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Patreon etcter. So thank you guys, We love you. Special Operations Cobert

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SB and I the Teamhouse with your
hope, Jack Murphy and David Bark.

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Afghanistan targeting was you know, still
in its infancy. Is still a lot

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of human based at that point in
time in Afghanistan, so they're really wasn't

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a great targeting platform to go on. As you know, we've looked for

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you know, legacy targets and plan
out some of that stuff, and as

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far as what the Rangers were doing
a lot of it, we were just

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on TSTs time Sensitive Target manning for
one platoon and then the other was on

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CESAR Combat Search and Rescue. It
was a STEO basic standard UH Ranger taskings

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at that point in time, and
we had just rotated off of the CSAR

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tasking onto the time of Sensitive Target
tasking. So we had just finished all

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the stand ups for you know,
running through timelines and and checks on all

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that stuff, and got the the
word that you know, marcins Treill's team

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was was going to go out and
do this Operation Red Wings. And you

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know, as Rangers always do,
you know, we get enough information to

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have a conversation about it at chow
hall table, and so it started talking

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with some of the REKI guys and
you know they're you know, they're briefing

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us because they've been following this a
lot closer than like a riflele teon has

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that wasn't kind of in our in
our wheelhouse as far as targets we were

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looking at, but stuff that REKI
had been looking at in areas to do

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to do some of their stuff,
and they were like, we wouldn't do

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it this way. Not four guys, No, we'd take a whole reckie

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section, you know, twelve guys
and then but we wouldn't do it without

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a rifle team and support, you
know, even if it was a you

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know, five k standoff between the
two, because they can fight to us

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and we can fight to them,
and it's a bigger footprint on the ground.

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Yeah, do we run the risk
of spoiling the target, yes,

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but you know, on the other
side of it, you know, we

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as rangers, you know, we're
always going to bring everything in the kitchen

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sink to bear on an objective to
turn the you know, the odds in

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our favor. And you know,
did they do anything wrong in the way

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they did it? No, they
made judgment calls along the way. And

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you know, we can armchair quarterback
this right. You know, here's years

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later and say, well, I
wouldn't have done that, and I wouldn't

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have done this, but you know, they did what they do and right,

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so you know that led us into
you know, you know, them

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losing calms and them getting in the
fight, and you know, as the

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as the movie portrays it out,
and you know, and then we've got

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to go in and and do the
combat search and rescue on the Turbine three

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three crash site and then figure out
what the question mark is. What was

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going on on your base with your
platoon. I mean, are you getting

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worried that this team is compromised?
There are guys who are m I A,

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we might have to go look for
them. Then you find out a

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bird went down, I mean,
can you take us through a little bit

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of that. So so that morning, so June twenty eight, that morning,

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you know, we we got up
and we just did what rangers do.

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You know? We got up,
did pt, went nate, breakfast,

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going on with our training cycle.
We were going to go out to

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East River Range, which is just
outside of Bograam, the little town of

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Bogram. So we left the base, got outside there. We're going to

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go do some shooting drills and just
you know, have a good session on

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the range. And we get out
there and start throwing the target stands off

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the trucks and that's about the time
that you know, we we find out

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that the bird's been shot down,
and you know it was Hey, don't

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don't worry about what you've thrown off
the trucks, get back on the trucks.

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We got to get back, and
you know, there was a lot

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of guys are like, what are
we doing? And you know, we

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didn't have any of the answers at
the leadership level of what was going on.

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We just knew that, you know, we had to be back for

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something that was going to going to
get briefed, you know, to us.

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And as the situation was developing,
and and so then as we're rolling

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back in, you know, we
find out that the aircraft has been shot

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down, that team's in the fight, and you know, we're just stand

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by at that point. So I
wouldn't really kind of understand the whole situation

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for you know, probably another six
years as I progressed through through leadership.

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But you know, as I tell
people, it's, you know, it's

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as a young guy, you know, it's not that we're not going to

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get in there and we're not going
to be a part of this and we're

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not going to We're going to turn
the tables so that way, when we

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do recommit forces into this area,
we've got so many assets to bear on

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the objective that nobody would be in
their right mind to want to play so

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you know, it was probably you
know, about ten hours or so after

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the initial shootdown that you know,
that night as we're getting ready to launch

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and you finally got the green light
that we're gonna go, and we load

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up everybody that's gonna fit on the
aircraft at altitude and launch and then we

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hit the mountain weather on that night
and have to divert infill and go sit

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at Dawlabad for a day and then
wait to get infilled the next night.

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What what was your understanding at that
time of the situation on the ground.

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So the understanding was that the forty
seven had been shot down. There was

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no movement on that, you know. ISR feeds were terrible at the time.

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I you know, I don't even
understand how people could understand, you

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know, what they're seeing on that
screen. It was such a bad quality

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feed even then, you know.
And so we knew that the aircraft's been

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shot down. We're going in to
do combat search and rescue on the craft.

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You know, Murphy's team was still
a question mark as to what's going

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on because there had been no radio
comes with them since Murphy's SAP phone call.

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So the priority tasking was to recover
the crash because we knew where it

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was, and then after that it
would just be to figure it out,

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if you will. So we interviewed
Tony Brooks on the show before. Was

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he in your platoon? Tony was
in one Charlie, so he was the

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other half of the element that went
up. So it was a third platoon

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led the way because we weren't on
the CSAR, so we didn't have all

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the recovery and crash actses and all
the stuff to do that, so we

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kind of plowed the way, if
you will, and we were there to

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kind of take the brunt of any
contact that was going to be made because

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we were just there to add security
to what they were going to come in

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and do. As far as recovery, that was you know, one Charlie's

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tasking at the time, So that
was that was where Tony was And okay,

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cool, you know, yeah,
no, it's cool to get like

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some different perspectives on it. So
then what was your platoon? You know,

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I mean you just explained what your
platoon's role was, but then walk

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us through infill and getting on the
ground. So infil we infilled somewhere about

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probably about eight thousand feet and you
know, it was what we could get

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to with the package size that we
had on the aircraft. And so there

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we knew there wasn't a way to
land anywhere up there. So we knew

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it was going to be a rope
and it was going to be at least

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a minimum of forty footer, and
it ended up forty and then as the

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rope drifts, you know, it
kind of goes forty to sixty to you

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know, as it works out.
And then when one Charlie came in,

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I know, their rope started at
sixty and it ended somewhere around eighty.

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Tony said they just roped down into
fog with like no idea of where the

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bottom was. Yeah, yeah,
it was well, I mean the fog

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came in after we were already on
the ground. I know what he's talking

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about, because you know, it
is just the way the weather was working,

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and you know, it's just it
was. It was, you know,

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one of those points where I never
really you know, after a private

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I never roped with with leather gloves, you know, fast fast rope,

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you know, the working work gloves
anymore. I always did it in no

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max shooting glow hamburger helpers run.
Yeah, I never tried like trying to

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take those gloves off and always felt
like my hands got so much hotter.

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And you know, had a teen
starts said, hey, just just rope

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in your shooting gloves because you don't
have to grip the rope is tight.

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You this pace the heat just as
well. And he said just try it

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on the fast rope tower. So
I did, and that's that's a forty

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foot rope, and you know,
it wasn't terrible. And then I was

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watching guys carrying two forties and stuff
roping in and they've got the big thick

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gloves on and their he's an extra
tight just to have a feeling on the

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rope, right, And so then
they're burning in, you know, and

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their hands are getting so hot that
you know they're blistering at you know,

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still ten or fifteen feet above ground, and they're just letting go. They're

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like, I'll just deal with it
when it hit the ground. And you

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know, when one Charlie came in, you know, they had the same

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problem, and guys were falling off
and then they were just ending up in

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the big pile and I know their
rto had had his arm broken because he

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got stepped on. Yeah, that's
and so you know he got guys that

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need to getting meted back, but
you ain't getting met of backed. Yeah.

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Yeah. So what was it like
for your platoon roping in and getting

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on the ground. Uh, it
wasn't. We didn't have any contact or

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anything, and it was it was
quiet, you know. And then when

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you when the brown out cleared and
all the you know, the wash of

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everything, and you know, you
kind of look up the mountain. You

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know, you you can see the
crash because it's still on fire still,

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and it's just kind of one of
those ominous moments, if you will,

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just kind of you know, the
gravity of what you're doing has finally set

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in because you're seeing it with your
own eyes and not on a TV screen.

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And then you know, it just
becomes the all night walk up hill

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through the nettles and you know the
Scotch Burn or not the Scotch Burn,

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but you know the pines and all
the groundcover that's up there in the mountains,

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and it's just were you guys,
Was there any intelligence that there were

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enemies on the objective or around the
objective? We had, you know,

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any eyes around the area. But
it wasn't anything like on on the objective.

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There wasn't any movement on there,
you know, throughout the day or

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or anything. And there wasn't there
wasn't any you know, people coming and

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going from it. I think,
you know, looking back at it now,

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is they realized what they had done
and what was about to happen,

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and so they would just kind of
got a little bit of standoff and they

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really were it was to observe how
we were going to take care of it.

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Yeah, and so you know as
the the that day turned into you

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know a week to two weeks,
you know, at night, you know

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you see little fires on the mountain
and you know, get eyes on it,

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especially can and then ac one thirties
dropping, you know, one O

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five's on it. Yeah, So
what was that first movement that first night?

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What was the movement like for you
guys? How long did it take?

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It took all night. We didn't
get to the top until about an

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hour before you know, sunrise,
and then were sitting there on it and

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then kind of listening to one Charlie, you know, suck their way up

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the mountain and then one Bravo was
still about halfway up the mountain because they

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had driven in from Jalalabad the night
or the morning that it happened. They

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drove up the ninety k in their
trucks and then they started walking from the

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base of the mountain up and they
didn't make it until the next day.

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And you know, only about half
the guys that started to climb up the

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mountain made it up and the rest
of them had to go back down and

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get picked up by the trucks.
And you know because they just either heat,

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heat, exhaustion or you know,
twisted ankles and whatnot. Yeah,

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yeah, And so what did that
what was the next like week to how

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what did that set in motion for
you guys in particular? So what I

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said emotion for us was, you
know, the priority tasking was to accountability

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and recovery of all you know,
members of that aircraft crew and then the

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QRF team that was on there.
So that totaled sixteen and so we got

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those numbers, you know, kind
of early afternoon and there was a small

204
00:15:05.480 --> 00:15:07.919
clearing on top of the mountain.
You could put a small helicopter like little

205
00:15:07.919 --> 00:15:15.639
bird on it, but it was
you know, CDs drops for demolitions and

206
00:15:15.759 --> 00:15:18.679
uh, you know, basically had
to create an hl Z to be able

207
00:15:18.679 --> 00:15:24.960
to get everybody off that mountain that
you know, the remains for those guys,

208
00:15:24.000 --> 00:15:31.720
and so it was kind of a
it was a good distraction, if

209
00:15:31.759 --> 00:15:37.679
you will, to do timber charges
and clear that space to be able to

210
00:15:39.120 --> 00:15:43.879
make enough room to bring you know, helicopter in and and so we just

211
00:15:43.919 --> 00:15:50.360
finished our regimental breachers course and uh
so all that old stuff, you know

212
00:15:50.399 --> 00:15:52.200
that that timber stuff was still fresh
in everybody's mind. So it was,

213
00:15:52.320 --> 00:15:54.480
uh, you know, we're all
sitting there trying to do the math and

214
00:15:54.519 --> 00:16:00.000
the first art, so like use
the ped method. Yeah, so we're

215
00:16:00.639 --> 00:16:03.799
sending tree stumps and everything up,
you know, like Roman candles. It

216
00:16:03.840 --> 00:16:06.799
was you know, just packing as
much explosives in these little burrow holes in

217
00:16:06.879 --> 00:16:11.039
or knees and launch it. And
so that was fun. We cleared that,

218
00:16:11.120 --> 00:16:14.879
and then we got to tasking for
you know, what would turn out

219
00:16:14.919 --> 00:16:19.919
to be, go down the mountain
and find Marcus. And so that that

220
00:16:21.080 --> 00:16:25.320
started the fun of the mountain.
Weather moved in that night and dumped on

221
00:16:25.440 --> 00:16:29.080
us, and we're trying to walk
down hill and you know, the trails

222
00:16:29.320 --> 00:16:33.080
a little stream bed at the time, and so guys are slipping and falling,

223
00:16:33.200 --> 00:16:37.600
and guys are trying to not fall
off the ridge, and then we

224
00:16:37.679 --> 00:16:40.639
end up just for safety reasons,
you know, we end up spending the

225
00:16:40.720 --> 00:16:44.320
last few hours kind of a under
pine trees waiting for the sun to come

226
00:16:44.399 --> 00:16:48.440
up so that we don't lose anybody. How many guys did you have left

227
00:16:48.440 --> 00:16:52.519
in your platoon at this point?
We had split the four so we had

228
00:16:52.279 --> 00:16:56.120
two squads in the PLS package,
So you know, the platoon leader rt.

229
00:16:56.279 --> 00:17:02.480
O FO were with us, and
then the team servant had his you

230
00:17:02.519 --> 00:17:08.480
know, uh one squad two machine
guns you know, on still on the

231
00:17:08.519 --> 00:17:17.359
top and okay, on the on
the top of the mountain, and we

232
00:17:17.400 --> 00:17:19.680
knew what we were. Yeah,
they were still up there with with one

233
00:17:19.759 --> 00:17:23.960
Charlie and and reinforcing them, and
we're just kind of the the maneuver element,

234
00:17:25.000 --> 00:17:30.359
if you will, going down and
trying to confirm or deny what this

235
00:17:30.799 --> 00:17:36.039
push to talk signal was that that
we were getting being triangulated down in this

236
00:17:36.759 --> 00:17:40.200
I always forget the name of the
village, so I can't even remember it.

237
00:17:40.880 --> 00:17:44.759
So you guys have you guys had
to kind of like hide that hide

238
00:17:44.759 --> 00:17:47.599
out not hide out, but you
know, take cover under the pine trees

239
00:17:47.680 --> 00:17:52.599
until dawn and then continue to move
down to where this you know, ostensibly

240
00:17:52.640 --> 00:17:56.920
there was a sicket hit that you
had to go investigate, right, And

241
00:17:56.960 --> 00:18:02.720
so that was basically confirmer deny.
You know, was it in me recovered

242
00:18:02.759 --> 00:18:08.759
American equipment or was it actually in
fact you know, Murphy's team or you

243
00:18:08.759 --> 00:18:12.880
know what what the question mark was
still for that And that was kind of

244
00:18:12.880 --> 00:18:17.720
where we were at for the tasking. You know, the crash had been

245
00:18:17.759 --> 00:18:18.920
accounted for us, and now we're
just trying to figure out, you know,

246
00:18:18.960 --> 00:18:25.319
the fate of you know, this
format seal team. And so you'll

247
00:18:25.319 --> 00:18:30.759
finally push down in there was signal
that you guys were going off of or

248
00:18:30.960 --> 00:18:33.200
was it just like a single a
couple of hits and they're like, okay

249
00:18:33.480 --> 00:18:38.839
around this general area. No,
it was It wasn't like a consistent but

250
00:18:38.880 --> 00:18:41.799
you know it's like somebody just ken
the key and the push to talk,

251
00:18:42.920 --> 00:18:48.119
you know, intermittently enough to get
a you know, an orbital transmission to

252
00:18:48.200 --> 00:18:53.200
triangulate uh, you know where it
was. And so it was kind of

253
00:18:53.240 --> 00:18:56.240
confirm or deny what that was.
And so you know, there was an

254
00:18:56.319 --> 00:19:00.640
s F team that was walking up
that we tied in with, okay,

255
00:19:00.680 --> 00:19:06.160
and then pushed back down into this
this little village. And then you know,

256
00:19:06.200 --> 00:19:08.559
as we're doing the rangers smash through
all the doors and clearing the village,

257
00:19:08.599 --> 00:19:11.119
you know, here comes Marcus,
you know, from up from where

258
00:19:11.119 --> 00:19:17.559
they had him hidden and kind of
stashed, and so you know, confirm

259
00:19:17.640 --> 00:19:22.960
that and then start you know,
doing the So so they actually brought Marcus

260
00:19:22.000 --> 00:19:26.839
out to meet you guys, right, and they knew why we were there,

261
00:19:26.839 --> 00:19:29.039
and they knew what we were lying
for, and so it was to

262
00:19:29.400 --> 00:19:32.599
you know, hand him over and
then do the you know the kind of

263
00:19:32.640 --> 00:19:34.880
the whole s F thing where they
do the you know, let's drink some

264
00:19:34.960 --> 00:19:40.119
tea and talk and you know,
well, what was that moment like,

265
00:19:40.279 --> 00:19:42.559
what was that moment like when you
first got face to face with Marcus and

266
00:19:42.680 --> 00:19:47.799
confirmed this guy's alive? And what
what was your your perception of all that?

267
00:19:51.200 --> 00:19:52.160
I don't know the big question you
know that we you know, the

268
00:19:52.160 --> 00:19:55.680
first thing that we asked was once
you know, we went through the whole

269
00:19:55.839 --> 00:19:57.960
challenge and and kind of confirmed that
it is him, you know, through

270
00:19:59.000 --> 00:20:02.519
the whole you know, m I
pow m I A cards, you know,

271
00:20:02.559 --> 00:20:04.359
we all fill out, and going
through that, it was, you

272
00:20:04.400 --> 00:20:11.960
know, dude, where's everybody else? You know, and then you know

273
00:20:12.000 --> 00:20:17.839
it's like they're dead. Well okay, great, not great, but you

274
00:20:17.880 --> 00:20:23.359
know it's like, okay, but
where they're on the mountain. That's it.

275
00:20:25.119 --> 00:20:27.440
You know, it's kind of that
you can't give me anything more.

276
00:20:29.400 --> 00:20:32.559
The city has just started kind of
a frustration thing. And I get it,

277
00:20:32.599 --> 00:20:36.079
you know that he's been you know, I wasn't. It probably wouldn't

278
00:20:36.079 --> 00:20:37.359
have been fun to come down that
mountain the way he says he came down

279
00:20:37.400 --> 00:20:44.119
that mountain. But you know,
I I would like to hope to think

280
00:20:44.160 --> 00:20:45.279
that, you know, my friends
were dead on that mountain. I can

281
00:20:45.359 --> 00:20:49.960
at least remember some kind of terrain
feature that I could at least tell somebody

282
00:20:51.000 --> 00:20:56.039
that they're you know, they're up
here in this area. And so what

283
00:20:56.400 --> 00:21:00.720
was the next step after that initial
you had that initial questioning of Marcus,

284
00:21:02.680 --> 00:21:06.519
what what happened next? So then
what happened next was, you know,

285
00:21:06.559 --> 00:21:10.519
we just kind of secured the little
village that we were at and you know,

286
00:21:10.960 --> 00:21:14.599
confirmed that it was him passed up, you know, oversap that you

287
00:21:14.640 --> 00:21:15.720
know, we had him, and
then we were in control of him,

288
00:21:15.720 --> 00:21:18.799
and then we just had to sit
and wait for nightfall to come so that

289
00:21:18.839 --> 00:21:25.359
we could bring in the middle of
backburg and get him out. And then

290
00:21:25.400 --> 00:21:32.599
it just started, you know,
days and days and days of sweeping and

291
00:21:32.640 --> 00:21:36.799
searching this mountain side for the rest
of the team. For the rest of

292
00:21:36.839 --> 00:21:42.759
the team. I mean, did
you guys eventually find the remains of those

293
00:21:44.759 --> 00:21:48.839
three other guys? Yeah, we
expelled Marcus and the next day, you

294
00:21:48.880 --> 00:21:55.400
know, we're sweeping the lower portion
of this of this spur, and the

295
00:21:55.440 --> 00:21:59.200
other half of our ple team was
coming from the top of the ridge down

296
00:21:59.359 --> 00:22:00.720
we're just kind of eating in the
middle. And so after we had met

297
00:22:00.720 --> 00:22:06.000
in the middle and you know,
kind of traded information, they got a

298
00:22:06.000 --> 00:22:08.440
break, you know, they started
to climb back up for the night,

299
00:22:08.480 --> 00:22:12.119
and we turned around and started coming
back down to finish our suite. They

300
00:22:12.319 --> 00:22:18.000
stumbled on on two of the remains, just by half instance. Somebody lost

301
00:22:18.000 --> 00:22:21.240
their footing and slipped into a little
wash and ended up, you know,

302
00:22:21.559 --> 00:22:26.680
face first with with two of them. Do you want to talk about because

303
00:22:26.680 --> 00:22:30.119
I think you it sounds like you're
somewhat involved or on the periphery of it

304
00:22:30.799 --> 00:22:37.640
of the operation Red Wings when that
bird went down. Yeah, So in

305
00:22:37.720 --> 00:22:44.440
Afghanistan there basically there were basically three
different types emissions for APACHE pilots, and

306
00:22:44.480 --> 00:22:47.759
so the first is ring route security. And as we were talking before,

307
00:22:48.480 --> 00:22:52.519
pretty much everything in Afghanistan, or
much of everything moved by helicopter, and

308
00:22:52.559 --> 00:22:56.720
so when the Blackhawks or Chinooks would
transport people or equipment, you'd always have

309
00:22:56.759 --> 00:23:02.000
Apaches with them that were escorting them, and that that mission was usually long

310
00:23:02.799 --> 00:23:06.960
and fairly boring for the most part, because again, the Talaban a pretty

311
00:23:07.000 --> 00:23:10.640
smart They're not going to pick a
fight with an Apache or a black Hawk

312
00:23:10.640 --> 00:23:14.359
that has an Apache, and so
it's long hours of flying and not really

313
00:23:14.400 --> 00:23:18.759
doing much. On the other extreme, you would have the direct action missions

314
00:23:18.799 --> 00:23:22.160
where you're you know, a customer
on the ground is going to go hit

315
00:23:22.200 --> 00:23:30.119
a compound and so you're going to
provide covering as they're flying in, You're

316
00:23:30.119 --> 00:23:32.519
going to escort them, you're going
to clear the landing zone, and then

317
00:23:32.519 --> 00:23:36.160
you're going to transition to providing over
the shoulder support for the folks on the

318
00:23:36.160 --> 00:23:40.839
ground as they're kicking indoors and doing
what they do. And so that was.

319
00:23:41.119 --> 00:23:44.839
Those types of missions were usually planned
weeks in advance. You do a

320
00:23:44.839 --> 00:23:48.599
lot of rehearsals, most of them
all, I think almost all of the

321
00:23:48.599 --> 00:23:52.000
ones I was slotted on were canceled. It wasn't uncommon. You know,

322
00:23:52.039 --> 00:23:53.680
you'd get through, you do the
rehearsal, something would change, the guy

323
00:23:53.720 --> 00:23:57.799
would be there and you wouldn't do
it. And so those were the opposite,

324
00:23:57.880 --> 00:24:02.640
usually very shortened duration, but had
a tendency to be very exciting.

325
00:24:02.680 --> 00:24:06.359
And then the middle of those,
which was red wings for me, are

326
00:24:06.440 --> 00:24:08.920
the QRF or the quick reactionary force
missions. And so the way that that

327
00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:15.640
worked is that you would do a
shift usually from four in the morning I

328
00:24:15.640 --> 00:24:18.359
think it was till four in the
afternoon, or the reverse of that.

329
00:24:18.440 --> 00:24:21.599
If you were on the night shift
and you would come in in the morning,

330
00:24:22.160 --> 00:24:26.279
you'd run the bird up. You'd
get the brief from at the talk

331
00:24:26.319 --> 00:24:30.319
the Tactical Operations Center for the day, and they would tell you if there

332
00:24:30.359 --> 00:24:33.559
were any scheduled missions, and those
missions were usually you know, some vip

333
00:24:33.839 --> 00:24:38.119
escorts or things like that, or
maybe if there had been if there was

334
00:24:38.160 --> 00:24:42.160
an ongoing fight, you'd say,
hey, there's a tick of troops in

335
00:24:42.200 --> 00:24:45.839
contact right now you might get released
authority for that, so be ready for

336
00:24:45.920 --> 00:24:49.920
it. And then you would go
about your day with a walkie talkie and

337
00:24:49.960 --> 00:24:53.240
if the walkie talkie went off,
you had thirty minutes to be airborne.

