Welcome to Stories of Special Forces Operators Podcast. Listen to some of the bravest
and toughest people on the planet share their stories, Sit back and enjoy.
Welcome back everyone. Today we have another great guest, Kyle Lamb. He
retired from the US Army, but that's not the whole story. As you'd
probably imagine, he has been in the military since the age of twenty four.
He went on to serve in a special unit, one of the most
elite special operations unit in the military. He went on to serve there for
fifteen years, with deployments to Somalia, Bosnia, and Iraq on multiple occasions.
He's also offered two books on topics ranging from markmanship to leadership, and
then he founded Viking Tactics, Inc. Which we're going to be talking about
as well today. So we'll talk about his stories, what got him into
the military, his time during the military, share some stories there a little
bit of situational awareness for everybody and his company Fighting Tactics. So before we
get started, folks, make sure to share, subscribe, and hit that
like button and go visit in Fighting Tactics dot com. So let's not waste
any more time. Welcome to the show. Mister Kyle, am welcome,
sir, hey, thanks for having me. Yeah, and one just one
tiny correction there. I went in the army. Is I went in the
army at eighteen years old? Eighteen okay, so yeah, yeah's right.
Leeds was coming in the especially for twenty four. Yeah, and then I
got into the unit when I was twenty four. So it's uh, yeah,
time flies and you're having fun. I suppose absolutely. I guess the
free first question is I'm always curious because I know when I've asked a lot
of other operators in the past, what motivated you? I hear this resonating
theme, So I guess I'll throw it out to you first. I keep
hearing Green Berain movie a lot of times on the John Wayne movie. Did
that have any impact? Was the parents? Was a discipline? What motivated
you to get in the army? Well, to get in the army It
wasn't John It wasn't John Wayne. I got in the Army just because I'd
always had been kind of a guy that liked being in the woods and firearms.
I grew up in South Dakota doing a lot of horse riding and hunting,
and I Honestly, I was probably scared that I was going to have
to farm, and I'm probably not hard enough worker to be a farmer.
Those cats work really, really hard. I know my dad, he was
just He's one of the hardest working people I've ever met. So at that
point I wanted adventure, and I thought if I joined the Army, I
would get adventure. And then when I got in the army, the green
beret thing then started to kind of bite me. When I got in the
Army, I was a thirty one victor, a tactical communications guy, and
I went to the eighty second Airborne as a paratrooper and I'd see these Special
Forces guys walking up and down the road or running up and down the road
at Bragg there, and I was like, man, those guys are pretty
awesome. And my wife goes, well you should try that, and I
said, oh, I couldn't do that. It was well, you don't
know till you try. So then eventually I was in eighty second for about
three years and I tried out for SF went to Special Forces Assessment selection,
made that, and then the rest is kind of history. So yeah,
I wish I had a cool story like you know, John Wayne inspired me,
but real Green Berets inspired me. It wasn't a pretend dude, which
nothing against John Wayne, but it was really cool to see those guys.
And there were some dudes that I shot with on the weekends competitive shooters that
were, you know, you kind of had to pull it out of them
that they were even Special Forces guys. They just seemed like good dudes.
They like to shoot. And then when I found that out, I thought,
man, I got some questions for these guys and they were just very
low key, and I kind of liked that, so it was it's a
pretty easy transition for me. I really enjoyed it. That's a great point.
That's one of the things that surprises me the most to say that sorted
at this podcast a couple of months ago. However low key most of you
are. I mean, we've bumped into you in the street and we piss
you off. It's going to be a bad day for us that day.
But we have no idea because you guys are so nice. Every time I
interview any of them, everybody's just really cool, calm, And I don't
know if that's because of what your skill set that you've learned, the confidence
is instilled. That's a question I'll be asking you for sure. Is the
Kyle that went in We know the Kyle that went in at eighteen the military
is going to be different for those six years. But the Kyle that went
into Special Forces. Is that guy different after he went through the training.
Yeah, I would say maturity is key there. We had to mature a
little bit faster than folks that weren't in the military. That's my opinion.
I don't know that because I have never been a civilian until I was,
you know, thirty eight thirty nine years old, But I feel like we
were more mature. And when I say more mature, that doesn't mean that
we don't get in trouble and drink and do crazy stuff. What I'm saying
is you would expect us to travel around the world and do something for our
country with nobody watching us, and do it correctly. That's you know,
that's a lot of weight on your shoulders, really, And I think if
you ask those guys, you know, the other guys that you've talked with,
you know, letting down the guys in your left and your right is
probably the biggest thing you don't want to do. So when you go out
to do something, it's not that you want to be a hero or anything.
It's that you don't want to let down the men and women that are
on the battlefield. They're with you, and to me that I guess that's
the biggest thing. Now. As far as being low key, I get
pretty wound up sometimes too in certain situations. But overall, I'm I'm a
pretty laid back dude. I like to have a lot of fun, but
I I don't know, I don't get I don't get wrapped around the actual
real quickly about things. One of my friends, he had been in the
unit for many years, and he went off to do an adventure race.
And during this adventure race, they had these other adventure race people and there
was a had to have a female on their team, and they end up
really really lost badly, and he says, hey, you got to stop.
I got to figure out where we are on the map so we can,
you know, get going again, and the uh, they were kind
of freaking out and they started crying and one of them said, this is
the lowest point in my life. This is the worst time ever. And
he started laughing, and they're like what are you laughing about? You're terrible,
you know, And he said, well, this is nowhere near the
lowest point in my life. And they all clammed up because they're like,
what has this guy been through? We're out here freezing to death or you
know, we're lost, and he was like, we're not going to die.
You're you're okay. You might lose the race, but whatever. Who
cares? And I still see people get wrapped around the axle about stuff like
sporting events. Who cares? I mean, it's cool, go cheer for
your team, but people lose their minds. It's like, it's a it's
a game. It's you know, I hate to break it to Lebron James,
but that moron has to realize he's playing a game and whether he wins
or loses doesn't do anything good for anybody in America. It doesn't protect anybody's
lives. It doesn't, you know, change the way Afghanis or Iraqis are
treated. It doesn't help little girls go to school, It doesn't give him
electricity. All it does is put more money in his bank account. So
go play your game and shut up, dude, you know what I mean?
