LLP #122: Combat Common Sense

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What skill do you think soldiers use most in combat? If your answer involves shooting or physical fitness, you might be surprised by the truth revealed by two Iraq War veterans. In this deeply personal episode, Eric and Matt draw from their infantry experiences to explain why critical thinking and situational awareness—not marksmanship—proved most valuable in modern asymmetrical warfare.

Through vivid stories from their deployments, they shatter Hollywood misconceptions about combat reality. When enemies don't wear uniforms and blend with civilian populations, success depends on split-second decisions made by teenagers with the weight of lives on their shoulders. "You had 18, 19-year-old kids having to make very, very quick and correct decisions on the spot," Matt explains, detailing how street smarts often superseded formal tactical training.

The conversation takes thought-provoking turns as they discuss the psychological aspects of warfare, how military hierarchy practically dissolves under fire, and why sometimes choosing not to shoot saved more lives than engaging would have. They explore how each generation of warfare creates unique challenges—from World War II's hedgerow fighting to Vietnam's jungles to Iraq's urban complexity—while reflecting on the surprising post-war development of Iraq compared to Afghanistan.

Perhaps most compelling is their nuanced perspective on respecting enemy commitment without agreeing with their ideology, and recommendations for books like "On Killing" by Dave Grossman that explore combat's psychological dimensions. Whether you're a military history enthusiast, a veteran, or simply curious about the human experience of modern warfare, this episode offers authentic insights rarely discussed in mainstream media. Subscribe now to hear more conversations that bridge military experience with everyday American values.

Book recommendations:
On Killing
By Dave Grossman

Ordinary Men
By Christopher R. Browning

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back everybody.
This is Eric and Matt and thisis Life, liberty and the Pursuit
, your beacon of freedom and theAmerican way of life.
Tune in every Monday for a newepisode as we dive into the
world of liberty and what makesour country great.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
Welcome back everybody.
This is Eric and Matt here withLLP.
You're home for all thingsnormal in a world of craziness
and debauchery.
In the world gone mad.
Hopefully we're the beacon offreedom that shines a light on
all the crazy things going on inthe world what's going on?
rock and roll, johnny, rock androll so today's uh show is going

(00:35):
to be really fun.
You know, we've been takingdown a bunch of, uh random ideas
here and some of these aregoing to be pretty interesting.
But, uh, we decided today, uh,to do our show on what skills
are used in combat the most.
This is kind of an interestingtalking point because I think
that it's going to bring somethings to light for many of you
and I think people have thissort of preconceived notation,

(00:56):
matt, about what being in combatis like and what a soldier's
job is and what your duties are.
And you know, everybody sees,you know the varying types of
different soldiers, right, likethere's always the picture of,
well, either someone's aninfantryman or they're like a
cook, like that's it, that's theonly two jobs in the military,

(01:17):
and like there's so many things.
So we're going to discuss someof the niceties and finities of
it and give some of ourexperience from our time in the
sandbox.
Of course, there's going to bea lot of other things we're
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Um, how's your week been?

Speaker 3 (02:50):
dude, my week has been absolutely great.
Um, you know I'm back trainingregularly as I can uh back in
the wrestling room, back in thejiu-jitsu mats.
I mean it's it's been one ofthose phenomenal weeks.
Everything's going good.
It's a rare occasion, but whenit happens it definitely is
awesome.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
I wish I could say the same.
It's been a really crazy weekfor me.
There's been a lot going on andeverything.
Some of you that follow me onTwitter especially and I may
have posted a few things over onInstagram as well but some of
you know that my trainer, jamescersei uh, pitbull, the guy
that's in all of my videos withme, um, when I'm doing lifting

(03:31):
and stuff he passed away lastweek, um, and it was really
unexpected.
You know, we all really didn'tknow what to think there and
it's just, you know, he wasn'treally that old and for us it's
like it was very sudden.
You know he wasn't really thatold and for us it's like it was
very sudden.
You know, like we just had alifting session that morning.
Everything was going well, wewere doing some monster squats,
things are looking great, andyou know, you just never know.

(03:54):
You know when it's your timeand, of course, the energy in
the gym this week was justcompletely different.
You know, of course we hadlifting sessions, but it's like,
you know, there's always thatkind of thought, that like he's
always going to be there with us.
You know, and it's always hardwhen you lose someone in that
type of way in that capacity,when it's unexpected, you know

(04:15):
when someone's, you know whenyou expect it.
It's always different than itbeing a surprise and you're like
, oh wait, I just talked to himor something.
So it's really tough.
And you know, my, my um, mythoughts and prayers obviously
go out to the Searcy family andto all the the folks at team
Pitbull.
And you know, we're going tokeep training.
We got some meets coming up.
We're not going to quit.

(04:35):
We're going to keep hitting theground, running and training
hard and we're going to trainjust like he's there yelling at
us the whole time.
So you know, that's, that's allwe can do.
But, uh, it's always tough tolose people and those of you
that have been following me onuh twitter, especially uh iraq
veteran 88 88 on twitter.
If, if you dare, uh, follow meover there spicy, yeah, some of
y'all have been following meover there.

(04:56):
Um, y'all know, you know Iposted some photos and some
memorial things and you know Ipost a lot of my lifting videos
over there.
So, um, yeah, that sucks.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
So pretty crappy week there yeah, I remember when you
, when you told me about thatman, it's uh, and I know the
feeling you're talking about.
It's like a somber feeling oflike you know you just talked to
this person or you were justwith this person, and then you
know, they, they pass awaysuddenly, uh, it is a different
feeling than you know when it'sa planned, uh, a planned death,

(05:26):
as you say because, yeah, yeah,at least you like you're
expecting it, right?

Speaker 2 (05:30):
yeah, like when my grandpa was in the hospital.
You know he's in the hospitalfor a couple of days, two or
three days.
You're getting updates from thedoctor and it's like okay, you
kind of know you have time toprepare for it, you're mentally
preparing that something's goingto happen.
But but when it's just sosudden you get a call and what?
You think it's some sick jokeor something.
Not that someone would jokeabout that, but damn you know,

(05:50):
yeah, it just sucks.

Speaker 3 (05:52):
Unfortunately, that's kind of what you, that's the
feeling you get when you'redeployed in a war zone.
It's only those types of alerts.
It's not like, oh, we just wentto the d-fac or we just were
eating chow the other day, andthen it's like, bam, right, no
more someone goes out on a, on a, on a you know a stick for the
day, and they don't come back.

Speaker 2 (06:12):
Yep, and, and that's that's very difficult to cope
with.
We are going to talk a littlebit about that.
Um, to kind of like brightenthe mood before the show gets
rolling, I do want to share this, uh, this crazy picture I took
earlier.
So, okay, matt, yep, I wasbehind this vietnam veteran the
other day and he's in his oldmobile, you know, and and it was
just covered in all these crazybumper stickers and I'm like,

(06:36):
all right, I gotta take apicture of this.
So I blur the guy's tag, put iton twitter.
So matt has not seen thispicture yet, so you're gonna get
his reaction to this picture inreal time.
And, uh, while he's looking atthe picture, I'm going to pull
up my tweet.
And, uh, I, I tweeted, okay,and I'll.
I'll show you the tweet hereshould I open the picture now?

Speaker 1 (06:57):
um.
Hang on one second, so allright so here's the caption for
this picture.

Speaker 2 (07:01):
matt you ready?
I bet there's a 30-year-oldFolgers can, full of camel butts
on the floorboard and agovernment issue 1911 stuffed
under a 1990s issue of ShotgunNews.
All right, you ready?
Yes, okay, here you go.
Here's his reaction.

Speaker 3 (07:15):
Let's see.
Let's see, pull her up.
You are 100 correct.
That is exactly what I wouldimagine, just like a folgers tin
can full of cigarette butts andlike some dip spit yeah, yeah,
there's like a jar of ears inthe trunk.

Speaker 2 (07:38):
A dead prostitute like there's something, oh man
like there's something going on,like I, I would give anything
to go through that car.
Like there's no telling what'sin that car.

Speaker 3 (07:46):
Yeah, you got to watch out for the Vietnam vets,
man.
They're a different breed.
They could care less aboutanything you say or do.

