this is Jocko podcast number 149 with
Echo Charles and me Jacques are willing
good evening echo good evening all my
life I've waited for this now
I've joined you and your losses are a
strength to me I eke and yet I know that
Alec retched with pain on the dust road
that went to Corinth I breathed the dust
and yet I know that grandpa breathed the
gas that made a hero out of Pershing I
flinch when bullets tear the air in
angry rents and yet I know that father
and three farmer boys at Pickett's
Charge felt a cutting edge that dropped
them dead how can I be bitter you are my
strength you ghosts and I have learned
those things those esoteric skills and
knowledge --is that mark me as one of
you that loose bowel piles of shit too
much shit from overeating plopped
randomly around the outer dikes of a
vill mean trouble catching the aroma
seeing the groupings watching flies
dance lazily rejoicing in their latest
fetid morsel that bends the low grass
and a muddy glob like a bomb of cow dung
trouble I can tell from the crack of a
rifle shot
the type of weapon fired and what
direction the bullet is traveling I can
listen to a mortar pop and know its size
how far away it is
I know instinctively when I should prep
a tree line with artillery before I move
into it I know which draws and fields
should be crossed on line which should
be assaulted and which are safe
to cross and column I know where to
place my men when we stop and form a
perimeter I can shoot a rifle and throw
a grenade and direct air and artillery
onto any target under any circumstances
I can dress any type of wound I have
dressed all types of wounds watered
protruding intestines with my canteen to
keep them from cracking under sun-baked
patched sucking chest with plastic tied
off stumps with field expedient
tourniquets I can call in medevac
helicopters talk them cajole them dare
them into any zone I do these things
experience these things repeatedly daily
their terrors and miseries are so
compelling and yet so regular that I
have ascended to a high emotion that is
nonetheless a crusted numbness I am an
automaton bent on survival agent and
prisoner of my misery how terribly
exciting and how to what purpose will
these skills serve me when this madness
ends what lies on the other side of all
this it frightens me I haven't thought
about it I haven't prepared for it I am
so good so ready for these things that
were my birthright I do not enjoy them I
know they have warped me but it will be
so hard to deal or the life empty of
them and there are the daily sufferings
you ghosts have known them but who else
I can sleep in the rain wrapped inside
my poncho listening to the drops beat on
the rubber like small explosions then
feel the water pour into rivulets inside
my poncho soaking me as I lie in the mud
I can live in the dirt sit and lie and
sleep in the dirt
it is my chair and my bed my floor and
my walls this clay and like all of you I
have endured diarrhea as only an animal
should endure it squatting a yard off
the trail and relieving myself
unceremoniously naturally animal II
deprivation zuv food festering open
sores worms heat aching crotch that nags
for fulfillment any emptying hole that
will relieve it who appreciates my
sufferings who do I suffer for and that
right there is a excerpt from a book
that is called fields of fire and it was
written after the Vietnam War by a
Marine who served there in this book
paints a picture of of combat and in
fact it actually does more than that
because a picture and no pictures
supposed to paint a thousand words or
say a thousand words but pictures don't
always properly convey thoughts and
emotions you need words to make that
happen and and this book really captures
all of it horror fear disgust love hate
indifference the chaos of combat the
sorrow of loss heroism and of course in
all that human nature and as I always
say about this podcast while yes it is
about war it's about leadership and it's
about atrocities and it's about to
struggle it is most importantly it's
about human nature and on top of that
the
credible power of the human will and
this book fields of fire gives us a very
close examination of human nature in all
of its glory and of course in all of its
horror
as well and the book was written by a
man by the name of James Webb who was a
Marine officer in Vietnam recipient of
the Navy Cross former secretary the Navy
former senator from the great state of
Virginia he's written a bunch of other
books ten I believe he's written and
produced movies all kinds of stuff on
top of that he's has five children if
I'm correct one of those children Jim
also served in the Marine Corps and it
was actually whose time in Ramadi
overlapped with my time in Ramadi where
he served as a as a 311 rifleman as a
member of the one six Marines and also
as a radio men in stay platoon so it's
awesome to read these books and know
their history and it's even more awesome
and an absolute honor to have with us
here today the author of the book fields
of fire and also his son so sir thank
you for coming Jim thank you for coming
thank you thank you for having us
I was kind of wondering because you've
you know James and Jim and I decided
when I was trying to figure out what to
call you guys I figured I'd call you
young Jim Jim and I just keep calling
you sir
easier so yeah I can't thank you guys
enough for coming all for coming all the
way out here from the east coast and to
