WEBVTT 1 00:00:02.919 --> 00:00:14.640 Special Operations Colbert Asbienna The Team House with your hosts 2 00:00:15.480 --> 00:00:18.280 Jack Murphy and David Bark. 3 00:00:23.519 --> 00:00:26.519 Welcome to episode three hundred and fifty one of The 4 00:00:26.559 --> 00:00:30.399 Team House. I'm Jack here with Dave in studio with 5 00:00:30.719 --> 00:00:34.600 Jonathan Hanckett. He is a former Marine. He's the author 6 00:00:34.679 --> 00:00:38.240 of the Theory of Irregular Warfare or irregular War, I 7 00:00:38.240 --> 00:00:41.799 should say, and the fourth coming book, Iran's Shadow Weapons, 8 00:00:41.799 --> 00:00:45.600 which is coming out this summer. Jonathan served in the Marines, 9 00:00:46.679 --> 00:00:49.560 worked in a second capacity, a human capacity, was with 10 00:00:49.679 --> 00:00:54.320 marsk all over the Middle East and West Africa, Central Africa. 11 00:00:55.119 --> 00:00:58.039 Plenty of stuff to talk about here. We'll talk about 12 00:00:58.079 --> 00:01:00.079 you and then we'll talk about your books and the 13 00:01:00.079 --> 00:01:04.439 theory behind your research. So thank you for joining us 14 00:01:04.519 --> 00:01:06.519 and coming in studio today. Yeah, thanks for having me. 15 00:01:06.560 --> 00:01:09.920 Happy to be here. Yeah, So it would take it 16 00:01:09.920 --> 00:01:11.680 from the top if you tell us a little bit 17 00:01:11.719 --> 00:01:13.879 about you know, what was it like for you growing 18 00:01:13.959 --> 00:01:15.840 up and like what sort of like took you towards 19 00:01:15.879 --> 00:01:18.560 the Marine Corps. So I grew up in Maine, way 20 00:01:18.680 --> 00:01:21.680 up north Caribou Mainz. Like most northeastern city the United States, 21 00:01:21.680 --> 00:01:24.319 a lot of snow loved the snow. Then we moved 22 00:01:24.319 --> 00:01:26.640 to Connecticut when I was about ten years old, and 23 00:01:27.079 --> 00:01:29.079 from there I met a couple of different people in 24 00:01:29.079 --> 00:01:31.439 the military, especially World War two and Vietnam people because 25 00:01:31.439 --> 00:01:34.359 I was that era. And I had a history teacher, 26 00:01:34.640 --> 00:01:37.680 mister Donahue, who fought in the Chosen Reservoir in the 27 00:01:37.799 --> 00:01:40.840 Korean War as a marine, and he was so down 28 00:01:40.879 --> 00:01:43.079 to earth, like a really nice guy, and you wouldn't 29 00:01:43.079 --> 00:01:44.239 imagine if he met him on the street that he 30 00:01:44.280 --> 00:01:47.000 had fought in the Chosen Reservoir, you know, like fighting 31 00:01:47.000 --> 00:01:48.519 in reverse and all the stuff that they were doing. 32 00:01:49.439 --> 00:01:50.879 So that's that's one guy that was like in the 33 00:01:50.879 --> 00:01:53.480 back of my mind, like something about him. I like 34 00:01:53.599 --> 00:01:56.000 that guy, you know. And then I met a family 35 00:01:56.040 --> 00:01:59.599 friend who fought in the Battle of Pelulu World War two, 36 00:02:00.000 --> 00:02:01.959 and he actually had a katana of one of the 37 00:02:02.000 --> 00:02:04.120 last guys that he killed on the island and he 38 00:02:04.159 --> 00:02:06.640 had it in his house. His name's Butch Watkins. He 39 00:02:06.680 --> 00:02:08.680 has two silver stars from that battle, and like all 40 00:02:08.759 --> 00:02:11.120 he's a crazy background. But if again, if you met 41 00:02:11.159 --> 00:02:13.159 him on the street, you wouldn't know that that guy 42 00:02:13.439 --> 00:02:16.159 did that. He was like, you know, if your car's 43 00:02:16.159 --> 00:02:17.800 broken down, he'd go over and stop and like help 44 00:02:17.840 --> 00:02:19.439 you fix your tire, even though you're a stranger, like 45 00:02:19.680 --> 00:02:21.680 that kind of guy. But you got to think, like 46 00:02:21.759 --> 00:02:24.400 back to that time, you know, he was doing that stuff. 47 00:02:24.840 --> 00:02:26.879 And there were people in my family who had been 48 00:02:26.919 --> 00:02:28.560 in like World War Two and things like that in 49 00:02:28.599 --> 00:02:32.520 the army, Like my grandfather was in France during the 50 00:02:32.560 --> 00:02:35.000 liberation of France, which is cool and awesome, but like 51 00:02:35.039 --> 00:02:36.400 there's something about the army where it's just kind of 52 00:02:36.400 --> 00:02:38.919 like the army goes rolling along, but there's a difference 53 00:02:38.960 --> 00:02:40.479 with the way the Marine Corps is and like like 54 00:02:40.520 --> 00:02:43.439 these two individuals, for example, like there's something about them 55 00:02:43.520 --> 00:02:47.000 that's more than just the military, you know. And I 56 00:02:47.039 --> 00:02:49.599 also like to be like a high achiever. I was thinking, 57 00:02:49.599 --> 00:02:51.759 like what's the highest thing I can do right now? 58 00:02:52.159 --> 00:02:53.919 And I was kind of a bad kid in high school, 59 00:02:54.199 --> 00:02:56.159 so like I stayed back in twelfth gradecause I didn't 60 00:02:56.159 --> 00:02:58.000 go to school for an entire year. I just didn't 61 00:02:58.039 --> 00:03:00.280 go and my mom was too busy working, Like the 62 00:03:00.280 --> 00:03:02.520 trumant officer would come and I wasn't home, and you 63 00:03:02.560 --> 00:03:04.639 can't do anything about that. So I couldn't go to 64 00:03:04.639 --> 00:03:06.560 college right away. I'm like, how do I get out 65 00:03:06.599 --> 00:03:08.599 of here? Well, I could do that Marine Corps thing, 66 00:03:09.039 --> 00:03:11.080 and so that's that's why I joined the Marine Corps, 67 00:03:11.439 --> 00:03:15.319 getting out of my town in Connecticut basically. And you 68 00:03:15.360 --> 00:03:18.120 came in the Marines doing scene. Yeah, so I didn't 69 00:03:18.120 --> 00:03:20.120 even know what that was. I knew I wanted to 70 00:03:20.159 --> 00:03:24.000 do something kind of like unconventional and unique, because that's 71 00:03:24.080 --> 00:03:25.840 kind of the way I grew up, was just like 72 00:03:25.960 --> 00:03:29.360 almost no rules, no boundaries, you know. And I didn't 73 00:03:29.360 --> 00:03:32.319 want to be boxed in the military ken box you in. 74 00:03:32.639 --> 00:03:34.240 But I told her recruiter, like, I don't want to 75 00:03:34.240 --> 00:03:36.000 be boxing. You gotta find somewhere else for me. So 76 00:03:36.039 --> 00:03:38.759 he's like, okay, take this test, the ASFAB the entry test, 77 00:03:39.120 --> 00:03:41.159 And back then it was on a like a you know, 78 00:03:41.199 --> 00:03:44.400 black and white screen old computers, you know. And I'm 79 00:03:44.439 --> 00:03:46.039 doing the test, and I'm doing the math test, and 80 00:03:46.120 --> 00:03:47.800 like the science tests, I'm answering the questions. They keep 81 00:03:47.840 --> 00:03:51.520 getting harder. I'm like, am I stupid? And I thought 82 00:03:51.520 --> 00:03:52.840 I got like a zero, you know, like I thought 83 00:03:52.840 --> 00:03:54.479 it did really bad. And they gave me the sheet 84 00:03:54.520 --> 00:03:56.879 and apparently I did really well. And I didn't know this, 85 00:03:56.919 --> 00:03:58.439 but the as bab back then. I don't know if 86 00:03:58.479 --> 00:04:01.280 it still does. They give you more difficult questions the 87 00:04:01.319 --> 00:04:04.680 more you answer correctly, Oh I did. I had no 88 00:04:04.719 --> 00:04:07.240 idea and I just thought I was dumb the whole time, 89 00:04:07.639 --> 00:04:09.080 you know. And I'm like looking at guys next to me, 90 00:04:09.120 --> 00:04:11.080 like are they all answering these correctly? Like what's going 91 00:04:11.080 --> 00:04:13.360 on here? You know? But then they're like, yeah, you 92 00:04:13.400 --> 00:04:15.879 can't do infantry because your score is too high. You 93 00:04:15.919 --> 00:04:18.279 can't do this because of this and this, And I'm like, okay, well, 94 00:04:18.279 --> 00:04:19.920 I don't even know what to do anyway, because I 95 00:04:19.920 --> 00:04:21.879 don't know anything about this, Like we'll just you know, 96 00:04:21.959 --> 00:04:27.000 sign this contract. Hey, don't worry, and so yeaheah, yeah yeah. 97 00:04:27.079 --> 00:04:29.480 So I did making our numbers. Oh yeah yeah. And 98 00:04:29.519 --> 00:04:31.079 actually he kept calling me, he's like, you want to 99 00:04:31.079 --> 00:04:32.759 go to boot camp like a little earlier because he 100 00:04:33.000 --> 00:04:34.800 had like a monthly quota. He's like, need to get 101 00:04:34.839 --> 00:04:36.360 you as soon as possible, you know, are you really 102 00:04:36.399 --> 00:04:39.279 serious about it? You show me you're serious. So I 103 00:04:39.279 --> 00:04:42.279 did actually went earlier. So I went there in October 104 00:04:42.279 --> 00:04:45.240 two thousand and four to boot camp and uh that 105 00:04:45.279 --> 00:04:48.720 was in Paras Island, good time. And then at the 106 00:04:48.800 --> 00:04:50.399 end of boot camp, I found out what my job 107 00:04:50.439 --> 00:04:52.879 would because I didn't even know like that contract I signed, 108 00:04:52.920 --> 00:04:55.240 no clue what it was, and like, hey, you're going 109 00:04:55.279 --> 00:04:58.319 to Pensacola, Florida. Well, we did Marine Corps combat training, 110 00:04:58.439 --> 00:05:01.120 which is what the the you know, non infantry guys do. 111 00:05:01.480 --> 00:05:03.800 They're like very basic. It was still like Vietnam era stuff. 112 00:05:03.839 --> 00:05:05.040 Back then. It was like two thousand and three, two 113 00:05:05.040 --> 00:05:07.040 thousand and four. We had like the old flackjackets, the 114 00:05:07.040 --> 00:05:09.800 tricolor flackjack like covers your whole body and all that, 115 00:05:09.839 --> 00:05:12.040 you know, and the h hardness chest brig that they 116 00:05:12.120 --> 00:05:14.000 used to wear back in the day. So we're doing 117 00:05:14.040 --> 00:05:16.639 all that like nonsense, like patrolling around like idiots. And 118 00:05:16.680 --> 00:05:19.079 then even though the war had already taught us stuff, 119 00:05:19.279 --> 00:05:22.519 we weren't learning those lessons yet, and like teaching us 120 00:05:22.519 --> 00:05:24.480 to do like the Turkey peak but with a long gun, 121 00:05:24.720 --> 00:05:27.199 which is so stupid. It was just like dumb stuff. Anyways, 122 00:05:27.839 --> 00:05:29.480 They're like, yeah, you're going to Pensacola after that. So 123 00:05:29.519 --> 00:05:31.920 I went to Pensacola, where the NSA actually teaches like 124 00:05:31.959 --> 00:05:36.759 a joint school to teach singgan collectors basically, so singles 125 00:05:36.759 --> 00:05:40.519 intelligence collectors. They collect foreign intelligence on nation states and 126 00:05:40.600 --> 00:05:44.160 any other target that we need, and so we learned 127 00:05:44.160 --> 00:05:46.360 all that stuff. And at the time, they were transitioning 128 00:05:46.399 --> 00:05:49.040 from the old way of doing sigan like against the 129 00:05:49.079 --> 00:05:51.800 Russians back in the day, to a new way of 130 00:05:51.839 --> 00:05:54.879 doing it, which was all digital because before that there 131 00:05:54.920 --> 00:05:57.199 was a lot of Morse code, especially during like the 132 00:05:57.279 --> 00:05:59.680 nuclear period, because Morse code is the only thing that 133 00:05:59.680 --> 00:06:02.319 will vibe a nuclear strike as far as communications are concerned. 134 00:06:02.319 --> 00:06:04.319 So like Russia, China, North Korea, and the United States 135 00:06:04.319 --> 00:06:07.680 all have Morse code backup systems. So of course that's 136 00:06:07.680 --> 00:06:09.639 a target that'd be very interesting to listen to, right 137 00:06:09.680 --> 00:06:11.759 because you could know what they're going to do in 138 00:06:11.800 --> 00:06:13.759 the event of a nuclear attack because they're always practicing 139 00:06:13.839 --> 00:06:15.839 that stuff. So we learn how to do that. We 140 00:06:15.839 --> 00:06:18.079 also learn how to do something called hand graphic analysis, 141 00:06:18.399 --> 00:06:23.160 where you listen to some stuff over satellite communications and 142 00:06:23.160 --> 00:06:25.120 you actually take a piece of graph paper and write 143 00:06:25.160 --> 00:06:28.160 down the bits on it and figure out where the 144 00:06:28.160 --> 00:06:30.399 bits start and end, and you can actually decrypt stuff 145 00:06:30.439 --> 00:06:33.600 this way. And I'm way over simplifying it, but we 146 00:06:33.680 --> 00:06:36.399 did that for like three months while there's a ton 147 00:06:36.399 --> 00:06:38.519 of trigonometry involved, and I am not good at math, 148 00:06:38.800 --> 00:06:40.680 so that took me a long time to master. I 149 00:06:40.759 --> 00:06:42.560 was spending a lot of extra hours in the schoolhouse. 150 00:06:42.879 --> 00:06:45.720 Eventually got it. The reason you trigonometry is because you 151 00:06:45.720 --> 00:06:49.040 can actually figure out like the angle, the amplitude, all 152 00:06:49.040 --> 00:06:50.759 these different things about the signal if you just do 153 00:06:50.800 --> 00:06:52.759 the math on it, really, which will help you solve 154 00:06:52.800 --> 00:06:55.279 the equation and figure out what part of this signal 155 00:06:55.439 --> 00:06:58.120 is protecting the data? What part is the actual data, 156 00:06:58.160 --> 00:07:00.399 Like what's the nuclear communication in there, and what's just 157 00:07:00.439 --> 00:07:02.560 the error correction stuff on the outside of it? And 158 00:07:02.600 --> 00:07:04.079 when you collect it, you don't know. You just see 159 00:07:04.160 --> 00:07:06.279 zeros once. So you got to figure out, like, first 160 00:07:06.279 --> 00:07:08.000 of all, where does it begin, because that will tell 161 00:07:08.000 --> 00:07:10.279 you everything else about the sequence and all that. And 162 00:07:10.319 --> 00:07:12.079 we were doing this on a piece of graph paper. 163 00:07:12.560 --> 00:07:13.560 They don't do that anymore. 164 00:07:14.199 --> 00:07:18.079 So this school, then, for seeing it is different. 165 00:07:18.240 --> 00:07:20.279 It's a different focus than the voice Inership school. I 166 00:07:20.319 --> 00:07:23.000 have a good fellow, so that is a complimentary school 167 00:07:23.160 --> 00:07:25.879 that is for the Air Force now, but it used 168 00:07:25.879 --> 00:07:28.600 to be that school used to be an analysis school. Only. 169 00:07:28.720 --> 00:07:30.560 Oh I'm sure I don't mean a good fellow. I 170 00:07:30.600 --> 00:07:34.959 mean not good fellow, I mean San Angelo. Oh okay, yeah, yeah, 171 00:07:34.959 --> 00:07:37.240 that was a follow on school for a like a 172 00:07:37.279 --> 00:07:39.839 portion of this stuff. Okay, what we were learning at 173 00:07:39.839 --> 00:07:43.839 Pensacola is like broad oh interesting, from satellite communication interception 174 00:07:43.920 --> 00:07:46.279 all the way down to like tactical radio interception to 175 00:07:46.480 --> 00:07:50.800 digital communications, analog communications. We were using oscilloscopes and spectrum 176 00:07:50.800 --> 00:07:54.000 analyzers and like all this stuff. It's fascinating. Yeah, And 177 00:07:54.040 --> 00:07:56.639 then so I did that, and I was the honor 178 00:07:56.639 --> 00:07:58.439 graduate in the class, which meant I get to pick 179 00:07:58.519 --> 00:08:01.600 my duty station. And they listed all these places, and 180 00:08:01.800 --> 00:08:03.759 I thought to myself, like, I don't want to go 181 00:08:03.759 --> 00:08:06.560 to a Marine Corps unit even though I'm Marine, because 182 00:08:06.600 --> 00:08:08.040 I know if I go to Marine Corps unit, I'm 183 00:08:08.040 --> 00:08:10.040 gonna get boxed in. So I was like, what's the 184 00:08:10.120 --> 00:08:12.480 least Marine Corps thing I can do? There was this 185 00:08:12.519 --> 00:08:15.360 thing on there that said NSACSS, which is National Security 186 00:08:15.360 --> 00:08:19.279 Agency Central Security Service Hawaii, and I was like, I'll 187 00:08:19.279 --> 00:08:21.800 do that. So I went to Hawaii to work in 188 00:08:21.800 --> 00:08:25.000 the tunnel, which is there's a walkway three quarters of 189 00:08:25.000 --> 00:08:28.160 a mile undergroundunderneath the pineapple field that people who work 190 00:08:28.199 --> 00:08:29.879 there will know exactly what I'm talking about. It's a 191 00:08:29.920 --> 00:08:33.399 dull pineapple plantation that the US government leases the soil underneath, 192 00:08:33.639 --> 00:08:36.559 and we have a gigantic three story building buried underground. 193 00:08:36.799 --> 00:08:38.919 It's no longer functionally, actually close a few years ago, 194 00:08:38.960 --> 00:08:40.960 so I can talk about it now. But it was 195 00:08:40.960 --> 00:08:43.840 a huge collection site. Thousands of people worked there twenty 196 00:08:43.879 --> 00:08:46.559 four hours a day, mostly monitoring Chinese and Russian stuff 197 00:08:46.559 --> 00:08:49.039 and North Korean stuff. So I was on a mission 198 00:08:49.039 --> 00:08:53.960 there monitoring some nuclear stuff and both listening to audio 199 00:08:54.000 --> 00:08:57.200 like you're talking about, but also looking at digital satellite communication, 200 00:08:57.399 --> 00:09:00.440 ship boarding communication, all this stuff because these countries have 201 00:09:00.440 --> 00:09:02.879 the nuclear triad, right, They've got subs, they got aircraft, 202 00:09:02.919 --> 00:09:04.399 they have ground launched all this, all this stuff, and 203 00:09:04.399 --> 00:09:06.720 they're communicating all the time. So we want to know 204 00:09:06.759 --> 00:09:07.960 what they're doing, just like they want to know what 205 00:09:07.960 --> 00:09:10.120 we're doing, right, because I mean, the whole point of 206 00:09:10.120 --> 00:09:13.000 intelligence is to reduce uncertainty because that makes a decision 207 00:09:13.000 --> 00:09:15.440 easier to make. So that's what we were doing out there. 208 00:09:16.120 --> 00:09:18.080 A lot of interesting things happen out there. One that 209 00:09:18.120 --> 00:09:20.879 stands out to me is one of our targets was 210 00:09:20.960 --> 00:09:23.559 using that old fashioned method of communication I was talking about, 211 00:09:23.559 --> 00:09:25.399 and we were using the old fashion method of breaking 212 00:09:25.399 --> 00:09:29.279 the code. And it was Christmas Day two thousand and five, 213 00:09:29.480 --> 00:09:31.679 I think, and I was on watch, was like three 214 00:09:31.679 --> 00:09:35.519 in the morning, and I decoded the message and it 215 00:09:35.559 --> 00:09:37.679 was a bunch of at symbols in the shape of 216 00:09:37.679 --> 00:09:40.919 a Christmas tree, and it said Merry Christmas, Americans. Holy shit, 217 00:09:41.000 --> 00:09:43.639 And I'm like, what am I even doing here? Why 218 00:09:43.679 --> 00:09:45.559 are you so secretive? If you know, like you know, 219 00:09:45.720 --> 00:09:47.799 I know, we know, like it was so like I 220 00:09:47.840 --> 00:09:50.759 felt dumb, you know, but it was kind of cool. 221 00:09:51.320 --> 00:09:52.639 And then you know, that kind of stuff went on 222 00:09:52.679 --> 00:09:55.519 for a little while, and then my three years there 223 00:09:55.600 --> 00:09:58.279 was up, so I had to go choose another station, 224 00:09:58.480 --> 00:09:59.799 and again I did not want to go into a 225 00:09:59.799 --> 00:10:02.480 Marie core unit, so I went to NSA headquarters and 226 00:10:02.480 --> 00:10:05.799 I actually got to work on a more advanced collection 227 00:10:05.919 --> 00:10:10.440 capability called expeditionary singgent kind of like exploiting targets that 228 00:10:10.519 --> 00:10:16.360 are like very specific with basically manufactured devices and kind 229 00:10:16.360 --> 00:10:18.519 of form factor stuff depending on what the mission is. 230 00:10:18.919 --> 00:10:22.000 So you know, for example, I can take a picture 231 00:10:22.000 --> 00:10:24.919 of the soil from space. See there like a rock formation, 232 00:10:25.320 --> 00:10:26.919 so I know what those rocks look like. I can 233 00:10:27.000 --> 00:10:29.159 use some other measurement and signature intelligence to figure out 234 00:10:29.200 --> 00:10:31.399 what the soil is composed of. Then in the laboratory, 235 00:10:31.399 --> 00:10:33.919 I can reproduce that sand and that stone and put 236 00:10:33.919 --> 00:10:35.360 a listening device inside of it and then kick it 237 00:10:35.360 --> 00:10:37.720 out an airplane into that country and it looks like 238 00:10:37.799 --> 00:10:39.480 a part of the desert that belongs there, and like 239 00:10:39.519 --> 00:10:41.240 you wouldn't know that unless you cracked it open that 240 00:10:41.279 --> 00:10:43.639 it was not that. So that's the kind of stuff 241 00:10:43.639 --> 00:10:45.759 we were doing up there, which is really interesting, and 242 00:10:45.799 --> 00:10:48.480 it was definitely the direction I wanted to go. Problem is, 243 00:10:49.159 --> 00:10:52.000 the more advanced I got in these things, they further 244 00:10:52.039 --> 00:10:53.919 from a window I became, and like the less sunlight 245 00:10:53.919 --> 00:10:56.279 I would see, and you know, I felt like I 246 00:10:56.320 --> 00:10:58.120 need to get outside and touch grass because I'm going 247 00:10:58.200 --> 00:11:01.080 to become like a shriveled vitamin D deficient in person 248 00:11:01.120 --> 00:11:03.360 pretty soon. Here, you weren't the guy that they sent 249 00:11:03.440 --> 00:11:06.519 up the telephone pole to the wire, you know, deep 250 00:11:06.559 --> 00:11:09.759 deep deep in the You were like a skiff within 251 00:11:09.799 --> 00:11:12.679 a skiff within a skill. Yeah. Yeah, it was actually 252 00:11:12.720 --> 00:11:15.159 funny because back then we hadn't like locked down like 253 00:11:15.200 --> 00:11:17.639 it was before Edward Snowden's, Like, things weren't as locked 254 00:11:17.639 --> 00:11:19.759 down as they are now. And uh I was a 255 00:11:19.799 --> 00:11:21.679 sergeant at the time, so I would just go around 256 00:11:21.720 --> 00:11:23.799 the NSA and the OPS building where I worked, and 257 00:11:23.799 --> 00:11:25.840 I would go into random conference rooms and just listen 258 00:11:25.879 --> 00:11:28.799 to meetings that were going on, and like nobody asked 259 00:11:28.840 --> 00:11:29.960 you if you were supposed to be there or not. 260 00:11:29.960 --> 00:11:31.000 Like I would just sit in the back with a 261 00:11:31.000 --> 00:11:32.840 notebook and pretend like, yeah, I'm supposed to be here, 262 00:11:33.039 --> 00:11:34.600 because I was. I was like so interested, like what's 263 00:11:34.600 --> 00:11:36.360 going on in here? You know? And like back then 264 00:11:36.399 --> 00:11:38.360 you could do that. You could just like go sit 265 00:11:38.440 --> 00:11:39.759 in on something I got. I used to sit on 266 00:11:39.799 --> 00:11:43.879 General Ordierno's IRAQ update, the mnf I update every week, 267 00:11:44.159 --> 00:11:47.039 and like I wasn't supposed to be there, but it 268 00:11:47.080 --> 00:11:52.360 was really cool. So the way that you found your 269 00:11:52.399 --> 00:11:54.919 way out of singing out of the caverns of the 270 00:11:54.960 --> 00:11:57.960 skiff was you made this interesting transition. I don't think 271 00:11:58.000 --> 00:12:00.960 too many people make. We've interviewed one or two, but 272 00:12:01.120 --> 00:12:05.200 not many people who go from singant to human. How 273 00:12:05.240 --> 00:12:09.120 did that take place for you? So I was wondering 274 00:12:09.120 --> 00:12:11.600 what will I do next, and the way our promotions work, 275 00:12:12.200 --> 00:12:13.720 I could see it coming where I was not going 276 00:12:13.799 --> 00:12:16.080 to be able to do operations anymore if I stayed Singan. 