Lessons From War with Sean Parnell

As we honor the men and women who have paid the ultimate sacrifice in the pursuit of freedom this Memorial Day, don't we owe it to them to be even more judicious before sending our military to war? Don't we have an obligation to learn from past mistakes so we don't repeat them? In this episode, Lisa hears from decorated combat veteran Sean Parnell, who spent 16 months in the mountains of Afghanistan. At just 24 years old, he led the legendary 10th Mountain Division. His bravery led to two Bronze Stars (one for valor) and a Purple Heart. In his New York Times bestselling book, Outlaw Platoon, he details his platoon's fight - outnumbered and outmanned but never giving up. In this gripping interview, Sean recounts his time in Afghanistan and the lessons we should learn as a society moving forward. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
So it's a Memorial Day, And obviously on Memorial Day
we take a moment, we take a day to remember
the follow and to remember the heroes who have paid
the ultimate sacrifice to defend this nation, defend our country.
We honor the families who have lost loved ones in
the pursuit of freedom to protect this great country. But
beyond taking the time to remember, shouldn't we also reflect?

(00:26):
And shouldn't we also reflect on mistakes that we've made
as a country and things we could change moving forward,
and being more judicious with the lives of our military
men and women. Shouldn't the people in charge shouldn't their
sole duty with our military men and women be to
avoid casualties, avoid sending them to unnecessary wars, so that

(00:48):
we have less men and women who have to pay
the ultimate sacrifice in the pursuit of freedom. So that's
why I wanted to do this Memorial Day. Not only
honor the fallen and honor their bravery, and honor the
people who give everything for this country that they love
and that we love, but also take a time to reflect.
And one of those wars is Afghanistan. You know, it
was the longest war in American history twenty years lost,

(01:10):
so many service members, so many service men and women
in Afghanistan. So what are the lessons we could learn there?
What should we take from that and do differently moving forward?
And who better to talk to you than Sean Parnell.
He has a former US Army Airborne ranger who served
in the legendary tenth Mountain Division for six years, retiring

(01:32):
as a captain. He received two Bronze Stars, one for
valor and a Purple Heart as well. He wrote the
New York Times best selling book Outline Platoon, and he
also wrote Man Award Outlaw Platoon details his sixteen months
in combat and Afghanistan. Sixteen months in combat in Afghanistan, well,

(01:53):
he was there. His platoon repeatedly was outnumbered, repeatedly outgunned,
and they displayed such tremendous bravery to the that over
of his platoon received Purple Hearts for wounds that they
incurred in battle. Sean was also injured in battle, day
in and day out, fighting for freedom in the mountains
of Afghanistan. He was twenty four at the time. Can

(02:17):
you imagine being twenty four and leading a platoon in
the mounds of Afghanistan, day in, day out, out numbered out,
gun fighting bravely and fearlessly next to your your brothers
in the military and in the army. So we're gonna
get Sean Parnell's take on what lessons we should learn

(02:38):
from Afghanistan, what we could be doing different moving forward,
and how we can truly honor, to the best of
our abilities, the men and women who have paid the
ultimate sacrifice and the pursuit of freedom. I hope you
enjoyed this conversation. He's an absolute hero, and he's an
absolute badass, Sean Parnell. Sean Carnell, you are such a

(03:09):
badass and such an American hero. It's an honor just
to have you on the show. So I really appreciate
you taking this time. Oh well, thanks, Lisa. I don't
know if i'd call myself a badass, but I was.
I was in the Army for a time and I
was surrounded by badasses every day, so I guess I
was pretty lucky. I'll call you badass, so I'll be
the one. I'll do it because you can be humble.
I will take the humility out of it for you. Um,

(03:32):
you know we're recording this before. But this is gonna
err on Memorial Day and obviously a day to honor
the individuals and so many who have paid the ultimate
sacrifice in the name of defending freedom, defending this great
country that we love. But shouldn't we also take this
time to learn lessons from you know, wars like Afghanistan,
and also using it as a time to be more

(03:54):
judicious in sending our military men and women to war.
I think so, I mean, you know, I think I
think it speaks directly to the importance of you know,
warriors coming back, you know, American men and women who
fight our wars coming back and being involved with regards
to where our country goes and the decisions that we

(04:16):
make pertaining to the future of America and the wars
that we get ourselves involved in. Um. You know, after
I spent time in Afghanistan back in in two thousand
six and two thousand and seven. UM, we were there
for what like twenty years. You know, it's a long
long time that I think most America, most of America, America,

(04:36):
it's difficult to wrap your mind around that length of time,
you know. And so I feel like, you look at
what happened in Afghanistan and all the blood, the treasure
that we spent there, right after twenty years there, Um,
you look now and it's like, well, what do you
have to show for it? You know? And look, I

(04:59):
would know you this, like, I'm proud of my time
in Afghanistan. I don't regret it for a second. I
joined after after September eleven. One of one of the
best experiences of my life was serving this country. So
I am not a victim in any way. I'm a
volunteer and I would do it all again in a heartbeat.
And I'm proud of what we did in Afghanistan, you know. Um.
But and critics, critics would say, you know, when I

(05:21):
would say, well, what will we have to show forward,
critics would say, well, look, I mean, you know, look
at what you do, what you built for the Afghans,
you wells and villages. You know, little girls know how
to read, and you know, boys are part of the
economy now and they understand what what freedom, freedom is,
even if it was just for a brief time. And
I just say to that, yes, that is all true. Um,

(05:41):
but I would rather have my friends alive, you know. Um,
And you look at what's happening today and the Afghan
you know things, and in Afghanistan just collapsed what like
less than a year ago, Lisa, right, like August two
thousand and twenty one. And it seems like you have

(06:03):
members of Congress on both sides of the Aisle, in
the House and in the Senate that are clamoring to
go right back into the fight in Ukraine, which from
a geopolitical standpoint is just it's far more complicated than
than Afghanistan. Um without even taking a breath after the

(06:24):
Afghan warrant, saying, wait, is this really worth it? Should
we like take time to hit the reset button as
a country and figure out if, if this fight is
worth Americans dying for, because that that's the question that
American moms and dads need to ask themselves. Lisa's like,
is Ukraine so important that you're willing to sacrifice your

(06:44):
son or daughter for that? If the answer to that
question is no, then we shouldn't be doing anything for Ukraine.
And and look, Lisa, I feel bad for the people there.
My heart aches for the civilians and children who are
caught in the middle. Like this is not me saying
like we should ignore it completely, Like nobody, like a
few people in this country understand that the humanitarian disaster

