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1:28

deadliest sniper named The Reaper with 33 confirmed kills

1:31

over the course of just four months.

1:55

New York Times bestselling author of

1:58

The Reaper and Way of the Reaper. author

2:00

of Reaper the Board, served

2:03

six years in U.S. Army Special

2:05

Operations, Third Ranger Battalion, 75th

2:08

Ranger Regiment. You're the first African American

2:10

to deploy into the global war on

2:12

terrorism as a sniper in your battalion.

2:15

Owner of Hard Shoot, you train personnel

2:18

in the art of long range shooting,

2:21

and former mentor on the

2:23

Fox reality show American Grit.

2:26

That sums it up pretty good, yeah. Did I

2:28

miss anything? No, no,

2:30

no. I don't even care

2:32

anymore about that stuff. And

2:34

to be honest, like, there's a few TV

2:36

shows and movies, but no, I don't even

2:38

care, man. Do you like doing the TV

2:41

stuff? Not anymore. I lost

2:43

that itch. I

2:46

was doing a show for Discovery Channel, and

2:49

I lost the itch thereafter.

2:51

The show was called Master of Arms. It was

2:53

like a forge and a fire where you make,

2:55

they would forge stuff. And

2:58

I was one of the judges, but I would just test

3:00

the weapons. And I just

3:02

had a bad experience with that. And then thereafter, I

3:04

was supposed to do a TV show with

3:09

Tim Kennedy and a few other snipers. And

3:12

it was my second go around

3:14

with that stuff. And I just kind of lost the

3:16

itch after it. I

3:18

guess the Hollywood lifestyle. I've done

3:20

like the Transformers stuff.

3:23

You were in Transformers too? Yeah. Transformers,

3:27

then I helped with the show, or

3:30

the movie The Wall. Terrible movie.

3:32

It was like, it's like a

3:34

two star movie on Amazon, but it's called The

3:36

Wall. And it was

3:39

a cool experience because I got a chance to

3:41

hang with one of my good friends, John Cena.

3:44

We've been hanging out since like 2015, I believe,

3:49

14 or 15. Good guy, and it was

3:51

cool to work with him. But other than that,

3:53

and the guy who did Jason Bourne, the director,

3:56

cool experience, but it was just, I

3:59

lost the tape. after that. All the

4:01

stuff that is going on in Hollywood

4:03

that you hear about. I've

4:05

had my taste of nothing along those

4:08

lines of just weird

4:10

stuff in Hollywood after my last

4:12

show with Discovery. Discovery Channel. Yeah.

4:15

Yeah, definitely a lot is coming

4:17

out about the circles in Hollywood.

4:19

Oh yeah. None

4:21

of it seems to be

4:24

positive. No, by any means.

4:26

But moving on, so

4:29

I have a subscription account on Patreon

4:31

that's they have been here since the

4:33

beginning. They're top supporters and so

4:35

I give them

4:37

an opportunity to ask every guest possible

4:40

a question. And

4:43

so here is a

4:46

question from Steven Casey. What

4:51

is the best decision that you've ever made

4:53

and how has that helped you? That's

4:57

the first question. Yeah, that's a that's

4:59

a deep one. Wow. What's

5:02

the best decision I've ever made and how

5:05

has it helped me? Stop

5:10

caring so much. That's probably been

5:12

the best decision. Stop caring so

5:14

much about the outside and care

5:17

more about care more so about

5:19

what's on the inside. Meaning what's

5:21

going on in my life, observing

5:24

that how I'm feeling emotionally that

5:26

the issues that I've had, acknowledging

5:29

that, taking care of that. Even

5:32

if you're not I wasn't taking care of it

5:34

you know when I first started to

5:36

acknowledge it. Are you talking

5:38

about quit paying attention

5:40

to external influences? Yes, yes.

5:43

Man, that's crazy. I was just on a

5:45

podcast yesterday and that's I said the exact

5:48

same thing. Really? That's crazy. Hey man, I

5:51

was remote viewing and I heard you

5:53

say that. That's what happened. But

5:56

that's that's like the

5:58

best thing or best advice. that I've

6:00

taken from myself was, yeah,

6:03

stop caring so much about the external

6:05

forces and things that are out of

6:07

my control. I can't control what other

6:10

people think, what they believe, what they, you

6:13

know, want to believe about me or

6:15

anything. I can't control that. Only thing I can control

6:17

is myself. So not

6:20

worrying so much about the outside,

6:23

you know, just more

6:25

so about taking care of me. Like

6:28

when we dive, we're all gonna go in that

6:30

casket by ourselves, you know? And I

6:32

think that that is my

6:35

biggest takeaway, knowing that at

6:37

the end of the day, it's just gonna

6:39

be me anyways. So I really shouldn't

6:41

have to care about the outside forces

6:43

and other things that I can't control,

6:45

you know? I

6:47

have to stand before the judge by myself at

6:49

the end, so. Yeah, you know,

6:52

that's, man, that's great. I'm

6:54

glad you said that. What led you

6:56

to start looking internally

7:00

instead of externally? And how

7:02

did that, I mean, affect

7:04

your daily life, maybe your business

7:06

life, anything? I would say the

7:09

birth of my son. So

7:11

long story, I've always wanted a

7:13

family like a kid. I wanted

7:15

two originally. I still want two,

7:17

just the way things are. I

7:19

don't have control over that. But

7:22

I knew before I turned 30, I said, before

7:24

I turned 30, my 30th birthday, I wanna

7:26

have my first child. Fast

7:28

forward, my 30th birthday, on

7:31

the date, my son pops out. Being

7:34

there and witnessing that, seeing that, and

7:36

the struggle that he had to go

7:38

through, he was born with like a

7:40

weird heart condition. It's

7:42

healed up, thankfully, now. But it

7:45

was hard to watch and not

7:48

have to

7:50

feel so much power of wanting to, dang,

7:53

I'm gonna already choke up, dude. But

7:55

yeah, having no

7:57

control of that

7:59

circumstance. and realizing, like,

8:01

I guess how important life really is,

8:04

you know, it all came in

8:06

that moment. And that's when

8:08

the switch went on of, you know, like

8:10

nothing really matters, and I

8:13

wanted to be there for him in the long

8:15

run. So that's when

8:17

the switch definitely changed, was, yeah,

8:20

I wanted to stick around for

8:22

him. How did it affect your

8:24

life? Oh man,

8:27

drastically. I

8:30

was too caught up in outside

8:33

circumstances, outside forces that I had no

8:35

control over. I was too caught up

8:38

in the outside world. And having

8:40

that center point, that center focus being my

8:43

son and, like, everything,

8:47

I guess, went away, if you want to say

8:49

it. Yeah, all the issues that I had, not

8:51

issues, but my perspective

8:53

of what was important in

8:56

life changed. And what was important for me

8:58

would be able to raise my

9:00

son and be there for him. So

9:03

it definitely helped out as far as ignoring

9:08

what everybody else thought. I wanted

9:10

my son to think, you know, my dad

9:12

is the, you know, coolest, I can

9:15

go to my dad at any time, no matter what.

9:17

I'm going to be, you know, I'm always going to

9:19

be his dad. I don't, I

9:21

can't always be what some

9:23

guy on the internet or some family member wants me

9:25

to be. I can't be that. I can't be all

9:27

those things at once, but what I can be is

9:29

better for my son. So, yeah. Man,

9:32

thanks for sharing that. I appreciate it.

9:34

But before we get in, man, we're

9:36

already starting to get deep here, but

9:40

before we get into your life story,

9:42

and that's what I want to do, we're going to start

9:44

the childhood, go into

9:46

your military career, go into your transition

9:49

civilian career, businesses that you run. And,

9:52

but before we do that, everybody gets a

9:54

gift. What

9:57

do we got, man? Everybody gets a gift. up

24:00

one time. I need some more people. But it's

24:02

legit. Holy shit. Yeah. My

24:04

dad used to do, um, he

24:07

did it in the army during a,

24:09

what do you call those things

24:11

where like a talent contest or

24:15

something like that, where they were just like,

24:17

some people would go up and like sing

24:19

or a talent. Yeah. Talent show. Talent show.

24:22

And that's what my dad did with some of

24:24

his coworkers and they had the biggest guy sit

24:28

in the chair and he had females

24:30

do it all women and he lifted

24:32

up the biggest guy in their unit

24:34

out of the chair. Yeah. Whoa.

24:36

Yeah. Crazy

24:39

dude. Totally wasn't expected to go down

24:41

this road. Yeah. Yeah.

24:43

100% man. So

24:46

what, I mean, what is it? Is it a religion? Well,

24:50

not really necessarily. Um, like

24:53

who do comes from Africa and

24:55

it was like, according to who

24:58

you talk to or what the belief

25:00

is that was our original religion,

25:04

but it was not religion.

25:06

It was just a spirituality of the

25:08

manipulation of the spirit world. And that's

25:12

what they practiced before

25:14

religion was introduced and they

25:17

were killed and stuff like that for

25:19

practicing what they perceived to be is

25:21

black magic from black people's magic. So

25:24

they said no more

25:26

and introduced a different form of spirituality,

25:29

which I'm not against. I think that

25:31

there's a, I think

25:34

all spirit religion is a form of

25:36

magic. Even prayer is a form

25:38

of, of, of magic. You know, it's just

25:40

the, you're the belief that

25:42

you're putting something into the spirit realm, asking

25:46

a deity or an entity

25:48

to whatever you want,

25:50

asking you shall receive as above. So

25:52

below as within. So without all

25:55

these things. So they all coincide

25:57

with each other. I think all roads lead to Rome.

26:00

This is how we interpret and practice different

26:03

beliefs. Very interesting.

26:06

Back to childhood. So

26:08

what were you, other than

26:10

Voodoo, what were

26:12

you into as a kid? What

26:14

grabbed your interest? Wow. I

26:17

love space. I used to want to be

26:19

an astronaut. My

26:21

dad was a big space geek. He

26:23

was always taking me outside to

26:25

look through the telescope to look at the

26:28

moon and look at the stars and show

26:30

me where Orion's belt was at and how

26:32

to find the North Star, the Big Dipper,

26:34

Little Dipper. I teach my

26:36

son this stuff at his age

26:39

now, and he's seven, but how

26:41

to find North, South, East, and West and

26:43

different star constellations on how to read them.

26:46

So I've always wanted to be an

26:48

astronaut. Like, originally, that was my first

26:50

dream. So for fun, pretending

26:53

I was an astronaut, taking

26:57

cardboard boxes and

27:00

wanting to blast off into space, that was

27:02

like my original dream until

27:04

my dad showed me Chuck

27:06

Norris Delta Force and

27:09

Charlie Sheen Navy Seals.

27:12

Then my whole perspective of

27:14

what I wanted to do changed. And then school.

27:18

I got into school and I wasn't, like, too great at it, and

27:21

the astronaut thing was out of the window. Why

27:24

weren't you great at school? Do you run into it or...? I

27:27

wasn't really into it. Like,

27:30

first grade was easy. Anybody can say

27:32

that. But I just

27:36

like to play, and I like to joke

27:38

around, and I don't

27:40

know if I had, like, ADHD or something like that,

27:43

but it was hard for me

27:45

to focus. And the way

27:47

I used to read, and I guess I still do

27:49

read, like,

27:52

for me, I would read one

27:54

sentence and build that story, as opposed

27:57

to reading the whole paragraph and then building

27:59

it. or building it as you go along,

28:02

I would break each sentence out of

28:04

that paragraph or chapter into

28:07

my mind to build that story. And

28:09

I guess it just took too long and, you

28:12

know, I wasn't great at math

28:14

and anything. So I started to

28:17

realize I wasn't great at school, like

28:19

the second or third grade. And that's when

28:21

I used to get into a lot of

28:23

trouble at home for not

28:25

bringing home, you know, good grades. So,

28:28

yeah. And

28:30

after, oh, after the haunted house, I moved to a

28:33

little bit near, near

28:38

the city portion of Baltimore, Maryland.

28:40

Not this city, but in Maryland.

28:42

And that's where I stayed from

28:44

1993 to 2004 when I graduated. And

28:49

that's where we spent my

28:51

entire life pretty much. What

28:53

did you enjoy doing as a kid? Were

28:55

you an athlete? Like a belt

28:57

in the woods? Yeah, I loved, well, I loved

28:59

being in the woods with my granddad. We would

29:01

take trips to a small

29:04

place called Hogginsville, Georgia. Small,

29:08

small spot in Georgia. And

29:11

my granddad had a

29:13

lot of land. So,

29:17

yeah, the whole like slave

29:19

lineage, my great,

29:21

great, great, great granddad

29:23

was a slave and, no,

29:26

a slave owner, I'm sorry. And

29:30

ended up raping

29:32

one of the women.