277 00:12:16.200 --> 00:12:18.039 I was like, how do I keep doing operations? Well? 278 00:12:18.840 --> 00:12:21.200 Human is there. I didn't know very much about it. 279 00:12:21.600 --> 00:12:22.960 I kind of took a risk on it and just 280 00:12:22.960 --> 00:12:24.720 said I'm gonna try it. If I don't like it, 281 00:12:25.159 --> 00:12:26.600 then I'm going to suffer. But if I like it, it 282 00:12:26.639 --> 00:12:28.919 might be cool. So I went. We did a screener. 283 00:12:28.960 --> 00:12:31.120 They do like a board where they sit down. They 284 00:12:31.200 --> 00:12:32.840 used to interrogate you for like eight hours with a 285 00:12:32.840 --> 00:12:35.480 group of dudes sitting across the table from you. Now 286 00:12:35.480 --> 00:12:39.440 it's not like that anymore. But I did that past 287 00:12:39.480 --> 00:12:43.120 the screener, went to the school and had no clue 288 00:12:43.159 --> 00:12:44.759 what I was about to learn, and so it was 289 00:12:44.840 --> 00:12:47.000 kind of a shock. I just was trying to get out, 290 00:12:47.080 --> 00:12:48.480 kind of like when I joined the Marine Carps, trying 291 00:12:48.480 --> 00:12:50.720 to get out of Connecticut. Similar thing where I was like, 292 00:12:50.759 --> 00:12:53.759 how do how do I pivot out here? And it 293 00:12:53.799 --> 00:12:54.360 was the right move? 294 00:12:55.519 --> 00:12:57.799 Was it difficult though, too, because I mean, here you are, 295 00:12:57.840 --> 00:13:00.919 we're seeing you have TSSCIO, so you know, some sat 296 00:13:01.000 --> 00:13:04.960 access toff like that were they were they reluctant to 297 00:13:05.000 --> 00:13:08.039 let you go from the sandfield, anywhere else, not just 298 00:13:08.120 --> 00:13:08.960 human but anywhere. 299 00:13:09.080 --> 00:13:12.200 Yeah, and actually more so, the Marine Corps was pissed 300 00:13:12.200 --> 00:13:14.679 that I hadn't served in a Marine Corps unit, and 301 00:13:15.519 --> 00:13:18.960 they were really resistant to approve my stuff. But they 302 00:13:19.399 --> 00:13:23.039 they the local leadership had no power over my package 303 00:13:23.039 --> 00:13:25.399 that I sent up. All they could do is non 304 00:13:25.440 --> 00:13:28.159 concur but it didn't affect the outcome, so I still 305 00:13:28.159 --> 00:13:32.080 got picked in the Marine Corps. If I remember. 306 00:13:31.840 --> 00:13:34.399 I working with some guys like. 307 00:13:36.759 --> 00:13:39.759 Aren't most of their human ters warrants? 308 00:13:39.840 --> 00:13:42.480 Or is there or I guess, can you tell us 309 00:13:42.480 --> 00:13:44.360 how it works, because I'm not sure. 310 00:13:44.399 --> 00:13:47.159 I just remember working. So there have been some changes 311 00:13:47.200 --> 00:13:49.200 over time. It used to actually be two different fields. 312 00:13:49.200 --> 00:13:51.440 We used to have c I. Counter Intelligence separate from 313 00:13:51.480 --> 00:13:53.879 human just like the army. Okay, no longer is that 314 00:13:54.000 --> 00:13:56.159 the case. And there's actually a third field, which is 315 00:13:56.240 --> 00:13:58.960 interrogator translators that they rolled all three of these into 316 00:13:59.000 --> 00:14:01.200 a single MOS. So what you do is you have 317 00:14:01.240 --> 00:14:04.879 the enlisted people there and usually have some junior officers. 318 00:14:05.000 --> 00:14:06.440 They don't do this anymore. They did it for about 319 00:14:06.440 --> 00:14:08.039 ten years and then got rid of it. But like 320 00:14:08.120 --> 00:14:10.120 let's say you're a first attendant out of Quantico and 321 00:14:10.159 --> 00:14:14.120 your mos is going to be Cihuman officer. You would 322 00:14:14.120 --> 00:14:16.879 go through the class with us and listed just like 323 00:14:17.039 --> 00:14:19.120 the rest of us, like kind of like through a 324 00:14:19.240 --> 00:14:20.960 soft training where it's like there's no the rank is 325 00:14:21.000 --> 00:14:23.039 not important. What's important is the training. You know. It's 326 00:14:23.120 --> 00:14:26.279 very similar to that. The warrant officers have to come later. 327 00:14:26.679 --> 00:14:28.639 So you know, you graduate, get a couple of deployments 328 00:14:28.679 --> 00:14:30.159 under you. It used to be you need like three 329 00:14:30.240 --> 00:14:32.559 or four deployments during the war. Now that the war 330 00:14:32.639 --> 00:14:35.360 is over, like nobody's deploying, so they're just letting people 331 00:14:35.440 --> 00:14:37.759 go in. But it used to be a lot more competitive. 332 00:14:37.799 --> 00:14:40.799 They used to reject people all the time. Those warrant 333 00:14:40.799 --> 00:14:42.759 officers would become the team leaders and you'd have like 334 00:14:42.799 --> 00:14:46.000 between three to five CI Human collectors and a team 335 00:14:46.080 --> 00:14:48.080 leader on top, and then you'd go deploy to do 336 00:14:48.080 --> 00:14:50.639 either direct support or general support to a unit that 337 00:14:50.720 --> 00:14:53.960 needed you. Hey, guys, it's your pal Jack. I just 338 00:14:53.960 --> 00:14:55.360 want to take a moment to tell you about the 339 00:14:55.360 --> 00:14:59.440 sponsor for this show, which is stop Box. Stop Box 340 00:14:59.559 --> 00:15:05.039 makes this very cool box to secure your items in 341 00:15:05.080 --> 00:15:10.399 where your valuables or weapons could be a firearm, knife, 342 00:15:10.440 --> 00:15:14.759 things that you want to keep away from kids. 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Discover a better way to 363 00:16:22.399 --> 00:16:27.519 balance security and readiness with stopbox and what was your 364 00:16:27.519 --> 00:16:31.600 first assignment once you got into the human field. So 365 00:16:31.639 --> 00:16:33.919 I went to Afghanistan. That was like at the height 366 00:16:34.000 --> 00:16:36.679 of Marine Corps involvement in Afghanistan. Went there in twenty eleven. 367 00:16:36.720 --> 00:16:39.080 I was there for a year. Went to Helman Province, 368 00:16:40.080 --> 00:16:44.240 super interesting experience. I went there with multiple functions, so 369 00:16:44.279 --> 00:16:46.679 I was general support to the area that we were in. 370 00:16:46.840 --> 00:16:49.879 We were in Regimental Combat Team five, which was a 371 00:16:49.919 --> 00:16:53.120 portion of Helman kind of south west Ish all the 372 00:16:53.120 --> 00:16:55.720 way down to the Pakistan border. So I was doing 373 00:16:55.759 --> 00:16:58.320 interrogations in our debt FAC. I was going on raids 374 00:16:58.360 --> 00:17:00.279 with our Aerial and Addiction Forces, which is a out 375 00:17:00.279 --> 00:17:02.360 there and like looking for dudes crossing between Pakistan and 376 00:17:02.360 --> 00:17:05.720 Afghanistan with drugs, you know, land the helicopter right in 377 00:17:05.759 --> 00:17:07.480 front of the car and grab the dudes, take the drugs, 378 00:17:07.599 --> 00:17:09.400 go back. I would talk to him for a little 379 00:17:09.400 --> 00:17:12.119 while and be like, yep, you're going to bogram, you know, 380 00:17:12.200 --> 00:17:14.279 and then send them out or let them go, depending 381 00:17:14.279 --> 00:17:16.720 on what was going on. Did that at the very beginning. 382 00:17:17.480 --> 00:17:20.240 Then our policy in Afghanistan change. About halfway through the deployment. 383 00:17:20.279 --> 00:17:23.240 They started shrinking down base footprints, so they were closing 384 00:17:23.240 --> 00:17:25.160 down some of the bases like Dell Around, for example, 385 00:17:25.200 --> 00:17:27.319 they shut that down send a lot of those guys 386 00:17:27.319 --> 00:17:29.400 to Camp Leatherneck. They sent us to Camp Leatherneck. I 387 00:17:29.440 --> 00:17:32.759 was at Camp Dwire before, so when we went to Leatherneck, 388 00:17:32.759 --> 00:17:35.680 the mission change more to a CI focused mission. But 389 00:17:35.720 --> 00:17:37.519 I still had all my source network that I had 390 00:17:37.519 --> 00:17:41.279 developed in Southern Afghanistan, which was really helpful because one 391 00:17:41.279 --> 00:17:43.680 guy that I had been working with. It's kind of unusual, 392 00:17:43.759 --> 00:17:47.000 especially in the military, to do a cold bump with 393 00:17:47.039 --> 00:17:49.440 a guy, which means your very first contact, run it 394 00:17:49.480 --> 00:17:52.319 all the way through to recruitment. Usually that doesn't happen. 395 00:17:52.400 --> 00:17:55.319 Usually it's multiple handlers are doing this over time, and 396 00:17:55.359 --> 00:17:58.559 then finally maybe the guy gets recruited. But this one 397 00:17:58.599 --> 00:18:01.079 particular source I had, I actually the week after I 398 00:18:01.119 --> 00:18:04.359 showed up, I met him, started developing him, and was 399 00:18:04.400 --> 00:18:07.319 able to recruit him in October the next year. So 400 00:18:07.319 --> 00:18:08.599 it's like less than a year. I was able to 401 00:18:08.599 --> 00:18:11.559 move through the entire recruitment cycle, which was like unheard of, 402 00:18:11.680 --> 00:18:14.519 especially in your first deployment. So when I transferred up 403 00:18:14.519 --> 00:18:16.920 to leather Neck, that guy stayed on my books, and 404 00:18:17.000 --> 00:18:19.680 I'm glad he did, because there was an attack in 405 00:18:19.759 --> 00:18:23.359 Camp Bashion in September twenty twelve. He had been reporting 406 00:18:23.400 --> 00:18:27.119 on that attack from February twenty twelve. He was giving 407 00:18:27.119 --> 00:18:29.759 information on the vehicle to be used, like a high 408 00:18:29.799 --> 00:18:32.440 lux white and red High Lucks pickup truck. He knew 409 00:18:32.440 --> 00:18:34.799 exactly where the safe house was, where they'd be staging at. 410 00:18:35.240 --> 00:18:37.279 He knew where they actually were going to come up 411 00:18:37.279 --> 00:18:39.319 to the fence line. And the guys actually did a 412 00:18:39.359 --> 00:18:42.880 three They did three dry runs cutting the fence, using 413 00:18:43.200 --> 00:18:46.000 very good methods to cut diagonally across the fence and 414 00:18:46.119 --> 00:18:48.319 the base. They ran all the way up and tagged 415 00:18:48.359 --> 00:18:51.160 their hand on the aircraft there and ran back just 416 00:18:51.200 --> 00:18:52.599 to make sure they'd be able to do it. Nobody 417 00:18:52.599 --> 00:18:54.920 caught them. The reason nobody caught them is because there 418 00:18:54.920 --> 00:18:58.480 were Tongans guarding those posts, and every other post had 419 00:18:58.480 --> 00:19:03.160 a silhouette, not a person. During this whole time, we've 420 00:19:03.160 --> 00:19:05.799 been telling General Kurganis, who was the major General in 421 00:19:05.880 --> 00:19:08.200 charge of the Marines there in RC Southwest, Hey, this 422 00:19:08.240 --> 00:19:10.759 is attack's going to happen, Like tell them in February, 423 00:19:10.759 --> 00:19:12.920 tell them in March, tell them in April. Like every 424 00:19:12.920 --> 00:19:14.920 month we were updating him, like, hey, we got even 425 00:19:14.920 --> 00:19:17.200 more information now we even know. We had a video 426 00:19:17.759 --> 00:19:20.160 of them training with In the video, there's a map 427 00:19:20.599 --> 00:19:23.759 of Camp Leatherneck Ambassi and they're aircraft on the map 428 00:19:23.960 --> 00:19:25.640 and the guy's there with a little stick like back 429 00:19:25.640 --> 00:19:28.359 in the old days teachers. He's like pointing to the 430 00:19:28.400 --> 00:19:30.720 points of entry and like the actually the place they 431 00:19:30.720 --> 00:19:33.359 had already dry run. He's pointing to that like you know, 432 00:19:33.440 --> 00:19:35.039 going through the whole thing. The guys are all sitting 433 00:19:35.039 --> 00:19:38.319 around like watching like school children, and we're showing them like, hey, 434 00:19:38.359 --> 00:19:40.359 we have like direct evidence that's going to happen. And 435 00:19:40.400 --> 00:19:42.559 this source is like an A one source, like very 436 00:19:42.599 --> 00:19:46.119 highly credible, very good veracity, like we've tested, we off 437 00:19:46.160 --> 00:19:49.680 seest them a lot of times. Very responsive. He's like, no, 438 00:19:50.599 --> 00:19:53.559 I know this base is impervious. There's no way they 439 00:19:53.559 --> 00:19:55.519 could get away with something like this. And we were like, sir, 440 00:19:55.640 --> 00:19:58.000 they already have three times. They've done a dry run 441 00:19:58.039 --> 00:20:01.680 successfully three times during the day, not at night, right, 442 00:20:02.200 --> 00:20:05.039 and he kept pushing back. It came around like July, 443 00:20:05.319 --> 00:20:09.200 I believe, maybe early August, and finally we got a 444 00:20:09.279 --> 00:20:12.599 report from that source saying the attack will be in September. 445 00:20:13.599 --> 00:20:16.640 Because Prince Harry is at the base. So they had 446 00:20:16.640 --> 00:20:18.960 this plan like in their pocket for over a year 447 00:20:19.200 --> 00:20:20.680 and they weren't doing it. They were waiting for like 448 00:20:20.680 --> 00:20:23.240 an opportunity where it would make the most impact. Which 449 00:20:23.400 --> 00:20:26.279 totally get that. Prince Harry was very vocal about his 450 00:20:26.400 --> 00:20:28.599 visit to the base. It was like widely covered in 451 00:20:28.640 --> 00:20:30.880 the news. Even wrote a book about it later, you know. 452 00:20:31.799 --> 00:20:33.759 But that drew their attention. They said, what if we 453 00:20:33.799 --> 00:20:36.160 could kill him. He was actually staying over by the 454 00:20:36.240 --> 00:20:38.920 Danish tents, which was pretty far away from the aircraft. 455 00:20:39.799 --> 00:20:41.640 They were able to go in and destroy the aircraft. They 456 00:20:41.720 --> 00:20:45.759 killed two Marines. These guys were on PCP and a 457 00:20:45.759 --> 00:20:48.920 bunch of other drugs. They were getting shot like over 458 00:20:48.960 --> 00:20:51.000 and over, and they kept going like zombies. It was crazy. 459 00:20:51.119 --> 00:20:52.599 The only way they were killed is when they were 460 00:20:52.640 --> 00:20:54.519 cut in half by the fifty calls from the helicopters, 461 00:20:54.559 --> 00:20:56.440 and the helicopters took time to figure out that this 462 00:20:56.559 --> 00:20:59.599 was going on. And you had one dude cut in 463 00:20:59.640 --> 00:21:03.079 half from the waist down, crawling like eyes wide open, 464 00:21:03.519 --> 00:21:05.400 trying to get a grenade out and open it, like 465 00:21:05.440 --> 00:21:07.680 didn't know his body was gone, you know. And the 466 00:21:07.720 --> 00:21:09.519 other thing is the guys they selected for this were 467 00:21:09.519 --> 00:21:12.680 mentally challenged. Yeah, they picked them this way on purpose obviously. 468 00:21:12.920 --> 00:21:14.640 Then they put him on drugs, and then they sent 469 00:21:14.720 --> 00:21:17.920 him on a suicide mission. Right. One guy survived. We 470 00:21:18.000 --> 00:21:20.680 called him Stumpy because he lost his hand during the fight. 471 00:21:21.440 --> 00:21:23.599 He was the one we interrogated, so my debt fact 472 00:21:23.640 --> 00:21:27.799 actually got him, and he was very mentally challenged. And 473 00:21:27.880 --> 00:21:30.640 it's sad because like, this guy obviously didn't believe in 474 00:21:30.640 --> 00:21:33.359 anything that was going on. He was just mentally challenged 475 00:21:33.400 --> 00:21:35.440 and convinced this is what you're going to do. Put 476 00:21:35.480 --> 00:21:38.000 on drugs, that's what you're doing. And while we're talking 477 00:21:38.000 --> 00:21:39.200 to him, we're trying to get him to talk, and 478 00:21:39.200 --> 00:21:40.839 he's like kind of cage. He doesn't want to talk. 479 00:21:41.319 --> 00:21:43.359 And finally we're thinking, like, how do we get this 480 00:21:43.400 --> 00:21:47.559 guy to communicate? And one of the other interrogators gave 481 00:21:47.599 --> 00:21:50.640 him a marker and he just starts drawing, and he 482 00:21:50.640 --> 00:21:54.319 starts drawing that map that was in that video. And 483 00:21:55.039 --> 00:21:57.240 I got to rewind a little bit because in July 484 00:21:57.599 --> 00:22:01.759 that year, my partner and I the counterintell agent, we're 485 00:22:01.799 --> 00:22:04.279 going around the base and Camp Blaveneck was huge at 486 00:22:04.319 --> 00:22:05.880 the time. There was like three to five thousand people 487 00:22:05.920 --> 00:22:07.559 at any given time living on that base in a 488 00:22:07.599 --> 00:22:10.240 small town. Well, there was a bus that would take 489 00:22:10.480 --> 00:22:13.759 third country nationals like Pakistanis and other people around the base. 490 00:22:14.359 --> 00:22:16.880 And there were maps that said, you know, this is 491 00:22:16.880 --> 00:22:18.920 the chow hall, this is the aircraft, this is the 492 00:22:18.960 --> 00:22:22.359 blah blah blah. Those maps were secret no foreign maps 493 00:22:22.759 --> 00:22:25.640 that the Army Corps of Engineers printed out, cut the 494 00:22:25.799 --> 00:22:28.720 classification off of, and then slipped into a plastic thing 495 00:22:29.039 --> 00:22:31.319 and then screwed them up all over the base. Right. 496 00:22:31.839 --> 00:22:33.720 My partner and I went around and picked up over 497 00:22:33.799 --> 00:22:36.960 sixty of these maps, right, And we brought the actual 498 00:22:37.000 --> 00:22:39.200 stack of maps with us to this one meeting and 499 00:22:39.240 --> 00:22:41.599 we brought it to hit the general like, these are 500 00:22:41.640 --> 00:22:45.279 classified maps. Here are the originals we found with Buckeye imagery, 501 00:22:45.279 --> 00:22:48.119 which is classified imagery right here, And here's the map 502 00:22:48.160 --> 00:22:51.039 that's printed. It's the same, it's just missing this. And 503 00:22:51.039 --> 00:22:52.480 he's like, well, how are my guys going to know 504 00:22:52.480 --> 00:22:54.920 how to get around the base. We're like, sir, this 505 00:22:54.960 --> 00:22:58.440 is classified information. You can't release it to third country nationals, 506 00:22:58.519 --> 00:23:01.640 especially Pakistanis, who we already know are doing things over 507 00:23:01.640 --> 00:23:04.160 the border. Right, And he's like, but how will the 508 00:23:04.160 --> 00:23:06.440 third country nationals know how to get to the defact 509 00:23:06.480 --> 00:23:08.519 the chow hall and you know, to the gym like 510 00:23:08.559 --> 00:23:10.119 this is what this is what he was saying. It 511 00:23:10.200 --> 00:23:13.880 was like shocking to me. Okay, fast forward to the attack. 512 00:23:14.160 --> 00:23:17.920 Stumpy in his pocket is one of those maps, and 513 00:23:17.960 --> 00:23:20.000 it's just like mind blowing, you know. 514 00:23:20.480 --> 00:23:24.799 Was the same base commander there when the attack happened. 515 00:23:25.839 --> 00:23:29.000 What was his response and were there any repercussions for him? 516 00:23:29.079 --> 00:23:31.640 Oh? Yeah, so I don't know what his personal response was, 517 00:23:31.640 --> 00:23:33.960 but he got relieved of duty, which is very unusual 518 00:23:34.000 --> 00:23:36.880 for a general to be relieved Yeah in theater, Yeah, yeah, 519 00:23:36.920 --> 00:23:40.440 for sure here I mean because usually I mean I 520 00:23:40.480 --> 00:23:42.640 think that we're just used to those guys getting off 521 00:23:42.640 --> 00:23:45.279 Scott no matter what happens. It was actually two generals, 522 00:23:45.279 --> 00:23:47.880 So there was Kriganis, who was the Infantry Division commander. 