00:59:20.480
convinced ourselves that it's no big deal, nothing, right, yeah, right,

905
00:59:20.679 --> 00:59:23.320
right, yeah, yeah. Can
can we talk about your your second

906
00:59:23.360 --> 00:59:28.920
deployment to Afghanistan and how that differed
from the first one. Yeah, So

907
00:59:29.039 --> 00:59:31.599
the first one, I kind of
live with the team the entire time,

908
00:59:32.119 --> 00:59:37.519
So the second one was vastly different. So I was, you know,

909
00:59:37.760 --> 00:59:40.119
based out of Bogram, you know
there, and so what I did was

910
00:59:40.159 --> 00:59:44.840
I only really supported like level two
missions, you know. So as you

911
00:59:44.920 --> 00:59:46.760
know, the six months kind of
went on, we had missions throughout the

912
00:59:46.840 --> 00:59:51.119
country. They'd look and say,
okay, we have these assets, let's

913
00:59:51.159 --> 00:59:55.320
go place them for these certain missions. And so that was a difficult deployment

914
00:59:55.360 --> 01:00:00.679
in the sense that I didn't have
that time to build the poor with a

915
01:00:00.760 --> 01:00:02.880
team, you know. So you
know I talk about going to neurostand.

916
01:00:02.920 --> 01:00:06.920
I remember I was about to go
home, like I was about to rotate

917
01:00:07.000 --> 01:00:08.800
out, and I was within,
you know, a couple of weeks of

918
01:00:08.920 --> 01:00:12.039
leaving, you know, and like, hey, we're going to send you

919
01:00:12.119 --> 01:00:15.239
the nerves stand for a few weeks
and I show up and I remember the

920
01:00:15.320 --> 01:00:17.599
ODA just kind of being like why
you're here, Like what are you going

921
01:00:17.679 --> 01:00:22.119
to do? And you have to
go through the It was like every few

922
01:00:22.119 --> 01:00:24.519
weeks, I was having to explain
myself the story over and over again,

923
01:00:24.639 --> 01:00:28.119
versus like when you're living with them, you know, a team, you

924
01:00:28.239 --> 01:00:32.000
do it once in your end.
I was having to do it every single

925
01:00:32.079 --> 01:00:36.639
mission. So that was the frustrating
part, was like you didn't feel like

926
01:00:36.719 --> 01:00:38.880
you really belonged to a team on
that one. You know, you were

927
01:00:39.000 --> 01:00:43.280
just trying to You're just like a
hiring guy that shows up and then you

928
01:00:43.440 --> 01:00:46.079
leave after things you know, finished, and you're not there to clean up

929
01:00:46.119 --> 01:00:49.800
being that mess kind of thing,
you know, and that that kind of

930
01:00:49.840 --> 01:00:53.599
sucked, you know, And so
while you're there trying to just build rapport

931
01:00:53.679 --> 01:00:58.039
as much you can, create some
contacts, you know, and try to

932
01:00:58.079 --> 01:01:00.400
stay in touch with guys, you
know, after you leave in case maybe

933
01:01:00.440 --> 01:01:04.719
something yes second mission or something,
you go out there, you know and

934
01:01:04.960 --> 01:01:07.199
so you try to stay in contact
with them and bring gifts, you know,

935
01:01:07.280 --> 01:01:12.039
So I always i'd always bring tobacco, uh from Bogram, you know,

936
01:01:12.440 --> 01:01:14.599
try to try to bring you some
things like hey, I'm thinking about

937
01:01:14.599 --> 01:01:16.760
you guys, and I know I
got it good. I'm sleeping in Bogram,

938
01:01:16.960 --> 01:01:21.239
you know some days. So we'd
try to just kind of buy my

939
01:01:21.320 --> 01:01:25.360
way in at some points, which
which can be really effective, like showing

940
01:01:25.440 --> 01:01:31.079
up with a bunch of school or
like will go a long way. Yeah,

941
01:01:31.360 --> 01:01:36.519
yeah, And so those those those
missions too, as you show up

942
01:01:36.639 --> 01:01:38.360
and you know they have their their
level too, but you're there a few

943
01:01:38.400 --> 01:01:40.840
weeks and so they start thinking,
well, how else can we employ you?

944
01:01:40.960 --> 01:01:45.880
And we talked a little bit earlier, but as I kind of asked

945
01:01:45.920 --> 01:01:51.960
to jump in this rubber duck and
fully across the river. And so I

946
01:01:52.039 --> 01:01:55.800
had like a little a sonar sensor
that could give me depth recordings across the

947
01:01:55.920 --> 01:02:00.679
river. And so the goal was
to pull me across, I take recordings.

948
01:02:00.239 --> 01:02:07.119
Well, essentially I can then build
an underwater profile of subsurface. So

949
01:02:07.159 --> 01:02:09.320
if I know that, now I
understand, you know, if I'm going

950
01:02:09.400 --> 01:02:13.519
to build a bridge where I can
put some supports and things like that.

951
01:02:13.760 --> 01:02:15.920
So hey, like, can you
do this for me, CAU if I

952
01:02:15.960 --> 01:02:19.800
can build a bridge that allows us
to extend the green zone and kind of

953
01:02:19.840 --> 01:02:23.360
bring some more people in and build
some rapport with the locals. And I'm

954
01:02:23.400 --> 01:02:25.039
like, Okay, well, what's
on the other side of the river now,

955
01:02:25.199 --> 01:02:28.400
And they're like, yeah, we
don't know what's on right now,

956
01:02:29.039 --> 01:02:31.039
you know, And I'm like,
God, like this this is a good

957
01:02:31.079 --> 01:02:35.000
idea. Like I'm not sure if
it's a good idea, you know,

958
01:02:35.159 --> 01:02:37.960
And it's like sure, man,
you'll be fine, Like you'll be fine,

959
01:02:37.119 --> 01:02:39.880
you know. And you know,
you're kind of doing like these kind

960
01:02:39.920 --> 01:02:45.559
of weird out of the box type
type scenarios there just to all right,

961
01:02:45.639 --> 01:02:49.920
man, we'll we'll run it and
kind of see what happens. So,

962
01:02:50.880 --> 01:02:54.000
but that one not near as impactful
when it comes to take like firefights and

963
01:02:54.039 --> 01:02:58.920
takes and stuff. You know.
We got in one in neurostand one other

964
01:02:59.079 --> 01:03:02.719
small one, you know, take
some pot shots, but it wasn't fight

965
01:03:02.719 --> 01:03:07.880
as intense as that first one.
Could you tell us about the operation where

966
01:03:07.920 --> 01:03:14.360
you in place the environmental sensor for
avalanches? Yeah? Yeah, And so

967
01:03:14.880 --> 01:03:19.320
we kind of bring this all kind
of full circle where we talked earlier about