338
00:24:53.279 --> 00:24:57.640
And so most of the time,
like I said, those were either metavac

339
00:24:57.839 --> 00:25:02.839
escorts or VIPs score, but every
now and then it would be a tick

340
00:25:02.920 --> 00:25:08.559
and it was part of our squadron
was in Salerno, and those folks did

341
00:25:08.559 --> 00:25:12.880
a whole lot more on QRF than
we did because we were the bogram QRFs.

342
00:25:12.880 --> 00:25:18.319
So to get release authority for the
apaches it was hard because the powers

343
00:25:18.319 --> 00:25:23.119
that be were always weighing if we
we let the apaches go and something bad

344
00:25:23.160 --> 00:25:27.160
happens, what do we do Right
where the folks in Sellerno, we're much

345
00:25:27.319 --> 00:25:30.759
didn't have the flagpole there with them
were co located with the customer. It

346
00:25:30.799 --> 00:25:36.200
was much easier for them to get
release authority. And so for me on

347
00:25:36.680 --> 00:25:40.880
June twenty eight, two thousand and
five, I knew that Red Wings was

348
00:25:40.920 --> 00:25:44.240
an operation that was getting planned.
It was not one that I was slotted

349
00:25:44.359 --> 00:25:49.079
to be on, and it was
originally a conventional mission that the Marines were

350
00:25:49.079 --> 00:25:52.880
going to do, and for a
bunch of different reasons, they ended up

351
00:25:52.920 --> 00:25:57.960
pulling in the seals who then that
night, so June twenty seventh, of

352
00:25:59.039 --> 00:26:03.279
four man colteam was inserted. And
so when I came on duty that morning,

353
00:26:03.359 --> 00:26:07.960
I remember the battle Captain or whatever
saying, hey, there was a

354
00:26:07.000 --> 00:26:11.200
seal team that was inserted last night. We've lost comms with them. There

355
00:26:11.319 --> 00:26:15.079
might be something going on today.
Just kind of be ready. And that

356
00:26:15.319 --> 00:26:19.319
wasn't all that much different from a
lot of briefs during the day, right,

357
00:26:19.359 --> 00:26:22.759
not usually that intense where we've lost
contact, but there were a lot

358
00:26:22.799 --> 00:26:27.400
of kind of just be ready,
something might go on. And so a

359
00:26:27.440 --> 00:26:32.079
couple hours later something my radio went
off. And the way it worked is

360
00:26:32.119 --> 00:26:34.599
that my front seater I flew with
quite a bit, you kind of your

361
00:26:34.640 --> 00:26:38.160
battle crewed with another pilot a lot
of the times, and he would run

362
00:26:38.200 --> 00:26:41.079
for the talk and get the update, and I would jump in the back

363
00:26:41.119 --> 00:26:45.160
and get the engines run up and
the bird ready to go. And so

364
00:26:45.200 --> 00:26:49.400
he came running back and jumped in
the front seat and said, it's the

365
00:26:49.400 --> 00:26:53.279
seal team. They're in contact.
And we basically had a call sign,

366
00:26:55.279 --> 00:26:57.759
radio frequency and a last known grid
and that was about it, and so

367
00:26:59.079 --> 00:27:02.960
I took off. My wingman,
who was my EXO, was in the

368
00:27:02.960 --> 00:27:06.799
front seat, and then the maintenance
test pilot and we flew from Bogren down

369
00:27:06.839 --> 00:27:11.400
to Jelalabad because there was there were
a pair of black Hawks in Jelalabad that

370
00:27:11.559 --> 00:27:15.279
had the Marine Infantry Battalion QRF loaded
up, and so we were going to

371
00:27:15.319 --> 00:27:19.759
link up with them and then go
to literally just the last known grid that

372
00:27:19.799 --> 00:27:23.440
we had and see if we could
raise these seals. And so as I

373
00:27:23.519 --> 00:27:30.200
was coming into land at Jelalabad,
I remember seeing chinook taken off and I

374
00:27:30.240 --> 00:27:33.400
knew it was a one sixties Chinook
because it had that big old fuel boot

375
00:27:33.440 --> 00:27:36.839
them on it, and they're the
only ones that have those, the refueling

376
00:27:36.880 --> 00:27:40.119
probe and so you know, I
remember thinking, I wonder where he's going,

377
00:27:40.279 --> 00:27:44.319
and then I did the air mission
brief, got ready, we took

378
00:27:44.359 --> 00:27:49.240
off towards that last known location.
And so at the time, the apaches

379
00:27:49.319 --> 00:27:53.599
we didn't have satcom and so there
was no way to talk back to our

380
00:27:53.640 --> 00:27:57.200
higher headquarters and everything. It was
literally just go there, see if you

381
00:27:57.240 --> 00:28:03.480
can raise the seals, and then
start doing what apaches are supposed to do.

382
00:28:03.920 --> 00:28:07.839
And so as we're flying to this, it's really really high in the

383
00:28:07.920 --> 00:28:11.000
mountains and weather's starting to come down
a little bit. There's an A ten

384
00:28:11.079 --> 00:28:17.200
that's overhead that's trying to provide a
little bit of situational awareness that we don't

385
00:28:17.240 --> 00:28:22.880
have because we're so underpowered that it's
taken a lot to be able to get

386
00:28:22.960 --> 00:28:27.880
to the altitude where that little grid
coordinate was. And as I'm flying,

387
00:28:29.559 --> 00:28:32.680
traditionally, what you would do,
like I said, the Blackhawks would stay

388
00:28:32.680 --> 00:28:36.200
in front of you until you'd hit
what's called the release point, which was

389
00:28:36.680 --> 00:28:40.240
I don't know, like maybe eight
or nine kilometers maybe more than that away

390
00:28:40.279 --> 00:28:42.880
from the landing zone. You would
pass them. At that point, the

391
00:28:42.920 --> 00:28:48.400
apaches would go to the landing zone
first, do an LZ reconnaissance, and

392
00:28:48.440 --> 00:28:51.599
then call it either cherry or I
say, the landings are cold, you

393
00:28:51.640 --> 00:28:53.640
can come in. The landing zone's
hot, and you're going to continue to

394
00:28:53.680 --> 00:28:56.559
work it. And so as I
was trying to pass them, I had

395
00:28:56.599 --> 00:29:00.200
to call the black Hawks and say, you got to slow down. You're

396
00:29:00.279 --> 00:29:03.319
leaving me. I'm so power limited, I can't maintain the air speed.

397
00:29:03.319 --> 00:29:07.240
You got to slow down. And
so as we did that, I saw

398
00:29:07.279 --> 00:29:11.799
two Chinooks come in and join the
flight ahead of us, and I can't

399
00:29:11.839 --> 00:29:17.039
remember, Like I said, it
was a long time ago, and so

400
00:29:17.119 --> 00:29:19.799
I can't remember if we could talk
to them directly or we had to talk

401
00:29:19.839 --> 00:29:26.920
to him through the A ten because
the one sixtieth operated with slightly different fills

402
00:29:26.960 --> 00:29:30.079
than we did, and so so
for your users, the fill is the

403
00:29:32.400 --> 00:29:37.319
portion that makes the radio secure the
crypto, thank you, and so you

404
00:29:37.359 --> 00:29:41.519
reload it every day. And so
if you're not on the same crypto as

405
00:29:41.559 --> 00:29:44.000
the person, even if you're on
the same frequency, you can't talk to

406
00:29:44.079 --> 00:29:47.000
them. Or it was close enough
that was kind of intermittent. And so

407
00:29:47.079 --> 00:29:49.200
I saw them, and we either
got from the A ten's or got from

408
00:29:49.240 --> 00:29:55.039
them that they were the one sixtieth
Chinooks and they had the rest of that

409
00:29:55.119 --> 00:29:59.720
seal team as their quick reactionary force
in there. And so I remember calling

410
00:29:59.799 --> 00:30:02.480
to either the Chinook or the A
ten and saying, Hey, you got

411
00:30:02.519 --> 00:30:06.640
to tell that Chinook to wait for
me to clear the landing zone because I'm

412
00:30:06.680 --> 00:30:10.079
so power limited, you know,
I'm barely edging past the black Hawk right

413
00:30:10.119 --> 00:30:14.119
now. And I remember the Chinook
responding back saying, you know negative,

414
00:30:14.119 --> 00:30:15.680
we're going to the LZ. You
can clear it once you get here.

415
00:30:17.240 --> 00:30:19.279
And then the next thing I remember
is the A ten, either the A

416
00:30:19.400 --> 00:30:22.839
ten or one of the Blackhawks that
was ahead of me, because I was

417
00:30:22.880 --> 00:30:26.640
trying to pass the black Hawk at
that time, saying the MH is down,

418
00:30:26.680 --> 00:30:29.200
the MH is down, the MH
is down. And so what it

419
00:30:29.319 --> 00:30:33.400
happened is the Chinook had come to
a hover, the seals were about to

420
00:30:33.480 --> 00:30:38.039
fast rope, and a Taliban hit
him with the RPG. Chinook kind of

421
00:30:38.680 --> 00:30:42.319
tried to fly away and then ended
up going down and tumbling down the side

422
00:30:42.319 --> 00:30:45.559
of the mountain. But from my
perspective the way it worked, I was

423
00:30:45.799 --> 00:30:51.640
just passing the Blackhawks as it happened. So they turned away from the landing

424
00:30:51.720 --> 00:30:55.559
zone, which turned them into my
flight of two helicopters, and it was

425
00:30:55.839 --> 00:30:57.880
just grace of God that we didn't
have a mid air It was kind of

426
00:30:57.880 --> 00:31:04.240
the starburst of hiloics flying everywhere.
And to make things a little more interesting,

427
00:31:04.720 --> 00:31:08.519
as the Chinook went into the ground, the A ten turned and started

428
00:31:08.559 --> 00:31:12.880
firing white phosphish rockets on either side
of it, and when I talked to

429
00:31:14.000 --> 00:31:17.359
him later saw the deep brief.
In his mind, what he was trying

430
00:31:17.400 --> 00:31:21.680
to do is keep people off the
crash site. But from my perspective,

431
00:31:21.720 --> 00:31:25.720
alls I could see was stuff burning
everywhere and blowing up everywhere. And so

432
00:31:25.880 --> 00:31:30.880
for the first couple minutes I couldn't
I had turned down one blind draw,

433
00:31:30.279 --> 00:31:36.599
my wingman had turned down another,
and I couldn't even find him, and

434
00:31:36.640 --> 00:31:40.000
so it took a while for us
to link back together. And then when

435
00:31:40.039 --> 00:31:44.640
we turned inbound, all that I
could see was everything on fire everywhere,

436
00:31:44.640 --> 00:31:47.960
And I remember arguing with the A
ten, I'm like, this can't be

437
00:31:48.000 --> 00:31:51.519
the crash site, like there were
at the wrong spot, And so he

438
00:31:51.680 --> 00:31:56.200
literally had to talk us onto the
crash site where he's saying start turn stop,

439
00:31:56.279 --> 00:32:00.160
turn, start turned until we flew
over and there wasn't anything there that

440
00:32:00.240 --> 00:32:04.960
looked like a helicopter anymore, just
look like sheets of fire between what he

441
00:32:05.000 --> 00:32:09.799
had shot up the what the schnook
did. And so we just did a

442
00:32:09.839 --> 00:32:15.920
whole bunch of low passes over and
over again, because we and there were

443
00:32:17.200 --> 00:32:22.599
at one point I had my wingman
was an incredibly brave guy and would fly

444
00:32:22.839 --> 00:32:28.240
super low over the crash site and
I would fly above him with the thought

445
00:32:28.319 --> 00:32:31.200
processes of if he can draw fire, I can at least see where it's

446
00:32:31.240 --> 00:32:37.200
going and try and shoot back at
it, because we were definitely afraid of

447
00:32:37.319 --> 00:32:39.920
hitting an American that the four Seals
were somewhere around there there, that we

448
00:32:39.960 --> 00:32:45.640
would accidentally cause fractricide. And every
time we got shot at during one of

449
00:32:45.640 --> 00:32:49.680
the points, it was so high
that, like I told you before,

450
00:32:49.680 --> 00:32:52.799
if you're going one hundred and ten
knots or one hundred and twenty knots,

451
00:32:52.799 --> 00:32:55.880
it's really hard to hit a helicopter. We were barely doing fifty or forty.

452
00:32:55.920 --> 00:33:00.640
As we're coming to the top of
this ridge line in my front seater

453
00:33:00.000 --> 00:33:05.240
yelled at you know, we're taking
fire. It's an RPG, and he

454
00:33:05.359 --> 00:33:07.559
had the gun slave to his eye, and so we turned to shoot.

455
00:33:07.680 --> 00:33:13.079
But what happens is the gun will
only turn so far and then it's limited

456
00:33:13.119 --> 00:33:16.279
so you don't accidentally hit the helicopter, and so he we couldn't. We

457
00:33:16.319 --> 00:33:20.319
couldn't shoot, and then when I
came back around, we still couldn't figure

458
00:33:20.319 --> 00:33:22.680
out where it was coming from,
and so it was awful. It was

459
00:33:24.200 --> 00:33:29.880
you know, I'd spent my entire
career training for that moment to come.

460
00:33:30.000 --> 00:33:32.000
You know, if there's a mission
for the cavalry, it's that one.

461
00:33:32.079 --> 00:33:37.160
Your job is to come over to
hill to save the good guys. And

462
00:33:37.200 --> 00:33:40.400
we not only did we not save
the good guys, but until the Extortion

463
00:33:40.559 --> 00:33:45.720
shoot down years later, the most
Seals in the history of the Seals were

464
00:33:45.799 --> 00:33:47.920
killed on that day. And it
happened in my watch, and I couldn't

465
00:33:47.960 --> 00:33:53.279
stop it. And so, you
you know, the not to trivialize it,

466
00:33:53.319 --> 00:33:57.759
but for somebody who isn't in the
military, the closest analogy I could

467
00:33:58.160 --> 00:34:02.680
think of is that if you're a
professional foot and you spend your entire career

468
00:34:02.720 --> 00:34:07.119
trying to get to the Super Bowl, and you get to that moment and

469
00:34:07.160 --> 00:34:08.880
then you walk on the field and
the first play of the game you fumble,

470
00:34:08.880 --> 00:34:12.920
and that's it. That's it.
And that's what it felt like,

471
00:34:13.000 --> 00:34:16.400
because when we flew over that crash
site over and over again, trying to

472
00:34:16.480 --> 00:34:21.280
draw fire, trying to find survivors, until we ran out of gas and

473
00:34:21.360 --> 00:34:23.400
had to leave, and the only
thing I could think of is if anybody's

474
00:34:23.400 --> 00:34:27.719
still alive there watching us leave us
on that mountain right now, and there's

475
00:34:27.719 --> 00:34:30.639
nothing that we can do about it, and it was. It was awful.

476
00:34:30.760 --> 00:34:36.519
And it took me a long time
to come to terms with that because

477
00:34:36.559 --> 00:34:42.599
it wasn't it wasn't how, it
wasn't how it was supposed to happen,

478
00:34:42.679 --> 00:34:45.920
right, it wasn't the way that
you trained for it to happen. And

479
00:34:45.960 --> 00:34:50.199
it was and I couldn't stop it. And so yeah, that is that

480
00:34:50.320 --> 00:34:54.280
is my version of the lone survivor's
story. And you see yourself, as

481
00:34:54.360 --> 00:34:58.639
everyone else does, out there as
somebody who can put their hands on the

482
00:34:58.679 --> 00:35:01.119
situation and take action. And I
mean that must have been such a feeling

483
00:35:01.159 --> 00:35:06.360
of like powerlessness at that moment.
Yep, it was. And when when

484
00:35:06.679 --> 00:35:10.880
I met Marcus Latrell once briefly,
I met and got to be better friends

485
00:35:10.920 --> 00:35:15.719
with Mike Murphy, who was awarded
them posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor,

486
00:35:15.760 --> 00:35:20.519
and I met his mom and dad
and his brother and his dad. His

487
00:35:20.840 --> 00:35:25.599
whole family is great, but his
dad was a Vietnam era infantry platoon leader,

488
00:35:25.679 --> 00:35:30.039
Purple heart guy, and so he
knew what the deal was like.

489
00:35:30.239 --> 00:35:35.480
He knew and they He ended up
inviting my wife and I to come to

490
00:35:35.679 --> 00:35:38.920
the christening for the Michael Murphy's ship
when it was done. But it was

491
00:35:39.440 --> 00:35:43.760
you know, when I read Marcus
and so I met Marcus once but never

492
00:35:43.800 --> 00:35:45.880
really talked to him or whatever.
And when I read his book and the

493
00:35:45.920 --> 00:35:50.519
part where he talks about watching the
apaches fly away, it just gutted me.

494
00:35:50.559 --> 00:35:52.880
And I was like, that was
exactly what I was afraid of,

495
00:35:53.000 --> 00:35:58.440
Like that dude sat on the mountain
and watched us leave him, and and

496
00:35:58.519 --> 00:36:01.360
you know, and and and we
couldn't stop it, you know, and

497
00:36:01.400 --> 00:36:06.599
we couldn't And so it was.
It was bad. Did a bad day?

498
00:36:06.960 --> 00:36:09.119
Did you guys have fuel up?
And they sent you back out there

499
00:36:09.119 --> 00:36:13.239
looking for people? I mean,
was the next No, that's the worst

500
00:36:13.280 --> 00:36:15.679
part is that you came to the
first. One of the first things you

501
00:36:15.280 --> 00:36:22.639
learn as a young cavalry officers the
fundamental fundamentals of reconnaissances. In the fundamentals

502
00:36:22.639 --> 00:36:24.840
of the cavalry, the first one
is to gain and maintain contact with the

503
00:36:24.920 --> 00:36:30.159
enemy. Right, And so we
were the only ones who knew what that

504
00:36:30.239 --> 00:36:35.880
crash site looked like. The A
ten that was overhead had to break station

505
00:36:36.000 --> 00:36:37.960
and come back. So a new
guy was on. We went back to

506
00:36:38.119 --> 00:36:43.920
Sadabad to refuel with the intention of
going back there, and that was the

507
00:36:43.960 --> 00:36:47.360
first time we could talk with our
higher headquarters because the Sadabad had satcom and

508
00:36:47.360 --> 00:36:50.360
they came back and said, no, you guys can't go back in,

509
00:36:50.679 --> 00:36:52.119
and you're like, what are you
talking about? Like what are you were

510
00:36:52.119 --> 00:36:54.639
the only ones, and then like
the weather's too bad, you can't go

511
00:36:54.760 --> 00:36:59.199
back in the mountains, and the
weather was coming down. It was starting

512
00:36:59.199 --> 00:37:01.920
to cloud over and we were kind
of dodging clouds as we were trying to

513
00:37:01.960 --> 00:37:05.719
find that guy. But then that
made it even worse. It's like,

514
00:37:05.920 --> 00:37:08.119
not only did I not stop it, not only did I not fire a

515
00:37:08.159 --> 00:37:12.280
single shot and anger, but now
you're telling me I got to go home.

516
00:37:12.440 --> 00:37:15.079
And that was how it ended for
me. It was awful. You'd

517
00:37:15.159 --> 00:37:20.840
rotate and we're in the Sadabd and
dude, I'm on my way home,

518
00:37:21.000 --> 00:37:24.639
which is beautiful, all my kids
packed up. I'm sitting on the porch

519
00:37:24.719 --> 00:37:30.599
and the side of bod our of
our house. We have rocking chairs,

520
00:37:30.760 --> 00:37:34.000
don't like you know Charlotte Airport,
you know the rocket chair. Well,

521
00:37:34.079 --> 00:37:36.559
I don't know how we got the
rocking chairs. I'm sitting there in the

522
00:37:36.679 --> 00:37:40.480
rocking chair, and I'm like this, I'm going home. This is great.

523
00:37:42.000 --> 00:37:46.519
Family had this huge uh vacation plan
to go to France. My mother

524
00:37:46.559 --> 00:37:51.960
had just gotten through about of cancer. We were gonna have this beautiful family

525
00:37:52.079 --> 00:37:53.639
thing. And I'm like, you
know, I'm checked out, right,

526
00:37:53.719 --> 00:38:00.360
man, I'm done, shit's loaded, ready to go home. All I'm

527
00:38:00.400 --> 00:38:04.440
waiting to do is to get on
the helicopter that night fly back to where

528
00:38:04.440 --> 00:38:07.960
we were in Afghanistan. So I'm
flying back to Cobble, right, yeah,

529
00:38:07.000 --> 00:38:12.719
and then flying home and I see
there's a Special Forces a team across

530
00:38:12.760 --> 00:38:17.519
the street from him from us that
we was running another force like I forgot

531
00:38:17.519 --> 00:38:22.599
what they called kandak. Yeah,
I wanted one of those things. And

532
00:38:22.599 --> 00:38:28.079
I knew the team leader, and
I just see this frantic activity going on.

533
00:38:28.199 --> 00:38:31.440
This is probably like four o'clock,
trying to get four o'clock in the

534
00:38:31.480 --> 00:38:37.360
afternoon. And I go down there
and I talk to the team leader,

535
00:38:37.440 --> 00:38:40.039
Christian Systems, Like what's going on? Crucial? Can I tell you Southern

536
00:38:40.079 --> 00:38:44.559
guy? Great guy. He's like, no problem, If you need anything,

537
00:38:44.639 --> 00:38:49.039
let me know, because something bad
really happened. It's like we're here

538
00:38:49.079 --> 00:38:52.199
for you. Go back and sit
down I'm just watching. Finally, I

539
00:38:52.199 --> 00:38:54.320
can't stand it anymore. So I
just walked over and went into their team

540
00:38:54.440 --> 00:39:02.039
room and realized that special connaissance team
that the Navy Seals put in had been

541
00:39:02.079 --> 00:39:08.320
compromised. The reaction force had been
shot down. I think they lost one.

542
00:39:08.360 --> 00:39:16.440
Helicopter had crashed, and nobody knows
what's going on. And I was

543
00:39:16.559 --> 00:39:22.679
like, oh shit, okay,
you know, selfish voice is like I

544
00:39:22.760 --> 00:39:25.800
really want to go home. That's
one of this kind of that's kind of

545
00:39:25.800 --> 00:39:30.559
one of those weird ones. And
I'm just a normal dude, So don't

546
00:39:30.599 --> 00:39:34.920
like take this like egotistical. But
I had to do some thinking on that

547
00:39:34.960 --> 00:39:38.360
one, because we talk about like
no one left behind, right right,

548
00:39:38.480 --> 00:39:43.440
Like we have an obligation if there
is an American soldier or American service member

549
00:39:43.840 --> 00:39:45.280
in need, like you don't bail
on him. But I got to tell

550
00:39:45.320 --> 00:39:51.400
you I might have thought about it, like because I know how this ends.