Just go do Go play your game. It's so fascinate You've brought that
up, because every podcast I do, whatever one I do, I do
a lot. I know, folks, whatever, But every podcast I do,
I change a little bit as a human being because of the interaction and
the changes that I've seen in myself. Just talking to you individuals who's been
through so much in Special Forces. It's phenomenal because that's exactly how I feel
now a lot of times when I look at a problem and I'm thinking,
why am I so worried about this one? The guy I interviewed two weeks
ago, Ryan stepped on an ID and lost half his leg. Yeah,
and I'm complaining about this. I mean, I bet I could just shut
my mouth and keep moving, but yeah, it keeps popping up in my
head. You're so right about that. Well, I think you know the
other You brought up a good point. And I just wrote an article for
Guns and Ammo and it was for for nine to eleven, the anniversary of
nine to eleven, and I talked about my children and my children they grew
up in this type of society. So my two kids act different than most
kids that are that that are their age. Now, my daughter is thirty
two and my son is thirty, so they're a little you know, they're
they're growing up. But when they see somebody that's injured, they don't look
at them like they're like they're different. They look at them like, yeah,
that guy got blown up and he's missing a leg or he's disfigured,
but he's still the same person. And I think that, you know,
a lot of America, well a lot of people in the world, that's
what we do. We see somebody walk by that's different than us. You
know, they're missing a leg or they're you know, you can see that
they've been injured, maybe they've been burned badly, they're missing a hand,
whatever it might be, and you look at him like, wow, this
guy's a freak. And what's funny is if my kids, or me or
my wife we see somebody like that. If I see a dude that's missing
a leg and they kind of have that look like they were in the military,
and even if they haven't been, I'm like, so what happened to
you? Man? And I've never had one of those people say none of
your business. You know, normally I hit pretty close and the guy's like,
man, I was in Afghanistan. I'm like, oh, man,
I was in the military, and then boom, we're buddies because I know
that we're from the same tribe. You know, that doesn't mean you got
to be in the military to be in that same tribe. I can right
away, I can start talking to that person, and guess what, they'll
talk to me because I'm one of them. If somebody comes up, like
a news reporter or you know whatever, they're gonna have a little bit more
time, hard time getting a story out of that cat because they're they probably
aren't quite they don't want to open up to that person. I guess that's
the biggest thing to say. Yeah, you don't know what kind of narrative
they're going to try to spin on it. That's kind to get scary.
And not all journalists, but a lot of them. Yeah, yeah,
a lot of them make it very complicated for everybody. No, it's amazing.
Like I said, I've changed a lot. Just the way and I
remember listening now as you're talking, reminded me also of them. I think
it was a huge think he was a marine raider or recon one of the
I can't remember, and he was just laughing. Last year when people were
freaking out about the toilet paper, He's like, what's the matter with you?
Yeah, you know, I was over in Afghanistan. That's like the
last thing we went looking for. Yeah. I was like, oh,
this is interesting. It's a different mindset. Yeah, and I think that,
you know, that be it being prepared, that preparedness mindset. We
my wife was looking for more toilet paper, but we didn't. It wasn't
We never ran out, you know, and we she had bought some of
those really big roles like they would have at a football stadium, and I
made a holder for these things. It was kind of it became kind of
a family joke. But if people were really worried about being prepared, they
they bought the wrong thing. Because last time I checked, COVID didn't create
diarrhea, you know, maybe a little bit, but not It wasn't terrible.
Not everybody's running around with that. So it's one of the symptoms.
I'm sure is everything's blame on COVID. Yeah, you know, it's interesting
because I was talking at I think it was actually Dutch last time I spoke
to him. We were talking about how almost society now we're going backwards in
a sense where we need to be going back to nature and how to live
in those environments in case technology should falter, which it has as we're seeing
sometimes now with the hackers attacking the pipeline. Hey, you don't have gas
anymore, you know, people freaking out and going back to the nineteen seventies
and filling up their gas tanks on lines. And you mentioned something. I
was gonna say it for later, but I just asking now before I forget.
I'm getting older. He has a little light sight on his gun.
I can't remember the name of the tournament for him, a little beam of
light. And then but he said he kept the metal one on there as
well, the iron sight. I think I forgot what he called it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, his open sites yep, yeah.
But he said, how many people nowadays, I guess get rid of it.
Just leave the light on there. Yeah, the site. So you
have a red dot site and then you have a set of backup iron sights.
And when we do classes, we very rarely have somebody that doesn't have
both sets of those sites. It's just in our world. It's just kind
of a it just makes sense to do that. Yeah. You know,
you talk about the being prepared that what I get a kick out of is
up on a farm. And the original survivalist was the American farmer. Because
American farmers can do they could do everything. And even to this day,
if you look at what farmers are doing, they're they're really not They're not
freaking out about anything that's going on because they know that they can raise food
and if they got to grind up wheat, you know, to make it's
it's not hard to grind up wheat or grind up corn and kill a critter
and eat pretty well. I mean, that's really all you've got to be
able to do. And I don't know, I don't. It's kind of
funny. My wife and I both are country bumpkins and we're both from South
Dakota, and we just don't I don't know, we don't. We just
don't get wrapped around the axle about that. I mean, I'm I am
prepared, but I don't overdo it. I guess I got plenty of guns
and ammos so that I can get what I need with that, I suppose,
but you know, in reality, you can, you can, you
can survive with what's around you pretty easily. That's a great feeling. It's
a great feeling. Let me take it back again. We'll go back to
your time. You went into the Special Force, and I don't recall or
were you a Green Beret or a Ranger. I was a Green Beret.
Special Forces Yep, yep, I never was a Ranger. Nope, there's
a rivalry there. Sounded like a little bit. No, not really.
I mean, here's what I would say if if I was. And I've
tried to convince a lot of the young people that are trying to go in
the military right now, they go, what should I do? And I
go, you should be a unassigned airborne Ranger And they're like, why,
Well, because if you go to the Rangers, you can do everything.
If you go to the if you go to one of the three Ranger battalions.
From there, you can go to Special Forces, you can go to
the unit you can you can do anything, and you will have the best
training. You'll be equipped very well. You will be out on the battlefield
conducting missions when a lot of units are not traveling and around the world doing
that. You're you're going to be employed. And if that's what you want
to do. That's what I would recommend. And I'll tell you most of
those guys have either done that or they've went into the eighteen X ray program,
which is the SF baby, so they go right into the military and
then they get in the pipeline and they start training so they can become a
Special Forces guy as a lower enlisted individual. That's a that's a pretty decent
route too. But if I could go back in time, I would have
went to the Ranger battalion. That's that's what I should have done. I
had no idea what I was doing, so I ended up in the eighty
second, which is fine too, But really I would highly recommend the Rangers.
And then when you get to guys like like me that are in the
unit. We worked with the Rangers all the time on the battlefield, so
that's where we recruited from. So we recited recruited a ton of young Rangers
to come to the unit, and they saw us operate and so they you
know, it was just it was a very good relationship. Going back to
Somalia, we were there with the Rangers, you know, so we had
a good relationship with the Rangers as well. Contrary to what some stories say.
I mean all the unit dudes, the the guys at the at the
bottom, we all got along with the rangers. You know. There was
probably some leadership issues between the two units, but I wasn't in a leadership
position that I was just in a follow the leader position, you know.
I guess I'm bringing it. One question I always like to ask, how
did you like seer training? That sucks? What? Yeah? Yeah,
the first one? All right, No, seer training. I mean it
sucks because you're you don't get to eat jow and you got to listen to
babies screaming, you know. I mean it's kind of it's just it's kind
of demoralizing. There. The fun thing was you have your little you know,
you're trying to have these little victories and no matter what that is.
I remember, uh, I went. I went through that several times,
and they would do refreshers, which I told my father in law, you
really don't need to train up to be miserable. It comes it really comes
natural. But they would send us to refreshers and make you go in and
get interrogated again, and and make you stay in your circle and use the
techniques that they taught you, and one of those trips I got rolled in.
