Ep. 40 - From Eight Tours In Iraq and Afghanistan to Civilian Life: Stu Sword's Journey - The VetsConnection Podcast

Episode Transcript
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Scott McLean (00:01):
Welcome to the podcast.
I'm Scott McLean.
My guest today is Stu Sword.
Stu is the Chief OperatingOfficer for Fort's Logistics,
located in Coconut Creek,florida.
How you doing, stu?
I'm doing.
Great Thanks for having mecompanies, even though there are

(00:24):
some that are very veteranfriendly.
I try to keep this informativeand pretty much nonprofit based.
But Stu and I we met throughthe Mission United in Broward
County and we had we just had aconversation, we and we hit it
off and Stu had some interestingthings to say.

(00:46):
So he's had some interestingexperiences.
So I thought you know what it'smy podcast, I can bring whoever
I want on.
And he said hey, I'll come on.
Okay, you're on, and here weare.
Here we are.
So, stu, tell the listeners alittle about yourself where
you're from, when you went intothe military, what branch, and a

(01:08):
little bit of what you did,because I know there's some
interesting aspects to yourmilitary career also.

Stu Sword (01:15):
Yeah, for sure, and we'll kind of dissect that a
little bit during the episode.
But again, thanks for having meon For the listeners.
Thanks for tuning in.
Got an interesting story totell.
Hopefully I'll share it alltoday.
If not, maybe we'll have asecond cut followed up with
another episode.
But I've got a lot of uniqueknowledge from my experience in
the military, but also mychildhood.

(01:35):
So I'm a Virginia boy,originally Grew up in Virginia
Beach, kind of bounced around alittle bit, Originally born in
North Carolina but I grew up inVirginia, virginia beach.
A lot of people when you thinkof Virginia you don't think of a
beach.
But I grew up on the beachdoing a lot of surfing and I
found myself in really goodshape.
But also found myself runningwith the wrong crowd right
Hanging out with some kidsskateboarding.

(01:57):
That probably wasn't going tolead to the brightest future.
And one day in the common areahigh school, you know, I saw
some recruiters standing thereand it was kind of the taboo
thing to do at the time, likedon't go talk to the recruiters,
like that's not the cool thingto do, right, I'll make money
off surfing and skateboarding.
But I knew that was far fromreality so I went up to the

(02:17):
recruiters one day and I justasked like, hey, what's some
bad-ass stuff you got and whatcan I do?
And they're like well, you gotto take a couple of tests and
you got to do a couple of thingsand I'll our listeners probably
know they're familiar with theASVAB and stuff like that you
want to do well, because thatsets you up for what you're
going to do in the military.
You can always retake it.
But I think, luckily enough, Ihadn't done very well in high

(02:39):
school.
I'd come from a broken home.
You know a lot of like things Iwas processing as a child, you
know, from a broken home.
So the military became my newfamily at a very young age.

All right, and you went in the army.

Stu Sword (02:54):
Yeah, I chose.
I chose the army.
You know, when I was serving Iwas a little biased to the army.
You know, if you ask like anair force guy, what's the only
branch, they're going to say airforce, and it is, by the way it
is.
And you're an Air Force guy,what's the only?

branch, they're going to say Air Force, and it
is, by the way it is.

Stu Sword (03:05):
And you're an Air Force veteran, scott.
But the Air Force and Armyworked closely together.
Wow, the Air Force came out ofthe Army, the Air Force came out
.
I was kind of thinking MarinesArmy.
I wasn't sure the Marinesdefinitely caught my eye with
their uniform and stuff.
But I started talking to thearmy recruiters about joining

(03:26):
the rangers at a young age and Iwas cross country runner, I was
a surfer, I was teed up to besuccessful in the army.

Right, and so you went in and you went to ranger
school prior or after.

Stu Sword (03:42):
That's an interesting conversation that we could
probably take this whole podcaston.
But yeah, I'm definitely acertified army ranger.
To get to that is is a verydifficult, you know, process.
I'm sure some of the listenerscan can relate to that.
But yeah, definitely went overto the desert.
What?

year what?

Stu Sword (03:59):
year.
I was there for the, so Imissed I was not present for the
beginning of the Afghanistaninvasion because I was actually
in Korea serving over in Korea.
So everyone was chomping at thebit to get over on the army
side, right, cause, like the,the ground force invasion was
coming Right and that's like thegame you don't want to miss,
right?

(04:19):
That's why everyone joins RightTo kind of like get to put the
smack down on someone, right?
You don't know and I tell thisto people that don't know
anything about the military itcould be, you know, the guy or
gal on the National Guard.
It could be your tier oneoperator, delta Force, seal type
guy.
Everyone joins to do their jobright, and when you're going

(04:41):
overseas it's a chance to doyour job on the grandest stage.
So, everyone, when you telleveryone you're rolling out, you
don't see many people lookingto miss the bus.
Now some people don't make thebus for other reasons.
But yeah, I did eight tours inIraq, afghanistan, kind of joked
.
When I was serving in Iraq Ihad the key to Baghdad because
we were doing 15 monthdeployments.
I'm sure some of the listenerscan relate to that.

(05:03):
That's a long time.
It's a long time and onedeployment I distinctly remember
the most is we deployed inNovember of 07 and came back in
January, february of 09.
So take a few seconds andprocess that Two Thanksgivings,
two Christmases, two New Years,not to mention all the other

(05:23):
like holidays in between.
But that's a long time.

Yeah, absolutely.
So you went over there.
Give us some of the experiencesthat you.
You told me that you uh aboutan ambush.

Stu Sword (05:37):
Oh yeah, so we were.
We were fighting pretty muchhouse to house is how the army
would describe it doing asystematic clearance of Haifa
Street and I'm sure a lot of thelisteners can.
They've heard of Haifa Streetor they know about Haifa Street
in Baghdad, iraq, very kineticarea, we would say.
The weather forecast is bullity, right, because there's going

(06:00):
to be some shooting.
It's just a matter of you know,is it the first block or the
second block?
And we had been fighting houseto house and doing rather well.
Premier Army infantry unit outof the 82nd Airborne Blue
Falcons and it's kind of funnyto hear Blue Falcon, a lot of
people call that the buddyfuckers right, but the Blue
Falcons were a very prestigiousunit.

(06:22):
The unit's no longer aroundbecause they sunset it, but the
Falcons still are around, soit's just the red and white.
The blue was the thirdbattalion of the regiment and we
were fighting house to house.
Snipers up high and probably a20-story building and we started
taking contact through an areawe had already have cleared.
So essentially the enemy'strying to encircle us at that
point they're coming from therear.

(06:42):
We've got some fixed to thefront but they're now coming
from the rear.
But the snipers eliminated themquicker than we could say oh
shit, right.
The snipers dropped them realfast.
And there was one guy that theyhad observed on a moped, that
was kind of like yo-yo in thebattlefield and what he was
doing was relaying messages andgrid coordinates and at the time

(07:04):
the snipers relayed to theground force commander, he's
still alive, headshot.
We think we need to detain him.
So the commander put it outover the radio net like hey, I
need two guys to go do an EPWsearch on this guy and secure
him and bring him back up here.
Epw for the listeners.
Yeah, epw would be an enemyprisoner of war.