968
01:03:19.599 --> 01:03:22.480
style tees bringing in that environmental peace, and so you know, in between

969
01:03:22.639 --> 01:03:27.760
missions there at Bogram, you know
where you're thinking, how else can we

970
01:03:28.039 --> 01:03:34.360
be impactful will the conventional Army was
running resupply routes through the Salang Pass to

971
01:03:34.440 --> 01:03:37.679
go up and resupply some of the
fobs to the north there. Well,

972
01:03:37.719 --> 01:03:40.440
in the wintertime, the Slang Pass
has the most avalanches of anywhere else in

973
01:03:40.519 --> 01:03:47.519
the world, Like it's just a
heavy avalanche zone, and so most of

974
01:03:47.639 --> 01:03:51.159
us were avalanche certifies. So we
start thinking like, well, if I

975
01:03:51.239 --> 01:03:55.760
can understand the temperatures and the gradients
of the snowpack, I should be able

976
01:03:55.760 --> 01:04:00.719
to at least give a fairly accurate
estimate of that snowpack could slide or not.

977
01:04:01.599 --> 01:04:08.159
And so I remember we contacted a
company out of Texas to build like

978
01:04:08.320 --> 01:04:13.159
this forty five foot tower that had
these sensors on it that as it snowed

979
01:04:13.280 --> 01:04:15.320
up temperatures, I'm getting ground readings
and things like that. So they get

980
01:04:15.360 --> 01:04:19.840
it shipped over and I'm pretty positive
that like this is probably some dudes in

981
01:04:19.880 --> 01:04:24.519
the garage like welding this thing together, like you know, and we get

982
01:04:24.559 --> 01:04:27.400
it. We put together, and
so we throw it on a trailer and

983
01:04:27.559 --> 01:04:31.480
just drive it up, you know, into the mountains, and it's kind

984
01:04:31.519 --> 01:04:34.760
of crazy, like here we are
like just putting this tower up, and

985
01:04:34.880 --> 01:04:39.960
then we connect it via GPS and
then take it back to Bogram and then

986
01:04:39.960 --> 01:04:45.199
we give the conventional weather you know
HQ there and say hey, like log

987
01:04:45.280 --> 01:04:47.239
in here and now you guys can
actually get readings here and then you can

988
01:04:47.360 --> 01:04:51.559
use us once the snowpack comes,
will kind of help you understand what you're

989
01:04:51.599 --> 01:04:56.519
looking at, you know. And
so that was kind of a weird mission,

990
01:04:57.320 --> 01:05:00.400
crazy mission, you know, and
the fact that we're putting this tower

991
01:05:00.519 --> 01:05:03.320
up and it's like it almost like
looks like Ewajima, but it's a bunch

992
01:05:03.360 --> 01:05:08.559
of weather guys putting up an avalanche
sensor. You know, it's really kind

993
01:05:08.559 --> 01:05:13.679
of walking it up. So did
it did it work? Yeah? Yeah,

994
01:05:13.800 --> 01:05:15.519
so it worked, and you know
it it was cool too because it

995
01:05:15.599 --> 01:05:19.039
gave me a chance to kind of
I take the turp and kind of went

996
01:05:19.119 --> 01:05:23.679
into a couple of different like little
entities there up in the mountains too.

997
01:05:24.960 --> 01:05:29.400
Because the Afghans they had their own
weathermen, like they have you know,

998
01:05:29.519 --> 01:05:32.280
their trained weatherman. They have people
up there that are doing observations and stuff,

999
01:05:32.320 --> 01:05:35.119
and so it allowed me to kind
of walk in there with the turp

1000
01:05:35.199 --> 01:05:40.199
and like kind of figure out some
of that historical type data, you know

1001
01:05:40.360 --> 01:05:43.000
that's helping the conventional guys. So
I kind of took that back and it

1002
01:05:43.039 --> 01:05:45.920
say, hey, here's some notes
they gave me about how they're they're forecasting

1003
01:05:46.039 --> 01:05:48.519
up in the mountains. You know, if you ever, you know,

1004
01:05:48.679 --> 01:05:54.000
have any conventional guys going to drive
up to there out of curiousity because you

1005
01:05:54.079 --> 01:05:59.320
mentioned that you were part of this
sort of this nascent or baby Special Operations

1006
01:05:59.360 --> 01:06:04.400
whether program right before there was a
pipeline, before they really knew what their

1007
01:06:04.480 --> 01:06:08.719
value added was going to be your
first apployment. You get a bronze star

1008
01:06:08.840 --> 01:06:13.639
with Valor, then you go back
home. How how do you see during

1009
01:06:13.679 --> 01:06:18.239
this time? How do you see
the SOWT training change, their mission profile

1010
01:06:18.400 --> 01:06:21.880
change? Did they come to you
about stuff about what do we need to

1011
01:06:21.920 --> 01:06:26.079
do to bring value added? How
does all that working out on the back

1012
01:06:26.199 --> 01:06:30.320
end? Yeah, when I got
back, I mean it was it was

1013
01:06:30.480 --> 01:06:35.119
constant as far as like commanders wanted
to talk to you, you know,

1014
01:06:35.400 --> 01:06:40.559
squadron commanders from the sts wanted to
talk to you. You know. That

1015
01:06:40.960 --> 01:06:45.320
was not that I had a problem
with it, Like I didn't mind sharing

1016
01:06:45.360 --> 01:06:48.760
the story and like my after action, but it was like almost like exhausting

1017
01:06:48.880 --> 01:06:54.519
sometimes because you became the person there
was like anytime there was like talk about

1018
01:06:54.639 --> 01:06:59.199
medical stuff. Since I was involved
in a heavy situation that involved medical training,

1019
01:06:59.559 --> 01:07:01.440
Hey, what's sure? You know, what do you think about going

1020
01:07:01.440 --> 01:07:03.800
to this medical school? Like what
do you think about doing this for this

1021
01:07:03.960 --> 01:07:08.320
next rotation? And you know,
you start getting asked these things and you're

1022
01:07:08.360 --> 01:07:12.159
like, I mean, I'm just
a staff sergeant here, like I you

1023
01:07:12.239 --> 01:07:14.480
know, I give you an opinion, but I'm not saying I got the

1024
01:07:14.599 --> 01:07:16.960
right answers. But they use that
a lot, so they you know,

1025
01:07:17.599 --> 01:07:21.000
sou Key's. We went to a
lot of good medical training, especially out

1026
01:07:21.000 --> 01:07:25.039
in Vegas. You know, I
feel like I'm shouting out of these schools

1027
01:07:25.079 --> 01:07:29.559
like I might not expect to check
back. But Joint Tactical Medicine, which

1028
01:07:29.599 --> 01:07:33.239
is out in Vegas, was an
awesome course one because not from the medical

1029
01:07:33.280 --> 01:07:36.880
side, but also like they'd hire
you know, some some op for to