551
00:39:51.440 --> 00:39:54.119
You know, in the movie how's
the movie end? The guy who

552
00:39:54.159 --> 00:39:58.920
is on his way home right goes
on one final movie? Yeah, and

553
00:39:59.599 --> 00:40:01.280
yeah, you know how it is. It's a recovery. It's not a

554
00:40:01.320 --> 00:40:06.840
rescue. Well yeah, but the
thing is, it's like the cop who

555
00:40:06.960 --> 00:40:10.920
is on his last day before he
retired, who answers the call. The

556
00:40:12.000 --> 00:40:15.000
soldier who just had a baby.
Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. Because

557
00:40:15.039 --> 00:40:19.119
I have a hyperactive imagination. Man, I'm like, this is like,

558
00:40:19.400 --> 00:40:23.920
this is I know how this ends. And I walk back and I tell

559
00:40:24.639 --> 00:40:30.239
the head Afghan that was my partner. I said, get everybody up,

560
00:40:31.280 --> 00:40:35.480
get everything out in the street,
get all our trucks lined up, get

561
00:40:35.480 --> 00:40:37.360
ready, we're going to move out
on an operation. I can't tell you

562
00:40:37.440 --> 00:40:44.159
what it is. You know what
they do. They're getting paid, mister

563
00:40:44.239 --> 00:40:47.320
Chris fucking shit gets fired. Yeah. Man, what a great bunch of

564
00:40:47.360 --> 00:40:52.079
people. You know this trucks we
had, We're just oh my god.

565
00:40:52.400 --> 00:41:00.360
I went in and this was I'm
finally now older and mature and had a

566
00:41:00.400 --> 00:41:05.440
lot a lot of lessons, learned
a lot of scar tissue from doing things

567
00:41:05.480 --> 00:41:08.400
wrong, and that a team is
doing the best they can. But I

568
00:41:08.440 --> 00:41:14.960
can just see that it's disjointed,
and I said it's frantic, and so

569
00:41:15.039 --> 00:41:22.400
I just said I didn't say anything. I pulled out a Butcher blockboard because

570
00:41:22.440 --> 00:41:25.480
you know where I'm going with this. Let's just do mission planning right the

571
00:41:25.519 --> 00:41:31.199
way we've been trained. So I
just put that butcher block up and I

572
00:41:31.280 --> 00:41:38.079
said, let's do mission analysis.
Step one is what's the enemy situation?

573
00:41:38.519 --> 00:41:42.519
And everybody just snapped in. At
that point, I was like, my

574
00:41:42.679 --> 00:41:46.320
job here is done. You know, I'm not. I'm not. I'm

575
00:41:46.360 --> 00:41:55.960
being a little facetious. And then
the biggest thing we talked about escaping evasion

576
00:41:57.039 --> 00:42:01.000
earlier, and the warrant officer is
always in charge of escape and invasion planning.

577
00:42:01.360 --> 00:42:05.679
And I don't know about Jack,
You're better than I'm You probably paid

578
00:42:05.719 --> 00:42:08.719
attention. I hated that shit.
Like Chief would be like, hey,

579
00:42:09.079 --> 00:42:13.320
you know, like we gotta do
this, this, this, and you

580
00:42:13.480 --> 00:42:17.440
like leave it alone. And they
would always talk about command and control and

581
00:42:17.599 --> 00:42:21.360
I would just like, Chief,
leave it alone. We don't give it,

582
00:42:21.559 --> 00:42:27.840
we don't care. The problem was
it was it was the Navy Seals

583
00:42:27.880 --> 00:42:32.199
were in there. Seventh Group was
in charge of Special Forces Special operations.

584
00:42:34.039 --> 00:42:38.599
They were being ripped, they were
being relief in place by third group was

585
00:42:38.639 --> 00:42:44.440
coming in. It was the worst
possible moment anything could ever happen to Who's

586
00:42:44.480 --> 00:42:50.800
in charge? Who's in charge?
And we finally get that worked out and

587
00:42:50.880 --> 00:42:53.320
let's be on counter terrorist and task
Force took over. Jaysack just said,

588
00:42:53.320 --> 00:42:59.440
we got this, but that took
a long long time, and so we

589
00:42:59.599 --> 00:43:05.960
decide they put in a restricted what's
a rise restricted airspace where they shut down

590
00:43:05.960 --> 00:43:12.000
the airspace forgot them where you can't
fly anything, because they thought that the

591
00:43:12.000 --> 00:43:16.719
the Taliban, they weren't Taliban,
but the insurgence. The enemy had shot

592
00:43:16.760 --> 00:43:21.559
down the helicopter with surfs to aramis
right, and you've had some of those

593
00:43:21.559 --> 00:43:23.519
guys, you've had on there's a
lot more coming out about this. So

594
00:43:23.599 --> 00:43:28.559
we couldn't fly in like the most
powerful military in the world, all this

595
00:43:29.599 --> 00:43:34.800
extra high end equipment, and you
know what we're gonna do. We're gonna

596
00:43:34.800 --> 00:43:39.599
walk our ass up there. And
you've been to Colorado Springs. You look

597
00:43:39.679 --> 00:43:44.480
up at Pike's Peak, Yeah,
it was like that. You're like,

598
00:43:44.800 --> 00:43:49.360
holy shit, we got to get
up there. But this isn't Pike's Peak,

599
00:43:49.559 --> 00:43:55.880
like very the weather rails and roads
built into it. So we all

600
00:43:55.920 --> 00:44:00.719
move out that morning and we just
like any that wants to show up be

601
00:44:01.360 --> 00:44:05.760
the vehicle drop off point at the
base of this mountain. And dude,

602
00:44:05.760 --> 00:44:08.360
you're just looking up there. We're
like, like, we can see the

603
00:44:08.440 --> 00:44:19.079
crest, but they're not there,
they're behind it. And it's like what

604
00:44:19.199 --> 00:44:22.880
I remember most was the sun came
up really really early, Like I could

605
00:44:22.920 --> 00:44:27.039
swear it was like five o'clock suns
out. Dude. It's like, I'd

606
00:44:27.079 --> 00:44:30.199
like to look at the weather.
It seemed like it was eighty degrees fahrenheit

607
00:44:30.239 --> 00:44:34.440
at the time and just going up, no clouds. And have you ever

608
00:44:34.480 --> 00:44:38.679
seen those pictures of a like World
War two in going over the hamp or

609
00:44:38.679 --> 00:44:44.280
you'd see people going where they're walking
up these hills and you have these switch

610
00:44:44.360 --> 00:44:46.800
backs. Yeah, like that,
that's what we're doing. Yeah, And

611
00:44:49.559 --> 00:44:54.079
it's a combined force. It's CTPTS
Special Forces and you guys had an RRD

612
00:44:54.199 --> 00:44:58.760
team with you. RRD shows up. I didn't even know what RRD was.

613
00:44:58.880 --> 00:45:01.400
Man. Those are the the toughest
dudes I have ever met in my

614
00:45:01.519 --> 00:45:06.280
life, the most professional soldiers.
I was so in awe. We had

615
00:45:06.320 --> 00:45:09.159
a Ranger platoon, so you got
this like first Lieutenant he was great with

616
00:45:09.199 --> 00:45:15.840
his forty rangers. You guys appreciate
this. You got RD. Then the

617
00:45:15.960 --> 00:45:21.199
Navy Seals like anybody that could get
there showed up. We had two special

618
00:45:21.239 --> 00:45:23.599
Forces, a teams, we had
a Special Forces B team, a company

619
00:45:23.639 --> 00:45:28.199
headquarters, and then I got fifty. I didn't take all of our force.

620
00:45:28.760 --> 00:45:34.079
I just took fifty of our counter
terrorism pursuit team, our mercenary force.

621
00:45:35.119 --> 00:45:37.920
It was like, here's the plan. Movement to contact, which is

622
00:45:38.000 --> 00:45:44.079
we all know is not all the
technology. Why would you ever do a

623
00:45:44.119 --> 00:45:46.039
movement to contact? Movement to contact? For those that don't know, this

624
00:45:46.199 --> 00:45:51.119
is like you just walk until you
run into the end they start shooting at

625
00:45:51.159 --> 00:45:52.800
you. Yeah, you're like,
we found him, right. I was

626
00:45:52.840 --> 00:45:57.320
like, oh man, this is
gonna suck. This is going to suck

627
00:45:57.800 --> 00:46:01.840
so bad. It's funny because I
think it was I think it was Tony

628
00:46:01.880 --> 00:46:06.280
Brooks who said, like they were
the guys that roped in from the forty

629
00:46:06.320 --> 00:46:08.840
sevens the range at night, and
he was like, we ran into an

630
00:46:08.920 --> 00:46:12.000
r r D team up in the
mountains and it was just like one of

631
00:46:12.039 --> 00:46:15.320
the mystique around them, like,
how did you guys get up here?

632
00:46:15.360 --> 00:46:16.559
We want to know how that got
there? Yeah, so we walk our

633
00:46:16.599 --> 00:46:21.800
ass up there. People are falling
out like green berets because they're wearing one

634
00:46:21.840 --> 00:46:25.760
hundred and forty pounds. You know
what. I took an lsee basically to

635
00:46:25.760 --> 00:46:31.480
ammunition. Yeah, Rangers were great, you'll love this U two Rangers.

636
00:46:32.280 --> 00:46:37.079
I was leaving, so I forgot
to take money. Thank goodness, there

637
00:46:37.119 --> 00:46:42.800
was a Green Beret that had money
and they rented like every donkey or yeah

638
00:46:42.840 --> 00:46:49.280
they could find. And the Carl
Gustaf Gunner from the Rangers. How much

639
00:46:49.320 --> 00:46:52.320
is that thing weigh? It's a
big fucking It's like that was my first

640
00:46:52.440 --> 00:46:57.039
job. I think it's like twenty
seven pounds, yeah, plus the round.

641
00:46:58.199 --> 00:47:00.639
Yeah, he's got that thing.
And I'm like, hey, I

642
00:47:00.639 --> 00:47:01.639
didn't call him son, that would
have been like, you know, I

643
00:47:01.679 --> 00:47:05.880
felt like son. I said,
hey, man, why did you put

644
00:47:05.920 --> 00:47:08.599
your Carl Gustav on the donkey?
And he's like, because his platoons are

645
00:47:08.840 --> 00:47:13.199
squad. Later he's like, you
will never be be on one stuff,

646
00:47:13.280 --> 00:47:15.639
but right, and it was so
cute. Right. I was like,

647
00:47:15.760 --> 00:47:19.800
oh man, poor guy. By
the time we got going, that thing

648
00:47:19.880 --> 00:47:23.880
was on the donkey. Here's what
happens. It's so hot that donkeys quit.

649
00:47:23.920 --> 00:47:29.199
I didn't know they were allowed to
quit when they're done. They're not.

650
00:47:29.880 --> 00:47:31.480
We're not, Yeah, they're not. I was like, like,

651
00:47:31.559 --> 00:47:35.480
like, there's a reason they say
stubborn as a mule, right that I

652
00:47:35.599 --> 00:47:37.320
didn't believe that. Yeah, I
didn't even know. I didn't even know

653
00:47:37.360 --> 00:47:40.400
that happened. You know. So
now we're just walking, we walk up,

654
00:47:40.440 --> 00:47:44.800
we run out of water right away
because from bad to worse, we're

655
00:47:44.840 --> 00:47:49.199
just combat and effective. And the
decision is made to put together what's called

656
00:47:49.199 --> 00:47:52.400
the Flying Column of the Ranger r
D. Because these guys are these are

657
00:47:52.440 --> 00:47:55.920
like this isn't even this is easier
than PT. Yeah what you get?

658
00:47:55.960 --> 00:48:01.920
And the endage who grew up there
and don't Yeah right RD and a couple

659
00:48:02.639 --> 00:48:08.920
stellar green berets can't sol him and
some other people, uh, decide pool

660
00:48:09.079 --> 00:48:13.960
all the water. We're gonna give
all our water to like these twenty dudes

661
00:48:14.039 --> 00:48:20.199
and they're gonna haul ass. And
can I talk about me in a second?

662
00:48:20.519 --> 00:48:22.840
Indeed, it was like I so
want to be part of that,

663
00:48:22.920 --> 00:48:28.719
Like I'm I've been training for this
moment all my life, a desperate mission,

664
00:48:29.119 --> 00:48:34.760
right you know where it is success, cataclysmic success or cataclysmic failure.

665
00:48:35.000 --> 00:48:40.360
And I was like, I am
the leader of the mercenary force. I

666
00:48:40.480 --> 00:48:44.519
have to stay with them and do
my job. Were they doing all right?

667
00:48:44.920 --> 00:48:49.599
Or were they? And did just
doing fine because we didn't carry body

668
00:48:49.679 --> 00:48:52.039
arm. Yeah, everybody else is
wearing body armor. I was like,

669
00:48:52.039 --> 00:48:57.320
we're all dead. And they got
over their shoulder by the barrel, run

670
00:48:57.320 --> 00:49:04.519
and shoes and uh basic gloak and
that's it. And then uh so we

671
00:49:04.519 --> 00:49:07.840
we they take off, the flying
column takes off. I was like,

672
00:49:07.039 --> 00:49:15.559
envious tears. We keep moving for
the night. Uh the endage out of

673
00:49:15.599 --> 00:49:19.519
nowhere, there's a village and they
like and we get all this food and

674
00:49:19.519 --> 00:49:25.400
ship comes up to us and that's
at that night is when the Rangers fast

675
00:49:25.480 --> 00:49:31.159
ripped in. And the reason I
know this is because we're on this like

676
00:49:31.280 --> 00:49:38.559
knife edge, uh you know,
the classic knife's edge Ridgeline. I knew

677
00:49:38.599 --> 00:49:44.519
that we were quite expendable. When
the green Beret major said Chris, I

678
00:49:44.559 --> 00:49:47.519
said, he didn't know I was
a lieutenant colonel. He found out later,

679
00:49:49.079 --> 00:49:52.280
but I was just Chris at the
time, and I was trying to

680
00:49:52.280 --> 00:49:54.800
be helpful because his show, he's
the he's the officer in charge, the

681
00:49:54.800 --> 00:49:58.840
ground force commander. He goes,
why don't you take the Afghans out?

682
00:49:58.920 --> 00:50:01.480
And you know, pulls the purity
closest to the enemy. I was like,

683
00:50:01.519 --> 00:50:04.719
oh, I know how this is
gonna work. We're just cannon fire,

684
00:50:05.199 --> 00:50:13.280
fine, whatever, And that was
I made a mental decision that if

685
00:50:13.280 --> 00:50:20.039
the Rangers got in to the crash
site successfully, we would I would take

686
00:50:20.559 --> 00:50:23.440
the mercenary force out because I knew
we were like, we were beyond fourth

687
00:50:23.480 --> 00:50:29.239
class citizens, like like the Rangers
still were like, we gotta have cans

688
00:50:29.280 --> 00:50:31.440
with us. We ought to kill
them all, not you know, Rangers.

689
00:50:31.960 --> 00:50:36.239
That changed later in the war,
but at this point it's still that

690
00:50:36.280 --> 00:50:43.159
way. And I just remember,
uh, trying to sleep and uh,

691
00:50:45.000 --> 00:50:47.800
it was so humid, your clothes
went and dry. But you know how

692
00:50:47.840 --> 00:50:54.199
it is at elevation, it plummeted
the temperature. I'm just lying there freezing,

693
00:50:54.320 --> 00:51:00.480
and I hear we needed watery supply. So when the MH four sevens

694
00:51:00.480 --> 00:51:04.320
brought in the Rangers, they brought
in a resupply bird and started kicking five

695
00:51:04.360 --> 00:51:07.800
gallon cans and mr boxes off the
back because the good idea of air dropping

696
00:51:07.880 --> 00:51:12.679
stuff didn't work. Long story won't
bore you with that. What the fuck

697
00:51:12.719 --> 00:51:20.440
were they thinking about? Uh?
And there's the surrealistic moment of the MH

698
00:51:20.639 --> 00:51:27.480
forty seven hovering directly over me,
lying there in the fetal position in some

699
00:51:27.519 --> 00:51:32.760
sort of like feverish dream and five
gallon water cans and then on the boxes

700
00:51:32.920 --> 00:51:38.800
start like landing around me. I'm
like, this is ironic that I'm going

701
00:51:38.840 --> 00:51:45.159
to be killed by my own side
with five gallon kids dropping on me.

702
00:51:45.960 --> 00:51:49.920
Uh. Rangers got in that night, fast roped in, patrolled in,

703
00:51:50.159 --> 00:51:54.960
got the crash site. At this
point, I'm like, the major comes

704
00:51:55.039 --> 00:51:59.320
up with this great idea that we're
going to leap frog forces far we're blah

705
00:51:59.360 --> 00:52:01.960
blah blah, and I'm like,
oh, we're going to be the last

706
00:52:02.000 --> 00:52:05.920
to move. Oh, yes you
are. It's like, I have an

707
00:52:05.960 --> 00:52:12.400
idea. We're going to reposition the
reaction force, the mercenary force I was

708
00:52:12.440 --> 00:52:15.440
in charge of, back to a
side of bad so we can more rapidly

709
00:52:15.519 --> 00:52:21.360
respond. You could just see him
like, oh thank God. But now

710
00:52:21.440 --> 00:52:25.719
I'm concerned because I'm abandoning the Americans
right right. So I try to call

711
00:52:25.800 --> 00:52:32.679
back. I get on Satcom,
doesn't work. I get on Iridium to

712
00:52:32.760 --> 00:52:38.360
call back to base, to my
higher headquarters to get permission. Can't talk

713
00:52:38.400 --> 00:52:43.679
to anybody. So that's another one
of those moments where you're like, Okay,

714
00:52:43.719 --> 00:52:49.280
here we go back to the end
diage. They were absolutely smoked by

715
00:52:49.320 --> 00:52:51.599
the end of this. Yeah,
because there's this legend like, oh my

716
00:52:51.599 --> 00:52:53.840
god, they can walk on the
mountain forever. No they can't. They

717
00:52:53.880 --> 00:52:59.599
got done and they were absolutely gassed. It was hilarious. It was hilarious.

718
00:52:59.679 --> 00:53:04.639
Yeah. Yeah. So at that
point, rangers secure the crash site

719
00:53:05.079 --> 00:53:07.800
start leaping forward. Marcus Latrell's on
the run. We don't know this now.

720
00:53:07.840 --> 00:53:15.800
Remember this area of was the most
all of our intelligence assets from satellites

721
00:53:15.840 --> 00:53:20.559
on down. We're focused on that
piece of train and it wasn't that big,

722
00:53:21.079 --> 00:53:23.760
and we had no idea where Marcus
Latrell was. Anybody that says differently

723
00:53:23.840 --> 00:53:28.280
is full of shit. Yeah,
And that was another eye opener, Jack,

724
00:53:28.320 --> 00:53:31.519
where I'm like, oh gosh,
we've been promised all this stuff and

725
00:53:31.719 --> 00:53:39.000
this comes down to hard. Yeah. Hard only people physically fit that are

726
00:53:39.039 --> 00:53:44.639
willing to close with and engage the
enemy and won't quit. And that was

727
00:53:44.679 --> 00:53:50.119
like one of those eye opening moments. It's so it's so like, no,

728
00:53:50.320 --> 00:53:52.920
duh, you know, it's so
obvious, but we had been trained

729
00:53:52.960 --> 00:53:57.719
to think that we're gonna have all
these assets available, like, but it

730
00:53:57.840 --> 00:54:00.639
just came down to being really,
really tough. Was my takeaway and then

731
00:54:01.119 --> 00:54:02.960
you know, you know the rest
of the story. Mark. I was

732
00:54:04.000 --> 00:54:07.840
on the other end when they when
Marcus was recovered. But we don't want

733
00:54:07.880 --> 00:54:12.440
to bore everybody with that. There's
a there's a great story that hasn't been

734
00:54:12.440 --> 00:54:15.679
told about that. Okay, well
you can, you can. You can

735
00:54:15.719 --> 00:54:20.719
slide into my inbox with that story. Yeah, and uh, we'll work

736
00:54:20.800 --> 00:54:24.159
on that. That's where we got
ready, and we got back and we

737
00:54:24.199 --> 00:54:30.119
got word that the helicopter had gone
down and that was the Navy Seals that

738
00:54:30.119 --> 00:54:32.559
had been shot down. So this
was Operation Red Wings and I didn't know

739
00:54:32.599 --> 00:54:37.480
it. I'm just some dumb private
time. You know. My my job

740
00:54:37.559 --> 00:54:42.960
was a Gustaf gunner, So thankfully
I was lucky enough to be chosen to

741
00:54:43.159 --> 00:54:46.079
go on this mission. So we
gear up and all that stuff, get

742
00:54:46.119 --> 00:54:50.719
all of our stuff ready and got
the called Gustaf and some rounds and all

743
00:54:50.760 --> 00:54:53.719
that. We fly out. We
get kanked the first night we go out.

744
00:54:54.280 --> 00:54:59.079
We land in jbed and we stay
in some like airport and then we

745
00:54:59.159 --> 00:55:00.840
go downstairs till I the jail cell
or something like that, and we're all

746
00:55:00.880 --> 00:55:04.880
just kind of hanging out in the
jail cell, sleeping there waiting, and

747
00:55:05.000 --> 00:55:08.840
so we go in the next period
of darkness, and so yeah, that

748
00:55:08.920 --> 00:55:15.360
was pretty sketch. So going out, you know, my first mission in

749
00:55:15.400 --> 00:55:17.840
the army, so it's like,
you know, what the fuck is going

750
00:55:17.880 --> 00:55:22.480
on right now? Pretty scared,
you know, pretty freaking scared. And

751
00:55:22.679 --> 00:55:27.840
not to mention, I got a
lot of weight in our fast rope site

752
00:55:27.920 --> 00:55:30.159
I don't know, sixty eighty whatever, ninety feet long, and that bitch

753
00:55:30.320 --> 00:55:36.079
is like barely touched in the ground. And so thankfully we all make it

754
00:55:36.079 --> 00:55:42.239
to the ground off of these you
know, sixty plus ropes, sixtylus plus

755
00:55:42.320 --> 00:55:47.000
foot ropes, and so we're actually
not on a flat part of the mountain.

756
00:55:47.039 --> 00:55:52.239
We're kind of, you know,
on a hill. Basically, did

757
00:55:52.320 --> 00:56:01.360
you rope in with Tony Brooks or
with Nick Morris platoon? Uh? We

758
00:56:01.400 --> 00:56:05.480
were, we were in. Uh
we ended up at the same spot.

759
00:56:06.360 --> 00:56:09.480
I don't I want to say I
was in, probably in Nick Moore's.

760
00:56:10.800 --> 00:56:16.400
I honestly don't remember which, because
I man, I may have been with

761
00:56:16.480 --> 00:56:22.280
Tony. I just remember going down
the rope in it taking forever, and

762
00:56:22.400 --> 00:56:25.679
I actually had both my gloves were
the same ones, so I didn't have

763
00:56:25.800 --> 00:56:30.440
I think I've had two left handed
gloves. Yeah. Yeah, So I

764
00:56:30.480 --> 00:56:35.320
had to like wrench that on there
and put the strength of a tiger you

765
00:56:35.360 --> 00:56:39.440
know on there and just slide down
that rope and pray that that Jesus take

766
00:56:39.519 --> 00:56:44.719
the wheel at some point. But
I didn't die. John Kelly, my

767
00:56:45.119 --> 00:56:46.760
squad leader at the time, had
put his foot on me as I was

768
00:56:46.840 --> 00:56:51.800
rolling down the mountain, so that
that helped a little bit from dying.

769
00:56:52.559 --> 00:56:54.960
But we had one guy, the
r t O uh. He ended up

770
00:56:55.000 --> 00:57:00.360
breaking his arm. A dude came
in and smashed his arm, and I

771
00:57:00.360 --> 00:57:02.679
think like two days later they came
and got him. But strong he was.