523 00:23:48.240 --> 00:23:50.880 Then there was the Marine Air Wing commander who was 524 00:23:50.880 --> 00:23:54.240 a one star broad Meadow I believe his name was. So. 525 00:23:54.559 --> 00:23:56.920 Right before that attack happened, like two weeks before it happened, 526 00:23:57.240 --> 00:23:59.839 the maw commander, that general came to visit us at 527 00:23:59.839 --> 00:24:01.799 Camp to Wire because we were doing some stuff down 528 00:24:01.839 --> 00:24:05.839 there with the Afghans, and we had reports that the 529 00:24:05.880 --> 00:24:09.599 Taliban wanted to kill a general like generally they didn't 530 00:24:09.599 --> 00:24:11.920 know which one or anything, but like target of opportunity, 531 00:24:11.960 --> 00:24:14.240 like hope it happens, you know, And we were telling 532 00:24:14.440 --> 00:24:16.599 that general like, hey, just so you know, the Taliban 533 00:24:16.640 --> 00:24:19.160 has been thinking about attacking a general, and no generals 534 00:24:19.160 --> 00:24:21.160 had visited this base in a very long time. If 535 00:24:21.160 --> 00:24:22.799 you come there, you're probably going to trigger an attack 536 00:24:22.839 --> 00:24:24.519 because they're gonna know that you're there. Give this giant 537 00:24:24.640 --> 00:24:26.240 entourage and he's like, no, no, no, I have to 538 00:24:26.279 --> 00:24:27.880 see the troops. I have to see the troops. So 539 00:24:27.920 --> 00:24:30.000 he goes there. He went to the Afghan side of 540 00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:31.920 the base, which was separate from our side of the base. 541 00:24:32.400 --> 00:24:35.240 There's this massive crowd of Afghans like on top of him, 542 00:24:35.240 --> 00:24:36.920 you know, because it's kind of like they're very excited 543 00:24:37.039 --> 00:24:39.400 all this stuff. And this one guy comes running up 544 00:24:39.440 --> 00:24:41.640 from behind and like plows his way through the crowd 545 00:24:41.839 --> 00:24:43.920 and he's got one of those stick minds that the 546 00:24:44.000 --> 00:24:46.880 Russians had back in the Cold War in Afghanistan, and 547 00:24:46.920 --> 00:24:49.160 he like lights it off and it blew his hands off. 548 00:24:49.400 --> 00:24:51.799 Didn't kill anybody because it was it wasn't a dud, 549 00:24:51.839 --> 00:24:54.680 but it was like not functioning order or whatever. Yeah. Yeah, 550 00:24:54.799 --> 00:24:57.240 So like if that thing had worked, he would have 551 00:24:57.319 --> 00:24:59.799 killed that guy, that same general that got relieved later 552 00:24:59.839 --> 00:25:02.039 on for not listening to us about the other attack. 553 00:25:02.319 --> 00:25:05.440 You know. So that's some of the frustrations out of 554 00:25:05.440 --> 00:25:10.440 that deployer. And after that Afghanistan deployment, when was it 555 00:25:10.480 --> 00:25:14.920 that you went over to Marsak? So the following year. Actually, 556 00:25:15.680 --> 00:25:19.160 Scott Stalker was the Marine in charge of assignments for 557 00:25:19.240 --> 00:25:23.000 enablers to Marsak at the time, and I called him 558 00:25:23.039 --> 00:25:24.839 up and I said he was a master sargant at 559 00:25:24.839 --> 00:25:26.359 the time. I said, Master Sergeant, you know, I'd really 560 00:25:26.440 --> 00:25:27.960 like to come over to Marsak. I've heard a lot 561 00:25:28.000 --> 00:25:29.319 of things because I actually worked with them when I 562 00:25:29.400 --> 00:25:31.799 was in Sycad back during Debt one. I was making 563 00:25:31.799 --> 00:25:34.160 stuff for their unit and I said, you know, I'd 564 00:25:34.200 --> 00:25:36.039 love to come over there as a human guy. And 565 00:25:36.079 --> 00:25:38.680 he was like, Okay, let me see. Uh do you 566 00:25:38.720 --> 00:25:40.839 want East Coast or West coast? It was at the 567 00:25:40.880 --> 00:25:42.559 time when it was split across the coast, and I 568 00:25:42.640 --> 00:25:45.400 was like, well, I'm already in Camp Pendleton, California. Would 569 00:25:45.440 --> 00:25:46.799 be awesome. He goes, why don't you open up a 570 00:25:46.839 --> 00:25:48.920 marine online? So I opened up like our It's like 571 00:25:48.960 --> 00:25:50.319 the thing the Marines used to look at all their 572 00:25:50.359 --> 00:25:52.920 personal information. He's like, do you see any orders in there? 573 00:25:53.279 --> 00:25:55.880 And I was like yeah, he gave me orders over 574 00:25:55.920 --> 00:25:59.880 the phone, which was crazy. So they, you know, they 575 00:26:00.240 --> 00:26:02.400 risk on me. I went over there and just up 576 00:26:02.440 --> 00:26:05.720 the road it was. It was fantastic and greatest five 577 00:26:05.799 --> 00:26:08.799 years of my twenty years in the Marines. With enablers, 578 00:26:08.799 --> 00:26:10.559 they don't let you stay more than five years, so 579 00:26:10.640 --> 00:26:13.880 I stayed literally exactly five years and zero days over there. 580 00:26:14.039 --> 00:26:16.920 And you said something like you were part of a 581 00:26:16.960 --> 00:26:21.079 pilot assessment and selection course. Yeah, so in twenty thirteen 582 00:26:21.279 --> 00:26:24.519 they were piloting this assessment selection for enablers. So obviously 583 00:26:24.519 --> 00:26:26.839 not as hardcore as the operators, but they what they 584 00:26:26.839 --> 00:26:29.680 were trying to do is like, you know, week from 585 00:26:29.680 --> 00:26:32.000 the Chaff kind of thing, because at the time, there 586 00:26:32.039 --> 00:26:34.119 was a lot of unknown about Marstock, at least in 587 00:26:34.119 --> 00:26:36.319 the conventional side, like what is this place? So a 588 00:26:36.319 --> 00:26:37.640 lot of people were going there that might not have 589 00:26:37.680 --> 00:26:39.839 belonged there, So they're trying to filter that. So a 590 00:26:39.920 --> 00:26:42.640 lot of physical stuff, a lot of psychological stuff, but 591 00:26:42.759 --> 00:26:44.799 packed down into about seven day periods, so it's not 592 00:26:44.839 --> 00:26:48.039 as long as others. It was pretty grueling though for 593 00:26:48.119 --> 00:26:51.480 the time that it was. We slept like one or 594 00:26:51.519 --> 00:26:54.279 two hours a night the whole time, exhausted, a lot 595 00:26:54.279 --> 00:26:56.240 of like Okay, run down to the beach and I'll 596 00:26:56.240 --> 00:26:58.640 swim a kilometer out there. Go over here, put on 597 00:26:58.680 --> 00:27:00.920 your cameis, go run to the pill go do pool 598 00:27:00.920 --> 00:27:03.519 pte now go. Like it was like thing after thing 599 00:27:03.559 --> 00:27:06.279 after thing, you know, Like in midnight, we're going up 600 00:27:06.319 --> 00:27:09.559 over the Reaper, which is this really high inclined hill 601 00:27:09.599 --> 00:27:12.200 in Kent Pendleton, and as we're going up there, then 602 00:27:12.200 --> 00:27:13.839 we get ce us gas blown up on us, and 603 00:27:13.839 --> 00:27:15.559 then suddenly we got a casualty and then oh man, 604 00:27:15.559 --> 00:27:17.480 now there's some ammocans you got to carry too, and 605 00:27:17.519 --> 00:27:19.559 like the whole thing, you know, so like they were 606 00:27:19.599 --> 00:27:21.240 just throwing stuff at us the whole time, and like 607 00:27:21.240 --> 00:27:24.160 guys were getting injured. Almost everybody made it. Only a 608 00:27:24.160 --> 00:27:26.039 couple of guys didn't. I think there was like fifteen 609 00:27:26.079 --> 00:27:28.160 of us total, and then like two or three didn't 610 00:27:28.200 --> 00:27:30.480 didn't make it. But it was all the enablers at 611 00:27:30.480 --> 00:27:33.279 the time. They were going through so like intelligence analysts, 612 00:27:33.319 --> 00:27:36.839 dog handler, EOD. So they all the all the dynamic 613 00:27:37.039 --> 00:27:39.599 people together and uh, it was it was pretty interesting. 614 00:27:40.799 --> 00:27:43.440 They actually did a good job of like monitoring it 615 00:27:43.519 --> 00:27:45.960 and and kind of adjusting it. So like, for example, 616 00:27:46.640 --> 00:27:49.359 they had this like mental task. It was like the 617 00:27:49.400 --> 00:27:51.400 second to last day where they brought us into this 618 00:27:51.440 --> 00:27:53.200 conference room and they took a trash can full of 619 00:27:53.240 --> 00:27:55.119 intel reports and the guy stood up on the table 620 00:27:55.119 --> 00:27:57.319 and just dump the intel reports out all over the table. 621 00:27:57.559 --> 00:27:59.119 He's like, you have one hour to figure out when 622 00:27:59.119 --> 00:28:01.039 the attack's going to be. And like all of us 623 00:28:01.079 --> 00:28:02.519 like look at each other like ah man a right 624 00:28:02.519 --> 00:28:04.039 here we go, like we're all trying to read, like 625 00:28:04.039 --> 00:28:06.400 we can't read because we're tired. And me and one 626 00:28:06.440 --> 00:28:09.680 other guy who had worked on Asia stuff before started 627 00:28:09.720 --> 00:28:11.759 realizing like, oh, this is like an abusayaf thing from 628 00:28:11.759 --> 00:28:14.279 the Philippines. And actually he knew the thing that it 629 00:28:14.319 --> 00:28:15.880 was about, and I knew the thing that it happened 630 00:28:15.880 --> 00:28:17.480 before that that caused it. So like he and I 631 00:28:17.480 --> 00:28:20.039 were over in the corner like putting stuff together, and 632 00:28:20.079 --> 00:28:22.839 like they could see that through the glass and they 633 00:28:22.839 --> 00:28:24.200 came in and like pulled me and him and one 634 00:28:24.200 --> 00:28:25.480 of their dude out like, hey, guys, come to this 635 00:28:25.519 --> 00:28:27.519 other room. So they pull us over this other room 636 00:28:27.599 --> 00:28:30.200 and they're like, you have a new problem. You have 637 00:28:30.400 --> 00:28:34.319 this spaceship with I can't reader the exact things, but 638 00:28:34.319 --> 00:28:36.720 it was like there's a woman on there, she's forty three, 639 00:28:37.119 --> 00:28:40.039 she had a miscarriage. There's a man who's five foot 640 00:28:40.079 --> 00:28:42.480 ten and has a history of cancer in his family, 641 00:28:42.480 --> 00:28:44.400 and like they all these like interesting like things with 642 00:28:44.440 --> 00:28:47.359 each person, like pick nine out of the fifteen that 643 00:28:47.400 --> 00:28:50.240 can go to Mars and live there. And so like 644 00:28:50.319 --> 00:28:54.359 that was the problem. Like what so we're like we're 645 00:28:54.359 --> 00:28:56.440 trying to figure it out, you know, And they wanted 646 00:28:56.519 --> 00:28:59.359 us to use certain analytical techniques to like very quickly 647 00:28:59.400 --> 00:29:01.440 solve a problem. And actually we had a pretty good 648 00:29:01.440 --> 00:29:03.960 solution to it. So it's kind of it's very interesting. 649 00:29:04.039 --> 00:29:06.839 It was like the physical stuff and there was like 650 00:29:07.160 --> 00:29:09.319 a mental thing in between each physical thing. It's like 651 00:29:09.400 --> 00:29:11.240 forcing you to use your brain even though you're tired, 652 00:29:11.519 --> 00:29:13.319 So it's pretty cool. Then they did away with it 653 00:29:13.359 --> 00:29:16.240 because there was too much attrition for their liking, and 654 00:29:16.279 --> 00:29:18.480 instead of like calibrating it, they just got rid of it, 655 00:29:18.519 --> 00:29:23.119 which is unfortunate. And from there, I mean, you did 656 00:29:23.160 --> 00:29:25.279 a whole bunch of deployments all over the place. I mean, 657 00:29:25.279 --> 00:29:27.240 where was the first one that they sent you off to? 658 00:29:27.720 --> 00:29:30.279 So the first one was really interesting. It was to Indonesia, 659 00:29:30.680 --> 00:29:34.640 but it was supporting a Jasok preparation of the environment activity. 660 00:29:35.480 --> 00:29:37.559 And I didn't know that. I had no clue about 661 00:29:37.559 --> 00:29:39.799 any of this stuff. And they said, hey, you know 662 00:29:39.839 --> 00:29:42.240 you've been selected to do an interview. This is how 663 00:29:42.240 --> 00:29:44.440 it started. I'm like, okay, Like, but you can't do 664 00:29:44.480 --> 00:29:45.960 it in your uniform. You need to be in a suit. 665 00:29:46.359 --> 00:29:48.000 It's going to be at some early time in the morning. 666 00:29:48.039 --> 00:29:49.839 Came or what it was. It's because I was getting 667 00:29:49.920 --> 00:29:52.519 interviewed from a guy in Hawaii that was at the 668 00:29:52.640 --> 00:29:56.559 Joint Intel Support Element over there in sock pack and 669 00:29:56.960 --> 00:29:58.559 I get on there and it's him and some other people. 670 00:29:58.599 --> 00:30:01.160 He's a civilian guys talking to me, and they're like, 671 00:30:01.200 --> 00:30:03.079 what do you know about jam Islamiya? What do you 672 00:30:03.079 --> 00:30:04.920 know about Abusayav? What do you know? Like they're asking 673 00:30:04.920 --> 00:30:07.039 me like all these questions like like boom, boom boom, 674 00:30:07.039 --> 00:30:09.160 and I'm like answering to the best my ability, and 675 00:30:09.480 --> 00:30:11.000 like what do you know about these strategic things and 676 00:30:11.039 --> 00:30:13.640 these tactical things, like they're trying to like figure out stuff, 677 00:30:14.039 --> 00:30:16.759 and I feel like I didn't know anything, but I 678 00:30:16.759 --> 00:30:19.400 got the job. I don't know Wow or who else 679 00:30:19.440 --> 00:30:22.720 they talked to, but anyways, I got that. And they're like, 680 00:30:22.799 --> 00:30:25.720 now you're going to go to Sockpack for an unknown 681 00:30:25.720 --> 00:30:28.160 period of time. We'll determine when you're ready to go. 682 00:30:28.279 --> 00:30:31.839 So I went to Sockpack, and uh, for ninety days 683 00:30:31.880 --> 00:30:34.319 I worked with that guy that interviewed me. His name 684 00:30:34.359 --> 00:30:38.359 is Dan. He is like the Indonesia expert in sock Pack, 685 00:30:38.759 --> 00:30:42.720 amazing counter terrorist analyist and uh. He actually was not 686 00:30:42.759 --> 00:30:45.240 in the military or the intel community at all. He 687 00:30:45.400 --> 00:30:50.400 was a dendrologist major like studying trees in college and 688 00:30:50.440 --> 00:30:53.759 his master's degree in Indonesia. He like knows Bahasa Indonesia, 689 00:30:53.759 --> 00:30:56.720 he knows like other local dialects and somehow, like you know, 690 00:30:57.119 --> 00:30:58.920 one thing led to another and he started working for 691 00:30:59.000 --> 00:31:02.359 the government. So he's like a true cultural expert, which 692 00:31:02.400 --> 00:31:05.200 is really helpful. And he said, look, I know you 693 00:31:05.200 --> 00:31:07.799 don't know a lot about Jemmi Islamia, but I need 694 00:31:07.839 --> 00:31:09.839 you to master it in three months. I'm giving you 695 00:31:09.960 --> 00:31:12.240 ninety days. You can be in the skiff as much 696 00:31:12.279 --> 00:31:14.000 as you want or as little as you want, and 697 00:31:14.079 --> 00:31:16.240 at the end, you're going to brief the sock pack commander, 698 00:31:16.240 --> 00:31:19.799 Admiral Kilrain about what you learned. And then he let 699 00:31:19.799 --> 00:31:21.720 go of me for the next ninety days and I 700 00:31:21.759 --> 00:31:23.400 just went in there like twelve to fifteen hours a 701 00:31:23.480 --> 00:31:26.279 day reading every report since two thousand, I think it 702 00:31:26.319 --> 00:31:29.599 was no actually from nineteen ninety one until twenty fourteen, 703 00:31:29.599 --> 00:31:32.119 which is when I was there, and I learned a 704 00:31:32.119 --> 00:31:35.079 lot about Jemmislimia, and I learned that there's a certain 705 00:31:35.079 --> 00:31:37.640 pattern about how they do their attacks compared to how 706 00:31:37.680 --> 00:31:40.039 they split into new groups, because they have a history 707 00:31:40.039 --> 00:31:42.680 of splintering into smaller groups, and there is a huge 708 00:31:42.680 --> 00:31:46.160 correlation between these two conditions, which is very fascinating. And 709 00:31:46.240 --> 00:31:48.599 I briefed that to the admiral and he said that 710 00:31:48.640 --> 00:31:50.839 he'd never heard that before and that was that was great, 711 00:31:51.119 --> 00:31:52.920 And he looked over to Dan. He's like, what do 712 00:31:52.960 --> 00:31:54.839 you think, Dan? And Dan's like he can go on 713 00:31:54.880 --> 00:31:58.160 the deployment, which is pretty cool. Yeah. So then that, 714 00:31:58.319 --> 00:32:01.640 like I mean with the Filipino groups too, is that 715 00:32:01.839 --> 00:32:04.079 like they split off because like there's like a piece 716 00:32:04.119 --> 00:32:06.400 deal is about to go in, and there's one group 717 00:32:06.720 --> 00:32:08.880 or one faction that feels like they're not getting a 718 00:32:08.880 --> 00:32:11.640 big enough slice of the pie. Like, well, from your analysis, 719 00:32:11.640 --> 00:32:14.160 why was that taking place? It's actually more a diversionary 720 00:32:14.640 --> 00:32:17.000 because if we're putting they know how we work. We 721 00:32:17.039 --> 00:32:19.640 know like, for example, al Qaida is an organization. Well, 722 00:32:19.680 --> 00:32:24.240 if there's a new group called JEM or JTWJ or whatever, 723 00:32:24.519 --> 00:32:26.640 we're like, well, that's not al Kaieda, right, and then 724 00:32:26.640 --> 00:32:29.000 like three years later like, oh wait, it is al Qaida, right, 725 00:32:29.039 --> 00:32:31.440 you know. Right, So they understand that, and they're very 726 00:32:31.440 --> 00:32:33.559 good at like splitting off at the exact moment where 727 00:32:33.599 --> 00:32:35.680 it makes sense for them to do that, and that 728 00:32:35.720 --> 00:32:37.920 group becomes a target later and then that group disappears 729 00:32:37.920 --> 00:32:39.200 and then this one comes up, and like it's the 730 00:32:39.240 --> 00:32:41.599 same two sense, you know. And actually Humbali, who is 731 00:32:41.599 --> 00:32:44.920 in jam Islamia, was one of the original AQ dudes. 732 00:32:45.119 --> 00:32:47.359 He was Indonesian. He's in Gitmo right now. He's still 733 00:32:47.519 --> 00:32:49.720 one of the last people in Gimo. He was arrested 734 00:32:49.759 --> 00:32:54.000 I think in Thailand. Yeah, that was an interesting thing. Yeah, 735 00:32:54.200 --> 00:32:56.440 And I mean I've tried to like figure out exactly 736 00:32:56.480 --> 00:32:58.720 how that happened. Maybe you know better than I do, 737 00:32:59.720 --> 00:33:04.039 but there were rangers standing by in case things went sideways. Yeah, 738 00:33:04.079 --> 00:33:06.680 that was the criff On one Charlie one one probably 739 00:33:06.920 --> 00:33:09.319 uh no, no, no, Ranger battalion. Oh okay, yeah, because I 740 00:33:09.319 --> 00:33:12.480 actually know the guys. Oh yeah, Yeah, there was a 741 00:33:12.519 --> 00:33:14.119 whole thing they went to timely in to do a 742 00:33:14.200 --> 00:33:16.519 j set, but there was a whole option to like 743 00:33:16.559 --> 00:33:19.640 switch it from training to live yeah, like actually issue 744 00:33:19.640 --> 00:33:23.000 them live ammunition. This was like two thousand and four. Yeah, 745 00:33:23.039 --> 00:33:25.759 that that happened, yep, And that that did not happen. 746 00:33:25.799 --> 00:33:28.079 They did not ever flip it green. I think it 747 00:33:28.119 --> 00:33:32.240 was a liaison ye thing that they arrested that guy 748 00:33:32.279 --> 00:33:35.359 over there. Yeah, it's fascinating too. I mean the whole 749 00:33:35.400 --> 00:33:37.839 Al Qaeda in Southeast Asia thing, I think it's like 750 00:33:37.880 --> 00:33:40.759 little understood or like poorly understood about like how pivotal 751 00:33:41.160 --> 00:33:44.160 the Jumma Islamia and other groups that were associated with 752 00:33:44.160 --> 00:33:46.519 them were to like the Bojinka plot, which was the 753 00:33:46.559 --> 00:33:48.680 original aircraft plot and all those things those were like 754 00:33:49.119 --> 00:33:51.519 planned in Southeast Asia, like the physically they were into 755 00:33:51.519 --> 00:33:54.640 Southeast Asia planning and stuff like Khalei Shik Muhammad also 756 00:33:54.720 --> 00:33:57.599 was over there in Bangkok, you know, in Marwan yep, 757 00:33:57.920 --> 00:34:02.559 all those Singaporeans Malaysians yep. Yeah, really fascinating. So yeah, 758 00:34:02.559 --> 00:34:05.119 that deployment was basically working at the embassy in Jakarta 759 00:34:05.200 --> 00:34:07.599 and it was me and an operator paired up and 760 00:34:07.720 --> 00:34:09.639 we would go around the country and look at places 761 00:34:09.679 --> 00:34:12.440 to do preparation the environment tasks, so like operational preparation 762 00:34:12.480 --> 00:34:15.360 the environment, which means setting the condition so that other 763 00:34:15.400 --> 00:34:19.079 forces can commit and do stuff. So big focus was 764 00:34:19.119 --> 00:34:21.719 like ports. For example, we wanted to have certain ports 765 00:34:21.760 --> 00:34:23.719 that we knew we could press a button and that 766 00:34:23.760 --> 00:34:26.360 port will be available if something happened, something like of 767 00:34:26.360 --> 00:34:28.840 a crisis happened. Let's say a hostage was going on. 768 00:34:29.119 --> 00:34:30.719 We need that to be secure so we can get 769 00:34:30.719 --> 00:34:33.960 to that airfield near this area and like without any hiccups, 770 00:34:34.039 --> 00:34:37.119 let it happen. So that's what we were doing over there. 