(07:09):
and people stuck in the middle of the fight that
the me. I get that. But but again I would
say I would rather have American sons and daughters alive.
You know, I think we need to take care of
ourselves here at home a little bit. First. We just
see politicians, you know, beating the drums of war with Ukraine.
Udu Biden said something today about Taiwan about you know,
you should take a military action. But you just hear

(07:31):
these politicians and it almost there's a callousness to it,
to be honest, because it doesn't take into account that,
as you pointed out, it's it's would they send their
son or daughter? You know, it just it doesn't take
an account like I just lives or American people should
be the most important to us. That lives the precious lives,
or military men and one should be the most important

(07:52):
to us, And it just doesn't. It doesn't seem to
be the case, and it makes me sad. Look, you're right, Lisa,
I mean, you're right, it's it's well, I think part
of the problem is that you only have point four
percent of the people in this country who have served
this country. During Iraq and Afghanistan's twenty years of war,

(08:13):
so longest period of war in American history, only point
four percent of the country actually experienced what it means
to protect and defend freedom. And so I think as
a result, you have, you know, most of American of
America who enjoyed freedom on a day to day basis
in this country, and you have less than half of

(08:36):
one percent who protected. So there's there's a there's a
significant gap between those two groups. And I think that's
part of the reason why, you know, you have politicians
who really never served anything but themselves for the majority
of their lives talk so callously about sending American sons

(08:57):
and daughters into the fight because the reality is they
don't have any understanding of what that means for American
families who are actually doing the fighting. Like for for example,
when I got back from Afghanistan, sixteen month combat deployment,
sixteen months, like four five days, It's like if you
had a kid, it's like, have a good first grade year,
have a good second grade year, I'll see you on

(09:17):
your way to third grade. That's crazy, you know, And
you know, we got back, we hit the reset button.
You know, most of we weren't even back for a
couple of weeks. We already had to go right back
down to Fort Polk, Louisiana. So we got back home.
Hugger families went back to do training down at Fort Polk,
Louisiana and prep for another combat deployment to Afghanistan that
was nine months later. I mean, it's an incredibly heavy

(09:40):
burden that we that we place on a very very
small percentage of Americans, and most of the time our
politicians are unaffected by that. But I guess it sounds
cool when you're up there at the podium, uh, you know, hey,
of China invades Taiwan, like We're gonna get involved militarily,
with no real understanding in the geopolitical consequences or the
fall lot for the American people or how that would

(10:02):
affect people who serve. I mean, it's it's just irresponsible,
especially Lisa, when you consider just how much suffering there
is here within our own borders at home. I think
a lot of our a lot of our attention should
be focused on well. And I think President Trump really
changed at least my thinking on foreign policy because what

(10:24):
he was able to show us is that you can
be strong, you can flex muscle, you can deter the
bad guys without sending troops, without invading, without beating the
you know, the the drum beat for war, and you
can do it like he did when he was sitting
with President She you know, having chocolate cake, telling him
he's sending Tomah health missiles. Right, it's such a fall
or striking these peace deals on the Abrahambichords. It just

(10:47):
changed the way, you know, I thought about things because
he just showed us a different path. He really opened
my eyes too. You know there there is a different
way you know there and and when you're in Washington,
I mean really when whether you're a Democrat or Republican
there there is the group sink right where everyone sort
of thinks the same way, um about a lot of things.

(11:09):
And I think that's why you hear a lot of
people talk about the uniparty, you know, where you have
you know, people like you know, as ideologically different as
Adam Kinzinger and Ted Cruz both talking about the importance
of defending Ukraine, to even certain Democrats talking about the
importance of defending our ally Ukraine, even though they're not
an ally um um. You know, it's like you see,

(11:33):
you see these certain groups of people that think alike Lisa.
And what I always admired about President Trump is it
takes an unbelievable amount of mental toughness to resist that
type of pressure and group think, right. And and in Washington,
President Trump was I mean, gosh, any given at any

(11:53):
given moment. Uh in d C. In the White House,
both Republicans and Democrats were fired up in angry at
President Trump for different reasons. And that's what I admired
about him the most. And that's ultimately why I think
the American people sent him there, Because there is a
level of dissatisfaction in this country that if people just
got outside the Beltway or New York City or l

(12:15):
A and they took a stroll through you know, Middle America,
they would feel that sense of discontent about the direction
of our country. And President Trump tapped into that. And
you look at what he was able to accomplish in
four years and in the face of I mean, so

(12:36):
what that man faced in the White House was criminal.
It was criminal. I mean, now we're learning of what
what Hillary Clinton did. It was like make legitimately criminal,
I don't know. But but the things that he was
able to accomplish in four short years I never thought possible,
and you know, the Abraham Accords and peace in the
Middle East. Never thought that was possible, but he did it.

(12:59):
And yeah, like you said, it really opened my eyes
to a new way of being and that you know, um,
we don't have to deploy and get locked down, and
like it's almost become cliche now in these in these
forever wars, but that's really what they are. I mean,
twenty freaking years in Afghanistan is a long time. I

(13:20):
mean twenty years. I mean think about it like this,
Like I'm forty years old. That's half of my life.
We were in Afghanistan, like half of my life. The
only professor, the only thing that I've known is war
in Afghanistan. Lost thirty five plus friends there. I mean,
that's a long time. And I think what President Trump
showed us was that it doesn't have to be that way.

(13:41):
We can still have peace, um, as long as we're
focused on the right stuff, um, and focusing on ourselves
at home. And unfortunately, a year and a half of
Joe Biden, he's unraveling that pretty quickly. I mean, I
never thought it could get this bad, this fact us.
I mean, it's just it's really sad. But I but

(14:02):
I honestly think I think the turning point for him
was because you know, people thought he would restore order,
he do all these things that obviously people like us
knew he wasn't going to do and he wasn't capable
of it. But his ratings really started to take a
nosedive after Afghanistan. And it was the disastrous exit, the abandoning,
like the back Roum airfield before getting her people out,
getting thirteen service members killed, leaving Americans behind, And I

(14:26):
think that was the turning point. And when that all
was going down, you tweeted out that the Afghana baccles
on the suits, not the boots. Talk about that disconnect
in the military between the suits and the boots and
how that played out with Afghanistan so disastrously. It was
so frustrating to me. And part of what I do
like coming back home after I got back from Afghanistan,

(14:46):
was was realizing very quickly that a lot there are
a lot of men and women here who served this
country that needed help, and you know, there's a way
in which you come back from war. War changes you,
um and some pretty deep and fundamental ways, and you
could you know, you come back and you meet and
talk to your family and you feel like your family
doesn't know you because you've changed, and you talk to