Speaker 2 (07:53):
Yeah, and there's always a Jane Fonda sticker.
Yes, right Is that?
They're not Fonda Jane?
That's right, they're not FondaJane, that's clever man.
And some stickers have been onthat car for a hot minute.

Speaker 3 (08:06):
The car itself.
The paint is like peeling, it'slike faded.
You're like, okay, he couldcare less.
He's on his way to probablypick up another pack of camels.

Speaker 2 (08:18):
I mean, isn't there something to be said about that,
like the veneer of yesterday.
That's why that picture isintriguing to me, cause it's
like, yeah, it's, it's cool tosee all the random stickers.
I mean, of course there's asecond amendment, and you know
every reference to Vietnam youcould ever think of which is
it's just great, you know.
But there's something aboutthat that you know.
There's something about theforgotten moments of yesterday

(08:41):
that get brought up and youthink about, about things that
happened in your life and andeven that, like his car is just
a rolling retrospect of hismilitary career or whatever, and
you think, like you begin tothink about things that you did
and things that you went through, and it's like like, wow, you
know that those guys really gottreated like crap when they came
home.
You know, the Vietnam vets got,got treated rough and uh, it's

(09:04):
just crazy like how someone cansurvive and and stay in good
spirits and go about their lifeand and be normal and be
productive members of societyafter all that.
And not to say that theyshouldn't be or wouldn't be, but
I guess all I'm saying is, uh,like, wow, you know some of
those guys that go on to havegreat careers and successful

(09:25):
companies and, you know, makesomething of themselves after
all of that and seeing all thattraumatic stuff, and not
everybody makes it through thatsystem.
You know, that's what's somessed up about it.
I mean, there are probablyVietnam veterans right now that
are on the streets, don't haveanywhere to live.
So there's a wide range ofpeople who successfully made it

(09:46):
through that system and some whodidn't.

Speaker 3 (09:49):
But you could say that about guys with the GWAT,
the experience the global war onterrorism the same thing you
have.
There's quite a few, a ton ofguys that are homeless right now
that went through the samething, and there's also highly
successful people that came outof that um.
On the other end, you couldeven go as far as to say that

(10:10):
you know that the va systemprobably went through more
changes because of the g watt,the 20-year g watt war, than
with the vietnam war, becausewith the Vietnam war Cause, with
the Vietnam war, they were justdenying everything.
I mean blatantly obvious thingslike agent orange, like all

(10:32):
kinds of stuff that you knew100% was the result of being in
Vietnam and being doused withthese chemicals and the chemical
agents.
They were just denied, denied,denied.
But now, with GWAT, you can'treally hide there.
Then they had the wholepresumptive like, hey, if you
were in the area, we're justgoing to assume that you have
these problems.

(10:52):
Um, and that was honestlyprobably the easiest, the path
of least resistance, instead ofhaving everybody come in
individually like all right, youwere in Afghanistan, you were
in Iraq.
We knew we had, we were usingthese chemical agents.
We knew we were using thesechemical agents.
We knew we were doing burn pits.
We knew we were doing this andthey're just blanket.
They blanket awarded peoplethat applied for it, so it

(11:15):
worked out for some people andthen not so much for others.

Speaker 2 (11:17):
Yeah, and you know I recently went into the VA
hospital.
Well, I went in for the firsttime about maybe a month ago to
get my little card.
You know they give you that,yeah, the health card, the
health card.
So I went in to do that.
It was a very smooth process.
But I remember the first time Iever set foot in a VA hospital
was a month or so ago and therewere a lot of Vietnam vets in

(11:40):
there and a lot of them werelooking pretty rough, you know,
and and of course they all havetheir hats on and their patches
and there's just something aboutbeing, you know, in a hospital
that can be rather depressing.
It can be, you know,off-putting, and hospitals on
their own are already kind of adepressing place to be in when
you see people that are not well.
But when you see veterans thataren't well and they're all

(12:01):
veterans that's even harder,because it's like each one of
them has their own story andtheir own experiences and and
you think, damn like, what washe like when he was my age?
What was he like when he wasyounger?
he was a hard-charging marine ohyeah, like you're not just
looking at guys that are justyour run-of-the-mill people.
You're talking, you know folksthat went and did some really
courageous things and you know Imean there, I mean there was

(12:23):
one guy from World War II.
It's like, wow, not a lot ofthose left really.
I mean the World War II vetsare.

Speaker 3 (12:29):
You know, they're getting long in the tooth you
know, I honestly don't know howmany more are even still alive.
Not that many, yeah, it'sreaching the point now where,
even like the guys that jumpedin and enlisted when they were
like 13,- because and enlistedwhen they were like 13 because
you saw a lot of those stories.

Speaker 2 (12:45):
Yeah, they lied about their age?

Speaker 3 (12:46):
Yeah, they lied about their age they're jumping in
there at the age of 13.
Even those guys are up in the90s now.

Speaker 2 (12:50):
Right.
So to run into a World War IIveteran is a pretty rare thing
these days.
I mean, I ran into a World WarII vet in the grocery store
about maybe half a year ago andhe looked pretty old.
I mean, he had to have been inhis 90s, but he seemed like he
was getting getting aroundpretty good, you know.
So it's just crazy.
But um, I digress.

(13:10):
The point is is that you know,when you go in these
institutions and you see, um,all these veterans in one place,
it it does wake it.
Wake you up like wow, you know,hospitals are bad enough
already, but then when it's allthe vets too, and you and you
think of what they were in theiryouth, you know it's like wow,
it really does make you realize,like, like it's coming for all

(13:31):
of us.
And that's a scary kind ofthing.
You know, when you're youngerand you see someone who was a
true badass in their youth, andthen you know, and they're, and
they're older, it's like itcomes for us all.
And um, and I went and did astress test for the first time
this week I mean not to get intoa whole bunch of business, but
it's interesting they shoot thisradioactive goo in your arm and
you run on the treadmill andthey take pictures of your heart

(13:53):
.
You know I've never hadprocedure done like that before,
so I will say that myexperience so far with VA
medical care is actually quitepositive.
You know, I've had goodexperiences.
All the doctors have beenpretty good, the scheduling's
pretty quick, the turnaround ispretty good.
All in all I can't reallycomplain with the, with the
service I've gotten through theVA.

(14:14):
Now I know a lot of veteranshave um had issues and have
complained of certain issues.
But I can say in Atlanta I mean,look, knock on wood, but the
service is pretty dang good.
I mean you walk in the door andthere's like literally a
concierge in there, like aperson in a jacket that'll say,
what are you trying toaccomplish today?
And they'll like literallyescort you anywhere in the

(14:35):
building you need to go.
I mean, imagine some 80,90-year-old person who might
have a little dementia going inthere and it's like they have
literally people that will justliterally take them wherever
they need to go by hand, like,hey, this is where you need to
go and help them.
It's, it's a very well runsystem.
I mean, what they have going onin Atlanta is pretty good.

(14:56):
I can't speak for all the VAhospitals, but Atlanta is pretty
legit.

Speaker 3 (15:00):
So I haven't had any experience yet going to the VA
hospital.
I do plan on making anappointment to go check them out
, but I just haven't had time todo it right now.
So eventually maybe I'll get toexperience how good the system
is here in LA.
Yeah, I mean, let me know whatyou think.