771 00:34:37.239 --> 00:34:39.800 It was really cool because we were actually partnered with station, 772 00:34:40.000 --> 00:34:44.239 like our desks were in station spaces and the analyst 773 00:34:44.280 --> 00:34:47.480 I was paired up with the agency analyst. His name 774 00:34:47.519 --> 00:34:50.079 was also John, like me, but this guy was way 775 00:34:50.079 --> 00:34:53.079 different than me. He had a PhD in Islamic theology 776 00:34:53.280 --> 00:34:56.800 from Harvard University and this guy he was younger than me, 777 00:34:57.320 --> 00:35:00.639 and he knew like the deepest, deepest backstore of every 778 00:35:00.679 --> 00:35:04.079 single character in this counter terrorism story. It was crazy, 779 00:35:04.199 --> 00:35:06.239 like just the level of knowledge that he had. I 780 00:35:06.239 --> 00:35:09.280 felt like this big city next tip, you know. But 781 00:35:09.320 --> 00:35:11.239 it was an awesome team to work on because there 782 00:35:11.239 --> 00:35:15.599 are people like that on that team. That's pretty cool. 783 00:35:15.679 --> 00:35:19.559 So it was all like kind of ope, like just 784 00:35:19.760 --> 00:35:22.800 in case there's an emergency, yep. So we do the 785 00:35:22.800 --> 00:35:25.320 whole range of things from like driving from point A 786 00:35:25.360 --> 00:35:26.800 to point B to see how long it takes to 787 00:35:26.840 --> 00:35:28.920 drive during the day, like kind of mundane stuff like 788 00:35:28.960 --> 00:35:30.480 going out and trying to measure like the height of 789 00:35:30.519 --> 00:35:32.280 this stuff. So we knew if a helicopter could land 790 00:35:32.280 --> 00:35:35.039 there these things to like more advanced stuff like we 791 00:35:35.039 --> 00:35:38.280 actually flew up to Natuna Basar, which is an Indonesian 792 00:35:38.320 --> 00:35:40.840 island in the South China. See it's the only Indonesian 793 00:35:40.920 --> 00:35:43.440 territory in the South China. See. We went up there 794 00:35:43.559 --> 00:35:46.280 to do pe tasks, but we also had a secondary 795 00:35:46.320 --> 00:35:48.360 task to look at the Chinese overflights that were going 796 00:35:48.440 --> 00:35:50.880 on because China was like routinely invading their airspace every 797 00:35:50.880 --> 00:35:53.280 second day, so we actually got up there, and another 798 00:35:53.280 --> 00:35:56.320 third task we had was to confirm the location of 799 00:35:56.360 --> 00:35:58.400 a radar that the Indonesians had, and the Indonesians were 800 00:35:58.400 --> 00:36:00.599 like super hesitant to let us see it. So we 801 00:36:00.639 --> 00:36:02.800 had to figure out a way to like get a 802 00:36:02.840 --> 00:36:06.039 photo of us like with them with the radar in 803 00:36:06.039 --> 00:36:07.760 the background, which is what we actually ended up doing. 804 00:36:08.239 --> 00:36:11.119 So we got the picture, and they were really upset 805 00:36:11.119 --> 00:36:12.400 that we were trying to find like they knew we 806 00:36:12.400 --> 00:36:14.159 were trying to do it, but we never like openly 807 00:36:14.199 --> 00:36:16.599 set it. I mean, I'm a little surprised that the 808 00:36:16.639 --> 00:36:20.400 Indonesians gave you as much freedom and free access as 809 00:36:20.400 --> 00:36:22.679 they did, like from what I've been told anyway, that 810 00:36:23.400 --> 00:36:25.880 it's okay to like meet privately, but they're much more 811 00:36:25.920 --> 00:36:28.880 hesitant to have like a public relationship with American officials. 812 00:36:28.960 --> 00:36:32.480 It's funny you say that. So into Tuna Basar, it 813 00:36:32.559 --> 00:36:35.199 was only one hotel, It's a very small island, and 814 00:36:35.960 --> 00:36:38.079 the people onto Tuna Basar were not happy that we 815 00:36:38.079 --> 00:36:40.280 were there, Like the government people were not happy were there. 816 00:36:40.280 --> 00:36:42.800 We actually had liaisons with us from Jakarta, but they 817 00:36:42.840 --> 00:36:45.000 weren't happy they were there either. And so like we're 818 00:36:45.079 --> 00:36:47.480 rolling around the island, like taking pictures and like doing stuff. 819 00:36:47.480 --> 00:36:49.559 You know. We had this aircraft called Non standardy Aviation, 820 00:36:50.039 --> 00:36:51.960 which is like a small little prop plane. We're like 821 00:36:51.960 --> 00:36:54.280 flying around the island taking pictures, like doing stuff, and 822 00:36:54.280 --> 00:36:56.000 then we'd land. Well, one day we went out on 823 00:36:56.000 --> 00:36:57.639 the other side of the island, like two hours the 824 00:36:57.679 --> 00:37:00.360 other side of the mountain, and we'd come back and 825 00:37:00.400 --> 00:37:02.280 there's like, you know how you get that feeling like 826 00:37:02.320 --> 00:37:05.480 something's weird. Come to the hotel, go to the front desk. 827 00:37:05.559 --> 00:37:08.320 The lady like looks up, doesn't speak, and it like 828 00:37:08.360 --> 00:37:10.760 looks back down or like somebody's in here, you know. 829 00:37:11.079 --> 00:37:13.679 So like go up to my room. I had brought 830 00:37:13.679 --> 00:37:15.639 a suitcase and I had some other stuff. It's like 831 00:37:15.800 --> 00:37:18.199 dumped out in a pyramid on my bed, and there 832 00:37:18.239 --> 00:37:20.159 is a memory card on top of my clothes. It 833 00:37:20.199 --> 00:37:22.000 was a blank memory card because I had the real 834 00:37:22.000 --> 00:37:24.000 memory card in my camera, right, I had a backup 835 00:37:24.039 --> 00:37:25.920 that was blank, and I think they were pissed that 836 00:37:25.920 --> 00:37:27.440 it didn't have anything on it, and they like left 837 00:37:27.480 --> 00:37:29.440 their calling card like we knew you had a camera. 838 00:37:29.760 --> 00:37:33.159 Like okay, you know, like what are gonna do about that? Right? Right, 839 00:37:33.480 --> 00:37:37.000 there's just like a really interesting experience. What is their 840 00:37:37.039 --> 00:37:41.000 intelligence services? Like, is it composus? So Capasus is their 841 00:37:41.000 --> 00:37:43.280 special forces, which is actually for a while it was 842 00:37:43.320 --> 00:37:46.159 blacklisted because in Tamar they did a lot of stuff. Yeah, 843 00:37:46.239 --> 00:37:48.119 there's a little there's a little bit of like a 844 00:37:48.159 --> 00:37:52.400 prisoner execution happening. They're pretty heavily tainted. Yeah. Well, actually 845 00:37:52.400 --> 00:37:53.760 we came up with a solution for how to work 846 00:37:53.800 --> 00:37:56.119 with them still, so in twenty fourteen, we had to 847 00:37:56.159 --> 00:37:58.639 cut off if they had graduated from their academy before 848 00:37:58.679 --> 00:38:00.960 two thousand and eight, we couldn't work with them. They 849 00:38:01.000 --> 00:38:03.920 graduated after we could, And then two years ago they 850 00:38:03.920 --> 00:38:07.119 just eliminated the entire blacklist. So now all of CAPOSUS 851 00:38:07.199 --> 00:38:09.639 is available because the President of Indonesia was in Capasus 852 00:38:09.719 --> 00:38:11.880 in Teamor and he was one of the guys that 853 00:38:11.920 --> 00:38:14.079 was implicated, so he can't blacklist him, you know, he's 854 00:38:14.079 --> 00:38:20.480 the president. And so what was the second one after Indonesia? 855 00:38:20.480 --> 00:38:22.880 I mean, you spent some time in West Africa, so 856 00:38:22.920 --> 00:38:25.400 that came later. I actually I came back from Indonesia 857 00:38:25.480 --> 00:38:28.239 and at the time it was twenty fourteen, twenty fifteen, 858 00:38:28.280 --> 00:38:32.880 when Isis was really morphing into this new thing. So 859 00:38:33.199 --> 00:38:34.960 twenty fifteen, I come back and they're like, hey, do 860 00:38:35.000 --> 00:38:37.239 you want to go on another deployment right now? And 861 00:38:37.280 --> 00:38:39.679 I was like yes. So they're like, we're going to 862 00:38:39.760 --> 00:38:41.519 send you to the Middle East. We're not exactly sure 863 00:38:41.719 --> 00:38:43.599 if you're going to go to Syria, Iraq or Lebanon 864 00:38:43.679 --> 00:38:45.639 yet because things are so dynamic right now, like at 865 00:38:45.639 --> 00:38:47.320 that time, like we didn't know what we were doing, 866 00:38:47.480 --> 00:38:49.480 like where to go and stuff like that, and so 867 00:38:49.559 --> 00:38:51.599 I said okay. So I started working up with a 868 00:38:51.639 --> 00:38:55.559 team a hotel company at Marsak and while we were 869 00:38:55.800 --> 00:38:59.400 working up, they were doing a deployment flarization training where 870 00:38:59.400 --> 00:39:01.440 they basically go out like practice the full mission profile 871 00:39:01.480 --> 00:39:04.920 in the United States before they go overseas. On that DFT, 872 00:39:05.440 --> 00:39:09.079 one of the helicopters crashed, the Raider seven helicopter, so 873 00:39:09.199 --> 00:39:12.320 we lost a big portion of our company's expertise. And 874 00:39:12.400 --> 00:39:15.039 also those guys that died were in leadership positions within 875 00:39:15.079 --> 00:39:18.199 their teams, so they had to completely restructure a lot 876 00:39:18.239 --> 00:39:21.679 of hotel companies teams. So I got pulled off of 877 00:39:21.719 --> 00:39:24.400 the Iraq deployment put on the Lebanon deployment as a 878 00:39:24.440 --> 00:39:28.679 result of this. So I went to Lebanon in early 879 00:39:28.719 --> 00:39:32.239 twenty sixteen, and we were working with Lebanese special forces 880 00:39:32.440 --> 00:39:36.039 and the Magawirra Baja, which is the Lebanese Navy seals basically, 881 00:39:36.920 --> 00:39:39.679 and also the Mukafaja, which is like their ranger unit 882 00:39:40.239 --> 00:39:41.880 or kind of like a strike force, if you will, 883 00:39:42.280 --> 00:39:44.880 and we were training them but also at the same 884 00:39:44.920 --> 00:39:47.280 time enabling them. There were some other tasks we had 885 00:39:47.280 --> 00:39:49.400 in Syria that we weren't going into Syria. Instead, we 886 00:39:49.679 --> 00:39:50.880 were going up to the last line of cover and 887 00:39:50.880 --> 00:39:53.360 concealment with our partner force. They would go over there 888 00:39:53.360 --> 00:39:55.400 and do stuff we would also. It was a very 889 00:39:55.440 --> 00:39:57.960 interesting time. We would actually enable some of our enemies 890 00:39:57.960 --> 00:40:00.719 to do things to ISIS at that time. Is pretty interesting, 891 00:40:00.760 --> 00:40:05.119 controversial period of time. But we weren't like directly involved 892 00:40:05.119 --> 00:40:06.719 in that. But we weren't doing things to help. Like 893 00:40:06.760 --> 00:40:09.159 the Battle of Kuserra up in northern Lebanon where hes 894 00:40:09.239 --> 00:40:12.360 bullet defeated ISIS. You know, that wasn't like they weren't alone, 895 00:40:12.480 --> 00:40:15.159 you know doing that. Yeah, I mean it became like 896 00:40:15.239 --> 00:40:17.400 you know, how we outlied with the Taliban against ISIS 897 00:40:17.440 --> 00:40:22.159 later on, yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's interesting. 898 00:40:22.639 --> 00:40:25.719 Hey, guys. 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I love ghostped Thanks guys. 947 00:42:52.599 --> 00:42:56.679 Okay, so yeah, Webanon sounds interesting and uh and then Iraq. Yeah. 948 00:42:56.719 --> 00:42:59.360 So in Lebanon, we're doing the training stuff and I'll 949 00:42:59.360 --> 00:43:02.039 just tell you oneleb story please yeah, move on. So 950 00:43:02.079 --> 00:43:04.199 we were doing visit board search and seizure training with 951 00:43:04.280 --> 00:43:08.199 the Lebanese Special Forces and we actually boarded a Chinese 952 00:43:08.320 --> 00:43:10.639 vessel that was parked in Patroon, which is the town 953 00:43:10.639 --> 00:43:13.800 in Lebanon, and the Lebanese are going up a caving ladder, 954 00:43:13.880 --> 00:43:15.559 which is this very narrow ladder in the width of 955 00:43:15.559 --> 00:43:19.079 your foot, and we're behind them as they're coming up 956 00:43:19.079 --> 00:43:21.320 off their rigid hole inflatable boat. They're going up the 957 00:43:21.559 --> 00:43:23.559 caving ladder. It's a pretty high boat. I mean it's 958 00:43:23.760 --> 00:43:27.320 a shipping vessel, you know, And the dude goes almost 959 00:43:27.320 --> 00:43:29.800 to the top, this one soldier and then he loses 960 00:43:29.800 --> 00:43:32.800 his footing and the way. You know. Sometimes they're called 961 00:43:32.800 --> 00:43:35.039 the Lebanese Special Forces, and some of them are really badass, 962 00:43:35.760 --> 00:43:38.679 but they're not all that way, just like any partner force, 963 00:43:38.719 --> 00:43:40.760 where like some guys are just there because there's someone's 964 00:43:40.800 --> 00:43:42.920 cousin or brother or whatever. Well, this guy was one 965 00:43:42.920 --> 00:43:45.239 of those guys, and he was wearing his helmet in 966 00:43:45.280 --> 00:43:47.119 such a way where like it wasn't clipped on to 967 00:43:47.199 --> 00:43:49.199 his chin, it was clipped on under here, and his 968 00:43:49.320 --> 00:43:52.679 rifle wasn't secured properly, and so like he flips backward, 969 00:43:52.880 --> 00:43:55.880 his kevlar goes back over his throat and starts choking him. 970 00:43:56.000 --> 00:43:58.280 He's like choking out up there upside down on the 971 00:43:58.280 --> 00:44:00.000 caving ladder, like I don't know, fifty feet off the 972 00:44:00.039 --> 00:44:03.320 ground or off the water, like swerving like this right 973 00:44:03.320 --> 00:44:05.840 over the whole of the boat. And if that dude fell, 974 00:44:05.880 --> 00:44:07.920 he would be like squashed like a grape on that 975 00:44:08.000 --> 00:44:10.559 because the front of the boat is metal. Yeah, so 976 00:44:10.599 --> 00:44:13.199 that's happening, his rifles swinging around like this, you know, 977 00:44:13.360 --> 00:44:15.519 And so we actually had to go up the other 978 00:44:15.559 --> 00:44:17.159 side of the boat and come rescue him from the 979 00:44:17.159 --> 00:44:19.320 top down. And we're just thinking, like one of these 980 00:44:19.320 --> 00:44:22.239 guys have to actually do one of these things. You know. Yeah, 981 00:44:22.280 --> 00:44:23.840 that was crazy. So like that was like two weeks 982 00:44:23.840 --> 00:44:27.960 before I left Lebanon. But yeah, in Lebanon, they're like, hey, 983 00:44:28.239 --> 00:44:30.519 because things are so dynamic in Iraq, are you willing 984 00:44:30.519 --> 00:44:32.480 to just go straight to Iraq instead of going back home? 985 00:44:32.599 --> 00:44:35.400 I was like yes, So I went directly to Iraq, 986 00:44:35.440 --> 00:44:37.400 like I flew from I think I connected in Jordan 987 00:44:37.480 --> 00:44:40.679 on an ENSAUV of the non standard aviation into Baghdad 988 00:44:40.679 --> 00:44:44.039 and then up to Reveal and then at that time 989 00:44:44.079 --> 00:44:45.800 we had just got an authorization to start doing a 990 00:44:45.840 --> 00:44:48.360 lot of air strikes. So my mission up there was 991 00:44:48.400 --> 00:44:51.280 human triggered strikes, where basically I have a source or 992 00:44:51.480 --> 00:44:54.320 a principal Asian who has his own network that's sitting 993 00:44:54.360 --> 00:44:57.000 outside of a building and can see there's fifty guys, 994 00:44:57.360 --> 00:44:59.280 bad guys meeting in there, and he's giving me information 995 00:44:59.320 --> 00:45:02.079 about it. Once we feel good about the information or 996 00:45:02.119 --> 00:45:05.000 that the place is safe, then I'm gonna be the 997 00:45:05.000 --> 00:45:07.639 one talking to the air officer. They're gonna start sending 998 00:45:07.679 --> 00:45:09.400 up aircraft and they're gonna blow that building up and 999 00:45:09.440 --> 00:45:12.039 kill those guys. So that's what that deployment was was 1000 00:45:12.280 --> 00:45:14.400 one after another after another and after another, and actually 1001 00:45:14.679 --> 00:45:17.239 not just our deployment, but that like six month period 1002 00:45:17.320 --> 00:45:20.000 right before we retook Mosol, that the area we were 1003 00:45:20.000 --> 00:45:23.239 in was around Mosol. Right before we retook Mosol, like 1004 00:45:23.280 --> 00:45:26.639 the Joint Special Operations Task Force had killed like thirty 1005 00:45:26.639 --> 00:45:29.239 thousand people in air strikes, just like those air strikes 1006 00:45:29.519 --> 00:45:31.519 and that was mostly all of guys doing human triggered 1007 00:45:31.519 --> 00:45:34.559 strikes all around northern Iraq. It was a really interesting 1008 00:45:34.760 --> 00:45:38.159 period of time. And this is also is this the 1009 00:45:38.199 --> 00:45:40.840 deployment where you met your missus? It is, yes, tell 1010 00:45:40.920 --> 00:45:43.639 us about that because I think that's an interesting story. Yeah. 1011 00:45:43.719 --> 00:45:46.039 So I was working with the a Lebanese guy who 1012 00:45:46.079 --> 00:45:48.760 was helping us in a support capacity out in Herbel 1013 00:45:49.199 --> 00:45:50.800 in Dream City, which is like the nice part of 1014 00:45:50.880 --> 00:45:54.400 Rebel And he had a huge mansion and he used 1015 00:45:54.440 --> 00:45:56.599 to have talking about that part of the of Verbil 1016 00:45:56.639 --> 00:45:59.639 that looks like Abu Dhabi. Yeah, yeah, real nice area. 1017 00:46:00.079 --> 00:46:01.840 It's got the guys with the ak standing outside to 1018 00:46:01.840 --> 00:46:05.079 make sure nobody unwanted goes in there, like not bad guys, 1019 00:46:05.079 --> 00:46:08.360 but just the unwashed, you know. So they would let 1020 00:46:08.440 --> 00:46:09.960 us in, so we'd go in there, and this guy 1021 00:46:10.039 --> 00:46:12.360 used to have dinner parties and his you know, his 1022 00:46:12.760 --> 00:46:14.960 big courtyard that had these like high walls and everything 1023 00:46:14.960 --> 00:46:16.880 so nobody could see in. And there's probably like twenty 1024 00:46:16.960 --> 00:46:20.159 or thirty people there. And we're around this like very 1025 00:46:20.199 --> 00:46:22.760 long table and there's only one open seat, and I'm 1026 00:46:22.760 --> 00:46:24.760 sitting next to that open seat. It's like ten o'clock 1027 00:46:24.800 --> 00:46:27.639 at night, and she walks in on the other side 1028 00:46:27.719 --> 00:46:29.440 and there's nowhere for her to sit, so she comes 1029 00:46:29.440 --> 00:46:32.079 and sits next to me, and we start talking. And 1030 00:46:33.360 --> 00:46:34.920 like I said, it's like ten o'clock at night. We 1031 00:46:34.960 --> 00:46:36.840 talked to like three or four in the morning, just 1032 00:46:36.880 --> 00:46:38.440 me and her, and like if you like you know 1033 00:46:38.440 --> 00:46:40.599 when you do those like time laps and like everyone's leaving, 1034 00:46:40.960 --> 00:46:42.519 but you can just see like people leaving the table 1035 00:46:42.559 --> 00:46:44.599 over time, and it's just me and her like yapping 1036 00:46:44.760 --> 00:46:47.079 the entire time. And we just talked for hours. And 1037 00:46:47.079 --> 00:46:50.440 I'm like, she's amazing. And I think she had the 1038 00:46:50.440 --> 00:46:53.880 same thought too, because now we're married. But she's an 1039 00:46:53.880 --> 00:46:57.239 Iranian and she was actually interble working. She'd been living 1040 00:46:57.239 --> 00:46:59.079 there for a few years. She was there when Isis 1041 00:46:59.079 --> 00:47:00.760 came all the way up to the edge of herbel 1042 00:47:01.280 --> 00:47:04.119 and she couldn't go home because she felt unsafe in Iran. 1043 00:47:04.280 --> 00:47:07.480 So she was basically trapped in herbel right while Isis 1044 00:47:07.519 --> 00:47:10.519 was coming up there pretty crazy time. And she's been 1045 00:47:10.559 --> 00:47:13.199 through a lot on her own too, And we were 1046 00:47:13.239 --> 00:47:14.679 able to get her to come to the United States. 1047 00:47:14.679 --> 00:47:16.639 She got her green card and she got her citizenship 1048 00:47:16.679 --> 00:47:22.159 last year, so really awesome. Yeah, yeah, it's a wild story. 1049 00:47:22.320 --> 00:47:25.760 She didn't feel safe going back home because she has 1050 00:47:26.159 --> 00:47:29.079 involved in some counter regime activities. Yeah. You know people 1051 00:47:29.079 --> 00:47:31.920 in Iran. Most people in Iran do not like the government. Yeah, 1052 00:47:31.960 --> 00:47:34.519 and they will take to the streets to tell you that. 1053 00:47:34.719 --> 00:47:37.480 You know, they're very proud of saying what they believe, 1054 00:47:37.719 --> 00:47:39.599 even if they get punished or hurt for it. The 1055 00:47:39.639 --> 00:47:43.559 problem is the government is going to hurt you. Yeah, 1056 00:47:43.639 --> 00:47:46.280 and people disappear all the time. So she was concerned. 