772
00:57:04.039 --> 00:57:07.280
That dude was hardest woodpecker dick.
And so he was helping you know,

773
00:57:07.360 --> 00:57:10.239
drag bodies up the hill that night
when they were putting them in the

774
00:57:10.280 --> 00:57:14.280
body bags and everything. And our
job was, since I was in the

775
00:57:14.360 --> 00:57:16.400
weapon squad, we were all just
you know, plump security. We were

776
00:57:16.760 --> 00:57:22.639
you know, setting up basically a
big patrol base around there, yeah,

777
00:57:22.760 --> 00:57:27.199
or as best as we could.
And because it was just a shit situation

778
00:57:27.320 --> 00:57:30.440
and we just you know posted up
the best where we could, and so

779
00:57:30.559 --> 00:57:35.440
we built some little shacks try to
you know have some some sort of concealment,

780
00:57:35.519 --> 00:57:38.679
not much cover because that dot dread
dead dry wood right there doesn't really

781
00:57:38.920 --> 00:57:42.599
provide a whole lot of cover.
Bullets will run right through that, so

782
00:57:43.400 --> 00:57:47.000
it's more for concealment and some shade. But uh yeah, we roped in

783
00:57:47.039 --> 00:57:52.440
and it was really cold that night, because it was like, I don't

784
00:57:52.480 --> 00:57:59.079
know, ten ten two or something
like that, ten thousand feet and even

785
00:57:59.119 --> 00:58:02.519
though it's July, it's it's fucking
cold. It's not it's not warm,

786
00:58:02.559 --> 00:58:06.519
and we didn't bring it. We
brought stuff for a twelve hour mission,

787
00:58:06.679 --> 00:58:08.800
not for twelve days, because that's
how long I was there, and so

788
00:58:09.840 --> 00:58:14.119
I barely had I thankfully had a
T shirt on. Most guys didn't have

789
00:58:14.159 --> 00:58:16.480
a T shirt on or nothing like. And we're up there nut to butt,

790
00:58:16.559 --> 00:58:20.199
like trying to crawl inside of each
other because it's so damn cold and

791
00:58:20.239 --> 00:58:23.199
it's raining on us, and so
we break protocol and we're just like,

792
00:58:23.280 --> 00:58:25.559
you know what, fuck it,
we're burning the stump right here. So

793
00:58:25.559 --> 00:58:29.840
we just sat there and whatever we
could find we burned, and we were

794
00:58:29.840 --> 00:58:34.920
burning the stump and just huddling close
to it because nobody's moving in that there's

795
00:58:34.960 --> 00:58:37.559
no way nobody's going to maneuver on
you. It's not happening. And so

796
00:58:38.320 --> 00:58:42.880
you, i mean, your your
combat ineffective at that point, right,

797
00:58:42.960 --> 00:58:45.800
and so you had to stay warm. Thankfully, we stayed warm enough to

798
00:58:45.920 --> 00:58:50.320
make it through the night and everything. And then but yeah, we had

799
00:58:50.599 --> 00:58:54.199
zero basically zero rations and I had
like two bottles of water. So they

800
00:58:54.280 --> 00:58:58.000
quickly realized that we were going to
be there for a minute. And so

801
00:58:58.800 --> 00:59:00.920
you know, we had to start
a establish you know, some sort of

802
00:59:00.960 --> 00:59:06.880
like I said, concealment of some
sort, because we had many nights where

803
00:59:07.039 --> 00:59:12.320
we had because we had constant air
presence. So whether it be a tens

804
00:59:12.599 --> 00:59:16.599
f fifteen's apaches, whatever, fast
movers, whatever you want to call it,

805
00:59:16.599 --> 00:59:22.320
it was there constantly and you could
cond like just NonStop around like a

806
00:59:22.400 --> 00:59:27.159
round because they're you know, trying
to come up and they're trying to find

807
00:59:27.239 --> 00:59:32.599
Latrelle and whatnot. And thankfully they
we we never had anything crazy happen up

808
00:59:34.000 --> 00:59:37.920
up top on us because we had
so much eyes on us because that was

809
00:59:37.239 --> 00:59:40.840
you know, we were part of
the main show there. Yeah, that

810
00:59:40.920 --> 00:59:45.280
was that was twelve days of just
like you know, your first you're you're

811
00:59:45.320 --> 00:59:49.119
just kind of wondering, like is
this what is this what we always do?

812
00:59:49.519 --> 00:59:52.840
Because there you see different units coming
through. We saw some r r

813
00:59:52.960 --> 00:59:59.039
D guys coming up. I remember
turning around and seeing uh like a you

814
00:59:59.079 --> 01:00:01.960
know, four or five of them
walking up and they were gonna go look

815
01:00:02.000 --> 01:00:07.119
for Latreil as well, and so
you know, it's it was all hands

816
01:00:07.119 --> 01:00:10.920
on deck, and so it was
just like this is crazy. I thought

817
01:00:10.920 --> 01:00:15.719
we were gonna do raids and ambushes
and like ranger school stuff and like,

818
01:00:15.800 --> 01:00:17.679
you know, all this crazy stuff. I was learning before we came out

819
01:00:17.719 --> 01:00:22.360
here, so now we're out here
looking for our own. But it was

820
01:00:22.599 --> 01:00:25.559
a good it was a good learning
experience. Uh, you know, kind

821
01:00:25.559 --> 01:00:28.920
of went hungry there for a little
while. I had to run up and

822
01:00:28.960 --> 01:00:31.920
down the mountains and chasing pallettes that
had broken, because you know, when

823
01:00:31.960 --> 01:00:35.679
you try to drop a palette on
something like this, it's kind of hard.

824
01:00:37.000 --> 01:00:38.920
And so it's like do you just
get it stuck in the tree and

825
01:00:39.119 --> 01:00:42.800
say fuck it, let's try to
get it down from the tree and you

826
01:00:42.840 --> 01:00:45.000
know, figure it out when it
comes down, or so, yeah,

827
01:00:45.000 --> 01:00:50.880
we chased a lot of bundles down
and we made a lot of little canopies

828
01:00:50.920 --> 01:00:57.000
and shelters with those canvases and parachutes
and all that stuff. So yeah,

829
01:00:57.039 --> 01:01:00.000
we still had a good time out
there, even though you know you're sitting

830
01:01:00.159 --> 01:01:04.880
they're just kind of wondering what the
fuck is going on? And so but

831
01:01:05.000 --> 01:01:08.079
no, it was cool our first
aren't. You know. He's known for

832
01:01:08.320 --> 01:01:12.800
blowing up stumps and whatnot. He's
pulling apart C four claim More, you

833
01:01:12.800 --> 01:01:15.440
know, Claymore is pulling the Sea
four out and everything and packing them under

834
01:01:15.480 --> 01:01:20.639
the stumps and whatnot and blowing these
stumps sky high and just laughing his ass

835
01:01:20.679 --> 01:01:23.400
off. And and so that way
we can get more forty seven's in there

836
01:01:23.440 --> 01:01:28.440
to x fill us to relieve us, because we were actually on the end

837
01:01:28.480 --> 01:01:31.960
of our deployment, and so three
seven five comes in and relieves us,

838
01:01:32.199 --> 01:01:37.440
and uh so, yeah, that
was that was number one. And so

839
01:01:37.119 --> 01:01:39.800
you know, that was kind of
significant to me, I guess, just

840
01:01:39.840 --> 01:01:45.159
because it's it's a very significant time
in history. And thank thankfully at least

841
01:01:45.239 --> 01:01:49.360
we had one guy survived, so
and we were able to find him.

842
01:01:50.559 --> 01:01:52.440
And this was the time. You
know, you're the squadron commander. You

843
01:01:52.719 --> 01:01:59.199
had told me earlier when Operation Red
Wings happened and you were the ground force

844
01:01:59.239 --> 01:02:04.239
commander, uh for for the squadron
when that happened. Yeah, in one

845
01:02:04.239 --> 01:02:07.519
of the deployments, we were over
there. And again we you know in

846
01:02:07.559 --> 01:02:12.039
the in the as you guys know, but there were multiple change of command,

847
01:02:12.079 --> 01:02:16.000
right the White side guys worked for
Siegsota, who worked for the two

848
01:02:16.079 --> 01:02:21.519
star or three star army guy that
was you know the overall battlespace on our

849
01:02:21.599 --> 01:02:24.559
we worked for a different chain of
command. So we were kind of watched

850
01:02:24.760 --> 01:02:30.840
the planning going on for for Red
Wings and they needed some helicopters, so

851
01:02:30.880 --> 01:02:35.639
they came over and you know,
requested permission to use the helicopter. So

852
01:02:35.679 --> 01:02:37.679
I kind of watched the planning going
on, but we weren't directly involved,

853
01:02:38.360 --> 01:02:44.159
so you know, we had zero
skin in the game besides you know,

854
01:02:45.159 --> 01:02:49.119
giving them advice on where not to
go, what not to do, which

855
01:02:49.159 --> 01:02:54.559
is what they did. But like
they so we watched the planning and I

856
01:02:54.559 --> 01:02:59.840
remember, you know, they like
I didn't think of it, anything of

857
01:03:00.079 --> 01:03:05.039
it. And we were working nights, so we'd wake up around lunchtime and

858
01:03:05.400 --> 01:03:10.440
uh remember the day June twenty eighth, two thousand and five, like we

859
01:03:10.440 --> 01:03:15.360
were still using pagers. The beepers
went off, you know, right before

860
01:03:15.440 --> 01:03:17.719
lunch, like hey, you know, report to the jock immediately, and

861
01:03:17.760 --> 01:03:24.840
we mustering the jock and like,
what's going on and like they a bird

862
01:03:25.079 --> 01:03:30.280
has just been shot down one of
our task force assts, but like not

863
01:03:30.400 --> 01:03:35.840
tracking any of it, Like holy
shit, like how does that happen?

864
01:03:36.440 --> 01:03:39.360
You know, And come to realize
that they had inserted the night before they

865
01:03:39.360 --> 01:03:44.599
got compromised, big firefight and this
is the four four man Reki team,

866
01:03:44.760 --> 01:03:49.400
which is a pretty light Wreki team, and uh, and then they had

867
01:03:49.480 --> 01:03:52.280
launched a QRF in the middle of
the day, and uh, that's when

868
01:03:52.280 --> 01:03:59.239
we kind of got notified because although
we were all one task force, you

869
01:03:59.239 --> 01:04:02.360
know that the aviators were tracking what
was going on, but the C two

870
01:04:02.559 --> 01:04:09.360
was over at Siege of Soda and
so like we just weren't tracking. So

871
01:04:09.760 --> 01:04:13.960
then it became okay, we need
to send a QRF up there. And

872
01:04:14.000 --> 01:04:24.920
it became a fairly interesting thing to
watch for me because we could have gone

873
01:04:25.159 --> 01:04:30.920
right away, but after having a
siege Asota QRF launched in the middle of

874
01:04:30.920 --> 01:04:35.800
the day and get shot down,
nobody was really keen on sending anybody else

875
01:04:35.920 --> 01:04:41.639
right back in there, especially during
the day, and so we waited a

876
01:04:41.679 --> 01:04:45.280
long time. So the seat in
time, the task Force and seed Asota

877
01:04:45.639 --> 01:04:49.599
were both those sixes, and then
you went straight to the you know,

878
01:04:49.679 --> 01:04:56.639
either sitcom or or the conventional battlespace
owner and so there was a lot of

879
01:04:57.280 --> 01:05:01.639
fighting and politics going on there.
We waited around for quite a while and

880
01:05:01.679 --> 01:05:05.440
finally my boss said, hey,
how long we'll it take for you guys

881
01:05:05.440 --> 01:05:11.199
to get up there? And we
had prepositioned them an entity up closer earlier

882
01:05:11.239 --> 01:05:13.880
in the day, and it's like, wait, we can be born in

883
01:05:13.920 --> 01:05:17.639
forty five minutes. It's like Roger
that you're you're now the ground force commander,

884
01:05:18.400 --> 01:05:25.320
go and so are really what we
wanted to do the first night was

885
01:05:25.440 --> 01:05:30.599
just get a smaller element of rangers. So we had this joint strikeforce Hensteen.

886
01:05:30.639 --> 01:05:39.280
It was most of my squadron and
a company minus of rangers from two

887
01:05:39.280 --> 01:05:42.039
seven to five. And so Mike, you know, I had a troop

888
01:05:42.079 --> 01:05:48.440
basically plus company commander with most of
his company whatever birds we needed, and

889
01:05:48.800 --> 01:05:55.400
you know, pre stage get closer
and get to the craft site. And

890
01:05:55.400 --> 01:05:59.960
it's pretty cool because you know,
you talk about operating with commanders in ten

891
01:06:00.239 --> 01:06:06.599
Like the mission brief was they rescue
any survivors, recover any remains, fill

892
01:06:06.639 --> 01:06:11.280
as many bad guys as you can. Any questions, No, Sarah,

893
01:06:11.320 --> 01:06:15.639
we can work with that. So, you know, we flew up to

894
01:06:15.800 --> 01:06:20.840
Jabad and sent the first guys up
got weathered out, so they had to

895
01:06:20.840 --> 01:06:24.760
come back. So now we're on
the ground, like what do we do.

896
01:06:25.360 --> 01:06:28.960
We had everybody coming out of the
woodwork, we had assets along the

897
01:06:28.960 --> 01:06:32.719
border, other guys hats assets.
We basically said, hey, can anybody

898
01:06:32.719 --> 01:06:45.079
get there on foot? And so
you know it was you know, where

899
01:06:45.119 --> 01:06:49.280
the crash site was was in a
valley. But to get there, like

900
01:06:49.760 --> 01:06:55.360
if we drove north from Jabad to
a Sadabad to get to the crash site,

901
01:06:55.400 --> 01:06:59.679
you'd have to cross like two ridge
lines. So it wasn't an easy

902
01:07:00.639 --> 01:07:03.440
traverse. And so but we we
said, hey, we're gonna we got

903
01:07:03.440 --> 01:07:08.159
to figure this out, like hedge
our bets. So we will send entities

904
01:07:08.440 --> 01:07:13.079
to walk uh and then we will
fly in the next night. And so

905
01:07:13.119 --> 01:07:16.559
they started the journey. A lot
of guys had turned back because it was

906
01:07:16.599 --> 01:07:18.920
so mankey. They all ran out
of a bunch of them ran out of

907
01:07:18.920 --> 01:07:24.440
water, and then we flew in
the next day about five clicks south,

908
01:07:25.079 --> 01:07:28.440
uh, you know, kind of
back into the same area, but not

909
01:07:28.559 --> 01:07:30.920
the exact area. And we had
I don't know, we had about sixty

910
01:07:30.960 --> 01:07:38.119
guys, seventy guys combined force of
rangers and seals, and we had brought

911
01:07:38.280 --> 01:07:42.559
a couple of the guys from the
troop, the White Side troop with us

912
01:07:42.960 --> 01:07:45.559
because they were itching to get into
the fight and we needed some more manpower.

913
01:07:46.119 --> 01:07:48.760
So we had about a ninety foot
fast trope. You know, I

914
01:07:48.800 --> 01:07:56.000
think it was I I think Si
Sierra Nevada's you know, high tall pine

915
01:07:56.039 --> 01:08:01.400
trees, beautiful country, but some
people with some nerves, Like it was

916
01:08:01.960 --> 01:08:05.079
the highest rope I've ever done in
my life. Yeah, and I just

917
01:08:05.079 --> 01:08:08.840
remember, like, you know,
I was up near the cockpit talking to

918
01:08:08.880 --> 01:08:11.760
the pilots, and so I'm the
second to last guy to come out of

919
01:08:11.760 --> 01:08:14.559
the bird. I had a dog
guy behind me. You know, it

920
01:08:14.599 --> 01:08:17.760
was faster with his dog, and
man, it just kept going and going

921
01:08:17.920 --> 01:08:21.760
and going, just going faster,
faster and faster. I remember hitting like

922
01:08:21.760 --> 01:08:26.560
the sack of shit and just like
a little days remembering, oh god,

923
01:08:26.600 --> 01:08:29.880
the dog guys right behind me,
so rolling out of the way and he

924
01:08:29.960 --> 01:08:33.239
comes fucking plowing in and then we
had to you know, walk about,

925
01:08:33.560 --> 01:08:38.840
kind of linked up every buddy did
this monster patrol up to the crash site

926
01:08:39.239 --> 01:08:45.840
and sent the the pj's and some
some other guys from the Ranger entity down

927
01:08:45.880 --> 01:08:48.399
there to secure the crash site.
We set up C two No and started

928
01:08:48.399 --> 01:08:54.199
looking for survivors, and you know, they they did a really good job,

929
01:08:54.439 --> 01:09:00.319
and it was really significant terrain and
steep and so we probably set up

930
01:09:00.319 --> 01:09:05.199
our CT note around probably nine thousand
feet when the crass sight was probably a

931
01:09:05.239 --> 01:09:10.039
thousand feet below us, because I
think the way it happened, the RPG

932
01:09:10.119 --> 01:09:14.640
had hit the back of it and
it kind of rolled down this h this

933
01:09:14.760 --> 01:09:16.199
hill that didn't look like much on
video, but when you get there,

934
01:09:16.199 --> 01:09:20.680
you're like, oh my god,
Like just getting there and back is going

935
01:09:20.760 --> 01:09:27.960
to be significant. But the guys
got down there to the crash site while

936
01:09:27.960 --> 01:09:31.079
we were sending out patrols trying to
find the REKI team is at the time

937
01:09:31.119 --> 01:09:34.600
we had no idea where they were, you know, kind of doing the

938
01:09:34.640 --> 01:09:39.840
forensic analysis of like, okay,
a firefight happened here. We can see

939
01:09:39.880 --> 01:09:44.960
all those shells from both sides which
way did they go, but couldn't really

940
01:09:45.000 --> 01:09:48.600
determine that, And a lot of
singing and other things are coming in indicating

941
01:09:48.640 --> 01:09:53.640
that maybe they were over in Pakistan
at the time, because several of the

942
01:09:53.720 --> 01:09:59.439
radios had from the had been taken
some people. What I think happened is

943
01:09:59.479 --> 01:10:02.479
people are like clicking the mic and
things like that, and we weren't exactly

944
01:10:02.520 --> 01:10:05.720
sure where it was coming from.
But you know, first order of business,

945
01:10:05.760 --> 01:10:10.920
get the guys. Unfortunately, there
were no survivors from the helicopter.

946
01:10:11.760 --> 01:10:16.359
You know, sixteen of the there
were eight crewmen in eight seals had perished.

947
01:10:16.600 --> 01:10:24.279
We couldn't determine one guy because his
remains were pretty burned and mangled.

948
01:10:24.680 --> 01:10:30.800
There was a fire down at the
crash site, but got all their remains.

949
01:10:30.680 --> 01:10:34.319
Had to blow an HLZ so they
could come in. So you know,

950
01:10:34.359 --> 01:10:40.720
we had had to get resupplied.
It was another issue. So we

951
01:10:40.760 --> 01:10:45.199
fast roped in with like minimal kit
because we thought we were kind of get

952
01:10:45.279 --> 01:10:47.479
going to get into it, and
we were at nine thousand feet. So

953
01:10:48.000 --> 01:10:54.279
your weigh mobility versus like security,
right, and if you were kitted down

954
01:10:54.319 --> 01:10:57.920
with body armor and things like that, you would you would have been spent

955
01:10:58.039 --> 01:11:00.000
before he even got there, so
we most of us didn't have body armor

956
01:11:00.039 --> 01:11:04.479
on fact, some of the guys. It was pretty funny on the rope.

957
01:11:04.479 --> 01:11:08.800
Thought they were going to do a
typical like pen foot rope onto the

958
01:11:08.880 --> 01:11:12.359
you know, a roof of a
building, and when they did a ninety

959
01:11:12.359 --> 01:11:15.560
foot rope, wearing just like flight
gloves or batter's gloves. I saw a

960
01:11:15.600 --> 01:11:21.119
young ranger his entire hand was double
the size the next day and it was

961
01:11:21.239 --> 01:11:28.479
just a blister, and but he
pressed on. Another kid had a broken

962
01:11:28.560 --> 01:11:30.600
arm. He you know, hit
real hard. He pressed on. Nobody

963
01:11:30.840 --> 01:11:36.479
nobody asked to get meta actent that
they could have anyways, But we got

964
01:11:36.520 --> 01:11:42.520
everybody out, I think all the
remains out the next day and continued looking

965
01:11:43.359 --> 01:11:47.920
for you know that whoever was you
know, still a lot. We didn't

966
01:11:47.960 --> 01:11:55.199
know if any of them were alive, of the four wreckie elements, and

967
01:11:55.239 --> 01:11:58.960
we didn't know where they were,
so we looked and looked and looked and

968
01:11:59.239 --> 01:12:04.880
going on wild chases for several days. And then you probably read the story

969
01:12:04.920 --> 01:12:13.119
that a guy who was housing Marcus
Schotraev walked to a Sadabad and basically said,

970
01:12:13.119 --> 01:12:17.439
hey, I have this American in
uh, in my home in whatever

971
01:12:17.560 --> 01:12:23.399
village it was. And so you
know, that was like day seven or

972
01:12:23.399 --> 01:12:30.319
eight, I forget exactly what it
was and uh. And that lined up

973
01:12:30.319 --> 01:12:33.239
with some other intel that we were
receiving, and so then we had a

974
01:12:33.239 --> 01:12:38.239
pretty idea that, yeah, he's
probably there and we need to go rescue

975
01:12:38.319 --> 01:12:43.039
him now. And again we don't
know what's going on. We had seen

976
01:12:43.439 --> 01:12:46.600
goat herters, you know, and
not a lot of enemy contacts, some

977
01:12:46.680 --> 01:12:50.840
harassing fire things like that that we
would just kind of suppressed with AC one

978
01:12:50.920 --> 01:12:58.880
thirties or mortars and uh. And
so we launched to rescue and it was,

979
01:12:59.000 --> 01:13:01.840
you know, a little interesting.
The way it went down is we

980
01:13:01.920 --> 01:13:08.760
had a small small team of SF
guys and in Afghans had it in the

981
01:13:08.800 --> 01:13:13.560
area a couple of clicks away,
like, hey, this is the grid

982
01:13:13.560 --> 01:13:15.720
of where we need to go.
Can you can you go do this?

983
01:13:16.399 --> 01:13:19.920
And they said no, Like,
we have five Americans, five Afghanians who

984
01:13:19.920 --> 01:13:26.239
were wearing like four frams and you
know, you know, pajamas and they

985
01:13:26.239 --> 01:13:31.640
have one magazine piece like okay,
and so we took a pause, sent

986
01:13:31.760 --> 01:13:36.840
a ranger element up there. They
went up, took charge and led the

987
01:13:36.880 --> 01:13:43.159
rescue into the ground while we kind
of set up a suppression of enemy air

988
01:13:43.239 --> 01:13:47.119
defense, you know, kind of
planned to precede the rescue helicopter that came

989
01:13:47.159 --> 01:13:50.199
in there. So they went in
there, they secured Marcus, we knew

990
01:13:50.199 --> 01:13:55.079
he was there. Then we launched
everybody else in to get him and did

991
01:13:55.079 --> 01:14:00.479
that whole uh suppressive suppressive fire which
was pretty pretty cool, and they could

992
01:14:00.479 --> 01:14:04.960
only take out like two people,
you know, Marcus and like one another,

993
01:14:05.000 --> 01:14:08.840
because we wanted to bring the guy's
family that they were going to get

994
01:14:08.880 --> 01:14:11.600
killed, and they're like, sorry, you can't do it, but you

995
01:14:11.640 --> 01:14:16.279
can walk out with with our our
elements. So once Marcus got back in

996
01:14:16.479 --> 01:14:20.079
you know, debrief, then we
started figuring out, hey, this is

997
01:14:20.119 --> 01:14:24.560
what happened, here's where we were. And right away we went out and

998
01:14:24.560 --> 01:14:30.039
found two of the other guys,
Murphy and Danny deaths, but we couldn't

999
01:14:30.079 --> 01:14:35.159
find the last of the recu element
I think is Matt Axelson. So we

1000
01:14:35.279 --> 01:14:41.560
actually had been up there for eight
or nine days and we're supposed to go

1001
01:14:41.640 --> 01:14:45.520
home, not that that is going
to drive anything, but we did a

1002
01:14:45.560 --> 01:14:49.319
relief in place because we could not
find the last of that four men recky

1003
01:14:49.359 --> 01:14:51.920
element. So we did a relief
in place with another squadron and some other

1004
01:14:53.000 --> 01:14:57.039
rangers came in, and by that
time we had some other conventional forces helping

1005
01:14:57.119 --> 01:15:00.840
us out too. So uh,
they found him I think two days later

1006
01:15:00.239 --> 01:15:05.960
and then Xfield and we were mission
complete, and yeah, it was a

1007
01:15:06.640 --> 01:15:11.199
I'll tell you what. A couple
of the guys that walked in, like

1008
01:15:13.439 --> 01:15:17.960
from from the Battalian Reconnaissance Detachment of
two seventy five, like those guys or

1009
01:15:18.000 --> 01:15:21.840
some tough, tough dudes. We
had a lot of people quit on that

1010
01:15:21.920 --> 01:15:27.439
hump, including some of you know, some some some people from my community,

1011
01:15:28.000 --> 01:15:31.039
a lot of the Afghans quit.
But those guys showed up. I

1012
01:15:31.039 --> 01:15:34.039
think like two days after we were
there, out of water, out of

1013
01:15:34.079 --> 01:15:39.760
food, stumbling in. I'm like, oh my god, you guys are

1014
01:15:39.760 --> 01:15:42.479
the biggest bad asses on the planet. It was. It was pretty cool

1015
01:15:42.479 --> 01:15:45.479
and I gained a lot of respect
or you know, again, there was

1016
01:15:45.479 --> 01:15:53.000
always this stupid kind of rivalry even
when we're working together, like mutual respect.