29:35

And so we come from like

29:37

that lineage and that land and that plot of

29:40

land ended up staying with the family because

29:42

the guy who is

29:44

a white guy, who was

29:47

a slave owner, of course, and having

29:49

a relationship with one of the slaves

29:51

and mistresses, whatever you want to call

29:53

her. And somehow that land,

29:57

because he loved her, got inherited to our

29:59

family. Oh,

34:00

man. Yeah. So they

34:03

didn't know how to... And that lineage has just,

34:05

you know, gone on and gone on. So

34:09

when I popped out and we did, it was... They

34:12

didn't know how to love or how to show emotion.

34:15

My mom was never told by her

34:17

dad that he loved her for, you

34:19

know, her entire life. My

34:22

dad's dad died when he was in the sixth grade. And,

34:25

yeah. And then it was

34:27

just a hard lifestyle for him. They

34:30

were both poor. Yeah. Very poor.

34:32

So it was... They

34:34

didn't know how to love. So

34:36

for me, how my parents would

34:40

deal with anything was violence.

34:43

Or, yeah, was

34:45

by that. So it was like that. Yeah.

34:48

Do you think that affects you to this day? Or... Really?

34:53

Me and my sister were having a conversation about it.

34:56

Because she has issues too. She

34:58

was raped as a kid

35:01

and... Shit. Yeah. By a

35:04

close friend. Yeah.

35:08

It was

35:10

not the best childhood. But as

35:13

far as it affecting us now, 100%. I

35:18

tried and I don't want to be like that. So

35:24

I stay away from that. But... Because

35:27

I know what it does to a child, you know? And I

35:29

don't want that for my son. But

35:31

for my sister and I, it's

35:33

100% affects us to this day. Not

35:38

many friends, I think. We push people away a

35:41

lot, you know? This

35:44

is gonna sound weird, but like

35:46

we weren't allowed to have friends growing up. My

35:48

parents were very, yeah, controlling

35:51

in that nature of who we could hang out

35:54

with, who could be our friends, and... Yeah.

35:56

It was very... Why do you think

35:58

that is? I don't know.

36:01

I've questioned that so much. I

36:05

don't know. At one point I thought it

36:07

was because they did not want the word

36:09

to get out. That, yeah,

36:11

I get spanked and

36:13

be, you know, at least three, four

36:15

times a week, you know? And

36:18

that was normal. That was

36:20

extremely normal. But whether you

36:22

didn't do anything or if someone was having a

36:24

bad day or it didn't

36:26

matter, you just always felt that you

36:29

weren't good enough. So it was my fault

36:33

that I just was not being a good son. So it

36:35

was, in my mind, it made sense why I

36:37

would get spanked and beat. Looking

36:41

back at it, of course, I don't think that that

36:43

was the reason. I know I

36:45

wasn't a bad kid, you know? But

36:48

then also growing up, I

36:50

had, you know, my next door neighbor, the only

36:52

friend, my friend to this day, Andre, we've

36:55

helped each other a lot. I've seen his

36:57

mom be beaten by

37:00

her boyfriends and

37:04

I've had to help with his

37:06

mom and I've seen him and

37:08

his brother get absolutely destroyed by

37:10

their 250 pound dad or stepdad

37:12

at the time. I

37:16

just grew up around that. So it wasn't like my

37:20

next door neighbor sold drugs and I've

37:22

seen them fight and, you

37:25

know, with people who owe them money or whatever.

37:27

And it was just normal. So I didn't feel

37:29

like I had it that bad, you know? How

37:32

did you, I mean, how did you and your

37:34

sister navigate your way through that? Stayed in our

37:36

room, yeah. Mainly

37:38

for her, I would stay outside as long

37:40

as I could, but it

37:42

always felt like if I was having too much fun, my

37:46

dad would cut it short, yeah. Like

37:49

come inside and do something, go

37:52

clean up something. Or yeah,

37:55

it never really felt like I was

37:57

allowed to be. be

38:00

me or have that much fun

38:02

without having mom or dad or

38:05

whatever, pick something

38:07

out and bash

38:09

you for it, you know? Damn, man.

38:13

What would you say to kids that are

38:15

growing up in

38:17

abusive environments today?

38:20

Wow. If you had a piece of advice for them? Man,

38:29

it's going to end one day. If

38:33

you have someone to talk to, talk to them. But

38:36

it's just the whole you have to be careful about it.

38:39

I get it that you

38:41

don't want to get anyone in trouble in the wrong way

38:43

and you don't want to also get

38:45

yourself in even more trouble. That's

38:48

a tough one. I mean, for me, what I

38:50

did, but I don't think it's the healthiest way, you just

38:54

know what's going to end one day. I

38:57

wanted to leave my home at a young age, you

39:00

know, young age, and

39:03

couldn't wait to leave home. I haven't

39:05

been back since like that. So it's

39:08

going to end one day, staying

39:11

strong and yeah, that's like, it sucks

39:13

not having, I've never thought about that.

39:15

I don't know. It's a

39:18

really tough one. I can just, you know, go by

39:20

my experience, but also see what that's done to me

39:23

and my family. It's

39:26

not saying. Did you ever run away? Yeah.

39:29

Yeah. How young were you when that

39:31

started? Oh my. Old enough to

39:33

where I thought running away

39:35

was where you take a stick and a

39:38

bandana and you tie it at the end of it

39:40

and put your stuff in there. And

39:42

I went like down the block and stayed

39:45

for a few hours and realized I don't have anywhere

39:47

to sleep. So I

39:49

went back home and I ran away to my friend's house one

39:51

time and I knew that if

39:53

I stayed away too long, that when I

39:55

got back, my parents were going to destroy

39:58

me. So I just. came

40:00

back and got the lesser

40:02

spanking, as opposed to, you

40:06

know, getting laid on pretty

40:08

good. Wow. So

40:11

you graduated in 2004? Yeah.

40:14

And what happened then? Immediately thereafter.

40:16

I signed the contract while

40:19

in high school. I was, so

40:22

in the 10th and 11th grade, I went

40:24

to Annapolis. I was in ROTC

40:27

and I was in Navy C Cadet Corps. And

40:30

I went to this baby SEAL program, where

40:33

you have to, like to get in,

40:35

you take the real SEAL PFT or

40:37

test, where I think it was like

40:40

a 500 meter swim in

40:42

12 minutes, 30 seconds or something,

40:44

and two and a half mile run and

40:47

pull ups, sit ups, and it's to

40:49

the standard. But did

40:51

that at 16, got scuba qualified.

40:53

My whole route was Navy SEAL

40:55

and it didn't pan

40:58

out that way. Colorblind and Navy didn't want

41:00

me. So, and my senior

41:02

year is when I signed the Army

41:04

contract and I had to get the

41:06

parental consent from my parents to sign

41:09

me off. And two weeks after

41:11

I graduated, I was on the bus

41:13

heading to the airport to go to

41:15

Fort Benning. Real

41:18

quick, so you wanted to be a SEAL. Yeah. You

41:21

couldn't get in because you were colorblind. How

41:23

did Rangers come up? How

41:26

did that get introduced to you? So I failed

41:28

the color vision test the

41:30

first time. And it was called

41:32

the Easy Hara Test, like this book and they, you

41:35

see the numbers and that pattern of

41:38

colors. And I didn't

41:41

see any number except for the number you're not

41:43

supposed to see. And

41:45

they told me I was colorblind and I

41:48

could not be a SEAL or anything

41:50

of that nature. I had like a very

41:52

small, I guess,

41:55

list of jobs that I could do in the Navy, none

41:57

of which I wanted to do. and

42:00

my ASVAB score was not high enough

42:02

to get those jobs. So

42:04

I came back and

42:07

I studied online dial-up internet.

42:10

The, not dial-up, it

42:12

was the, it ran on a modem.

42:15

But I downloaded all

42:17

the easyhara tests that I possibly could

42:19

think of or find on the internet

42:21

at the time, and I studied them

42:23

and the answers. So when I went

42:25

back, hopefully, when I retake the test, I could

42:28

pass it because I studied the test and I know the

42:30

answers to it. I went

42:32

back a month or two later, not even

42:34

two months, maybe like a month later. And

42:38

instead of the easyhara test, they

42:40

had this weird light test. And

42:42

it looked like a traffic light, but different

42:45

colors of light. And I

42:47

completely failed that one too. So I

42:49

broke down, I'm crying, and

42:52

next door, this army check,

42:54

a nurse, she

42:56

heard me crying. She

42:58

came in, or as I'm walking out, she

43:01

peeked her head into the doorway and she had, you know, come

43:03

over to her room, went

43:05

over there, and it was an army

43:08

recruiter there she was talking to. And

43:10

she introduced me to him and

43:12

he started talking about, do

43:15

I know what army rangers are and

43:17

Green Berets? I was like, I know what

43:19

a Green Beret is, but

43:22

I'm not too fond of what a ranger

43:24

is. I saw them in Black

43:26

Hawk Down, but I didn't like what

43:28

they were doing. It was not what Delta was doing.

43:31

So I thought, I didn't really know what a ranger was.

43:33

And he said, well, they're like Navy

43:35

SEALs, but they don't swim. I

43:37

was like, okay, well, that's fine. I can do that then. And

43:40

the lady who was going

43:43

to administer the color

43:45

vision test, she held

43:47

out the book and she traced her

43:49

fingers on the number. So

43:51

I just called it out. I was like, oh,

43:54

12, five, and I couldn't see anything.

43:56

And I still have the document where I had zero

43:58

out of 14. to

44:00

14 out of 14 of my

44:02

color vision test. Wow. And that's how

44:04

I got into the Army. Damn,

44:07

no kidding. Yeah. And 9-11 had already

44:09

happened. Yeah. So we're already, it's this

44:11

2004 timeframe, so

44:13

we're already at war. Yeah. I mean, is

44:15

that what you wanted to do? Oh, 100%.

44:17

100%. After

44:20

I saw what happened and like

44:22

some of the seniors during that

44:24

time were in ROTC. They

44:27

were going to go off and join the

44:29

military too. And I just didn't want to

44:31

feel like left out, and miss the party.

44:33

Felt like I missed the party, but I

44:36

wanted to at least get in and contribute

44:39

some type of way. I had no other option.

44:41

I was not, I couldn't do

44:44

college. I graduated with the 1.7 GPA

44:46

from high school, and I

44:48

barely pulled that off. So it was

44:51

the only option for me was the military. And

44:54

yeah, went there after 9-11 and

44:57

knew I was going to deploy once I found out

45:00

exactly what Rangers do. Granted,

45:03

as long as I made it, if I made

45:05

it, then I knew for a fact that was

45:07

going to go to combat. So that was partially

45:09

my driving force. The other was I grew

45:12

up telling my best friend Andre and

45:15

my family that I'm going to do

45:17

this thing. I'm going to. I can't

45:19

come back. So to

45:22

fail and not make that would mean,

45:26

yeah, it was not an option. I couldn't let it happen. I

45:28

had to do it. What about

45:30

the sniper thing? Always, not always

45:32

wanted to be a sniper. Since

45:34

Gilly suit days is when I wanted to be a sniper.

45:39

Like I was a decent shot as a

45:41

kid growing up and going out to the

45:43

country. I was okay, but not

45:46

like, you know, anything that would make

45:48

me stand out. But the

45:50

sniper thing came after. So

45:53

for us, it is you go through at the

45:55

time. It was called rip. This was

45:57

after basic and after airborne. make

46:01

it through airborne, overcome

46:04

my fear of heights, my

46:06

shattered tibia fibia, pull

46:08

that off and going

46:10

on to RIP, Ranger Indoctrination Program.

46:13

It was like a month, I believe. I

46:16

wanna say it was a month long. And

46:19

all it was was just a beat down fest of, you

46:22

just get smoked. We had 98, 95 or 98 guys going in

46:26

and we graduated six from that

46:28

original class and seven with the rollover.

46:31

So we had a seven man graduation and

46:35

made it through that and got into

46:37

battalion. So that's less

46:39

than a 10% success rate. That

46:42

was a weird class. It was a brutal

46:44

class, it was bad. It was a smoke

46:46

fest. After that is when they slowly started

46:49

to come out with RASP. How

46:51

long is RIP? At

46:53

that time, it was like a month long,

46:55

a little over a month, I think. What

46:57

is, is it a selection process? Yeah, it's

46:59

a selection to get to battalion, the 75th.