I was in civilian clothes, and when I got in there, I
reached and I got into that little box and I reached inside of my uh
my breeches, and in the the coin pocket, I had a set of
ear plugs, and I took those ear plugs and put them in there,
and I slept like a baby. And then whenever they'd come to get me
out, as they were unlocking the door, I'd pull the ear plugs out
and put them in there. And I kept those ear plugs for the entire
time that I was locked up. So that was my little that was my
little victory. What did you enjoy? Did you enjoy the academic proportion?
That's what I keep hearing a lot of guys really like that apartment learning about
whatever you guys learned about the first part of it. Yeah, I think
you know, the survival part that that's fun to learn because there are things
that that I didn't know that I mean some of the I mean some of
some of the traps, you know, like going through there, learning that
they send us through Seer during what was during our our or special Forces course
or it's actually that was a survival portion that wasn't the seer portion. But
during the survival portion, they they taught us to do things that I'd never
really you know, just like how to how to build a figure for dead
fall or you know, trip wires and things like this for and not really
for people, but for animals so that you could try to get some chow.
Well, we got to the part where we had to butcher animals.
That was a cinch because I'd been butchering. I've been butchering animals since I
was a little kid, so that that wasn't a big deal. Some guys
were a little squeamish, but I just knew that I'd I'd done that a
long time, so grown up in the farm was no problem. Yep.
Now did it switched for you? And you have to forget my ninety tay
if I don't know exactly how the order goes, But did you You went
from Green Berets then you went and mentioned to Delta yep? And how was
that transition? And why? Well? I made that transition because as a
when I went through Special Forces training, they made me a eighteen ECHO,
which is Special Forces Communication Sergeant, so on an operational Detachment Alpha. You
have different specialties, so you've got a medic, you've got an engineer,
weapons specialist, you've got a commo guy. I was the como guy.
So because of my former commo background, when I went through there, they
sent me to Morse Code School to learn how to do that. And then
when I got to fifth Special Forces Group, I had just finished Arabic Language
school. So I went right to Desert Shield Desert Storm. Wow. So
when I got there, I'm like, all right, I'm gonna get on
a team. And then they said, well, you're gonna work in the
bay station because you're a como guy. And I went, wait a minute,
so did that? I got to run around the battle feel a little
bit, but nothing, nothing exciting. I mean it was exciting for me,
but I would find out years later that I hadn't seen anything, you
know. So then I came back from that and they said, we're gonna
put you in the special in the UH the UH based oh what they call
it, but CNE Battalion Communications and Electronics, and you're gonna you're gonna help
these guys over there. And I was like, man, I don't think
I want to do that. I want to. I came to Special Forces
to be a Special Forces guy. So at that point I said, well,
there's one way out of here, and I can try out for the
unit and and do that. So I went to selection and made it,
and then went there and spent pretty much the rest of my time. I
had one year I went to first Special Forces Group out of the unit,
but most of the rest of my time I was there in the unit and
did that. And it was you know, I would say this, it's
not for everybody, but it was definitely for me. I mean, all
the shooting, the physical stuff. I enjoyed that. And I wasn't like
a pet stud, but I would I could do whatever I needed to do.
But the shooting and this close quarter battle, that was I really really
enjoyed that. And then eventually I became a sniper and did that, and
and I stayed there and worked as a in the leadership there as well,
So that was it really was a good niche for me. That's awesome.
That's awesome. At least you know what you wanted, it sounds like,
and all the way, all the way through most of the time. Can
you share one of your stories. I know you have one story you were
talking about. I can't remember where I read it or I heard you talking
about one of the more scary moments. I guess it was in Mogadishu,
actually, if I remember correctly, any story you want to share, any
of the most stories that let's see here. Sure you got a lot,
Yeah, I'll give you. I'll give you a story that I think I
don't I normally don't tell. I mean, my war stories are normally funny.
So I'm gonna I'm gonna take you down a funny a funny war story.
So we were in Iraq and one of the guys found a prayer watch,
and a prayer watch it goes off the five times a day that a
Muslim is supposed to pray, so that it goes off, and I don't
know if it's what direction to face, but they got that figured out pretty
good. But this one would crow like a chicken, and then it would
start speaking and it wasn't an Arabic. It was some I don't know what
they were saying, but it wasn't Arabic. So uh, this little watch
started becoming kind of a kind of a party gag, and it was getting
hidden in different people's gear. Well, we it never ended up on my
gear. I was a troops arm major, so they kind of left me
out of it, I guess. But I was driving across an airfield one
night in a civilian vehicle and Savilian clothes with another guy in there with me,
and all of a sudden he goes stop stop, and I'm like,
oh crap, we're you know, he saw something. We're going to get
in a fight or whatever. And he jumps out of the vehicle and he
starts tearing off all of his gear and he rips off his body armor,
and we had concealment body armors, so it took a few layers to get
to that. And he pulls it apart and he reaches in there and he's
got that little that prayer watches in there, and he's like, I got
it. And so as we're driving back to the other side of town to
this safe house we're staying at, he tells me but because i'd heard about
it, but I had, that's the first time i'd actually seen it.
And the other thing was I couldn't hear it because my hearing is so bad
when it would go off, I could barely hear it, so it never
It really didn't bother me. So next thing, I know this, you
know, I laugh about it. Well, it starts going from one person
to the next. Well, they end up putting it in the pistol grip
of one of the soldier's rifles, and as they're driving across town, all
of a sudden, this thing starts going off. Well they go off the
side of the road and they pull out their guns and they're trying to find
it and they find it stashed inside the pistol grip of their rifle. Okay,
so this guy comes back, he's the medic, we called him head,
and he's he's like, yeah, you guys are a bunch of children
playing with this did what? They said, well, where's this watch at?
And he goes, I threw it away. That's stupid. You're like
a bunch of children. So they were upset with this medic. He was
a great medic, sfmetic, just awesome dude. He says, I threw
it away, man, you just guys whatever. And there was some cussing
back and forth and some you know, trying to threaten him with his life,
but he said no, p threw it away. So probably a month
later during the middle of the day. Now we slept during the day and
we operated at night. During the day, these guys were all laid up
in their hoots and their bunk beds there, and all of a sudden,
like there was a ginormous chicken in your room with you. This thing started
crow and going off. And what he had done and they didn't find it.
They all jumped out of bed, where's it at? Where's it at?
And it was just so loud and echoing in the room. They couldn't
find it. So the next day they were ready for it. So midday,
boom, it goes off again. And what this medic had done.
He had crawled up in the duct work of their room, because the duct
work was big enough for a person to crawl in there. He crawled away
up in this duct work. He hooked up an archer amplified speaker to this,
so it's a suction cup that goes on the back of a you know,
whatever radio or whatever you're listening to. He tape that all together and
then just left it in there and crawled back out. So he got the
last laugh because that little archer speaker made that thing so loud. But you
know, that's one of the things we would do as soldiers. There's always
something funny, Always something funny happened, and I over in Iraq, same
thing. We came off one of the objectives and ends up some of the
SSEE material, the sensitive slight exploitation material. They're bringing this off and I
get called in. They go, we got an issue. We found two
more people that we need to add to the target list. And I'm like,
what are you talking about. Well, we have all these pictures of
these two guys were after, but there's two other people in the picture with
them, and several of these pictures, and we're going to try to get
them put on the targeting list as well. They showed me the pictures and
the other two guys in the pictures were myself and another buddy of mine,
completely dressed up like Arabs, and they had laid us in on this picture.