1057 00:47:46.320 --> 00:47:48.360 Back in two thousand and nine during the Green Revolution, 1058 00:47:48.480 --> 00:47:51.440 John Boshi sobs. She was in that protest. A lot 1059 00:47:51.440 --> 00:47:53.679 of Iranians were in that protest, and she didn't feel 1060 00:47:53.679 --> 00:47:56.079 safe staying in the country after that protest because they 1061 00:47:56.119 --> 00:47:57.519 were like rolling people up on the streets and they 1062 00:47:57.559 --> 00:47:59.559 were just disappearing. You know, we're getting pushed off of 1063 00:47:59.599 --> 00:48:02.079 buildings and like all kinds of crazy stuff. And so 1064 00:48:02.159 --> 00:48:04.800 she went to Iraq because as an Iranian she can't 1065 00:48:04.800 --> 00:48:07.440 really go anywhere else easily. Yeah. I mean, she's not 1066 00:48:07.440 --> 00:48:09.760 from an affluent family. She's not the son or daughter 1067 00:48:09.800 --> 00:48:12.400 of some Ayatola who can just go to Canada America 1068 00:48:12.440 --> 00:48:14.480 and go to college like most of them do, or 1069 00:48:14.559 --> 00:48:16.760 live in Paris and having Instagram accounts like they do. 1070 00:48:17.440 --> 00:48:19.519 So she had to like really make her way out. 1071 00:48:19.639 --> 00:48:22.320 And yeah, she went to Reveal doing you know, small 1072 00:48:22.400 --> 00:48:25.559 jobs there and that's when I met her. So you 1073 00:48:25.559 --> 00:48:28.320 guys are in love. It's great, but I do have 1074 00:48:28.400 --> 00:48:30.880 to ask, like was this with the c I guys 1075 00:48:31.000 --> 00:48:33.760 like crazy about this that one of their humantors is 1076 00:48:33.840 --> 00:48:39.079 dating a Persian. Oh yeah, you have no idea? Yeah, 1077 00:48:39.280 --> 00:48:42.360 nice bump, Yeah exactly. Yeah. Yeah that's you know, that's 1078 00:48:42.400 --> 00:48:45.159 when the ignorance comes out too, because like my assignmus 1079 00:48:45.199 --> 00:48:47.599 manager called me up like three years later and he's like, hey, 1080 00:48:48.079 --> 00:48:50.760 are you aware that you're affiliated with an Iranian? And 1081 00:48:50.760 --> 00:48:54.840 I was like yes, And I'm like, first of all, 1082 00:48:54.840 --> 00:48:57.199 why are you calling me my assignment's manager, Like you're 1083 00:48:57.239 --> 00:48:59.119 not even involved in this, you know, and like who 1084 00:48:59.159 --> 00:49:01.159 is talking to you? And like what's going on here? 1085 00:49:01.199 --> 00:49:01.360 You know? 1086 00:49:01.960 --> 00:49:03.320 But it was like that for the rest of my career, 1087 00:49:03.360 --> 00:49:05.599 where like routinely I was having to answer for this 1088 00:49:06.119 --> 00:49:09.840 sin of marrying or being with somebody who is from 1089 00:49:09.840 --> 00:49:12.800 the other side, right, which is crazy because like the Germans, 1090 00:49:13.000 --> 00:49:16.519 Koreans and Japanese are back during those wars, there were 1091 00:49:16.559 --> 00:49:18.719 a lot of service members that married those people. Like 1092 00:49:18.760 --> 00:49:21.119 that's not crazy, you know, but this is this is 1093 00:49:21.159 --> 00:49:23.320 the worst, you know, some trips to terrain here in 1094 00:49:23.400 --> 00:49:27.119 Jermy Yeah, didn't want to tell us about. I wish someday, 1095 00:49:27.159 --> 00:49:31.360 I hope the government changes and I know me too. Okay, 1096 00:49:31.480 --> 00:49:35.800 So you meet your future wife and as you come 1097 00:49:35.840 --> 00:49:38.760 back home, I imagine carrying on this long distance relationship. 1098 00:49:38.800 --> 00:49:42.079 And I know from my own experience getting a green 1099 00:49:42.119 --> 00:49:46.079 card and immigration is that nightmare? Yeah, what's going on 1100 00:49:46.119 --> 00:49:48.760 with the rest of your career in the Marine Corps 1101 00:49:48.760 --> 00:49:51.719 as all that's going on and transpiring. Yeah, So twenty sixteen, 1102 00:49:51.719 --> 00:49:53.800 I'd come back from Iraq and actually I was in 1103 00:49:53.800 --> 00:49:57.519 Turkey and Injulik Airbase. This is July twenty sixteen, and 1104 00:49:57.639 --> 00:49:59.800 there was a coup and they told us to lock 1105 00:49:59.840 --> 00:50:02.199 down and we couldn't leave the hotel. And it turns 1106 00:50:02.199 --> 00:50:04.800 out that the leader of this coup was the base 1107 00:50:04.840 --> 00:50:06.719 commander for inter Lick, which is where we have some 1108 00:50:06.840 --> 00:50:10.079 very sensus stuff for NATO. But it's just wild to 1109 00:50:10.119 --> 00:50:12.159 be like the guy with his finger on the button. 1110 00:50:12.639 --> 00:50:15.159 Besides Airedwan, he's like, the closest dude to these things 1111 00:50:15.880 --> 00:50:17.880 is the one with the coup. They rounded up and 1112 00:50:17.920 --> 00:50:20.159 killed like three thousand people in like a month that 1113 00:50:20.199 --> 00:50:22.360 they blamed this coup on. And they actually blamed it 1114 00:50:22.360 --> 00:50:25.320 on a guy based in the United States exactly the Gulanists, 1115 00:50:25.639 --> 00:50:29.840 the Ghulanistas. Do you believe that? I don't think so, 1116 00:50:29.880 --> 00:50:33.599 but that happened, and so flew home. Then as soon 1117 00:50:33.599 --> 00:50:35.039 as I got back, I actually went into our team 1118 00:50:35.119 --> 00:50:36.480 room and we had a big whiteboard and there was 1119 00:50:36.480 --> 00:50:38.679 the deployment schedule up there, and I was like, man, 1120 00:50:38.800 --> 00:50:41.199 that was an awesome deployment like the Iraq one. And 1121 00:50:41.280 --> 00:50:43.519 I looked up there and I'm like, there's a lot 1122 00:50:43.559 --> 00:50:45.239 of cool stuff going on in Africa. And I asked 1123 00:50:45.239 --> 00:50:47.280 our operations officer, like can I go on one of these? 1124 00:50:47.400 --> 00:50:49.119 He's like, yeah, but you just got back and I'm like, 1125 00:50:49.440 --> 00:50:51.119 I don't care, I'll go right now, and he's like, 1126 00:50:51.159 --> 00:50:54.920 all right, you're going to Senegal. So I worked up 1127 00:50:54.960 --> 00:50:58.119 and went to Senegal right after that. And what were 1128 00:50:58.159 --> 00:51:01.119 you doing in Senegal? If I remember, there's an Elevenese 1129 00:51:01.159 --> 00:51:04.159 presence there. Yeah, so I was actually working with the 1130 00:51:04.199 --> 00:51:07.719 Senegalese Special Forces, the FSS. And there's also a team 1131 00:51:07.760 --> 00:51:10.280 that was going into Mali at the time because MANUSMA, 1132 00:51:10.320 --> 00:51:12.960 which is the UN mission in Mali, a lot of 1133 00:51:13.000 --> 00:51:16.199 the West African countries were actually like the ground forces 1134 00:51:16.239 --> 00:51:19.000 for that UN mission and they were doing combat operations 1135 00:51:19.000 --> 00:51:20.679 in Mali. So what we would do is train them 1136 00:51:20.679 --> 00:51:23.400 in our countries that we were partnered with. Those guys 1137 00:51:23.440 --> 00:51:25.840 would then go for three months or however long. Was 1138 00:51:25.880 --> 00:51:28.480 this part of like one of those like constructs like 1139 00:51:28.480 --> 00:51:31.079 Amy Salm and some of the others. Yes, okay, yeah, 1140 00:51:31.079 --> 00:51:34.719 it's like it's like an official UN mission exactly, just 1141 00:51:34.800 --> 00:51:36.960 like that. Yeah. But it's the weird thing is like 1142 00:51:37.239 --> 00:51:39.639 all the training in preparation is not in Mali. It 1143 00:51:39.719 --> 00:51:42.119 was outside Mali, at least for the military part of it. 1144 00:51:42.840 --> 00:51:44.360 And then we would send the guys in there and 1145 00:51:44.400 --> 00:51:47.039 they would go work with the Malians and stuff like 1146 00:51:47.039 --> 00:51:49.360 that and try to figure the situation out, which they 1147 00:51:49.360 --> 00:51:52.519 didn't do a very good job at And how did 1148 00:51:52.519 --> 00:51:55.679 you like the car? It was a really interesting experience. 1149 00:51:56.679 --> 00:51:59.360 Some say it's a good introduction to Africa, and after 1150 00:51:59.400 --> 00:52:01.079 going to some other countries in Africa, I mean that's 1151 00:52:01.079 --> 00:52:02.719 pretty true. I remember when I was landing in Waga 1152 00:52:02.760 --> 00:52:05.679 Doogu and Burkina Fossil, I'm like, where am I There's 1153 00:52:05.760 --> 00:52:09.039 not any pavement anywhere in the capital city, and then 1154 00:52:09.119 --> 00:52:14.280 Nicher similar situation like whoa. But actually I liked Morocco 1155 00:52:14.360 --> 00:52:17.880 a lot more than Senegal, even though you know, Dakar 1156 00:52:18.039 --> 00:52:19.920 is a pretty easy city to work in, to live in. 1157 00:52:21.000 --> 00:52:23.119 Just something about Morocco is different, like the mountains, the 1158 00:52:23.159 --> 00:52:26.960 Atlas Mountains, Sahara Desert, you know, and the Moroccan special 1159 00:52:26.960 --> 00:52:29.719 forces we worked with were really good people, like very 1160 00:52:29.760 --> 00:52:31.960 good unit that we had. You ever see the movie 1161 00:52:32.000 --> 00:52:34.920 I watched it the other day, rewatched it The Man 1162 00:52:34.920 --> 00:52:37.079 Who Would Be King? No, I've never seen that with 1163 00:52:37.119 --> 00:52:40.000 Sean Connery and Michael Kinan. It's supposed to be in Afghanistan, 1164 00:52:40.039 --> 00:52:43.000 but it was actually filmed in Morocco. I gotta watch it. 1165 00:52:43.159 --> 00:52:43.960 It's a fun movie. 1166 00:52:44.960 --> 00:52:50.639 Yeah, yeah, Seank Sean Connery is the locals mistake him 1167 00:52:50.679 --> 00:52:53.519 for a god and he starts drinking his own kool 1168 00:52:53.559 --> 00:52:55.400 aid and you can only imagine that it does not 1169 00:52:55.679 --> 00:52:56.119 turn out. 1170 00:52:56.360 --> 00:53:01.800 Yeah, so you were also you did make your way. 1171 00:53:01.840 --> 00:53:06.079 You said you mentioned Nijeer, Burkina Faso. What were some 1172 00:53:06.119 --> 00:53:08.199 of these other trips that you were bouncing around. Yeah, 1173 00:53:08.199 --> 00:53:11.559 So Burkina Fasso is interesting. There was a team up 1174 00:53:11.559 --> 00:53:13.840 on the Mali Burkina Fosso border, up in a place 1175 00:53:13.840 --> 00:53:16.159 called Kaya, which is like right up there on the border, 1176 00:53:16.519 --> 00:53:19.239 and this was an army team that was there and 1177 00:53:19.280 --> 00:53:21.199 we found out that they hadn't been debriefed on anything 1178 00:53:21.199 --> 00:53:22.360 they were doing, and they were doing a lot of 1179 00:53:22.360 --> 00:53:24.559 stuff in Mali, and at the time, we're like trying 1180 00:53:24.559 --> 00:53:26.119 to figure out more about what's going on in Mali 1181 00:53:26.199 --> 00:53:28.559 because our partner forces weren't involved in the things we 1182 00:53:28.599 --> 00:53:30.679 wanted them to be involved in, and we were worried 1183 00:53:30.719 --> 00:53:33.119 about Al Kaida, and there's other groups there in Mali 1184 00:53:33.159 --> 00:53:34.760 as well that we're trying to figure out what's going on, 1185 00:53:34.920 --> 00:53:40.400 like Jane m and the the Mira Batun was another 1186 00:53:40.599 --> 00:53:44.000 big group that we're looking for. So I went up 1187 00:53:44.039 --> 00:53:46.119 there for a couple of weeks and just spent every 1188 00:53:46.159 --> 00:53:49.039 day debriefing the team guys on what they'd been seeing 1189 00:53:49.039 --> 00:53:51.639 and doing in Mali and sent all that reporting back. 1190 00:53:51.639 --> 00:53:53.280 And that was the first time we'd ever actually had 1191 00:53:53.320 --> 00:53:56.840 reporting from that area of Burkina Fasso about Mali. So 1192 00:53:57.039 --> 00:53:58.840 that was like a very fulfilling trip, even though it 1193 00:53:58.840 --> 00:54:01.239 was short at school. So they were doing like human 1194 00:54:01.320 --> 00:54:04.599 collection up there, so they were actually working with people there. 1195 00:54:05.480 --> 00:54:09.239 They weren't human people there, you know, guys, and nobody 1196 00:54:09.280 --> 00:54:11.400 was talking to them, you know, because they were up there. 1197 00:54:11.800 --> 00:54:14.079 That was actually around the same time that remember the 1198 00:54:14.119 --> 00:54:18.199 Green Bray got strangled by the guys Logan Melgar. Yeah, 1199 00:54:18.239 --> 00:54:20.559 so one of the guys on my team was actually 1200 00:54:20.559 --> 00:54:23.719 in that room, Kevin Maxwell. That happened at that time, 1201 00:54:23.800 --> 00:54:26.159 at exact time, so like our task force got shook 1202 00:54:26.239 --> 00:54:28.480 up quite a bit, so they started moving us around 1203 00:54:28.519 --> 00:54:34.360 and things were changing very rapidly at that time. Any 1204 00:54:34.440 --> 00:54:37.239 other West Africa adventures you want to tell us about, 1205 00:54:37.800 --> 00:54:40.199 you know, Morocco was probably my favorite, like I said, 1206 00:54:40.639 --> 00:54:42.280 really interesting. I actually went from the top of the 1207 00:54:42.280 --> 00:54:45.000 country to the bottom, and it's twice the size of California, 1208 00:54:45.559 --> 00:54:48.159 And that was a really eye opening experience because I 1209 00:54:48.239 --> 00:54:51.039 had always thought Western Sahara was a country, because that's 1210 00:54:51.079 --> 00:54:52.960 what the maps say. But then you go to Morocco 1211 00:54:53.000 --> 00:54:54.840 and you ask a Moroccan is there such thing as 1212 00:54:54.880 --> 00:54:57.519 Western Sahara. They're like, no, there's only southern Morocco. And 1213 00:54:57.800 --> 00:55:00.440 that was a very interesting thing because the West, I 1214 00:55:00.440 --> 00:55:02.679 think we don't understand that dynamic very well. We talked 1215 00:55:02.679 --> 00:55:05.000 to an Irish guy who's part of the UN mission there, 1216 00:55:05.199 --> 00:55:09.639 like I don't know, five episodes ago. Yeah, yeah, really interesting. 1217 00:55:09.840 --> 00:55:12.000 There was an Irish guy in Lebanon, actually that was there. 1218 00:55:12.119 --> 00:55:15.239 It's not related to that, but he owned a bar 1219 00:55:15.519 --> 00:55:17.880 in Beirut and he had been there since the nineteen 1220 00:55:17.920 --> 00:55:20.320 eighties because a lot of the ira guys went to 1221 00:55:21.000 --> 00:55:23.679 Lebanon and fought against the Israelis. Yeah, and that guy 1222 00:55:23.719 --> 00:55:28.119 stayed behind and opened a bar. Like just interesting, that's crazy. 1223 00:55:29.320 --> 00:55:31.559 And then there's also like some other sort of like 1224 00:55:32.239 --> 00:55:35.760 this is more not not administrative, but just the way 1225 00:55:36.119 --> 00:55:39.280 that things get done, in the way these missions get done. 1226 00:55:39.679 --> 00:55:42.280 The one twenty seven Echo program you mentioned, there's also 1227 00:55:42.280 --> 00:55:47.559 a Delta Echo Fox Trot yep. I mean they're controversial 1228 00:55:48.039 --> 00:55:50.360 in some quarters. I mean, we want to explain like 1229 00:55:50.400 --> 00:55:52.840 the reality of what those programs are and you know 1230 00:55:52.880 --> 00:55:54.880 what your thoughts are about them. Yeah. So the thing is, 1231 00:55:55.000 --> 00:55:57.239 we have foreign partners we want to work with in 1232 00:55:57.320 --> 00:56:00.480 the conventional military. Usually that's a military unit. So like 1233 00:56:00.519 --> 00:56:03.400 if I'm from the fifth Artillery Brigade, I'm going to 1234 00:56:03.400 --> 00:56:05.079 go to a country that has an artillery brigade and 1235 00:56:05.199 --> 00:56:06.800 train them on how to use their stuff and then 1236 00:56:06.800 --> 00:56:09.320 we work together. That's pretty normal. Well, the one two 1237 00:56:09.360 --> 00:56:11.360 seven Echo thing was like, it's so this is a 1238 00:56:11.400 --> 00:56:14.400 legal authority that Congress says, here's money to do this thing. 1239 00:56:14.440 --> 00:56:16.679 We're authorizing you to do it. And for a long 1240 00:56:16.719 --> 00:56:19.480 time they didn't have that. There were some other authorities 1241 00:56:19.559 --> 00:56:21.639 like twelve oh seven, twelve oh six, twelve o eight, 1242 00:56:21.639 --> 00:56:23.920 which were these other like disparate authorities that kind of 1243 00:56:23.960 --> 00:56:26.519 worked together, but they weren't really meant to work together 1244 00:56:26.519 --> 00:56:28.840 for a while, and they were trying to make us 1245 00:56:28.840 --> 00:56:31.440 so that we could partner with entities that were not 1246 00:56:31.559 --> 00:56:35.320 exactly the traditional entities. They aren't the fifth Artillery Brigade 1247 00:56:35.320 --> 00:56:38.519 in Estonia. Instead, they're an irregular force in Southeast Syria. 1248 00:56:38.559 --> 00:56:40.719 That's got some questionable background, and we're not sure what's 1249 00:56:40.760 --> 00:56:42.639 going to happen when we leave Syria. Like this is 1250 00:56:42.920 --> 00:56:44.440 the kind of people that we're trying to work with 1251 00:56:44.519 --> 00:56:47.599 because the enemy in my enemy is my friend, and 1252 00:56:48.440 --> 00:56:50.360 they are the ones closest to the problem that we 1253 00:56:50.400 --> 00:56:52.559 need to solve right now. So it's kind of an 1254 00:56:52.599 --> 00:56:55.320 expeditionary requirement, like we need to cut the timeline on 1255 00:56:55.440 --> 00:56:58.000 vetting these guys because the big controversy with one two 1256 00:56:58.039 --> 00:57:01.400 seven ECHO, there's no human rights checks. There's no way 1257 00:57:01.440 --> 00:57:06.679 heave adding there is not, So that's a problem. Of course, 1258 00:57:06.840 --> 00:57:09.760 isn't the other controversy that these units get op cond 1259 00:57:09.880 --> 00:57:14.360 to the United States? Right because they're working for us essentially, 1260 00:57:14.559 --> 00:57:16.920 And that's how this law has changed over time. So 1261 00:57:16.920 --> 00:57:18.800 like from twelve oh seven and twelve oh eight, one 1262 00:57:18.800 --> 00:57:21.119 of them was equipment and the other one was training. 1263 00:57:21.719 --> 00:57:24.519 With the new law one two seven ECHO, it's equipment, 1264 00:57:24.519 --> 00:57:27.519 training and operations. And there's been two other things added, 1265 00:57:27.559 --> 00:57:31.000 which is the Delta and foxtrot. Foxtrot is preparation of 1266 00:57:31.000 --> 00:57:33.800 the environment activities that is now codified in law. For 1267 00:57:33.840 --> 00:57:35.719 a long time, it wasn't and actually when I was 1268 00:57:35.719 --> 00:57:38.400 Indonesia working on a Preparation the Environment mission. There was 1269 00:57:38.440 --> 00:57:40.599 no law that said you can do preparation the environment, 1270 00:57:40.639 --> 00:57:43.159 and it was very sketchy. The COCOMs didn't have like 1271 00:57:43.599 --> 00:57:46.360 don't they have like the Human Intelligence Executor and all 1272 00:57:46.360 --> 00:57:48.760 these other OPE authorities. So we were working under the 1273 00:57:48.760 --> 00:57:51.280 ct exord, the counter Terrorism Exort, and the Al Qaeda 1274 00:57:51.320 --> 00:57:55.079 Exword AQ Exword, which had language in it that said 1275 00:57:55.119 --> 00:57:57.280 you could do these things, but there was no law 1276 00:57:57.360 --> 00:58:00.000 because that's just the military saying that's not a law, 1277 00:58:00.159 --> 00:58:02.400 all right. Yeah, So like there was no like thing 1278 00:58:02.440 --> 00:58:04.320 to draw that from that would say like, hey, actually 1279 00:58:04.320 --> 00:58:07.559 it's legal and there's money for it. Yeah, And that's 1280 00:58:07.599 --> 00:58:09.880 what these these authorities do is they give you money 1281 00:58:09.920 --> 00:58:13.079 and permission to go do something, right, So that didn't 1282 00:58:13.079 --> 00:58:15.840 exist in twenty fourteen twenty fifteen, So we were doing stuff. 1283 00:58:15.880 --> 00:58:17.159 We actually had a piece of paper. It was a 1284 00:58:17.199 --> 00:58:19.800 one page piece of paper. So if a congressional delegation came, 1285 00:58:20.199 --> 00:58:22.239 we would give them this piece of paper that explained 1286 00:58:22.280 --> 00:58:24.840 what preparation of the environment is, and they said like 1287 00:58:24.920 --> 00:58:29.119 advance force operations, INTEL operations, and operational preparation in the environment, 1288 00:58:29.360 --> 00:58:31.760 each with one paragraph and That's what we were to 1289 00:58:31.960 --> 00:58:36.239 describe to the Congress visitors, right, which is crazy because 1290 00:58:36.480 --> 00:58:38.960 there was no law. So we were basically telling them like, hey, 1291 00:58:39.000 --> 00:58:40.519 can you let us do this? This is what we 1292 00:58:40.519 --> 00:58:43.119 think we're supposed to do. But then they eventually made 1293 00:58:43.119 --> 00:58:44.840 it into a law. It was a slow process where 1294 00:58:44.840 --> 00:58:48.159 it kind of transformed over time. This last Defense Authorization 1295 00:58:48.199 --> 00:58:50.400 Act last year or this current fiscal year is the 1296 00:58:50.400 --> 00:58:52.559 first time that the Preparation the environment one is actually 1297 00:58:52.559 --> 00:58:55.159 in there. So now it's okay, after twenty years of 1298 00:58:55.199 --> 00:58:57.960 doing it, it's okay. You talked a little bit. I 1299 00:58:58.000 --> 00:58:59.960 mean maybe for folks you can describe a little bit 1300 00:59:00.199 --> 00:59:02.360 of what ope is. I mean you described it. I 1301 00:59:02.360 --> 00:59:05.199 think when we talk about Indonesia. Is there anything else 1302 00:59:05.239 --> 00:59:07.800 you want to tell people that like what that means? 