47:03

Now it's called RASP, Ranger

47:06

Assessment Selection Program or something, I forget

47:09

what it's called. But now

47:11

it's RASP and it's essentially

47:13

the same thing, but they've extended it to where

47:15

they teach you something now. So when

47:18

you get to the battalion, you're

47:20

just not like some guy

47:22

who's just a beat up, weak, private

47:25

who can't do

47:27

the basics of a door breach or

47:29

breaching a door or clearing a room. So

47:31

now they've incorporated that. Back

47:34

then it wasn't like that. So

47:36

yeah, we graduated, I go into battalion. I

47:40

get there right as my guys were

47:42

coming back from Afghanistan. I

47:44

did an entire train up with them

47:46

and I deployed to crit Iraq.

47:50

Hold on, hold on. Before we get

47:52

into the deployment to your regiment, let's take a

47:54

quick break. When we come back,

47:56

we'll talk about what it was like for you

47:58

showing up at the regiment. Oh my. Yeah, perfect.

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51:50

right, Nick, we're

51:53

back from the break. You're

51:55

checking into the regiment. How did that feel? They

1:04:00

can't have us all quit. I just have

1:04:02

to outlast that guy or the next guy

1:04:05

or someone else. But every

1:04:07

single day I wanted to quit. More

1:04:09

so in Ranger School. But every day I wanted

1:04:11

to quit. I think I

1:04:13

was just too stupid to even do

1:04:15

it at the time. Too much ego. Too

1:04:17

much ego. To get up there and you

1:04:20

get respect for quitting. They respect

1:04:22

you and they don't treat you and call you names.

1:04:24

They don't treat you bad. So it was more

1:04:27

so of an ego thing for me of not wanting to

1:04:29

quit. But yeah, I wanted to every day. Interesting.

1:04:32

So they make it appealing to quit. Oh

1:04:35

yeah. So

1:04:38

that was the biggest thing about RIP. And

1:04:41

I think that's what I think made it hard too

1:04:43

is it was different than basic

1:04:45

training. You're more on your own and you're

1:04:48

given a set of instructions to do something and you

1:04:50

do it. You're not like in

1:04:52

basic training where they hold your hand the whole

1:04:55

way. It was different in

1:04:57

that aspect too. And just how

1:04:59

mean they were. Like these guys were demonic. It

1:05:01

felt like I was terrified of Rangers

1:05:04

going in. I saw a guy with

1:05:06

the tambourine. As a kid, I'm you know,

1:05:08

avert your eyes and I would always say to myself, Oh

1:05:10

my gosh, this guy's probably killed people. And

1:05:12

I would terrify me because they,

1:05:15

a Ranger to me always looked

1:05:17

very neat. Very, you

1:05:19

know, yeah, very neat, very

1:05:22

well put together. And knowing that

1:05:24

this guy or thinking that, you know, this guy

1:05:26

has taken a life was like weird

1:05:28

to me. It scared me. So I was always scared to

1:05:30

look these guys on the eye of. Yeah,

1:05:33

that. So I was scared

1:05:36

of all my instructors. Interesting. Yeah. All

1:05:38

right. So let's move forward again. You

1:05:41

checked in. You're at third

1:05:43

Ranger Battalion. What's

1:05:47

it like when you meet your team? Terrifying.

1:05:51

I heard a mass

1:05:53

like a stampede coming through the

1:05:55

barracks. They're screaming loud

1:05:58

doors being kept. So

1:14:00

we don't go to like an airport. It's

1:14:02

not announced when we're leaving. It's just the C-17

1:14:06

lands in the back runway behind our compound

1:14:08

you get on and We

1:14:10

fly to Germany from Germany. We go to where we're

1:14:12

going. I thought when they lower the ramp

1:14:16

It was gonna be bullets flying. I'm

1:14:19

gonna come out charging and that's how

1:14:21

you enter war But

1:14:24

instead it was the exact opposite We

1:14:26

uh, and I kind of got that picture

1:14:28

as a new guy when I was

1:14:30

also high on Ambien I took the Ambien pill

1:14:32

before I was supposed to and I

1:14:36

Didn't know what Ambien was I know was a sleeping aid But

1:14:38

I took it before I was supposed to so

1:14:41

I had to fight staying awake while

1:14:43

on this C-17 waiting to taxi off

1:14:45

the runway And as

1:14:47

I'm sitting there waiting, I started to

1:14:49

see faces pop out of the

1:14:51

chairs. I'm hallucinating like I'm Cracked

1:14:54

off this Ambien and I'm hallucinating and

1:14:56

I'm seeing stuff and my team leader

1:14:58

Salazar He's like, did you did you

1:15:01

take your Ambien before and like yes,

1:15:03

I'm I'm tripping and he's like dude,

1:15:05

just wait Finally get an

1:15:07

opportunity to sleep. But um Yeah,

1:15:09

we get off the C-17. We're running off

1:15:12

I think we're gonna run off and I don't

1:15:14

have a mag for my gun with bullets I'm

1:15:16

like, where do we get bullets that I missed

1:15:18

that that meeting where they handed out

1:15:20

the bullets before we go on this deployment? And

1:15:23

I'm saying to myself when we run off the

1:15:25

C-17 I'm gonna

1:15:27

pick up the first guys ammo that

1:15:30

drops like saving profit Ryan, but You

1:15:33

legitimately thought that's why I thought that's how we

1:15:35

come into war and they lowered

1:15:37

the ramp and you see people walking

1:15:39

around Little coffee bean.

1:15:42

Yeah shops and

1:15:44

Burger King joints and stuff like that and Food

1:15:48

places and it's smelt like not bad.

1:15:50

It's smelt like well Iraq But where

1:15:52

we first landed at it just smelt

1:15:54

normal and smell like bombs

1:15:56

and anything like that

1:15:58

burning bodies know what

1:26:00

was going on, never trained for that. You

1:26:02

know? And he's like, my

1:26:04

PL slaps me on the helmet, and

1:26:07

he's, shoot this mother, you know, cussing me out,

1:26:09

and I'm like, all right, put the sights

1:26:12

on the hood of the car,

1:26:14

this white car, and put the

1:26:16

butterfly switches on it, the butterfly trigger, and skipped

1:26:19

the rounds, nine-round bursts from the hood,

1:26:21

all the way into the driver's seat,

1:26:23

and, pfft, he went, veered

1:26:25

off the road. We got

1:26:27

out, and the assaulters did, and,

1:26:29

you know, did their

1:26:32

little SSE, and investigated what had

1:26:34

happened, and found the explosives, and,

1:26:36

yeah. But when they opened the car,

1:26:38

I remember him, like, spilling out the car.

1:26:41

How did that feel, knowing that you had just taken

1:26:43

another man's life for the first time? It did not

1:26:45

make sense to me. It didn't make sense until I

1:26:48

got back, and I went to sleep, and

1:26:50

that's when I had my first weird dream of,

1:26:55

like, I didn't feel anything. I

1:26:57

didn't feel real, because it's

1:26:59

not what I expected. I thought it was going to be,

1:27:01

like, in the movies, you know? Big decision-making

1:27:04

process. Yeah, yeah. This was like, I'm not

1:27:06

even being shot at. This guy's just driving

1:27:09

at us at a high rate of speed, and I

1:27:12

didn't train for that, you know? And, yeah,

1:27:15

it was just a weird feeling. I didn't have

1:27:17

a disconnect. I didn't feel anything. But

1:27:19

I went to bed that night, and that's when I had

1:27:22

the dream of that guy was

1:27:24

the ceiling fan, and his

1:27:26

arms were the blades, and his head was the centerpiece where

1:27:28

the light would be, and he started spinning,

1:27:31

and I'm strapped to my bed, and it's

1:27:33

spinning faster and faster until his body,

1:27:35

like, starts to rip apart in my room,

1:27:37

and he just bays my,

1:27:39

or soaks my room with blood, and I'm,

1:27:41

like, bathing in his blood, and

1:27:43

his face stayed still, and

1:27:46

was just screaming, but no sound was coming out.

1:27:49

And that's when I was like, oh, I

1:27:52

guess, I don't know what I, I just felt, I

1:27:54

woke up scared, but I

1:27:56

guess that was the first real moment where I

1:27:58

had a chance to say, or I say to myself,

1:28:00

man, I killed someone. But

1:28:03

after that, it was like not

1:28:05

a normal thing, but it was, as

1:28:09

a machine gunner back then, it was a lot of

1:28:11

shooting, a lot of, yeah,

1:28:15

a lot of laying down fire

1:28:18

during ambushes and things

1:28:20

of that nature. So

1:28:22

it was different, but it was not what I

1:28:24

expected. The first time I shot

1:28:26

someone with an M4 was, I

1:28:29

was hanging out the hatch

1:28:31

of the striker and my guys were

1:28:33

just, the

1:28:36

assaulters were in this, it

1:28:38

was almost like a trench warfare scenario where

1:28:40

they had this trench thing, there

1:28:43

were foreign fighters, and they

1:28:45

had this trench system that

1:28:47

we had to, the assaulters had to fight through. My

1:28:50

vehicle blocked off the portion of the road

1:28:52

so they couldn't scroat

1:28:55

across. One guy did, and

1:28:57

I remember, I'm parked next

1:28:59

to another striker, Rico two or whatever,

1:29:02

and I remember him looking at this guy and

1:29:04

he puts his laser on the guy and in

1:29:06

his floodlight, when his floodlight hits him, that's when

1:29:08

you see the AK. And he's

1:29:11

running back looking at our guys and he's running with

1:29:13

an AK. That

1:29:15

guy starts shooting, my guy starts shooting at him,

1:29:18

so I'm like, well, we gotta light this guy up. And

1:29:20

I'm, my first time doing that with an M4,

1:29:22

I clicked, I hit the safety,

1:29:25

or not the safety, I hit the mag release on

1:29:27

the side of my M4. Mag

1:29:29

falls out, click, boom, one bullet

1:29:31

comes out, hit the

1:29:33

guy in the back, and he falls down, tumbles,

1:29:35

and that was like

1:29:38

the first experience I had with shooting

1:29:40

a person and seeing the laser go

1:29:42

on the guy and pulling a trigger

1:29:44

and watching him collapse. But

1:29:47

I wasn't like the sole contributor. I

1:29:49

didn't like, I don't think I killed him myself.

1:29:51

It was a joint thing

1:29:53

where he was being shot up by- Lots

1:29:55

of lasers. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It

1:29:57

was my first experience, but with-

1:30:00

that though, you know? But

1:30:02

I don't contribute to know my bullet did. It

1:30:04

was a few lasers lighting this guy

1:30:06

up. Yeah. And

1:30:09

it was like that for pretty

1:30:11

much that entire deployment was just... a

1:30:15

lot of direct action, but the firefights

1:30:17

were never to where we thought that

1:30:20

we were being overrun or gonna lose

1:30:22

a firefight. It was pretty one-sided and

1:30:24

happened. It was over pretty quick. Did

1:30:27

you guys lose anybody on that first deployment?

1:30:30

No. No, we did not. We lost

1:30:32

somebody in a different platoon. I

1:30:35

believe second platoon. We lost

1:30:37

one guy during an

1:30:39

IED blast that blew up his striker and

1:30:43

a nut that goes onto one of the screws on

1:30:45

his striker blew and punctured

1:30:48

the back of his back

1:30:50

and went through him and he bled out. That's

1:30:52

the only guy we lost on that deployment that

1:30:55

I knew. Sounds

1:30:57

like a very

1:30:59

kinetic deployment. Yeah.