It looked completely real. I still have a copy of the It just
it makes me laugh every time I see it. You know, it's funny
you mentioned that, because that's one of the things I see, the correlation
between special OT people and then homicide detectives. You're in a world that's very
different that most people will never see. Thankfully, I think a lot of
people are thankful they're not going to have to see it. But homicide detectives,
when I've talked to I've talked a lot of them, you know,
they see some really crazy stuff, just like you guys, just really crazy
stuff. They have to process it somehow, and humor is the best way
for them to be able to process that. And a lot of times civilians
or non law enforced have no idea how to deal with that because they're going,
are you sick in the head? How are you laughing? But if
you haven't been exposed to that a daily basis, it's hard to really understand
why. But they have to, and I completely get it. Yeah,
I would stories. I would say. I'm not a psychologist, but what
I would say is do act like that keeps you from becoming sick in the
head. And by sick, I don't mean like you're you're a weirdo.
I mean if you let this stuff, if you just sit around in a
dark room and think about all these bad things that have happened to you,
of course it's going to eat you up. So get out of that dark
room and find like minded people and just talk about what if you want to
talk about that because you're struggling with it, then talk about you know,
to another cop or to another military guy. But you know, get it,
get out. And I would also say, and this is something I've
come and I've kind of come into in the last probably two years. You
if you are with people that don't make you a better person, then get
away from those people. So and I'm not telling you not to be around
military people or law enforcement or you know, whoever that happens to be.
I'm just telling you to find the right positive attitude people so that you can
have a positive Outlook. You don't just sit around and go, oh,
woe is me? And this terrible and I'm having these bad dreams and I'm
having Hey, we all have bad dreams. I hate to break it to
you, but if you've been through all this stuff, you're gonna have dreams.
It's what you do with that. And at the end of the day
that or in the morning, I should say, you know, when you
get up, get out and do some exercise, go to the range,
do something that puts you in a different place, a better place than that.
And if you see that coming on, just know how to take care
of it. And I would not recommend personally, I wouldn't recommend going to
a psychologist. I would I would recommend going to another person that knows what
you've been through and they might be able to help you even more. I
work some with Warrior's Heart. A buddy of mine, Tom Spooner, start
a Warrior's Heart, and that's what they do there. Everybody you're talking to,
they're on the same sheet of music with you. So it's not you're
not going to the person with a lab code and they're gonna, you know,
poke you and you know lock you in a cage that they're going to
treat you like with the respect that you deserve, and you're gonna talk about
your sues with other people that have the same issues, and you're going to
realize that you're no different. You know, if you think that you're a
weirdo, guess what, I'm just as weird as you are. We just
have a different way of processing that. So let it, you know,
go to somebody and talk about it. So that's what I would say.
That's a great point. I think a lot of times. Look that's my
world, right, I deal more with criminal psychopathology. But you're absolutely right.
It's a lot of psychologists don't know that world of the military and don't
know what cops go through on a daily basis. You know, they see
some parts of it on TV, and that's nothing compared to what they normally
see. They don't they don't show on TV. To me, I always
tell people criminal minds, Law and Order, stop to show you on TV.
A lot of this stuff is Disneyland for their world. I mean,
the cop walks in and sees a kid who's got three or four years old
and it's actually molested and abused and killed. That you're not going to see
on TV because the average American can't handle it. They can't process. And
for you guys in the military, some of these stories I already heard,
there's no way they can process it. They can barely handle saving Private Ryan.
Yeah, and I would say that, you know, I feel for
cops because of what they have to be exposed to because and this is going
to sound bad, but I'm just going to say it the way the way
I feel. In the military, we bring some retribution on the bad guys
when when they go out and they murder innocent women and children and innocent men
as well. Normally we get to visit to that you know, we visit
them late at night and we bring the retribution that they deserve. That might
be that they'd get rolled up and put in guantanamo for you know, ten
years, or they might not make it till the next morning. Whatever.
But I think a lot of times with law enforcement, you know, one
of the struggles there is that they may not see that that even if you
if you find a smoking gun of that person that molested that child, it's
going to take year, years and years and years for their for their to
be closure on that. And they may never have closure because that dirt bag
that did that the inhumanity to some child, they may never be punished for
what they what they did. One thing I recently, I do some work
with TBI and and by TV I'm talking about Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. They
they're a really good group of people, very respected by the other law enforcement
officers in the state because they really try to help them. They're not you
know, they don't come in heavy handed like FBI or somebody like that.
They come in and they try to help. And I've tried to help a
few of those people because they just, like you've talked about, you know,
the things that they've seen. How are they processing that? And I've
tried to just let them know that, hey, we've we've all seen some
stuff. They've probably seen way more than I've seen. But go talk to
another like minded individual. Don't start taking drugs and doing you know, crazy
stuff. Get the help that you need. But I would say, if
they start handing you handfuls of dope to take, that's probably not the person
that really wants to help you. I would say, go to a fellow
law enforcement officer or a military person that's seen that, and let's talk about
it. I mean, let's just what is on your mind. And man,
you could That's what's good about being in the military for me anyway,
When I was in you can say anything. When my buddy started talking,
we could, we could literally say anything, and our buddies would not alienate
us because of what we said. And I believe that in law enforcement sometimes
if you talk to the wrong person, you may become you may get alienated,
and that's definitely not going to help your cause. So choose wisely,
but choose the right person. And I can tell you those folks, you
know, they can let their guard down around me because they could tell me
anything. And I'm going to help them with their issue because I I know
that the struggles are real that they're going through. One of the psychologists that
they made me go see when I was getting out, they talk about hypervigilance,
and oh, wow, you you know you must have post traumatic stress
because you're you have hypervigilance, and it's like you must be a sorry,
worthless dirt bag not to have hypervigilance. Why would you not protect your family
and your friends. Why would you not be looking, you know, for
escape routes. Why wouldn't you do that? So, no, I don't
have post traumatic stress. I'm trying to take care of my family and my
kids, my grandkids as best as I possibly can. And if that means
that I'm standing on my toes a little bit more than you are, that
doesn't mean I'm a bad person. And I think that that stigmatism or stigma
that these people have tried to give some of these military people, it's been
terrible and it's because they don't understand. They just don't get it. If
you're a cop, you under stand if even if even a firefighter probably gets
it a little bit, but dah god, military dudes there, hypervigilance is
a is a it's a way to survive. That's yeah, that's what you've
got to have in this environment that we're in. Look at cops, Look
what you have to do. At least in the military. It's it's it's
a little bit better defined, I believe, because we know we kind of
know who's bad and who's good, so to speak. In law enforcement.
You're out in the public and you don't know who your enemy is, so
man, you better be switched on. That's a great point. Our situational
podcast is one thing we talk about over and over against the distinction between hypervigilance.
I don't even like the word paranoiac even clinically. It doesn't make any
sense to say your paranoid, because paranoid is completely delusional. So that's that's
a whole sized point. But hypervigilance, as you said, now has become
a negative term almost and reality now you're just being aware of what's around you
and what's going on. And in today's world, you and I both know
the last five years things have changed a lot. Oh yeah, yeah,
this country's not a safe in some parts anymore. And if you're not paying
attention, you're going to be a victim really fast. Well, I'm really
lucky because my wife is also very switched on. And if for some reason
I have a lapse in awareness or a lapse in judgment, I mean we
all have that. I'm really lucky because my wife is switched on and she
knows how to keep me out of trouble. And I know what. We've
been married a long time. We've been married thirty five years. Oh wow.