(07:26):
So you know, even though we canbe rather kinetic, you know, if
someone's wounded and we assessthem as a wounded enemy person,
you know, oftentimes we willlike render them aid.
Yeah, right, but the guy hadtaken a headshot with a 50 cow,

(07:56):
so that's that, it's not goingto end well for him, but he, so
that's that.
Typically the army will searchprisoners with a buddy team.
So we're going to move about400 meters from the main element
, which is still within likesmall arms range.
The snipers can see us.
So initially we're like, ok,this isn't too bad.
But as soon as we get downthere and we're in the open area

(08:29):
of essentially the middle ofHaifa Street, we start taking
gunfire and grenades from everysingle alleyway to the south, to
our rear that we possibly could.
And Specialist Mitchell, one ofmy soldiers who was a part of
my fire team, was hit instantlywith a grenade right.
So now he's wounded, but he'sstill conscious and able to
fight.
We grab this fighter and we draghim to the side right, because
obviously you don't want to bein the middle of the street
while a bunch of gunfire israining down the street.
We get him to the side.
We communicate back up to theground force commander, a true

(08:53):
American, captain Massey.
We called him Ranger Massey andif you're listening, ranger
Massey, man, I love you, you'reawesome, all the troops love you
too.
And he saw what was happening.
The snipers are communicatinglike hey, they're taking heavy
fire down there, grenades arecoming over walls and luckily
enough, me and Mitchell wereboth carrying the 203, the old

(09:14):
school grenade launcher.
So a lot of the sergeants backthen in the 82nd we would all
carry.
The sergeants would have thegrenade launcher Now typically
off your ilmto your militarytable of organizational
equipment.
The sergeant wouldn't have thegrenade launcher.
We just knew it was a veryvaluable weapon on the
battlefield.
So him and I both had about 18grenades we could launch.

(09:36):
And we just started launchinggrenades down every single
alleyway.
But we were now fixed.
The larger element couldn'tmove to us and it's just a
matter of time.
We're going to be, we're goingto be overwhelmed, right, but
we're, we're of the mindset andwe're going to fight, you know,
until we're down to the lastround.
But luckily, very competentcompany commander, ground force
commander, ranger Massey, hecalls in two Bradley fighting

(09:59):
vehicles that were in the areafrom the third infantry division
and I can hear these enginescoming from like around about
three blocks away, right,because they were kind of set up
in like a blocking position.
Like hey, we got some guysfixed.
The snipers were shootingarmor-piercing rounds, right,
and these rounds, you know,sometimes they ricochet, they've

(10:20):
got some kickback and stufflike that.
So they're like, hey, we can'tengage, they're too close.
We've got some kickback andstuff like that.
So they're like, hey, we can'tengage, they're too close.
So we're so close to anycontact the snipers can't even
help us because of the type ofrounds they're firing.
So the Bradleys move up into theposition and, like I said, you
can hear these Bradleys coming.
They came around, not quiet,they're not quiet, they're loud.

(10:40):
They do a 90-degree—now it's atracked vehicle.
It's not a wheeled vehicle,right, but it's got a badass
like machine gun on there, a30-millimeter Bushmaster like
cannon.
It's got some other toys onthere too, of smaller caliber,
and they roll up right in frontof us.
They came around that turn onlike one track, right.

(11:02):
And it's interesting because alot of the light infantry ranger
guys don't like the mechanizedguys.
It's just a weirdcounterculture, right.
But at that instant I reallyhad a very fond appreciation for
them, right, because, as wetalked about the little rivalry
earlier amongst the branches,right, if those guys and those
Bradleys had not come up, Iprobably wouldn't be on this

(11:24):
podcast right now.
I would have been me andMitchell would have been killed
right there.
And they're buttoned up.
So they've got all theirhatches closed and they're in
essentially an armoredprotective vehicle and they are
looking with their thermalsthrough their 30-millimeter
Bushmaster cannon and they seeus on the ground and they just
tilt that cannon like up, down,like north, south.

(11:45):
I see where you're at Becauseyou know a lot of the military
folks can relate.
You got to know where yourposition is on the battlefield,
right?
If not, you're extra vulnerable.
And they point that cannonright at us and give us a north
south and then just start firingfull auto down every single
alleyway, which was perfecttiming because at that point
we're almost out of all of ourgrenades, our grenades Right,

(12:07):
and then one of them backs up asclose as they can get to us and
they drop ramp.
Yeah, so Mitchell, even thoughhe's wounded, great American, is
still fighting, conscious andable to move on his own.
So me and him grab a leg ofthis enemy combatant and and
drag him up into the back ofthat Bradley, of this enemy
combatant and drag him up intothe back of that Bradley.
And at that time we're stillkind of in the elementary stages

(12:30):
of the war, right.
So it's just communicated.
Hey, we've got one friendlywounded, one enemy wounded, and
we're so close to downtownBaghdad, the green zone, the
cash, the combat hospital, thatthose Bradleys just moved
together through the streetstaking us directly to the front

(12:53):
door of the cash.
And as, as we roll up, you knowwe're trying to do, and me and
Mitchell had violated a fewthings that we should have
searched that guy in detailbefore we drug him in the
Bradley right Cause he couldhave had a suicide vest on,
could have had a weapon on whichhe did.
We found it while we're in theBradley right Cause he could
have had a suicide vest on,could have had a weapon on which
he did.
We found it while we're in theBradley Right, but at the time
we're we're so focused on, like,eliminating the threat and
trying to survive.

We couldn't.

Stu Sword (13:14):
We couldn't search the guy, we had to do it in
route.
And so we roll up and I'llnever forget there's about five
surgeons outside and the rampdrops on the Bradley and this
guy you know his brain matter isstarting to run down the ramp.
The combatant he's shot in thehead with a .50 cal and the
surgeons are like where's thefriendly wounded at?

(13:37):
Because we always treat ourfriendly first and Mitchell
walks out.
Yeah, I'm the guy.
He's right here in my leg.
Yeah, yeah yeah, and they'relike all right.
So all these surgeons arefocusing on him and the enemy
combatant's still there.
And then they scooped up theenemy combatant and stuff, but
it didn't end too well for him.
But he had a pistol on him andhe had a GPS device on him, and
in the GPS device were all thegrid coordinates for where they

(14:00):
had all their weapons stored.
Oh, there you go.
So it was a valuable you know,prisoner of war in terms of the
intelligence value so huge andfor that you know, as you do
things in the army, I never didthings for recognition, I just
did things because they were theright thing to do.
But you know, after thateveryone was like, oh my gosh,
that was so badass, like wethought y'all were dead because

(14:20):
there's so much gunfire andgrenades going off, like the fog
of war is a real element.
At that point they know we'redown there but no one can see
because grenades are kicking updust and dirt.
Luckily those Bradleys rolledin so big shout out to anyone's
ever served in a Bradley or the3rd Infantry Division.
Y'all saved my life.

There's an episode that you could probably listen
to.
This kid that I interviewedthat was in a bradley got blown
up yeah I think, and it's.
It's a very, it's the numberone.
Listen to episode on my podcast.
It's a good story, good kid.
You'll probably relate to it inin more than a few ways.
But so you did eight tours.

Stu Sword (15:01):
Yeah, it was a total of eight tours Iraq, Afghanistan
.
I had thought I had served moretours in Iraq than Afghanistan,
but when I was gettingdischarged Iraq, so I got caught
up in the surge of the 15-monthcycle, so you start to lose

(15:32):
track of time.
At that point Some of theinitial Afghanistan deployments
were only like three, fourmonths.
We'd go in, we'd just lay thesmack down on people and then
we'd bounce.