1017
01:15:53.039 --> 01:15:56.800
But you know, after that,
it's like we truly are the same,

1018
01:15:56.880 --> 01:15:59.840
Like these guys are awesome. Yeah, yeah, our guys are awesome.

1019
01:16:00.199 --> 01:16:02.439
Also one of those moments where was
all these different units working together,

1020
01:16:02.880 --> 01:16:09.600
working together to repatriate Americans. You
know, I mean it's kind of an

1021
01:16:09.600 --> 01:16:15.720
incredible moment in that sense. It
was you know, it's always we're gonna

1022
01:16:15.880 --> 01:16:18.760
just dominate and it's going to be
done, but sometimes it's not that way.

1023
01:16:20.399 --> 01:16:24.880
Yeah, we didn't do a dang
thing until Operation Red Wings hit.

1024
01:16:25.279 --> 01:16:28.720
We were close to going home with
you know, I called it pitching a

1025
01:16:28.760 --> 01:16:35.359
shutout on that deployment. So tell
us then about the run up to Red

1026
01:16:35.359 --> 01:16:40.079
Wings, Like, did you guys
were you designated as a QRF for that

1027
01:16:40.119 --> 01:16:42.600
mission? Did you even know that
mission was going on? I mean,

1028
01:16:42.640 --> 01:16:47.800
how did this come up on your
radar initially? Yeah, we actually didn't

1029
01:16:48.520 --> 01:16:55.560
know anything about the mission. About
two weeks prior my squad was designated as

1030
01:16:55.640 --> 01:17:00.600
primary Combat Search and Recovery for the
entire country of Afghanistan. They were trying

1031
01:17:00.640 --> 01:17:04.880
to find jobs for us that were
combat related because they weren't going to send

1032
01:17:05.000 --> 01:17:09.000
a ranger pill tune out to win
hearts and minds. That's like the dumbest

1033
01:17:09.000 --> 01:17:14.680
thing ever. Thankfully they got that
right. But yeah, that was one

1034
01:17:14.720 --> 01:17:17.840
of our jobs and we trained up
for it. And we never really thought

1035
01:17:17.880 --> 01:17:20.880
we would actually do anything. I
think it was one of those like just

1036
01:17:20.880 --> 01:17:24.920
go through the motions, learn the
job. We know how to dismantle a

1037
01:17:24.960 --> 01:17:29.640
helicopter, we know how to work
with the PJS and lo and behold,

1038
01:17:29.680 --> 01:17:33.600
two weeks later, right after that
training, we get the call that a

1039
01:17:33.720 --> 01:17:39.399
Chinook helicopter just went down and you
guys are going to go recover it.

1040
01:17:40.359 --> 01:17:44.159
And that's basically all we knew.
We later found out was a one sixtieth

1041
01:17:44.199 --> 01:17:46.119
bird, which we were all confused
because it was middle of the day,

1042
01:17:47.119 --> 01:17:50.640
and come to find out, yeah, it was the middle of the day,

1043
01:17:50.640 --> 01:17:55.479
and that might have been one of
the reasons why it ended the way

1044
01:17:55.520 --> 01:18:00.279
it did. It was. I
mean, obviously it was a lucky shot.

1045
01:18:00.199 --> 01:18:05.159
I mean I was right out the
crash site and there's not many places

1046
01:18:05.159 --> 01:18:11.560
they could have shot from to get
a good view. So whoever it was

1047
01:18:11.640 --> 01:18:16.760
got really lucky. Now, granted, those guys have a lot of fighting

1048
01:18:16.800 --> 01:18:20.199
skills. I mean, I don't
want to discount their skills because I mean,

1049
01:18:20.239 --> 01:18:27.800
look at right now, they are
taking over a country in weeks well,

1050
01:18:28.039 --> 01:18:30.880
I mean waring helicopters into valley systems
and shooting them down is something that

1051
01:18:31.000 --> 01:18:34.960
the Afghans excel at, right,
Yeah, well this was at the peak.

1052
01:18:35.039 --> 01:18:39.000
This was at the top of the
mountain, so a little bit different

1053
01:18:39.039 --> 01:18:42.880
than their usual mo of getting them
into a place where they could shoot down

1054
01:18:42.880 --> 01:18:45.840
at them. This guy had to
shoot up, There's no doubt about it.

1055
01:18:46.880 --> 01:18:53.159
So you guys hear about this gets
spun up for this bird that went

1056
01:18:53.239 --> 01:18:58.279
down. What's the process like then
for is it just your squad or is

1057
01:18:58.319 --> 01:19:01.800
it the entire platoon that is designated
to go in? Uh? Yeah,

1058
01:19:01.840 --> 01:19:05.800
our whole platoon got spun up on
that one. You know, we were

1059
01:19:05.800 --> 01:19:12.239
getting word that this is like similar
to Robert's Ridge. So obviously Robert's Ridge

1060
01:19:12.239 --> 01:19:16.840
happened a couple of years prior to
that, and we knew all about it.

1061
01:19:16.880 --> 01:19:19.199
We had learned, you know,
we had some lessons learned from that.

1062
01:19:19.680 --> 01:19:23.199
So we were we thought we were
going into the same thing again.

1063
01:19:24.520 --> 01:19:27.279
So that was our mindset going into
it, was this is going to be

1064
01:19:27.399 --> 01:19:31.319
hillacious firefight when we get there.
You know, we're putting our gear together

1065
01:19:31.880 --> 01:19:36.000
and rangers being rangers, we don't
need water, we don't need food more

1066
01:19:36.039 --> 01:19:43.439
AMMO, Right, so we just
loaded up on AMMO and we were ready

1067
01:19:43.479 --> 01:19:45.880
to go. We had basically no
intel. We didn't know anything about the

1068
01:19:45.880 --> 01:19:50.279
seals on the ground. All we
knew was that there was a Chinook helicopter

1069
01:19:50.359 --> 01:19:54.920
down. It was a one sixtieth
bird. It had some seals on board,

1070
01:19:55.319 --> 01:20:00.520
and we were going to get it, and you know, they sent

1071
01:20:00.640 --> 01:20:04.640
us out with that intel. That
was so for the people who might not

1072
01:20:04.720 --> 01:20:13.439
be familiar with this story, this
actually all started with latrelle Beats right,

1073
01:20:13.720 --> 01:20:21.520
Murphy and Axelsson, a four man
seal team Wreckie team UH, a seal

1074
01:20:21.600 --> 01:20:27.359
recky team that went out. I
believe it was for Ahmed Shah to to

1075
01:20:27.520 --> 01:20:32.239
like find his ID factories or to
do the WRECKI on those they got compromised

1076
01:20:32.359 --> 01:20:38.920
by a shepherd or a goat goat
herder or you know, somebody. They

1077
01:20:39.079 --> 01:20:43.239
let him go. He reported on
them, and then they and then UH

1078
01:20:43.720 --> 01:20:46.760
forces converged on them, and so
they called, you know, they called

1079
01:20:46.760 --> 01:20:53.319
for a quick reaction force and that's
why the Chinook, the one launched during

1080
01:20:53.319 --> 01:20:57.479
the day with the seals on it
was as UH as you know, forced

1081
01:20:57.479 --> 01:21:00.279
to save these and then the vert
get shot down. Do you do they

1082
01:21:00.319 --> 01:21:06.000
know what it was shot down by? We didn't at the time, we

1083
01:21:06.079 --> 01:21:15.199
had suspicions that it was a stinger, is what we initially thought. The

1084
01:21:15.279 --> 01:21:18.600
evidence is still not one d percent
on it, but I think what we've

1085
01:21:18.600 --> 01:21:24.800
come to the conclusion was probably an
RPG seven and you know it was.

1086
01:21:25.720 --> 01:21:29.560
If you've ever shot an RPG,
you know they're not super accurate. So

1087
01:21:30.600 --> 01:21:36.920
he hit the the directly at the
rotor mass and it just went spinning out

1088
01:21:36.920 --> 01:21:41.319
of control at that point. So
at this point, do you guys know

1089
01:21:41.399 --> 01:21:45.520
anything about Latrell and his team or
do you only know about the down show?

1090
01:21:45.600 --> 01:21:48.439
Do you know that there are other
Americans out there? Yeah, we

1091
01:21:48.479 --> 01:21:50.640
knew there was someone out there,
but we didn't know it was Seal Team.

1092
01:21:50.680 --> 01:21:55.279
We didn't know it was a recon
team. We just knew that it

1093
01:21:55.319 --> 01:21:59.000
was a quick reaction for us going
to help somebody. Okay, we didn't

1094
01:21:59.000 --> 01:22:02.199
find out about the recon team until
we were on the ground, at least

1095
01:22:02.239 --> 01:22:05.800
at my level. I was a
private so I had to do a lot

1096
01:22:05.840 --> 01:22:10.439
of interviews to kind of get all
this information. But yeah, we didn't

1097
01:22:10.520 --> 01:22:13.279
we didn't get that trickled down to
us. Yeah, so it talked to

1098
01:22:13.319 --> 01:22:17.800
us about the infiltration. Then,
Yeah, that was that was a fun

1099
01:22:17.840 --> 01:22:24.199
one. The initial one was the
night after the bird was shot down,

1100
01:22:24.680 --> 01:22:28.880
and the weather was just absolutely awful. It was, you know, raining,

1101
01:22:29.119 --> 01:22:31.279
and it was windy, and we
were flying up into the mountains and

1102
01:22:31.319 --> 01:22:34.680
you couldn't see a thing out of
the bird, not one thing, and

1103
01:22:34.760 --> 01:22:39.840
it was having it was struggling to
get up into the mountains. So by

1104
01:22:39.880 --> 01:22:43.239
the time we got pretty close to
the mountain, we were starting to head

1105
01:22:43.279 --> 01:22:46.000
up the mountain, they actually pulled
us out. They they they were worried

1106
01:22:46.000 --> 01:22:50.560
about losing another bird. So we
went to Jabad or Jalalabad, and we

1107
01:22:50.640 --> 01:22:55.319
stayed the night and we were going
to try again the next night. And

1108
01:22:55.560 --> 01:22:59.159
as you can imagine, you know, a platoon full of rangers who was

1109
01:22:59.239 --> 01:23:02.359
told that you're going to help your
buddies, but we're going to pull you

1110
01:23:02.399 --> 01:23:11.399
because of weather. There was a
little bit of anger in that bird.

1111
01:23:12.000 --> 01:23:14.920
All of us were pissed off,
like, are you kidding me? Weather?

1112
01:23:15.039 --> 01:23:20.159
Drop us here, we'll walk in. But you know, commanders do

1113
01:23:20.199 --> 01:23:28.159
what commanders do, and they were
not willing to lose our bird. I

1114
01:23:28.239 --> 01:23:31.600
mean, at this point, you
don't know if Americans survived the crash,

1115
01:23:31.720 --> 01:23:35.359
if they're fighting off hostels like you
have no idea what's going on the ground

1116
01:23:35.439 --> 01:23:40.640
right now with this bird in the
people on it? Is that correct?

1117
01:23:41.000 --> 01:23:45.279
No, not at all. We
did get some word that there was a

1118
01:23:46.279 --> 01:23:51.439
strobe on the crash site and that
it was moving around, So you know,

1119
01:23:51.479 --> 01:23:55.119
they could be a couple of things. That could be someone who survived,

1120
01:23:55.560 --> 01:23:59.920
That could be the enemy gathering gear, there could be a lot of

1121
01:24:00.319 --> 01:24:02.920
so we didn't really think much of
it other than, hey, we might

1122
01:24:02.960 --> 01:24:10.199
have some people alive on the crash
site. So the next night is when

1123
01:24:10.199 --> 01:24:15.920
we actually did our actual infill,
and that was something that it's tough to

1124
01:24:15.960 --> 01:24:18.760
explain. I mean I wrote about
it, and I tried to explain as

1125
01:24:18.840 --> 01:24:24.359
best I could. But we did
one hundred and ten foot rope through some

1126
01:24:24.479 --> 01:24:28.520
fog and trees to the point where
when we were going to get on the

1127
01:24:28.560 --> 01:24:30.960
rope and you looked down, there
were no chem lights. So normally you

1128
01:24:30.960 --> 01:24:34.199
would look down, you'd see kim
lights. Right, it was so foggy

1129
01:24:34.199 --> 01:24:39.439
and we were so high up you
couldn't see a thing, so I didn't

1130
01:24:39.439 --> 01:24:42.039
even know how high we were.
I got on the rope and just held

1131
01:24:42.079 --> 01:24:46.960
on for dear life and was waiting
to hit the ground rating some of the

1132
01:24:47.640 --> 01:24:51.399
civilians out there. This is a
fast rope. We're talking about, like

1133
01:24:51.439 --> 01:24:56.079
a braided nylon rope that you can
grip like a fire hose, sort of

1134
01:24:56.399 --> 01:24:59.560
coming off of one of those back
of one of the forty seven's that you

1135
01:24:59.600 --> 01:25:03.079
can see behind Tony there on his
screen. And you're saying the rope was

1136
01:25:03.079 --> 01:25:06.199
one hundred and ten feet long,
which is much longer than we usually we

1137
01:25:06.479 --> 01:25:11.319
use, and that rope is just
descending into the fog below and disappearing.

1138
01:25:11.520 --> 01:25:15.520
You have no idea where the where
the bottom is. No, no one

1139
01:25:15.520 --> 01:25:18.359
did, I mean even even the
rope master when he when he got to

1140
01:25:18.399 --> 01:25:20.399
the rope, you know they go
and they give us the thumbs up.

1141
01:25:21.880 --> 01:25:28.840
He looked at us and did one
of these oh my god. No one

1142
01:25:28.920 --> 01:25:30.800
knew what that meant. We're like, what do you mean? No,

1143
01:25:31.880 --> 01:25:41.159
and then he went so wow balls. Yeah, yeah, that's amazing,

1144
01:25:41.199 --> 01:25:44.399
because again, you don't you don't
know, you can't see it. You

1145
01:25:44.439 --> 01:25:46.920
have no idea what's at the end
of that rope. If it's a big

1146
01:25:46.960 --> 01:25:49.840
hole, if it's a late I
mean, you just don't wear it.

1147
01:25:49.960 --> 01:25:54.439
Just an empty space. Yeah,
yeah, exactly. The side the edge

1148
01:25:54.439 --> 01:25:57.359
of a cliff wherever. He's like, what what? What was at the

1149
01:25:57.359 --> 01:26:01.039
bottom when you got down there?
It was logged. It was a logged

1150
01:26:01.079 --> 01:26:04.000
area. So there were a bunch
of trees laying down on their sides.

1151
01:26:06.439 --> 01:26:10.159
Because when I landed, I you
know, there was nothing to put my

1152
01:26:10.199 --> 01:26:13.520
feet on, so I flopped over. I was laying on the ground in

1153
01:26:13.600 --> 01:26:16.039
between trees that were down because you
know, the Afghans do a lot of

1154
01:26:16.079 --> 01:26:21.079
logging up in those parts, and
you know obviously that had recently been logged

1155
01:26:21.119 --> 01:26:28.199
because we were tree stumps and everything
else down there. But yeah, you

1156
01:26:28.199 --> 01:26:33.359
get to remember it's foggy, and
you have your night vision up right out

1157
01:26:33.359 --> 01:26:36.520
of the way. You don't flip
it down until you get to the bottom.

1158
01:26:38.239 --> 01:26:44.319
So we couldn't. I couldn't see
a thing. It was black.

1159
01:26:44.439 --> 01:26:47.199
If there's timber or logs down there. I mean, was there a pile

1160
01:26:47.279 --> 01:26:50.520
up because guys, obviously if you're
falling, you can't get out of the

1161
01:26:50.520 --> 01:26:57.000
way, and guys just start stacking. Yeah, it was like nothing.

1162
01:26:57.199 --> 01:27:01.159
I mean, it would be like
watching a circus. I mean, I'm

1163
01:27:01.239 --> 01:27:05.439
rolling around and I hear guys trying
to get up next to me and people

1164
01:27:05.520 --> 01:27:10.600
trying to run to the perimeter,
and obviously got senior guys like running up

1165
01:27:10.640 --> 01:27:13.760
there and grabbing people out of the
way because they were just coming down,

1166
01:27:14.000 --> 01:27:16.199
one after the other, the other, landing on each other. And and

1167
01:27:16.239 --> 01:27:19.840
we actually did have one. We
had one guy, our radio operator who

1168
01:27:19.920 --> 01:27:27.279
was you know, came burning in
like sure only imagine with his radio and

1169
01:27:27.600 --> 01:27:30.039
I don't know if he was unconscious
or not. But the next guy landed

1170
01:27:30.079 --> 01:27:34.000
right on him and compound fracture to
his arm. Oh my god, thank

1171
01:27:34.000 --> 01:27:39.840
god, you guys didn't have a
mortar team with you, you know,

1172
01:27:40.520 --> 01:27:44.119
Yeah, thank god we did have
mortars out there, but I don't know

1173
01:27:44.119 --> 01:27:48.760
if they I don't think they may
have had their sixty to be honest,

1174
01:27:50.039 --> 01:27:54.600
imagine. But you know, we
were we were loaded. We were loaded

1175
01:27:54.640 --> 01:27:59.199
down. They I mean, our
chinook was at weight with like twenty five

1176
01:27:59.239 --> 01:28:03.399
guys. And if you've you've ever
been on a chinook, you can get

1177
01:28:03.399 --> 01:28:08.239
a lot more than twenty five guys
on one and still fly easily. Yeah,

1178
01:28:08.279 --> 01:28:11.760
Well, we were at weight partly
because the elevation was so high,

1179
01:28:11.840 --> 01:28:15.880
right, but also because we had
I mean, we had to carry enough

1180
01:28:15.920 --> 01:28:17.239
body bags and I don't know if
you ever carried a body bag, a

1181
01:28:17.239 --> 01:28:21.760
military body bag, but they weighed
about twenty pounds. They're not light.

1182
01:28:24.199 --> 01:28:26.159
I couldn't believe it. The first
time I held it. I'm like,

1183
01:28:26.199 --> 01:28:31.800
what the heck is this lead?
But it's a really thick canvas, very

1184
01:28:31.880 --> 01:28:36.520
large bag. I didn't know.
So, yeah, it was news to

1185
01:28:36.560 --> 01:28:41.399
me. And we had to carry
these things. Yeah, that's morbid,

1186
01:28:41.439 --> 01:28:44.359
man, And you know what,
I'm sorry you guys had to deal with

1187
01:28:44.399 --> 01:28:46.279
all of that. I'm sure we'll
get into that a little bit. How

1188
01:28:46.319 --> 01:28:51.600
far was your route position from the
crash site? You know, I've been

1189
01:28:51.640 --> 01:28:55.239
able to look at it on a
map and I actually laughed because it was

1190
01:28:55.279 --> 01:29:01.319
like two miles, but it was
two miles on the map. With elevation

1191
01:29:01.520 --> 01:29:08.600
change, it was about six miles, and it it felt like twenty yeah,

1192
01:29:08.680 --> 01:29:14.319
because you know, you walk one
hundred meters and you've only on the

1193
01:29:14.399 --> 01:29:18.039
map on ten right, because you're
going after yeah, yeah, going straight

1194
01:29:18.119 --> 01:29:23.239
up. Yeah. And another issue
with this whole mission was the area we

1195
01:29:23.239 --> 01:29:27.319
were. We didn't even have proper
maps. We were using satellite imagery to

1196
01:29:27.840 --> 01:29:31.560
get to our location. And you
know, obviously the point man is trying

1197
01:29:31.600 --> 01:29:35.199
to make a route because they didn't
tell us where exactly where they were going

1198
01:29:35.279 --> 01:29:39.680
to land. It was we're going
to get as close to this point as

1199
01:29:39.680 --> 01:29:43.239
we can get, but we're going
to put you where we find an opening

1200
01:29:43.399 --> 01:29:45.159
or where something looks safe, and
we're just going to put you down.

1201
01:29:46.720 --> 01:29:49.039
And they didn't put us on exactly
where they said they were going to put

1202
01:29:49.119 --> 01:29:54.439
us. So it took us a
little bit to get oriented. And thank

1203
01:29:54.479 --> 01:29:58.039
goodness we had a good point man
because he led us directly to the crash

1204
01:29:58.039 --> 01:30:01.359
site right like spot on well,
and I imagine that they were worried about

1205
01:30:01.359 --> 01:30:03.840
another ambush, just like, hey, we were down one burden, there

1206
01:30:03.880 --> 01:30:08.359
will be another one coming. So
you know, they've got to put you

1207
01:30:08.439 --> 01:30:12.800
on the y or even you know
further out you know the Terran feature or

1208
01:30:12.800 --> 01:30:16.399
two away, so it's two miles
straight line distance on the map. You

1209
01:30:16.439 --> 01:30:20.199
guys start moving during the day,
or you could start moving at night,

1210
01:30:21.199 --> 01:30:25.359
middle of the night. So it
was it was you know, around midnight

1211
01:30:25.439 --> 01:30:28.920
that we hit the ground and your
your squad leader or team leader that was

1212
01:30:28.960 --> 01:30:30.680
the point man was Johnny on the
spot and took you right to the crash

1213
01:30:30.720 --> 01:30:38.039
site. Yeah, there were two
point guys that basically worked together. One

1214
01:30:38.079 --> 01:30:43.000
of them was Stargan Kandy of third
Platoon that we linked up with, and

1215
01:30:44.039 --> 01:30:47.159
he's just known for his line nab
skills. So thank you Kandy for putting

1216
01:30:47.199 --> 01:30:49.960
us on point. I know you're
probably going to watch us at some point.

1217
01:30:50.039 --> 01:30:58.439
So yeah, it's unbelievable that.
I mean, I learned land now.

1218
01:30:58.520 --> 01:31:00.560
Obviously I went to ranger school and
I was a team leader, so

1219
01:31:01.960 --> 01:31:06.800
I'm pretty good at land now,
but I this was something, something else.