(15:09):
your best friends. And there was a moment for me
like where I'm from Pittsburgh and so like the first
thing I do when I get back from Afghanistan is
like text my buddies, you know, who I went to
college with and stuff. And like I opened up my
like little flip phone and text them and they text
me back their address and like look at it. Read
the address. I'm like, oh my gosh, Like these dudes

(15:31):
are still living in the same address they've been living
at for ten years, and I just got back from Afghanistan.
Feel like a totally different person show up at there.
I show up at their apartment. I walk in and
like they're like all sitting in the same spots on
the couch, like drinking the same Iron City beer, talking
about the same girl problems. And I'm like Simpson's posters

(15:52):
on the wall and family Guy magnets on the fridge,
and I'm thinking to myself, like oh my god, like
nothing has changed here at home, but I'm different person
in every way. And so if I was feeling like that,
there are probably millions of Americans feeling like that. You
come home from more and just feel like they're different,
and maybe they feel like exiles in their own country.

(16:13):
And so I started doing everything I could to make
sure that, like the war is really what I'm I
guess I'm getting to Lisa, is that the war for
a lot of veterans really starts when you get home.
And I wanted to just help veterans come home in
the most productive way possible and not just survive on

(16:34):
a day to day basis, but but really, but but thrive,
you know. And when I tweeted that about Afghanistan about
it being on the suits and not the boots, was
really it was in that spirit, because I knew there
would be a lot of veterans thinking like, what the

(16:55):
hell was all this for? You know, why the hell
did I Why did I lose my friend in this country?
Why did I go to this country and and sacrifice
a piece of myself there? You know? Why do we
do all of this just to have some moron in
the White House throw it all away, uh, because I mean,
quite honestly, he's a bumbling idiot. Leadership matters, and he's

(17:17):
a commander in chief, so that the term commander predisposes
chief his job at first and foremost an obligation to
our American military. And it was a it was a
dereliction of duty of the highest order of what he
did in Afghanistan. And it's not just it's not just
leaving Americans behind, which is horrific, horrific enough, right, I

(17:38):
can't even believe I have to say this, but the
sacrifice that twenty years of Americans bled the ground red
in Afghanistan just to seed it back to the Taliban
in a few weeks. I mean, that's a that's a crime.
It's a crime, and it's it's gonna do unbelievable moral

(17:59):
damage to people who served there that the ramisifications of
which I don't think we fully understand yet. Um. And
so it's just like unbelievable to have to witness the
fall of Afghanistan and the speed at which it fell
here in America after having been there for twenty years. Um.

(18:19):
And again, never ever, ever, ever would have happened under
President Trump or really any American president. They could speak
in coherent sentences without having to read off a sheet
of paper. I mean, just unbelievable, and you can't help
but think you cannot help, but think, like I used
to joke around in the campaign trail when I was
running for the House and the Senate um well mostly

(18:41):
when I was running for the Senate, but like about
like just to utter incompetence. But I don't think it's incompetence.
I think it's I think it's intentional. I think that
this is you can't be this good. I mean, he's
Joe Biden, and in his administration a bunch of Obama
appointees two point over right back in the White House,
some of which are sermon in the same cabinet positions.

(19:03):
It it's like they're unbelievably efficient, ruthlessly efficient at destroying
almost every pillar in this country, I mean every pillar
strengthening country. It's unbelievable that they the level of which
they're failing. And I think Afghanistan was just one of
those pillars. Well, I think we all just felt such

(19:25):
an amount of shame with the way that we exited.
Just the loss of military men and women are sort
of the thirteen service members and just leaving Americans behind.
Quick Commercial break Back with Sean Parnell on the other side,
talked about sort of you know, the challenge with coming
home when you've been at war like that. I'll say

(19:46):
one of the most rewarding experiences I've ever had in
my career was doing an honor air flight for Vietnam
war vets from Wisconsin for Fox and Friends. And I
went on this trip with them, and I'll tell you
it was just such a moving experience talking to these
like big, strong guys who were just brought to tears
of just feeling the honor of having served because they

(20:06):
didn't get the welcome they deserved when they came home.
And so just doing the interviews with them and seeing
these you know, grown men and you know cry and
just it was just incredibly moving, uh And I learned
a lot from it. It It was just a really you know,
humbling and just incredible experience, you know, spending time with
them and just being able to bless them and being

(20:26):
part of this with the trip. Yeah, well, Vietnam vets
are I mean, we owe them so much. And obviously,
because as you mentioned, they didn't have the welcome home
that that we did. And so much of the reason
why my generation was welcomed home was because after like
what these Vietnam what the Vietnam era went through, they

(20:49):
made themselves a promise to never allow another generation of
veteran to experience what they did. And because of that,
like we had by and large, a very positive homecoming,
you know. And I when I talk about feeling like
an exile in your own country, I should say, like
almost everybody that you talked to you says thank you
for your service. I am not again, like we're lucky

(21:12):
to live in a country like like America and come
home to people that that appreciate you. And that that
is because of Vietnam veterans who went through hell when
they came back, went through hell, and combat through hell,
and they came back and then but didn't give in.
And they they made a promise to you know, subsequent
generations of Americans when they came home from the fight,

(21:34):
and and and that promise was to never allow what
they went through to happen again. And I mean, really
my generation is standing on the shoulders of giants with
with them and and World War Two veterans and career
veterans before them. UM, so yeah, we're we're lucky. We're
lucky to live in this country. But there's still a

(21:55):
lot of work to do, that's for sure. I can't
imagine how it doesn't change you, particularly some of this
stuff that you endured. You know, I know you very humbly.
You know, didn't take me saying that you're, you know,
a complete badass and a hero, but you really are.
I mean, you've retired at highly decorated captain. You're awarded
two Bronze Stars, one for valor and a purple Heart.
You wrote the New York Times best selling book, Outlaw Platoon.