Yeah, hit and run.
So you did 23 years 26.
26 years.
Have you ever totaled up theamount of time out of those 26
that you were over there?

Stu Sword (15:50):
Yeah, I never really cared, but as I was doing my
final discharge, when I'msitting with the kind lady, Kind
of a look back.
Yeah, they tally it up and itliterally she's tallying it.
I'm watching it.
I'm like, oh shit, that's a lotof months right.
It literally stopped on ahundred months.
Wow, and I couldn't.

(16:12):
If you gave me a sheet of paperwhen I joined at age 17,.
Stu, how many months overseasin combat where you serve?
I wouldn't have like stopped itat a hundred, because who stops
?

at a hundred 26,.
Just less than half was overthere.

Stu Sword (16:23):
Yeah, it's like like, like, I think it's like eight
and a half years.
I mean, I have to do the math,but it's like a hot minute.
It's a lot of time.
It's a lot of time right.

Over there.
I don't know if I've metanybody that's done that much
time over there.

Stu Sword (16:36):
Yeah, god bless you, buddy, there's definitely.
You know well.
The thing with the army, youknow, is during the surge, you
know we called it March Madnessis when Mutada al-Sadr in
Baghdad was trying to retake,trying to really purge the surge
, if you will.
So the army was maxed out.
There were soldiers thatliterally had been on a return

(16:59):
flight, had touched down attheir home base and got sent
back.
They came right back.
They never got off the plane.
That's rough.
So literally the army was maxed.
They were, we were maxed out.
I say the army, I'm saying,like my branch, we were maxed
out during the surge.
And there's still some peopleserving that were in during the
surge and they'll tell you yeah,that was a rough time.
Expect to be gone for 15.
I'm almost certain.

(17:21):
I never went longer than 15months overseas, but there were
some units that did.
So you know the amount ofservice and stuff like that is
just like unbelievable.
Although you weren't in it forthis and it's, you know, it's
nice to have, but you weren'tlooking for awards, medals, yeah

(17:42):
.
So back to that, that ambush wewere talking about.
You know, I was still just ayoung, motivated sergeant.
I really wasn't payingattention to promotion to the
next level, I was just doing thebest.
At my current job, I was a teamleader in a premier you know,
infantry ground unit and when wecame back from that deployment,
you know we had all earned ourcombat infantry badge, which is

(18:03):
like the rifle with the wreaththat you talk to, you know the
army.
Now they got the combatinfantry badge, which is like
the rifle with the wreath thatyou talk to you know the army.
Now they got the combat actionbadge.
It just signifies you've beenin combat and received fire from
an enemy element which is huge,right, like someone's trying to
kill you.
Yeah, right, it's not many,it's a very small percentage of
Americans say that someone triedto kill me, right, and then to
be in that type of ground combatwhere I don't even know how

(18:25):
many grenades came over thewalls, probably in the range of
10 to 20.
We I think I had about two ofmy HE grenades left out of 18
when we were getting in the backof that Bradley and then we
drove down to the green zone,the cache, with only two
Bradleys.
So you talk to people thatserved later in the war.
You couldn't drive down thestreets in two Bradleys.
You'd get ambushed and killed,right.

(18:47):
So you'd have to have a largervehicle package, I think it's.
Sometimes the minimum packageis like either four or six
vehicles.
You had to have to go down thestreets in Iraq.
That's a lot of firepower, alot of armament, right.
So we'd shot it down in two.
But for all that, I got an ArmyAccommodation Medal with a v

(19:08):
device, which is a valorousaward it's.
It's something I hold near anddear to my heart.
Even today I've got that awardwhere I live at, and you know it
means a lot because when youread it you're like, oh, wow,
like yeah, you know, risked ownlife and like imminent danger to
assist and save others.
Like oh shit, that's powerful,yeah.
So it means a lot.
It's very special to me.

There, you go so you retired as a.
What was your rank?

Stu Sword (19:30):
Command Sergeant Major.

Command Sergeant Major.

Stu Sword (19:33):
So for all your branches, for the enlisted it
goes E1 to E9.
Yeah, I was at E9, and thenthere's levels to E8, and
there's levels to E9.
Same thing with the officerstructure, but I was an officer
so I'm not really qualified tocomment on that.
But there's levels of commandselect right.
So not only are you badassenough to get selected to E9 and

(19:55):
then graduate the SergeantMajor Academy, which is a pretty
difficult task to do right,it's a year long course,
constantly being evaluated on alot of different things, very
stressful environment.
But then you are identifiedabove your peers to go into a
command position, which thearmy's saying you are one of our
best.
So I was a command select d9 atthe battalion level and I was

(20:17):
running boot camp in southcarolina when I retired.

Ah okay, so out of all, if you don't mind me
asking any after effects, if youknow what I mean from all the
yeah, it's interesting you frameit like that, scott, because I
think you know exactly whatwe're about to talk about.

Stu Sword (20:34):
Yeah, and the listeners probably hear it too.
Yeah, I definitely.
You know, like I said, when Iwas just serving I was in the
moment I was current I waspresent back in that near ambush
and even after that, becauseyou're still on an adrenaline
high right, the adrenaline'scontinuing like days, weeks for
the entire deployment.

(20:55):
Right, you're just switched off, you don't go backwards.

Yeah, no, so you don't want to go backwards
either.

Stu Sword (21:01):
No side effects from that, I'd say probably the
largest is like post-traumaticstress disorder, which a lot of
veterans are familiar with.
For me, I started to identifythat probably back in about 2006
.
Okay, now I didn't retire until2023.
Yeah, I was going to say I dida lot of self-coping for those

(21:24):
like whatever that is like youknow, 16, 17 years.
I did my own research.
We'd come back from deployment,we went through reintegration
training, but it wasn't likerobust reintegration training.
It was more so like theimportance of getting your
paperwork signed right, becausethat's what stands in between
you and your first weekend backRight.

(21:46):
So everyone's just trying toblow through it, right.
But the impacts of adrenaline,the impacts of doing night
operations continuously reallyhad an adverse effect on me that
I had to self cope with to thepoint it kind of started to
manifest in about 2022.
It kind of started to manifestin about 2022.
Now, luckily for me, I was closeto the end of my time in the

(22:09):
military and you'll see, a lotof vets don't step forward.
A lot of the active forceserving today don't step forward
right, because you don't wantto get certain types of
medication, because then youcan't deploy.
If you can't deploy.
You're a shit bag.
You know what I mean.
You probably won't make thenext rank, even though you're

(22:29):
going to be told you will.
Because how can you stack up?
How can you stack up whenyou're down range for six, 10,
12, 15 months and then the otherperson's back in the rear
sweeping the floor?
It doesn't stack up, it can,can't be quantified.
So a lot of folks don't stepforward.
Hey, my knee hurts.
Oh shit, don't go to sick call.

(22:50):
You're gonna be a sick callranger.
Right, don't do this, right?
So a lot of people justself-cope and they quickly want
to get in and out, but they'reharboring a lot of things inside
.
So definitely ptsd in terms ofme, like like night terrors and
stuff like waking, waking up atnight, like sweating, like bad
to the point, like the mattressis soaked.