1303 00:59:07.800 --> 00:59:09.760 Because a lot of things can be rolled up, you know, 1304 00:59:09.800 --> 00:59:13.000 even the term operational preparation of the environment that could 1305 00:59:13.079 --> 00:59:18.039 even that could potentially include you know, kinetic lethal absolutely, absolutely, yeah. Yeah, 1306 00:59:18.119 --> 00:59:21.159 So there's another part of preparation. There's three buckets, Like 1307 00:59:21.199 --> 00:59:24.239 I said, Intel Ops, Advanced Force operations, and operational preparation 1308 00:59:24.280 --> 00:59:27.480 the environment. Advanced Force Operations is the really interesting one. 1309 00:59:27.519 --> 00:59:30.480 From a kinetic perspective. For example, when we invaded Iraq 1310 00:59:30.519 --> 00:59:33.199 in two thousand and three, there was advanced force operations 1311 00:59:33.199 --> 00:59:35.559 going on in Iraq for a very long time before 1312 00:59:35.559 --> 00:59:38.760 we invaded, basically preparing the environment for the moment that 1313 00:59:38.880 --> 00:59:41.559 the President said go to war. All this stuff would 1314 00:59:41.599 --> 00:59:44.039 fall into place and just happen. And it wasn't by 1315 00:59:44.079 --> 00:59:46.400 accident that those things happen. And that's what preparation the 1316 00:59:46.480 --> 00:59:49.239 environment does into it. For a large scale conflict like that, 1317 00:59:49.639 --> 00:59:52.239 or for some smaller raid like for example, a hostage rescue. Well, 1318 00:59:52.239 --> 00:59:53.440 you need to have an airfield, you need to have 1319 00:59:53.480 --> 00:59:55.920 basing access and overflight. There are all these things that 1320 00:59:56.000 --> 00:59:58.800 have to be ready to go tonight right now, like 1321 00:59:58.840 --> 01:00:01.039 within hours, and the teams are like all over the 1322 01:00:01.039 --> 01:00:02.880 world doing that. And the thing is like you don't 1323 01:00:02.880 --> 01:00:06.119 know exactly what mission you're ready ing right right, So 1324 01:00:06.119 --> 01:00:09.360 you're like, Okay, I'll do this this landing survey, I'll 1325 01:00:09.360 --> 01:00:11.559 do this route reconnaissance, and like I'm not sure if 1326 01:00:11.559 --> 01:00:14.840 these things work together. But some planner at whatever CoCom 1327 01:00:14.920 --> 01:00:17.719 and whatever socom desk is taking all that stuff and 1328 01:00:17.760 --> 01:00:19.960 like weaving it together within like three to eight hours 1329 01:00:20.000 --> 01:00:21.920 or twelve hours or whatever it is before they're like 1330 01:00:22.440 --> 01:00:24.440 National Mission Force is going in to do this tomorrow 1331 01:00:24.519 --> 01:00:26.280 or this morning or whatever, and they're taking all that 1332 01:00:26.320 --> 01:00:28.880 stuff you've collected over time and putting it together. Yeah. 1333 01:00:28.920 --> 01:00:31.960 So if the president pushes that button, everything's ready to go. Yep, 1334 01:00:32.280 --> 01:00:36.199 and it's really fast around the world. We talked to 1335 01:00:36.239 --> 01:00:39.119 somebody maybe a year ago now he's a human or 1336 01:00:39.199 --> 01:00:42.519 talking about doing the ope for the Solomani strike, and 1337 01:00:42.559 --> 01:00:44.639 I think they were like when it happened, they were like, 1338 01:00:44.639 --> 01:00:49.320 oh shit, like that's what we were doing. Yep. Yeah, 1339 01:00:49.639 --> 01:00:52.679 uh okay, And so tell us about kind of like 1340 01:00:52.800 --> 01:00:56.320 finishing out your Marine Corps career and then you went 1341 01:00:56.360 --> 01:00:58.840 to work with the DIA, right, So I went to 1342 01:00:58.960 --> 01:01:01.559 DIA while I was still in So I left Marsak, 1343 01:01:01.599 --> 01:01:03.639 and my common theme is I didn't want to go 1344 01:01:03.679 --> 01:01:06.239 to a Marine Corps unit. So I've actually only spent 1345 01:01:06.280 --> 01:01:07.840 one year at a Marine Corps unit in twenty years. 1346 01:01:07.880 --> 01:01:10.280 The rest of the time was somewhere else. So after 1347 01:01:10.320 --> 01:01:11.840 Marsok was ending, I was like, first of all, I 1348 01:01:11.840 --> 01:01:13.679 want to stay, like you can't stay. So I hit 1349 01:01:13.719 --> 01:01:16.039 my five years and zero days and I wanted to go. 1350 01:01:16.079 --> 01:01:18.039 I screened for this program at DIA and the Director 1351 01:01:18.079 --> 01:01:21.119 of Operations to go to Defense at TACHE office, which 1352 01:01:21.119 --> 01:01:23.639 is unusual for an enlisted person to do. So I 1353 01:01:23.679 --> 01:01:27.519 went from very clandestine, low visibility stuff all the way 1354 01:01:27.519 --> 01:01:30.960 at to strategic level over declared activities in a country, 1355 01:01:31.599 --> 01:01:34.519 plus some other things that supported that right. So I 1356 01:01:34.599 --> 01:01:37.480 actually went to Jordan to US Embassy Imon. We were 1357 01:01:37.519 --> 01:01:40.800 supporting not only Jordan but also the Syria mission because 1358 01:01:40.800 --> 01:01:44.280 in twenty twelve Syria closed US embassy, Syria closed and 1359 01:01:44.599 --> 01:01:47.599 Damascus went to two different countries, Jordan being one of them. 1360 01:01:47.880 --> 01:01:49.920 So we were supporting half of that mission as well. 1361 01:01:50.119 --> 01:01:51.639 And there was a lot of stuff still going on 1362 01:01:51.719 --> 01:01:54.960 with the Syria and especially southern Syria. There was a 1363 01:01:55.000 --> 01:01:57.320 covert operation called Timber Sycamore that went on for quite 1364 01:01:57.320 --> 01:01:59.360 a while, and there's a lot of support in Jordan 1365 01:01:59.440 --> 01:02:02.840 for that. That infrastructure existed even after the covert operation ended, 1366 01:02:03.199 --> 01:02:04.719 so we were helping a lot with some of the 1367 01:02:04.760 --> 01:02:07.599 things that still existed in those structures, basically working with 1368 01:02:07.639 --> 01:02:10.480 guys inside of Jordan, then working with them inside of 1369 01:02:10.519 --> 01:02:13.239 Syria like at Tenef Garrison atg and also up in 1370 01:02:13.280 --> 01:02:16.320 northeast Syria like Haseka and all those places and kind 1371 01:02:16.320 --> 01:02:20.280 of continuing our operations there separately from what the old 1372 01:02:20.360 --> 01:02:23.320 covert action was that failed essentially and was closed down 1373 01:02:23.320 --> 01:02:27.239 in twenty seventeen. Hasako is YPG. Yes, Yeah, yeah, Actually 1374 01:02:27.920 --> 01:02:30.039 I was on a team where there was one of 1375 01:02:30.079 --> 01:02:33.400 our guys on the same task force that he was 1376 01:02:33.400 --> 01:02:35.400 in a picture in the media and he has a 1377 01:02:35.519 --> 01:02:38.880 YPG patch on. This was when Obama was saying there 1378 01:02:38.880 --> 01:02:40.400 are no troops on the ground in Syrias back to 1379 01:02:40.400 --> 01:02:42.800 twenty sixteen, and we're like looking at ourselves, like looking 1380 01:02:42.800 --> 01:02:45.000 at our He's like, no boots on the ground. We're like, 1381 01:02:45.079 --> 01:02:48.239 my boots on the ground in Syria, you know, like 1382 01:02:48.239 --> 01:02:50.719 you're saying, we're not here you doing you know. It 1383 01:02:50.800 --> 01:02:53.599 was just a weird time. Yeah, I was there at 1384 01:02:53.880 --> 01:02:59.880 twenty fourteen in Hasaka. Okay, so you're working now for 1385 01:03:00.199 --> 01:03:02.639 the defense at attached to the data YEP out of 1386 01:03:02.639 --> 01:03:05.960 an embassy. What's that job entail? Because you say that 1387 01:03:06.000 --> 01:03:08.239 this is like more over, like you're going out there 1388 01:03:08.239 --> 01:03:10.679 and talking to government officials and things like that. It 1389 01:03:10.719 --> 01:03:13.360 was really fascinating. I'll talk about the training first because 1390 01:03:13.360 --> 01:03:15.960 it was very unique. So it's at DIA, it's a 1391 01:03:16.079 --> 01:03:19.320 Joint Military attach h school. I think it's four months 1392 01:03:19.360 --> 01:03:22.400 or something like that. They basically teach you how to 1393 01:03:22.440 --> 01:03:26.000 be a diplomat, which sounds simple, but that means like 1394 01:03:26.079 --> 01:03:29.519 teaching you how to use a crab fork properly, you know, 1395 01:03:29.679 --> 01:03:32.480 or like these like very interesting utensils. You're actually graded 1396 01:03:32.559 --> 01:03:35.239 on it. They bring in a wardrobe specialist to talk 1397 01:03:35.280 --> 01:03:37.320 to you about why your suit sucks, and then they 1398 01:03:37.360 --> 01:03:38.880 tell you, like how to cut this better so it 1399 01:03:38.880 --> 01:03:41.679 looks better for you, Like all the stuff from there, 1400 01:03:41.800 --> 01:03:44.039 all the way, there's a seer portion to it that 1401 01:03:44.559 --> 01:03:48.199 is a huge surprise. Towards the end, the black hood 1402 01:03:48.199 --> 01:03:49.840 goes over your head. Yeah, and they do it to 1403 01:03:49.880 --> 01:03:50.599 the spouse's too. 1404 01:03:50.920 --> 01:03:51.159 Wow. 1405 01:03:52.880 --> 01:03:56.440 It's some very interesting stuff in there. They like everyone 1406 01:03:56.480 --> 01:03:58.239 does a different job in the embassy, but they teach 1407 01:03:58.280 --> 01:04:00.639 you kind of the baseline of what all people do 1408 01:04:01.119 --> 01:04:03.599 in the defense att test say office, and every embassy 1409 01:04:03.639 --> 01:04:05.079 is different, like if you've been to one embassy, you've 1410 01:04:05.079 --> 01:04:07.039 only been to one embassy, and they teach you like 1411 01:04:07.119 --> 01:04:10.159 kind of more theoretical of like the embassy writ large. 1412 01:04:10.519 --> 01:04:12.800 And then you go to your country and you learn 1413 01:04:12.800 --> 01:04:14.880 your actual mission in that country because it's very unique, 1414 01:04:14.960 --> 01:04:17.239 and Jordan is an interesting one because it supports so 1415 01:04:17.320 --> 01:04:19.320 much in the Middle East. We joke that it's like 1416 01:04:19.400 --> 01:04:22.400 the world's largest land based aircraft carrier because that's where 1417 01:04:22.440 --> 01:04:24.000 most of our jets are in the Middle East, besides 1418 01:04:24.039 --> 01:04:28.360 the Katar But you know, so we're supporting that mission 1419 01:04:28.519 --> 01:04:32.239 for Jordan, but we're also supporting the Syria diplomatic mission. 1420 01:04:32.280 --> 01:04:35.920 So there's like stateless Syrians in Jordan that we're part 1421 01:04:35.920 --> 01:04:38.960 of the resistance to us that we supported, so we 1422 01:04:38.960 --> 01:04:41.639 would have to also meet with them too. And a 1423 01:04:41.719 --> 01:04:43.760 day in the life is basically you're wearing a suit 1424 01:04:44.360 --> 01:04:49.000 all the time everywhere. You're driving armored vehicles, You've got escorts, security. 1425 01:04:49.360 --> 01:04:52.800 You're also setting up visits. So like if let's say 1426 01:04:52.840 --> 01:04:56.159 the Secretary of Defense is coming to visit the country, 1427 01:04:56.280 --> 01:04:59.119 you alone are setting up that visit. There's no like 1428 01:04:59.280 --> 01:05:01.119 entourage to help you. So like you're the guy that's 1429 01:05:01.119 --> 01:05:03.880 planning the aircraft landing. You're talking to the ice guy 1430 01:05:03.960 --> 01:05:05.519 to get the correct correct amount of ice for the 1431 01:05:05.519 --> 01:05:08.239 aircraft or the jet, like everything about it, plus the dinners, 1432 01:05:08.360 --> 01:05:12.239 the security detail. You're going and investigating the hotel top floor, 1433 01:05:12.239 --> 01:05:15.119 middle floor, bottom floor. You're getting other places, you know, 1434 01:05:15.119 --> 01:05:17.960 for their comm suite. You're getting all that stuff booked out, 1435 01:05:18.079 --> 01:05:19.760 and you're the guy doing it, like the point man, 1436 01:05:20.119 --> 01:05:23.280 and they would rotate it around the office so that like, okay, 1437 01:05:23.280 --> 01:05:25.599 you just got the sectaff this month, all right, dasdy 1438 01:05:25.639 --> 01:05:27.320 Middle East is coming for you. You're gonna do that 1439 01:05:27.360 --> 01:05:29.960 next month. The CoCom commanders coming out, you got that, 1440 01:05:30.079 --> 01:05:32.679 Like they'll just we're just rotating all the time handling 1441 01:05:32.679 --> 01:05:35.719 these diplomatic visits or this distinguished visits. At the same 1442 01:05:35.800 --> 01:05:38.840 time we're meeting with our host nation liaison partners. So 1443 01:05:38.880 --> 01:05:41.400 like the Defense at Tesche office represents the Secretary of 1444 01:05:41.400 --> 01:05:44.079 Defense in that country, so you get to liaison with 1445 01:05:44.119 --> 01:05:46.840 the Secretary of Defense equivalent in that country, usually a 1446 01:05:46.840 --> 01:05:51.360 Minister of Defense. That's your primary contact, not his staff him. Right, 1447 01:05:51.400 --> 01:05:53.360 So like on a weekly basis, the sdo DAT is 1448 01:05:53.400 --> 01:05:55.400 going to meet with that guy. And in Jordan, that's 1449 01:05:55.440 --> 01:05:57.719 pretty big because they're coordinating a lot of stuff around 1450 01:05:57.760 --> 01:06:01.880 the area, especially ship visits for the Marine Corps Navy side, 1451 01:06:01.880 --> 01:06:04.039 so a lot of those ships come to port in Akaba. 1452 01:06:04.480 --> 01:06:06.880 I guess who gets to organize those ship visits? You know, 1453 01:06:07.000 --> 01:06:09.440 one of US gets to pick like, Okay, the cure 1454 01:06:09.440 --> 01:06:11.360 star is coming, you got it, and you got to 1455 01:06:11.400 --> 01:06:13.519 go do all the diplomatic communications with the host nation, 1456 01:06:13.599 --> 01:06:15.679 the ministry and all that at the same time that 1457 01:06:15.679 --> 01:06:18.159 you're doing your overt collection activity, at the same time 1458 01:06:18.199 --> 01:06:21.280 that some people are doing clandestine collection as well in 1459 01:06:21.320 --> 01:06:23.480 that same mission, so you have like multiple hats. It 1460 01:06:23.559 --> 01:06:27.199 was a very busy time. Yeah, I can only imagine. 1461 01:06:27.239 --> 01:06:30.559 And what was your impression of some of these programs 1462 01:06:30.599 --> 01:06:33.800 we had jetting into Syria? I mean, as far as 1463 01:06:33.840 --> 01:06:36.559 the efficacy of some of those programs, it was very interesting. 1464 01:06:36.800 --> 01:06:38.400 At the time that I was there, we had one 1465 01:06:38.400 --> 01:06:41.639 major group left, the Magawirathaua the m AT, who was 1466 01:06:41.679 --> 01:06:44.920 like a last vestige of the old program, and they're 1467 01:06:44.960 --> 01:06:48.360 basically just like professional smugglers who really benefited from all 1468 01:06:48.360 --> 01:06:50.440 the ammunition we gave them, and they didn't really do 1469 01:06:50.519 --> 01:06:54.719 much counter terrorism. And at one point, especially like twenty 1470 01:06:54.760 --> 01:06:57.800 one after we killed Solomoni, you know, Iran obviously responded 1471 01:06:57.840 --> 01:07:01.800 to that. They Iran fled so many guys into Syria 1472 01:07:01.880 --> 01:07:06.840 and that camp was surrounded by Hesbela Hesbela Syrians that 1473 01:07:06.880 --> 01:07:10.159 supported Iran. There was like a ring around that base. 1474 01:07:10.239 --> 01:07:13.039 It was completely ineffective, and so we got our guys 1475 01:07:13.039 --> 01:07:15.760 stationed there training the mugwir thaua to do what I 1476 01:07:15.800 --> 01:07:18.199 don't know, because they're completely surrounded. There's no way they're 1477 01:07:18.199 --> 01:07:25.719 going out on any operations whatsoever. Right. And then the 1478 01:07:25.760 --> 01:07:29.760 next thing you did was teaching a counterintelligence human. Yeah, 1479 01:07:29.800 --> 01:07:31.199 so I went back to the schoolhouse that I had 1480 01:07:31.199 --> 01:07:33.519 gone to a long time ago, and I taught there, 1481 01:07:33.920 --> 01:07:38.320 teaching interrogations kind of intelligence surveillance, detection routes, source handling. 1482 01:07:39.159 --> 01:07:40.840 We do the whole gambit, you know, because we have 1483 01:07:40.920 --> 01:07:44.239 both CI and HUMID. So the way the course is designed, 1484 01:07:44.239 --> 01:07:48.119 it starts out very basic, like friendly four ste briefing, 1485 01:07:48.360 --> 01:07:49.679 kind of like what I was talking about in Berkina 1486 01:07:49.719 --> 01:07:51.519 fossl wor you're just like, hey, what kind of airplanes 1487 01:07:51.559 --> 01:07:53.400 did you see? That's how it starts out, and it 1488 01:07:53.440 --> 01:07:56.519 just keeps advancing and advancing. Then you get to interrogations, 1489 01:07:56.519 --> 01:07:58.880 and that's kind of the filter point where we drop 1490 01:07:58.920 --> 01:08:02.239 a lot of guys. Interogations is more dynamic, so you have, 1491 01:08:02.320 --> 01:08:05.239 as an instructor more freedom to say that that student 1492 01:08:05.280 --> 01:08:07.639 probably shouldn't be here, So you filter out quite a 1493 01:08:07.639 --> 01:08:09.719 bit of people in interrogations. The ones that survive that 1494 01:08:10.199 --> 01:08:12.920 then get to do source handling. So we go into 1495 01:08:12.920 --> 01:08:16.439 military source operations first, which is you know, recruiting assets 1496 01:08:16.479 --> 01:08:20.399 to support military defense collection things, and we move into 1497 01:08:20.439 --> 01:08:24.800 more advanced primary or principal Asian operations, where we have 1498 01:08:24.880 --> 01:08:27.720 the students running a guy who's got several guys under 1499 01:08:27.800 --> 01:08:31.439 him that the handler can't see or communicate with, and 1500 01:08:31.479 --> 01:08:34.199 that's one of the more complex ways to handle a source. 1501 01:08:34.479 --> 01:08:36.239 So that's kind of towards the end of the course 1502 01:08:36.279 --> 01:08:38.840 they're doing that, and then they do covert communications like 1503 01:08:39.000 --> 01:08:42.239 dead drops, brush passes, brief encounters, things like that, and 1504 01:08:42.279 --> 01:08:45.159 they finish out the course doing a final exercise that's 1505 01:08:45.199 --> 01:08:47.479 about a month long where they're doing the full range 1506 01:08:47.520 --> 01:08:50.319 of trade craft and they use the entire Hampton Roads 1507 01:08:50.359 --> 01:08:53.039 area to do this, so it's you know, it's an 1508 01:08:53.119 --> 01:08:56.359 artificial geography that they have and there's role players and 1509 01:08:56.720 --> 01:08:59.479 bad guy land. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah exactly. Yeah, it's 1510 01:08:59.479 --> 01:09:01.479 a lot of fun for the instructors. The students are 1511 01:09:01.520 --> 01:09:05.279 under a lot of stress. Yeah that's awesome. Yeah, and 1512 01:09:05.319 --> 01:09:09.039 then you ended up retiring as a master sergeant I did. Yeah, Yeah, Well, 1513 01:09:10.319 --> 01:09:12.600 what was like, I mean, you came up on your 1514 01:09:12.600 --> 01:09:14.680 twenty and you didn't want to go back to the 1515 01:09:14.800 --> 01:09:18.199 normal Marine Corps. That's what I'm what I'm thinking, So 1516 01:09:18.319 --> 01:09:20.359 I actually, you're exactly right. I was talking to the 1517 01:09:20.359 --> 01:09:23.119 assignments manager and he's like, yeah, I got to give 1518 01:09:23.119 --> 01:09:25.720 you orders to North Carolina to be the intelligence chief 1519 01:09:25.800 --> 01:09:28.319 for this thing. And I'm like, I'm not doing that. Yeah, 1520 01:09:28.359 --> 01:09:30.159 I don't want to do that. That would be a huge 1521 01:09:30.159 --> 01:09:32.199 downgrade from the trajectory I've been going on. He's like, 1522 01:09:32.199 --> 01:09:33.720 you have to give back to the Marine Corps. I'm like, 1523 01:09:33.720 --> 01:09:35.199 I'm sure you can find someone that will go to 1524 01:09:35.239 --> 01:09:37.359 North Carolina. I'm sure there are people in North Carolina 1525 01:09:37.399 --> 01:09:39.520 that want to stay in North Carolina. Right. He was like, no, no, no, 1526 01:09:39.560 --> 01:09:41.600 you can't do that. I'm like, what about these other 1527 01:09:41.640 --> 01:09:43.760 four assignments that I listened off. Some of them are 1528 01:09:43.840 --> 01:09:46.199 kind of concessions, like maybe he would say, yes, he 1529 01:09:46.239 --> 01:09:48.159 rejected all of them. He's like, if you don't accept 1530 01:09:48.439 --> 01:09:51.319 North Carolina, then you're gonna get retirement in lieu of orders, 1531 01:09:51.520 --> 01:09:52.880 which is a thing in the Marine Corps like if 1532 01:09:52.920 --> 01:09:55.920 you reject orders and you're at retirement, they forced retire you. 1533 01:09:56.399 --> 01:10:00.520 That's what happened, because I'm not going to camplshit. Yeah, 1534 01:10:00.640 --> 01:10:02.640 I think he thought I was bluffing. I wasn't bluffing. 1535 01:10:04.680 --> 01:10:09.560 So we'll talk about your post service life a bit. 1536 01:10:10.000 --> 01:10:12.439 But before we go there, I want to talk about 1537 01:10:12.439 --> 01:10:14.199 your book, and I want to chop it up a 1538 01:10:14.239 --> 01:10:18.279 bit about the theory of a regular war because this 1539 01:10:18.439 --> 01:10:20.319 was you know, when you open up a book like 1540 01:10:20.359 --> 01:10:23.079 this and this could be a pretty dry book about doctrine, 1541 01:10:23.159 --> 01:10:26.000 you know, where's he going with all this? But actually 1542 01:10:26.159 --> 01:10:28.479 I was I thought this was a great book, Thank you. 1543 01:10:28.800 --> 01:10:31.720 I was really fascinated by it. And I think that 1544 01:10:32.039 --> 01:10:35.039 the reason why I liked it was because you challenged 1545 01:10:35.199 --> 01:10:37.960 the orthodoxy. Yeah, and you were willing to confront some 1546 01:10:38.000 --> 01:10:40.600 of the failures of the past twenty twenty five years 1547 01:10:41.199 --> 01:10:44.479 that we've had in the military with counterinsurgency theory. And 1548 01:10:45.119 --> 01:10:47.439 you know, some of the younger people don't even remember. 1549 01:10:47.439 --> 01:10:50.720 There's this whole field where people call themselves Koynistas. Yeah 1550 01:10:50.800 --> 01:10:55.079 you remember that shit. I do. So anyway, let's let's 1551 01:10:55.159 --> 01:11:01.600 jump into it. Counterinsurgency theory, the theory of irregular warfare. 1552 01:11:02.680 --> 01:11:05.880 It's fraught with problems. There's a lot of over philosophizing 1553 01:11:06.119 --> 01:11:09.319 that takes place. One of the things you talk about 1554 01:11:09.399 --> 01:11:12.239 is like all the lingo, we're kind of baffling each 1555 01:11:12.279 --> 01:11:16.720 other with bullshit ye words like kill webs cray zone, 1556 01:11:16.840 --> 01:11:20.640 conflict and like all these where we're reinventing terms for 1557 01:11:20.800 --> 01:11:23.079 you know, guerrilla warfare, things that have always been around. 