come on this and for me to revisit fuel
to fire which is just a a book and we'll
get into that a little bit later it's an
iconic book about not just the Vietnam
War but really about war and
the wave laid it out and again we'll get
into that a little bit but I also wanted
to talk to you and really get some of
your back story as well and your
upbringing you know we always try and
start with the guest kind of talking
about where they came from and what
their background was and you have a lot
of that actually laid out in your memoir
so I was gonna ask if it's cool to call
this a memoir but there it says it on
the cover a memoir I heard my country
calling and I guess what one little
section of this that stuck out at me and
I think you know obviously will let you
expand on it but I'm going to the book
so again this book is called I heard my
country calling and here we go back to
the book when it hurts just grit your
teeth and take it don't don't you ever
back down never start a fight but if
somebody else does never run away if you
run from a bully you'll never stop
running but if you fight you won't risk
coming back at you again
stand up fight back mark him give him
something to remember every morning when
he looks in the mirror then even if you
lose you win and by the way if you ever
run from a fight I will personally beat
your ass and you go on my father was not
exactly a mellow guy he did not spare
the rod but he taught me early that
there is no substitute for moral courage
whatever the cost and that the ultimate
duty of every leader is to take care of
the people who rely on him when
otherwise they would be forgotten or
abandoned courage in the face of those
above you and loyalty to put to those
below you were my father's in alterable
standards the only true way to measure
the worth of another human being so
there you go those are some those are
some standards your dad laid out for you
he was a tough guy he was a tough guy
you know I listening do you read the the
excerpt from fields of fire I was just
thinking about how long it has been in
the journey that
had since I wrote those words in
learning I think we were talking about
this last night learning how to write by
writing this novel writing a novel was
an act of will for a lot of different
reasons and one of the things when when
I think about growing up and our family
was my dad was a leader more than
anything he was a leader and you know
bit different families have different
conversations when when you're sitting
around the dinner table but his was
always you know he would talk about
different issues but it was always how
do you lead how do you motivate people
one of his slogans was you can make
people do something or you can make
people want to do something and so in a
nutshell you know learning from him you
know he was a career military person he
enlisted in World War two became a
bomber pilot b-17 b-29s and was in
Berlin Airlift and when I was very young
and was transitioning into jets for the
Korean War and the air pressure and the
cockpit blew out the jetblue's eardrums
out he got grounded I'll never forget
that day when he came home when he he
couldn't fly anymore
we were getting worried for him to walk
into the door and my mom says it took
your dad's wings away don't ever mention
it he walked in and he was still wearing
his wings you know once you qualified
that hey hey don't take off and so first
thing I said to him was hey Dad you they
let you keep your wings he's upstairs
Saturday but then he was a pioneer in
the muscle program still didn't have a
college degree put the first atlas in
for the Air Force and one of the one of
the great things to observe as a
teenager was when they gave him a
command of an atlas Thor Scout junior
and missile squadron the D success rate
on the Atlas at this time out of
Vandenberg we had opened up Vandenberg
it was a 85,000 acre wilderness when I
first went out there in eighth grade but
the success rate and that squadron was
11% and he made it 100% 12 out of 12
successful launches and I'd go with him
out to the the pads don't you know when
I'm 1617 and watch how he dealt with his
people wait you just trumped cuz iris
talk about how I bring my I used to
bring my son out to the training grounds
and let him shoot machine guns and stuff
but you your dad brought you out let you
shoot missiles let me watch YouTube you
just trumped me ya know you could back
then you know I could go sit at senator
block house like a thousand yards away
from where one of these Atlas was born
but watch and how he treated his people
and on a you know he'd been deployed a
lot when he went back into the mill he
got ripped at the end of World War two
because he didn't have a college degree
that when they brought him back in they
was either deployed or stationed at
bases that did not have military housing
for three and a half years and we were
up in Saint Joe massara where I was born
my father's family had come in from the
Appalachian Mountains and ended up in
st. Joe my mother was from East Arkansas
very she had a very tough life
early life three of our seven siblings
had died of childhood disease the kinds
of things you don't even see anymore
like her her sister that was nearest to
her died of typhoid fever when's the
last time we seen American with typhoid
fever so we were up in st. Joan Nazira
my mother had four kids by the time she
was 24 years old and my dad was gone and
she didn't know hardly anybody in st.