(23:10):
That's not good, right.
I used to have to go grabtowels out of out of my like a
linen closet and lay towels down.
That way I could stop sweating.
And then, you know, when Istarted to seek care back I
think in 2022, the initialassumption was like we've got to
check you for leukemia, youknow Cause.
I guess that's a sign.
I mean, I'm not a doctor.

(23:30):
I'm just going off what I'mtold.
But like a lot of people thatsweat profusely at night, you
know perhaps have otherdisorders and leukemia being one
of them.
So they did a full on likeleukemia workup just make sure I
didn't have like leukemia,that's scary.
Which all that stuff came backnegative it was like.
And then I did a sleep studywith a doctor in South Carolina
really older gentleman like 70,been doing like sleep study for

(23:53):
a very long time and they, youknow, they record you.
They got like 30 sensors on youand a lot of people do it for
sleep apnea.
Right, but I was doing it toconfirm or deny like night tears
, because this is what's causingme to sweat, ah, interesting.
And my heart rate?
When I would have these nighttears, my heart rate would be
running like 160 beats a minute.

(24:14):
I mean that's like you're outon like a moderately intense
workout.

Yeah.

Stu Sword (24:17):
Very intense workout While you're sleeping, while
you're sleeping right, andthat's what would wake me up.
So did a sleep study and thedoc's like, yeah, you're, you're
like a historical guy.
You just been down range toolong.
You're like too switched onRight and at and at night,
you're like re, re, experiencingthings through your own, your
dreams, which isn't good, rightCause if you're not sleeping
well, you're more susceptible toother things and stuff like

(24:39):
that.
So he's like yeah, you've,you've definitely got night
terrors, which I was diagnosedwith, diagnosed with adrenaline
fatigue and stuff like that.
Like we could be filming thispodcast right now, scott, and
someone could get shot in frontof me and my heart rate would
probably stay about the same.
Yeah, it's like, oh shit, likesomeone got shot, you know.

But that's, that's one of the things with with the
PTSD is you just look atsomething and you're like, yeah,
so I saw that before.

Stu Sword (25:02):
Yeah.

Like it's like it's, it's, it's part of it is
almost being desensitized tothings.
In those situations everybody'ssituation is different, but
like I could see something I'dbe like yeah, it's not nice to
see, but I've seen it before.
Like it's not shocking to meyeah, which isn't good.

Stu Sword (25:20):
No, you, you're desensitized to a lot of that
stuff.
Just like me, I was jumping outof airplanes.
Yeah, you know I mean like Ilike me, I was jumping out of
airplanes.
Yeah, you know what I mean.
Like I don't jump out ofairplanes anymore.
I got a few friends that stilldo some skydiving stuff, but
like, not for me, not for thisguy, that's a law of averages
thing yeah, yeah, yeah, it'slike in my last episode I talked

(25:42):
about one of my.

Eventually, you're going to be searching for a
bomb.
That's going to be there.
It's going to be there.

Stu Sword (25:50):
And it's jumping out of planes, jumping out of planes
.
Eventually someone's going tohave a failed canopy, and I saw
it.
I'm not going to say a lot, butI saw a fair amount of failed
canopy.
Now, luckily, they had a secondcanopy.
They hit it about a few secondsbefore they were about to make
impact.
But yeah, I don't, I don't doany skydiving or the other, the

(26:11):
other things got that that I gotdiagnosed with.
That I hadn't really thoughtabout.
I kinda I kinda knew it waslike weird or wrong, but like
I'd be walking through like Aldi, thinking of how to like breach
a door Is that a door?

A lot of cops do that, Like I do, that I was on.
It's a wonderful world,whatever it is in Disney.
What's that?
It's a one.
It's the the one where you goin the little boat ride and it's
like all happy.
I'm looking for like exits.
Yeah, You're looking for likeexits.

Stu Sword (26:46):
Like there's a door behind that rock over there,
like, yeah, just live like that,just too switched on, you know
which is not good, right?
You're like, I'm in aldi, youknow, with with my, with my
teenage girls, and I'm thinkingabout how to like breach the
grocery door.
Yeah, it's not, that's notsomething like healthy, right?
I should be in again, goingback to what I said, be current
and present where you're at.
Yeah, right, I'm in aldi withmy teenage girls.
I shouldn't be thinking abouthow I blow the door in.
Is it inward, is it outward?

(27:08):
Is it a slider?
Do I use a cutting charge?
Do I use a C charge?
Do I use a pushing charge?
Like all that stuff isn'thealthy, not normal.
And actually, interestinglyenough, scott, I actually went
to, while I'm still on activeduty, like I'm preparing to

(27:28):
retire.
I went to an inpatient facilityin San Antonio, texas, called
Laurel Ridge, and I'm a bigproponent of anyone that's
struggling with anything goingto any type of facility.
It doesn't have to be LaurelRidge, right, but Laurel Ridge
is one of the premier placesthat the military DOD uses to

(27:50):
help people essentially rewireoff-ramp, being too switched on,
and it's reallyperformance-based, it's
outcome-based.
So if you think about my careerbadass infantry guy award for
valor, fighting through ambushes, all kinds of schools.
I know you got my bio.
It goes on and on and I don'tlike to self-boast, but the last

(28:11):
school in the army was a psychward.
Think about it Interesting,it's very interesting, right,
yeah?
And you get a littlecertificate and one of my
roommate there, cause, you know,it's two people in a room and
it's and it's not like prison,but it's kind of like a soft
prison, like you can't leave atnight.

I went through the three-week inpatient alcohol
rehab at Travis Air Force Base.
I kind of get an idea of howthat is run.

Stu Sword (28:40):
You can't go anywhere .
You know what I'm talking about, right, but I'm a big proponent
of mental health.
I'm talking about right, andI'm a big proponent of mental
health.
I'm a big proponent of peopleseeking help talking to a
professional.
So, anyone that's listening, ifyou're struggling with some of
the stuff we just talked about,or you know someone that is, I
encourage you to go talk to aprofessional.
And there's nothing wrong withtalking to someone about how you

(29:03):
feel.
Right, think about the amount ofmoney we spend on ourself.
Like I'm going to go get ahaircut, I want to go get a
beard trim, I want to go get mynails done, I want to go get my
toes done.
Manny petty, I want to get anew pair of shoes.
Guys, do that.
No, I've done it once or twice.
It's kind of cool.
Okay, yeah, sometimes you gotto get a little cleanup,

(29:26):
especially the feet.
The feet, yeah, I'm a careerinfantry guy, right?
Like, the feet are our primarymode of transportation, so you
got to keep your feet in tip top.

Now, I've only done it like twice.

Stu Sword (29:35):
I got you.
I'm not like a regular person,but people will spend $100 on
their feet or their nails, butthey're reluctant to pay $100 to
go talk to someone about somethings that are going on in your
head, right, but it should besomewhat normalized like, hey,
I'm not doing okay.
So when I talk to a lot ofpeople these days, I ask them

(29:58):
and we talked about this, scott,before I ask you how you're
doing.
But then I ask you how are youreally doing?
Are your bills paid?
Have you paid your electricbill?
How's your family?
When's the last time you talkedto your parents?
Like, how are you really doingas a man?
And it's okay to tell me thatyou're not doing okay, because

(30:20):
maybe I mean I can definitelyslide a $5 bill your way.
I may not be able to pay yourrent for the month, but I can
help you, get in touch with someservices and some people that
can help you.
Right, and I know we're allfamiliar with like the 22 a day
and I've seen some studies andresearch say it's even higher
than that Right, yeah, I justhad that discussion in my last
episode.