1030
01:07:36.960 --> 01:07:40.800
come in. They owned a mountain
with some steel on it, so they

1031
01:07:40.840 --> 01:07:44.239
had a downed hel so you could
run a full mission profile out of there,

1032
01:07:44.280 --> 01:07:47.400
and like, I learned so much
when it comes to trauma just from

1033
01:07:47.480 --> 01:07:51.159
that school. You know, it's
like we're not pj's by by no means,

1034
01:07:51.360 --> 01:07:55.440
right, you know, battlefield trauma
like I was, I was fairly

1035
01:07:55.519 --> 01:08:00.920
good. But so at what point
are they trying to basically turn you guys

1036
01:08:00.039 --> 01:08:04.480
into a many PG, many C
C T like many like there are they

1037
01:08:04.519 --> 01:08:09.239
trying to make you jacks of all
trades? Do do they lose mission focus

1038
01:08:09.440 --> 01:08:12.719
or do they Are they trying to
find a spot for you? Yeah,

1039
01:08:12.760 --> 01:08:15.679
I think that's where they're at now. Actually, you know, I think

1040
01:08:15.479 --> 01:08:19.800
you know now they're I think that's
as SoC in general, you know,

1041
01:08:20.000 --> 01:08:25.479
like Afghanistan is don't happen anymore.
Like so now J tech missions aren't the

1042
01:08:25.560 --> 01:08:28.760
same, Like everybody's kind of looking
for what's the next thing going to be?

1043
01:08:29.319 --> 01:08:32.079
And so I think that's why they
shifted to this reconstance piece, because

1044
01:08:32.159 --> 01:08:36.000
not only is it physical you know
constants, it's you know, cyber reconnaissance,

1045
01:08:36.079 --> 01:08:40.439
you know, so they're getting trainings
when it comes to cyber stuff and

1046
01:08:40.880 --> 01:08:44.600
you know the stuff that I'd never
had any exposure to you know, so

1047
01:08:44.680 --> 01:08:48.640
I think everybody's trying to find that
that next niche of what we're going to

1048
01:08:48.720 --> 01:08:55.239
own, you know, on on
the battlefield here and where we currently are

1049
01:08:55.319 --> 01:08:58.840
in the in the current situation.
I think that's a smart move, Like

1050
01:08:58.920 --> 01:09:02.439
they're they're looking for the new the
new battlefield and trying to you know,

1051
01:09:02.760 --> 01:09:08.600
become experts in a field that's going
to be you know relevant. There are

1052
01:09:08.640 --> 01:09:12.680
there any more weather technicians, I
mean, are they do the guys still

1053
01:09:12.720 --> 01:09:16.720
go to the meteorological school and nope, Nope, they don't even go to

1054
01:09:16.960 --> 01:09:19.960
the school anymore. They'll go to
like an observer school, Like they'll become

1055
01:09:20.000 --> 01:09:25.680
like observer certified, but it's not
as an intense like you're not you know,

1056
01:09:27.119 --> 01:09:30.119
that's not your primary focus anymore,
you know, Like, so you

1057
01:09:30.239 --> 01:09:34.840
have the capability, but that's that's
not your primary Well, one more deployment

1058
01:09:34.960 --> 01:09:40.840
story. You talked about Neuristan a
time where there was a low ceiling that

1059
01:09:41.000 --> 01:09:43.960
might have limited air coverage, and
I was wondering if you could talk a

1060
01:09:44.000 --> 01:09:46.079
little bit about that because I think
that lends a little bit more insight into

1061
01:09:46.239 --> 01:09:50.359
into this career field. Yeah,
so, you know, for that mission.

1062
01:09:50.439 --> 01:09:54.039
You know, we kind of talked
about sometimes you hit it and sometimes

1063
01:09:54.079 --> 01:09:58.520
you don't. You know, it's
a zero to hero, and so we'd

1064
01:09:58.640 --> 01:10:01.079
kind of you know, infilled in
a stand and we'd been on target for

1065
01:10:01.560 --> 01:10:05.359
you know, six ish hours or
so, and we had cast. So

1066
01:10:05.439 --> 01:10:10.239
we had a one thirty overhead and
we were in an active tick and some

1067
01:10:10.600 --> 01:10:13.640
ceilings rolled in to where the one
thirty. You know, some of the

1068
01:10:13.720 --> 01:10:16.680
other assets were starting to want to
push off because they just couldn't see anything,

1069
01:10:16.720 --> 01:10:19.640
and so we had to kind of
make a call of one, we

1070
01:10:19.720 --> 01:10:23.600
want to keep them on station a
little bit longer to see if the ceilings

1071
01:10:23.640 --> 01:10:27.399
pass. And two houses going to
affect our expill, you know, because

1072
01:10:27.439 --> 01:10:30.119
we were down in a valley.
The valley was going to fill up with

1073
01:10:30.199 --> 01:10:31.680
fog potentially, and so I had
to kind of make a call there on

1074
01:10:31.760 --> 01:10:35.279
the ground. So we you know, that was probably one of the few

1075
01:10:35.319 --> 01:10:40.720
times where I got to just do
traditional weather kind of forecasting, you know.

1076
01:10:40.840 --> 01:10:44.680
So it's like I'm understanding, you
know, where the predominant wind flows

1077
01:10:44.720 --> 01:10:47.800
from. I'm understanding, is am
I getting upflow up draft where this is

1078
01:10:47.840 --> 01:10:50.319
going to stay? Or am I
getting this across the mountain, it's going

1079
01:10:50.399 --> 01:10:55.439
to create some downdraft where it's going
to dissipate or push off. And so

1080
01:10:55.560 --> 01:10:58.960
I made the call like, hey, like we're good. We're probably got

1081
01:10:59.000 --> 01:11:01.600
about a thirty minute window here before
we start to clear out again. You

1082
01:11:01.680 --> 01:11:04.560
know, it's kind of made that
call. So I'm communicating that to the

1083
01:11:04.600 --> 01:11:09.119
combat controller and the jay talk on
the ground, who's communicating to the air

1084
01:11:09.199 --> 01:11:12.359
asset, and so kind of made
that decision, and you know, it

1085
01:11:12.439 --> 01:11:15.279
kind of worked out in my favor. I looked smart, you know there

1086
01:11:15.319 --> 01:11:17.239
in the moment, and you know, thankful for that. And you know,

1087
01:11:17.319 --> 01:11:20.199
I just had to carry that heavy
rock that that wasn't wet that night

1088
01:11:20.199 --> 01:11:26.439
because it wasn't raining in my and
my website and what was the uh next

1089
01:11:26.479 --> 01:11:30.880
assignment for you after that deployment.
Yeah, so I got back there in

1090
01:11:30.199 --> 01:11:35.520
twenty eleven, going into twenty twelve, I got assigned to go being an