When she touches my arm, I know exactly what she means. We
don't have to talk. So when she gives me that cue, I turn
and I go with her, and that's it. There's no court, Like,
what are you doing? No, I know that whatever she's telling me,
we need to leave right now, and we're going to do that.
Because it used to be that in certain situations, I wouldn't just go to
jail, but I'd lose my job. So get out of those situations.
You know, if people are drinking and starting to fight, then just go
the other direction. If you think somehow that proves your manhood, you're probably
wrong, but it's best just to just to go the other direction and get
out of there and you know, not end up locked up, because being
locked in a cage is not something I want to do again. The eighteen
Echo family over there, Yeah, you have the calm stuff down, that's
right. You know, it's interesting. Remind me of two things, actually
remind me. A couple of weeks ago, i went down to downtown San
Diego and this guy was coming down the street and I'm just looking. Okay,
I see it's eighty five degrees outside. He's wearing a hoodie that's bothered
me a little bit, and I'm thinking it's a little warm. I'm having
trouble with my t shirt on. And he's coming down the street and I'm
looking. Then he's got his hand in his pocket, so I'm going,
okay, coming down the street hand in your pocket. Is nobody else really
around? Is kind of bearing around here. So I'm kind of looking the
person I was with, and I'm starting to get shure eyes just to be
kind of like, you know what, you might want to turn your back
because you had a chatter back to the person I said, you might want
to turn around and move a little bit, just in case I have no
idea what this person's up to, and they were doing the I'm looking down,
looking up, looking left, looking down. You know, they're always
so inconspicuous, right, they don't know, nobody can tell. And thankfully
I think they we turned them enough that he just kind of walked by.
But that's one of those moments. Again we have to be paying attention and
back to your point, which I've only touched this a couple of times,
but I like to see your takes. I think you just answered it.
There was an individual the other day. I was at a bank. There
was three of us in the line. We didn't move forward for whatever reason.
We just didn't move forward when the line was moving, and the guy
just starts going off. You know, you have an idiots, why don't
you move? You know COVID this you thought. I guess we're all apparently
my COVID or something. I don't know what to deal with. So you
started yelling about that. And of course you could handle it two ways.
You can turn on I turn around telling the f off, or you can
ignore it. But I think some people, I think they have to defend
themselves to be a tough guy, And in reality, if it happened to
you, I'm pretty confident that person's he wouldn't be on the ground. I
mean he'd be on the ground. I guess my point, he wouldn't be
around very long we've happened to you. But I also think you wouldn't do
anything. You would know better to say. I would, yeah, I
mean I wouldn't say I wouldn't cuss at him, but I because I don't
believe that does any good. That only elevates the situation. I'm not saying
I haven't done that. I'm just saying that, you know, if that
happened to me tomorrow, I'd be like, hey, man, hey,
hey, hey, it's all right, dude, Just relax, sorry about
that, try to talk him down a little bit. And the other thing
that I do is I normally invade people's space at that time too, because
I want here if they want to fight, if you take their space away
and you put them on their heels, you immediately have an advantage. So
now, if you're a female, I'm not telling you to go up and
bump chess with this guy. That's what I'm not what I'm saying, but
square your body to that target, you know, and get in a fighting
stance so that if you have to do something, you can and maybe what
you have to do is run. You know what, what are you going
to prove if you get in a fight in a bank with somebody, I
mean nothing. You're not proved. Yeah, you're not proven. You're not
proving anything there. So I would say, you just I don't know.
I do like to I do like to be close. And the reason I
say that is because if I'm close, I can react. If I'm far
away, I don't have the ability to react. And then I would also,
you know, protect my tools. So I carry a gun ninety nine
percent of the time, so I would start blading my body correctly so that
I could, you know, get to my gun if the guy attacked me.
I would protect my tools just like a cop is taught to do.
Protect your firearm, protect you know, whatever you have on the tool side,
and then you know, deal with it there. But yeah, I
tell you, man, and this is going to sound kind of ridiculous,
but most people that I've had confrontations with end up apologizing to me because I
just I I close, I close the distance, and I tell them,
hey, man, just I'm sorry I offend you to you. I didn't
mean to do that. But just just relax a little bit, man.
And if they start getting hyped up, hey, just I've got my family
with me. Don't Let's just don't do that. Dude. I'm sorry whatever
I did upset you. Hey, apologize to the dude, even if you
don't believe that you did something wrong. What does it hurt to apologize to
somebody and then get out the door and let the cops go arrest him later
when he does whatever he's going to do. And the other surprise that some
people don't realize is we all have bad days, don't you know. If
I know, if I have a bad day and I get grumpy and somebody
comes up and they're nice to me, I have a really hard time continuing
to be grumpy, you know what I'm saying, So treat them. Yeah,
my buddy, he runs the Free Burma Rangers. It's an organization,
a Christian organization over in Thailand. They go into Burma and he says,
love everybody and then just shoot the people that need to be shot. And
I'm like, that's a good way to look at it, you know.
Love everybody, But don't Loving everybody doesn't mean that we turn our back on
them or let them do something to our family. We still are prepared.
We're vigilant. My buddy Trey Lawrence, he's a Special Forces officer. He
says, vigilance that's having a plan to kill everyone you meet. And it's
true. You know, when you're vigilant, you you actually are sizing up
what's going on around you. And if you're very smart, you're going to
say, Okay, this is a bad situation. I'm going to get out
of here and go somewhere else. I don't like crowds. It briefts Well
like, Oh, I want to go downtown Nashville to the fireworks. So
we go down there. There's too many people. We end up walking through
the crowd one time and I told my wife, Okay, let's go stand
over there where we can see the fireworks, but there's not a crowd.
And that's what we did. When we watched the fireworks. There was nobody
within ten foot of us, and we could see all the fireworks, but
we were probably a quarter mile back from where the crowd was at. Well
good, it was perfect. We didn't have to deal with any of the
crowds, and I wasn't freaked out by the crowd and nobody was bumping into
her or me, and it was it was awesome. So make the you
know, make the right choices there. I'm really glad you said that.
Hopefully folks will hear that again, folks. Green Beret Kyle Lamb from Vikingtactics
dot com. So you heard it from him, a guy who can definitely
protect himselfs if need be, and yet he's telling you to de escalate these
situations and it's not worth it. I could completely agree. It's just not
worth it in today's world, especially not in front of your family either.