(22:17):
It's about your time serving as commanding the Army's tenth
Mountain Division in Afghanistan. As you mentioned, you served in
combat for sixteen months. You guys were repeatedly out in
our ber, repeatedly outgun. Yeah, your platoon killed over three
fifty enemy fighters. Why do you think your platoon was
able to be so effective in the face of so much? Um,
it's a great question. I think when you look at

(22:41):
the things that the American military can bring to the fight,
you know, like we've got lots of cool and sexy technology,
like we've got great guns and weapons, and we've got
air superiority helicopter and fixed wing aircraft and all that.
Believe me when I tell you all that really really helps.
But I think really are our secret weapon was the

(23:03):
the love and brotherhood that we shared for one another. Um.
You know, we we spent a lot of time training
UM leading up to our deployment in Afghanistan. And I
feel like I was very blessed um to lead one
of the most diverse platoons that you can imagine. And
it's funny when you hear a lot of these politicians

(23:24):
talking about diversity in America being a strength, and it's like, well,
of course diversity is a strength, but not in it
of itself. What what makes America so truly exceptional is
that we unify beyond like our many differences, Right, It's
not just diversity for diversity's sake. And really, my platoon
was a microcosm of that strength. Like we had black

(23:47):
next white Christians next to atheists, Democrats next to Republican, rich,
next to poor, young, next to old. We were like
as wildly different as you can imagine, Yet there were
no real hyper there were no hyphenative Americans out there
in Afghanistan patrol on those those mountains. Um. And it

(24:08):
was the very fact that I think we were able
to put aside all of our differences and unify beyond
them and the one cohesive fighting force that that that
was what allowed us to to go through sixteen months
of absolute hell, sixteen months of heavy combat, and and
make it you know, um, you know, we made ourselves

(24:32):
a promise. I think what drove us every day on
the battlefield, Lisa was was the fear of of of
not the enemy, but the fear of letting each other down.
You know. Um. I would have soldiers that would get
that would get shot in the head, a soldier that
got shot through his helmet, his helmet slowed the round

(24:53):
down enough where it penetrated his skin but not his skull,
and skirted around the side of his all and back
out the other end. And that guy went back to
the base, wrapped his head up, and was back out
of patrol twenty four hours later. So when you're when
you're serving with men or Americans that have that much

(25:17):
like that, the level of toughness and tenacity and dedication
to duty that someone that that someone like that has
how do you fail somebody like that, Like if you
twist an anc or you you take some shrapnel or
you get maybe a shot, but it's a grazing wound,
Like how do you how do you how do you
how do you not saddle up when you're surrounded by

(25:39):
men like I just described. And so it was the
fact that we were able to really to unify beyond
our many differences in fear of letting each other down,
that really drove us to accomplish I think extraordinary things
and and really I mean it, like my platoon really

(25:59):
just accomplished. It was just one unbelievable triumph of the
human spirit after the next. I mean, we were not
like Navy seals or anything. You know, we were light infantrymen.
So we're in the tenth Mountain Division. We were light infantry.
I mean, we were real well trained and stuff. Don't
get me wrong, but you know, we weren't special forces.

(26:19):
You know, the most of the jobs that a lot
of these kids had, like prior to carrying a machine
gun in the mountains of Afghanistan, the job prior to
the military is like high school shortstop. Yet these these
kids were just accomplished unbelievable things. And I think it's
because we were led on one another and that's what's
what allowed us to get through it all. And you're

(26:42):
twenty four at the beginning right of this painting. I mean,
how do you do that at and be responsible for
all these brave men that you just talked about. I mean,
what an incredible amount of responsibility. I was an idiot. Yeah,
but how do you know? I don't know, I don't know.

(27:03):
You just you know. I I um had a conversation
with my mom when I got back from Afghanistan and
maybe a couple of years after, and my youngest brother,
I'm the oldest of four, and so my youngest brother
was like like helping my middle brother moved down to
Texas or something like that or and my mom was like, oh,
I'm nervous that your younger brother and he's gonna have

(27:25):
to drive drive, you know, his brother's car all the
way down to Texas. And I'm like thinking, like my
and he's twenty three years old, Like I think he'll
be all right. I was leading people in Afghanistan at
twenty three years old, you know, So I don't I
don't know, you know, Yeah, I was just like it
was just something that we were laughing at about it. Um,

(27:46):
you know, I don't after so I think part of
that Lisa's like I was a sophomore in college when
nine eleven happened, Um, and that that hit me that
like like it did some millions of other Americans, you know.
And I think if you live through nine eleven, you
can probably tell me exactly where you were and what

(28:06):
you were doing and what you had plans to do
that day. Um. And I the only thing, like I
was kind of like a I was kind of a
screw up as a kid, Like my grades were okay,
but I didn't really know what I wanted to do
as an elementary education major. But again as a sophomore
in college, and I must have changed my major a
few times, like um, but when nine eleven happened, I

(28:28):
knew that I wanted to to join the army, going
the infantry, go to airborne school, go to ranger school,
like be on the front lines of our collective response.
And you know, I just knew. I knew it, um,
in my heart of hearts, that that was that was
the path that God intended me to walk at that

(28:48):
specific moment, in my life. And that's I think. I
think this is my faith in God and that that
was my purpose. I think that that's how I was
able to do it. And you know, years old, when
you when I just feel like when you know what

(29:08):
path you're meant to walk, and you know that like,
no matter how bad things get, this is where you're
supposed to be. I've got no regrets, um, I just
think it gives you a sense of clarity, you know,
about what you're supposed to do and and and in
my case, it was lead troops in Afghanistan a years old,

(29:30):
you know, um. And as horrible as that combat was,
I mean seriously, like we we like an you think
back to two thousand and six. You I don't, I
don't know if you're doing stuff at Fox back then,
I sure as hell wasn't. I mean, I'm trying to
I think it was like working on Capitol Hill doing
you know, like nothing of nothing like you were doing.

(29:52):
It wasn't of no, I'll tell you that much. You know,
I don't know. I mean we're probably we're probably the
same age, you know, so I'm a little I'm a
little older than you, but you know, I'll take those
a couple of years. But you know, I don't know.
I feel like it was the path I was I
was meant to walk, you know, and you know, get

(30:14):
back and you see, I was able to take a
company command and then did a b a time were
detachment command, and so at the age of eight years
old end up being in charge of like eighteen or
nineteen hundred uh like people, where I was in charge
of training young soldiers to go to war and taking
care of the wounded when they came home, and then

(30:36):
looking after the families who were left back at home,
and then ultimately doing the capture notification, which was ten
times worse than than combat. So I've seen both sides
of the fight. I've seen I've seen combat up close
and personal, um and I've seen the fallout here at home.
And when I was saying earlier, is it like no

(30:56):
one expected Michael Tune or or are experience in Afghanistan
leads to be like what it was like if you
think back to two thousand and six and if you're
a congressional staffer, are working on the hill or something
like that back then, then you know, the talk back
then was the Iraq War and whether or not there
are weapons of mass destruction there? Or should we should

(31:18):
George W. Bush send more troops to the surge in
Iraq or not? Should we even be there or not.
At the time, Afghanistan was just a stability and support operation.
We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into,
and man, like we just got thrown into the meat ground.
Were an eastern Afghanistan about five clicks five kilometers from