1:31:02

Yeah. Most of

1:31:04

them were, except for one, and I

1:31:06

was working with SEAL Team 6

1:31:08

and Jill all about it. And

1:31:11

that's the difference. Yeah. I got

1:31:13

my... It wasn't fun. Well,

1:31:16

get there. Get there. So

1:31:18

you do a 90-day deployment, about 120 raids or

1:31:21

ops. What

1:31:25

is it that you think... If

1:31:27

I remember in your outline, we'd talk about

1:31:29

that you... You

1:31:31

know, your first... I mean,

1:31:33

how did you gain your guy's respect? What

1:31:35

was it about you that... I

1:31:39

went along with the program. I

1:31:41

just fell in line. I got

1:31:44

in trouble for stupid new

1:31:46

guy drunk stuff that everybody was getting in trouble for

1:31:48

at the time. You know,

1:31:50

barracks, fights and stuff like that. One

1:31:54

time I mouthed off to a team leader because

1:31:56

we just got back from Kentucky. air

1:32:00

air air

1:32:02

assault stuff like fast-rope and

1:32:05

somewhere in Kentucky and my team

1:32:08

leader who was not my team leader wanted me to re-clean

1:32:11

some 240s and Mark 48 and everybody

1:32:15

else was going to bed and I'm like dude I'm not gonna

1:32:17

do that and he chewed me

1:32:19

out and the next day when I went back

1:32:21

to work there was a

1:32:24

handful of team leaders who were

1:32:27

waiting for me and ready

1:32:29

to take care of things the way they take

1:32:32

care of things and in battalion

1:32:34

behind the back of the shed so that

1:32:38

got rectified quick follow

1:32:40

the line quick yeah so

1:32:46

let's wrap up your first farm and you come home

1:32:48

I mean what very

1:32:50

kinetic employment sounds

1:32:53

like a lot of killing yeah how

1:32:55

are you processing this at home I

1:32:58

really wasn't man I just I felt

1:33:02

like I felt like Robin

1:33:04

amongst a bunch of

1:33:06

Batman you know I was

1:33:08

just Robin just a just

1:33:11

yeah I was just a sidekick it felt like so

1:33:13

I didn't really nothing

1:33:16

really processed I think it happened

1:33:20

relatively quick and I got wasted you know to

1:33:22

be honest with you like that was the first

1:33:24

thing we did when we got back was

1:33:27

just drink and drink

1:33:29

and drink and drink for like two

1:33:31

days of binge drinking and

1:33:34

as soon as you're done that you're back

1:33:36

in the training like there was no time

1:33:38

to we had two weeks 13 days were

1:33:40

allotted two weeks per year

1:33:42

one month per year so two weeks before

1:33:44

deployment two weeks after you're

1:33:47

allotted for that so yeah I

1:33:50

went home to Maryland

1:33:53

stay with my friend did some

1:33:58

cool stuff I guess got drunk and

1:34:00

just hung out with friends. I didn't

1:34:02

really think about

1:34:04

too much of anything. Like I didn't have bad

1:34:06

dreams or anything like that. It

1:34:09

just felt weird. I felt different as I tell

1:34:11

you what, I felt that I was never gonna

1:34:13

get picked on again. Like

1:34:15

my senior 11th grade and 12th grade

1:34:17

was, I wasn't allowed

1:34:19

to, my last year in high school, I was

1:34:21

not allowed to get suspended anymore for fighting. I

1:34:23

had been, I had used up all my fight

1:34:25

days, if you want to call it that, before

1:34:28

expulsion and I would have to come back and

1:34:30

repeat and just go to a different school. Like

1:34:34

I was bullied a little bit, I guess you could

1:34:36

say, because I didn't fit

1:34:38

with the crowd

1:34:40

of guys who just

1:34:43

lived a different lifestyle. You know, I wasn't,

1:34:45

I couldn't afford

1:34:47

to, my parents would not let me be

1:34:50

that guy. So

1:34:52

not being able to fall into like the

1:34:54

guys with the streets or whatever, you would

1:34:57

get picked on. But,

1:35:00

so I had to fight a lot, you know, and

1:35:03

after that deployment coming back, I knew I was

1:35:05

never gonna get picked on ever again, because

1:35:08

it was, yeah, I felt

1:35:10

like that, that I've killed

1:35:13

people, you know, and I don't, it

1:35:16

was not a big thing to me. Like I didn't

1:35:18

cry about it, it wasn't like the movies or anything,

1:35:20

it just was, it just was what it

1:35:22

was. I carried that back

1:35:24

and I, you know, I still to this day carry

1:35:27

it, of I don't

1:35:29

ever want to kill anyone again, but, because

1:35:33

I think it does take a piece of your soul

1:35:35

every time you do it, I don't know, my opinion.

1:35:38

But if I had to, of course I would, I would,

1:35:42

yeah. At

1:35:45

what point did your wife come into

1:35:47

the picture? Oh,

1:35:51

so during that deployment, during

1:35:54

like the later portion, I'm on MySpace, I had

1:35:56

snuck out to go to the MWR. So,

1:36:00

That was the only place where Myspace was allowed. We were

1:36:02

not allowed to have it on our compound or anything

1:36:05

like that. I go

1:36:07

across the street to an MWR that the

1:36:09

legs used, the regular army guys, and I

1:36:12

go in there and I hop on Myspace, and

1:36:14

this girl, Jessica, she messages me,

1:36:16

and her picture didn't pop up at first, and

1:36:20

she just says, hey, we went to school, elementary

1:36:22

school together, just wanted to reconnect or see how

1:36:24

you were doing, and I thought it was a

1:36:26

different Jessica that I did not like. So I

1:36:28

clicked X and I was like, there's nothing there.

1:36:31

But it ate me up for the rest of

1:36:33

that day because I wanted to see

1:36:35

if it was the right Jessica. I go

1:36:37

back the next day and her page loads up, and

1:36:40

it's the girl that I went to

1:36:42

school with in elementary school. In the first grade,

1:36:44

the girl I used to pick on

1:36:46

and threw a frog on and a spider

1:36:49

on and stuff like that and

1:36:52

dated elementary school style. Same

1:36:55

girl, but just looked way hotter. I

1:36:58

looked at my friend who was next to me, I'm like, dude,

1:37:01

I'm going to marry this chick. And

1:37:03

he laughed, he chuckled about it, printed out her picture,

1:37:06

messaged her, got her phone number,

1:37:08

came back, and I called

1:37:10

her from a sat phone. And

1:37:13

we talked, she knew I was in Iraq, but she didn't

1:37:15

know what I was doing. She was in the army and

1:37:17

I was overseas in Iraq. Like, it was

1:37:19

all I was allowed to say at the time or whatever. And

1:37:22

I met her

1:37:25

after that deployment. I

1:37:28

got a flight to Maryland and I got a flight

1:37:30

to San Antonio. And I

1:37:32

went to go see her and

1:37:34

stayed with her as a friend

1:37:36

for a few days. I

1:37:40

couldn't afford a hotel. I spent all my money

1:37:42

on some rims, 20 inch

1:37:44

rims. And

1:37:50

I got ripped off. They

1:37:52

charged me like 10 grand for something

1:37:55

that didn't even fit on my car. So it

1:37:58

was a bad story. on

1:38:00

that and plane

1:38:02

tickets. So when I went to go see

1:38:05

her, I was broke, but I was broke

1:38:07

balling. I made it, you know, it was a

1:38:09

good time. And yeah,

1:38:12

she liked me, but I

1:38:14

guess not the way

1:38:16

I wanted her to like me. She

1:38:18

wanted to be friends, but I'm a

1:38:20

type of guy who's very, that's not going

1:38:23

to happen. And

1:38:25

she was just getting out of a relationship. So,

1:38:29

and he was still trying to talk to her. And

1:38:31

my way of telling her I'm the

1:38:33

right guy was, I

1:38:36

will beat your guy's ass. And

1:38:38

yeah, I just did my

1:38:40

little work, my magic, no

1:38:42

voodoo. And we

1:38:45

ended up dating in 2007, got

1:38:47

married in 2007 November after

1:38:49

my second deployment in

1:38:55

Ranger School. Yeah, her

1:38:57

third deployment got married.

1:39:01

So second or third deployment, Ranger School,

1:39:03

and then my second deployment got married. Okay,

1:39:06

so you came home, you met your

1:39:08

wife, go on another

1:39:10

deployment. Yeah. When

1:39:12

did it start getting serious between you and her? Well,

1:39:16

okay, so it

1:39:19

was always serious to me. I

1:39:24

introduced her to my friend, Andre, the

1:39:26

one I grew up with. And I introduced her

1:39:29

as my girlfriend and she was like,

1:39:31

no, we're just friends. And

1:39:33

I was way on to her early on, more

1:39:37

so than she was me, all

1:39:39

the way to when I proposed to her. Like

1:39:42

her parents, they're

1:39:45

old fashioned Mexican. And

1:39:48

I was a gentleman. I approached the mom,

1:39:51

told her my plans. I

1:39:53

don't know how she felt about it. She seemed like she was cool

1:39:55

about it until it was time to

1:39:57

talk to the dad. And I kind of understood it. He

1:40:00

said no, but I

1:40:02

didn't understand the why of

1:40:05

what he believed in. So

1:40:10

it was, when I proposed to her, it

1:40:12

was tough because the parents

1:40:15

were not for it, you know?

1:40:17

They did not want any of

1:40:19

that intermixing, you know? So

1:40:22

she was disowned really quick,

1:40:25

really quick. And it's

1:40:27

more so after we had our child. She

1:40:30

was pregnant before that, had a miscarriage. I

1:40:34

think during my, I had moved

1:40:36

her down, so it was like 2008. And

1:40:39

the backlash she got from that

1:40:41

initially was pretty bad and

1:40:43

it just went downhill from there as

1:40:45

far as like, you

1:40:47

know, they just don't like, they

1:40:50

don't believe in interracial, you

1:40:52

know, at all. And they

1:40:55

told me things about what they, what

1:40:57

they believed about what I was as

1:40:59

a black guy and

1:41:02

what they, their stereotypical ideas

1:41:04

were and why they didn't, you know,

1:41:06

necessarily want me dating their daughter or marrying her.

1:41:10

So it was, it was like that, still

1:41:12

is, and now they just don't talk and

1:41:14

haven't, and forever. Oh man, they

1:41:16

ever got over that? No, no,

1:41:18

no. I remember when we

1:41:20

had our child and yeah, her

1:41:24

dad held him in

1:41:27

like disgust, gave him back and

1:41:29

never saw him again and never has

1:41:32

not talked to his daughter in

1:41:34

almost a decade. Shit,

1:41:36

man. Sorry to hear that. Dude, it's all

1:41:38

good. I think people like that are just,

1:41:41

amen. You know, you can't change that mentality.

1:41:43

One, two, it's not my first rodeo is

1:41:46

as far as being like, not

1:41:48

like because of what I look like. So

1:41:51

it was nothing like new. It

1:41:54

was more so new to her, but that's what she

1:41:56

was, you know, she grew up hearing that was you're

1:41:59

allowed to. be friends with them, but you're not allowed

1:42:01

to be in a relationship with them. So

1:42:03

she was already going against that from what she

1:42:05

was brought up with. But

1:42:08

I don't know. It's I

1:42:10

can't I'm not mad at it though. I think

1:42:12

it hurt her more more than anything else

1:42:14

though. You know, we'll

1:42:19

dive into that more later. What?

1:42:22

So you you meet your wife. You

1:42:26

haven't won her over yet, but you go on

1:42:28

a second deployment. Yeah. Oh, after I proposed to

1:42:30

her, she says yes.

1:42:33

And as I'm leaving to go on deployment, she

1:42:35

said no, parents got in the air. So

1:42:38

that bummed me out. I'm

1:42:41

hurt dude, you know, going on

1:42:43

this deployment. I

1:42:45

just got that news that she doesn't want

1:42:48

to anymore. So my whole focus going over

1:42:50

there was winning her back, you

1:42:52

know, so I spent like that first

1:42:54

month or so just constantly

1:42:57

typing and trying to call and talking

1:42:59

to her and trying to win her back over

1:43:01

and she finally did during that

1:43:03

deployment. And we

1:43:05

made the decision we were going to get married finally, like

1:43:07

when I got back. And then I

1:43:10

got the news during that deployment in 07.

1:43:12

We were in Mosul. And

1:43:14

that was second deployment. Yes, that was a

1:43:16

terrible deployment of mainly

1:43:20

IEDs, a threat of IEDs. And yeah,

1:43:24

like my first day in country, the first thought

1:43:26

we did, we were supposed to be driving around.

1:43:28

We had a guide who had

1:43:30

been there and showing us

1:43:32

like different routes we could take around the

1:43:34

city of Mosul. We

1:43:36

go through this one place called RPG Alley. Nothing

1:43:39

happens. There's no RPGs. And then we

1:43:42

go down to where going down this

1:43:45

neighborhood or segment of this

1:43:47

route we were taking. And

1:43:49

the guide says, yeah, there's nothing

1:43:52

ever happens here. It's, you know,

1:43:54

silent. Don't have to worry about anything here.