1220
01:31:06.840 --> 01:31:11.600
This is a different world out there. And how long did it take

1221
01:31:11.640 --> 01:31:16.399
you to move? There's two miles
you know, we hit the crash site

1222
01:31:16.439 --> 01:31:23.439
at sunrise, so you can imagine
that that's a lot of several hours,

1223
01:31:23.920 --> 01:31:29.359
five to six hours walking. Yeah. No, Afghanistan is brutal, terrain,

1224
01:31:29.880 --> 01:31:33.640
brutal and carrying all that gear,
I mean the ever present question where

1225
01:31:33.680 --> 01:31:38.520
you guys were in body armor on
top of all that we were, Ye,

1226
01:31:39.039 --> 01:31:44.760
so that was another kind of lesson
learned about that is you don't bring

1227
01:31:44.800 --> 01:31:49.039
your plates. Yeah, so we
had body armor, which is uh,

1228
01:31:49.600 --> 01:31:56.119
we did drop our body armor the
next day when we after we recovered the

1229
01:31:56.920 --> 01:32:01.520
Chinook and they came in for the
recovery, we dropped our plates because we

1230
01:32:01.560 --> 01:32:04.199
were only wearing the front plate.
We were wearing the back one, thankfully,

1231
01:32:05.399 --> 01:32:09.479
So let's uh, let's get into
that. Then you know, bond

1232
01:32:09.600 --> 01:32:15.520
coms, you find yourselves at the
crash site, Ranger platoon arrives, what

1233
01:32:15.960 --> 01:32:20.079
ended up happening that morning, So
the first thing was to determine, Well,

1234
01:32:20.079 --> 01:32:24.520
the pjs were the first ones exactly
on the crash site, and they've

1235
01:32:24.560 --> 01:32:29.199
kind of led the charge on the
recovery. But they basically quickly came back

1236
01:32:29.199 --> 01:32:32.520
after they saw the crash site and
said, you know, there's no one

1237
01:32:32.560 --> 01:32:38.319
alive, so this is not a
rescue anymore. It's now a recovery.

1238
01:32:39.159 --> 01:32:42.039
And that was like you might you
might as well have just taken a you

1239
01:32:42.039 --> 01:32:44.640
know, a k bar and slammed
it in the side of my sidewall of

1240
01:32:44.680 --> 01:32:48.039
my car, you know, let
out the let out the air for sure.

1241
01:32:50.359 --> 01:32:56.079
And then basically from there it was
we need to recover everybody and find

1242
01:32:56.119 --> 01:33:02.119
all their equipment. So we kind
of staged and started that little sweep and

1243
01:33:02.600 --> 01:33:10.720
you found there were sixteen sixteen personnel
and you found fifteen of them like fairly

1244
01:33:10.800 --> 01:33:17.279
quickly, right correct, And then
it was I'd say within the first hour

1245
01:33:17.359 --> 01:33:24.760
or so, we had fifteen of
the sixteen accounted for, but we were

1246
01:33:24.760 --> 01:33:28.119
having a really tough time finding that
last person. Right, And I remember

1247
01:33:28.159 --> 01:33:30.760
how big a chinook is, right, you see it behind me? Yeah,

1248
01:33:30.800 --> 01:33:34.399
those are I mean those are bigger
than a city school bus or a

1249
01:33:34.880 --> 01:33:42.920
city bus. Right. And on
the ground there wasn't much left. And

1250
01:33:42.920 --> 01:33:45.479
there's a good photo in my book
that shows a few of the guys at

1251
01:33:45.560 --> 01:33:51.359
the remnants of turbine thirty three,
and the three guys covered the amount of

1252
01:33:51.399 --> 01:33:58.760
bird that was left. Yeah,
so it was definitely a site that you

1253
01:33:58.840 --> 01:34:01.079
just couldn't believe it, Like,
how is this Shanook? How is this

1254
01:34:01.159 --> 01:34:06.960
is Shanook? Unbelievable? It looked
like the whole side of the mountain was

1255
01:34:08.000 --> 01:34:13.159
basically burned up. Correct, Yeah, it was a huge fire. Obviously

1256
01:34:13.199 --> 01:34:16.520
a huge forest fire had occurred,
and yeah, everything was burned. And

1257
01:34:17.279 --> 01:34:20.920
you're not for the people who might
not be familiar with like a ceasart,

1258
01:34:21.079 --> 01:34:25.720
Like, you're not just looking for
the body in the sense that you don't

1259
01:34:25.720 --> 01:34:29.399
know if this person is out there
trying to escape in a vain right now.

1260
01:34:29.479 --> 01:34:31.680
You don't know if they've been captured. You have no, like,

1261
01:34:31.720 --> 01:34:39.279
if you can't find the body,
then it changes the entire equation for what

1262
01:34:39.319 --> 01:34:45.000
the next steps are. Yeah,
we were definitely worried that someone was on

1263
01:34:45.039 --> 01:34:49.560
the run, and so we're just
like, he's not here. Where is

1264
01:34:49.600 --> 01:34:54.600
he? Did they capture him?
Is he you know? Ian e ing

1265
01:34:54.760 --> 01:34:59.960
right now in the mountains. So
they said, all right, guys,

1266
01:35:00.880 --> 01:35:02.520
this is this is it. We've
gone on much more time. We got

1267
01:35:02.560 --> 01:35:06.239
to find the sixteenth guy. Yea. And it took it took some new

1268
01:35:06.279 --> 01:35:14.920
eyes from from the third platoon of
Charlie Company. And I'll be damned if

1269
01:35:15.039 --> 01:35:19.640
within like thirty minutes one of the
guys finds them in one of the burnt

1270
01:35:19.760 --> 01:35:26.439
areas. It was actually a down
tree that obviously fell after the forest fire,

1271
01:35:27.119 --> 01:35:31.000
and it was he was hidden kind
of under the tree. Yeah.

1272
01:35:31.039 --> 01:35:36.840
And I don't want to get too
gruesome or like yeah you know or anything,

1273
01:35:38.319 --> 01:35:42.960
you know, make the gory,
but it must have been an experience

1274
01:35:43.039 --> 01:35:48.680
for you guys, you know,
recovering these people that had been in a

1275
01:35:48.720 --> 01:35:54.399
schnip crash with a fire like it
much not have been easy for for everybody

1276
01:35:54.479 --> 01:35:59.800
involved. I mean no, I
would say you'd be surprised at how well

1277
01:35:59.840 --> 01:36:04.600
you would perform when you know these
are your buddies. You're moving pretty fast,

1278
01:36:04.880 --> 01:36:10.840
and you know you don't have time
to process your emotions really, so

1279
01:36:10.880 --> 01:36:14.720
you're really just working, work and
working. Now, after it's all done,

1280
01:36:14.760 --> 01:36:17.720
that's a different story. But in
the moment, actually, you know,

1281
01:36:17.880 --> 01:36:20.840
I think we were so motivated to
find these guys and get them home

1282
01:36:21.439 --> 01:36:28.840
that yeah, it's it's it's hard
to explain how you just get into this

1283
01:36:29.000 --> 01:36:31.680
robot mode, but I think a
lot of combat veterans watching understand, But

1284
01:36:32.439 --> 01:36:39.880
for the civilians, it's it's it's
one of those things that you you try

1285
01:36:39.920 --> 01:36:44.560
really hard to not show your emotions
when you're on the battlefield because you know

1286
01:36:44.600 --> 01:36:48.079
how it affects your buddies, and
then if everyone around you, so the

1287
01:36:48.119 --> 01:36:51.159
harder you work, the less chance
you have for any emotions to come out.

1288
01:36:51.479 --> 01:36:55.399
So I think that's kind of how
a lot of the spec Ops guys

1289
01:36:55.439 --> 01:36:59.359
operate. If you just keep working, there's nothing to think about. But

1290
01:36:59.560 --> 01:37:02.359
I mean, and also as hard
as difficult as that is, I mean,

1291
01:37:02.399 --> 01:37:06.159
you guys did the honorable thing and
recovered all sixteen of those personnel and

1292
01:37:06.239 --> 01:37:10.600
got back home. And you know, I don't think you or any of

1293
01:37:10.600 --> 01:37:13.239
the other guys out there. As
hard as that is to deal with,

1294
01:37:13.319 --> 01:37:16.439
you know, you all did the
right thing. Yeah, and I think

1295
01:37:16.479 --> 01:37:20.319
a lot what made it really easy, at least for me, was you

1296
01:37:20.319 --> 01:37:24.199
know, looking at these guys and
they were not much different than myself.

1297
01:37:24.279 --> 01:37:29.000
Right, there were most special operators
right there in front of us. And

1298
01:37:30.880 --> 01:37:32.760
what I kept telling myself was if
this was me, they'd be out doing

1299
01:37:32.800 --> 01:37:36.640
the same damn thing, right,
They'd be out there helping us, getting

1300
01:37:36.720 --> 01:37:40.399
us home to our family. So
I made it easy. And plus you

1301
01:37:40.439 --> 01:37:44.359
think about the families back home,
like they deserve their loved one to come

1302
01:37:44.359 --> 01:37:46.760
home, right, so there's a
lot of motivation, like to get them

1303
01:37:47.880 --> 01:37:56.680
home now during this time, do
you guys have sufficient like ISR and coverage

1304
01:37:56.840 --> 01:38:00.840
to make sure that you're not attacked
while while you're doing this. Yeah,

1305
01:38:01.039 --> 01:38:04.439
I don't think I've ever been on
a mission with more assets in the air.

1306
01:38:04.960 --> 01:38:08.840
You got to remember, and a
lot of people don't recognize this or

1307
01:38:08.880 --> 01:38:13.159
know this, but this was the
largest search and recovery operations since Vietnam,

1308
01:38:13.439 --> 01:38:16.039
and I think it's still to this
day. Is I think it was larger

1309
01:38:16.079 --> 01:38:23.800
than extortion. So we had multiple
air assets. I mean, I think

1310
01:38:23.800 --> 01:38:27.920
we had three at one point,
and that's unheard of. I mean,

1311
01:38:27.960 --> 01:38:30.680
you're lucky to have one thing on
station most of the time, but having

1312
01:38:30.760 --> 01:38:35.640
three different I mean, plus we
had fighters in the sky. I mean

1313
01:38:35.680 --> 01:38:41.520
it was intense. You knew it
was a big deal when you could pick

1314
01:38:41.520 --> 01:38:45.079
and choose which air asset you wanted
to use. Yeah, and you guys

1315
01:38:45.079 --> 01:38:48.239
had I guess the A tens were
kind of smacking dudes down as they were

1316
01:38:48.239 --> 01:38:51.560
trying to move towards you, so
they didn't even basically have a chance.

1317
01:38:53.840 --> 01:38:57.760
Correct. Yeah, we were actually, you know, recovering the crash site.

1318
01:38:58.079 --> 01:39:00.079
We had removed all of our gear, had our weapons set on the

1319
01:39:00.079 --> 01:39:03.159
ground, because when you're you know, we're doing a recovery, you don't

1320
01:39:03.159 --> 01:39:06.880
really you can't have any other extra
weight on you. You know, people

1321
01:39:06.920 --> 01:39:12.239
are heavy. So we had all
that stuff down and we hear cracking of

1322
01:39:12.279 --> 01:39:15.880
an AK and an airburst of an
RPG and we're like, up here we

1323
01:39:15.960 --> 01:39:19.800
go, they're here. So all
of us run over to our gear,

1324
01:39:19.880 --> 01:39:26.880
throw it on and get ready,
like getting ready to maneuver. And it

1325
01:39:27.000 --> 01:39:32.199
was looking back on it, it
happened so fast, like within minutes you

1326
01:39:32.199 --> 01:39:36.439
hear the a tens, you hear
them fire their rockets, and then you

1327
01:39:36.439 --> 01:39:44.880
hear over the radio, Yeah,
they're gone go back to work. They're

1328
01:39:44.920 --> 01:39:47.079
not going to be a problem.
You guys are gonna Yeah those eight tens.

1329
01:39:47.079 --> 01:39:50.479
When you hear that, Burt,
that's one of the greatest sounds in

1330
01:39:50.479 --> 01:39:56.039
the world. Yeah. I mean
they were using not only their their cannons,

1331
01:39:56.039 --> 01:39:58.800
but they were using rockets. They
were had the two seventy five millimeter

1332
01:39:59.359 --> 01:40:05.640
and those things are you know,
the flaschet rounds are They're huge. And

1333
01:40:06.840 --> 01:40:12.439
yeah, they basically littered that side
of the mountain. And I don't know

1334
01:40:12.479 --> 01:40:14.560
why these guys were firing at us, to be honest, They were like

1335
01:40:14.800 --> 01:40:19.279
a mile away, so we probably
wouldn't have seen them if they didn't start

1336
01:40:19.279 --> 01:40:27.079
shooting from too far. So you
get the remains of the seals and the

1337
01:40:27.079 --> 01:40:32.119
pilots recovered. What's the next step
to evact the bodies the remains the remains

1338
01:40:32.119 --> 01:40:36.479
out When do you start hearing about
this other patrol that's out there, an

1339
01:40:36.520 --> 01:40:42.079
American that's m I a kind of
what's what's the next step for your platoon

1340
01:40:42.119 --> 01:40:48.359
out there? It was almost immediately
when we finished recovery that we were told

1341
01:40:48.399 --> 01:40:54.079
we need to investigate some transponder hits
that were not you know, a few

1342
01:40:54.239 --> 01:40:59.880
like a mile away. So we
quickly got our gear on and headed out

1343
01:41:00.399 --> 01:41:06.600
on patrol. But you know,
we didn't know exactly still at that point,

1344
01:41:06.640 --> 01:41:10.640
we knew there were seals, but
we didn't know that they were the

1345
01:41:10.680 --> 01:41:14.680
recon element that was out there prior. We eventually learned that, I think

1346
01:41:14.680 --> 01:41:18.439
the next morning. We learned that
on our next patrol. But this is

1347
01:41:18.520 --> 01:41:25.479
Vietnam style patrolling that we joked that
we trained this way, you know,

1348
01:41:25.680 --> 01:41:28.760
during the Global War on Terror,
and then we actually did it. Now

1349
01:41:28.840 --> 01:41:32.159
we had had a we had a
Ranger School patrol base on my very first

1350
01:41:32.199 --> 01:41:36.079
mission, on my first deployment,
and so when I got to Ranger School,

1351
01:41:36.079 --> 01:41:38.920
It's actually kind of funny. When
I got to Ranger School, I

1352
01:41:38.960 --> 01:41:42.720
was like, oh, so this
is why we did this? Yeah,

1353
01:41:42.800 --> 01:41:46.319
you know, but yeah, we
we quickly right after recovery, we were

1354
01:41:46.319 --> 01:41:49.439
out moving again. So for the
recovery, did a bird? Did a

1355
01:41:49.439 --> 01:41:53.840
bird come in to do the recovery? How did you guys manage that?

1356
01:41:55.199 --> 01:42:00.800
Yeah? Essentially, the first sergeant
created an HLZ with a bunch of closest

1357
01:42:00.159 --> 01:42:10.159
and we waited until nightfall to bring
in a back another chinook to x fill

1358
01:42:10.199 --> 01:42:15.840
them that night. And and you
and you guys are like, well,

1359
01:42:15.840 --> 01:42:17.479
they get like, you're not getting
on the bird. You have a follow

1360
01:42:17.520 --> 01:42:21.399
on mission to go check out these
transponders. Yeah, we knew we weren't

1361
01:42:21.439 --> 01:42:29.000
leaving because we knew that there were
We hit the transponder patrol before the X

1362
01:42:29.039 --> 01:42:32.319
PHIL Actually oh really okay, Yeah, so it was right after we basically

1363
01:42:32.319 --> 01:42:35.560
lined them up for X pill and
it was still daytime. It was middle

1364
01:42:35.560 --> 01:42:41.560
of the day. So then we
did our follow on patrol shortly thereafter,

1365
01:42:42.840 --> 01:42:45.840
and we were beat We were beat
up. I couldn't believe it when they

1366
01:42:45.880 --> 01:42:49.800
sid ustart going on patrol. I
was thinking to myself, I don't know

1367
01:42:49.840 --> 01:42:55.600
about this. You know, all
of us are dehydrated and we're exhausted.

1368
01:42:55.640 --> 01:42:59.479
We walked all night, we you
know, recovered bodies all day and now

1369
01:42:59.520 --> 01:43:04.359
we're going on patrol. Yeah,
and so you guys are fanning out through

1370
01:43:04.680 --> 01:43:10.880
the mountains and the forest looking for
transponders. You initiated movement that night,

1371
01:43:12.520 --> 01:43:15.079
Yeah, it was actually middle of
the day, right after the recovery.

1372
01:43:15.359 --> 01:43:20.560
We headed out on this patrol and
UH Seal Team ten joined us. They

1373
01:43:20.640 --> 01:43:26.800
linked up with us and we patrolled
together. And when I say patrol,

1374
01:43:27.520 --> 01:43:30.840
uh, this this was not your
traditional type patrol. It was like,

1375
01:43:32.199 --> 01:43:35.199
you know, we had two guys
on the side of a goat trail and

1376
01:43:35.239 --> 01:43:39.960
we were booking it. We were
just running basically. It wasn't there was

1377
01:43:40.000 --> 01:43:45.239
no tactical movement here. Yeah,
we were asking for it essentially, and

1378
01:43:45.319 --> 01:43:48.880
we were told, you know,
the way we're moving, pretty likely we're

1379
01:43:48.880 --> 01:43:54.319
going to get in some bad firefight. So be ready because we're we're moving

1380
01:43:54.359 --> 01:43:58.680
fast and we're moving loud, and
we're not you know, in a proper

1381
01:44:00.199 --> 01:44:04.960
where this is not how you shouldn't
move. But speed was our our tool

1382
01:44:05.000 --> 01:44:10.560
at the time because we thought we
might have guys that are alive still right,

1383
01:44:10.680 --> 01:44:15.640
you're you're moving to potentially rescue other
Americans that are out. Yeah,

1384
01:44:15.680 --> 01:44:17.840
so we were I mean, it's
crazy. I mean, we don't we

1385
01:44:17.840 --> 01:44:21.960
don't even do this in a training
environment. This was like an old road

1386
01:44:21.960 --> 01:44:25.800
march where you're on the side of
the road and you're just booking down,

1387
01:44:25.800 --> 01:44:30.199
but it's a goat trail, and
yeah, the security was you know,

1388
01:44:30.239 --> 01:44:33.720
you did the best you could write. But really, for me, I

1389
01:44:33.760 --> 01:44:39.239
was trying to keep up the guy
in front of me. Yeah, so

1390
01:44:39.600 --> 01:44:42.279
if they start shooting at us,
we'll fight. How far did you have

1391
01:44:42.359 --> 01:44:46.520
to move to that first transponder hit? It was about a little over a

1392
01:44:46.520 --> 01:44:51.479
mile, but it was like straight
downhill into a valley, and so the

1393
01:44:51.520 --> 01:44:57.920
movement down wasn't too bad. Yeah. Yeah, coming back that that's a

1394
01:44:57.920 --> 01:45:02.199
different story. And was the transfer
are still there when you arrived? Nothing?

1395
01:45:02.279 --> 01:45:09.359
There was nothing we found nothing we
got to Yeah, it was just

1396
01:45:09.359 --> 01:45:15.680
an empty space where obviously they probably
made a radio transmission from that spot or

1397
01:45:15.720 --> 01:45:23.840
near it, or a SAT phone. We don't know exactly what caused this

1398
01:45:24.640 --> 01:45:30.399
intel but but no bootprints, no
bootprints in the mud, no expended brass,

1399
01:45:30.479 --> 01:45:35.279
nothing, nothing. We came up
completely empty. Then it was obviously

1400
01:45:35.279 --> 01:45:40.720
a huge disappointment. You know,
we just walked for nothing. We didn't

1401
01:45:40.760 --> 01:45:45.479
find our guys, so we were
told hurry up and get back. We

1402
01:45:45.560 --> 01:45:49.279
got to x fill these guys and
Sealt ten is going to go with them,

1403
01:45:50.079 --> 01:45:54.880
so they got to get back before
the bird does. So obviously at

1404
01:45:54.880 --> 01:45:58.159
that point, you know, we
were again basically running up the mountain.

1405
01:45:58.239 --> 01:46:01.520
At that point that was beat.
I was carrying the litter the sched cooat

1406
01:46:02.560 --> 01:46:08.640
and it's not that heavy, but
it is when you're going up a mountain.

1407
01:46:08.840 --> 01:46:13.319
Well, yeah, everything adds up. And you guys, I mean,

1408
01:46:13.319 --> 01:46:15.159
how are you doing on water by
this point in time, because even

1409
01:46:15.159 --> 01:46:19.079
where I'm like, what is it
a the two gallon or five gallons?

1410
01:46:19.720 --> 01:46:26.960
The camelbacks, I don't know how
even like I would have burned it through

1411
01:46:26.960 --> 01:46:30.920
that on the first movement to the
site and then working all day recovering bodies.

1412
01:46:31.720 --> 01:46:35.920
Do you guys have water left?
No, we were most I think

1413
01:46:35.960 --> 01:46:40.159
almost everyone was out of water.
I had like a little bit just to

1414
01:46:40.159 --> 01:46:45.760
wet my mouth, and it was
freaking me out because you know, the

1415
01:46:45.800 --> 01:46:47.359
one thing that you don't want to
happen is to run out of water.

1416
01:46:47.760 --> 01:46:51.039
Yeah, and being I was the
new private, right, I'm the young

1417
01:46:51.079 --> 01:46:54.520
guy, and I'm about to run
out of water, I'm like, oh

1418
01:46:54.760 --> 01:46:58.720
shit, yeah, I'm gonna have
to ask my team leader or the tab

1419
01:46:58.720 --> 01:47:00.560
aspect for it for water now.
And you don't know that everybody else is

1420
01:47:00.600 --> 01:47:05.560
already out too. Though just about
everybody was out. I don't think anyone

1421
01:47:05.600 --> 01:47:10.880
had anything more than like half a
bottle of water. Yeah, basically,

1422
01:47:10.960 --> 01:47:15.880
So, yeah, there was no
water at that point, and yeah,

1423
01:47:15.880 --> 01:47:19.199
we were booking it up that hill. Thankfully, the one sixtieth guys when

1424
01:47:19.199 --> 01:47:23.359
they came in to recover the bodies. Once we got up to the mountain,

1425
01:47:24.079 --> 01:47:29.720
they restocked us for a little bit
at least. Yeah. So now

1426
01:47:29.720 --> 01:47:32.720
it's snyeteime. So you guys have
been on the move and working hard,

1427
01:47:32.800 --> 01:47:39.640
like expending massive amounts of energy for
almost twenty four hours straight. Correct,

1428
01:47:39.720 --> 01:47:47.359
So it's time to go home.
No, no, no. They put

1429
01:47:47.439 --> 01:47:53.600
us back at HLZ up there,
and we created a patrol base and we

1430
01:47:53.720 --> 01:47:57.479
pulled security for the night because they
put us down for the night because they're

1431
01:47:57.520 --> 01:48:00.520
like, we're going to kill these
guys if we keep pushing them. Yeah,

1432
01:48:00.640 --> 01:48:03.039
they're basic out of water. They've
got to recover. But they said

1433
01:48:03.199 --> 01:48:08.159
in the morning, we're heading out
again. There's some other things we need

1434
01:48:08.199 --> 01:48:13.479
to do, and we're going to
drop some ordinance on this uh this uh,

1435
01:48:13.720 --> 01:48:18.640
this village nearby which we almost were
in the night before, and this

1436
01:48:18.680 --> 01:48:25.600
is apparently where Ahmasha had his ID
factory and they suspected him to be there.