Yeah, my last interview.

Stu Sword (30:41):
Yeah, and it's.
It's really a shame.
You know, think about you know,some of these people that you
know choose to harm themselves,and I know I've got a very
personal story and I don't knowif you want to get to it now,
you want to wait till a littlelater.
But I can.
I can share that as well, butit's really a shame that, like,
someone is more reluctant to notspend a hundred dollars to talk

(31:02):
to someone and then take theirown life.

Tell me the story Tell us the story.

Stu Sword (31:06):
So quick, quick testimonial from myself.
I was in Iraq on that 15 monthdeployment we had talked about
earlier and it's late at night,you know.
It's like 11 o'clock at night.
We weren't on a mission cyclethat night, so that we still
kind of stay up late Cause alsoit's done at night and I get
called up to the battalioncommander's office, you know,

(31:28):
which is like oh shit, I'm likeI'm an e5 in the army.
What the hell does the car wantto see me for?

yeah, you know, I mean, I've had those calls, it
wasn't good.

Stu Sword (31:38):
Yeah, this is typically not good.
Yeah, it's typically not.
Yeah, but I'm just thinking,did I screw something up, like
you know?
You know, did I lose my rifle?
You know how it is when you'redownrange right, like someone
left their rifle at theport-a-john or something.
So no, I've got my rifle, I'vegot my night vision, it's
definitely not that.
And I walk in and I'm just atthat point I'm a younger version

(32:01):
of me, right, but I'm notstupid.
I can tell something isn'tright.
And I walk in and the colonel'slike, hey, stu, sit down.
Yeah, I think he called meSergeant Sword.
Sit down, sit down.
I'm like, oh shit, he's likeyou're going to need to go home.
We got a helicopter inbound soyou don't need anything.
Actually, you know you'll leaveyour rifle out there.
I think I left it with like theS3, the op cell.

(32:27):
Leave all your stuff there.
You got to go home.
Your brother's in bad shape.
I was like, wow, my brother,what the hell happened to him?
You know what I mean?
A car accident, like someonetried to rob him and he didn't
know right, cause it was a redcross message, and I'm sure a
lot of listeners know the redcross message is kind of vague,
but it's been verified by adoctor that.
Hey, your brother.
His real name was Micah, butMike's sword is not in good
shape.
So, long story short, I endedup going back, grabbed the

(32:51):
helicopter some soft guys.

Where were you at this point?

Stu Sword (32:54):
I was in Fah Rustamaya, which is kind of like
East Baghdad, okay, but I gotto get over to Baghdad
International Airport.
You know, because they gotflights going every night back
to Kuwait and I hopped on ahelicopter some soft guys it'd
get me over to Biop BaghdadInternational Airport.
Get on a flight in uniformgoing to Kuwait.

(33:14):
Get to Kuwait, there's like alittle cell there and they put
me in civilian clothes, right.
They go like go over there andfind some clothes that fits you,
leave your uniform in the bagand we're taking you to Kuwaiti
International Airport.
Here I am like sunburnt guy, Igot the raccoon eyes.
We've been in the desert for afew months and I find myself in
Kuwaiti International Airport inlike some clothes that don't

(33:35):
fit me and literally fly all theway back to Virginia.
So my brother was a veteran aswell.
Long story short, I'll justgive you the abstract version.
My brother committed suicideand it was fatal.
He didn't survive and, as wewere talking earlier about, if
you need help, ask someone forhelp or go seek help.

(33:58):
He was a guy that had served inthe invasion of Iraq and a lot
of these units that aren't, like, you know, premier top infantry
units, were trailing behind andtaking over territory, you know
land, and they had taken oversome area and they got uh, they
got overrun, like here it is aunit that's not designed to
fight fighting, and thataffected him immensely.

(34:20):
And he got his VA decisionletter.
You know cause?
All the uncles in the Swordfamily are all Vietnam vets,
right?
So when my brother, mike, cameback, they're like hey, mike,
you know, if you're not usingthe VA, like go use the VA.
Which he did, right.
But the VA was still goingthrough some processes at that
time he got his decision letter.
His wife got it the day afterhe killed himself.

(34:41):
100%, permanent, total.
Appreciate your service.
Day too late.
You've been struggling too long, right?
So, as I say that, you know ithits near and dear to me, but I
can't change the past.
I do recall my brother callingme before that deployment and
talking to me about wanting tocome back in the army.

(35:04):
He's like hey, could you helpme get back in?
Well, of course I can help youget back in.
I know a bunch of people havebeen serving the army, people
know me.
Of course I can help you getback in and but I was flying out
the next day and he's callingme.

(35:24):
He called me and I'm like hey,I that that was cool.
I remember that it was greatskateboard.
You know we started talkingabout that.
I'm like all right, bro, I loveyou, but I gotta go.
I gotta go hang out with thekids.
He's like and what about thisand what about this?
Yeah, and it was like you know,again, I was so like into the
moment well, you don't thinkabout that as you know, that's
the last thing that you'rethinking about.

Yeah, that's your brother.

Stu Sword (35:45):
That's like you know it's not going to happen to you.
Just like we talked about theparachuting stuff like, oh, the
parachute is not going to happento me, but that was him
starting to think of harminghimself.
You know what I mean and as Ilook back, I'm that was him, but
at that point I was nowherenear where he was.
I wasn't in a position toreally influence that.

(36:07):
But I say that to be aware thatdon't be in a mental state that
, oh, it's not going to happento me.
No, it can happen to you, itcan happen to your friends, it
can happen to people you've beenserving with right.
As I continued to serve, I knewa ton of other people in the
Army that harmed themselves.
I'm not going to mention thenames just out of respect for

(36:28):
the family, but a team leader Iwas serving with we went to
lunch one day and we came backfrom lunch you know we start
doing tasks after the lunchbreak and he wasn't there.
And where the hell is Sarge?
Sarge hung himself in his roomduring lunch.

(36:48):
Yeah, and I got another friendof mine Ranger, badass guy.
This guy would have been acommand select sergeant major
too I'm not going to mention hisname out of respect to the
family.
But he killed himself onThanksgiving Day and everyone
knew he was struggling.
He was in a bad divorce.
We had played the football gamethe day before you know what I

(37:10):
mean, the turkey bowl right andfirst started to talk to him and
he was like bro, why don't youstay here with my family and why
don't you spend Thanksgivingwith us?
You know, I know you're goingthrough some times, but like we
love you, man.
And he's like no, no,everything's cool man.
He's like I got a plan andwe're like okay, we respect you.

(37:31):
If you got a plan, you got away to work it out, work it out.
He hung himself that night inhis house, yeah, yeah it's just,
it's really a shame.
You know, like good friend ofmine, both these guys, good
friends of mine, just likeharmed themselves.
They're no longer on thisplanet.

Yeah, man.

Stu Sword (37:46):
Gone to another place .
So, as I say that you know, ifyou need help, get help, talk to
someone, take care of yourself.
If you spend a hundred dollarson a manicure, pedicure, a
haircut like, be willing tospend a hundred dollars and go
talk to someone, but but for aveteran, there are a slew of
benefits out there for theveteran right.

So when you got out, you got out in what year?

Stu Sword (38:10):
I retired in 2023.