1:43:57

And the striker in front of me blows

1:43:59

goes up, lifts off the ground, boom. And

1:44:01

I'm like, that doesn't make any sense. So

1:44:03

I call IED over

1:44:06

the comms. We go to our procedure

1:44:08

as far as how to secure

1:44:10

that site and provide

1:44:13

cover. And that

1:44:15

was the first, within the first few

1:44:17

hours in country, watching

1:44:19

my roommate get blown

1:44:21

up by a 50 pound

1:44:24

or something IED, but they buried it

1:44:26

too low or upside down or something

1:44:28

that it didn't split the striker

1:44:31

in half, but it lifted it off the ground by

1:44:33

a few feet and snapped the axle on it. And

1:44:36

they had to come get it out

1:44:38

with the big machine, big

1:44:41

crane or something. Was anybody injured? Yeah,

1:44:43

the driver was. He was injured. Nothing

1:44:46

too serious though. He just covered in oil. And

1:44:51

I think he broke his ankle or something

1:44:53

like that. Something small, my

1:44:56

new. But that was

1:44:58

my first experience being in Mosul. And

1:45:00

it was like that every day. And

1:45:03

we ran about the same amount, 110 plus

1:45:05

missions in those 90 days. And that

1:45:09

was a brutal deployment as far as the pace that

1:45:11

we were trying to keep up and being

1:45:13

run to the ground. And that was

1:45:15

a deployment where I went

1:45:17

dry on all my ammo. The

1:45:20

50 cal gunners all went dry

1:45:22

on all seven strikers. The

1:45:24

Kiowa helicopters all went dry. The pilots were

1:45:26

hanging out. The side of their doors

1:45:28

on the Kiowa was doing strafing runs with their M4s and

1:45:33

on full auto doing strafing runs on a, we were

1:45:35

gonna go take down this apartment

1:45:38

building, like a big apartment building. We

1:45:41

were introduced to it, this leg unit who

1:45:44

lived nearby to our compound, knew who we

1:45:46

were. And our rules of engagement were

1:45:48

different at the time. So they

1:45:50

came over and they needed help because every

1:45:52

time they went down this road, they would

1:45:54

get ambushed. Their SOP was to

1:45:56

just blow through it, but

1:45:58

they were tired of costing. constantly getting hit.

1:46:02

So they asked, you know, could we help

1:46:04

out using our ROE? So

1:46:07

we dressed up like them, put their patches on

1:46:09

to look like them, went

1:46:12

down the road and drove down that route and no

1:46:15

shit, man, we get ambushed

1:46:17

by this big, like, apartment building

1:46:20

a few hundred guys in there. And

1:46:24

we parked the vehicles, all turned

1:46:26

50 cals that way, everybody

1:46:28

dismounted except for the drivers and

1:46:30

we start hammering this

1:46:33

building. And it was like playing whack-a-mole.

1:46:35

Like I'm looking through the ACOG

1:46:38

of my M4 and

1:46:40

a head would pop up and you'd send

1:46:42

off a round or two and you

1:46:44

don't know if you hit the guy, but another head

1:46:46

would pop up and another head would pop up. And

1:46:48

we were just, we stayed there, I think it was

1:46:51

like six hours, we're just laying into this building until

1:46:54

everybody went dry, drive

1:46:56

back and they dropped two 500

1:46:58

pound bombs on it after we left

1:47:00

and leveled the place. And yeah.

1:47:03

Damn. Yeah. No

1:47:05

idea how many people, anybody, it was

1:47:08

just chaotic,

1:47:10

chaotic of leveling

1:47:12

this place. How did you get your

1:47:14

head right from being

1:47:18

basically turned down for your marriage

1:47:21

proposal by your future wife and

1:47:24

walking into an extreme

1:47:28

hostile, engaging

1:47:32

environment full of combat? Being shot at.

1:47:34

Yeah. Yeah. That

1:47:36

was the only thing that made it, you know, take my mind off

1:47:39

of what was going on back at home. The

1:47:41

only thing it's up until that

1:47:43

point, like there was a, you know,

1:47:45

you're just waiting to get, I guess shot at

1:47:47

or get that, that rush of

1:47:50

your only focus is kill the bad guy and

1:47:52

make it home. Well, once you make

1:47:54

it home, once I made it home, then I would go

1:47:56

back into rush to

1:47:58

the phone to call Jess. and try to work

1:48:00

this thing out. But I

1:48:03

was always going into the mission prior to that,

1:48:05

like, I guess you could say depressed, you

1:48:07

know, crushed. I

1:48:09

wasn't used to that. So

1:48:12

yeah, just the firefights and it was a constant,

1:48:14

we were always, you know, getting into firefights. So

1:48:16

it was easy to keep your mind off of

1:48:18

it, but it

1:48:20

didn't have to last long. It was like a month

1:48:22

into that deployment and she was okay with it and

1:48:24

we decided to get married. And I was back on

1:48:27

my A game after that, mentally, I guess you could

1:48:29

say, mentally. She

1:48:33

was the only person to ever be there when I

1:48:35

got back from deployment. Like family

1:48:37

never, I never had

1:48:39

family members. Your family never did come around.

1:48:41

No, on after my

1:48:43

deployments. And like my first deployment, I was sad.

1:48:46

You'd watch the guys have girlfriends meet them and

1:48:48

family. I just got off the bus

1:48:50

and went to the room,

1:48:52

got drunk with the guys and you

1:48:54

know, so having her and

1:48:57

she was there for all of them after that, you

1:48:59

know, always there was really, really good. At

1:49:05

what point does the sniper

1:49:07

come on the radar? I

1:49:10

always had it on from

1:49:12

day one. It was just a process of getting there. I

1:49:14

knew I had to go to ranger school and

1:49:17

I wanted to stay far away

1:49:19

from ranger school as possible because it was a

1:49:21

62 day course. If you

1:49:23

go all the way through and it's rare that guys

1:49:25

do. Why do

1:49:27

you say that it's where the guys do? From

1:49:30

my experience of Italian, it was rare you saw a

1:49:33

guy, unless he was really on his A game. He

1:49:35

could, even if you were, it was just luck. You

1:49:37

know, you could still be peered or somebody. You could

1:49:40

have a bad, a bad, I

1:49:45

honestly forget what they call it, where a graded

1:49:47

portion of the school where you

1:49:50

take lead and you're in charge

1:49:52

of all your guys, you plan all

1:49:54

your routes and, you know, basically

1:49:58

like mission planning. your

1:50:01

board. So when did you go

1:50:03

to Ranger School? Was it after your second appointment?

1:50:05

After that in 2007. So

1:50:08

we're pushing almost wintertime now and

1:50:10

I'll never forget when I'm watching 24

1:50:14

with Jack Bauer, 24, and my team leader comes

1:50:17

in and

1:50:19

he stuck his head through the window and he's like,

1:50:21

Irv, when we get back, pack your bags, you're going

1:50:24

to Ranger School. And I was

1:50:26

like, fuck man, there's no way. I

1:50:28

planned on, I wanted to get married when I got back and

1:50:31

I thought they were doing that to be a dick and

1:50:33

just wanted to throw off that wedding thing. But in

1:50:36

order to be a Ranger and stay a Ranger, you have

1:50:38

to go to Ranger School anyways or else

1:50:40

you get kicked out. So I

1:50:43

knew the time was coming. I just wanted it to be after

1:50:45

I got married. So I'm depressed

1:50:48

because of that now. Kind

1:50:50

of have to call off the wedding a little bit, push

1:50:53

it to whenever I graduate. I said, best

1:50:55

case, 62 days plus, maybe 70 days. Worst

1:50:58

case, I stay there like another guy I knew

1:51:00

in battalion and stayed there for almost a year,

1:51:02

you know? Just trapped in the

1:51:04

school. Don't want to quit. Because

1:51:06

if you fail, you get kicked out of

1:51:09

battalion and you go to like Korea or

1:51:11

somewhere, Italy. So go to Ranger

1:51:14

School. Like first day was your

1:51:17

PT test, your

1:51:22

15 or 12 mile ruck march, five

1:51:26

mile run, no, your PT test,

1:51:28

five mile run and all that stuff. Your

1:51:30

road march comes after the fact. You

1:51:33

do your water confidence stuff, which

1:51:38

I grew up wanting to be a SEAL

1:51:40

and I could swim, but

1:51:44

I'm not too comfortable with heights. So that was my

1:51:46

only thing I had to overcome

1:51:48

was my height, the fear of heights. And that was

1:51:50

all on mainly day one until

1:51:52

you get in the mountain phase of Ranger School.

1:51:54

But it sucked. Not

1:51:58

so much physically, it was just a I was hungry

1:52:00

a lot, you know? I was always hungry.

1:52:02

I lost 35 pounds. And

1:52:05

like I got sick in ranger school, I drank

1:52:07

some water that I didn't

1:52:10

purify and had the worms. And

1:52:12

I got really, really sick. Painted

1:52:15

some trees behind me one day while walking

1:52:18

to an objective and just enough to put

1:52:20

my pants down and spray the

1:52:22

bushes behind me. And the ranger instructor was

1:52:24

like, what the hell is wrong with you, man?

1:52:27

Go get checked out by the medic. Get

1:52:30

some IVs. Stay for like a day

1:52:32

at the hospital and come

1:52:34

back out in the field. But I wasn't able

1:52:36

to eat solid foods for a while,

1:52:39

you know, before it would just pass straight through.

1:52:42

Lost 35 pounds. Couldn't

1:52:45

feel my big toes for like a year after. My

1:52:47

nails stopped growing. And

1:52:49

yeah, got married. Extremely

1:52:52

malnutritioned and, yeah,

1:52:55

skinny and frail. Got

1:52:57

married in the courtroom, in the courthouse, like

1:52:59

25 bucks. 75

1:53:02

bucks or whatever it was. And her

1:53:04

dad didn't show up. So her mom, I believe,

1:53:06

walked her down there all. My grandmother showed up

1:53:08

to mine. Rest her

1:53:10

soul. She just recently passed

1:53:12

away too. I hear that.

1:53:15

All good. Yeah, we're losing. Lost

1:53:17

all my grandparents now. So all

1:53:19

in like two years, this past two years, man. It's

1:53:21

been crazy. So, yeah, she

1:53:24

showed up and my aunt

1:53:26

did. And that was it. Had

1:53:29

a little small wedding after Ranger School

1:53:31

and ended up deploying right after that

1:53:34

again, like a couple

1:53:36

of weeks after to Baghdad. So

1:53:39

when it comes to Ranger School and

1:53:41

RASP, from what I understand, Ranger School

1:53:43

is actually more of a leadership course.

1:53:45

That's exactly. Yeah, exactly. Anybody

1:53:47

can go. Like we had chefs and green berets

1:53:51

and I think like a Navy SEAL or two Navy

1:53:53

SEALs in that. Yeah, we had a couple

1:53:55

of guys go. Yeah. Okay. But

1:53:58

it was just like a leadership course, though.

1:54:00

What did you find more difficult, Ranger School

1:54:02

or Rasp? I

1:54:05

would say, for me, rip.

1:54:09

It was harder. It was rip was harder. Like

1:54:12

does Ranger School have a 90 percent attrition

1:54:14

rate as well? No, it's like 60 percent,

1:54:16

60 percent. But

1:54:21

it's not so physical. It's just fighting

1:54:24

sleep, hunger and

1:54:26

still being able to lead people and plan

1:54:29

and find your way around the

1:54:31

mountains, the jungle, the swamps, doing

1:54:34

water operations and stuff like that. OK.

1:54:38

It was tough, but. Your

1:54:41

day to day job in battalion was

1:54:43

way tougher than anything in Ranger

1:54:45

School. It was way tougher.

1:54:47

It was the the structure of Ranger

1:54:50

School that made it hard. You

1:54:52

know, like my first go around, I didn't

1:54:54

make it all the way

1:54:56

through. I had to recycle Darby

1:54:58

the first phase. And after that,

1:55:01

I went all the way through. But, you know,

1:55:03

it wasn't too, too tough. It just sucked.

1:55:06

So you get done with Ranger School. You're

1:55:09

married. And

1:55:13

then you're going on your third deployment.

1:55:15

Where's your third deployment? Baghdad. Baghdad.

1:55:17

So Iraq, Iraq, Iraq again.

1:55:19

Mm hmm. And

1:55:22

that wasn't that deployment. It

1:55:24

wasn't like as intense. It was fun. We got

1:55:26

to work. We got a chance to work with

1:55:28

SEALs on. I think they

1:55:30

were Mark Five boats or some like a

1:55:32

swift boat. They had machine guns

1:55:35

all over it. And it was like a

1:55:37

riverine type. Like a

1:55:39

rib. Almost. I guess Mark

1:55:41

Five is like a speedboat. No, it wasn't

1:55:43

that then like a rib. OK, yeah. That

1:55:47

was cool working with them. And, you

1:55:49

know, I didn't know anything about those boats,

1:55:51

but it was cool riding down the river

1:55:53

and stuff like that. And what was your

1:55:55

experience? I mean, it sounds like you

1:55:58

wanted to be a SEAL. Yeah. colorblindness

1:56:01

thing didn't work out.