Yeah. I just really don't know who's out there anymore. Kyle, we're
gonna shift gears. Now. It's a good segue into your work. You're
talking about blading your body, protecting your gun, tell us a little bit
about Viking Viking tactics, and then towards the end of the interview, I
definitely have a couple of questions about the movie world and see what your opinion
is on that. But before we get to that Viking tactics, what's this
all about? So when I was in the military. I like the job
of instructor, So no matter no matter what I if I had information,
I wanted to pass that on to other people, and I I worked on
my instructional capabilities. In the military. I ended up being the primary shooting
instructor for the unit for a few years, was a sniper instructor with a
first Special Forces group for a year, So that allowed me to kind of
hone my skills as an instructor. And it does take training to become a
good instructor, you know, getting your getting your POI squared away so that
when you present it a you have a flow so the students have a better
learning experience. And then the other part of that is as a military guy,
it took me a few years to figure out how to train cops because
law enforcement officers have somewhat different rules that they follow and how do I how
do I put this in a in a package that they can understand and better
yet, how do I answer their questions before they even ask them, so
that they don't you know, because quite honestly, some of these guys they
want to be like, oh I caught you, Oh I got youa you
know, like, oh, what we do is you know, we can't
just kill everybody like you do in the military. Well, if you read
what it says about the unit I came from, it's counter terrorist unit.
That means we're going in and doing hostage rescue. So if we just shot
everybody, you would kill the hostage and guess what that's called a failure.
So yeah, we were very sice with our aimed fire. We use the
safeties on our guns. I mean, there's a lot of things that you
see in the movies that when you see reality, it's two completely different things.
So when I got out of the military, I had forty two weeks
scheduled for that year to be on the range, which is a lot of
time to train folks, but it kind of catapulted us out there to train
a lot of law enforcement military guys and some civilians as well. And then
we also had a product line that we had launched at the same time.
Some of the products I designed when I was in the military, and we
just started to to, you know, promote those products. And then now
today we have a whole bunch of products that we promote, products that I've
designed, and some of them I've designed by myself. Some with other special
ops guys, some with law enforcement guys, some with hunters, and we
that's what we do. So I've written three books. I've written a carving
book as a pistol book, and then a leadership Leadership in the Shadows is
my latest book. We also have done some TV. I've had my own
show on the Outdoor channel, Viking Chronicles, which is now available also on
Amazon Prime. Got a podcast team VTAC podcast, so we do talk about
some of this stuff over there as well. Normally I'm interviewing versus being the
interviewed guy. But we do some leadership stuff on our YouTube channel. We
do some shooting instruction on our YouTube channel. We also sell some DVDs and
then a gun University. You can stream our videos over there too. That's
not my company, that's another guy's company, but he has our Our DVDs
are available to stream there as well, So that's kind of where we're at.
We try to we try to solve problems in the gear world with new
products that people haven't thought of, and we're pretty lucky because a lot of
people copy our products, which tells me that we're probably doing the right thing.
That used to really piss me off. But now it's like, what
are you gonna do about it? You know, they're they're telling you they
can't come up with their own ideas, so they're just going to copy our
stuff. So that's I guess that's a form of flattery. But I travel
around the country. I do a lot of classes up at SEG Academy.
I work with SEG Sour and at their academy, I work with Leopold Optics
Kinshop Buffers. We do some stuff with them. We have some knives that
we've done with top Knives. We've got some other products that we're working on
right now that will be kind of fun that are coming out, well,
not fun, they're good products, but it's been fun for me to design.
I like to design new equipment. So my wife and I run the
business. My wife is a CEO. I'm the chief bottle washer. And
one of the things there is that what I've learned over the years in the
military is you should try to set yourself up to be successful, and to
do that, you've got to look at the strengths and the weaknesses of all
the people that you're working with, and you try to employ people in the
areas where they have strength and keep them away from the areas where they have
weakness. And that's what's been really good about my wife and I with our
our relationship. She's very good at what she does, which is managing that
business, making sure that the warehouse is running smoothly, making sure that all
of our bills are paid, making sure that product is getting ordered, making
sure that she's dealing with customer service issues, making sure ship you know,
stuff is shipping when it's supposed to ship. We shipped very quickly, so
if you ordered, if you went online right now and ordered something, it
would ship out of our warehouse tomorrow. Now, if you order on a
Friday, it's probably not gonna ship till Monday, but the next business day
it's probably going to ship. And the nice thing is if it's in stock,
you'll see it's in stock and you don't have to wait. We don't
do back order type stuff either. So staying in your lane has been something
that I had to learn a little bit. I thought I could do some
things in the business world, but I really I'm not good at So I've
learned here in the last probably ten years, to be better at staying in
my lane and doing what I am good at, and teaching is what I'm
good at. Designing new products is what I'm good at. Being a spokesperson
for some of these other products, I'm good at that. So I try
to I try to be in that realm where I can help people. And
I'm not helping people if I'm running the business and worrying about the bills and
doing all that. My wife is so much more equipped to do that.
She's much more organized than me. So we that's what I've learned. You
know, I wrote the book on leadership, but sometimes we in our own
lives struggle with what we perceive as our expertise. And that's one of the
things I've really struggled with is to be a leader in your family is different
than to be a leader in law enforcement or the military, and it's way
more important. That's one thing that we in law enforcement military, we sometimes
forget that our family, well, they they really you know, they really
shouldn't. You shouldn't think, oh, I got to make sure they're first.
You absolutely, one hundred percent. Every day have got to focus on
making them first, because that's you know, if your successful husband or wife,
or son or daughter or whatever you, you'll be successful at your job
too if you can, if you can get that right. And I think
that's part of where I struggled in the past. And I've got buddies that
still struggle with that, and I try to help them as much as I
can too, and I still, I mean, I still have my struggles
there too. But yeah, trying to lead your family, that's the hardest
thing I've ever done, so got to keep doing it. It really is
a difficult thing, especially if you have children, because they're not always going
to be there. Yeah, they eventually grow up, and sometimes you don't
get the advantage of working with them and being around them as much as you
wanted. And well, it brings me another question before we get to that.
Green Eyes and Black Rifles Warriors Guide to the Combat, car Line Carding
Kyle E. Lamb Book, Stay in the Fight, Warrior's Guide to the
Combat Pistol, and his newest one, Leadership in the Shadows Special Operations Soldier
Kyle lambook. Again, So, folks, which are some of the books
you can definitely I highly recommend it, liking tactics dot com where you can
find out more from about his company. I forgot the name of the podcast
Team v Tech, Team v Tech, So definitely check out that podcast.
Yeah, Kyle, as you mentioned, the family is one of the biggest
things too. People don't realize it, and it's interesting you mentioned it in
the sense I'm going to go way back in our earlier parts of our conversation
talking to some individuals because one of the things I work a lot on and
teach is on trauma besides criminal psychopathology. And it's fascinating because one of the
things I realized is the individuals who come out, whether it's special forces,
police officers, homicide protect us, whatever, the ones who had really solid
families, the one who had a support system in and out of the families
were the ones who usually fared much better coming out of some of these tough
experiences as they have in our world. We call them protective factors. So
having a supportive family of family not only that supported you during the good times
but also the bad time. So we had challenges in life and you fell,
you came back up. As I mentioned before, I know my listeners
are pubbly sick of it. When I've interviewed Olympic athletes at Larry Holmes Larry
Holmes. One of the things I used to say is I remember asking Larry,
what did you think about when you got knocked down? Something? You
got knocked down once by Mike Tyson, and he said I thought he was
going to say, oh, man done. He said, I got to
figure out how to get back up and knock him out. And to me,
I was like, wow, that's interesting mindset. And again one of
those signs of resilience that you learned as a child, when you fail,
you come back up and try it again until you win it. And just
talk about that. Family and leadership resonated with me on that part. And
I think, you know, when I tell people, yeah, I've been
married thirty five years, they think it's all like skipping through the daisies,
and man, it's not. It's not that way at all. And I
would say that my wife and I have had some knockdown, drag out fights.