Speaker 2 (15:16):
I mean I've been twice so far and so far my
experience has been pretty good,awesome.
So, we're going to kind of getto the meat and potatoes of
today's show.
I wanted to.
I want to talk about thatvietnam vets car and I wanted to
give a shout out to my trainerand tell y'all how my week's
been going.
You know we like to do thatevery other show or so, because
you know we usually will film acouple of these shows a week, so

(15:38):
we'll only have one every othershow.
We'll kind of talk about theway our week has been, because
that's, we're only reporting forone week.
We typically will film two inone sitting when we can.
But so we want to talk a littlebit about these, these skills,
right, cause everyone has thissort of preconceived notation.
I'm shuffling some notes hereY'all just give me a second but

(15:58):
everybody has these sort ofpreconceived notations about
what they think of combat andwhat we really have not really
to blame but to thank for that,I suppose, is Hollywood.
I mean you know the moviesportray a certain type of
dramatized thing.
I mean you look at movies likeSaving Private Ryan and a lot of
World War II movies especially.
They really dramatize combat inWorld War II and look, world

(16:22):
War II is an ugly war.
Okay, I mean it was bad.
I'm not saying that war isn'tbad and I'm not saying that
Hollywood doesn't do aneffective job of showing the
brutality of war.
Of course, yeah, war is verybrutal and when you think it,
when people think war, that'swhat they think of.
They think of battlefield andtrenches and guys in uniforms,

(16:45):
and you know there's the bad guy, there's you, and it's like,
okay, we're going to fight thisout.
Like you know, they think it'sso cut and dry and black and
white, and in many cases, yes,it obviously is.
It is black and white.
But you know, the war, the Iraqwar, was really nothing like
that.
I mean, you have no idea whothese people are, where they are
.
They don't wear uniforms.

(17:05):
You know you're not going to beable to identify them.
So it was a very different typeof situation for guys like us
and I think that what we wind up, matt, we get sort of
pigeonholed into the mindset ofyou know, and I think this is
just a natural tendency of youknow, the human condition is
that we will tend to want to saythat our experiences are so

(17:28):
difficult and unique compared tothe generations that are going
to come after us, or maybe eventhe generations that came before
us.
I know there's a popular memeout there that shows like the
World War II grandpa and likethe you know Vietnam dad, and
then like the GW watt kid, andthey're all generational
military infantrymen.

(17:48):
Yep, I know you've seen thatmeme.
Some of y'all may have and youknow.
Oh well, you don't understandwhat it was like, or you know,
and it's always every generationthinking that what they went
through was way worse than anyother generation right right.
How could we ever think thatwhat we went through was worse
than being in Vietnam or WorldWar II?

Speaker 3 (18:07):
Yeah, no, you can't you can't.

Speaker 2 (18:09):
But again that somehow becomes the kind of
calling card of being in war.
Is that?
You know, people want to maketheir experience.
Oh, it was the worst.
It was the worst thing thatever was Like for the wars that
might come in the future foramerica.
Are we gonna be like, oh you,you kids do it, and blah blah no
I personally am not gonna havethat view because personally I I

(18:31):
think the face of war haschanged in such a crazy way that
whatever's coming is gonna beway worse than what we went
through.

Speaker 3 (18:37):
I mean I drones and shit, no way yeah, no, I agree,
and the way that I look at, Iwould never, would never look at
, you know, the World War IIguys or the Vietnam guys and say
, or even let's just say thePanama, if you want to, if we
throw Panama in there, I wouldnever say that we had it worse
than them.
They didn't have the body armorthat we had, they didn't have

(18:59):
the up-armored Humvees that wehad, they didn't have the
Bradleys, they didn't have theFox vehicles, they didn't have,
uh, the bradley's, they didn'thave, uh, the fox vehicles, they
didn't have the strikers, theydidn't have, you know, close air
support.
Not the way that we had it,like we could jump on the horn
and we'd have like two apacheslike inbound in like 30 seconds,
man, like these dudes.
The way that it worked overthere, if you guys don't know,

(19:22):
when we go out on patrol, we, welet, we let the talk know,
we're leaving the gate and thenimmediately we check in with at
that time on that rotation wasviper element.
So viper element was the apachesthat fly around and also, uh,
the marine, the marine version,the cobras.
So they you would have, theywould be constantly in the area

(19:44):
and then you just check in withthem.
Hey, this is, you know, thunderelement for whatever going out
the gate, and they would checkin.
This is viper two, three.
I have 150 rounds of he, I havefour tow missiles, you know, at
your service.
And that was it.
And then they let you know.
Hey, they're in the area,you're leaving the gate and if

(20:05):
you need it they'll send it.
Yeah, um have guns.

Speaker 1 (20:09):
Yeah, man like have guns, we'll travel that's the
way it worked.

Speaker 3 (20:13):
Um, now, like I would imagine we never had to call on
them, thankfully, um, but theylet you know, having that
security blanket, knowing thatthey're in the area.
And I've got tons of pictureswhere we're like rolling down
the msr and there'll be like anapache, just like cruising along
next to your vehicle.
They're like, hey, what's up,guys, I'm here, like, and then
they just fly off and do theirthing.
Um, I'll try to find.

(20:35):
I'll try to find a couple ofthose pictures.
If I can find a couple of thosepictures, I'll I'll throw them
up on the on the youtubes man oranytime, like especially at
night.

Speaker 2 (20:43):
If you ever heard an a10, oh yeah, shoot.
You know there was a few timesover there I could hear that.
You know it's like somethingbad's happening to somebody, but
they got it, ain't me.

Speaker 3 (20:53):
But but you know to your point, you know they didn't
have that type of ability likewe did.
Like, yeah, but at the sametime, when you look at it, like
they weren't, they weren'tgetting blown up with fricking
500 pound IEDs like every otherday either.
So it was, it's, it's, it's akind of a trade off, right.
But when you look at you knowthe totality of it, like what's

(21:16):
what was?
You know what skill set do youthink you use the most in combat
?
Right, that was the, that was,that was the general question.
And only speaking from aninfantryman's standpoint, I
would say, your criticalthinking ability, especially in
the GWAT, because they weren'tin uniform, they weren't.

(21:37):
There was no really indicatorson who was the enemy and who
wasn't.
It was.
Hey, you really have to focuson what's their posture.
Are they posturing in anegative way?
Are they doing anything that'skind of like funky?
And even as a lower enlistedwe're not talking leadership,
but even at lower enlisted youwere just as responsible for

(21:59):
making sure nothing happened as,say, your platoon sergeant,
your squad leader, your PL plyou had just as much
responsibility of calling a ducka duck as they did like hey,
man, look at that and then makesure.
But to me that's what it was.
You had 18, 19 year old kidshaving to make very, very quick

(22:22):
and correct decisions, yeah,like on the spot.
And to me that you know, nobodyknows how you're going to react
in war.
You could, you know you couldhave the most charismatic leader
you know.
You're like, oh man, I wouldfollow this guy into combat and
he'll fold.
You know like he'll absolutelyfold in combat.
And you, at the same time, youhave guys that you think you

(22:46):
know wouldn't be thatwell-rounded or have that
leadership ability in combatthat just always makes the right
calls.
Man, like I've seen it time andtime again Like you have guys
that they just never make a baddecision.
I don't know if it's justbecause you know they're natural
or they're critical thinkingabilities on another level, but
I've seen it Like, hey, we'regoing to do this, we're going to

(23:08):
do that, and it works out everytime.
And, conversely, I've seen theopposite of guys that just
always make the bad decision,you know.

Speaker 2 (23:17):
That's a really good point, you know.
I think you hit the nail on thehead.
I would say that at least thewar we were in and the job that
we did is as being, you know, um11 charlie, I was a mortar man,
so was matt, and I would saythat probably the most important
skill is just common sense yepI mean, like there are certain
things in those situations thatcan't be taught.

(23:40):
I mean, you can go out and reada book and do a whole bunch of
training and you can, you know,learn how to use a mortar system
.
You can learn how and read abook and do a whole bunch of
training and you can, you know,learn how to use a mortar system
.
You can learn how to react tocontact and you can learn you
know um squad movements andindividual movement tactics, and
you can learn all of these.
You know light infantry and andsmall unit tactics and things
like that.
Um, that you can read out of abook that was probably written

(24:02):
by people a lot smarter than me,but at the end of the day,
you're not going to use any ofthat in those situations, like
you.
There was no organized umwarfare.
It wasn't.
It was very asymmetrical inthat.
It was basically just a giantguerrilla warfare campaign on
their part.
And and and think about it, whywould you attack a larger, more

(24:25):
well-equipped, highertechnologically advanced force
with what you have at yourdisposal?
You know you're going to getfreaking ripped to shreds.
So the only way you can do isto try to blend in with the
populace and become sort of justa fly in the ointment, and
that's what many of them did,some of them quite successfully.
So it becomes much more aboutyour street smarts and your

(24:46):
everyday common sense thatbecome much more of a factor.
I mean, if something doesn'tsmell right, it ain't right.
And there were situations whereyou know you would kind of get
this, you know, maybe feelingyou were walking into an ambush
and sure enough it'd be a damnambush like and that's what it
would be.
I remember, um, that one nightit was I'm going to omit names

(25:08):
here because I really wouldn'twant to tell anybody's name
other than ours in today's showbut there was one of the guys
that I was on a stick with onenight.
He and I always kind of laughabout this situation but like we
had these passenger vansblocking the road and sure
enough it wound up being exactlywhat you thought it would be.