1:56:04

You went Rangers, now you're working side

1:56:06

by side with seals. What was your

1:56:08

experience like? Working with the regular

1:56:10

seal teams was not bad. They were cool. They

1:56:12

weren't as, it wasn't what

1:56:15

I expected. And

1:56:17

I talked it up to, I just, my

1:56:19

personal belief, I think they're really good at

1:56:21

water operations. Like no Ranger could ever do

1:56:23

that, you know? But I

1:56:25

think when it came to land work and direct

1:56:28

action, we were

1:56:30

pretty good. And we just had a lot

1:56:32

more time with it. It

1:56:35

wasn't like until I worked with seal team

1:56:38

six that I didn't

1:56:40

like, I didn't want to be a seal anymore.

1:56:43

You know? I didn't like, yeah,

1:56:47

it was not a good experience working with them.

1:56:50

They were dicks, man. But,

1:56:54

yeah. There

1:56:56

were a few times where, it

1:56:59

was back when McChrystal was

1:57:01

the, or was it

1:57:03

McChrystal? Who was the seal at one point? And

1:57:06

he was in charge of like the seals

1:57:08

or J-SOC or whatever at that time. And

1:57:11

he had to. Are

1:57:15

we talking about your experience with six or? Yeah,

1:57:17

with six. We'll get there and

1:57:19

let's keep it in chronological order. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:57:21

It helps me. Yeah, you're good. It helps me.

1:57:25

So you're back in Iraq. And I think

1:57:27

I know what this is. It was they

1:57:30

stood up a new task force. And

1:57:33

I can't remember what they call it, it was like

1:57:35

task force 21 or something. I was on that, yeah.

1:57:37

121 or something like that. Something, I can't remember

1:57:40

exactly what it was, but it was TF Red

1:57:42

and the teams. Yeah,

1:57:47

yeah. And so did you

1:57:49

guys get to, I mean, what

1:57:51

were you doing together? A lot of

1:57:53

direct action. Like my, like

1:57:57

one of my coolest awards, I guess, came with

1:57:59

working with me. with SEALs and doing

1:58:02

joint stuff with them. They

1:58:06

were cool guys. It was like working with Rangers,

1:58:08

but I just knew they were SEALs, you know?

1:58:13

And you guys had, they had cool equipment. It

1:58:15

was different than ours, and you guys'

1:58:17

weapons were cooler. It was cool in that

1:58:19

aspect and- How so? What was

1:58:21

different? You guys had the boats with

1:58:23

the machine guns on them. Okay. Yeah,

1:58:27

some of your weapons were different. Like your handguns,

1:58:29

we had Berettas at the time. Your

1:58:31

handguns were different. Other

1:58:35

than that, we both had Mark 48, so I

1:58:37

thought that was cool. And it

1:58:39

was like working with Rangers, but you guys had

1:58:42

a little bit, like little cooler stuff, like the

1:58:44

boats and- We just had a better budget. Better

1:58:46

budget, yeah. It was cool in that aspect, seeing

1:58:49

the things that you guys had. And the

1:58:51

missions were pretty routine. It wasn't like I got a

1:58:53

chance to see, you know, SEALs

1:58:56

do anything like

1:58:58

spectacular. We weren't doing anything,

1:59:00

what I consider spectacular. Just

1:59:02

regular, you know, gonna

1:59:04

go kill bad guys in this building or

1:59:07

capture bad guys if we can. It

1:59:10

was just pretty much that. And we would get there

1:59:12

by water sometimes, and I thought that was cool. Yeah,

1:59:16

it wasn't like anything that really stood out. We

1:59:19

never butted heads or anything like that. They pulled

1:59:21

their weight. We pulled our weight. It

1:59:23

wasn't until I got the SEAL Team Six Was

1:59:26

it competitive at all? No, not

1:59:29

well. The

1:59:31

only competitiveness that I saw was with Six.

1:59:35

Of like when we would be clearing

1:59:37

one objective or at side by sides,

1:59:40

who could, you know, who was getting

1:59:42

their objective cleared the fastest and first,

1:59:45

we would win. But, and I

1:59:47

have a crazy story. I don't know if I

1:59:50

wanna embarrass anybody, but with working

1:59:52

with them. But regular

1:59:55

SEALs are pretty cool. They were cool. Longer

1:59:57

hair, I was envious of that. Longer

1:59:59

hair. It seems like you guys the standards were a

2:00:01

little bit more relaxed and hands in pocket

2:00:04

First-name basis was it was cool. You know

2:00:06

in that aspect We

2:00:08

were very strict, you know, so

2:00:11

I liked seeing that I

2:00:13

didn't want to cross over It didn't make me

2:00:15

want to cross over I felt that we're kind

2:00:18

of doing the same stuff and I really didn't

2:00:20

want to be cold and wet and sandy after

2:00:23

You know being a Ranger and that I don't

2:00:25

like the water like that, you know, it takes

2:00:27

a different different different breed That's just not for

2:00:29

me. You know, I'm glad I was not

2:00:32

a seal cuz I think I don't think I would

2:00:34

have been a Good

2:00:36

seal because I don't like

2:00:38

water that much at all and

2:00:40

I don't I'm not comfortable

2:00:42

with scuba diving I got was scuba

2:00:44

certified young but I thought I'm

2:00:47

not like I'm terrified

2:00:49

of it at the same time, you know

2:00:51

claustrophobic scared of heights and Yeah,

2:00:54

I don't like swimming that much and the

2:00:56

ocean freaks me out, you know Doesn't

2:01:00

sound like a spectacular deployment No,

2:01:03

no, it wasn't spectacular. No,

2:01:06

but it was it was it was cool Do

2:01:08

you think maybe it was also with

2:01:10

the fact that you're doing this was your

2:01:12

third deployment to Iraq? Mmm, and so it

2:01:15

I mean were things becoming very

2:01:17

routine Yeah routine and was kind of dying down

2:01:19

at that time too. It wasn't as hot as

2:01:22

it was like in 06-05-07

2:01:25

no far from it. It was it was not we

2:01:27

were not running like 120 missions at

2:01:29

that point It was like maybe 70 missions

2:01:33

80 missions 90 Lower

2:01:36

amount not true in a 90 day deployment

2:01:38

or you up to one point at this

2:01:40

point Okay, so it was not a

2:01:42

lot of more free time and it just was not as

2:01:45

intense, you know But it was you're right 100% routine Um

2:01:49

The change-up didn't come for me until Afghanistan

2:01:52

Did you had you lost anybody that

2:01:54

you know up to this point yet

2:01:56

at that point? No

2:02:00

Not personally, no. I

2:02:02

knew guys who happened

2:02:04

to be killed in

2:02:07

combat or blown up or something, but I

2:02:09

wasn't like... I knew of them.

2:02:11

We butted heads a few times walking

2:02:13

to Chao, and I might have seen them in Chao

2:02:16

or PT or something, but I didn't know them like

2:02:18

that. When did you

2:02:21

find out you were going to become a

2:02:23

sniper? After my wife told

2:02:25

me to go ahead and pursue it, and I

2:02:27

knew 100 percent... I was skeptical after...

2:02:30

This is after the third deployment, though. After

2:02:32

that, I was skeptical of going because I

2:02:34

had built such a bond with my guys.

2:02:37

I didn't want to lose that, you know? So

2:02:39

when you go... I got questions about this

2:02:42

because that is... Correct

2:02:44

me if I'm wrong, did you go to R.R.D.? Is

2:02:46

that what it's called? No. Okay. We get

2:02:49

an invite. Just like

2:02:52

we get invites from Delta or whatever. What is

2:02:54

R.R.D.? Ranger

2:02:56

reconnaissance detachment. Back then it

2:02:58

was R.R.C., Ranger Reconnaissance Company

2:03:01

at the time. And it's like our

2:03:03

only tier one unit. The

2:03:05

first... I had no idea they existed.

2:03:07

I just would randomly see guys with

2:03:10

long beards, long hair, never in

2:03:12

uniform on our compound. And I

2:03:14

didn't know who they were. I thought they

2:03:16

were workers or contractors or something. Never

2:03:19

knew who they were. It's like... It's

2:03:23

rare you see these guys. I

2:03:26

don't know where they even stay, to be honest with you. My

2:03:28

entire time in battalion, I may

2:03:31

have seen one or two of

2:03:33

those guys throughout my entire career.

2:03:35

You know? And I always thought they were contractors

2:03:38

or something like that. Worked

2:03:41

with them twice overseas and I have no

2:03:43

idea what they were even doing. I just

2:03:45

know that they

2:03:48

did a halo

2:03:50

jump into Afghanistan

2:03:52

and we went to go pick them up. And

2:03:55

drop them off somewhere in the

2:03:57

mountains. And I have no idea what

2:03:59

they were doing. Interesting. Yeah. We

2:04:02

don't know too much about... We know a little bit,

2:04:04

but it's very, very secretive. Yeah. So

2:04:07

you get home from third deployment. What's

2:04:10

the discussion between you and your

2:04:12

wife with going to cyber? Should

2:04:17

I go? I didn't want to lose

2:04:20

that bond with my guys and the selection

2:04:22

process. You're not even sure if you're going to make it.

2:04:24

You could fill the board. They

2:04:27

could simply not like you for a person, and

2:04:29

you don't make it. So I

2:04:31

didn't want to experience that. I

2:04:34

would have still

2:04:36

gone back to my guys or whatnot, but I

2:04:39

just didn't want to experience that failure.

2:04:42

And I didn't

2:04:44

want to leave my guys either. So I was kind of... I

2:04:49

was so tired of schools at that point and

2:04:51

deploying. I didn't have free time, it felt like,

2:04:53

with my brand new wife at the

2:04:55

time. So I was

2:04:57

skeptical on it. I asked her, and

2:05:00

she's like, you know what, you should follow

2:05:02

your dream. I had told her since when we first got...

2:05:04

When we were dating, I wanted to be

2:05:06

a sniper for a long time. And

2:05:09

up until that time, she knew I was a ranger, but we

2:05:12

never talked about deployment stuff. She didn't know

2:05:14

about any of that stuff until one of my guys, she

2:05:17

went to come pick me

2:05:19

up after deployment as I'm

2:05:21

downloading equipment. Guys come around, and

2:05:23

they talk about me smoking some guy with

2:05:25

the 50-count. And she's like, what the

2:05:28

heck is going on? She had no idea. I

2:05:31

would always tell her, man, we go over

2:05:33

there, we watch stuff, nothing really happens. I

2:05:35

say Marines do most of the work. Those

2:05:37

are the guys who were first to fight

2:05:39

with all your might. Those

2:05:42

are the guys, and we don't really

2:05:44

do much. And

2:05:46

I was like, how much can you possibly do in that little

2:05:49

amount of time where you don't have time to do anything? So

2:05:51

she believed it to that point. And

2:05:54

she didn't really care or ask any questions about

2:05:56

it until

2:05:58

she overheard it about... We were, me and

2:06:00

my guys were talking after deployment and that's

2:06:02

where she was kind of like, wow,

2:06:05

you know, I didn't think about that. You guys

2:06:07

are doing stuff like

2:06:09

that or killing people. So

2:06:12

kept it from her for a while and-

2:06:14

Did it change? Did your relationship change when

2:06:17

that came out? Were there a lot of

2:06:19

questions? I think there were a

2:06:22

lot of questions that she

2:06:24

wanted to ask but didn't know how. She

2:06:29

mainly asked, like,

2:06:31

did I know anybody who died? Or was

2:06:34

I scared of coming back or anything?

2:06:36

But after that, mainly it changed for

2:06:38

her when she would drop me

2:06:40

off the tears, man. She would ball

2:06:43

her eyes out because now she

2:06:45

knew that I was on the

2:06:47

ground fighting. But she

2:06:49

never really brought up. She's very quiet

2:06:52

at the time, reserved, you know? Very

2:06:55

quiet. She didn't want to bring that stuff up because she

2:06:57

didn't know how to approach it, I guess either. And

2:07:01

I didn't really talk about it, you know, at all.

2:07:05

I mean, she's seen me cry in the car once,

2:07:09

but that's about it. And she didn't

2:07:11

really ask. She just asked if I was okay. I

2:07:14

wanted to talk about anything. She's always been open to

2:07:16

talking. Do I want to talk about anything? And

2:07:19

no, you know, at that

2:07:22

time. So it was

2:07:24

more so with that with her. She

2:07:27

didn't change any other way. Like she

2:07:29

still loved me the same and treated

2:07:32

me the same. Just was more asking

2:07:35

if I was okay, you know? Or

2:07:37

I wanted to talk about anything. Did

2:07:40

she have any support group or anything when you were gone?