1091
01:11:35.560 --> 01:11:41.399
instructor at the STTS, so go
back to the five level school. So

1092
01:11:41.479 --> 01:11:45.199
when I got there, obviously had
these two really recent deployments, you know,

1093
01:11:45.560 --> 01:11:48.000
with a lot of relevancy when it
comes to the school with the whole

1094
01:11:48.039 --> 01:11:51.439
mission profile. You know peace,
so you know, got assigned to the

1095
01:11:51.600 --> 01:11:56.079
back portion of training. You know, so like the school set up to

1096
01:11:56.119 --> 01:12:00.399
where we got pre dive, they
got you know, uh one, two

1097
01:12:00.479 --> 01:12:02.159
and three, and so I was
like O r T, which is like

1098
01:12:02.199 --> 01:12:06.439
basically operational readiness training. So like
you've you've gone through all like the basic

1099
01:12:06.479 --> 01:12:10.920
stuff, like you understand how to
do stuff. Now let's go put it

1100
01:12:10.960 --> 01:12:15.159
all together. So you have like
a mock fob, we're running full mission

1101
01:12:15.239 --> 01:12:18.960
profiles, like we're understanding like small
unit tactics like how to take down a

1102
01:12:19.079 --> 01:12:25.039
compound, and you're going through CQB
stuff. And so that was the focus

1103
01:12:25.119 --> 01:12:28.680
for my last you know, probably
three years was you know, teaching that.

1104
01:12:30.199 --> 01:12:33.319
And you know, when you're doing
that one, you're just rehearsing all

1105
01:12:33.359 --> 01:12:35.960
this stuff, you know, but
you're also learning more and more. You

1106
01:12:36.039 --> 01:12:42.000
know, You're you're getting different perspectives
come in. You know, you work

1107
01:12:42.039 --> 01:12:46.039
with combat controllers and pjs and like
you're you're understanding everybody's you know, value

1108
01:12:46.399 --> 01:12:50.640
on the X and understanding different perspectives. So even though I might have done

1109
01:12:50.680 --> 01:12:55.119
it a certain way with you know, the Marsac team or or whatever,

1110
01:12:55.279 --> 01:12:59.840
like they do it differently with the
ODA and so, you know, operation

1111
01:13:00.199 --> 01:13:02.760
wise, like I felt like I
got better, but I got to a

1112
01:13:02.840 --> 01:13:08.880
point there towards the end to where
I looked at like my career and I

1113
01:13:08.920 --> 01:13:14.600
started having to think about career moves
from there. And so after about eleven

1114
01:13:14.720 --> 01:13:17.279
years, I realized, like,
you know what, all the fun stuff

1115
01:13:17.319 --> 01:13:20.359
I was probably done, you know, like there was a new crop behind

1116
01:13:20.439 --> 01:13:25.520
me that we're going to get the
good you know spots at fobs, Like

1117
01:13:25.600 --> 01:13:31.520
I was going to be more of
that admin eye roll, and I just

1118
01:13:31.560 --> 01:13:33.439
didn't know if I wanted to do
that. You know. It's kind of

1119
01:13:33.520 --> 01:13:36.399
to a point where it's like I
feel like I'd gotten if you asked,

1120
01:13:36.479 --> 01:13:39.760
like guys, like what do you
want on your career, Like as far

1121
01:13:39.800 --> 01:13:44.000
as like action wise, like I
feel like I've filled that bucket. You

1122
01:13:44.119 --> 01:13:45.920
know, Like there's some guys that
go to their whole career just wanting to

1123
01:13:45.960 --> 01:13:48.920
get into you know, one firefighter, do one certain thing. And it's

1124
01:13:48.960 --> 01:13:53.640
like I got to do that,
and I didn't think it was going to

1125
01:13:53.920 --> 01:13:55.880
have a chance to do any more
of it, you know, so it's

1126
01:13:55.960 --> 01:13:59.119
just kind of time to go.
My son was about to be born and

1127
01:13:59.560 --> 01:14:02.000
we start talking about those those moments
where you're sitting there thinking to yourself,

1128
01:14:02.119 --> 01:14:05.960
like it was harder and harder to
turn on that that blank stare. You

1129
01:14:06.039 --> 01:14:12.079
know. I remember doing a free
fall and kind of climbing the altitude and

1130
01:14:12.159 --> 01:14:15.600
started thinking about what happened, like
parachute doesn't open, Like what's you know,

1131
01:14:16.039 --> 01:14:18.880
got a son at home now,
you know, and started having those

1132
01:14:18.960 --> 01:14:21.479
kind of thoughts and like when that
happened was like I just I was done,

1133
01:14:21.640 --> 01:14:25.960
Like I was ready to go,
ready to move on with life.

1134
01:14:26.119 --> 01:14:30.560
You know this this chapter is over, And what was that transition process?

1135
01:14:30.760 --> 01:14:33.039
Like? And where did you kind
of land after after the Air Force?

1136
01:14:34.119 --> 01:14:38.880
Yeah, so it kind of serendipitous
the way it happened. Like I didn't

1137
01:14:38.920 --> 01:14:41.479
have a plant, Like I was
going to go to school, max out

1138
01:14:41.560 --> 01:14:45.800
my gi bill, finished my undergrad
and just kind of figure it out.

1139
01:14:46.239 --> 01:14:51.439
Two weeks before I left, I
got called into an instructor's office. He

1140
01:14:51.560 --> 01:14:56.920
was a GS employee, he's a
prior PJ, and the Air Force was

1141
01:14:57.039 --> 01:15:00.000
get ready to contract the Special Operations
develop on a program. You know,

1142
01:15:00.039 --> 01:15:05.560
they were going to bring guys that
had just separated on and then train recruits.

1143
01:15:05.720 --> 01:15:10.279
They're getting ready to go to assessment
selections, like your primary purpose is

1144
01:15:10.319 --> 01:15:14.119
to one help them get in shape, but two just help them mentally,

1145
01:15:14.239 --> 01:15:16.880
like understand the weight of what they're
trying to do, you know, and

1146
01:15:17.000 --> 01:15:21.279
kind of talk to them through that
process, like how to survive certain situations

1147
01:15:21.359 --> 01:15:25.960
mentally. And so they called me
and obvious say, hey, there's a

1148
01:15:26.000 --> 01:15:28.680
contract out for this. I don't
know what company is going to win it,

1149
01:15:29.359 --> 01:15:32.239
but they're going to be looking for
guys to kind of fill these thlots,

1150
01:15:32.439 --> 01:15:34.840
you know. And I have a
contact at one company if you want

1151
01:15:34.880 --> 01:15:38.640
me to put in a word,
you know, and it paid fairly well.