1437
01:48:26.159 --> 01:48:29.560
So they were going to drop three
five hundred pound Jadams on this mud

1438
01:48:29.640 --> 01:48:34.800
hut. But it's weird. I
mean, it's odd to me that they're

1439
01:48:34.800 --> 01:48:42.680
going to drop ordinance on anything when
there's an American or at least you know

1440
01:48:42.960 --> 01:48:45.880
that there are possibly four Americans out
there alive that they don't know where they

1441
01:48:45.880 --> 01:48:51.359
are. True. Yes, as
I was in the patrol base that night,

1442
01:48:53.359 --> 01:48:57.079
me being the the young private I
was, I was a smart ranger,

1443
01:48:57.399 --> 01:49:00.319
so I always had these questions and
I always had, you know,

1444
01:49:00.039 --> 01:49:03.439
insight, and I was asking things
some of my team leader. Thankfully,

1445
01:49:03.479 --> 01:49:05.960
I had a good team leader who
actually answered them and didn't just yell at

1446
01:49:05.960 --> 01:49:11.880
me. But I said, I
asked him, I said, isn't it

1447
01:49:11.960 --> 01:49:16.399
weird that we're dropping bombs when we
don't know where our guys are? And

1448
01:49:16.479 --> 01:49:21.079
he just stared at me. Yeah, like no answer. He literally just

1449
01:49:21.119 --> 01:49:26.520
stared right through me, like I
want to answer you, but you don't

1450
01:49:26.520 --> 01:49:30.199
want to hear my answer, right
right? Well, I have an even

1451
01:49:30.239 --> 01:49:33.840
more obnoxious question, is why send
the Wrekie out on this facility if you're

1452
01:49:33.880 --> 01:49:38.720
just going to drop some bombs on
if you haven't heard from your Rekie team

1453
01:49:38.760 --> 01:49:42.800
and you don't need their input,
Just why didn't you anyway? Just throwing

1454
01:49:42.800 --> 01:49:45.319
that out there, Hey, teach
their own right, Yeah, well I'll

1455
01:49:45.359 --> 01:49:47.560
say this. You know, I
don't know if they if they had intel

1456
01:49:47.720 --> 01:49:53.640
on that building or not. Our
D was on the ground, so they

1457
01:49:53.680 --> 01:49:59.319
may very well have had eyes on
but we didn't get that information, so

1458
01:49:59.800 --> 01:50:02.800
I I want to assume everything.
But that was just my thoughts at the

1459
01:50:02.880 --> 01:50:06.000
moment, gotcha, Yeah, fair
enough. I did not know the r

1460
01:50:06.199 --> 01:50:10.319
D was on the ground, so
maybe they had confirmed so they were out

1461
01:50:10.319 --> 01:50:15.880
in another location. What were those
dudes up to? You know, I

1462
01:50:15.960 --> 01:50:18.279
don't know. We did link up
with them the next that day, so

1463
01:50:18.359 --> 01:50:25.000
that night we did link up with
them, so I don't know when they

1464
01:50:25.079 --> 01:50:28.720
arrived or where they came from.
They didn't come in with us. They

1465
01:50:28.760 --> 01:50:31.880
disappeared. I mean, Rekky doing
what Reky does, or does what already

1466
01:50:31.920 --> 01:50:36.319
does, right, they disappear.
So I wish I could get a hold

1467
01:50:36.359 --> 01:50:43.840
of some of those guys and find
out where they came from. But they

1468
01:50:43.840 --> 01:50:50.119
were definitely on the ground for sure. So now we're getting into day three.

1469
01:50:50.640 --> 01:50:56.600
Yeah, this was three days post
crash, but day two of us

1470
01:50:56.600 --> 01:50:59.600
on the ground, two of you
on the ground. The second morning,

1471
01:51:00.560 --> 01:51:03.640
how much water and what how much
water did did the bring you? Did

1472
01:51:03.640 --> 01:51:08.720
the recovery team bring you? Did
they restock you? Guys? They had

1473
01:51:08.760 --> 01:51:15.560
like three or four cases of water
like the Costco size basically, and we

1474
01:51:16.039 --> 01:51:18.359
burned through it right away. Oh
sure, I didn't last very long.

1475
01:51:20.000 --> 01:51:24.640
We grabbed a couple of bottles and
that's what we had. I drank one

1476
01:51:24.720 --> 01:51:28.760
during the night. I should have
had another looking back on it, but

1477
01:51:30.560 --> 01:51:33.479
we all had a couple of bottles
of water for the next day. That

1478
01:51:33.720 --> 01:51:39.039
when you say a bottle water,
you're just talking about like the little bottle

1479
01:51:39.039 --> 01:51:44.800
of water twelve ounce polar not like
a like the are the in a rack

1480
01:51:44.880 --> 01:51:46.960
the huge ones? Yeah, or
or not even the bottle, but like

1481
01:51:47.000 --> 01:51:53.720
a you know, like the fuel
can full of water. Nope, just

1482
01:51:53.760 --> 01:51:59.479
a little plastic bottles of water.
Well, you gotta love arms life sometimes.

1483
01:52:00.199 --> 01:52:01.399
I mean, I have a one
of my photos in the book is

1484
01:52:01.439 --> 01:52:05.640
actually shows you can see the trash
on the hl's east we just piled all

1485
01:52:05.720 --> 01:52:11.399
up. You can see the water
bottles sitting there. Yeah. What are

1486
01:52:11.399 --> 01:52:15.680
the temperatures like at this time you
know of year, like at night,

1487
01:52:15.760 --> 01:52:21.159
during the day, hillacious, I
mean during the day it's it's triple bidgets

1488
01:52:21.560 --> 01:52:27.680
and at night it gets into the
sixties. So you know, it doesn't

1489
01:52:27.680 --> 01:52:31.039
sound cold, but I'll tell you
what, when you've been sweating all day

1490
01:52:31.520 --> 01:52:34.319
and it gets down to sixty,
it feels like twenty. It feels like

1491
01:52:34.319 --> 01:52:38.279
it's freezing. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, I mean I was shivering.

1492
01:52:38.359 --> 01:52:41.680
I was like my teeth were chattering
in the morning. Had you guys,

1493
01:52:41.920 --> 01:52:44.279
with your lack of water, in
the temperature in the day and the work

1494
01:52:44.319 --> 01:52:46.319
in the moo, had you guys
have any had any heat casualties at this

1495
01:52:46.359 --> 01:52:55.279
point. Surprisingly, no one had
a keat casualty at that time, but

1496
01:52:55.399 --> 01:52:59.840
we did have guys that were near
their dropping point shortly thereafter. Sure,

1497
01:53:00.800 --> 01:53:05.119
so we're getting in it. So
that next morning, what was the what

1498
01:53:05.199 --> 01:53:10.000
was the next orders that you guys
got over the net? What came next

1499
01:53:10.000 --> 01:53:15.880
for the for the patrol. The
next was we are dropping ordinance and basically

1500
01:53:15.960 --> 01:53:19.039
you're going to chase the ordinance.
So what they did is they you know,

1501
01:53:19.079 --> 01:53:23.079
we heard the ordinance drop, We
felt it hit because it wasn't that

1502
01:53:23.159 --> 01:53:27.399
far away, and I mean it
shook that whole mountain. Yeah, three

1503
01:53:28.319 --> 01:53:32.560
pound bombs, it's a lot more
than I expected. I mean we were

1504
01:53:32.600 --> 01:53:38.039
about probably a mile a mile to
a mile and a half away and you

1505
01:53:38.039 --> 01:53:43.840
could feel it under your feet.
So as soon as they hit, we

1506
01:53:43.840 --> 01:53:46.960
were out chasing him because our job
now at that point was we need to

1507
01:53:47.000 --> 01:53:53.079
confirm we got our guy. And
at that point we still didn't know where

1508
01:53:53.079 --> 01:53:56.119
our seals were. We had no
clue. We didn't even know we were

1509
01:53:56.119 --> 01:53:59.079
going to go next. They were
just sending out patrols in different directions,

1510
01:53:59.840 --> 01:54:02.920
just trying to sweep the mountain as
much as they could. Yeah, what

1511
01:54:02.960 --> 01:54:05.720
the hell are you going to confirm
of the guy after you dropped three five

1512
01:54:05.800 --> 01:54:12.640
hundred pounders on him? You need
to ask. You need to ask the

1513
01:54:12.680 --> 01:54:15.920
commanders above our level, I mean
even our commander. When we got there,

1514
01:54:16.560 --> 01:54:20.720
he said, so what do you
want us to do? Yeah?

1515
01:54:20.800 --> 01:54:26.439
Yeah, this was a building and
now it's a field full of cement and

1516
01:54:27.680 --> 01:54:32.520
grass and dirt. And they said, b and behold, I need you

1517
01:54:32.520 --> 01:54:41.800
guys to s sc that site.
So so SSC made sensitive sight exploitation.

1518
01:54:42.000 --> 01:54:45.880
And it means like if you go
into a house, didn't you search everything

1519
01:54:45.920 --> 01:54:47.199
in the house, you take all
the documents, you take a few They

1520
01:54:47.239 --> 01:54:53.079
are like you search everything, And
basically they want you to do this to

1521
01:54:53.079 --> 01:54:58.439
to a pile of rubble, a
pile of rebel. I mean, to

1522
01:54:58.439 --> 01:55:00.039
be honest, it didn't even look
like a pile of rebel looked like to

1523
01:55:00.159 --> 01:55:05.920
me. It was like a farm
field with some chunks of like rock and

1524
01:55:06.039 --> 01:55:13.399
cement and dirt and clay. Didn't
seem like a building at all. Right,

1525
01:55:15.159 --> 01:55:17.399
were they doing this to target on
that shot? Did they expect you?

1526
01:55:17.600 --> 01:55:20.680
I mean, did they send you
in with a handy rapid DNA like

1527
01:55:21.079 --> 01:55:29.000
sniffer that could pull all the DNA
odor from the now we had nothing,

1528
01:55:29.119 --> 01:55:32.000
like nothing of the sorts. I
think they wanted us to find a body,

1529
01:55:33.079 --> 01:55:41.279
which really three five hundred pound bombs, come on. But you know,

1530
01:55:41.520 --> 01:55:44.560
before we even got to that,
you know that patrolled down to that

1531
01:55:45.079 --> 01:55:49.920
location was Yeah, it was downhill, but it was some of the most

1532
01:55:49.960 --> 01:55:54.239
relacious train we saw. The whole
time. We were sliding on our rear

1533
01:55:54.359 --> 01:56:00.960
ends down this mountain, you know, and it was wide open. I

1534
01:56:00.960 --> 01:56:03.640
mean, we're sliding on our butts
on the hillside. Basically, if someone

1535
01:56:03.640 --> 01:56:09.760
had an RpK, they could have
picked off a rangeable tune I mean easily.

1536
01:56:10.119 --> 01:56:14.079
Yeah, So to get down to
that site. You know, we're

1537
01:56:14.079 --> 01:56:17.199
basically running, sliding on our butts, and then we get there we find

1538
01:56:17.279 --> 01:56:26.600
this this complete mess of a jade
m site. That are our commander who

1539
01:56:26.680 --> 01:56:30.279
is now general work. He he
basically said, are you sending us heavy

1540
01:56:30.319 --> 01:56:38.319
equipment? Because that's what it's gonna
take we have we don't have gloves,

1541
01:56:38.359 --> 01:56:41.199
like, we don't have gloves to
do this. We have shooting gloves.

1542
01:56:41.479 --> 01:56:47.520
Right, So what did what did
your SSE consist of while you were there?

1543
01:56:49.960 --> 01:56:57.119
That is pretty awesome. Yeah,
I was you see anything? No,

1544
01:56:57.279 --> 01:57:00.800
you don't, Okay, really there
was no SSS. It was impossible.

1545
01:57:00.840 --> 01:57:05.560
There was nothing to s s.
You know. We started moving rocks

1546
01:57:05.600 --> 01:57:12.760
around and it was a complete waste
of time, but we did find actually

1547
01:57:13.039 --> 01:57:17.840
a hand. There was a hand
and my one of my team leaders of

1548
01:57:17.880 --> 01:57:21.760
my squad was poking at it with
a stick. Come look at this,

1549
01:57:21.840 --> 01:57:28.880
guys, look at what we got. Pretty horrific to see a hand,

1550
01:57:29.520 --> 01:57:32.439
especially when you get up to it
and you look down and the hand looks

1551
01:57:32.479 --> 01:57:40.439
awfully small. You know, it
was I would say, best case scenario

1552
01:57:40.560 --> 01:57:45.319
is a teenager or a little person. Maybe it was a little person,

1553
01:57:45.439 --> 01:57:51.479
you know, the the infamous bidget
it's possible. Yeah, So I was

1554
01:57:51.479 --> 01:57:55.840
a little disheartening. You know,
you don't go to war to see potential

1555
01:57:55.880 --> 01:58:00.359
civilian casualties. That's not what you
want. No one wants that. So

1556
01:58:00.439 --> 01:58:02.199
that was my first thought actually,
is like, oh man, we killed

1557
01:58:02.199 --> 01:58:05.960
some civilians. This is horrible.
So we were all sitting around thinking,

1558
01:58:06.560 --> 01:58:11.399
uh, we just killed civilians.
Great, right, that's freaking awesome.

1559
01:58:12.039 --> 01:58:16.159
But years later I found out from
my platoon leader, who actually went back

1560
01:58:16.159 --> 01:58:24.640
to the same village as a company
commander. Actually he left that he left

1561
01:58:24.720 --> 01:58:30.159
Red Wings and became company commander for
the company that was in the documentary Restrepoh.

1562
01:58:30.760 --> 01:58:38.159
We watched that that was his next
deployment, pretty unbelievable. And he

1563
01:58:38.279 --> 01:58:43.800
found out that actually that Jadam actually
killed a bunch of insurgents, so it

1564
01:58:43.880 --> 01:58:48.600
wasn't it wasn't a civilian casualty like
I thought. So that was a little

1565
01:58:48.600 --> 01:58:51.960
bit refreshing. But you know,
I lived at like ten years of my

1566
01:58:53.000 --> 01:58:57.000
life thinking that I saw a bunch
of civilians secular, right, And I

1567
01:58:57.039 --> 01:58:59.760
mean up to this point, like, you guys haven't been in combat,

1568
01:58:59.840 --> 01:59:02.039
so you haven't had that. I
don't want to say release, but sort

1569
01:59:02.039 --> 01:59:10.840
of that active part you've had,
you've recovered bodies, which was probably or

1570
01:59:10.960 --> 01:59:14.880
had some emotional you know weight,
and then you go and you think,

1571
01:59:15.079 --> 01:59:18.000
you know, you feel as though
we just jdamned civilians, which has emotional

1572
01:59:18.039 --> 01:59:24.039
weight. And I mean, is
does this feel like a heavy op for

1573
01:59:24.079 --> 01:59:28.159
you, especially since you haven't been
in combat yet? Yeah? For me,

1574
01:59:28.239 --> 01:59:31.039
it was like, I honestly,
this was the moment. You know

1575
01:59:31.159 --> 01:59:33.640
Jack was mentioned earlier, is this
you were living the dream? Right?

1576
01:59:33.880 --> 01:59:36.680
This is what you thought it would
be? No, well, that's the

1577
01:59:36.760 --> 01:59:41.640
moment I had. It was basically
right after that that night, after that

1578
01:59:41.760 --> 01:59:45.039
Jay Damn site, I was sitting
there and you know, talking to one

1579
01:59:45.079 --> 01:59:50.640
of the team leaders and basically it
was like, is this what you thought

1580
01:59:50.680 --> 01:59:55.399
war was going to be? Like? No, this is nothing. This

1581
01:59:55.479 --> 02:00:00.119
is this is nothing that I thought
it was gonna be like. And it

1582
02:00:00.119 --> 02:00:01.640
it was. I mean, the
whole mission was a complete failure, right,

1583
02:00:02.119 --> 02:00:04.840
Like we wouldn't even know about this
mission if it was a success.

1584
02:00:05.359 --> 02:00:10.600
Right. So the whole point we're
talking the reason the only reason we're talking

1585
02:00:10.600 --> 02:00:15.239
about this is because it was like
one of the most epic failures in specop's

1586
02:00:15.279 --> 02:00:19.760
history. So you know, We're
sitting there on the mountain and I'm just

1587
02:00:19.800 --> 02:00:24.760
thinking, okay, so we know
sixteen guys are dead, we killed some

1588
02:00:24.840 --> 02:00:29.239
civilians. We still haven't found our
navy seals, and I haven't eaten and

1589
02:00:29.359 --> 02:00:34.079
we're out of water. This fucking
sucks, you know, this is like,

1590
02:00:34.479 --> 02:00:39.159
this is horrible, and so now
where's the fighting? Where's the glory?

1591
02:00:39.560 --> 02:00:42.000
Right? And now it's time,
of course, for you guys to

1592
02:00:42.000 --> 02:00:44.920
get on the bird and go home
for hot sandwiches and soup, right,

1593
02:00:45.279 --> 02:00:48.520
you know, I wish you know, at that point, we were starting

1594
02:00:48.560 --> 02:00:54.279
to have heat casualties. People were
starting to fall out and docks running around

1595
02:00:54.279 --> 02:01:00.960
with ivs and it was a mess. And I'm sitting there joking with one

1596
02:01:00.960 --> 02:01:02.560
of the guys, is about to
be heat casualty. I asked him,

1597
02:01:02.560 --> 02:01:08.880
wouldn't be nice if they air dropped
some pizza And he didn't like that because

1598
02:01:08.880 --> 02:01:11.359
he was about to come to find
out, he was about to pass out.

1599
02:01:13.079 --> 02:01:17.920
So, you know, we finally
got a resupply that night, but

1600
02:01:18.319 --> 02:01:24.479
that was another ship show. Was
they went to go air drop us water

1601
02:01:24.560 --> 02:01:28.199
and food and they dropped it a
valley over Oh god, oh shit.

1602
02:01:29.279 --> 02:01:32.119
And We're like you've got to be
kidding me. Yeah, Like we've walked

1603
02:01:32.119 --> 02:01:36.279
for twenty four hours, like we're
not going to get it. Yeah,

1604
02:01:35.920 --> 02:01:40.680
And the one that landed near us, the shoote never opened and it burned

1605
02:01:40.680 --> 02:01:45.199
in so half of the stuff that
exploded. Yeah, So we were I'm

1606
02:01:45.279 --> 02:01:50.479
drinking out of these like broken water
bottles that were half full and we're just

1607
02:01:50.560 --> 02:01:56.079
chugging these things, and they resplied
us the next day. Finally we ended

1608
02:01:56.159 --> 02:02:00.159
up getting food and water. But
it was on the way down to that

1609
02:02:00.279 --> 02:02:03.680
Jadam site that we heard that there
was new intel. That's when we kind

1610
02:02:03.680 --> 02:02:11.760
of heard about the Seals. So
three Charlie was on our way down was

1611
02:02:11.800 --> 02:02:17.079
sent to a village to search for
what we were hurt. We heard was

1612
02:02:17.640 --> 02:02:21.000
an American. They had an American. They were kind of chattering on the

1613
02:02:21.079 --> 02:02:27.239
radio and someone had come into a
local base and said, we have an

1614
02:02:27.279 --> 02:02:32.159
American in our village. So three
Charlie basically started running to that village while

1615
02:02:32.199 --> 02:02:36.199
we were on our way down to
that Jadam That was the only glimmer of

1616
02:02:36.199 --> 02:02:43.840
hope I think we had for the
first two or three days there. But

1617
02:02:44.479 --> 02:02:50.840
we also heard shortly after the ssee
that they found they found somebody. They

1618
02:02:50.880 --> 02:02:58.079
literally found a live American. And
I can't even explain what that felt like.

1619
02:02:58.479 --> 02:03:03.359
After all that negativity and all that
failure that we all felt, It's

1620
02:03:03.399 --> 02:03:10.279
like, holy shit, that someone
survived all this. And yeah, it

1621
02:03:10.319 --> 02:03:14.520
was like a we were like partying
and you guys got high five and yeah,

1622
02:03:15.319 --> 02:03:18.159
and and not only did they survive, you guys being out there having

1623
02:03:18.199 --> 02:03:23.720
gone through all that, you guys
were on you know, close enough to

1624
02:03:23.880 --> 02:03:28.560
actually go and get him. Yeah
he was. He was not that far,

1625
02:03:28.680 --> 02:03:31.079
I mean far considering all the injuries
and stuff that he went through.

1626
02:03:31.520 --> 02:03:35.199
And I can't believe he made it
that far, to be honest, but

1627
02:03:35.279 --> 02:03:39.479
I guess, you know, adrenaline
douzzle crazy things to the human body.

1628
02:03:40.640 --> 02:03:45.479
Let's actually get to some questions before
so it comes to answer to some questions

1629
02:03:45.479 --> 02:03:48.720
and then we'll get back into this. Okay, Jackson, thank you very

1630
02:03:48.800 --> 02:03:53.560
much for Tony, Jack and Dave. Where do you all see the future

1631
02:03:53.560 --> 02:03:57.840
of Ranger Ragiment headed in a perfect
world? What would be the next evolution

1632
02:03:58.039 --> 02:04:04.520
of the seventy fifth Tony take it
away. I mean, I think they've

1633
02:04:04.600 --> 02:04:12.119
kind of already molded into this counter
terrorism type force that is new to them.

1634
02:04:12.479 --> 02:04:19.560
They went from you know, airfield
seizures to to these direct action raids,

1635
02:04:19.560 --> 02:04:27.039
and I think that's the right path
given there's so many urban centers in

1636
02:04:27.079 --> 02:04:30.239
the world. If we're going to
Oregon, we're going to need that large

1637
02:04:30.359 --> 02:04:35.760
urban force to go door to door
and fight. I mean, it's urban

1638
02:04:35.760 --> 02:04:42.159
warfare is the future. Yeah,
I think the Ranger Regiment, you know,

1639
02:04:42.199 --> 02:04:45.600
they build themselves. They call themselves
America's premier raid force, So that

1640
02:04:45.680 --> 02:04:50.239
kind of says it all right there
what they see their future as. So

1641
02:04:50.560 --> 02:04:56.199
that's definitely not going away. I
mean I was there, so I can't

1642
02:04:56.239 --> 02:04:59.920
speak to it so much now that
I was there when it was you know,

1643
02:05:00.079 --> 02:05:03.520
airfield seizures, when it was patrol
base, and when it was making

1644
02:05:03.600 --> 02:05:09.199
the change into the CQB and things
like that, And there were a lot

1645
02:05:09.199 --> 02:05:13.399
of people at Ranger Battality that resisted
that they didn't want them to go that

1646
02:05:13.520 --> 02:05:16.399
way. So we were, you
know, kind of serving two masters.

1647
02:05:16.439 --> 02:05:18.560
You know. One, you get
in your RSAD, you know, your

1648
02:05:18.680 --> 02:05:23.840
Ranger whatever it was vehicle and go
out and sit in a barasuit on a

1649
02:05:23.880 --> 02:05:28.479
cold ass airfield in the morning after
you know whatever. And then you know

1650
02:05:28.479 --> 02:05:32.520
and then you'd go, do you
know, updrills and you know, mozambiques

1651
02:05:32.600 --> 02:05:38.399
and stuff, you know, on
the range or the shoe house. When

1652
02:05:38.439 --> 02:05:42.359
I worked with Rangers or you know, in Afghanistan, Iraq, they had

1653
02:05:42.399 --> 02:05:47.760
become later on, they'd become so
professionalized where they could become dog hammers,

1654
02:05:47.800 --> 02:05:50.640
they could become you know, the
interrogator. I mean, they just had

1655
02:05:50.680 --> 02:05:55.520
a lot more going on, which
I think is fantastic. Now it's like

1656
02:05:55.560 --> 02:05:58.920
a little army within an army.
Yeah. No, I think that's fantastic.

1657
02:05:59.039 --> 02:06:00.920
But you guys have is know a
lot more than I do about that.

1658
02:06:01.479 --> 02:06:05.439
And then Jackson again, what was
the most professional unit you worked with?