But then at the end of the day, and I'm not I mean,
I'm not trying to say I'm a great person or a great dad.
That's not what I'm saying. Man, I'm struggling. And I guess what
the message I want to pass to the people that will listen to this is
that I've been successful because of my wife and my family and my faith and
what I've done in the military and fighting through that. Whether you're fighting for
your family, you're fighting for your faith, you're fighting for your job,
whatever it might be, man, you gotta fight for it. And it's
if it's worth I mean, you tell me who has a child is not
worth fighting for. They're all worth fighting for, you know. I mean,
so don't think that you know I'm some special person. I'm not.
I'm a dirt bag just like every other SF guy out there. I'm very
lucky that my wife stuck with me through all the rough times, and I'm
sure that we'll have more rough times to come. So it's been a it's
been an advent sure for her. I keep telling her she needs to write
a book because her book would be way more interesting than mine. But yeah,
you know, it's it's I'm not gonna beat the dead horse, but
yeah, take care of your family and and and whatever that is. Like
I talked about faith, I mean, that's something I've struggled with too.
And you know, if you don't have that, I feel sorry for you.
But I do have that, and that's helped me through some of the
really tough times too. That's true. I can't have a lot of individuals.
And it's interesting because when you talked about vigilance earlier, there's a lot
of awareness and I'm noticing with a lot of you guys, there's not only
did you have to be really aware of your environment and other people, but
a lot of you have translated back into your family. Being aware of when
you're impacting your wife or your children in a negative way like we all do.
You don't have to be special forces or anything like that to do that.
We could impact them negatively all the time. But being aware when we're
affecting them in a negative sense and say, hey, what's wrong? Did
I do something that I say something? Or are you going through a tough
time? What's happening right now? And just being noticing them when they're down
and out, Yeah, yeah, yeah, And that's sometime that's hard and
get we get bullheaded. We come home and we're throwing stuff and we don't
want to talk about because we've had a crappy day. Well what's crappier staying
at home with the kids and changing diapers all day or going out and doing
what we do. DoD God, I'd much rather go get shot at than
sit around the house and have to change diapers every day. And I'm not
saying that that I'm not minimizing what they do. That's the way more important
job than being in the military, being a mother, being a father.
That's way more important than any of that other stuff. So you know,
that's the hand that rocks the cruel, the hand that rocks the cradle rules
the world. Right there you go. You know, in our last few
minutes together, I could be here all day with you, but you got
work to do and I got work to do. Well, what I wanted
to ask you, I always like to get your perspectives on the news and
nothing news really but the movie world in Hollywood, because it gain is a
really weird oppression. When I talked to cops before, I asked him,
hey, do you think dirty Harry helped, They're like, well, not
anymore. Maybe forty fifty years ago. Yeah, And now I look back
and I see Rambo, right even though so the salon's still making movies a
ninety or whatever he is, and he's doing a great job. But Rambo
is another one that kind of gave a different impression about green Berets, even
though he was being bullied and harassed, if you want to use today's terminology
by that cop in the very first movie. Yeah, but you know,
we see movies like that, We see movies like Apocalypse now, way back
when, things of that nature. What do you think about Hollywood's depiction of
the military. Do you think? Is it so so? First Blood?
That was a great movie, and there was so Jack Carr, the writer
is a good friend of mine, and I didn't under I didn't even understand
what was going on there. And I didn't even know that in the David
Morel book that was written. You know, Rambo dies at the end of
that. So in that movie, they actually tested two different endings, one
he died and one he lived. And I guess they realized that it'd be
better if he lived because they could make another eighty five. You know.
I guess Rambo conquers Alzheimer's or whatever. You know. I think in the
last movie. I'm trying to remember if he died in the last movie or
not. But anyway, he beat the cartels the last movie. Okay,
there we go. It's that first movie was very I don't know if inspirational
is the word for me, but I love that movie and to this day,
I did a thing with Black Rifle Coffee a while back where we watched
that movie and we did a veteran's rehaction. I'm telling you, that is
a that is such a realistic movie. Other than a couple of the things
where they were shooting eight laws or at fours or whatever they were shooting in
there, that might have been a little bit fictitious, but overall it was
a pretty a pretty realistic movie. Now it ended with that movie. The
rest of them they were just over the top. And I haven't even seen
all the other all the other movies, but I think that I'm gonna I'm
gonna skip ahead to what's the name of the movie, The guy with all
the fancy gun handling skills? Yeah, yeah, Wick, Okay, So
here's what I would say about that. That guy has actually trained very hard
to be able to handle weapons a little bit more realistically. Now, John
Granted, yeah, granted, what he's doing in that movie is is fictitious.
However, it's it's way better than some of the other movies that you
see out there that where guys are handling guns and you can tell they've never
they've never handled a gun. So my hat's off to him for going out
and getting the training. We have a guy that works with fighting tactics.
He also works with Flear, a guy named Chili Palmer, and he that's
not his real name, but that's what he goes by, Chili Palmer.
He does some stuff with movies and trains the actors how to be how to
handle their weapons correctly. And when you see a movie that he's worked on,
it makes a big difference. So it's kind of nice to see that
he went from being a special Operations sergeant major like myself and very good good
friend of mine. Like I mean, I'm tighter with him than I am
with any of my my real family, you know what I mean. So
he's he's he is truly my brother, and he's he's working on his second
movie now, which is Gray Man, So it's that. Yeah, So
he's been working on that, and it just tells me that it's going to
be a good movie because he's gonna going to handle guns the way that a
real you know, in a cop or a military guy sees it to be,
Like, yeah, that's you know, that's realistic. So I don't
know if if I answered your question or not there, but well you did.
It was actually a fascinating answers. I've never heard that depiction of Rambo
before, and I really don't have Obviously, you have to understand, I
think most people are starting to get the chest of it that these movies don't
represent reality. But some people, especially twenty years ago, they didn't.
They just thought, oh, watch Green Berets stuff. But I look at
it now, like you mentioned, if you take back and look at it
again, there's a lot of skill sets that he has that are really beneficial
that he showed people if you get stuck out of the forest somewhere, how
to survive, how to find food and water and shelter and do these things.
And he was doing all that stuff in the movie. Now. You
know, earlier you said, did watching the Green Berets did that have any
influence on you joined the military? Well, watching Rambo First Blood did not
influence I don't really think it influenced me joining the military. But I'm going
to tell you that movie man that motivated me. I mean, I see
this guy and I'm like, Okay, I'm not gonna take steroids and get
all jacked up like Sylvester Stallone. However, the cool knife that he had,
that Jimmy Lyle knife, which I've only seen one of those in person
in real life ever, and that was in Saudi Arabia, and it was
a female MP that had that knife. Her dad had gotten that knife,
I believe, for And I saw that knife and I was like, is
that a Jimmy Lyle knife? And she goes, how'd you know that?