1152
01:15:38.760 --> 01:15:41.439
And and I'll say that sounds like
a pretty easy job, Like I

1153
01:15:41.479 --> 01:15:44.680
could do that, like give a
couple of past tests and run some development

1154
01:15:44.760 --> 01:15:48.479
sessions. And so what I did
was I jumped on LinkedIn. I contacted

1155
01:15:48.520 --> 01:15:53.159
that content. But I also found
out the other three companies that were in

1156
01:15:53.479 --> 01:15:57.920
the running, and I contacted all
three and basically like position myself with a

1157
01:15:58.079 --> 01:16:01.319
very smart yeah, so whoever won, Like I had a job, you

1158
01:16:01.399 --> 01:16:04.960
know, so this contract in the
company a one. They called me up

1159
01:16:04.960 --> 01:16:08.199
a couple of days later, like, hey, we got the job in

1160
01:16:08.279 --> 01:16:11.039
Kansas City if you want. And
I was like, sure, I'll be

1161
01:16:11.159 --> 01:16:14.079
up there like in a week ready
to start, and uh kind of that's

1162
01:16:14.079 --> 01:16:17.960
the way it worked. And so
I did that for seven years and finish

1163
01:16:18.039 --> 01:16:23.079
my undergrad while I was doing it. I got my MBA also while I

1164
01:16:23.199 --> 01:16:25.840
was doing it, So it was
a perfect for me, like to raise

1165
01:16:25.880 --> 01:16:29.920
a young family, finish school professionally, and kind of got to a point

1166
01:16:29.920 --> 01:16:32.960
where say, okay, like now
it's time to like now grow professionally,

1167
01:16:33.199 --> 01:16:39.399
Like I need to go beyond this
contracting gig. And that's why I reached

1168
01:16:39.439 --> 01:16:41.960
out and my buddy Zach, who
you know, is an account executive,

1169
01:16:42.079 --> 01:16:45.640
and you know, I wanted to
understand business just finish my NBA. So

1170
01:16:45.680 --> 01:16:47.359
I was like, I want to
get into business, and what better way

1171
01:16:47.359 --> 01:16:50.760
to understand business than to understand how
to generate revenue, you know, And

1172
01:16:51.000 --> 01:16:54.560
so I kind of contact him and
he was, you know, I was

1173
01:16:54.640 --> 01:16:57.439
kind of unsure if like that's the
route I wanted to go, and he

1174
01:16:57.600 --> 01:17:00.880
was like, dude, like sale, and what I do is so much

1175
01:17:01.079 --> 01:17:03.920
what we did in the military.
So he was a combat controller and he's

1176
01:17:03.920 --> 01:17:06.600
like, imagine like you show up
on a FOB and you have to build

1177
01:17:06.640 --> 01:17:12.079
report instantly and show value. He's
like, that's selling. He's like,

1178
01:17:12.279 --> 01:17:15.600
you have, you know, a
solution to a problem. You help them

1179
01:17:15.640 --> 01:17:17.479
solve problems, you know. And
he's like, and then you build report.

1180
01:17:17.479 --> 01:17:21.119
What you're doing it you already notice. Yeah, And so I just

1181
01:17:21.199 --> 01:17:24.520
had to think of it. It
just a little different way, and you

1182
01:17:24.560 --> 01:17:27.279
know, kind of broke in as
an account executive, like never was an

1183
01:17:27.399 --> 01:17:30.000
SDR, never was BDR, and
you know, kind of figured it out,

1184
01:17:30.359 --> 01:17:33.359
you know, and kind of put
the things I knew from the military,

1185
01:17:33.399 --> 01:17:35.560
the things I had learned throughout my
life, and kind of put it

1186
01:17:35.600 --> 01:17:39.520
into action. And you know,
that's the one thing I will say about

1187
01:17:39.640 --> 01:17:44.479
military is, you know, one
there's so many things that you learned,

1188
01:17:44.560 --> 01:17:46.640
but you just there's not names for
them in the military, right, It's

1189
01:17:46.680 --> 01:17:50.680
just become second nature, right,
And so you learn this stuff and you

1190
01:17:50.840 --> 01:17:56.399
just realize that's not common. And
then too, like the military does a

1191
01:17:56.479 --> 01:18:00.359
great job of like making you believe
you're only worth a certain dollar amount,

1192
01:18:00.600 --> 01:18:03.000
right, Right, So you're you're
at E seven, you could be the

1193
01:18:03.039 --> 01:18:05.800
best EAT seven there is on the
planet. You're going to get paid as

1194
01:18:05.840 --> 01:18:09.880
all the other E sevens right,
you know, and so you believe you're

1195
01:18:09.920 --> 01:18:14.800
only worth a certain amount, you
know, and so like making this transition

1196
01:18:14.960 --> 01:18:18.199
and like changing your compensation. It's
like eye opening because you're like, wow,

1197
01:18:18.319 --> 01:18:23.800
like you do have the skills to
do this, like transitioning military members

1198
01:18:23.880 --> 01:18:27.600
like you know, hopefully you know, if somebody was listening to this transitioning

1199
01:18:27.640 --> 01:18:30.319
and want to just talk transition,
like I'm always open to do that,

1200
01:18:30.680 --> 01:18:33.319
you know, helping them navigate that, like how to look at it,

1201
01:18:33.840 --> 01:18:36.319
how to navigate the market, you
know, how to break in, like

1202
01:18:36.399 --> 01:18:40.119
I broke into where I'm at,
like I said, with no SD like

1203
01:18:40.199 --> 01:18:42.720
no experience, like I never sold
a thing in my life, you know,

1204
01:18:42.760 --> 01:18:45.199
and I broke in as an account
executive and selling you know, software,

1205
01:18:45.319 --> 01:18:48.479
and it's not very common, you
know, but I think you go

1206
01:18:48.640 --> 01:18:53.000
to it with a certain approach.
And you know, Zach was you know,

1207
01:18:54.199 --> 01:18:56.680
good to me and giving me a
good playbook and helping me. And

1208
01:18:56.800 --> 01:18:59.520
hopefully I'm able to help a few
other people kind of do that, you

1209
01:18:59.600 --> 01:19:02.960
know, guys that are are looking
to do something. And it's interesting because

1210
01:19:03.159 --> 01:19:08.279
obviously when you're in the military,
like building rapport, uh, you know,

1211
01:19:08.359 --> 01:19:10.880
so you can do your job.
It's not a metric, right,

1212
01:19:11.000 --> 01:19:15.720
it's not something that goes on your
review, on your like n list of

1213
01:19:15.760 --> 01:19:21.520
review, your evaluation, whatever you're
you know, but I know that,

1214
01:19:21.680 --> 01:19:26.399
like Jack mentions when he was leaving
the military as a former ranger and SF

1215
01:19:26.840 --> 01:19:30.039
like the career council said, you'll
make a good security and it's a lot

1216
01:19:30.079 --> 01:19:35.000
of yeah, And it's a lot
of these intangibles that that you build in

1217
01:19:35.119 --> 01:19:41.199
this community and in the military in
general, but particularly in this community.