2023.
And you worked for the VA for alittle bit.

Stu Sword (38:16):
First job out the gate was a program manager with
the VA, which is kind of like abroad title Like what the hell
does that mean?
It means we're doing some shit.

You're the manager of every program.
In other words, but it was.

Stu Sword (38:29):
It was a very rewarding experience for me,
because here I am, commandselect D, nine sort of 26 years,
like no one's going to bullshitme, right?
Like I I kind of know whatyou're saying, I know your
experience and I graduate, youknow, to work for the VA.

(38:50):
I mean some people get a joband they just like answer the
phone or like low level people,great Americans, but they just
it was just a phone answer right, yeah, but I was more of like a
benefits guy.
You know what I mean In terms oflike being able to help people
unlock their benefits.
But you got to go through anacademy to be at that level.
You don't just get hired offthe street and you're like the
benefits guru, right?
So no, I went over to St Petevery beautiful place over there

(39:12):
VA Academy over there, graduatedthe academy over there, did a
ton of other training to getaccess to a lot of the systems
that help benefits.

So let me stop you there.
You mentioned the VA Academy,right?
I've never heard of that, andI'm probably not the only person
that has ever said what is thatand how long has that been
around?
So this tells people that theydon't just hire somebody.
Okay, study this pamphlet andnow you can start talking about

(39:42):
benefits.
Now you can start talking aboutbenefits.

Stu Sword (39:43):
Yeah, it's not.
It's not just a day or two.
Oh, JT, you know what I mean.
It's like all right, start likeprocessing claims, you know?
No, no, no, it's, it's like a.
You know, I'm a career army guy, right, I would compare it, you
know, to you know a lot ofcourses in the military where
it's like very robust rightthere, Like being a recruiter,
recruiter's school in all thebranches is the hottest school.

(40:05):
Yeah, you're going to go throughtraining and a lot of people
that know the VA.
There's three components,sections to the VA.
There's the benefit side money,people.
The healthcare side the VAhospitals and a lot of the CBOCs
, the community-based care typestuff, and then there's the
National Cemetery Administrationfor Veterans, right.

(40:26):
So there's three components.
So, based off who you'reworking for and what you're
doing determines on which typeof you know VA academy you would
go to right, then you getcertified right.
You got to essentially graduate.
Now, if you show up every daywith a good attitude and you got
a good aptitude, you'reprobably going to graduate right
.
It's not that difficult.

(40:53):
But I mean, there's tests.
It's like a hundred questionclosed book test that you have
to score I think it was an 85 onto get certified right.
And that doesn't even unlockyour access to all of their
programs they use.
So hey, as a veteran and as aperson that's an alumni of
working for the VA, hats off tohow they onboard and train the
people that have the access.

I never knew that.

Stu Sword (41:09):
Yeah, and I see veterans too that sometimes
they're disgruntled, right yeah,and that's one of the things I
did as a program manager therefor Miami VA, working in
downtown Miami, was helpingveterans unlock all their
benefits.
Veterans unlock all theirbenefits If it's healthcare, if
it's percentage for compensationpayments, if it's other

(41:29):
programs, then I'm just like awealth of knowledge of benefits.
So when I see a veteran andthey start talking to me, hey,
I'm having struggles with X, yor Z and I meet people all the
time.
I love the vets that arewearing those hats.
If you see me, scott, you wouldnot think I'm a vet.
You definitely wouldn't thinkI'm a 26 year command star major
, would you?
I didn't?
yeah, okay no offense, but notyou know, I think like I aged

(41:54):
well, if it's genes, or likerunning every morning.
I don't know what it was right,but I look you were a surfer.
So there you go, right.
Good, maybe it's the vitaminback to the roots, the vitamin d
, right, and then maybe it wasrunning every morning.
You know, maybe it was theadrenaline stuff kept me A lot.

All of it.

Stu Sword (42:11):
Yeah, All of it Right .
So you know I look younger thanI am.

Yeah, and people don't think the guy wearing all
Lululemon is an army ranger whospent his career like smashing
doors and breaking people'sfaces, Right that is.

Stu Sword (42:30):
That is by no way a plug for Lululemon on this
podcast, but okay, yeah, well,it's like not that guy and I
would get that when I wasworking with the VA.

Yeah.

Stu Sword (42:36):
Right.
But then when vets found out Iwas a SAR major, like it was, it
was all hands off.
Like, like you know, cause alot of the vets and sure I love
the old timers, right, they sitthere in the va.
You meet them in the cafeteria.
They hang downstairs by thefree coffee and as I would walk
in the morning, I'd be likesergeant major, good morning,
sergeant major.
It was almost like I was onactive duty.

(42:56):
Yeah, right, and I, I'm a guywho's very humble.
I don't like people refer to meas my rank.
If you want to, I'll let yousure.
Right, but they felt compelledto do it.
And then, you know, I wouldfind myself like cutting the
cake on the Army's birthday.
I'm like, hey, we're about tosing the Army song, let's take
it from the top.
Like, if you don't know theArmy song, shame on you.
Like, if you're a fat and youdon't know your branch's song,

(43:19):
shame on you, you should learnin right Cause, like if you
don't know it, just start doingpushups, right, but no, I, you
know, I look young and I say allthat to say sometimes people
don't.
You know, you don't look likethe typical veteran, but I like
to seek out the vets that havethe hat on, cause I thank them
for their service.
Yeah, and you know, oftentimesI'll have like a good opening

(43:41):
line right, oh, wow, you're inthe navy, like watch your wallet
around that guy, yeah, andthey'll be like, yeah, they'll
be like what the hell are youtalking about?
Yeah, I was like I and sailorscan be rowdy, you know what I
mean.
And they're like are you a vet?
Yeah, I'm a vet.
Now, oftentimes, like vets arelike a different culture.

you know what I mean so a lot of times you know
what we are.
We're different, we.
We we're no better than anybodyelse, right?
And any veteran that thinksthat they are is thinking the
wrong way.
We're no better than anybodyelse.
We just did something differentthan everybody else yeah, for
sure, and I, you know.

Stu Sword (44:14):
You know, when I was a young sergeant, I used to
think like there was only onebranch right.
Because I became more senior, Irealized that each branch
accomplishes a specific missionset that's very important for
our country, regardless of yourbranch Right.
So when I meet vets like I,it's like, it's like a, it's
like a homecoming yeah, it'sgreat to see you, I appreciate
your service, tell me your story, right, and I like to talk to

(44:37):
them and and just thank them.

But also, when I meet vets, you still, you still
think like a Sergeant Major.
Yeah, you still think like Iguess you can't break that, like
that's just in you now, andthat's how a good leader does.
It's like tell me aboutyourself, don't worry about me.
I want to know about you, andthat's what a good leader always

(45:01):
does, is it's you first, I'lltell you about me later.
But, like you said, how are youdoing?
Yeah, how are you doing?

Stu Sword (45:05):
Yeah, how are you doing?
Tell me about you, are youdoing?

okay, I'm sorry, a command Sergeant, major, excuse
me, I'm an Air Force guy.
What do I know?
I don't.
I don't want to lower your,your, your rank in any way.
No, I'm not, I'm not, and mylast name was sore too, right.

(45:30):
So like yeah, yeah, that's,that's actually pretty cool,
like sergeant sword just askedme, did you change your name?
No, I didn't change my name,dude.
When I was in basic training,the the ti across the hall is
literally sergeant rambo.
Oh, oh, geez, this was the 80s.