(25:30):
I mean, if you have a convoyand you're rolling down the road
at three o'clock in the morningand you've got some passenger
vans turning like this, blockingthe road, what do you think
that is?
Are they selling popsiclesthree o'clock in the morning?
No, they're probably notselling popsicles.
Is'clock in the morning.
No, they're probably notselling popsicles.
Is it nuns asking for, you know, donations for the church?
Probably not a bus full of nunsasking for donations for the

(25:51):
church.
Okay, it's somebody that thathas some ulterior plans, uh, for
the evening for you and youknow.
It's just that common sensekind of thing.
Like there's probably somegunner that would just think
that that's okay and wouldn'teven think anything of it or
wouldn't raise the alarm or sayanything and you know, doesn't
have the.
You know, you gotta have somestreet sense.
Like, okay, we're rolling up inthis area where there, where

(26:15):
the road kind of goes in thislow spot in the road, there's a
big bridge overhead, there's, uh, there's retaining walls on
either side that have good cover, that are made out of big ass
pieces of stone.
Okay, so relatively bulletproofagainst small arms fire.
So you're thinking all right, ifI wanted to shoot at a convoy,

(26:36):
where would I be?
That's where I'd be.
Yeah, you have the advantageyou have a high ground.
They're going to be lower thanyou, they're going to be coming
in.
You've got a good spot tobottleneck them and stop them.
And if they're not ready andprepared, yeah, you're in a
situation where you may have theadvantage.
And, believe me, when theseguys, you know they don't have
night vision, they don't havethermals, they don't have

(26:58):
Apaches following them around,so they've got to take every
opportunity they can to try tofind an advantage over you.
And that's really.
You know, combat is aboutoutmaneuvering and outthinking
your enemy, and everybody thinksthat it's all, you know, like
in the movies, you know, guyswith machine guns and running
around.
I mean, yeah, that's a factorof course, but it's really about

(27:23):
outthinking your opponent.
I mean, it's a game of chess.
That's why they call theinfantry the queen of battle,
because if a war zone is a chessgame, the infantry has the best
ability, light infantryespecially to move wherever they
want, wherever they canphysically go.
And what does a queen do on thechessboard?
She moves any way she wants to,right.

(27:45):
So that's why they call theinfantry the queen of battle,
not because it's the mostimportant piece on the
chessboard, because it's themost versatile piece on the
chessboard that can do anything.
Nobody wants to lose theirqueen in a game of chess.

Speaker 3 (27:58):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (27:59):
They're losing that linchpin.
They're losing that one piecethat can completely change the
way that the chess board is evenlooked at.
I mean, winning a game of chessis about kind of leveraging the
power of your queen.

Speaker 3 (28:12):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (28:12):
You know what I mean and uh, or sometimes using her
as a distraction to think thatshe's dangerous, when you really
maybe you're bringing a fewnights in or you're you know,
you might have a plan.
There's a plan.
Every game of chess is a littledifferent.

Speaker 3 (28:26):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (28:27):
But it's just interesting to think about that
they, even though we wouldpicture them as uneducated dumb,
whatever they weren'tuneducated and dumb.
They're actually smart to figurethose things out.
If you can't physicallyovercome an opponent through

(28:48):
sheer numbers, technology,better weaponry, whatever it may
be, you've got to overcome yourenemy with superior tactics.
And that requires common sense.
You got to kind of think likeall right, we're into combat
that Matt.
What do I have to think?
What would I do if I were intheir situation?
I sure wouldn't be just on theside of the road, flat ground

(29:08):
with 500, 600 meters of openground in every direction.
That's suicide.
You've got to think where wouldthe enemy be?
That's where I'd probably beSure enough my hunch was correct
and you know I'm not going tosay what happened that night,
but let's just say that you knowI'm not going to say what
happened that night, but butlet's just say that you know I
was correct let's just say theteam made it back.

Speaker 3 (29:29):
Yeah, we did, we did.
Yeah, you did all your ownconclusions.
Yeah, draw your conclusions.

Speaker 2 (29:35):
But it's just.

Speaker 3 (29:35):
But that required common sense it does, and that's
something that you know you getfrom being in combat, like
being there.
So I I distinctly remember whenwe were rotating out, we had
the guys that were replacing uscome in and to see the way that
they operated when they firstget there.

(29:56):
It was just you never know howmuch you learn yourself from
being in theater than the guysthat have never been there,
because, like, we're out theredoing our patrols and we're
doing everything else and theyjust they stick out like sore
thumbs.
They're not doing the thingsthey're supposed to be doing,
they're kind of oblivious tolike everything.

(30:17):
Most importantly, when the,when we were getting mortared,
we, after being mortared for solong, like a year straight, you
have a very good idea of what'sclose and what's not close.
So when these rounds startimpacting the guys that have
been there, we're kind of likeall right, you know it is what
it is, but these guys are likejumping for cover.

(30:39):
We're like that's, that'sreally far away, you don't have
to worry about that.
Um, but you didn't know atfirst either, not at first.
No, so that's where I wassaying, like you could tell, you
grow and you learn so much justby being there and experiencing
it.
Then the guys that are comingin and hopefully, like they are,
they're going to learn and yourjob is to teach them before you

(30:59):
leave.
But you only have two weeks toteach them before you get out of
.

Speaker 2 (31:03):
Dodge, and even if you do try to explain something
to them, it's like sometimesthey don't listen.
Like I remember I think it was101st they, they, they replaced
and, like I remember I think itwas- 101st.
They replaced us.
It was elements of manydifferent groups of people, but
I remember specifically seeingthe Screaming Eagle patches, so
I know it was 101st guys.
And wasn't it like the firstweek they were there they did a

(31:25):
like ruck march out on the mainhighway.
Yeah, they got chewed up downand we tried to tell them like
guys, you have vehicles, youhave armor vehicles, you don't
need to.
You don't have to do that Likeuse the technology at your
disposal.

Speaker 3 (31:40):
They were doing a present.
I remember they were doing apresence patrol and they were
like, oh, we just got in there.
And guys, just so you know,this was early G watt.
Well, we call early GWAT OIF-3.
So it wasn't like this was the101st, 10th deployment, which
I'm sure they did deploy many,many, many times.

(32:01):
Just not those guys.
Just not those guys.
Those guys were like, hey,we're 101st and this goes back
to World War II.
They're like oh, we're goingoff our reputation here.
Our reputation is we got thispatch where it's screaming
eagles we are forced to bereckoned with.
And they're like we're going todo a presence patrol, we're
going to let them know we're intown yeah, and their lt was like
some 22 year old kid or 20 20year old kid.

Speaker 2 (32:23):
They got rocked, don't know nothing they got.

Speaker 3 (32:25):
They got absolutely rocked yes, they did and we told
them not to do it.
We're like listen, we run thisroute every day.
It was, you know, one of thelike.
We get ied mortared all thetime.
You do not want to go on footon this route.
Go on foot, got chewed up, man.
There's a reason we did we triedto tell them well, there's a

(32:46):
reason we do recon by fire onthat particular route, like that
was one of the only routes.
We would like recon by fire acertain area because, like they
like to hide in.
It was like right where themarsh area was.
So it was like a wadi, uh, likesome some marsh area and I like
to hide in that marsh area.
So we would just, yeah, justlay it down every time we go
through there I know exactlywhat you're talking about.

(33:08):
Yeah, it was right where youmake that right hand turn yeah,
get it go onto the dirt, yeah.

Speaker 2 (33:12):
Yeah, it was kind of like a low-lying area, that,
where the canals were, yeah, andit was one of the areas that
they had sort of dammed up alittle area in the canal to kind
of get some water kind of goingout a little more they would go
out into the water.