(31:39):
the Pakistan border. Our mission was like about as simple
as you can. You can get phind Osama bin laden
close with and destroy the enemy, that's it. And man,
we just got attacked every single day. We were outnumbered
every single day. I mean my my base, my base
m hmm probably took four thousand rockets and four five days,

(32:02):
four thousand, you know, hundreds of direct fire engagements, and
we just sort of just like got thrown in there,
you know, were the so much of the focus of
this nation was on Iraq that we couldn't even get
up armored humb beast because all that was going to Iraq.
Like before, we were supposed to come home after after
a year, Um, we got extended for four more months,

(32:24):
sixteen months. Why because the soldiers that were supposed to
replace US in Afghanistan got sent to Iraq and supported
the surge, just so we were sort of like an
afterthought and we went through absolute hell. And ultimately Lisa
that that's why I wrote the book, because I thought
to myself, like, oh my God, like nobody knows in

(32:45):
this country, and nobody knew how bad Afghanistan was way
back in two thousand and six. Nobody, And I just
felt like it was my job as the leader of
that platoon to make sure that the legacy of my
soldiers that was kept alive. And you know, even if
Outlaw Betune ended up being a word document on my
computer that I emailed all of my troops that like

(33:06):
maybe once every ten years we read through and drank
beers or whatever like that would be that's worth it.
At least their experiences on the page preserved forever. I
didn't know that. I didn't know that it would take
off and become a bestseller in his first week, and
I was I feel like I was also lucky. It
was all sort of maybe it was a state Um
when Outlaw Betune came out. Do you remember that story

(33:30):
way back in a day where UM soldiers at bog
where I'm got in trouble for like burning a Koran
or something like that, and that was like all over
the news. Um, it was like headline news for like
a week Outlaw Betune came out at that exact time,
and I was like the young kid with an Afghanis
with a new Afghanistan book. Then you know how that
goes on Fox Dudes and stuff like that. Like I
was a dude guy with a book, so I was

(33:51):
able to go on there and promote it and the
rest is history. I was just it was just it
was just a blessing to be able to have that opportunity.
You tell, tell the story of my troops. You have
talked about. You know, obviously we had superior you know, equipment,
being the US, but you're on their terrain and you're
in the mountains. How difficult is it to try to

(34:13):
navigate that when you know you're you're on their home base, right,
you're in their mountains. That is a good That's another
great question. It was. It was ridiculous. I mean, it's
another thing about Afghanistan, like do you want to go
back to a time where Jesus Christ walk the earth
at the a k forty seven like the icoon walkie
talkie type radio at a pickup truck, and you've got
Afghanistan there. When we were there, there was like one

(34:36):
paved road in the entire country, no running water, no electricity,
no economy, all all finding age males would do all
the men and in the villages that we were around
would cut down wood all summer and prep for the winter.
And that was it. That's all like there was nothing, nothing,
and it's just all tribal. And so when we were

(35:01):
where we were in Burmel, like Burmel District, was that
we were in the valley, our base was in the valley.
But fighting up in the mountains, I mean we're probably
at fourteen fifteen thousand feet there, you know, in the
Hindu Kush mountains. And so if you if you're like
a football fan, that's like playing a football game at
Marahei Stadium times three. And the enemy that we faced

(35:21):
over there again, like you hear the media talk about
and you certainly saw this during the collapse of Afghanistan,
but but the media talks about the Taliban as if
they're in monolithic force and they are not. I mean,
you have so many different enemy factions that you face
over there on a day to day basis, whether it's

(35:43):
the Hakkani network or hak Matier or al Qaeda or Taliban,
or just crimes that happened on a day to day
basis like any other country. That like any other country
in the world. And as a young leader you've got
to like navigate all that somehow and be almost like
you know, an ambassador, an American ambassador with a gun,

(36:06):
you know, ready on a moment's notice to either you know,
fire your weapon in defense of of your troops or
cradle a baby in a village where you're doing a
humanitarian distribution. I mean, it was one of the most complex,
rugged environments that I certainly have ever been in. And
you know, you add to that the fact that all

(36:26):
of those enemy factions that that I just told you about,
like most of those most of the the enemy that
we face in Afghanistan cut their teeth against the Russians
in the eighties and then thought in the Afghan Civil
War in the nineties and then against us in a
post nine eleven era. And you know, the the average

(36:48):
Afghan that we were fighting had ten years combat experience
on eighteen year old American private you know, Um, this
was not a group of farmers with with pitchforks or
some sort of rag tag insurgency that they just mustered
up at the last second. Now, the people that we

(37:08):
fought there, the level of tactical acumen that they displayed
on the battlefield on a day to day basis was
just as good, if not better than us. And they
weren't weighed down with a hundred pounds of gear like
we were, and they knew the terrain better better than
we did, at least initially, because what you know, as

(37:29):
obviously being in Afghanistan for sixteen months sucked something fierce.
It was horrible. But um, what was interesting as this,
I don't mean to sound crass, but we killed so
many of them over there that that we were getting
intel in May of two thousand and seven that Pakistan
families were sick and tired of sending their sons into

(37:51):
the fight. They were they were no longer going to
commit male fighters to the war in Afghanistan. And what
we saw that a lot of the new fighters that
had replaced the older ones that we had killed didn't
know the terrain as good as us. So it was
a real odd dynamic where at first they were better
than us, they were faster than us, they knew the terrain,

(38:12):
but slowly over time because we never broke contact, we
never surrendered, We we always pressed the enemy. We would
never give them that moral victory on the battlefield. We
just slowly whittled away at their force and killed them
one by one, to the point where at the end
of sixteen months we knew the terrain better than they did.
And and all of this culminated in an attack, um,

(38:36):
probably in January. It was early January of two thousand
and seven. We had built my pet tune had built
or my company had built, the first combat outpost. And
I'm sure you've seen like you know, uh, I can't
remember some of the movies names that the movie where
you see in Afghanistan a combat outpost getting overrun. Um,

(38:57):
probably every year after I was Afghanistan a combat outpost
had been overrun. Lisa and and and like I was
highly critical of that strategy because like all, they would
be manned with almost no combat power, with like a
squad and all they would David just be simply relegated
to a defensive position. There and all along the border

(39:18):
of Afghanistan, you had like a main base with what
they call cops like combat outposts, and it almost looked
like a modern day version of imagine O line thinking like, well,
if we have all these bases along the border, there's
no way the enemy will be able to get bias
and that's complete bs um. So anyway, like they tried
to attack this base that we had built and we