Stu Sword (45:37):
so yeah, that was a big deal so we're about to do
some pt with sergeant rambo.

Yeah, yeah, sergeant sword, that that's
another.
That's a good name too.
Sounds like a wrestler actually, but okay.

Stu Sword (45:50):
Yeah, if you told some of my soldiers, I was known
for doing some rather elaboratephysical training.

There you go.

Stu Sword (45:56):
Because you always hear safety stand down.
You know what I mean Likedifferent stand downs.
But I'm like why don't we dolike a physical fitness stand
down?
Yeah, and I actually likebrought that on board and we
used to do those where we'd golike 10 mile run and we'd come
back and go to the weight roomand then we'd go to the track,
Then we're going to go to thepool and then we're going to

(46:17):
cook some hamburgers and hotdogs and everyone's going to go
home.

Yeah.

Stu Sword (46:20):
Like really core to militarypeople is their fitness level
right, which is important.
So always try to think outsidethe box and like come up with
creative solutions and that's agood lead is to and it goes back
to what we said like, just bethe best at what you're doing.
If you've got the ability toshape the schedule and you can
do a physical fitness, standdown, we just do three or four

(46:40):
hours of physical trainingnonstop and have a burger too,
and I send you home at 1 PM.
You know I and oftentimes saywe don't have to make things
harder than they are.
We don't have to make thingssuck worse than they already do.
Yeah, right, so we don't haveto stand out here in the rain
without our like wet weathergear on.

Yeah exactly Already miserable.
Why don't you put your rainjacket on?

Stu Sword (47:03):
Like well, we didn't want to look like hard, you know
what I mean.
Like no, you look stupid rightnow.
Like put your rain jacket on,yeah.

Yeah.

Stu Sword (47:10):
So, but I like to thank veterans for their service
, and then I like to ask themlike have you unlocked all your
like VA?

benefits.
You know what?

Stu Sword (47:20):
I mean Cause like there's programs out there I
didn't know existed and I cangive everyone a teaser if you
want to follow this up onanother episode.
I'm not sure how long we'vebeen talking.
Scott or I can deep dive thisinto like a VA academy, right
now.

No, we could do this on another episode.
Absolutely, because I think youdefinitely have more to say
about that and that would be agood episode right there.
But you could give a teaser ifyou want.

Stu Sword (47:42):
Yeah, I'll just give everyone a teaser of a couple
things to maybe research ontheir own.
But I'm a big proponent of theVA.
I know a lot of people like tobash the VA and that's one of
the things I would do when I wasworking for the VA is like
contact folks that were havingproblems, right, and I'd help
them solve their problem.
But oftentimes I would find youknow the veteran or the

(48:05):
caregiver, the family memberthey don't really understand
what they're trying to do and inthat process they're talking to
the wrong person, right.
So I would encourage all vetsto like, if you don't know what
you're doing, find a veteranservice officer, and oftentimes
they're located in your nearestlike VA hospital, right.
So if you're trying to likeunlock college benefits for your

(48:27):
kid, you can go talk to a VSO.
But you know you got to becareful, right, and I'm not
trying to bash some of theselike veteran organizations but
you may find yourself talking toa VSO that was just appointed a
VSO by you know their veterannonprofit.
They haven't graduated the VAAcademy.
So you really want to findsomeone that's graduated the

(48:49):
Academy to help you unlockbenefits.

How would you determine that?
Would you ask that particularperson like, hey, all right,
stewie, did you graduate the VA?
Like if I was just Scottveteran guy who wants to do that
and I go, okay, I go to thisorganization.
Oh, go see, stu, he's our VSO.
Yeah, so I don't know anybody,because now you are the
authority figure, you're the onethat I'm going to, right, yeah,
I would ask you know, are you acertified?

(49:15):
Vso service officer, that'sgood, good information.

Stu Sword (49:19):
Now, like you and me, scott and now I am, I've got
the paperwork to prove it.
But we could both just walkdown the street and be at a
local pub and just be like ScottScott's a VSO Because he's like
a ninja veteran stuff.
But like you know, scott, likeyou know, if you haven't
graduated the VA academy, you'renot a certified VSO.
We might be self-appointed,self-appointed, yeah Right.

(49:40):
But, that's kind of like workingwith a barracks lawyer.
Yeah, A lot of people know whata barracks lawyer is.
Right, you might get led astray, and I think that's where the
gap is with a lot of vets.
You talk to someone who has thetitle but they're not actually
certified.
Then they're giving you badinformation.

We'll get these people and I have talked to them
, so this is personal livedexperience.

Stu Sword (50:01):
Yeah, and you get led astray and you're not using the
systems that are in front ofyou.
If you're not using the VA appor Vgov.
If I ask you to log into youraccount, you don't know how.
That's probably your firstproblem, right, you need to have
a VA account.
Programs that, like, vets don'tknow about and I run to them all

(50:23):
the time and this is the teaserfor a follow-up episode is
veteran housing assistance.
Yeah, how do I unlock my valoan?
How do I turn on my crsc combatrelated special compensation
pay?
How do I turn that on right?
Because crsc and this is agreat way to like tease up for
the next episode combat relatedspecial compensate compensation

(50:44):
pay pays retroactive up to sixyears from your date of
discharge.
So if you've been out eightyears and you finally get
approved for CRSC, which is inaddition to VA benefits because
it's paid directly from yourbranch, it back pays up to six
years because there's vetswalking around all the time.
Oh shit, I didn't know aboutthat.
Well, here I am.
I'm sharing the gospel with youand it's very simple.

(51:06):
On the next episode, I'll talkabout how you do that and how
you can unlock that.

Absolutely, absolutely.
I think that's a good teaser.
So you left the VA and you workfor FORTS F-O-R-T-S Logistics.
Now, when we first met at theMission United Broward event,
you mentioned Forts and I waslike I wasn't really getting it
right.
I wasn't really getting it.

(51:29):
I went to the website.
I was like, oh shit, this issome crazy cool shit, like right
here.
So tell the listeners aboutForts, because Stu actually gave
me a tour of it's not just awarehouse, it is numerous
warehouses.
Like this is a serious made inAmerica business.

(51:51):
Like that was that's no joke.
Like we took a golf cart.
Okay, when someone says, hey,I'll give you a tour of the
warehouse, and they they put youin the golf cart.
You're not going from one endof the warehouse to the other,
you're going to other buildings,although and we did and I was
extremely impressed.
So give the listeners abackground on what FORTS does.

Stu Sword (52:13):
Yeah, so FORTS stands for.
You know, you hear fort.
You think of like an army fort,right, and the logo is very
similar to that.
But it's fold-out, rigidtemporary shelter or structure,
right.
Some people interchange thelast word for S, but that's what
FORTS stands for and it's justthat it's literally fold out
structures that are rigid, right.

(52:34):
So it's not a tent, it's not acamper, it's not an RV they're
not.
It's just that it can becustomized to any specific
organization.
And we do a ton of business witha lot of government agencies
federal, state, local.
We do a lot of business withpower companies.
We do a lot of business withanyone that may have a need in

(52:58):
their mission set to havestructures that can quickly and
temporarily be deployed anywhere, have their own power source,
have their own HVAC, beself-contained, be pre-wired
with ethernet cables, 110, 220,three-phase, single-phase.
We can do it all right.
If you can dream it up, we canbuild it.