Speaker 3 (33:25):
They'd sit there either with a switch or like a
machine gun.
Yeah, just try to fire at usfrom the grass or try to hit
switches from the grass andwe're like, we're like, f that
and we're just gonna.

Speaker 2 (33:35):
We're just gonna rake the whole area.
Yeah, when we started rakingthe area that kind of stopped.

Speaker 3 (33:40):
Yep.
Yep, funny how that how thathappens.

Speaker 2 (33:42):
You didn't have any problems after that, you know
there's something really weirdand unnatural about taking a
machine gun and just spraying anarea, because it's like we're
taught.
That marksmanship is like youknow, you're gonna see something
, you're gonna launch aprojectile and you're gonna hit
that something right but likemachine gun marksmanship is not

(34:02):
quite the same it's its ownthing, man machine gun.
Machine gunning is is kind ofthis weird art form like, uh,
you know, have you seen thosepainters that just take paint
and they flail their body around?
They just do this and sling thepaint everywhere.
That's kind of what being amachine gunner is like you're
just sort of slinging and youknow where the canvas is
generally in that area and youknow you're going to sort of

(34:24):
paint I don't know a little bitof a horizon little bob ross
actually.
Yeah, you're going to paint alittle, but it's just such a
weird feeling like I think thatone of the areas that I think
civilians tend to get, you know,they don't quite see the side
of it, is that imagine rollingdown highway 75 right here, you

(34:45):
know, modern highway right, andimagine, you know, being on a
truck with a ma Deuce or a 240and just going, well, there's no
threat right now, but we'rejust going to shoot anyway, yep,
and you know, and that's aweird feeling, like you're
clicking off at safety andyou're going I hope nobody's
over there taking a whiz orfishing, or I don't know what

(35:07):
they might be doing, but I hopethey're not there.
And in my mind I would wouldalways think like I hope they're
not dumb enough to be therebecause they know when we go by,
that's what we're going to do,but that's the reason you do it.
So they know not to, you knownot to try you know, that's
right there might be other guysthat aren't gonna.

Speaker 3 (35:22):
They're not gonna empty a belt and into that marsh
there's no other reason for youto be wading out into a
marshland and be hiding in thegrass, yeah, other than if you
had nefarious reasons well, Imean it and I guess that's kind
of part of it, like when peoplesay the skill sets for for
combat, a lot of it really isthe mental part of it.

Speaker 2 (35:43):
It's, it's the, it's the mental, it's also sort of
the mental drudgery, like youknow.
There might be a period of timethat goes by for a week or two
or more when nothing happens.
Oh yeah, oh god.
And that's the worst, becausethen you, then you begin to get
complacent.
Yep, and you know that'sanother thing is not be, you

(36:04):
know, getting into a mode ofcomplacency and, um, it's a
tactic that the enemy uses.
They go, go, all right, let'scool down, re-equip, lick our
wounds, come up with a plan,let's just ignore these guys for
two weeks, and you're thinking,well, have they given up?
Is the war over?
I mean, you know, you think youbegin as we were, you begin to

(36:28):
think, well, are they done?
Have they had enough?
You know, and then all of asudden, something pops off again
and it's like it's thosemoments you've got to be really
watching out for, because you'rethinking well, maybe they've
moved to another area ofoperations, or maybe they're out
of equipment, maybe they're outof bombs or they're something.
Maybe they're waiting on UPS toshow up with a resupply, or

(36:50):
whoever it is.
What would be their version ofUPS?
I don't know.
They're waiting on the deliveryman from Syria, the Syrian guy
to show up in the camo jacketsmoking a camel.

Speaker 3 (37:02):
I guess that's their.

Speaker 2 (37:03):
UPS man to show up with their Russian ordinance or
whatever they're using.
But I will say and look, Imight catch possibly some flack
for this opinion.
I catch flack for a lot of myopinions.
But the truth is I tell peoplewhat's on my mind and what's in
my heart and I don't reallyquite really care what people
think about what I have to say.

(37:25):
But I will say that you know,looking back on that whole
situation in retrospect, lookingback on that whole situation in
retrospect, I'm not going tosit here and say that I agree
with any of their thoughtprocess, of what they're trying
to accomplish, or I agree withtheir religious ideas or
anything like that, or theirreligious ideals or their morals

(37:45):
or principles or values or whothey are as people.
But it is very safe to say thatyou do have to respect their
tenacity and their willingnessto follow through on what they
want to accomplish and therespect they have for their
religion, because a lot of thatis very religiously motivated

(38:07):
for them and you have toremember that in their mind
they're doing something that'smorally pure to them.
I don't have to like that.
I have my views on what itmeans to be a Christian for me,
you know, versus their religion.
But I'm not over there thinking, well, I'm doing this as some
crusade or some Christianundertaking, but they're

(38:29):
thinking, hey, this is myundertaking to commit jihad or
whatever.
And you know what?
As much as it pains me to say,you have to respect their level
of commitment to what theybelieve in.
And when you look at today'sworld and all of the morality
that surrounds religiousmovements, whether it's

(38:51):
Christianity or Judaism orBuddhism or whatever, every
religion has a moral statutethat it kind of lines up with,
and sometimes those sort ofmoral statutes they don't quite
mesh well with Western culture.
Okay, that's all good and fine.
I can agree to disagree.
I can say that I don't agreewith certain aspects of a

(39:13):
religious movement or whatever.
But one common denominator, onecommon thread between those
different movements and thosedifferent religions, is that
some people really do believethe Kool-Aid and some don't.
And I will tell you, thosefolks have drank the Kool-Aid.
They are head over heels on thepath and I think that that's

(39:36):
something people should view asbeing very dangerous, because
those folks really believe whatthey're doing and that may be an
unpopular opinion.
I'm not saying I agree withthem or I admire them, but I do
respect them, and I think that'sanother thing that people have
to remember with all of this.
Stuff is like when you begin todehumanize your enemy in a way

(39:59):
that you know every war does itright.
I'm not going to say some of thederogatory comments, but you
know what they call theVietnamese soldiers.
You know what they called theGermans in World War II.
You know what they called theGermans in World War II.
Every soldier, enemy soldier,has some nickname in an attempt
to dehumanize them, to make iteasier to hate them, and I think

(40:21):
sometimes that's the wrongapproach.
I never fell into that trap.
Of course there was names forour enemy too, but I didn't use
those names.
I just, you know, for me, Ithink it's important to uh, to
respect your enemy because they,they're willing to die for what
they believe in.
And, uh, you know, I think thatyou have to at least have the

(40:43):
respect from human to human.
Just ignore the political,religious, moral, ignore all of
that and just go hey, thisperson has the stones to try to
do me harm.
You know, and I think from thataspect I mean you gotta hand it
to them like they were brave,like to stand up to us, because
you know we, we were way betterequipped than they were, a

(41:04):
hundred percent, way better butyet they still achieve some of
their goals, and there'ssomething to be said about that
level of commitment.
So never underestimate the levelof commitment your enemy has to
the cause.

Speaker 3 (41:17):
You know, I would agree and I think that there is
a level of tenacity that theyshowed.
Now, in retrospect, when youlook at where Iraq is at now,
current day, they are miles,light years ahead of Afghanistan
.
So, you know, if you look at,you know the cities in

(41:41):
Afghanistan, how they're playingout, it still resembles what
you would consider, in this dayand age, a third world country.
However, if you go and you know, you look at Iraq I've seen,
you know, youtube videos andlike documentaries of how Iraq
is now and it looks very likethe major cities at least look

(42:03):
very similar to what you wouldfind in like the UAE, dubai,
kuwait very modern, clean, verymodern clean.
Um, they, they closely resemblewhat you would see in a modern,
uh, a modern kuwaiti or uaecountry.
Um, very surprising, becausewhen we were over there, we were

(42:27):
like this place, no way thisplace is coming back from where
it's at.
Like it was like bombed out,dirt floors, no power, like no
running water.
It was, for all intents andpurposes, it was a de facto
third world country and now youlook at it and you're like, holy
crap, like this country madethe like a very, very fast

(42:49):
turnaround.
Um, so you can't say you knowwe didn't help, we?
I have a strong feeling thatthe us did kind of push them in
the right direction as far asdeveloping, developing the
country.
Now, government wise, I have noidea.
I don't.
I don't keep up with theirgovernment.
I don't keep up with how theydo.