1218
01:19:41.600 --> 01:19:45.239
Like you sat there and sold your
position. You built value, right,

1219
01:19:45.359 --> 01:19:49.399
you show up as as a weatherman, as a weather technician, and people

1220
01:19:49.439 --> 01:19:58.079
are like, well, like the
operators and you, but you find the

1221
01:19:58.199 --> 01:20:04.720
places where you can add value and
you focus on that, and you know,

1222
01:20:04.840 --> 01:20:09.000
it's it's a very interesting idea in
the uh. You know, in

1223
01:20:09.039 --> 01:20:13.520
the work in the realm of veteran
transition, the veterans don't have any appreciation

1224
01:20:13.680 --> 01:20:16.840
at all a lot of times for
what skills they actually developed that you can't

1225
01:20:17.039 --> 01:20:24.000
code onto a resume or onto a
you know that the career counselor is going

1226
01:20:24.039 --> 01:20:27.800
to be able to point out for
you just the coping, you know,

1227
01:20:28.199 --> 01:20:32.319
like this, your ability to adapt
to situations and like control the controllable,

1228
01:20:32.479 --> 01:20:34.800
Like how many times, like you're
in the military, like that's just what

1229
01:20:34.920 --> 01:20:38.800
you do, Like right, all
the times you think of like the things

1230
01:20:38.840 --> 01:20:41.159
you didn't control, we're that's just
the way it is, Like you can

1231
01:20:41.279 --> 01:20:45.199
move on about your life. That's
not like people aren't like that, right,

1232
01:20:45.239 --> 01:20:48.439
you know, And it's something that's
sometimes it's hard to teach, and

1233
01:20:48.520 --> 01:20:53.960
so I think having that level mindset, having that you know, what we're

1234
01:20:54.039 --> 01:20:58.439
doing doesn't have that much weight,
right, Like I've done stuff with a

1235
01:20:58.520 --> 01:21:00.640
lot of weight, Like my life's
on the line, Like I'm setting in

1236
01:21:00.760 --> 01:21:03.920
this office right now, this is
where I work from home, and it's

1237
01:21:04.000 --> 01:21:09.439
like this, yeah it's important,
like I want to do well, but

1238
01:21:09.760 --> 01:21:15.119
nobody's life is in danger right now, you know. And having that ability

1239
01:21:15.199 --> 01:21:17.039
to just remain calmer, it's like
other people that kind of freak out and

1240
01:21:17.119 --> 01:21:20.119
like the moment gets bigger than it
needs to be, you know. So

1241
01:21:20.159 --> 01:21:25.760
I think that's an asset like these
you know, military members and veterans need

1242
01:21:25.880 --> 01:21:29.199
to remember that, you know.
It's like some of that stuff like you

1243
01:21:29.279 --> 01:21:34.560
can't teach, Yeah, you got
it. How how do you manage that

1244
01:21:35.000 --> 01:21:41.399
in the civilian world, and that
when you say that, you know the

1245
01:21:42.079 --> 01:21:46.039
consequences aren't the same, right,
But then you're dealing with civilians who you

1246
01:21:46.119 --> 01:21:49.479
know, the hair is on fire
because they feel like these consequences are the

1247
01:21:49.520 --> 01:21:56.039
same. How do you manage that
without telling them to like shut the fuck

1248
01:21:56.079 --> 01:21:58.199
up. You don't know what you're
talking about, Like nothing here is real,

1249
01:21:58.640 --> 01:22:04.640
because to them it is. How
do you balance that with your previous

1250
01:22:04.760 --> 01:22:10.920
experience and knowing that breathe through this
and and everything will be okay because nobody's

1251
01:22:11.000 --> 01:22:16.159
gonna die regards what happens in this
environment. Yeah, yeah, obviously not

1252
01:22:16.279 --> 01:22:19.319
going to tell them, you know
what you're truly thinking, probably in your

1253
01:22:19.399 --> 01:22:26.239
right. But I think it's that
unwavering tone, you know, tonality in

1254
01:22:26.279 --> 01:22:30.600
your voice, Like sometimes that's all
it takes. Is like they're talking up

1255
01:22:30.640 --> 01:22:32.279
here at a high level, and
it's like it just they just need an

1256
01:22:32.359 --> 01:22:38.359
unwavering tone of like let's take a
breath, like we're okay. Reassurance,

1257
01:22:39.079 --> 01:22:41.680
you know, sometimes helps a lot, you know, to helps them kind

1258
01:22:41.680 --> 01:22:45.880
of reset, you know. And
that's an area where I think I'm thankful

1259
01:22:45.960 --> 01:22:48.800
to where I was at where it's
sprout social as I get to kind of

1260
01:22:48.880 --> 01:22:53.680
help you know, some individuals like
that that you know, start to worry

1261
01:22:53.720 --> 01:22:57.560
about performance, start to worry about
things like that, they're just sometimes out

1262
01:22:57.560 --> 01:23:00.720
of the control and us to help
help them reset, you know. So

1263
01:23:00.840 --> 01:23:03.279
it's like I'm almost I'm going back
to those weather days where I'm finding the

1264
01:23:03.399 --> 01:23:05.720
value outside of my day to day
job. Like, yeah, my day

1265
01:23:05.760 --> 01:23:11.119
to day is to sell a product, but you know, the other things

1266
01:23:11.159 --> 01:23:13.600
that I bring to a team,
you know, is to share that experience

1267
01:23:13.680 --> 01:23:16.439
and kind of help reps calm and
chill out. But yeah, uh,

1268
01:23:16.960 --> 01:23:19.600
never getting too high and never get
too low, you know kind of thing,

1269
01:23:20.439 --> 01:23:26.720
and I think you bring that and
it's just contagious. Yeah, Travis

1270
01:23:26.840 --> 01:23:31.039
Man, this has been like an
awesome interview, and I really appreciate you

1271
01:23:31.119 --> 01:23:35.239
coming on the show tonight or any
like final thoughts or anything anything of that

1272
01:23:35.359 --> 01:23:39.399
I failed to cover or anything I
failed to ask that you'd really like to

1273
01:23:39.439 --> 01:23:43.399
hit up before we go. No, No, I really appreciate it.