1659
02:06:06.079 --> 02:06:11.960
Rangers seem to always talk highly of
Delta, Air Force, Special Operations

1660
02:06:11.960 --> 02:06:17.680
Command and HRT. Did you work
with any of them? Yeah, I

1661
02:06:17.880 --> 02:06:20.479
personally worked with all of them.
I mean I worked with Seal Team six,

1662
02:06:20.720 --> 02:06:28.640
HRT. I worked with the Delta, the PJS, the GUYSJS obviously.

1663
02:06:28.720 --> 02:06:30.239
Yeah. And I would say the
two that stood out to me the

1664
02:06:30.239 --> 02:06:35.760
most one being Delta far and away
I think the best counter terrorism force out

1665
02:06:35.760 --> 02:06:42.640
there, and the other one is
the PJS. Those guys you talk about

1666
02:06:42.680 --> 02:06:45.600
knowing your job inside out, those
guys are amazing, So I give a

1667
02:06:45.640 --> 02:06:53.760
lot of props to those guys.
Jackson, thank you again. How critical

1668
02:06:53.760 --> 02:06:59.520
were other soft elements of this of
the Seal? Oh? How critical as

1669
02:06:59.560 --> 02:07:05.000
in like critical were the other soft
elements of the seals plans for the Rockie

1670
02:07:05.000 --> 02:07:11.399
of Ahmed Shah all due respect?
Was their pushback on their planning ability?

1671
02:07:13.760 --> 02:07:16.640
No, I don't know the full
details of that. I think this has

1672
02:07:16.640 --> 02:07:23.079
been written about. I think Ed
Derek covered this in his book and it's

1673
02:07:24.279 --> 02:07:28.560
I think a lot of the soft
community actually didn't want to do this mission,

1674
02:07:29.279 --> 02:07:35.359
and the only people that actually accepted
it was the Seals. So I

1675
02:07:35.399 --> 02:07:39.520
think that that was the pushback was, now, this doesn't seem like a

1676
02:07:39.520 --> 02:07:44.239
good idea for our guys, so
all it takes is one commander to say

1677
02:07:44.319 --> 02:07:47.479
yes, right, right right.
I think there were some people that told

1678
02:07:47.520 --> 02:07:49.760
this pulled the Seals, that it
wasn't a good idea. That you know,

1679
02:07:49.800 --> 02:07:54.600
that's one opinion, and the Seals
had their opinion, so you know,

1680
02:07:56.359 --> 02:08:01.279
yeah, I think the marine the
Marine commander is in particular advice that

1681
02:08:01.319 --> 02:08:05.199
they should have more more marines on
the ground when nearby when they're doing this

1682
02:08:05.239 --> 02:08:09.159
recky mission. Because of the terrain, and I don't I think they said,

1683
02:08:09.199 --> 02:08:13.279
no, we're going and we're going
by ourselves. Alejandra, thank you,

1684
02:08:13.319 --> 02:08:18.279
buddy. Hey Tony was talking to
him mutual our ranger Beddy of ours.

1685
02:08:18.680 --> 02:08:22.720
He wanted me to ask you to
tell stories of bush diving and bac

1686
02:08:22.000 --> 02:08:31.199
and rip ha ha ha too.
That's uh yeah, that's I think I

1687
02:08:31.279 --> 02:08:35.279
know who who who asked that question. Felipe, I know that's you.

1688
02:08:37.600 --> 02:08:43.880
Essentially, we used to get a
little rowdy on the weekends and I fell

1689
02:08:43.880 --> 02:08:50.760
into a bush on a walk back
to a motel, and you know,

1690
02:08:50.640 --> 02:08:54.600
it tripped up your own feet because
you had one too many and the bush

1691
02:08:54.680 --> 02:09:01.399
was the softest bush I had ever
fell into. So so every time we

1692
02:09:01.399 --> 02:09:03.800
would go back to this motel on
the weekend, we would jump into it,

1693
02:09:05.720 --> 02:09:11.159
and so we called it butsch divingers
being rangers. Yeah, exactly.

1694
02:09:11.920 --> 02:09:16.800
Dicky's discords dailies. Thank you.
Oh I didn't get a notification my malfunction.

1695
02:09:16.119 --> 02:09:18.800
Yeah, sorry about that. Hit
the little bell icon and select all

1696
02:09:18.880 --> 02:09:24.039
notifications. Yeah, Tip and Alejandro, thanks again, buddy for afghan portion.

1697
02:09:24.880 --> 02:09:31.760
What was talking with Philippe? Was
talking with Philippe p He mentioned during

1698
02:09:31.760 --> 02:09:35.560
the insertion almost fast roping off the
side of a cliff. L He mentioned

1699
02:09:35.600 --> 02:09:39.920
you had a guy land on you
while roping in injured your arm, and

1700
02:09:39.000 --> 02:09:43.960
Charlie Mike, Yeah, so I
wasn't the one who was injured, but

1701
02:09:46.720 --> 02:09:50.000
yeah, I mean it was a
bunch of trees. Yeah. And we

1702
02:09:50.000 --> 02:09:54.760
were very close to a to a
cliff, thankfully, not super close,

1703
02:09:54.800 --> 02:10:00.319
but close enough. And Bert was
the guy specialist Burt, a radio operator,

1704
02:10:00.359 --> 02:10:05.840
broke his arm. Uh. John
Dugan, thank you very much.

1705
02:10:05.000 --> 02:10:09.039
No segue for ball trimmers, awkward. Next time, we'll get you.

1706
02:10:09.199 --> 02:10:13.000
We'll we got, we got you, don't worry about it. Uh uh

1707
02:10:13.039 --> 02:10:16.960
and then uh b p a is
he thank you very much for the donation.

1708
02:10:18.119 --> 02:10:20.640
I don't see a question. And
if so, let's uh, let's

1709
02:10:20.680 --> 02:10:24.920
talk about the recovery. Then you
guys on the ground had gotten word that

1710
02:10:26.760 --> 02:10:31.680
an American has been found. What
was the next step for for your platoon?

1711
02:10:33.680 --> 02:10:39.119
After you know, they found Marcus
and that was three Charlie that found

1712
02:10:39.199 --> 02:10:43.720
Marcus. They but basically the next
job was, you know, where's your

1713
02:10:43.720 --> 02:10:46.079
where's the rest of your team?
You know, we know there's four of

1714
02:10:46.079 --> 02:10:52.039
you, so where's the rest of
your team, and you know Marcus,

1715
02:10:52.039 --> 02:10:56.319
Marcus did his best and he basically
gave us a decent area to go search,

1716
02:10:56.840 --> 02:10:58.600
and it took a took a quite
quite a bit of time to find

1717
02:11:00.199 --> 02:11:03.560
the rest of his team. So
our job then was we need to get

1718
02:11:03.560 --> 02:11:07.760
the rest of these guys. But
he quickly told us that, you know,

1719
02:11:07.800 --> 02:11:11.399
they're dead, so he knew that
it was there was no rescue,

1720
02:11:11.920 --> 02:11:16.079
it was, it was recovery.
So so Marcus told three Charlie an area

1721
02:11:16.159 --> 02:11:20.880
to search. That got radioed over
to your platoon, and then you went

1722
02:11:20.960 --> 02:11:24.520
searched the area. If I'm understanding
right. No, it was really close

1723
02:11:24.520 --> 02:11:26.199
to where three Charlie was and they
actually got it. Okay, gotcha.

1724
02:11:26.319 --> 02:11:31.960
But but we we were still doing
you know, presence patrols, hoping to

1725
02:11:33.119 --> 02:11:35.920
dry out you know, a mud
shot and his boys in case they were

1726
02:11:35.920 --> 02:11:39.079
still around. So that's what we
were basically doing at that point. So

1727
02:11:39.439 --> 02:11:43.000
one of the things I noticed in
your book was that La Troll was very

1728
02:11:43.000 --> 02:11:50.199
concerned about how many guys, uh, three Charlie had with them because,

1729
02:11:50.960 --> 02:11:56.119
you know, they he they had
been under siege and he felt like that

1730
02:11:56.119 --> 02:11:58.640
they were gonna He was worried that
you guys are going to be outgunned,

1731
02:11:58.720 --> 02:12:03.359
right, Yeah, I mean the
element that he came in contact with was

1732
02:12:03.399 --> 02:12:07.000
pretty small that he saw. Now
there were more guys, but they were

1733
02:12:07.079 --> 02:12:11.640
kind of hidden around the village.
So his concern was, you know,

1734
02:12:11.880 --> 02:12:15.680
they've got a lot more guys than
we do. You better have more,

1735
02:12:15.840 --> 02:12:18.479
Like he never really said that.
He just kept asking, you know,

1736
02:12:18.039 --> 02:12:22.720
how many guys do you have?
How many guys you have? And Lieutenant

1737
02:12:22.720 --> 02:12:28.479
English, who was the guy who
was basically interviewing him, a former enlisted

1738
02:12:28.520 --> 02:12:35.039
guy and CAG and a green Beret, just an amazing guy, he suspected,

1739
02:12:35.520 --> 02:12:37.720
is what he told me. So
I just want to say that,

1740
02:12:37.920 --> 02:12:45.039
you know, Lieutenant English has since
passed from cancer, so this was interviews.

1741
02:12:45.479 --> 02:12:48.600
Yeah, I mean, what a
great, amazing human. So I

1742
02:12:48.640 --> 02:12:54.479
just want to say that I interviewed
him shortly before he died years ago,

1743
02:12:54.800 --> 02:13:00.039
and this was before I decided I
was actually gonna write a book. And

1744
02:13:00.079 --> 02:13:07.680
he basically said he suspected that the
handlers that were with Marcus were waiting to

1745
02:13:07.760 --> 02:13:11.119
know exactly how many men they had, waiting for English to say something so

1746
02:13:11.119 --> 02:13:16.239
that he could, you know,
tell his buddies. So English never told

1747
02:13:16.319 --> 02:13:20.079
him how many guys they had.
He just kept saying enough, we have

1748
02:13:20.239 --> 02:13:26.079
enough. So, you know,
we were still skeptical that you know,

1749
02:13:26.479 --> 02:13:31.800
these villagers were protecting him, right
right, I think rightfully? So yeah,

1750
02:13:31.680 --> 02:13:39.920
interesting, So what happened? So
what happened in terms of the gears

1751
02:13:39.000 --> 02:13:46.399
turning above you when Pre Charlie calls
back to command like Jack bought, like,

1752
02:13:46.439 --> 02:13:50.119
we we have one? I mean, was the whole world moving for

1753
02:13:50.159 --> 02:13:58.039
you at that point in terms of
military logistics and everything you needed? Oh

1754
02:13:58.119 --> 02:14:01.239
yeah, I mean it was.
Yeah, we had supplies at that point,

1755
02:14:01.880 --> 02:14:07.359
we had other units moving towards us. We had a marine unit that

1756
02:14:07.439 --> 02:14:11.840
was moving to us on foot,
so reinforcements are on the way. And

1757
02:14:11.920 --> 02:14:15.239
then the next part of the mission
was okay, we got to find the

1758
02:14:15.239 --> 02:14:20.319
rest of this team, and it
was you know, we knew they weren't

1759
02:14:20.319 --> 02:14:24.920
alive, so it was it slowed
down dramatically at that point. It was

1760
02:14:24.960 --> 02:14:28.560
like to a crawl. There's no
more running around. Now. Now we're

1761
02:14:28.600 --> 02:14:35.600
doing legit like patrols where we're drawn
to contact. We're trying to try to

1762
02:14:35.640 --> 02:14:43.359
make contact and assault the enemy.
And of course they were long gone because

1763
02:14:43.439 --> 02:14:46.000
they're they're smarter than that. I
mean, look, what's happening. I

1764
02:14:46.159 --> 02:14:48.720
think, what's happening right now?
As soon as we left, what happened?

1765
02:14:50.239 --> 02:14:54.119
Yeah, Now at that time,
are you are you guys out there

1766
02:14:54.119 --> 02:15:00.600
and basically a company size element?
We were we were in a tuned minus

1767
02:15:00.600 --> 02:15:03.319
element at my my location. Well, I mean we split up, Okay,

1768
02:15:03.680 --> 02:15:09.000
That's what I mean. Is like
with England, with with everybody,

1769
02:15:09.199 --> 02:15:13.000
if you would have consolidated about how
many people did you have at that point?

1770
02:15:13.399 --> 02:15:18.840
There was about a company arrangers out
there. I mean there were two

1771
02:15:18.880 --> 02:15:24.199
platoons from Charlie Company, one platoon
from Bravo Company, and of course all

1772
02:15:24.239 --> 02:15:28.760
the other elements that were out there, you know Pj's, you had elements

1773
02:15:28.760 --> 02:15:35.239
of Seal Team ten, you had
r D, we had Green Berets,

1774
02:15:35.439 --> 02:15:41.319
we had marines that were also in
the area. So I would say total

1775
02:15:41.439 --> 02:15:45.560
probably two full companies of people.
So you guys, you guys could definitely

1776
02:15:45.640 --> 02:15:48.920
lay some hate then if you needed
to, like it wasn't you weren't at

1777
02:15:48.000 --> 02:15:54.560
risk of it becoming another like fighting
retreat from from or n from sion.

1778
02:15:54.560 --> 02:15:58.920
I mean it sounds that way,
but we were so spread out, you

1779
02:15:58.960 --> 02:16:01.920
know, you know, or a
few miles apart. So in that terrain,

1780
02:16:03.680 --> 02:16:05.439
you have to be together in order
to be effective. Right, we

1781
02:16:05.439 --> 02:16:09.560
were so spread out, we were
you know, yeah, we were ready.

1782
02:16:09.119 --> 02:16:18.039
We were pretty exposed, I would
say, each element. So what

1783
02:16:18.159 --> 02:16:22.680
happens next? So you they called
Jack Potter, they have Latrell, They

1784
02:16:22.720 --> 02:16:28.640
find the guys were do they now
is it time to go home? Now?

1785
02:16:28.680 --> 02:16:33.159
Do you get to go home?
For some not quite? Not quite?

1786
02:16:33.879 --> 02:16:35.840
This was the point where we still
need to find his team. Right,

1787
02:16:35.920 --> 02:16:39.840
So three Charlie has an idea where
they are, but they weren't.

1788
02:16:41.280 --> 02:16:46.239
I mean, Latrell's description was not
like this is the coordinates. It was

1789
02:16:46.280 --> 02:16:48.159
like this here, you're there.
He like circled an area on the map,

1790
02:16:48.680 --> 02:16:56.239
and we we trusted him. So
we sent three Charlie there, but

1791
02:16:56.799 --> 02:17:01.120
one Charlie My unit did patrols in
other areas that we knew that they had

1792
02:17:01.120 --> 02:17:03.959
passed by, just to be sure
that. You know, he just been

1793
02:17:05.000 --> 02:17:09.319
through severe trauma, so you can
trust him, but you can only trust

1794
02:17:09.399 --> 02:17:13.000
him so much. I mean,
we don't know how bad he's hurt at

1795
02:17:13.000 --> 02:17:18.760
that point. So we just kept
patrolling and looking and crawling around in the

1796
02:17:18.760 --> 02:17:26.120
mountains known areas of where they had
been and it was a few days later

1797
02:17:26.520 --> 02:17:33.040
before we found his buddies. So
you can imagine that that train's that bad.

1798
02:17:33.159 --> 02:17:35.479
I mean, it takes days to
search a little area on the map.

1799
02:17:37.559 --> 02:17:39.920
To me, the whole time I
was out there, I just had

1800
02:17:39.959 --> 02:17:43.319
no appetite. I mean I was
like snacking on things, but I never

1801
02:17:43.479 --> 02:17:50.600
ate a full meal. Really,
yeah, a little bit on edge from

1802
02:17:50.600 --> 02:17:54.520
the days prior, so you weren't
very hungry. So I mean I lost

1803
02:17:54.559 --> 02:17:56.120
like fifteen pounds in that week.
So just out of curiosity, you went

1804
02:17:56.159 --> 02:18:01.120
to Range School. Like when you
went to Range School after this, you're

1805
02:18:01.120 --> 02:18:05.159
probably like, this isn't shit,
Like I get two to three hours nicely,

1806
02:18:05.280 --> 02:18:07.680
I get at least a meal or
two a day, Like I'm cool

1807
02:18:07.719 --> 02:18:13.399
with this. No, Ranger School
still sucks, but I would say that

1808
02:18:13.399 --> 02:18:16.760
that was still aul. But at
the same time, I always had that

1809
02:18:16.520 --> 02:18:18.799
to fall back on, right right, you know, in the mountains.

1810
02:18:18.799 --> 02:18:22.840
I was in the mountains in winter. It sucked, and I just kept

1811
02:18:22.840 --> 02:18:26.799
thinking, well, at least I'm
not in Afghanistan, right right, right,

1812
02:18:26.840 --> 02:18:28.719
at least I know I'm getting a
meal today. So how long does

1813
02:18:28.760 --> 02:18:35.520
it take for three Charlie to recover
the other three teals. It was a

1814
02:18:35.559 --> 02:18:41.920
total two days after Marcus to get
everybody, and there's still there's still Matthew

1815
02:18:41.959 --> 02:18:46.959
Axleston was still not recovered at that
point. It wasn't until we got you

1816
02:18:46.959 --> 02:18:52.719
know, reinforcements from Third Range of
Battalion, who who basically deployed early because

1817
02:18:52.760 --> 02:18:56.399
of this mission. As soon as
soon as this mission went down, Third

1818
02:18:56.479 --> 02:19:01.040
Range of Battalion was activated. I
remember that, Oh really, Yeah.

1819
02:19:01.120 --> 02:19:05.360
It was Charlie Company. I believe
was like a platoon or two from Charlie

1820
02:19:05.399 --> 02:19:11.239
Company that they got out there.
I believe it was the sixth day or

1821
02:19:11.280 --> 02:19:15.600
six day. Yeah, it was
like you know, an RF one recall

1822
02:19:16.159 --> 02:19:18.600
called everyone's cell phones, got them
in there and rapidly deployed those guys.

1823
02:19:18.680 --> 02:19:24.520
Oh yeah, wow yeah. I
mean, like I said, it was

1824
02:19:24.559 --> 02:19:28.719
the largest rescue and recover operations since
Vietnam. So I think the military treated

1825
02:19:28.760 --> 02:19:33.440
this as we are not having another
Robert's Ridge. This is already bad.

1826
02:19:33.959 --> 02:19:37.280
We're not going to get overwhelmed by
firepower. It's not going to happen.

1827
02:19:37.479 --> 02:19:45.120
Yeah, yeah, that's that's amazing. So how were you guys doing?

1828
02:19:45.639 --> 02:19:48.319
Were people just pretty much sticking their
urage, how are you doing battlespace deconfliction

1829
02:19:48.399 --> 02:19:54.239
at this point? There were so
many moving elements that did not normally work

1830
02:19:54.280 --> 02:20:01.120
with each other. I don't know
how to answer that, because I don't

1831
02:20:01.159 --> 02:20:05.319
know that it was that. I
mean it was tough, obviously, there

1832
02:20:05.360 --> 02:20:11.799
were so many moving parts that and
radio transmissions out there were just god awful.

1833
02:20:11.479 --> 02:20:15.000
I mean, half of the time
nothing would go through. You'd have

1834
02:20:15.040 --> 02:20:22.639
to try satellite that wouldn't go through. So it was the line of sight,

1835
02:20:24.079 --> 02:20:26.200
you know. I mean, yeah, it was tough. The commanders

1836
02:20:26.239 --> 02:20:30.760
had their work cutout for him,
for sure. Were there any blue on

1837
02:20:30.879 --> 02:20:35.639
blue incidents during that point in time
or surprisingly? No? I mean,

1838
02:20:37.239 --> 02:20:39.760
I mean we linked up with units
on a patrol, like we linked up

1839
02:20:39.760 --> 02:20:45.520
with r D in the middle of
the patrol, and you know, so

1840
02:20:48.280 --> 02:20:52.079
I don't know how it all occurred, but it was very well done by

1841
02:20:52.600 --> 02:20:54.559
at least my leaders that I saw. I mean, I had I had

1842
02:20:54.559 --> 02:20:58.120
some of the best guys on the
planet. I had, you know,

1843
02:20:58.280 --> 02:21:05.879
Lieutenant Colonel Howell, I had general
work and you know Congden who is I

1844
02:21:05.959 --> 02:21:11.319
believe he retired to the sergeant major. These guys were cream of the crop.

1845
02:21:11.719 --> 02:21:20.079
So you know, impressive, let's
put it that way. Yeah,

1846
02:21:20.200 --> 02:21:22.920
so how did this operation finally start
winding down? I mean, after you're

1847
02:21:22.959 --> 02:21:28.959
out there five days, everyone's recovered, what was the next step. You

1848
02:21:30.000 --> 02:21:35.239
know, Axelson still wasn't recovered.
But when three when Third Ranger Battalion arrived,

1849
02:21:35.159 --> 02:21:37.280
you know, they wanted to get
us out of there. We were

1850
02:21:37.319 --> 02:21:43.040
just like a battered bunch of kids
out there. I mean, I have

1851
02:21:43.079 --> 02:21:45.879
a picture I think you guys,
I sent it to you, but it

1852
02:21:45.959 --> 02:21:52.000
was a picture right after the mission, and we looked like we had a

1853
02:21:52.040 --> 02:21:54.280
couple of pigs had rolled around in
the mud. You know, we all

1854
02:21:54.319 --> 02:22:01.399
had beards. It was that's it
want wound down. It's like, we

1855
02:22:01.440 --> 02:22:05.239
got to get these guys out of
here and get them replaced because they're beat

1856
02:22:05.239 --> 02:22:11.319
to all. Hell. Yeah,
that's that's amazing. It's what a three

1857
02:22:11.360 --> 02:22:16.719
seven five do. When they hit
the ground, they immediately went after the

1858
02:22:18.159 --> 02:22:24.799
the area where they believed Axelson to
be. And you know Axelson, you

1859
02:22:24.799 --> 02:22:28.440
know this this is not like it
isn't common knowledge, but he was not

1860
02:22:28.600 --> 02:22:31.239
near his two buddies. He was
a little bit a little bit away from

1861
02:22:31.239 --> 02:22:35.120
them. So you know, one
can say that you know, he may

1862
02:22:35.159 --> 02:22:39.440
have survived much longer than we thought. He may have been eating himself,

1863
02:22:41.120 --> 02:22:46.079
so that's why it took so long. He's a stud, right, so

1864
02:22:46.479 --> 02:22:50.920
he may have. He may have, you know, made his way out

1865
02:22:50.920 --> 02:22:56.239
of there. What what was the
estimated size of the force that they encountered?

1866
02:22:58.559 --> 02:23:03.040
You know, there's so many conflicting
reports out there, but I have

1867
02:23:03.120 --> 02:23:07.879
seen videos the Taliban that the Taliban
has put out or I'm much Cha's guys

1868
02:23:07.879 --> 02:23:15.319
have put out, and to my
best estimation, I think it was no

1869
02:23:15.440 --> 02:23:18.280
more than about twelve twelve men.
But you got to keep in mind,

1870
02:23:18.559 --> 02:23:24.760
and this is not to I'm not
trying to like make Marcus a story not

1871
02:23:24.799 --> 02:23:30.760
true because that terrain, right,
he could have put five guys against those

1872
02:23:30.799 --> 02:23:35.639
four seals, and that the superiority
of position they had, it wouldn't have

1873
02:23:35.680 --> 02:23:41.639
mattered. It wouldn't mattered if they're
a fifty or five you're shooting down down

1874
02:23:41.680 --> 02:23:46.600
on these guys and like just walking
that train. I'll just say this,

1875
02:23:46.879 --> 02:23:50.559
I don't know how anyone could have
survived if they're ambushed from above. I

1876
02:23:50.799 --> 02:23:56.239
just don't doesn't there's no cover and
there's trees, but they're they're shooting,

1877
02:23:56.280 --> 02:24:01.360
plunging fire down on you like you
have to aim, so our estimation is

1878
02:24:01.399 --> 02:24:35.360
about twelve. Yeah,