(43:10):
You know even what type ofgovernment they have.
I don't care, I'm done withthat.

Speaker 2 (43:15):
You know I'm I do have enough problems, yeah.

Speaker 3 (43:17):
We did our thing over there.
Yeah, Boom, Um, but I would saythat, um, outside of critical
thinking cause it was a thinkingman's war.
That was a hundred percentthinking man's word.
That was not a, uh, a bruteforce war, at least in my
opinion.
How we experienced it, it waslike you had to be super sharp

(43:38):
and if you weren't super sharp,usually it didn't go out.
They kept you back.
Like they had those guys thatjust didn't leave the wire.
They stayed inside.
They sent the guys out.
They knew what they were doing.
Um, second, I would say is likea second, but like what would
complement that, what wouldcomplement that critical
thinking?
It would be like just makinggood leadership, good leadership

(44:03):
decisions, like being a goodleader because how you, even as
junior enlisted, you know whenyou're out there, how you
interact with the civilians, howyou interact with the local
population, can determine howsuccessful you were in that area
.
You know, lots of times thekids will come up to you.
You know there's times whereyou see guys just like pushing

(44:23):
people away, like they don'twant nothing to do with them.
They're like get away If youcan make that decision and you
can say, hey, these people aregood that decision.
And you can say, hey, thesepeople are good.
Um, you know you can help themout, they'll help you out.
Um, that's just from myexperience.
I will tell you there was onereally weird experience.
I'm not going to name names,but we were out in the middle of
doing something.

(44:45):
I think it was during the.
Uh, like during the the voting,when they were voting the first
vote after, like, saddamhussein had been like captured
or something.
It was super dangerous time tobe outside, yeah.
But and I and I remember wewere, we were outside, we were
kind of like blocking offsomething.
And then people startedgathering around the vehicles

(45:08):
and we were like, oh crap, likethis isn't good because, like
they're civilians, like you'rejust gonna, you can't just start
shooting people, right, they'recivilians.
And one of these, somebodyreached up and grabbed one of
the dude's rifles.
Like he was, like he had hisrifle out, and the guy reached

(45:28):
up and grabbed the barrel of therifle.
And I'm looking at it fromanother vehicle.
I'm like, oh, my God, this dudeis about to get shot.
But that goes back to thatleader.
It was a leader that he grabbedand he made that decision Like,
hey, I could shoot this guy inthe face if I wanted to, but I'm

(45:50):
not, but you shouldn't, yeah,so he just pulled his rifle back
, like pulled it back.
I forget what he did.
He definitely yelled at him,but it was just like to me that
was the right decision.
Like, yeah, the guy probablywasn't very smart by reaching up
and grabbing the rifle, but hewas really in no danger of

(46:10):
losing it.
He definitely had more pointsof contact, he had more control.
He probably realized, like thisguy but that's what I'm talking
about like just having thatcommon sense to like not do that
kind of stuff.
Obviously he wasn't a threat,right, he's just like grabbing
it probably doesn't like a gunbeing point at him and then
reaches up and grabs it, boom.
But yeah, I remember that I waslike holy crap, the guy could

(46:33):
have repainted the vehicledefinitely yeah and that, and
we're not talking the type thatI was talking about earlier
either.

Speaker 2 (46:40):
We're talking a very direct uh, brushstroke there.
You know respect is universaland I think that you know.
It's very important to rememberthat.
You know, no matter what rank aperson is in in the military,
in in a war, you know whenyou're all in danger.
Everyone's the same rank,really.
And that sort of goes out thedoor, and I know that sounds

(47:00):
crazy, but when bullets startflying, you don't really care
what someone's rank is anymore.
All it is is hey, you're a setof eyes that has my flag on your
shoulder.
Therefore, you know your word'sgoing to be gospel.
If you say the boogeyman'saround the corner, boy, I'm
going to believe you, and itdoesn't matter if I'm an E8 and
you're an E2 or vice versa.
All I know is I'm going totrust that person's word.

(47:22):
If he says it's dangerousaround the corner, I'm going to.
I don't care what rank thatperson is.
At that point, when the bulletsstart flying, flying all that
goes out the door, you startusing first names.
It's like you don't even atthat point, you're just
americans, and it strips awayall of that formality.

(47:43):
And the formality is importantin garrison because it
establishes the hierarchy of whois a designated person to be in
control of the situation.
Who's a designated, you know,leader, right?
I mean, you have to have youknow it's.
It's no different than who'sgoing to be the captain of the
kickball team today or thefootball team, like we're gonna.
All right, pick a, pick a team,you know, pick, pick two sides

(48:05):
and pick a captain for each team.
It's, it's the same thing.
You're picking the captain forthe team.
But if you're playing dodgeballand the captain gets taken out,
uh, in the first wave ofdodgeball, well guess what?
You still have to go on andplay the game.
And and that's what war is ifif you're out there and the
leader gets taken out, wellguess what.
You're the damn leader now,like everyone's the leader, but

(48:28):
at that point the point is justto survive.
So there is a hierarchy ofdiscipline that we try to
achieve in garrison, but allthat goes out the window when
it's dangerous, and I think thatyou know leadership at that
point really becomes about.
Are you the person that's doingthe right thing at that moment?

(48:51):
That is the right situationalcircumstance, you know, is the
right thing to be doing in thatcircumstance, and I don't want
to, I don't really want to talkabout this in a lot of depth,
because I don't want to.
I don't want to talk about it,but there was a situation that
we were all involved in and andyou know it wasn't something I

(49:15):
did, it's something I didn't do-Sometimes it be like that, okay
.
So it wasn't something that Idid that helped the situation.
It's something I chose not todo, just like your situation.
Okay, could this guy have, allright, grab the rifle.
Could he have probably shot theguy he could have.
Would that have been the rightthing to do in that situation?

(49:36):
Probably not.
Now all those people are goingto be like what the heck and all
hell is going to break loose.
So by not doing something, hemight have actually saved
everybody's life.
The situation I was in we werehit with an IED, there was a lot
of crap and junk in the air andwe had kicked up a bunch of
dust and it was, and there was abig old marshland out there

(49:58):
with grass everywhere and thevisibility was absolute shit.
And uh what.
You could have easily panickedand just started shooting
whatever, like just laying down.
You know, as a machine gunneryou can just be like, well,
screw it, I can't see a lot, I'mjust going to.
You know, pretend the enemy'sthere, but you're trying to
maneuver these vehicles out of akill zone in the middle of this
marsh, which, if a one, one,three dumped into that marsh,

(50:21):
there's no telling if you'd getthat some bitch out or if it
would flip over and fill up fullof water, which happened to a
Bradley crew by the over there,and you know.
So I made the decision I'm notgoing to shoot at all, we're
just going to maneuver.
And then I'm like I'm talkingto the driver hey, pivot, pivot,
pivot, pivot, pivot.
Okay, and now straight, what doyou do?

(50:42):
You shift from?
All, right, well, we don't seeanything to do violence against.
So the next best thing is wehave to go.
Let's get the hell out of here.
Right, we're going to leave,we're going to, we're going to
we'reate.

Speaker 3 (50:53):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (50:54):
Hey, we're not hurt, Nobody's hit, the vehicle still
running.
That's what we have to go on.
We don't know where they are.
We don't even know if they'reeven still there.
So you can't get drowned in thefacts of well, I'm going to
have to just start shooting, soit's what I didn't do.
That ended up being the rightthing, and that's why that
common sense comes into play.
You have to think logically onyour feet in real time and do it

(51:19):
without screwing up.
That's right, and that's notindicative of past wars.
It is, but in a much differentway.