2:07:44

No. I mean, you

2:07:46

don't have a healthy relationship with your

2:07:49

parents, it doesn't sound like. Her parents

2:07:51

had written her and you off for

2:07:53

racial issues. And

2:07:57

what about the team? team,

2:08:00

my guys. Do you guys have a support

2:08:02

network? We had an

2:08:04

FRG family readiness group

2:08:08

but that was like a lot of drama,

2:08:10

you know, a lot of drama. Yeah,

2:08:12

so she stayed away from that.

2:08:14

Her, I feel so bad, you

2:08:17

know, for looking back at it, you know,

2:08:19

she moves to a place she's never been before and

2:08:23

experiencing these long durations

2:08:25

of just not having me

2:08:27

around and she had a

2:08:30

job at the mall in the bank

2:08:32

for a little bit and other

2:08:35

than that she had no like we had

2:08:37

a dog and that's about it. She didn't,

2:08:39

but I would call her every day whenever

2:08:42

I could but no she

2:08:44

was a

2:08:46

lonely person too, a lonely person too, you

2:08:49

know, so I guess

2:08:51

we kind of fit good in that aspect

2:08:53

we matched of we could both deal with

2:08:55

loneliness together, you know. How

2:08:58

was it getting into sniper? I mean what

2:09:00

is the, do you put

2:09:02

in for it? Yeah, you put in a packet,

2:09:06

you through your chain of command

2:09:08

like your squad leader to you

2:09:10

know platoon leader platoon sergeant platoon

2:09:12

leader first sergeant platoon leader all

2:09:14

the way up to the chain of command and

2:09:17

they review it to make sure you're good to

2:09:19

go. You go

2:09:21

qualify with the, you

2:09:24

know, M4 open sites

2:09:26

to make sure that you can hold a

2:09:28

group to

2:09:31

make, yeah, to get in and then

2:09:33

that's where the selection portion starts which is

2:09:36

your basic PT test, more

2:09:39

shooting test and then

2:09:41

a board of a

2:09:45

panel you go into this or you take

2:09:47

a psychological evaluation first a couple of those

2:09:51

written then you talk to a psych then

2:09:54

depending on what the psych says and if

2:09:56

you've passed everything else the physical portion and

2:09:58

the shooting portion the psych portion, then you

2:10:00

have to go to the board and

2:10:03

they sit you down and interview you. Interview

2:10:05

you about your

2:10:08

basic knowledge of what it is to be a ranger,

2:10:11

different operations, who you are as a

2:10:13

person, family man, just to

2:10:15

get to know who you are. Then they send

2:10:17

you out the room and you'll find out later

2:10:19

that day or the next day if you've

2:10:22

been selected. And out of the, I think

2:10:25

14 guys we had, seven

2:10:27

of us got selected. And

2:10:29

we joined the sniper section and there was 12

2:10:32

total at that time. Students.

2:10:36

Snipers. Not full fled

2:10:38

snipers at that time. The

2:10:41

seven who were, made

2:10:43

it through the selection process. Plus the guys who

2:10:45

were already there, most of the guys

2:10:47

had gotten out. So we

2:10:49

had the, you know, the veteran snipers

2:10:51

who had been there for a few rotations go in. And

2:10:55

after that you get sent to sniper school.

2:10:58

But for us it was, we

2:11:00

had to do, it was when we got like an increase

2:11:02

in the budget. So we

2:11:04

sent guys to like

2:11:07

these civilian courses that

2:11:10

for, I went to like long range

2:11:12

precision, mountain

2:11:14

precision. This

2:11:17

place down in Corpus Christi or

2:11:19

Kingsville, Texas, that does

2:11:22

all types of crazy type of

2:11:24

long range and moving target stuff.

2:11:27

It was a sick course, man. The

2:11:30

best shooting I've ever done, the best I've

2:11:32

ever been at shooting was after

2:11:34

that course. Then

2:11:36

I went to sniper school.

2:11:39

No shit. So they're sending you to

2:11:42

all these civilian courses leading up to.

2:11:44

Sniper school. Sniper school. Yeah.

2:11:46

Is the sniper school army sniper school? Army

2:11:49

sniper school. Versus specific

2:11:51

to Rangers. No, it's army sniper school.

2:11:53

At that time it was, I think it was an

2:11:55

eight week sniper course or I forget. I think it's.

2:11:57

Did you done anything? stalking

2:12:00

or was it all shooting

2:12:02

courses before you went to cyber

2:12:05

school? Most of it was... Army cyber school.

2:12:07

Most of the civilian courses were shooting. We

2:12:09

did a stalk here and there. It

2:12:13

wasn't like harped on or focused on. Like

2:12:16

the extreme long range shooting course was strictly

2:12:19

shooting and the mountainous stuff in

2:12:21

California, high angle stuff, not

2:12:24

the marine high angle. It's a civilian course that

2:12:26

now was all 100% shooting. The

2:12:29

only physical thing was getting up to the top of the

2:12:31

mountain. And

2:12:33

then we learned like... Were

2:12:38

there other civilians in the course? No, not

2:12:40

at that time. It was just you guys.

2:12:43

Yeah. Okay. So it was

2:12:45

basically what did you say, seven of you? And you

2:12:47

guys are just filling these courses, these civilian... Yeah.

2:12:52

That's pretty badass. Yeah.

2:12:55

Best shooting courses I've been to were the

2:12:57

civilian ones. By the

2:12:59

time you get to sniper school, the shooting is

2:13:01

the easiest part. The stalking is where it gets

2:13:03

like, okay, well, this is a

2:13:05

whole different ballgame. All

2:13:09

of us should... I mean, all the guys pass

2:13:11

that. And then from there, we'll start to send

2:13:13

out guys to marine,

2:13:17

scout sniper, their high angle

2:13:20

course. What did you find the

2:13:22

most challenging portion of Army

2:13:24

sniper school to be? Guard

2:13:27

detection. That was

2:13:29

the hardest portion of it. Stalking

2:13:31

was easy. I never... Like I

2:13:33

was... I could have gotten honor grad,

2:13:35

but I was being a ranger in

2:13:38

a regular Army school and dicking

2:13:41

off with my other ranger guys and being

2:13:43

sneaky, doing stupid stuff. So we were... I

2:13:46

wasn't allowed to get honor grad from that, but

2:13:48

stalking was easy. My last

2:13:50

stalk, so it's like a tradition where you

2:13:52

wear whatever you want to wear and you

2:13:55

do your final stalk or whatever after you've passed

2:13:57

all of them. One

2:13:59

of our guys... I keep

2:14:01

his name, I call him M, legend, really,

2:14:04

really great guy, good sniper. He did

2:14:06

his in like a yellow t-shirt and

2:14:08

he stalked and he passed

2:14:11

his stalk in a yellow t-shirt. So

2:14:14

for me and my spotter, we went

2:14:16

in t-shirt and jeans and we managed

2:14:18

to pass the stalk in t-shirt and

2:14:20

jeans. Stalking was the

2:14:22

easiest portion, but target detection

2:14:24

was like the hardest for me. Fighting

2:14:27

or finding the hidden objects in

2:14:31

the field and that's just, I

2:14:33

don't know, it takes a different, and I'm

2:14:36

not the best. Can you describe it a little

2:14:38

bit? Yeah, so target detection would be, imagine

2:14:41

10 military items. A

2:14:45

bullet casing, a compass,

2:14:48

protractor, dog tags, a boot

2:14:50

lace, things of that nature.

2:14:53

When they put it out 50, 100 yards

2:14:55

in front of you and they hide it in

2:14:58

the woods or in an urban environment. One

2:15:00

example, like one of the hardest ones I had

2:15:02

to find was a protractor. The clear square

2:15:05

protractors that use on maps was

2:15:07

taped on the side of a brick wall, a

2:15:10

white cinder block wall. Tape

2:15:13

to the side of that and the only thing

2:15:15

that stood out, what you had to look for

2:15:17

as you're looking on the edges or the edge

2:15:19

of the building, you're looking for

2:15:22

that irregular it goes from hard edge, hard

2:15:24

edge, smooth, and now you have little ticks

2:15:26

on that one. Let me focus in on

2:15:28

that. Oh, there's a protractor there, but it's

2:15:30

clear, but I can see the

2:15:32

ticks on the protractor. So okay, I can

2:15:34

outline that. Are

2:15:37

taping a toothbrush to a branch

2:15:39

in the woods or whatever, and

2:15:42

I'm looking for the irregularity from

2:15:44

crooked branches. Nothing in nature goes straight

2:15:47

lines. I'm looking for the straight line

2:15:49

of the toothbrush. I see that. I

2:15:52

see the bristles on it. That

2:15:54

is the hardest portion of Sniper School. Finding

2:15:56

Glintz, that's always easy. It's the...

2:16:01

Objects that don't have glint blends

2:16:03

in and you're only looking for

2:16:05

a straight line or something that just does not

2:16:07

fit. And yeah, that was

2:16:09

the hardest portion for

2:16:12

me. That

2:16:14

doesn't sound easy. No, man, that

2:16:16

was the most stressful. I failed. Finding a

2:16:18

clear protractor at 100 yards. On

2:16:21

a wall in an urban. Yeah, that was the...

2:16:23

Do they give you any parameters or is it

2:16:25

a 360 degree environment? No,

2:16:28

so there's like a tape line in front of

2:16:30

you. And

2:16:32

they give you your sectors, you know,

2:16:35

left and right field of sectors. And

2:16:39

everything in front of you from the

2:16:42

tape line to 100 yards

2:16:45

or further, whatever. It's

2:16:48

fair play. There's 10 military items

2:16:50

in there. Write them down, identify

2:16:52

them, describe them and draw

2:16:54

a picture of them. Of

2:16:56

where they're at. So you're looking for

2:16:58

shape, color, description, dimensions, and you're putting

2:17:00

all this down. Sometimes

2:17:04

they would put a hand grenade right in

2:17:06

front of you, like right across the line.

2:17:08

And that will be the only one

2:17:10

you don't find because it's right in front of

2:17:12

your face. But I took that mentality

2:17:15

with me and I carry it to this day. That

2:17:18

sometimes things can be so close to it, you don't

2:17:20

even see it or notice it. It's like your nose.

2:17:23

You know, if you focus on it, you can see, oh, I have

2:17:25

a nose right there. But how

2:17:28

often do we really see the nose that's sticking right out in

2:17:30

front of our face? It's rare. So

2:17:33

most of the stuff that we're looking for

2:17:35

nine times out of 10, the hardest things to find

2:17:37

can be the things that are right in front of

2:17:39

your face. That no one thinks

2:17:41

to see because they're too busy looking elsewhere. So

2:17:44

that was like the biggest takeaway I

2:17:46

learned from cyber school. Interesting. Yeah.

2:17:50

Hope it makes sense. It makes perfect

2:17:52

sense. So

2:17:56

you get done with sniper school, you go to

2:17:58

a couple more schools, you went to a mermaid.

2:18:00

Marine High Angle course? No, we would send guys

2:18:02

to Marine High Angle. I didn't go to Marine.

2:18:04

I was one too long of a course, and

2:18:07

I had seniority at the time, so

2:18:10

I sent one

2:18:12

of the newer guys who came in right after

2:18:14

me, I sent him to Marine Scout Sniper, and

2:18:16

then he went to Marine High Angle, where

2:18:19

the Green Marays go. They

2:18:22

have their sniper. Is that Sotik?

2:18:24

Sotik, there you go. Yeah, we would send a lot

2:18:26

of guys to that. I wanted to

2:18:28

so bad, but their course,

2:18:31

dude, I was married. I did not want to

2:18:33

do any more long schools, so I passed it

2:18:36

up. Looking back at it, I wish, I

2:18:38

really do wish I went to that, and

2:18:40

Marine Scout Sniper. I really do.

2:18:43

More so, Marine Scout Sniper,

2:18:46

because those guys are, dude, so badass,

2:18:48

man. Working with those guys

2:18:50

overseas was like working

2:18:53

with Carlos Hathcock, what I think.

2:18:55

My idol at the time, and

2:18:57

I to this day think is the greatest

2:18:59

sniper, is Carlos Hathcock, but... Who

2:19:03

is that? Marine Sniper with

2:19:05

the 93 confirmed kills in Vietnam,

2:19:07

like one of the deadliest ones.