Joe Missouri and we didn't have these
Family Assistance Programs like they do
now and it's been one of the great
privileges of my life to try to put
those into into our military so my
grandmother moved in she was living out
in Arkansas I mean from Arkansas to take
California and came up and lived with us
for several years and there was an iron
hand in the house but you know my dad
would come back he'd leave Friday night
get off work at at one point the Scott
Air Force Base Illinois Drive 380 miles
one way every weekend no interstates you
know Drive all night Friday night show
up we never knew what time Saturday
morning but he'd be in there was with my
mom said he born raised hell
Friday afternoon you get in the car and
drive back but his example taught me
more about
the axioms of leadership than anything I
learned anywhere else and being able to
apply it in the Marine Corps which you
know was one of the great prides of my
life was really an extension of what
he'd put on the table day in a day out
and you know I like Jim got the new son
Jim got to know you know his grandfather
my dad very well we spend a lot of time
fishing hunting we're an outdoor family
and we've had same kind of a few
thousand hours of discussions I think I
mean yeah you can very easily say that
the passage you read would qualify as
the eleventh commandment in our
household growing up I was passed down
to him in the past down to me very very
very simply never walk away from a fight
I've never start a fight but never walk
away from one never quit and you'll be
judged how you treat those around you
and it's uh it's it's it's it's been one
of those things I've kept with me my
entire life and it's I was lucky to have
that kind of formative influence at a
very young age and I love the Marine
Corps myself but everything I've learned
about leadership is from him and being
around his platoon growing up and it's
absolute blessing yeah that's that's
awesome I know and we talked about this
a little bit last night I would have
guys that are concerned that hey I'm not
around I got you know two kids and I'm
doing another deployment and and you
know I always would tell guys look guys
have been I don't know what you call it
in
you know Viking years or whatever but I
don't if they called it a deployment
back then but guys have been going on
deployment and leaving their families
for thousands and thousands of years and
and that to me is an example it's it's
that you might not be there to directly
influence your kid on a day-to-day basis
but the when a young man looks up or a
kid looks up and sees hey this is what
hard work is this is what commitment is
this is this is what sacrifice is and
they can emulate that you don't have to
be there every day to instruct them in
every single little thing that they do
and I mean clearly both of you are
examples of that you can turn out just
fine even if dad isn't around every
night
you know when I was really when I was
really young and he was deployed the
Berlin Airlift age I used to go to bed
every night with a picture of him on the
runway and the flight line that Air
Force Public Affairs had taken with him
and his first sergeant and some visiting
general I still had a picture over my
desk today but that was you know that
was a good night dad
you know and you look at that and you
you gain an understanding of what it
means to serve and what what your
country is all about and you know
serving your country and those sorts of
things the one thing I would say was my
dad really didn't want me to go in the
Marine Corps he from the job that we
were just talking about you know when he
had the missile squadron he had gone to
night school for 26 years he graduated
from college my senior in high school he
made it was deep selected for colonel
and then they sent him to the Pentagon
to do legislative affairs and it was the
McNamara era and he would just he would
just you'd go crazy about the whiz kids
who were running the Vietnam War and and
we would have these long discussions
about you know you're you're just gonna
be meat you know you're gonna be meat
you do them the Marine Corps is a
political football don't do it his line
was go in the Navy stay on the ship eat
ice cream and you know when I went in
the Marine Corps it was like oh man and
then when my brother went in the Marine
Corps my brother was at Huey pilot in
the Marine Corps it was like my boys are
Marines you know going back to your
childhood a little bit you talk about
how you moved around a ton
growing up I mean you sound like your
dad was a little bit of a habitual house
mover even when you get somewhere he
would move you know you're talking about
you you were in England you live in
three hats three different houses and it
seemed like everywhere you you went you
would move around a lot and one of the