Speaker 3 (51:29):
I would agree and I think that you know sometimes
you have to do that because,let's say, for example, you did
start shooting and you were thelead vehicle.
What if I hit my own people?
Well, what if the driver didn'tgo?
What if the driver said, youknow, I'm going to hang out here
cause he's laying down fire?
And then now you have the guysbehind you, the second vehicle,
the third vehicle, stuck intheir position and can't move,

(51:53):
and then you get hit with asecondary ied because you
started shooting.
So I mean, you just have to,you have to play the room.
You know you got to get outyour first.
Your first goal is to get out,like to escape the kill box, and
then you can do what you needto do imagine an infantry unit
in World War II.

Speaker 2 (52:10):
Okay, and they have an order to move forward and
take an objective a smallvillage or a town.
Go to this town, see if theenemy's there settle in, set up
a defensive perimeter, hold thetown until reinforcements get
there, move in the line.
You know, hey, hopping alongFrog leapfrogging Leapfrog.

(52:31):
Okay, you see a giant field infront of you.
Are you going to cross thatfield?
200 meters Could be a machinegun nest every freaking 50 yards
and the wood line pointing yourway.
You have no idea if the enemycould be there.
So it's like that's a muchdifferent decision-making

(52:51):
process than what we wentthrough.
And yeah, imagine being theperson who's in charge of making
that decision.
It's like, well, if we goaround, it might take an extra
four or five hours and they mayfind us out, they may know we're
there and then set up abushwhack when we get over there
.
So it's like what do you do?

Speaker 1 (53:12):
Wait till night.

Speaker 2 (53:13):
Try to sneak in, maybe, like what do you do?
Wait till night.
Try to sneak in, maybe moreoften what do you do?

Speaker 3 (53:17):
more often than not, in world war ii there was
definitely machine gun nests setup because they were counting
on you being lazy.

Speaker 2 (53:23):
They were like, hey, these guys aren't going to cut
four hours around, they're goingto go through the field and
we're going to cut these boysdown and that's why france was
such a bloodbath, because allthe hedgerows and all those
close-in hedgerows they had infrance, you could have the enemy
on the other side of thosehedgerows and not even know it.
It's like literally being in adeath maze in that place and
that's what happened and thetanks could barely get through,

(53:46):
so you couldn't get armor inthere.
So it's like you had to do itthe old-fashioned way and put
boots on the ground and walk inthere and find, get your way
through those hedgerows.
It's like you could hearfighting.
You know, maybe a few hundredfeet away or something, and
think, oh well, it stoppedsomething you know.
And then you get through thehedgerow and there's oh crap,
there's germans.

Speaker 3 (54:02):
You run right into you run right into and they're
like me to you, you know so thathad to have been a royally
scary situation to be in.

Speaker 2 (54:10):
let's see, like me, as a GWAT vet, I cannot imagine
what that felt like for them tobe in that situation.
But they don't know what itwould feel like to be in our
situation and the type of mentalgymnastics that we would have
to play.
So every war has its sort ofunique and terrible things that
the soldiers go through.
So every war is different, andeven every war is different for

(54:32):
each soldier, depending on theirversion of that war that they
got.

Speaker 3 (54:35):
You know, what's funny is I was just thinking
about this the other day and Idon't know why, but it's like a
shower thought.
So you guys have like theshower thoughts, where you're
like in the shower washing,you're like have that little
thought, yeah, and I'm like, andI was literally thinking of
this I was like, man, you knowwhat we didn't have to worry
about in Iraq with CQB, likeroom clearing.

(54:56):
We didn't have to worry aboutpeople shooting through walls,
because everything was likeeither like cinder block,
concrete like, or really thickmud Wasn't conducive to like,
you know, taking fire throughwalls.
But then I was like, well, well, what about the guys in world
war ii?

(55:16):
You often see it, they just,they'll, just, they'll just rake
the room right through thewalls.
Vietnam rice huts, man, theseguys are just shooting right
through the house.
But g what we have to worryabout?
That we knew like, hey, this isa solid brick wall, they're not
going to sit here and spraythis room, but conversely, we
can't.
A solid brick wall, they're notgoing to sit here and spray
this room, but conversely, wecan't spray the room either,

(55:37):
because it's just going tobounce around like a, like a
little meat shredder.

Speaker 2 (55:40):
The difference is we know that we understand that
distinction.
They don't, they don't care,they'll just rip in the room.

Speaker 3 (55:46):
They don't care.
But I mean, that's like it'sjust so funny how you brought up
that analogy, cause I wasthinking in the shower.
I was like man, that's onething.
I was like good thing, we haveto worry about that.

Speaker 2 (55:54):
Continue washing my hair you know and you know I
know we're kind of getting ontime on today's show, but I will
say that you, you hit the nailon the head.
Freaking perfect Matt showerthoughts like that completely
closes the loop of thisconversation in a way that that

(56:16):
people sometimes will never beable to truly understand.
Like yeah, having like 15 yearslater, having the thought of
hmm, I wonder if I would havedid this or did that and you go
through these scenarios of.

Speaker 3 (56:31):
Well, what if I?

Speaker 2 (56:31):
wouldn't have did this, what would have happened?
And that sticks with you and itscrews with you and, quite
frankly, those memories come upand sometimes those memories are
not good.
Okay, it's good when the memoryis hey, we, no one got hurt, it
was sketchy, but hey, we'reglad we walked away with all our
fingers and toes, everyone'salive.
And you go, wow, what did welearn here?

(56:53):
You know and and it'sinteresting to have that sort of
internal after action reviewwhere but that after action
review kind of happens for therest of your life.
Yeah, that's kind of the.
The nexus of it is that thatafter action review now becomes
a part of your everyday life,whether you like it or not, and
whether you want to call thatyou post-traumatic stress
syndrome.

(57:13):
I mean, that could be a part ofpost-traumatic stress, or it
could just be being wiser, youknow, being more learned in the
subject, and you kind of youknow, when you become a student
of war, even if it's a limitedwar, even if it's, maybe you
didn't see anything absolutelycrazy, maybe you weren't a

(57:39):
combat MOS, but maybe you wereguarding a chow hall or guarding
something on a dock somewhereor whatever, and you saw mortar
land and hit someone and you hadto help.
That alone, I mean, that'straumatic.
You're still seeing the effectsand the terrible consequences
of war and you know there weremany situations where I think
one of the camps that we were onit was one of the I think the
commissary got hit by a mortaror something, or was it the px.

Speaker 3 (58:02):
There was a that was liberty and they hit it was
either striker it was, strikerit was camp striker got hit by a
mortar.

Speaker 2 (58:11):
Of all places rockets .
It was a rocket.

Speaker 1 (58:13):
It was rockets that got hit and I remember anybody
get hurt um, not that, not thatwas in our unit.

Speaker 3 (58:19):
But you know, the wild thing about that little
story is our platoon sergeant'swife happened to call.
It was weird.
They called my family and said,like I was in the px when the
rocket hit which was a completelie because I wasn't anywhere
near it.

Speaker 2 (58:34):
Yeah, but then I call home to talk to my family and
they're just like freaking out,but I know exactly what you're
talking about, because Iremember that, caught up in this
weird thing, I was out andnowhere in nowhere when that
happened.
See, again, it's like you thinkof these things.
I haven't thought about that in20 years.
And here I am remembering.
Okay, what would someone onpost would have dealt with that

(58:58):
maybe I didn't deal with, andthat was one instance that came
to mind.
Mind, it was like you know,imagine you're guarding a px and
it's like, and you're thinkingI just load, and you know,
unload and load my gun on dutyevery day, don't fire a single
shot.
It's.
But hey, someone's got to guardthe px yeah I mean bottom line
is someone's got to stand watchin certain areas, you know, and

(59:21):
century duties, right, if youever wonder those guys were mps,
weren't they?

Speaker 3 (59:25):
it was, uh, so the mps, no, the mps did like convoy
stuff it was it was the airforce special uh security forces
, the air force security forcesright were the guys that were
doing gates, like the main gate,to come out and stuff those
guys when we would leave camp.