(53:20):
Now I'm on the logistical side.
So we typically maintain stuff.
And we maintain stuff for the VA, because a lot of people don't
know, the VA's fourth mission islike disaster response,
augmenting a lot of the civilianhospitals.
So we maintain a temporaryfield hospital, a medical
intensive care unit that can bedeployed anywhere in the United

(53:41):
States when asked to do so, wemaintain it.
We do the maintenance on it, westore it.
They call we take it whereverthey.
So we maintain it, we do themaintenance on it, we store it.
They call, we take it whereverthey ask.
We set it up, we leave on-sitesubject matter experts and they
maintain the facility, just likea facility manager would do at
a property you might live at.

(54:01):
It's super cool.
We do a lot of work withagencies.
I can't mention a lot of workwith.
You know agencies I can'tmention.
But if you can dream it andyou're interested in it, you
know we can.
You can buy one and put it onyour, your hunting land right,
you can fold it out, it's allcustomizable.
You dream it, we can build it,we can bring it to you, we can
set it up, we can maintain it,we can do anything you ask for.
But it's super.
Not only is it all made in theUSA, yeah, but it's veteran

(54:30):
friendly and heavily employsveterans.
Yes, and I've been lucky enough, and very fortunate, to work
there and assist them inaccomplishing their mission at
forts like uh, you know we liketo hire veterans.
Yeah, right, so we look to uhto hire veterans so how do you
deploy?

You have kind of a system and it's kind of run
like a military style thing,right yeah.

Stu Sword (54:51):
So I've been kind of like, given the ability to craft
my team.
What does Stu Sword's team looklike?
And I use a sealed teammethodology, right, where we're
a big company but we're small.
On the logistics side we'resmall.
All of my employees are verytactically and technically
competent, right.
So we show up just like a SEALteam would pretty much in the

(55:15):
cover of darkness, because thetime we get stuff there it's
dark, it's at night.
We're doing it in the dark andwe set it up and we did it
multiple times.
We were across seven differentgeographic locations during this
last disaster cycle ofhurricanes Debbie, helene and
Milton that hit Floridaback-to-back 10 days and dumped
all that rain up north in theCarolinas.
So we were one of the companiesthat were a first responding

(55:38):
agency setting up.
We helped build a thousandperson base camp.
We've got field hospitals.
There was a hospital in Largo,florida, that was flooded with
nine feet of water.
We brought a hospital from timeof notification and set it up
in 22 hours.
You know, so we possess liketremendous, like capability to
forward project assets and setthem up in one period of

(56:00):
darkness.
We're going to set it upovernight.
Now if we've got to go furtheracross the continent United
States, you know add on thetravel time, but we can
typically get stuff set upduring a disaster time in one
day.

Yeah, it's an extremely impressive facility
and I got to see all sorts ofdifferent kinds, from medical to
just basic art, like here'syour home base office, right
here, and they're all shapes andsizes.
Well, they're usually the sameshape but they're different
sizes.
Some can get dropped fromplanes.

Stu Sword (56:31):
Yeah, stuff can be airdrops.
Stuff can be airlifted in acargo net.
We're in the business ofportable structures, but also in
the business of portablehospitals, portable auction
generation, portable powergeneration.
You think about the power gridgoes offline because trees fell
on it.
You know snow, ice.
Whatever the situation may be,we can augment.
You know the power.
But if you think of a lot ofpeople that depend on oxygen

(56:52):
first responders, hospitals, theelderly we're also in the
business of mobile oxygengeneration so we can bring
mobile oxygen and set it up in aparking lot.
First responders can come by,we can top you off and it's
really remarkable, it'sinnovative and I'm super proud.
I'm probably just as proud, ifnot more proud, to be a part of
the FORTS team as I was a partof the Army.

(57:14):
Yeah, because it's badass andwe're here to help people, right
?
Check it out fortslogisticscom,super badass website.
Check it out If it's interestedor someone may benefit from it.
Check it out, give us a call.

Absolutely Well, Stu, my friend, this was a great
episode.
I appreciate you coming on.
I'm glad we got this done.
It was very informative, veryinteresting episode.
What do you think of the bigpink couch that you sit in?
You like the big pink couch?

Stu Sword (57:44):
Yeah, it's very soothing.
After we're done and you wrapthis episode, I might take a nap
right here.
It's a nice couch, but a shoutout to you, scott, what you do
and your facility here, and Ilook forward to coming back and
shooting another episode andjust deep diving into VA
benefits, right, because itreally kind of tugs at my heart
when I see a veteran, you know,and they're so proud and they

(58:07):
spent their $20 on their hat.

Yeah.

Stu Sword (58:10):
And they haven't unlocked their benefits.

Yeah.

Stu Sword (58:13):
And oftentimes I see, when I was working at the VA, I
would see spouses come in andthey'd have a binder and I'll
leave it with this.
There was a lady that came infor a Korean War vet.
The veteran had passed and shewas just like I wonder if I'm
eligible for any burialassistance and all this stuff,
and we'll get into the nextepisode.
Yeah, but he had like a silverstar, a bronze star, a combat

(58:36):
infantry badge.
It was a private, served liketwo years and of those two years
, like majority was in thekorean war, had never used any
of his VA benefits, just justdidn't know anything about it.
Right, and I was like wow, likeso many benefits left on the
table that could have benefitednot only the veteran but the
family Right.
So as we, as we shoot, anotherpodcast and we'll talk about

(58:58):
these benefits like I reallylike to see vets like unlock the
benefits that you've earnedright, it's not welfare, it's
not taking something thatsomeone else needs.
No, it's unlocking benefitsthat are already like allocated,
earmarked and funded for you asthe veteran.

Yeah, absolutely yeah, this is definitely another
episode here, so we will setthat one up and in the meantime,
again, thank you for coming on.
I appreciate your time,appreciate you taking time off
from work.
I know you're a busy guy overthere.
So thank you for coming over toDelray to the One man, one Mic
Foundation Studio, sponsored byWillow and Palm Construction.

(59:37):
Willow and Palm Construction,located in Delray Beach, florida
.
Willow and Palm Construction,south Florida's premier builder.
I always get that live plug in.
Sometimes it's smoother thanothers, but I get it.
And thank you, willow and Palmfor this.
Yeah, so with that we builtanother bridge today.
Very interesting conversationwith Stu Sword, command Sergeant

(59:59):
Major Stu Sword see, I got itin this time.

Stu Sword (01:00:03):
Yeah, shout out to Willow and Palm.
Shout out to One man One Mic.
Shout out to Willow and Palm.
Shout out to one man one mic.
Shout out to the VeteranConnection podcast.
Great job, scott.
I look forward to coming back.
So thank you.

Scott McLean (01:00:10):
Yes sir, yes sir.
And to the listeners if youlike it, share it, Tell another
vet about it, tell anothernonprofit about it.
I appreciate you listening.
This has gotten some legs.
That's always a good thing and,as I always say, listen all the
way to the end.
There's a public serviceannouncement concerning 988 and
211.
It's good for veterans, familymembers of veterans and just

(01:00:31):
civilians in general.
It's very informative.
It's only 30 seconds long, sotake a listen to it, you won't
be disappointed.
No-transcript.

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Ep. 40 - From Eight Tours In Iraq and Afghanistan to Civilian Life: Stu Sword's Journey

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Ep. 40 - From Eight Tours In Iraq and Afghanistan to Civilian Life: Stu Sword's Journey