1274
01:23:43.479 --> 01:23:45.279
You know, if I could leave
it, you know, any part of

1275
01:23:45.359 --> 01:23:48.760
words, I think it's just around
that transition for veterans, like you know,

1276
01:23:49.640 --> 01:23:53.279
just want to advocate for that,
like if there's you know, ever,

1277
01:23:53.399 --> 01:23:56.680
anything I can do where people want
to reach out to me just to

1278
01:23:56.760 --> 01:23:59.800
talk about it, transitioning, anything
I do to help them, you know,

1279
01:24:00.000 --> 01:24:03.239
always going to be a veteran advocate
for that and you know, try

1280
01:24:03.279 --> 01:24:06.159
to help them any way I can. Just try to give back to the

1281
01:24:06.239 --> 01:24:10.760
community, you know. Again,
want to also shout out some of the

1282
01:24:10.800 --> 01:24:13.000
teams I was on, you know, that Marsoff team. You know,

1283
01:24:13.039 --> 01:24:15.399
I don't have any products, but
Michael Golobleski, you know, wrote two

1284
01:24:15.479 --> 01:24:18.239
books about that, you know,
so if you want to check those out,

1285
01:24:18.319 --> 01:24:23.640
support Michael. Uh. Those books
are called Level Zero Heroes and a

1286
01:24:23.800 --> 01:24:26.800
Dagger two too, so it's a
two book collection, you know, So

1287
01:24:26.960 --> 01:24:30.000
shout out him, you know.
But uh, you know, just all

1288
01:24:30.119 --> 01:24:31.920
all the guys that were there,
and you know, men and women,

1289
01:24:33.279 --> 01:24:38.159
you know kind of understand those those
everyday trials and tribulations should go through.

1290
01:24:38.520 --> 01:24:41.079
You know, everybody's had their ups
and downs, and you know, want

1291
01:24:41.119 --> 01:24:43.680
to let everybody know like you're not
alone, you know, like kind of

1292
01:24:44.079 --> 01:24:46.119
fight some of this epidemic of veteran
suicide things like that, like check on

1293
01:24:46.199 --> 01:24:48.560
your battle buddy, things like that. So I just want to you know,

1294
01:24:48.680 --> 01:24:51.800
really highlight that and just leave it
at that, like, let's let's

1295
01:24:51.800 --> 01:24:57.760
all put our arms around each other, like rolling this together. Any websites,

1296
01:24:57.960 --> 01:25:00.960
social media or anything you want to
plug before we roll out? Yeah,

1297
01:25:01.079 --> 01:25:03.920
So, you know, if you're
looking to join the Air Force,

1298
01:25:04.199 --> 01:25:09.479
uh, specifically to go into ass
SoC you know, be a combat controller,

1299
01:25:09.600 --> 01:25:15.119
pair of rescue and TACPE special reconnaissance. Great podcast out there called ones

1300
01:25:15.159 --> 01:25:19.479
Ready, you know, so shout
out to Trent Siegmiller Fires Out Getting Ready

1301
01:25:19.600 --> 01:25:25.359
to Retire. You know, he's
running that podcast where they do a great

1302
01:25:25.520 --> 01:25:30.439
job describing to candidates how they can
prepare for the pipeline, what the pipeline's

1303
01:25:30.640 --> 01:25:32.760
like. You know. So if
you're in that position where you're just thinking

1304
01:25:32.800 --> 01:25:36.439
about doing that, I at least
suggest you you pop over there to Ones

1305
01:25:36.479 --> 01:25:42.279
Ready and give them So that's that's
Ones Ready on YouTube and the podcast platforms

1306
01:25:43.279 --> 01:25:47.159
yep. And then what's his name
again, Trent sig Miller. Okay,

1307
01:25:47.239 --> 01:25:50.960
great, And I want to give
a quick shout out myself to uh Costa

1308
01:25:51.039 --> 01:25:58.159
Carabeo Cigars, my preferred cigars that
I'm often spoken on this program. UH

1309
01:25:59.560 --> 01:26:03.880
dot com it's where you can go
to get them. Awesome company. Travis,

1310
01:26:03.960 --> 01:26:08.800
thank you so much for joining us
tonight. Yeah. I appreciate it,

1311
01:26:08.880 --> 01:26:11.039
and you know, I had a
good time. Next time I have

1312
01:26:11.199 --> 01:26:13.880
to, you know, get a
good little sip like you guys are having,

1313
01:26:13.920 --> 01:26:16.279
and maybe we can do it live
and in person. Come down here,

1314
01:26:16.399 --> 01:26:19.359
man, You're welcome anytime we have
a cigar and a drink with us.

1315
01:26:20.279 --> 01:26:26.199
Yeah. Absolutely, more than more
than welcome. Yeah, what what's

1316
01:26:26.319 --> 01:26:34.439
up? Second? Wait, is
this patron or Okay, all right,

1317
01:26:35.560 --> 01:26:41.159
we got a viewer question. Scott
g asks do you, uh, do

1318
01:26:41.239 --> 01:26:45.119
you utilize statistics, hourly data or
machine learning at all to pretict the weather?

1319
01:26:48.479 --> 01:26:54.159
Yeah? Uh, you know,
definitely those traditional forecasters are going to

1320
01:26:54.199 --> 01:26:58.199
be using you know a lot of
data and analytics. You know, they'll

1321
01:26:58.239 --> 01:27:02.680
they'll do that you know, simulated
forecast, but also rely a lot on

1322
01:27:02.960 --> 01:27:06.640
a a skew. Uh, you
know, the weather balloons. I don't

1323
01:27:06.640 --> 01:27:10.520
know if you guys ever seen like
the old joke of like the weather guy

1324
01:27:10.600 --> 01:27:15.159
with the red balloon, right,
try to get that that rising atmospheric you

1325
01:27:15.239 --> 01:27:17.960
know, so a lot of different
things that used the forecast. But yeah,

1326
01:27:18.039 --> 01:27:21.760
traditional guys definitely would use you know, data analytics, a lot of

1327
01:27:21.800 --> 01:27:28.479
AI things like that, all right, we got one more. Okay,

1328
01:27:28.760 --> 01:27:30.680
so I think we have one more. We have one more. What's that?

1329
01:27:30.880 --> 01:27:34.039
We have one more question? We
have one more question. Any thoughts

1330
01:27:34.119 --> 01:27:41.439
on the concept of generating value through
presence? Wow? Okay, that's deep.