1558 01:11:25.640 --> 01:11:29.319 Start wherever wherever you want with that. As far as 1559 01:11:29.319 --> 01:11:32.119 some of the problems and the faulty assumptions that we've 1560 01:11:32.119 --> 01:11:35.239 made as we approach the theory, I'd like to starting 1561 01:11:35.279 --> 01:11:38.960 before that, what caused your what was the genesis of 1562 01:11:39.000 --> 01:11:42.359 you writing this? Like where did that idea start? So 1563 01:11:42.439 --> 01:11:45.520 I was doing some personal research on the five Pillars 1564 01:11:45.520 --> 01:11:47.680 of a Regular Warfare, which is like a very doctrinal 1565 01:11:47.840 --> 01:11:51.319 Joint Pub Three Tax zero type thing, and I was like, okay, 1566 01:11:51.359 --> 01:11:54.560 so there's like counter insurgency, there's counter terrorism for an 1567 01:11:54.560 --> 01:11:57.279 internal defense, you know, like all those things. And I'm thinking, like, 1568 01:11:57.359 --> 01:12:00.000 this isn't actually like what's going on. These are just 1569 01:12:00.039 --> 01:12:02.479 descriptions of operations, and I'm like, okay, let's find out 1570 01:12:02.479 --> 01:12:05.000 what's going on, like with the people. And the more 1571 01:12:05.039 --> 01:12:06.640 I was reading, the more I was realizing, like that 1572 01:12:06.680 --> 01:12:10.560 doesn't exist in military writing. It exists in like sociology 1573 01:12:10.920 --> 01:12:13.439 or political science, where they're like talking about some conflict 1574 01:12:13.439 --> 01:12:15.920 in some country, but the military is not looking at that. 1575 01:12:15.920 --> 01:12:18.520 They're just looking at like, Okay, we've received information that 1576 01:12:18.560 --> 01:12:21.239 we will now do this, how do we do it? 1577 01:12:21.399 --> 01:12:23.359 Like they're skipping the first part where you need to 1578 01:12:23.359 --> 01:12:26.479 like figure out why is this happening? Because if you 1579 01:12:26.479 --> 01:12:29.199 can just solve that, a totally different outcome. It's not 1580 01:12:29.239 --> 01:12:30.640 going to be perfect. It's not going to be like 1581 01:12:31.039 --> 01:12:33.359 you won the war, but it's going to probably be 1582 01:12:33.439 --> 01:12:36.439 different than if you just oh, I'm a hammer boom. 1583 01:12:36.479 --> 01:12:38.960 Everything is a nail, right, And that's basically what we 1584 01:12:39.000 --> 01:12:41.479 do with our doctrine. So I wanted to research more, 1585 01:12:41.520 --> 01:12:43.880 and the more I was researching, the more I just 1586 01:12:43.880 --> 01:12:46.199 started taking notes and thinking about it. I had a 1587 01:12:46.239 --> 01:12:48.399 lot of assumptions that were incorrect. When I started out, 1588 01:12:48.439 --> 01:12:50.319 I was a lot like these thinkers. When I first started, 1589 01:12:50.319 --> 01:12:51.560 I was like, Oh, yeah, there's got to be some 1590 01:12:51.720 --> 01:12:55.319 like esoteric something you know, And that's not correct. That's 1591 01:12:55.359 --> 01:12:58.720 not true. Instead, it's human beings want certain things. When 1592 01:12:58.720 --> 01:13:01.359 they don't get certain things, they have reactions to those things. 1593 01:13:01.560 --> 01:13:03.920 It's extremely basic, which sound like when I say it 1594 01:13:03.920 --> 01:13:07.319 sounds very simple, it's not simple, especially when we don't 1595 01:13:07.399 --> 01:13:09.760 look at it simply, you know, we come to it like, 1596 01:13:09.800 --> 01:13:12.239 oh no, it's very complex. It's very difficult to solve. 1597 01:13:12.319 --> 01:13:15.159 Oh this is a thousand year old problem between this 1598 01:13:15.239 --> 01:13:17.520 party and this party. You know that's not true. It's 1599 01:13:17.560 --> 01:13:20.199 because this country invaded in this year, and then these 1600 01:13:20.239 --> 01:13:22.399 people reacted to that invasion and they don't like this 1601 01:13:22.520 --> 01:13:26.039 other country invading their country. And then there's remnants that 1602 01:13:26.039 --> 01:13:28.279 are now trying to take power because there's an imbalance 1603 01:13:28.279 --> 01:13:29.760 in what's going on here. I mean, it's like super 1604 01:13:29.800 --> 01:13:32.159 simple when you look like that, when you add like 1605 01:13:32.359 --> 01:13:34.239 names of countries onto it, and I'd be like, oh, no, 1606 01:13:34.279 --> 01:13:36.880 that's the country I like. I can't disagree with that 1607 01:13:36.920 --> 01:13:39.840 because I like them, you know. So that's kind of 1608 01:13:39.840 --> 01:13:42.000 what pushed me to research as deeply as I did. 1609 01:13:42.039 --> 01:13:45.640 I read about five hundred books over a thousand journal articles. 1610 01:13:45.680 --> 01:13:48.079 Like I was like steeped in this for a long time. 1611 01:13:48.960 --> 01:13:51.880 It just so happened that COVID kicked off right after 1612 01:13:51.920 --> 01:13:53.840 I started doing my research for this. I was like, 1613 01:13:53.880 --> 01:13:56.319 this is the perfect time to spend twelve hours a day, 1614 01:13:56.359 --> 01:13:58.319 reading every single day until this thing is over. I 1615 01:13:58.319 --> 01:14:00.159 had no idea obviously when it would be over. So 1616 01:14:00.239 --> 01:14:02.279 I did that the whole the whole time code was 1617 01:14:02.279 --> 01:14:05.359 going on, I was, I was researching every day. Please 1618 01:14:05.359 --> 01:14:08.000 say how many books and how many articles? Around five 1619 01:14:08.039 --> 01:14:11.000 hundred books and about thousand journal articles. And and I love, 1620 01:14:11.640 --> 01:14:11.960 I love. 1621 01:14:12.039 --> 01:14:14.319 I haven't read this yet, Jack has I will, but 1622 01:14:14.640 --> 01:14:17.000 I love that this is that, this is what you 1623 01:14:17.000 --> 01:14:18.119 were able to boil it down to. 1624 01:14:18.239 --> 01:14:23.319 Yes, it's the lemonade, yeah, out of many lemons. Yeah, 1625 01:14:23.680 --> 01:14:25.720 but I'll say it's it's short looking, but there's a 1626 01:14:25.720 --> 01:14:26.279 lot in there. 1627 01:14:27.119 --> 01:14:29.840 I think a lot of books are long because the 1628 01:14:29.880 --> 01:14:31.079 author wants them to be long. 1629 01:14:31.199 --> 01:14:33.399 Isn't that what Mark Twain or somebody said, like, sorry, 1630 01:14:33.399 --> 01:14:35.119 I wrote you such a long letter. I didn't have 1631 01:14:35.159 --> 01:14:41.479 time to write you a short one. I believe that. Yeah. 1632 01:14:41.560 --> 01:14:45.920 So from the bad analysis side, you know, you put 1633 01:14:45.920 --> 01:14:48.640 your finger on you know some of these generals that 1634 01:14:48.800 --> 01:14:53.079 came back and they wrote their memoirs and lawed themselves. Uh, 1635 01:14:53.600 --> 01:14:58.159 some of the the Coynistas also, uh. And then also uh, 1636 01:14:58.479 --> 01:15:02.760 this French dude who in Algeria and Vietnam, Yeah, completely 1637 01:15:02.800 --> 01:15:06.000 failed coin efforts. Then he taught the Americans how to 1638 01:15:06.159 --> 01:15:09.399 fail at coin also in his And it's funny because 1639 01:15:09.439 --> 01:15:12.319 so they failed in Vietnam. In Algeria him specifically, I 1640 01:15:12.319 --> 01:15:13.800 mean he was at the Battle of Dan Bampoo. We're 1641 01:15:13.800 --> 01:15:16.560 talking about Roger Trinkiar here, battle of Dam Pimpoo. The 1642 01:15:16.680 --> 01:15:21.760 Vietname has completely overwhelmed this massive French conventional force, and he, 1643 01:15:21.960 --> 01:15:24.159 you know, tail between his legs, went to Algeria the 1644 01:15:24.199 --> 01:15:27.039 dirty war starts. He fails at that, even after torturing 1645 01:15:27.039 --> 01:15:29.359 all these guys, still not getting any help and information 1646 01:15:29.399 --> 01:15:32.079 from that. And then he turns to the US Army 1647 01:15:32.840 --> 01:15:35.079 and says, now that you've taken on our Vietnam problem, 1648 01:15:35.279 --> 01:15:37.279 let me teach you how to solve the Vietnam problem. 1649 01:15:37.359 --> 01:15:39.479 And that's how we learned our interrogation techniques at that 1650 01:15:39.520 --> 01:15:43.479 time was from this guy. And if you look at 1651 01:15:43.479 --> 01:15:45.760 his books during that time, like the early two thousands, 1652 01:15:46.199 --> 01:15:49.760 that guy's name was everywhere. Trink hear, David Galula, all 1653 01:15:49.800 --> 01:15:52.319 of them like oh wow, these guys are geniuses. But 1654 01:15:52.359 --> 01:15:54.439 then you go back and look like trink here, for example, 1655 01:15:54.479 --> 01:15:59.039 was out fighting in the Katonga secession in Congo, you know, 1656 01:15:59.479 --> 01:16:02.600 fighting with a criminal organization against the congalse Like this 1657 01:16:02.640 --> 01:16:05.680 is the guy right there? Are you sure you know? Yeah? 1658 01:16:05.760 --> 01:16:08.640 I mean it was like learning to eat soup with 1659 01:16:08.640 --> 01:16:12.279 a knight. Yeah, the accidental gorilla. They're all all these 1660 01:16:12.319 --> 01:16:16.399 different like thought leaders at the time. Yeah. What do 1661 01:16:16.439 --> 01:16:18.079 you think went wrong? Though? I mean, what were the 1662 01:16:18.119 --> 01:16:21.159 faulty assumptions that we took into the war on terror 1663 01:16:21.479 --> 01:16:23.760 that didn't pan out for us? I think we in 1664 01:16:23.800 --> 01:16:26.520 the West have a problem with mirror imaging, where we 1665 01:16:26.840 --> 01:16:29.199 not only do we see the enemy as we see ourselves, 1666 01:16:29.279 --> 01:16:31.800 we want them to be like us. And like, even 1667 01:16:31.800 --> 01:16:33.800 with new information, we still are like, no, no, no, they 1668 01:16:33.880 --> 01:16:36.239 have to they have to want a democracy. They have 1669 01:16:36.279 --> 01:16:38.800 to want like how we look at their at them 1670 01:16:39.199 --> 01:16:41.720 and we when we put them up on a PowerPoint slide, 1671 01:16:41.720 --> 01:16:44.960 we structure it like a military table of organization and equipment. 1672 01:16:45.000 --> 01:16:47.760 It's like, wait, I'm not sure that's how the Taliban works. Yeah. 1673 01:16:47.840 --> 01:16:50.840 And I would add to that though, not only the enemy, 1674 01:16:51.159 --> 01:16:53.880 but are our partner forced so like the country that 1675 01:16:53.960 --> 01:16:58.560 were like, you know, to think that iraqis or at 1676 01:16:58.640 --> 01:17:02.199 Any's wanted the same thing we want is ridiculous. 1677 01:17:02.239 --> 01:17:04.039 Oh yeah, I mean, and also like with the Taliban. 1678 01:17:04.720 --> 01:17:07.800 The Taliban was in power before we showed up, does one, right, 1679 01:17:07.800 --> 01:17:11.479 Like they were the legitimate people running Afghanistan. Yeah, we 1680 01:17:11.520 --> 01:17:15.159 got there and over through the government. The Taliban didn't 1681 01:17:15.199 --> 01:17:17.479 see it as a legitimate change of power. They saw 1682 01:17:17.479 --> 01:17:20.279 it as an invasion and insurgency, right, Like we were 1683 01:17:20.359 --> 01:17:22.319 running an insurgency in Afghanistan. It was just with a 1684 01:17:22.399 --> 01:17:25.119 large Afghan National army for us. Right. So when you 1685 01:17:25.159 --> 01:17:27.880 ask a Taliban guy like, oh, who's the shadow governor 1686 01:17:28.000 --> 01:17:30.520 of this province? Like that doesn't mean anything to him, 1687 01:17:30.560 --> 01:17:32.520 But there is no shadow governor. He is the governor, 1688 01:17:32.640 --> 01:17:34.600 right right, Like why are we calling him that when 1689 01:17:34.600 --> 01:17:36.840 that's not what he is. But we'd have to admit 1690 01:17:36.920 --> 01:17:40.159 that it's actually illegitimate that we were there, Like, you know, 1691 01:17:40.880 --> 01:17:43.239 totally understandable why we went there. But the problem is 1692 01:17:43.239 --> 01:17:46.399 how we're framing our discussion of the things the conditions 1693 01:17:46.399 --> 01:17:48.520 that are there. You know, Like you have an Afghan 1694 01:17:48.520 --> 01:17:51.199 that's running a village. It doesn't matter where he came 1695 01:17:51.239 --> 01:17:53.520 from or if he's Taliban or not, Like, why is 1696 01:17:53.560 --> 01:17:55.000 he running the village way he is? Why do the 1697 01:17:55.039 --> 01:17:57.079 people think this about him or that about him? Like 1698 01:17:57.079 --> 01:17:59.039 we're not looking at it like that. Instead we're like, well, no, 1699 01:17:59.079 --> 01:18:01.279 he's a Taliban guy. He's a bad guy. 1700 01:18:01.479 --> 01:18:03.600 And you know, I mean from their point of view, 1701 01:18:04.000 --> 01:18:06.720 like we went in into Afghanistan and we won the 1702 01:18:06.760 --> 01:18:09.960 war in the first thirty days. Our job was to 1703 01:18:10.000 --> 01:18:15.039 destroy AQ YEP, and then once we destroyed AQ, we're like, well, 1704 01:18:15.159 --> 01:18:17.000 why don't we just hang out for a while, yeah, 1705 01:18:17.000 --> 01:18:19.279 and find somebody else to fight, And it was the Taliban. 1706 01:18:19.479 --> 01:18:21.520 Yeah. Yeah. And the thing is, I mean, the Taliban 1707 01:18:21.560 --> 01:18:24.560 are not a new phenomenon Operation cyclone. I mean, we 1708 01:18:24.680 --> 01:18:27.159 basically created them or the conditions for them at the 1709 01:18:27.279 --> 01:18:30.239 very least. And even like Hekmatyar and all those guys 1710 01:18:30.279 --> 01:18:33.479 like those weren't new people. You know. It's just kind 1711 01:18:33.520 --> 01:18:35.399 of shocking to look at it, Like we live life 1712 01:18:35.399 --> 01:18:37.439 in little chunks of memory. Yeah, and we don't connect 1713 01:18:37.439 --> 01:18:41.239 them altogether, Like yeah, these Mujahideen were the same muja hitden. 1714 01:18:41.479 --> 01:18:43.279 It's not like new muja hideen showed up, Like right, 1715 01:18:43.359 --> 01:18:46.840 they're the same Mujahideen. We didn't fund the al Qaeda, 1716 01:18:47.159 --> 01:18:49.520 you know, or create al Qaeda the way some people 1717 01:18:49.560 --> 01:18:53.119 would would assert. But you're right, we set the conditions. 1718 01:18:53.119 --> 01:18:57.560 We normalized these wlawless, armed groups running around against the end. Well, 1719 01:18:57.560 --> 01:18:59.800 we also allowed the Pakistanis to tell us everything to 1720 01:18:59.840 --> 01:19:02.760 do in the nineteen eighties, like they were leading the show. 1721 01:19:02.760 --> 01:19:04.319 They're like, oh yeah, this group over here, you should 1722 01:19:04.319 --> 01:19:06.520 work with them, this group, Let's definitely give them weapons, 1723 01:19:06.600 --> 01:19:08.840 you know, without really asking many questions about it, because 1724 01:19:08.840 --> 01:19:12.520 our goal was to defeat the Russians, right, it wasn't 1725 01:19:12.840 --> 01:19:15.720 just stop insurgence, right right, yeah, yeah, right, yeah, but 1726 01:19:15.720 --> 01:19:17.279 that short sighted us again. It will bite us, and 1727 01:19:17.319 --> 01:19:20.720 it bites us every single time. One of the assumptions 1728 01:19:20.760 --> 01:19:23.680 you point to in the book that you alluded to 1729 01:19:23.720 --> 01:19:25.760 a bit, but I think it's important to put our 1730 01:19:25.800 --> 01:19:29.319 finger on is that one of our assumptions is we 1731 01:19:29.399 --> 01:19:33.600 start with this idea that the insurgency is illegitimate and 1732 01:19:33.640 --> 01:19:36.920 the government is legitimate. Yeah, but you and others I've 1733 01:19:36.920 --> 01:19:39.399 read over the years point out, like in Afghanistan is 1734 01:19:39.399 --> 01:19:41.920 a great example that you mentioned that a lot of 1735 01:19:41.960 --> 01:19:45.720 times this isn't the case. Yeah. Yeah, there's there's ungoverned 1736 01:19:45.760 --> 01:19:49.159 spaces or semi governed spaces, especially in Africa for example, 1737 01:19:49.239 --> 01:19:52.479 like you go out to southern Algeria, there's a whole 1738 01:19:52.840 --> 01:19:55.239 state within a state down there that believes that it's 1739 01:19:55.279 --> 01:19:59.359 the Surawi Democratic Republic, right, the SADR, if you ask them, 1740 01:19:59.399 --> 01:20:01.439 that's what they are. If you ask the Algerians, that's 1741 01:20:01.439 --> 01:20:02.680 what they are. If you have some Rocans, that's not 1742 01:20:02.760 --> 01:20:05.560 what they are. Right. But really all it's all about perspective, 1743 01:20:05.680 --> 01:20:06.760 and that's a lot what I talk about in the 1744 01:20:06.760 --> 01:20:09.880 book is like where does sovereignty lie and is it 1745 01:20:09.960 --> 01:20:13.239 viewed as legitimate by that specific observer, Because it doesn't 1746 01:20:13.239 --> 01:20:14.960 matter how we observe it. What matters is how are 1747 01:20:15.039 --> 01:20:16.800 they observing it? And we need to understand that and 1748 01:20:16.840 --> 01:20:19.319 then work within the conditions of their vision of it. 1749 01:20:19.359 --> 01:20:21.479 And if we don't, we're just gonna be solving a 1750 01:20:21.479 --> 01:20:22.960 problem the way we wish we could solve it and 1751 01:20:22.960 --> 01:20:24.840 not the way it should be solved. Right, you get 1752 01:20:24.960 --> 01:20:27.479 pretty in depth into the theory you want to tell 1753 01:20:27.520 --> 01:20:30.479 us about the dysfunctional sovereign and the liminal sovereign and 1754 01:20:30.520 --> 01:20:32.800 some of these concepts that you win in your book. Yeah, 1755 01:20:32.800 --> 01:20:34.359 So the young governed space as I was talking about, 1756 01:20:34.399 --> 01:20:36.000 it's kind of that liminal sovereignty. Like if you go 1757 01:20:36.000 --> 01:20:38.600 to see the FARC in Columbia, for example, they govern 1758 01:20:38.680 --> 01:20:42.399 a space or they used to. Right, yeah, exactly because 1759 01:20:42.439 --> 01:20:45.159 the government, the legitimate quote unquote government cannot reach that 1760 01:20:45.239 --> 01:20:47.800 space because of the way the terrain is structured specifically, 1761 01:20:47.880 --> 01:20:50.680 and also because of local support and other things. That's 1762 01:20:51.159 --> 01:20:54.520 sovereignty over terrain. That the cup that the legitimate government 1763 01:20:54.520 --> 01:20:57.520 cannot control, so someone else is filling that space. And 1764 01:20:57.640 --> 01:21:00.960 a liminal space is basically a gap, something filling in there, 1765 01:21:01.000 --> 01:21:02.880 and that's in that case the farc and in other 1766 01:21:02.920 --> 01:21:05.760 cases it's cindera luminoso in Peru for example. Right, not 1767 01:21:05.840 --> 01:21:08.159 because people love these groups, but because there is no 1768 01:21:08.239 --> 01:21:09.800 other sovereign to look up to, like, well, how else 1769 01:21:09.800 --> 01:21:11.399 are we gonna have law and order? How else am 1770 01:21:11.439 --> 01:21:12.840 I gonna be able to take my trash out and 1771 01:21:12.880 --> 01:21:14.800 make sure it goes away. I was in Lebanon for 1772 01:21:14.800 --> 01:21:17.119 a while when the government was not picking up garbage. 1773 01:21:17.399 --> 01:21:19.079 This is a big thing in twenty sixteen, and there 1774 01:21:19.119 --> 01:21:22.479 was like garbage lining the streets because society no longer 1775 01:21:22.520 --> 01:21:25.359 had the ability to move trash, which is something very simple. 1776 01:21:25.600 --> 01:21:27.159 But think about how that will affect a lot of 1777 01:21:27.159 --> 01:21:29.720 other things in society. Right, we don't think about it 1778 01:21:29.760 --> 01:21:32.199 like that. We're like, well, let's have an election and 1779 01:21:32.399 --> 01:21:34.279 that guy's going to be the president, and we're gonna 1780 01:21:34.279 --> 01:21:36.720 support him, like Honey Karzai for example, We're gonna support 1781 01:21:36.760 --> 01:21:39.359 that guy. Well, what about the other people and how 1782 01:21:39.359 --> 01:21:42.439 do they actually govern themselves? Typically? You know, then there's 1783 01:21:42.439 --> 01:21:44.880 social order where the way the government and the people 1784 01:21:44.920 --> 01:21:47.439 are structured is different in every country is everywhere? I mean, 1785 01:21:47.880 --> 01:21:49.800 a country is a made up thing, you know, let's 1786 01:21:49.800 --> 01:21:52.199 be honest, Like, the concept of a country is pretty new. 1787 01:21:52.199 --> 01:21:54.680 It's four hundred years old. The Treaty of West Valley 1788 01:21:54.680 --> 01:21:57.319 in sixteen forty eight is what made states. There were 1789 01:21:57.359 --> 01:21:59.680 no states before that didn't exist. Even when you read 1790 01:21:59.680 --> 01:22:02.319 like macis the Prince, there was no such thing as 1791 01:22:02.319 --> 01:22:05.079 a state. There were really powerful cities like Florence, which 1792 01:22:05.119 --> 01:22:09.079 is where he was. There wasn't like Italy, right, there 1793 01:22:08.960 --> 01:22:13.680 were not until like late eighteen hundreds, early nineteen hundreds. Yeah. Yeah, 1794 01:22:13.760 --> 01:22:16.119 So those are things that I think we ignore a lot, 1795 01:22:16.720 --> 01:22:19.560 which is problematic because we look at our country that 1796 01:22:19.600 --> 01:22:21.720 we have now we say, we have this wonderful country, 1797 01:22:21.720 --> 01:22:24.039 which we do, we have this amazing constitution, but we 1798 01:22:24.119 --> 01:22:26.560 forget like how did we get that, How did the 1799 01:22:26.600 --> 01:22:29.680 revolution that we had go? How could it have gone sideways? 