(39:38):
ended up killing, killing, I think like two hundred plus
fighters just in that one engagement decisively because we caught
them just prior to them kicking off the attack. And
I mean I I would wager to say that that
from a strategic and tactical standpoint, back in two thousand
six and two thousand seven, we had we had decisively

(39:59):
won the fight in Afghanistan, and then we shifted from
a counter terror mission, which the basic premise of a
counter terror mission is going after and killing the enemy,
and through killing the enemy you secure the people UH
to counterinsurgency mission, like after the surge in Iraq. And
you know, I think there are there are the strategists
that would say the surgeon Iraq was successful. I think

(40:21):
I would tend to tend to agree, at least in
the moment back then, it was pretty successful. While they
tried to implement that exact same strategy in Afghanistan, which
is an entirely different country, and once we shifted to counterinsurgency,
we lost the initiative and Afghanistan went slowly downhill. From there,
We're going to take a quick break and then more
on Sean's time at Afghanistan on the other side. Take

(40:47):
us back to you June tenth, two thousand six. Your
your platoon was outnumbered by almost tend to one, ended
up leaving you with injuries. You know, talk about that
day and what happened. So June tenth, um we had
been tasked, we're tasked with finding a high value target,
and we had been out for a week up until

(41:08):
that point. And we sat up and in and what
we call an observation post, and we were just watching
infiltration routes from Pakistan into Afghanistan. And we knew that
this al Qaeda leader was using a cave complex to
navigate from Pakistan into Afghanistan, which is how he was
avoiding like our intelligence and reconnaissance and surveillance drones. So

(41:31):
we perched up on the hill, we we laid our
sites in on this cave site, which we what she
thought he was using. UM, and set in for the night.
Woke up the next morning, UM, and all throughout the
night I had plotted target reference points and confirmed them
with our base at A target reference point is like
when you've got artillery at your base. UM. You want

(41:52):
to be able to Artillery is basically like big guns,
and you want to be able to get those guns
into the fight as fast as humanly possible should you
make contact with the enemy. And best way to do
that is not like trying to plot it in the
middle of a fight, right, I think is the best
military commanders would look at a map and pick key
terrain and say, okay, this hilltop here is key terrain.

(42:12):
If the enemy takes this hilltop, they'll be able to
attack if you're easily. So I'm gonna plot this hill
it's target reference point one. And then you can coordinate
with the with the guns and say, look, this is
my target reference point one. When I say fired t
RP one, this is what I mean, and you just
you set in target reference point one through ten. UM.
Prior to even leaving, and so I had been I

(42:33):
had studied those throughout the night. The sun crested the
hill of the next morning, and I remember walking out
and looking at some mountaintops to directly to our east
that were a lot higher than the one that we
were on, and I just thought to myself, that's not
a good tactical position to be in, and so I
don't have the manpower to occupy those hills with troops.

(42:56):
In a perfect world, you would just occupy terrain it
was higher than yours with boots, but I didn't have that.
I just had one platoon. So I figured I'd occupy
those hilltops by fire, and if the enemy was watching us,
they would think twice about setting in there because I
know that I have this position styled in. And so
I fired those target reference points with my forward observer,

(43:18):
watched those, watched the rounds land um on point and
on target. Remember walking back to my truck and and
it's just like somebody threw a veil over my entire world,
and I remember, I don't remember much, but I do
remember waking up in in a smoldering hole about twenty

(43:40):
ft from where I had been standing, laying flat on
my back, and I couldn't see. I couldn't really hear,
but I could feel this stinging on my face and
it just felt like like like I was someone was
slapping me. And as I have blinked blinked my eyes open,
I sid one of my team leaders, Tim Stalter, slapping

(44:01):
me um and trying to get me to wake up.
And I finally wake up, open my eyes. I look
at him. He's got this big smile on his face,
and I'm like, what are you smiling at? What's going on?
He sir, He's like, you got blown the f up?
And he started laughing, like what the hell is he
laughing at? And I remember just like looking beyond him

(44:22):
at these trees, because we had these big, huge trees
up on the hilltop with us that a lot of
my men were taking cover behind, and the tops of
these trees that looked like they hadn't been touched since
the prehistoric era. Um, they were just getting blown to
smithereens like just crazy. And I remember looking to my
left hand, which was shaking, and it's just like kind

(44:44):
of lane in the Afghan dust, and I could see
rounds landing between my fingers, like like the level of
fire that that we were being hit with was like
nothing i've ever seen before felt before like it. Like
I felt like laying there on the ground with one
of my soldiers on top, Like if I moved even

(45:04):
one centimeter to the left of the right, I get shot.
I And that's how heavy the fire was. Remember looking
to my left and I see my platoon sergeant Greg Greason,
and his back is like covered in blood and he's
pointing to himself like saying that he's hit. And all
around my perimeter, I had five gun trucks on the
hilltop that day, and I had twenty four soldiers on

(45:25):
the ground along with one interpreter. But all along the perimeter,
at every one of my trucks, almost everybody was hit.
Like my platoon sergeant was head he's my number two
and chain of command. UM squadly or Phil Baldwin was
shot in the leg. Um. He wasn't really trying to
deal with that injury, but he was trying to furiously
stop the bleeding of his team leader, Bennett Garvin, who

(45:48):
was shot in the arm. I watched Mike Emrick up
on the gun, up on his fifth the caliber machine gun,
up on his truck. He got shot in the head,
fell on the truck, popped back up without his helmet on. Um.
I mean it was all hell was breaking loose. Within
within sixty seconds of getting attacked that day, almost every
key meter in my opportune had been hit, including myself.

(46:11):
And as I sat up, like the stalter of the
kid that had like brought me back stat me up straight,
and I remember feeling it's like clear liquid leaking out
of my nose and my ears. And I didn't know
it at the time, but it ended up being like
strebral spinal fluid. I had fractured my skull very slightly
um after getting blown up, and I just remember thinking, well, okay,

(46:33):
I'm not bleeding, I must be something else, and got
up and got back into the fight. And I'm trying
to figure out at this point, like how many people
are injured, how many of my trucks can drive, what
weapons systems are up versus down? How many rounds of
ammunition that we have left, Like I've got to get
the artillery at the base firing back on these guys.