And I said, Rambo, that is the knife. That is the real
knife. Jimmy Lyle is long since passed away, but it's interesting to see
that. I mean, now, I'm making knives. I've been forging knives
and tomahawks for the last few years, really getting into it and studying all
this stuff. And I still when I see that knife, that's one of
my It's one of the most unrealistic knives you could ever own. But that's
a really cool knife. So an unconscious influence on you, yeah, I
guess so. I mean, it's yeah, it's kind of crazy. But
I'm during a psycho psychoanalysis of Kyle Lamb today, folks. You know,
one of the I got one more thing on movies. Of course. Actually
I wanted to ask about black Hawk Down, but go ahead, and that's
what I was gonna actually talk about. Perfect. So I have had a
whole bunch of soldiers and former soldiers that have talked to me, have have
told me, they're like, I don't know if I should tell you this
or not, but the movie black Hawk Down was was one of the reasons
I joined the military. And it's been a bunch of guys that have told
me that. Wow. And I had nothing to do with Blackhawk Down.
I mean, I was there for the real mission, but for the movie,
I had nothing to do with that. But to me, it's it.
They did something right that you would inspire these men to join the military,
and I'm sure it inspired some women to do it as well. I
haven't met the woman that has told me that, but I've met a bunch
of these young men that have told me that. And now, you know,
and some of them have went in and served their twenty years and now
they're out and their inspiration was that movie. So that's you know, that's
to me, that's kind of cool to be somehow associated with that. The
movie is a movie it's not. It's not a documentary. So if you
say, oh, what was it like there, it wasn't like that.
It was different than that. But it from what I've heard, it's pretty
good movie. I saw it one time with some of the guys I've served
with over there, and I really don't have a desire to see it again.
But I you know, from everybody I've talked to, they say it's
a pretty good movie. Now, Saving Private Ryan another great movie. I
believe there are a few of those. A Bridge to Far are another great
movie, and that kind of goes back to my eighty second history being in
the five or fourth Parachute Infantry Regiment. Those are the guys that what was
his name? Fonda, Peter Henry Fonda? What's the young guy? Is
it Fonda? What's the what movie was it? It was A Bridge too
Far? Bridge too Far? Okay, I'll look for it. I'll tell
you what. I'm trying to remember the guys. What the guy's name is
it? Is it? I can't remember. Maybe he's not a Fonda.
I thought he was a Fonda. Let's see A Bridge too Far. We're
looking it up, folks, and you're probably yelling at this at the podcast
right now. Yeah, they're telling damn, Robert, I got James Cohn,
I got Michael Caine, Sean Connery, Gene Hackman, Robert Redford,
Robert Redford, that's it. He's not a boy. Robert Redford is going
to be pissed that I called him a fond. I mean, I was
probably think of his political views, so I was probably thinking of Jane Fonda.
That's how let's not go there. Anyway, that's a that's a really
uh breathtake. It's a it's a sad movie if you know the real history,
because we got our butts kicked there. But it's it's uh, it's
a great that is a great movie. It's an old movie, but it's
it's one worth worth checking out. So anyway, I'll definitely tell people to
catch that one, because I know we're always looking to get people to be
able to how would you say catch a movie that's more depicts more reality.
It's one of our big things. That's what we're trying to do. And
actually, next kind of funnyuse next week, I think we have a guy.
I'm not a guy, but former mac v sock. That awesome.
Yeah, so we wanted to show a little bit about that. John Meyer,
I think his nickname was Tilt or something if I remember correctly, on
the military. Super nice guy. So I can't wait to learn about that.
Well, you kind of answered the question about my clock down because I
was getting ready to ask you in the sense of that. I know,
I asked Dan Shilling. We talked about him before the show, and it
was the movie itself was just intense. I mean, you just can't relax.
The first five minutes is quiet, and then the rest of the movie
just doesn't stop. So I knew that probably wasn't necessarily exactly what happened there,
but yeah, he definitely he showed a good side of Mogadishue and his
experiences there and what he saw and what he went through. So intense stuff.
And again, I thank you very much for your service and if you're
doing that for us, we truly appreciate it. Yes, sir, I
guess my last couple of the things here were getting ready to wrap up.
We talked about Hollywood, by the way, because I think we were similar
ages. Do you remember Paladin Paladin the Cowboy movie? Yeah, I don't
know if I'm not sure if I've ever done. Yeah, I probably have
seen it, but it obviously didn't stick with me. I was a I
did like John Wayne's westerns and Glenn Eastwood's westerns. Oh, gun Smoke,
Yeah, absolutely, yeah, Matt Dlon and uh well, So I was
just telling a buddy of mine this the other day. So my son is
named Lucas, and he's named after Lucas McCain. So that was Rifleman.
The Rifleman had a gun that didn't exist in the time period when that was
made. I mean supposedly, that's what they say. So I'm trying to
remember what his real name was. Connors, Yeah, Chuck Connors. He
so he had that lever gun and you know, he could do all this
fancy work with it. But supposedly that lever gun was not the right gun
for that period that they were trying to portray. I also, and it
was funny. I just saw these movies the other day. I saw,
or not movies, but shows. I saw Matt Dillon, Gun Smoke.
I saw The Riflemen and Bonanza Bonanza. There you go, Bonanza one.
If you look at Lorne Green and Haas, I forget what his real name
is. And then the other guy that was on lor Engles Wilder. Yeah,
Michael Landon. You watch these guys ride their horses. They know how
to ride a horse. It's not you know in some of the movies now
when you see it. Very rarely do you see a horse in a movie
these days, unless you watch something that's made in China. They still use
a lot of horses in their movies. The Mulan is one of the kind
of a kid a kids well, it's a very violent kids show. They
have great horse scenes in there, and I believe that was filmed in China.
But yeah, I really like the horseman part of it. When you
see John Wayne riding a horse, he looked like he knew what he was
doing. When you saw any of those the two boys or the dad in
Bonanza, they looked like they knew what they're doing. Chuck Connors, I
can't remember those guys. Yeah, I remember, Oh yeah, I remember
Wanted with Steven Queen. He had that really cool whatever the gun he had
sought out shotgun thing. Yeah, yeah, that was bizarre, fascinating stuff.
You can be here all day talking about Memory Lane. A lot of
cool movies back then. Yeah, I think that you make me think about
the old Cowboy. Yeah. I think the last Cowboy movie that I really
enjoyed was Tombstone. Yeah, I don't think I've watched that more than one
hundred and fifty times. I don't know what it is about that movie.
Yeah, you know, and the my buddy Skinner. He he told me
to read a certain book about Wyatt because Wyatt Earp was actually kind of a
not a not probably a very good person. But uh, that movie is
amazing. Yeah, amazing. Oh, they did such such a good job
with those characters. Absolutely, mister, it's been a pleasure and honor having
you here today. Thank you so much for taking the time. Yeah,
thanks for having me. This has been a lot of fun. And yeah,
for all the men and women out there serving, whether they're you know,
whatever you're doing to serve. Hey, America loves you for that,
and just stop watching the news, just listen to the good people that are
out on the streets. They love you, so keep doing what you're doing.
Absolutely, absolutely again, folks. Kyle Lamb from Vikings Tactics Viking Tactics
dot Com definitely go check it out. We talked about three of his books,
Green Eyes and Black rifles stay in the fight and the most recent leadership
in the Shadows Special Operations Soldier Kmyle Lamb folks make sure to share, like
and hit that subscribe button.