1800 01:22:30.159 --> 01:22:33.119 You know, the Constitution is not something that was agreed 1801 01:22:33.199 --> 01:22:34.840 upon by everyone that was at the convention. It was 1802 01:22:34.880 --> 01:22:38.479 actually a fight document and the result was disagreements on 1803 01:22:38.479 --> 01:22:41.640 a paper. That's what the Constitution is. Like the Constitutional Convention, 1804 01:22:41.680 --> 01:22:44.520 almost everybody disagreed on something, and that document that came 1805 01:22:44.560 --> 01:22:47.880 out of it is because people finally compromised. But then 1806 01:22:47.920 --> 01:22:49.640 we go to place like Afghanistan and we're like, here 1807 01:22:49.720 --> 01:22:52.960 is your new constitution we have written for you, right, Like, 1808 01:22:53.000 --> 01:22:54.560 how do we expect them to do that? If we 1809 01:22:54.600 --> 01:22:56.760 couldn't even do that, you know, and we were fighting 1810 01:22:56.800 --> 01:22:59.039 over it. You know, there there were loyalists that were 1811 01:22:59.039 --> 01:23:01.720 supporting the British and while we wrote the Constitution and 1812 01:23:01.760 --> 01:23:04.840 the Declaration of Independence obviously, you know, but going back 1813 01:23:04.880 --> 01:23:07.520 to that, the Declaration of Independence, if you read it, 1814 01:23:07.520 --> 01:23:09.199 it has exactly the same stuff in it that a 1815 01:23:09.199 --> 01:23:12.479 lot of these revolutionaries today say, you know, we want 1816 01:23:12.479 --> 01:23:15.039 to shake off the burden of this and that, and 1817 01:23:15.079 --> 01:23:17.920 you know, have our freedom and the ability to determine 1818 01:23:17.920 --> 01:23:20.199 our own X, Y and Z, like these are just 1819 01:23:20.239 --> 01:23:23.640 basic things that people want. And if there's group A 1820 01:23:23.720 --> 01:23:26.279 and group B, and group B is doing it faster 1821 01:23:26.359 --> 01:23:29.800 and better and more trustworthy than Group A, they're probably 1822 01:23:29.840 --> 01:23:32.000 going to pick Group B, you know. And if we're 1823 01:23:32.079 --> 01:23:34.279 Group A, we're kind of out of luck in that situation, 1824 01:23:34.479 --> 01:23:37.439 just like Afghanistan, where like we're supporting the wrong side essentially, 1825 01:23:37.479 --> 01:23:39.199 like it's not going to be the winning side, especially 1826 01:23:39.239 --> 01:23:41.479 when you pull the structures away, which is us, and 1827 01:23:41.520 --> 01:23:42.319 it just collapses. 1828 01:23:42.800 --> 01:23:47.520 And I mean we really have this naive yeah, you know, 1829 01:23:48.439 --> 01:23:51.319 kind of view these things through a moral lens, yes, 1830 01:23:51.439 --> 01:23:55.000 like and a cultural moral lens. Really it's like does 1831 01:23:55.039 --> 01:23:58.159 their culture mirror hours? Do they do things that are 1832 01:23:58.359 --> 01:24:01.039 would be acceptable here? And in the answer is no, 1833 01:24:01.159 --> 01:24:02.960 then they're obviously bad people. 1834 01:24:03.199 --> 01:24:04.840 We also do it in a really normative way where 1835 01:24:04.880 --> 01:24:07.840 we say you should be this way instead of saying 1836 01:24:07.840 --> 01:24:10.520 how would you like to be? We don't ask that question. 1837 01:24:11.520 --> 01:24:14.319 What do you think is the policy prescription? As far 1838 01:24:14.359 --> 01:24:17.479 as I mean you could use a specific example if 1839 01:24:17.560 --> 01:24:21.000 you want, or just like broadly, how could we do 1840 01:24:21.079 --> 01:24:23.439 this better? I think what we need to do is 1841 01:24:23.680 --> 01:24:27.640 empower the military to actually ask why. It's not designed 1842 01:24:27.640 --> 01:24:30.239 to do that for very obvious reasons, especially in a 1843 01:24:30.239 --> 01:24:33.119 conventional war, you don't want people asking if you don't 1844 01:24:33.119 --> 01:24:34.840 want that private on the front line. Are you sure 1845 01:24:34.880 --> 01:24:37.239 we should go to that trench? Right? But in a 1846 01:24:37.279 --> 01:24:40.520 non conventional situation, in a regular situation, or like when 1847 01:24:40.600 --> 01:24:43.479 sovereignty is broken down, we need to really analyze that. 1848 01:24:44.039 --> 01:24:46.840 In the military. We don't need to rely on someone 1849 01:24:46.840 --> 01:24:49.439 else somewhere else saying here's a policy, go do it. 1850 01:24:49.720 --> 01:24:51.079 We should be able to ask them why is the 1851 01:24:51.079 --> 01:24:54.000 policy like that? And that is actually not that controversial 1852 01:24:54.079 --> 01:24:55.720 because if you look at the State Department, they have 1853 01:24:55.800 --> 01:24:58.720 something called the Descent Channel where they're allowed to dissent 1854 01:24:58.880 --> 01:25:01.720 all the way up to the Secretary in an official 1855 01:25:01.800 --> 01:25:06.279 channel that has archived and actually George Kennon's Long Telegram 1856 01:25:06.479 --> 01:25:09.720 was one of the original Descent Channel telegrams. Is very long. 1857 01:25:09.760 --> 01:25:11.520 It's why it's called a long telegram. But there was 1858 01:25:11.560 --> 01:25:14.640 another one about the Syria policy during Operation Timber Sycamore, 1859 01:25:14.640 --> 01:25:17.520 where the State Department said, this is really stupid. The 1860 01:25:17.520 --> 01:25:19.279 way you're armoring these guys is going to end up 1861 01:25:19.279 --> 01:25:21.760 falling back on you. These guys are affiliated with all 1862 01:25:21.760 --> 01:25:24.119 News for Refront and all Kaida and you know it. 1863 01:25:24.640 --> 01:25:27.199 And they wrote that in this dissent Channel memo to 1864 01:25:27.239 --> 01:25:29.720 the Secretary and it's been declassified. You can actually read 1865 01:25:29.760 --> 01:25:32.680 it now. But why can't the military do that? Right? 1866 01:25:33.560 --> 01:25:36.560 It's almost though, I wonder how that would go because 1867 01:25:36.600 --> 01:25:39.680 the military, least, I think some of the things that 1868 01:25:39.720 --> 01:25:43.600 we deal with, the military lied, whether they were lying 1869 01:25:43.600 --> 01:25:47.439 to themselves or lying to the administrations. You know, we 1870 01:25:47.560 --> 01:25:49.800 fought a twenty year war one year at a time, 1871 01:25:49.880 --> 01:25:53.640 and everybody's saying, that's great, victory is just around the corner. 1872 01:25:54.239 --> 01:25:56.720 They never even really. I think that a lot of 1873 01:25:56.720 --> 01:25:58.800 what the administration are doing were based on what the 1874 01:25:58.840 --> 01:25:59.600 military was telling. 1875 01:26:00.000 --> 01:26:01.119 Oh yeah, And I think there's a lot of high 1876 01:26:01.199 --> 01:26:04.039 ranking officers, especially generals, that are very happy to have 1877 01:26:04.079 --> 01:26:06.560 these wars because it means they get accolades, they get 1878 01:26:06.600 --> 01:26:09.239 written up, they get all this credit and glory, et cetera. 1879 01:26:09.279 --> 01:26:11.479 Because that's what they've been waiting their whole career for. Like, sure, yeah, 1880 01:26:11.520 --> 01:26:14.359 i've been here forty years, it's my turn. And actually, 1881 01:26:14.399 --> 01:26:16.279 in twenty sixteen, when we were in Syria and Iraq, 1882 01:26:16.640 --> 01:26:19.520 we had twenty two generals in our training command of 1883 01:26:19.560 --> 01:26:23.119 five hundred guys. That's one general for every squad. That 1884 01:26:23.199 --> 01:26:25.800 is absolutely insane. It was it was nuts, Like to 1885 01:26:25.840 --> 01:26:27.800 get author's age. Like those strikes I was telling you about. 1886 01:26:27.840 --> 01:26:29.960 I was doing dynamic strikes, which means within like twelve 1887 01:26:30.000 --> 01:26:33.319 hours we're hitting the target. There was also deliberate targeting, 1888 01:26:33.319 --> 01:26:35.520 which is like days or weeks. Right, you had to 1889 01:26:35.520 --> 01:26:38.199 get like five different generals to approve your deliberate strike, 1890 01:26:38.319 --> 01:26:40.199 and each general had a different reason for being the 1891 01:26:40.199 --> 01:26:42.840 one consulted. So like this guy is to determine whether 1892 01:26:42.880 --> 01:26:45.640 this is a residential facility. This guy is to determine 1893 01:26:45.640 --> 01:26:47.600 the right level of men, women and children in the house. 1894 01:26:47.840 --> 01:26:49.279 This guy is the one that gets to determine the 1895 01:26:49.279 --> 01:26:51.960 time of day. Like they had distributed among all the generals. 1896 01:26:52.079 --> 01:26:54.880 Everyone gets credit exactly, well exactly, so many generals and 1897 01:26:54.960 --> 01:26:58.520 not enough jobs. Absolutely, you know, it's everybody's kind of 1898 01:26:59.079 --> 01:27:03.600 washing each other's. Oh yeah, they're no general left behind. Yeah, exactly. 1899 01:27:07.520 --> 01:27:09.880 The other thing that you know you mentioned in your 1900 01:27:09.920 --> 01:27:12.800 book and we talked about before the show a little bit, 1901 01:27:13.000 --> 01:27:16.399 was talk about the special forces side of things, unconventional 1902 01:27:16.439 --> 01:27:20.119 warfare and the assumptions we get into going into that. Yeah, 1903 01:27:20.239 --> 01:27:23.840 the opposite of counterinsurgency. Now we are the insurgence. Yeah, 1904 01:27:23.840 --> 01:27:26.720 I mean, insurgency is basically a people rebelling against the 1905 01:27:26.720 --> 01:27:29.119 existing sovereign, which is something I talked about in the book. Well, 1906 01:27:29.199 --> 01:27:32.880 unconventional warfare is us supporting them doing it, right, So 1907 01:27:32.960 --> 01:27:35.119 if we're doing it, then it's okay. We're like, yeah, 1908 01:27:35.119 --> 01:27:38.479 this is a legitimate unconventional warfare operation. If we're on 1909 01:27:38.520 --> 01:27:40.600 the other side, though, if we're like the counter insurgents, 1910 01:27:40.600 --> 01:27:42.880 they're like, oh no, that those insurgents are really bad, 1911 01:27:43.000 --> 01:27:44.840 you know. So it's really interesting, like are they bad 1912 01:27:45.079 --> 01:27:47.199 just because we're on the other side, right, and we're 1913 01:27:47.199 --> 01:27:52.279 afraid to ask ourselves that. Right. And the new book 1914 01:27:52.319 --> 01:27:55.720 you have coming out, Iran's Shadow Weapons, that's coming out 1915 01:27:55.720 --> 01:27:59.960 this summer. Yep, you just got the proof copy, Yeah, today, 1916 01:28:00.640 --> 01:28:02.960 tell us what that book's about. Yeah. So, I think 1917 01:28:03.079 --> 01:28:06.760 a lot of people misunderstand Iran for various reasons. It's 1918 01:28:06.840 --> 01:28:08.960 kind of looked at as this like evil monolith that's 1919 01:28:09.000 --> 01:28:11.439 like God's fingers coming to take over the world and 1920 01:28:11.479 --> 01:28:14.079 all this, and I think that's a huge misunderstanding. And 1921 01:28:14.319 --> 01:28:16.399 what the book does is it looks at what is 1922 01:28:16.399 --> 01:28:19.960 the regime actually doing and thinking, not just at like 1923 01:28:20.000 --> 01:28:23.000 a strategic level of like big picture stuff, how are 1924 01:28:23.039 --> 01:28:26.119 they actually spotting assessing and recruiting sources. How do they 1925 01:28:26.159 --> 01:28:28.920 run SDRs, how do they pick safe houses and keep 1926 01:28:28.960 --> 01:28:31.560 safe houses? How do they do kidnappings inside the United States? 1927 01:28:31.800 --> 01:28:34.920 Like nitty gritty details and the really unique thing about 1928 01:28:34.920 --> 01:28:37.319 this book. First of all, nothing like this exists in print. 1929 01:28:37.359 --> 01:28:39.520 I guarantee you because I've read everything else just like 1930 01:28:39.560 --> 01:28:41.600 this book other one. I did the same thing for 1931 01:28:41.640 --> 01:28:43.920 this one. I read literally everything out there, including in 1932 01:28:43.920 --> 01:28:46.880 other languages, to a lot of Farsi sources in this 1933 01:28:47.560 --> 01:28:49.079 But the big piece is I got a bunch of 1934 01:28:49.119 --> 01:28:51.640 stuff declassified. So there's a lot of stuff appearing to 1935 01:28:51.640 --> 01:28:54.680 the public for the first time that was top secret, secret, 1936 01:28:54.720 --> 01:28:58.640 no foreign ACCM. A lot of protected information that's now 1937 01:28:58.720 --> 01:29:02.520 available showing things we knew, like for example, during the 1938 01:29:02.520 --> 01:29:07.359 Iran Iraq War, we supported Saddam Hussein and we supported Iran. 1939 01:29:07.720 --> 01:29:10.199 We supported Iran with Iran Contra and some other programs. 1940 01:29:10.239 --> 01:29:12.600 We also supported stim Hussein because the goal there was 1941 01:29:12.600 --> 01:29:15.279 not to defeat Saddam Musin or defeat Iran where each 1942 01:29:15.319 --> 01:29:17.439 other down exactly, is to bleed them out right. But 1943 01:29:17.479 --> 01:29:19.920 with this declassified stuff, you can see way more detail 1944 01:29:19.960 --> 01:29:22.960 about like how that actually happened and the Iran Contra 1945 01:29:23.079 --> 01:29:25.560 issue was only like one of many programs we had. 1946 01:29:25.960 --> 01:29:27.479 And this is for the first time that people are 1947 01:29:27.520 --> 01:29:29.000 gonna be able to read about this. And that's just 1948 01:29:29.119 --> 01:29:33.159 one example. What were the other programs, like weapons programs also? Yeah, 1949 01:29:33.159 --> 01:29:36.399 so actually, even after the war ended, we actually worked 1950 01:29:36.399 --> 01:29:42.439 with the IRGC in Bosnia to arm certain Muslims in Bosnia. Yeah, exactly. 1951 01:29:42.560 --> 01:29:45.720 And all the memos between Clinton and his staff are 1952 01:29:45.720 --> 01:29:48.560 now released that are discussing that. In fact, the Italian 1953 01:29:49.039 --> 01:29:51.840 president was sitting in the Clinton's office saying, you know, 1954 01:29:51.880 --> 01:29:53.159 you can try to tell us not to give the 1955 01:29:53.159 --> 01:29:54.760 weapons to the Iranians, but we know that you're doing 1956 01:29:54.760 --> 01:29:57.880 it too. It's very fascinating stuff that no one has 1957 01:29:57.920 --> 01:30:03.239 seen in public. Geez. And when does the book do out. 1958 01:30:03.439 --> 01:30:06.399 It's coming out probably early August. Okay, I got the proofs. 1959 01:30:06.399 --> 01:30:07.960 I got to hurry up and do an index for it. 1960 01:30:08.000 --> 01:30:09.800 That's actually they could go. We'd love to have you 1961 01:30:09.840 --> 01:30:11.640 back in to talk about that. I'd love to. It's 1962 01:30:11.640 --> 01:30:16.359 so fascinating. And you're now at Yale law, so I'll 1963 01:30:16.359 --> 01:30:18.760 go to Yale in August. Oh, okay, you're getting ready 1964 01:30:18.800 --> 01:30:20.760 for that. I'm in a holding pattern, right, now just 1965 01:30:20.840 --> 01:30:25.399 waiting for that. So how long's law school? Three years? 1966 01:30:25.399 --> 01:30:29.039 Three years? Yeah? And what are you like interested in? 1967 01:30:29.479 --> 01:30:32.479 You know, you have this extensive national security background and 1968 01:30:32.520 --> 01:30:34.359 now you want to go and you know, take the 1969 01:30:34.359 --> 01:30:37.319 bar exam, become a lawyer. What are you going to 1970 01:30:37.880 --> 01:30:39.920 go into next? Do you think? So? I like doing 1971 01:30:39.920 --> 01:30:41.600 hard pivots, So I'm gonna do like a ninety degree 1972 01:30:41.680 --> 01:30:43.880 pivot away from the military and government unless I'm on 1973 01:30:43.920 --> 01:30:46.119 the other side. So I want to work in a 1974 01:30:46.119 --> 01:30:49.239 big law firm, either doing like international arbitration. Like recently, 1975 01:30:49.279 --> 01:30:51.960 Facebook has had some problems in Ireland because they avoid 1976 01:30:52.039 --> 01:30:54.960 US taxes by being in Ireland, but Ireland has some issues. 1977 01:30:55.399 --> 01:30:58.479 I would be an attorney representing Facebook fighting Ireland essentially, 1978 01:30:58.560 --> 01:31:01.399 which is kind of cool that like international level or 1979 01:31:01.439 --> 01:31:03.359 doing things like export controls. So there's a lot of 1980 01:31:03.359 --> 01:31:05.520 stuff that has dual use, which means it can be 1981 01:31:05.600 --> 01:31:07.479 used for civilian purposes and it can be used for 1982 01:31:07.560 --> 01:31:11.680 military purposes, like countries' nuclear programs. For example, Iran has 1983 01:31:11.720 --> 01:31:14.479 a lot of stuff from Germany and the United States 1984 01:31:14.520 --> 01:31:17.680 in a lot of their nuclear facilities. So let's work 1985 01:31:17.680 --> 01:31:19.680 on the export controls of that and see how we 1986 01:31:19.720 --> 01:31:22.319 can fix that problem or make it so that certain 1987 01:31:22.359 --> 01:31:25.399 countries like Great Britain for example, has easier access to 1988 01:31:25.760 --> 01:31:29.199 certain US technology that's national security and nature. But i'd 1989 01:31:29.199 --> 01:31:32.199 be representing like the company for example, Boeing or Lockheed 1990 01:31:32.279 --> 01:31:35.800 or something like that. And you're also involved in the 1991 01:31:35.960 --> 01:31:39.039 Irregular Warfare initiative, that's right, Yeah, what is that? So 1992 01:31:39.079 --> 01:31:42.680 that's a collaboration between Princeton University and West Point. And 1993 01:31:43.319 --> 01:31:45.560 there's a podcast that's actually how it started, the Irregular 1994 01:31:45.600 --> 01:31:50.119 Warfare Podcast. And then there is a series of articles 1995 01:31:50.119 --> 01:31:52.399 that are published online kind of like the Small Wars Journal, 1996 01:31:52.479 --> 01:31:55.039 and actually recently we've paired up with them to do 1997 01:31:55.119 --> 01:31:58.000 like cross collaboration of sharing each other's articles, and it's 1998 01:31:58.119 --> 01:32:01.319 allowing practitioners anders in the field to kind of come 1999 01:32:01.319 --> 01:32:03.760 together and talk about these issues. You know, Like recently 2000 01:32:03.760 --> 01:32:06.560 we had an article about Boko Haram, like up to date, 2001 01:32:06.640 --> 01:32:08.760 we had one as soon as the India Pakistan thing 2002 01:32:08.840 --> 01:32:11.640 kicked off, we had an author in India writing an 2003 01:32:11.680 --> 01:32:15.000 article about what's going on in India on the Indian 2004 01:32:15.119 --> 01:32:18.640 unconventional warfare side, So very interesting. It's not just US authors, 2005 01:32:18.640 --> 01:32:22.319 so it's mostly US authors, but not you know, strictly, 2006 01:32:22.680 --> 01:32:25.399 so pretty interesting space to kind of share that information. 2007 01:32:26.159 --> 01:32:29.359 It's a nonprofit so it's just there for people to read, 2008 01:32:29.399 --> 01:32:32.119 and it's actually open to anyone to submit articles if 2009 01:32:32.119 --> 01:32:34.359 they want to, depending if it matches up with what 2010 01:32:34.399 --> 01:32:37.720 we're looking for. But yeah, all very irregular stuff, so 2011 01:32:38.039 --> 01:32:41.000 special operations on the military side all the way to 2012 01:32:41.159 --> 01:32:42.680 some of the issues like I talk about my book, 2013 01:32:42.800 --> 01:32:44.680 like the breakdown of society and what do we do 2014 01:32:44.720 --> 01:32:49.079 about that kind of things. I mean, we covered a 2015 01:32:49.079 --> 01:32:51.760 lot of ground here in a relatively short period of time, 2016 01:32:52.479 --> 01:32:54.840 and thank you for sharing your experiences. Like is there 2017 01:32:54.880 --> 01:32:57.199 anything else that you know we haven't talked about that 2018 01:32:57.279 --> 01:33:00.800 you'd really like to discuss anything we overlooked. I think 2019 01:33:00.800 --> 01:33:03.239 I would like to discuss the Iaron stuff in another episode, 2020 01:33:03.239 --> 01:33:06.800 because that will go on and on. Okay, Yeah, shoot 2021 01:33:06.840 --> 01:33:08.760 me a copy of the book when it comes out, 2022 01:33:08.880 --> 01:33:11.960 or an advanced copy, and yeah, I'd love to read it. 2023 01:33:11.960 --> 01:33:15.600 It sounds really interesting. Yeah. I actually have the IRGC 2024 01:33:15.760 --> 01:33:19.640 station in Vienna line and block charted out completely. It 2025 01:33:19.640 --> 01:33:23.199 tells you exactly who's who in the embassy and holy shit, fascinating. Yeah, Okay, 2026 01:33:23.239 --> 01:33:26.840 I'm excited. It's amazing. Yeah too. Yeah, I'll get you 2027 01:33:26.880 --> 01:33:30.760 on anything else. Do you like, where can people find 2028 01:33:30.800 --> 01:33:33.199 you on the web? Where can people find your books? 2029 01:33:33.560 --> 01:33:36.119 So I have a website Jonathan W. Hackett dot com. 2030 01:33:36.159 --> 01:33:38.520 I've got my books listed there, and any podcasts I've 2031 01:33:38.520 --> 01:33:41.239 been on are also there. Best place to contact me 2032 01:33:41.319 --> 01:33:46.000 is LinkedIn. I'm the Jonathan Hackett on LinkedIn. The the yeah, 2033 01:33:46.159 --> 01:33:48.880 because Jonathan Hackett was taken so I was like, all right, 2034 01:33:49.000 --> 01:33:53.039 well I'm the Jonathan Hackett so that, yeah, LinkedIn is 2035 01:33:53.039 --> 01:33:55.760 the best way. That's how I found you. Actually, that's 2036 01:33:55.760 --> 01:33:57.560 how I found you, and that's how I found Millburn 2037 01:33:57.680 --> 01:34:02.960 too on LinkedIn. Cool man. So, yeah, thank you for 2038 01:34:03.000 --> 01:34:05.680 telling us about your career and you know, your academic 2039 01:34:05.760 --> 01:34:09.239 works and everything else that's going on. And yeah, we'd 2040 01:34:09.239 --> 01:34:11.359 love to have you back to talk about this second book. Yeah, 2041 01:34:11.359 --> 01:34:16.359 I appreciate the time. Yeah, absolutely, man. Otherwise, we'll see 2042 01:34:16.359 --> 01:34:20.279 all you guys next time. Hey, guys, it's Jack. I 2043 01:34:20.359 --> 01:34:21.880 just want to talk to you for a moment about 2044 01:34:21.920 --> 01:34:24.199 how you can support the show. 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