1331
01:27:42.880 --> 01:27:47.319
Yeah right, uh, talk about
a heavy one. I think when

1332
01:27:47.359 --> 01:27:51.199
you create the value, you present
like you think about this concept. I

1333
01:27:51.279 --> 01:27:56.520
think how we kind of ended the
show here, we talked about that unwavering

1334
01:27:57.479 --> 01:28:00.560
kind of tonality. I think you
look at leadership. You look at all

1335
01:28:00.600 --> 01:28:03.119
the great leaders, like none of
them ever got too high, and they

1336
01:28:03.199 --> 01:28:06.199
never got too low, you know, they always remained the same. Whether

1337
01:28:06.279 --> 01:28:10.359
it's like you know, I think
of like all the battlefield leaders are I

1338
01:28:10.520 --> 01:28:13.720
was around, you know when when
I'm in the midst of like that the

1339
01:28:13.800 --> 01:28:17.239
most intense firefight, you didn't see
pain, like the eyes and like the

1340
01:28:17.800 --> 01:28:23.039
tonality and their voice never changed.
And so I think when you think about

1341
01:28:23.119 --> 01:28:28.199
presence, that's how I would envision
you know, that question, like how

1342
01:28:28.720 --> 01:28:33.479
you can create presence? Just you
know, and and yeah, I'm kind

1343
01:28:33.520 --> 01:28:36.000
of going off on a tangent there, but oh, you're right now,

1344
01:28:36.119 --> 01:28:42.439
right, we've talked, Yeah,
we we've we've talked about this both with

1345
01:28:42.560 --> 01:28:47.880
officers, uh, and also we've
talked about j tax and CCTs and how

1346
01:28:48.680 --> 01:28:58.199
no matter how uh dire the situation
was, how when they're talking on the

1347
01:28:58.319 --> 01:29:02.159
radio, you would never know that
they weren't sitting in a park on a

1348
01:29:02.239 --> 01:29:09.600
Sunday afternoon, that that that maintaining
that presence. We absolutely understand what you're

1349
01:29:09.640 --> 01:29:13.199
saying. Yeah, yeah, can
you believe that You listen to some of

1350
01:29:13.199 --> 01:29:17.479
those recordings and it's it's surreal because
yeah, you would you described it perfectly

1351
01:29:17.720 --> 01:29:21.119
like they could just be sitting in
a park chilling pet and their dog.

1352
01:29:21.479 --> 01:29:26.560
Yeah, like they're in the most
intense firefight, uh that you can imagine.

1353
01:29:26.760 --> 01:29:30.720
Yeah, And and it does a
lot one you know it. And

1354
01:29:30.880 --> 01:29:33.800
it's the same with an officer or
senior enlisted. My panic is contained when

1355
01:29:33.800 --> 01:29:39.199
they're maintaining that, Like it's it's
sort of a medic, right, whether

1356
01:29:39.319 --> 01:29:45.119
somebody's calm or somebody's panicked, it
influences everybody around them. And to have

1357
01:29:45.319 --> 01:29:49.920
that level to bring it down,
to be able to maintain that sort of

1358
01:29:50.279 --> 01:29:58.720
cadence and and the I guess security
and sincerity people glom onto that. Yeah,

1359
01:29:58.960 --> 01:30:01.840
like you know, kind of going
down the same you know path.

1360
01:30:01.960 --> 01:30:05.800
Here we talk about culture, you
know, we talk about how things are

1361
01:30:06.079 --> 01:30:10.159
contagious, like how that's contagious.
I think another thing is like the trust.

1362
01:30:10.720 --> 01:30:13.119
You know, we talk about the
veteran community, like what you bring,

1363
01:30:13.800 --> 01:30:16.239
you know. I think that the
basis of a good culture, you

1364
01:30:16.319 --> 01:30:20.079
know, the baseline is trust.
And I look back of what was your

1365
01:30:20.439 --> 01:30:24.680
ar room book, like after action
room, like after a mission, right

1366
01:30:24.760 --> 01:30:30.840
the door shuts. There wasn't rank
at all, Like you're free to call

1367
01:30:30.920 --> 01:30:34.039
out what you want to call out. Sometimes you take harsh criticism, sometimes

1368
01:30:34.079 --> 01:30:39.000
you take praise, but you never
left the room being like Dave, I

1369
01:30:39.079 --> 01:30:43.039
can't believe Dave said that about me, right right? It was an open

1370
01:30:43.159 --> 01:30:45.560
forum, and I think that's missing
sometimes. And a lot of like non

1371
01:30:45.640 --> 01:30:49.439
military cultures, is like everybody's too
scared to say what they feel, right,

1372
01:30:49.520 --> 01:30:53.760
And you get a lot of water
cooler talk right right, You're in

1373
01:30:53.840 --> 01:30:56.600
a meeting and you know you don't
like what you hear, but instead of

1374
01:30:56.640 --> 01:30:59.119
saying anything, you're going to wait
and go to the water cooler and you're

1375
01:30:59.159 --> 01:31:03.520
gonna chat with yours and saying why
would have? Yeah? And I think

1376
01:31:03.600 --> 01:31:09.119
if we were less afraid of hurting
feelings and getting our feelings hurt, we'd

1377
01:31:09.159 --> 01:31:15.439
probably produce a lot more high performing
cultures outside of the military. I think

1378
01:31:15.520 --> 01:31:21.640
that's extremely true. I mean yeah, yeah, So, uh, this

1379
01:31:21.800 --> 01:31:26.720
Friday, we're gonna have Lewis Rudeah
on the show. C I a case

1380
01:31:26.800 --> 01:31:32.560
officer who is I believe chief of
ops in Iraq. And uh, Travis,

1381
01:31:32.680 --> 01:31:35.560
thank you so much for joining us
tonight. Yeah, thanks for Friday

1382
01:31:35.640 --> 01:31:41.560
with us. We deeply appreciate it. Yeah, Monday, Yeah, ship

1383
01:31:41.800 --> 01:31:46.359
Wednesday, Wednesday, Wednesday, Yeah, we're always thanks thanks for spending your

1384
01:31:46.399 --> 01:31:50.960
Wednesday with us. I'm I'm fucked
up. Yeah no, really, thank

1385
01:31:51.000 --> 01:31:54.800
you, Travis. Thank you for
sharing your insights into this, uh,

1386
01:31:55.000 --> 01:32:00.399
this career field that is often misunderstood
and not really covered in these types of

1387
01:32:00.479 --> 01:32:05.079
podcasts. These vet bro podcasts don't
necessarily talk about the support guys, and

1388
01:32:05.439 --> 01:32:10.000
I think that's to our detriment.
So well, not even support, like

1389
01:32:10.119 --> 01:32:13.119
your your your direct action in your
own way. Yeah yeah, he did

1390
01:32:13.279 --> 01:32:19.880
become that absolutely enabler two, you
know, to like what's to what's happening?

1391
01:32:20.000 --> 01:32:26.800
I mean, like you're not support
when you're pulling somebody off off a

1392
01:32:26.880 --> 01:32:32.439
hill because they've been shot, you
know, right, yeah, I appreciate

1393
01:32:32.479 --> 01:32:35.600
it, fellos, And you know, it was a pleasure and honored to

1394
01:32:35.680 --> 01:32:39.199
be here. And you know,
anytime you want to chat to see me

1395
01:32:39.279 --> 01:32:43.680
up right, Well, we'll talk
to you next time. Let us know

1396
01:32:43.680 --> 01:32:45.880
if you're coming through the city.
Would be happy to have you here.

1397
01:32:45.960 --> 01:32:50.159
Absolutely, cheers fell us, all
right, take care man, thanks all ready.