Speaker 2 (59:42):
I remember one time they were test firing their
machine guns off the tower andthey had m60s.
Oh boy, they were test firingtheir machine guns off the tower
and they had M60s.
Oh boy, they were test firingtheir M60s.
And I looked up there and waslike is that a pig?
And it's like these guys arerunning M60, man, like the Air
Force guys had M60s.
I'm like okay, it's just weirdto think like there's some, you
know, grunt Well Air Force,grunt well air force grunt

(01:00:08):
cleaning the gas puck on an m60,you know like those things get
nasty, they do, you know.
And uh, that's just wild tothink like we're still using
that freaking thing it's alittle bit more complicated than
the 240, you know yeah, I thinkthat I think the bolt on that
gun can be put together a coupleof different ways on the early
version.
So I think they they correctedthat problem later on.
But it was always interestingto hear that pig talk, you know,

(01:00:29):
because I had a verydistinctive rate of fire over
the 240.
Yep, good times, man.
I mean like this could probablybe a two-hour podcast if we
really want to jump in the weedshere.

Speaker 3 (01:00:39):
But just unintended just just so you guys know, when
eric was like, oh, he was outand I was in, um, to give you
guys an idea of the way therotations worked, we would break
down into different squads andeach squad would go out for I
think it was like four or five.
It was a long, it was like aweek.
So we would do one week out andthen we would come back for

(01:01:01):
like two days, like two days.
So we would do 48 hours likedowntime and then we would
rotate back out for like another, like three to five days,
depending on what that missionwas, um, and there was obviously
four squads.
So then we would all likerotate.
So at some point in time therewas like one or two squads out,
one or two squads in, and whenyou had your downtime you just

(01:01:23):
left to do, to deal with yourown devices.
There wasn't really too much todo, like, like, do your
maintenance on your vehicles,clean your weapons.

Speaker 2 (01:01:31):
It wasn't really downtime, I mean, you still had
responsibilities to take care of.
But I would say, um, you know,you could go to the gym work out
If you wanted to.
You could go to the chow hall,maybe to you could go to the
chow hall, maybe go to the pxand buy a you know dvd player or
something.
You know that little.

Speaker 3 (01:01:51):
Yeah, I mean, at least have some sense of
normalcy, but, um, there's alittle black market that's
outside the gate.

Speaker 2 (01:01:54):
Yeah, yeah a little little black market.
You know, um, yeah, it's justcrazy.
I could tell so many storiesabout even that side of it, but
I won't because I know we'rekind of running on time here.
But but it's been a great showI've really enjoyed.
You know the amount that we'vegot to kind of reminisce on some
of this stuff and you know thepoint of today's video, I think,
was just to talk about the sortof psychological factor of

(01:02:18):
warfare and what it has onsoldiers.
There's a book by Dan Grossmancalled On Killing.
That's probably a good book toread if you want to read more on
the psychological proximity ofdeath and war.
It goes to talk about thedifference that, like, say, a
bomber gunner you know in WorldWar II would look down through

(01:02:41):
the little gunner site and dropbombs on targets and things,
talking about the psychologicaleffect that killing lots of
people with bombs would havelittle, very little effect on
that bomber.
But then the sniper, of course,who has a much more personal
relationship with his intendedtarget, right, the psychological
effects of those things.
It's a really good book.
It's dan dan grossman onkilling.
Uh, that's a really good volume.

(01:03:01):
I would recommend uh to some ofyou if you if you want to check
it out.
So, uh, anyway, some readingfor you.
If you want to get into that,check it out.
That's a really good volume Iwould recommend to some of you
if you want to check it out.

Speaker 3 (01:03:07):
So, anyway, some reading for you if you want to
get into that Check it out.

Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
It's a good book, yeah, and there's also another
volume I forget the author of it.
It's called Ordinary Men.
That's a good one too.
That can kind of really put youinto the psychological factor
of warfare.
It has to do with an SS unit inWorld War II on the German side
, and it talks about how theseguys, before the war they were

(01:03:35):
just barbers and just regularpeople.
You know what I mean.
And it goes to show that whenthat group mentality starts to
come into play and thatindoctrination of extreme
measures come into play, thateven regular people can be led
to do, and convinced to do, eventhe most heinous things in the
name of oh well, because someauthority said it was okay.

(01:03:57):
So oh, my officer told me to doit.

Speaker 3 (01:03:59):
therefore it's okay right and you know, and to them,
discipline was a very huge deal.
And you know, and to themdiscipline was a very huge deal
in their military, which is, youknow, which is why the United
States military specifically hasa rule that says you may
disobey an unlawful order.

(01:04:19):
So that type of group think so,that type of mentality doesn't
seep into the, the, at least inthe army side.
So if you have a bunch of guysand they're like hey, I want you
to do this, and you're like no,that's unlawful, that's war
crime, that's this, that's that,so you can, you can put the
brakes on it versus having tolike, follow, follow unlawful

(01:04:40):
orders right.

Speaker 2 (01:04:42):
So that would be another book that I'd recommend,
if you want to check it out.
It's called Ordinary man.
I forget the author, but justlook it up, you'll see it.
I think it deals with thePolish SS unit.
Very, very thought provokingbook because it could really it
really does drive home that sortof groupthink mentality with
violence, and it's interesting,it's very interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:05:00):
It's important to you know, to learn about this type
of stuff, the history, thenegatives and the positives,
because if you don't, it willrepeat itself.
That's the prime example.
Like hey, if history, youforget history, it will repeat
itself.
So we have ourselves as aresponsibility to keep up with

(01:05:21):
this, to read the books, to befamiliar with history.
Thus it happened again.

Speaker 2 (01:05:27):
Yep, I totally agree.
Thank you all so much forlistening on today's podcast.
I know this was kind of a deepsubject matter, but hopefully
enjoyed some of these storiesand, honestly, we could probably
do a whole nother hour of theseif we really wanted to, because
there's so many things that letus know in the comments.
Yeah, let us know if you want usto talk more about some of our
experiences.
You know some of the storiesare lighthearted, some of them
are a little more, a littledeeper, but it just depends on

(01:05:50):
you know, if you guys want tohear some more stories or not.
Maybe we can.
We can break some things downand plus we also have some of
our other buddies that we couldbring in.
I at least two or three I knowof that would love to sit down
with us and and share some crazystories.
Maybe we'll we'll do that inthe future episode you know that
might have to be over a coupleof scotches or something.

(01:06:10):
It may have to.
We have to get a few drops inthere before they start spilling
the beans.

Speaker 3 (01:06:15):
So we were stacking the bodies three.
Nothing like that.

Speaker 2 (01:06:18):
Nothing like that.
But, yeah, this has really beena great episode.
And look, make sure you followLLP on all the different places
that your favorite podcasts arefound Stitcher, spotify, apple
Podcasts.
Also every Monday at 9 am.
Tentatively.
If I upload the show on timeevery Monday at nine o'clock
Eastern Standard Time am we putthe show up on YouTube on IRAC

(01:06:41):
Veteran 8888, over on there onthe YouTube channel.
Also, you can follow me onTwitter at iracveteran8888.
Also, llp on Instagram.
We're over there Life, libertyand the Pursuit, which we need
to probably post more contentover there.
I know I kind of useiracveteran to help push the
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If you want to follow us overthere, maybe we'll put some

(01:07:03):
little clips up and things.
Follow us over there.
Maybe we'll put some littleclips up and things.
But thanks so much for thesupport and it really means a
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And big thanks to the sponsorsthat helped make the show
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If you're interested insponsoring the show, if you'd
like a spot on LLP, send us anemail.
We'll forward you to our peopleand they'll chat with you and
we'll make it happen.
Anyway, have yourselves a greatday.

(01:07:24):
Many more podcasts on the way.
Thanks so much, and Matt, yougot anything else for the crew
before we let them?

Speaker 3 (01:07:30):
go, nope, only that.
If you want to follow us onInstagram, it's LLP podcast
underscore official.
That's where you'll find us andwe post all of our clips there,
so check it out.

Speaker 2 (01:07:42):
All right, y'all have a good one.
We'll see you next week.

Speaker 1 (01:07:44):
Bye everybody.
Thanks for listening to Life,Liberty and Pursuit.
If you enjoyed the show, besure to subscribe on Apple
Podcasts, Spotify and anywhereelse podcasts are found.
Be sure to leave us a 5 starreview.
We'd really appreciate that youcan support us over on
Ballistic Inc by pickingyourself up some merch and
remember guys, dangerous freedom.

(01:08:04):
Have a good one.