2:19:11

His spotter had more, but his significance, the role

2:19:13

that he played, the reason

2:19:15

why we have a Barrett .50 cal today is

2:19:17

because of Carlos Hathcock. He decided to put a

2:19:19

scope on top of the Ma Deuce, and

2:19:23

single fire the .50 cal using a scope

2:19:25

on, mounted on top that he mounted to

2:19:27

it. Dropped a guy with it too. But,

2:19:31

so yeah, I think he's the best, and his stalking story

2:19:33

of stalking

2:19:36

this NVA high-value target,

2:19:39

thousand-yard stalk, taking

2:19:42

out his target. He was not supposed to come back.

2:19:44

It was a suicide mission. And

2:19:46

his whole story about that, dude, it's like

2:19:48

cutting slits in the back of his uniform

2:19:51

to shove grass through the makeshift, like a

2:19:53

little ghillie suit, and stalking this guy

2:19:55

and taking him out was just so

2:19:57

badass, man. Never got a

2:19:59

chance to do anything. like that but close working with

2:20:01

the Marines. The Marines, I got a chance to see

2:20:03

them work their good

2:20:06

magic man and it was phenomenal.

2:20:08

Let's go back just a

2:20:10

little bit. Let's talk about

2:20:13

the sniper-spotter relationship. How

2:20:16

does that happen?

2:20:19

In regular army there you

2:20:22

have a traditional spotter and sniper.

2:20:26

In range of Italian there is, we

2:20:28

call them spotters, but they're snipers too.

2:20:30

There is no spotter

2:20:33

in range of Italian. You're kind

2:20:35

of both snipers, just

2:20:37

know how to do the spotter work.

2:20:40

You only practice spotting in sniper school

2:20:42

just to get qualified and to

2:20:44

pass the course but after that there's

2:20:46

no more spotter stuff. We know how to do

2:20:49

it but the work we're

2:20:51

doing, direct action stuff, there's really no need

2:20:53

for it. It's more typical

2:20:56

engagement is closest

2:20:58

eye shot someone was like 20 feet and

2:21:01

the furthest was like half a mile. But

2:21:04

that was an extreme

2:21:06

rarity. Most of the engagements was the

2:21:08

long distance

2:21:10

half-mile shot. What would you say the

2:21:12

average shot was? A

2:21:15

hundred yards within 300, but then 300. Definitely within 300. Average about a

2:21:17

hundred yards. Before

2:21:21

we get into your

2:21:23

sniper work, you

2:21:26

get done with the sniper school. You've

2:21:29

been talking about being a sniper since you were a

2:21:31

little kid. How did that

2:21:33

feel graduating sniper

2:21:35

school knowing that

2:21:38

you're going to go to combat as

2:21:41

a regimental sniper?

2:21:44

A dream man, a dream.

2:21:47

Like it

2:21:49

did everything that I as

2:21:51

a kid wanted to do and imagine myself doing,

2:21:53

laying around in a ghillie suit to be able

2:21:56

to actually do it and have the title now

2:21:58

was It

2:22:01

meant everything, you know. All the days that

2:22:03

I wanted to quit didn't matter

2:22:05

anymore. It was like I'm glad I stuck with

2:22:07

it and stayed with this dream because

2:22:10

I could have talked myself out of it so

2:22:12

easily. It was, you know,

2:22:14

had it not been for my life saying, no, pursue

2:22:16

it, I would not have pursued it, you

2:22:18

know. But actually

2:22:20

doing it, it meant everything.

2:22:23

It felt, you can't describe it.

2:22:25

It was, it was

2:22:27

a legit dream come true, man.

2:22:29

A legit dream. Legit,

2:22:31

you know. Right

2:22:33

on, man. Yeah. Let's take a break. When we

2:22:35

come back, we'll get into your next deployment as

2:22:38

a sniper. Oh, good. When

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2:26:43

All right, Nick, we're back from the break. You

2:26:45

had just gone through all your

2:26:48

sniper training. You're now a regimental sniper

2:26:51

getting ready to go on deployment. Where

2:26:54

are you going? I'm going

2:26:56

to Afghanistan. For the

2:26:59

first time. First time. What year? Oh,

2:27:01

wait. Later, or early, oh,

2:27:03

wait, early, oh, wait. So it's

2:27:05

our middle eight. Jalalabad, that deployment

2:27:07

we hopped around. It

2:27:09

was like a terrible deployment. You go and work

2:27:12

with six. That's it. Yeah. So

2:27:14

I'm in Jalalabad, Allahabad

2:27:19

and Bagram. Asadabad. Asadabad. One

2:27:21

of the weird name. Asadabad

2:27:23

is a hot. Yeah,

2:27:25

yeah, it wasn't as hot when we went

2:27:27

though. I mean, it

2:27:29

was hot and the

2:27:33

SEALs just did more stuff. Like they treated

2:27:35

us. Dude,

2:27:38

it was really bad. Like they

2:27:43

would make us carry their equipment that

2:27:45

they could not carry. They'd

2:27:47

pass it on to us. We

2:27:50

almost got into a big brawl with them and

2:27:52

their general that some general had to come in.

2:27:54

I think it was McChrystal. I know he signed

2:27:56

an award for me and gave me a medal.

2:28:00

And I was the only time I

2:28:02

should get sand met him, but I think it

2:28:04

was him or one of their generals came in

2:28:07

and gave us- General or Admiral?

2:28:09

Admiral, Admiral, Admiral, I'm sorry. Admiral.

2:28:13

And he came in and gave a speech to

2:28:15

the SEALs and us

2:28:18

because we were bumping heads. One guy, we

2:28:20

were on this mission doing a hostage

2:28:23

rescue with SEAL Team Six up

2:28:25

in the mountain somewhere. And

2:28:28

one of my guys walking up the mountain, he fell

2:28:30

down and where he

2:28:33

didn't break his leg, but it folded back in.

2:28:35

So like dislocated

2:28:38

his, whatever tendon is right

2:28:40

here or whatnot, he snapped his

2:28:42

leg back. Care

2:28:45

had to carry him out. When we got to the debrief

2:28:48

room, there

2:28:51

was a bottle of Vagelsil that the SEAL guys

2:28:53

had placed where he used to sit. And

2:28:56

we got into an argument about that, almost

2:28:58

got into a fight. Admiral

2:29:00

came in and he's like, set

2:29:02

us down, had a big speech and

2:29:05

basically said, there's way more Rangers. I don't

2:29:07

care how bad ass you guys are. There's

2:29:09

like 35 of these guys and

2:29:11

a handful of you guys. Like they're, you know, probably

2:29:14

not gonna end up the way you wanted to. So

2:29:17

they put up this green fence in between

2:29:19

our compound, the SEALs Team Six compound and

2:29:22

the Rangers. And we had different child

2:29:24

times to eat. And

2:29:26

I remember we were going into, well,

2:29:29

we were doing a mission with SEAL

2:29:32

Team Six and I won't say we

2:29:35

were going, we were going out of Afghanistan. We

2:29:40

were going out of Afghanistan to a different place.

2:29:42

Something happened. One

2:29:45

of their guys drowned and

2:29:49

we came back without

2:29:51

the body. And

2:29:53

we were told to, we had to go out

2:29:56

and get that guy. And

2:29:59

this happened. Yeah, around 2008. There's

2:30:02

a story about it. He drowned and went

2:30:05

down the river into some other... I'm

2:30:07

very familiar with it. What's that? I'm very familiar

2:30:09

with that. Yeah. There for that one,

2:30:11

that was a weird operation

2:30:14

and how we were treated thereafter. And,

2:30:17

like, we wanted

2:30:19

to do the cool stuff with them. They just seemed

2:30:21

like that they were just way

2:30:23

better. And we

2:30:25

didn't know anything, you know? And

2:30:28

we had been doing DA operations

2:30:30

with, you know, tier one

2:30:32

units long before we were doing stuff

2:30:34

with SEAL Team 6. And, like,

2:30:37

we were getting really, really good at it. We were good at it.

2:30:40

You know, we had one of their CAG commanders

2:30:42

or first sergeant come in and give

2:30:44

us awards. We took over one of their missions.

2:30:46

They had to go do something else. They were

2:30:48

originally supposed to do this hit. And

2:30:51

we ended up doing it. And they were impressed

2:30:53

by it, you know, came

2:30:55

in, congratulated us, and thanked us. And went

2:30:58

on about their way. We were good at what we were

2:31:00

doing. But it was just working with them. They were, like,

2:31:02

it was not fun to work with. Like,

2:31:06

you didn't not get a chance to show

2:31:09

what you were capable of doing. It was

2:31:11

like they just brushed us off to the side so they could

2:31:14

get the glory or whatever it was. And I will

2:31:17

say this, every hostage rescue that I have been

2:31:19

on with them, dude, I remember

2:31:22

hostages getting shot, you know? I

2:31:26

remember carrying out one female. And

2:31:28

I was a kid. So

2:31:31

I kind of made a joke about it. But I

2:31:33

said, man, this chick must have done like a cartwheel because

2:31:35

she was shot in her arms and legs and that was

2:31:37

it. We had to carry her out

2:31:39

in the stretcher. They made us carry her to

2:31:41

the, uh, the helo. And that

2:31:44

was basically what we were used for, just like the

2:31:46

carry, all their equipment, all

2:31:49

their weapons that they couldn't carry, and stuff

2:31:52

like that. And once we got to the objective, they would take

2:31:54

it from us and they would do their thing. It

2:31:57

was like that. So we were pissed, you know? The

2:31:59

whole of a- deployment was like that? Yeah. Damn.

2:32:03

Yeah. Working with, you know, CAG

2:32:05

was, or Delta was way better, way

2:32:08

better. When they

2:32:10

came into Afghanistan, I

2:32:12

got a chance to work with their vehicle

2:32:15

interdiction team. They were doing a lot of that at

2:32:18

the time. And that was like the first time I'd

2:32:20

ever seen a vehicle interdiction. And how- Are

2:32:22

we talking CAG or are we talking- CAG, yeah.

2:32:25

Oh God. And how good they were and professional.

2:32:27

They treated us like little brothers, but with respect

2:32:30

taught us a lot of stuff. And yeah,

2:32:33

it was cool working with them because you

2:32:35

got a chance to see how fast and

2:32:37

good these guys really were. Like phenomenal, phenomenal.

2:32:39

So you're basically saying Delta took

2:32:42

you guys under their wing. Big time. And

2:32:45

took what you, took your knowledge and

2:32:47

improved upon it when their

2:32:50

counterpart, six

2:32:52

basically just kind of pushed

2:32:56

you off. Yeah, exactly that.

2:32:59

Most of the guys in CAG like come from

2:33:01

regiment. I knew a lot of guys who

2:33:03

went to CAG. I

2:33:06

had the opportunity, but something about walking 40

2:33:08

miles? No, I

2:33:10

sucked at 15. So 40? No,

2:33:13

that's where I do the line. Damn.

2:33:17

Well, that's, that's

2:33:19

a pretty disheartening to

2:33:21

hear. Yeah, yeah. Put a bad taste in

2:33:23

my mouth. I can imagine. I

2:33:25

can imagine. Well, let's skip that deployment. Yeah,

2:33:27

yeah. Unless you have anything else you want to bring up

2:33:30

from that deployment. No, that was a pretty, yeah,

2:33:32

it was like that. Saw

2:33:37

some weird stuff, weird stuff. Like

2:33:39

what? I

2:33:42

don't know if I can say on this, but just their ROE was different. Their

2:33:48

ROE was different. The use of bombs were different.

2:33:52

And I had questions. And I've

2:33:54

also seen them go through and I've also seen

2:33:56

them get kicked out of country a couple of

2:33:59

times. Interesting.

2:34:01

From questionable, you know, I

2:34:03

don't know. Yeah. Yeah.

2:34:06

I was too young to understand. I chalk it up to that, you know. Yeah.

2:34:11

Well, let's move forward. Yeah. Yeah.

2:34:15

How was the next? It

2:34:18

was a... How was the... I mean, what's... Actually,

2:34:21

I do have some questions. So you come home from that. What's

2:34:23

your leadership telling you after a deployment

2:34:25

like that? I mean, that

2:34:28

could discourage a lot of guys into getting out.

2:34:30

Yeah. And I mean, I

2:34:32

could imagine a very disgruntled

2:34:34

team. Yeah. We never wanted to work

2:34:36

with them again. Not

2:34:38

necessarily get out. It

2:34:40

was just never ever wanting

2:34:42

to work with them again. You do such a big

2:34:45

train up. Most of the

2:34:47

guys at that point, they've had, you

2:34:49

know, three, four, five deployments. And to

2:34:51

go on a deployment and you're told to, you

2:34:54

know, stand back and stand by, it's

2:34:56

disheartening, but it just is, you know, you're never

2:34:58