(46:55):
I should be calling for air support. I got to
get back to my truck to do it. All. Um,
looking at those hilltops that I had called for fire on.
Lisa the enemy had emplaced, uh, three machine gun nests
on each hilltop that I called for fire on. So
they had six machine guns dialed in on our position,

(47:16):
and they were firing in in what was like an X,
like if you had to draw an X over my hilltop,
My hilltop was right where that where the X intersected.
So they had us in a wicked crossfire. And they
were at an elevated position, so they were hitting us
with what's called plunging fire. So they were arching the
rounds down on top of us. Um. The reason why
people do that is because if you're like taking cover

(47:37):
behind a rock or something, you want to be able
to like drop the round in on top of them.
So it just minimizes minimizes your an enemy's ability to
take cover. And I'm watching them hit us with plunging
fire and thinking like, holy hell, like how the hell
do they know how to do that, you know, And
I'm watching the guns, the support by fire positions that
they had, the two separate ones. They weren't just firing

(48:00):
all at the same time. One gun would fire and stop,
the next gun would fire and stop, the next one,
you know, and so on and so forth. And the
reason why they did that is because if they fired
those guns on like a cyclic rate, their barrels would melt.
So they were firing and letting their barrels cool. It's
like all the way up and down the line again,
never fought like that. That's what we do, Lisa, that

(48:22):
that's how we fight. And so the enemy had hit
my position with air burst mortars to keep the head
keep our heads down, while they simultaneously in placed two
separate support by fire positions. And the next step is
I'm trying to like unpack everything that's happening. And really,
like when you're in a moment like that, it's like

(48:44):
remember like you ever looked through like a kaleidoscope when
you're a kid, and you turn the kaleidoscope and you
see all those colors move around like that, it's all
sort of happening at once. That's like that. It's like
being like that. It's like combat is like that, a
million different things happening all around you all at once.
And I'm trying to figure out what they're gonna do,
and I'm thinking, oh my god, like a viour them,

(49:05):
I'd attack and no sooner did I did? I think
that they did from both of those hill tops. Two
platoon sized elements like forty men plus so rushing down
those hill tops and up to our position. But it
wasn't just like a human wave attack. Again. They were
one fire team moving, the other one shooting, and they

(49:28):
were bounding and with squad leader like giving fire team commands.
It was the craziest thing I've ever seen. So I
ended up get into my truck and calling for fire.
I called for fire danger close on our position, which
essentially means like right on top of us, ourselves. The
whole intent of that is to just try to keep
them off of us and give our give give my

(49:50):
men some time to react, reload, consolidate, reorganized, flight back.
And I'm watching these rounds land with ruthless efficiency and
like vaporized like these guys as they that they they
bound towards us. And it didn't matter how many rounds landed,
they had people to replace them. It's just it was
just an unrelenting assault in our position, and they got

(50:11):
so close to us that that we had to blow
claim more minds, like we put claim more minds and
around our positions just in case, like we're about to
be overrun. So we're like blow and claim more minds,
like people. All my squad leaders are saying they're going
black on ammunition. Every member of my comple tune is hurt.
I've got all these casualties out there stranded. You know,

(50:33):
I'm watching my medic try to carry one of my
one of my squad leaders back to the casualty collection point.
He lifts up this guy. I watched him get shot
in the face. He falls down. Um, I think my
medic is dad. He's just Jose Panto has this kid
from Mexico. It came to America because he loved He
loved the country and wanted to serve the country. And
I remember he got shot in the face. Wasn't even

(50:55):
a citizen of the country. Who's supposed to get a
citizenship July four, a month later, I'm like, my god,
he just got shot before he came to become a
US citizen. And but he got back up. The entire
left side of his face was was completely destroyed. But
he got one of my squad leaders to the casualty
collection point. Um, that was the kind of day it was.
Lisa and we That fight took probably eight at least

(51:21):
eight hours. We dropped probably eleven two thousand pound bombs
and at the end had to bring in a B
one Strategic Lancer, a B one bomber to drop like
probably ten more. And what had ended up happening, Lisa,
was that I called for fire on those target reference

(51:41):
points earlier. But it looked what we had come to
learn that the enemy at night had planned to attack us,
and I had hit him just before they were going
to attack, And so it was like hitting a hornet's
nest with a baseball bat or something. They were already
in position ready to attack at us. I just hit
him before they hit us, which I guess the hindsight being,

(52:04):
I'm glad that I did, because it would have probably
not gone as as good for us as it did,
as even though it wasn't I mean, all things considered,
it wasn't good, but I would have much I was
glad that we attacked first, you know, and every one
of my trucks was was destroyed. They had to be
towed off the hill top uh um that and got

(52:27):
back to the base uh that day after like that
long long firefight. And I think like every member of
my platoons, I treated we took another platoons trucks and
went right back out after the enemy, like after we
after we got back, went right back out after them
to hunt them down. Um. And we said in that night,
and we did. We hunted them all down and we
and we got them. We killed probably oh man, I

(52:51):
probably killed probably killed like a hundred people that day,
like bad guys trying to attack us and so um.
But that's the out of deployment. That the kind of
deployment that we had, it was absolutely hell. You know,
I look back on it, like you asked me, how
did you do it? And the answers, I have no
freaking clue. I can't believe I lived through it. I

(53:11):
can't believe I made it through all that, you know, Shota,
as we recount this and as you you look back
and and you know, talk about those times, and you know,
we talked about Ukraine going on now, you know, Taiwan.
What should our lessons what lessons should we learn from
Afghanistan as a society. What do you hope that politicians learned?
What do you hope the country learns from our time

(53:32):
in Afghanistan? Just be more careful with America's sons and daughters.
You know, I I know, I know that freedom is
worth fighting for, freedom is worth dying for. America. My god,
if we were attacked, I'd be the first in line,
ready to ready to fight back. Um, but we should

(53:55):
not be getting ourselves locked down in the fights that
take forty years, costs tens of thousands of American lives
or or wounded Americans, people whose lives are changed forever.
You know, if you lose a love one in Afghanistan,
the ripple effect from that is profound. You have family members, moms, dad's, sisters, brothers,

(54:19):
spouses that will never see that person again. And the
whole that that leaves in in people's hearts and the
void that it leaves in their lives is something that
it lasts forever, like every second of every day and
and again, please don't misunderstand me. This is not like
a poor me thing. Again. I would do this again

(54:41):
in a second, but every second of every day the
war in Afghanistan is with me. Doesn't mean that I'm broken,
has nothing. You know, I'm fine, I can handle it.
I do it all again. But it's like it's like
spy wear on your computer. It runs without you even knowing,
you know, UM, like my troops that I lost that
Afghanistan first thing I think about when I wake up

(55:03):
and the last thing I think about when I go
to sleep. And over twenty years in that fight, lost
so many people in that country that I wish we're
still here. UM. And I think, what's even more tragic
than that is that And however many combat deployments that
my men went on, and and they there are some
of my soldiers even went on combat deployments after the

(55:25):
one that I took them on. UM. I mean, we
probably we've lost in my small unit, we've lost more
people to suicide than we have to combat. What does
that tell you about the way in which we take
care of our soldiers. There are our men and women
who serve this country here at home. Not not that
the v A isn't amazing, Like I'm I'm grateful and

(55:46):
glad that we have the v A. UM, but the
problems that we face here are far greater than you know,
maybe going to see a doctor or you know, being
given some drugs in a in a paper bag and
hey sent on your way, you know, on behalf of
a grateful nation. The problems that veterans face here at
home are largely existential problems, cultural problems that I think

(56:11):
America as a country needs to face. Um. And so
what I'd like I'd like to see is that I'd
like to see our politicians be more careful with America's
sons and daughters. Number one, Um, I'd also like to
see America like our country as a whole. And that
means like these little communities that we all live in,

(56:33):
like do everything that we can to recognize for men
and women and serve and that, and I think it
needs to we need to go beyond like thank you
for your service. Like I think we need to to
bring these people like into a high school gymnasium and
have them tell their story if they're willing, in front
of a bunch of high school students, so that those

(56:53):
kids not only learn about what it means to defend freedom, uh,
the legacy of that soldier and the people that that
person lost lives on in the and and the people
to hear that story. Like as I think as a society,
we need to do more with regards to bringing our

(57:15):
our men and women home. And so yeah, be more
careful with America's sons and daughters in American society getting
in the fight from a cultural standpoint to appreciate and
love our bets. Well, that's why I really wanted to
have this conversation with you, you know, one not only
to just you know, obviously to honor that you know,

(57:35):
those who have served and have lost their lives serving
this country and defending this country, but really just sort
of bringing awareness to what it takes and what you
guys go through, and why we should be judicials and
why we should be careful with our our people's lives.
And I think our you know, our lives are the
or military men and women or our own people, like

(57:56):
their lives, that's the most important thing, right that's a
most cherished asset, Like we off the bunch of weapons
whatever beyond in Afghanistan. Obviously that's a challenge, but it's
the lives, it's our people that we should cherish and
be careful with. And so, you know, that's why I
really wanted to have this conversation with you about that.
And again, your your petun was sober received purple hearts

(58:16):
for wounds they incurred in battle, and I wanted to
get you on this real quick before we go. You
talked about sort of that that brotherhood that brought you
guys together day in and day out, didn't matter what
you're facing. You know, you looked beyond. It wasn't about
looking at you know, race or religion or any of
these other things. You just saw him as you know,
your brother, more or less. Right. And now it's like

(58:37):
we're sort of injecting all these things in the military,
whether it's critical race theory, whether it's things like you know,
gender pronouns, and what kind of impact does that have
on on our military? It's devastating. It's devastating because again
it's not like the military is not about diversity, Okay,

(58:57):
like it, I'm grateful to have intellectual diversity in my
platoon I'm in, or in my units that I commanded.
I'm grateful to have racial diversity or people from a
lot of different backgrounds, like that makes us better. But
the problem with a lot like critical race theory being
injected into the military or some of these other like

(59:20):
I got these people with their pronouns and their bios
and stuff and all this other stuff, and like, hey,
do what you wanna do. But the military is about
unifying beyond those differences, not celebrating them so any times,
Like the whole point of going through basic training, right,
the whole point of it, Lisa, is you go in
there an individual. You know that you come out a

(59:42):
member of a collective team. The whole point, the reason
why you have drill sergeants screaming in your face and
yelling at you the whole time is to whittle down,
break down your sense of individual self and teach you
in a very like rubber meets the road kind of
way that the individual doesn't matter here anymore. What matters

(01:00:02):
is the collective and you're only as fast as your
slowest person. And going to Afghanistan the way that we
did and experiencing the things that we did. If if that,
if our dedication to our team and our unit wasn't
first and foremost, we would have not survived. Guarantee you,

(01:00:24):
we would have not survived. And so this focus on oh, like, oh,
look how diverse we are, because this is a strength.
Yeah it is, but it's only a strength, and in
a military, if you unify beyond it, that's where the
strength is. And so I think it's I think it's dangerous.
I think it's real dangerous is there anything else you

(01:00:46):
want to leave us with before we go. A lot
of people you're gonna see a lot of people on
Memorial Day talk about like, well it isn't for barbecuing,
you know, And I would just say, like, you celebrate
Memorial Day the way that you want, because is you know,
I feel like my soldiers who haven't been a who

(01:01:07):
you know, who didn't make it back, they don't get
to celebrate at all, you know, And I think it's
incumbent upon all of us. I think it's really our
duty and responsibility to live freely and and and enjoy
the freedom that they sacrifice themselves to protect. I mean,
of course, you know, if you get a minute, like

(01:01:28):
you know, if you're drinking a beer, or walking on
the beach, or reading the book, or just sitting on
your deck or watching your kids play, like just stay
a sign in prayer and just for for the men
and women who didn't come home. But you celebrate the
way that you want in America because that's what the
men and women who sign up and volunteer to serve
this country, that's what they gave their lives to do.
So just just don't forget, never forget them and and

(01:01:54):
have a have a good Memorial Day. Sean, It's an
honor to have you on the show. You are a hero,
and I think you so much for your service or
and just sharing you know, what you went through in
Afghanistan and the bravery of your platoon with my audience
and me, And thank you so much for coming on
the show. I really appreciate it. Thanks for having me, Lisa,

(01:02:22):
Thank you so much for listening to this episode. I
think I was one of the most fascinating conversations I've
ever had with anyone in my entire life. And I
just think it's so helpful towere it's left back with
Sean about what you went through with his platoon and
what show many people went through in places like Afghanistan
during a time of work. You know, we're either disconnected
from it, you know, when we're here in America and

(01:02:43):
we're living her everyday lives and they're out there on
the battlefield, you're fighting for freedom, fighting for their own
lives and the lives of the rest of their platoons.
So I think what better way to honor at the
fall and than talk to someone like Sean for now.
I hope you enjoyed it. I loved it. I want
to thank you guys were listening. I hope you enjoyed
the podcast. Tell your friends, tell your family, you know,

(01:03:03):
share on social media. We'd really appreciate it. And I
also just think anyone who's listening who has served, or
who was a family member who has served, and if
you have a family member whos paid the ultimate sacrifice,
I'm so sorry if you're lost, and I'm praying for
you today. Uh And be sure to listen every Monday
and Thursday. The Truth with Lisa Booth