things you say about that in the book is
I'm going back to the book here I not
only learned how to read a room but by
necessity became an acute observer of
subtle body language of each new tribal
circle in each place I learned valuable
distinctions that helped me to develop
skills and insights that carried over
into leadership challenges during
during my later life in order to lead
people you must first motivate them in
order to motivate them
you must understand them in order to
understand them you must be able to
grasp not simply their words but the
emotion behind their words the same
words and gestures can have vastly
different intentions in Alabama and
Southern California and Nebraska and
sometimes even within the same town I be
a receiver of information as well as a
careful broadcaster so absolutely you
know and first of all with with my dad
moving you know we I think the longest
way we lived in a house was like 17
months while I was growing up you know
if part of it was that you know the
Scotch Irish tradition uh the Ulster
Scots that settled the Appalachian
Mountains and then spread further west
and you know they're there they like to
say you know you you haven't you don't
stop moving - you've lived in at least
two or three houses there's something
over the mountain that you haven't seen
yet and yeah that literally yeah we got
we got you know the does post-world War
two military was you know it was still
solid sort of reseating itself in terms
of having large standing military and
where the missions were going to be with
the space program on stuff missile
program going on so yeah we buy a
necessity moved a lot but then you know
we'd get in the house Amarillo Texas
women Amarillo Texas one year would have
been three different houses that's a you
know I saw one now there's someone got
their own Sun set on what sets in Street
we're gonna move in that house so my
brother and I we lived on the back porch
do you know there with the the windows
rattling you know etcetera but as we
were destiny either become Marines or
start a moving company really so then
there was an upside of the downside of
that and that is you know academically I
went to any nine different public
schools in five years at one point three
different schools in eighth grade no you
know continuum in academic and
curriculum when I started in the eighth
grade that was in Santa Maria California
when they started first opened up
Vandenberg they tested the whole class
they took four of us they put us in
different really
is it like the beginning of GT you know
or whatever you know you're gonna you're
going to be like an experiment you're
gonna grow it academically at your own
rate by the time I got one two three
like the fifth school in Nebraska I was
on non college prep work release get
this guy out of here you know let us go
an hour early and I went to work now I
can always take a standardized test and
that's really how I was able to get into
the scholarship program that later led
me to go to to the Naval Academy but the
most important lesson from all of that
was I was able to see such a
cross-section of America first in the
military you know the military was the
first institution in the country that
was racially integrated and we had a
totally different environment than if I
had grown up in East Arkansas or
somewhere else but also so many
different communities and you walk in
and you're the new guy and you read the
room and you figure out where the
problem is but you also as you know from
from from the quote that you read you
learn that a big part of leadership is
knowing what motivates people and
understanding that different things
motivate different people not only
culturally but individually and so sort
of figuring out what you know what a
person is thinking when they are saying
certain things do what body language
means etc and you translate that into
the combat environment particularly in
in Vietnam during the Vietnam War when
when I was there and we had an
incredible cross-section particularly of
the the working side of American society
and and I by that time I'd been a boxer
for eight years I've been around a you
know a lot of African Americans my hero
uh and when I was in high school as an
African American incredible fighter once
the Olympics in 1964 but the Hispanic
communities California the farming
communities the southern you know the
southern mentality of which my culture
derived and so when you look at a
problem you look at a
problem you know I got cat ones I got
cat fours in terms of you know the
testing scores of people out there you
learn how to how to listen and then how
to make decisions and how to preclude a
lot of problems that were going on we
had racial problems and in the military
writ large during that period we our
society had these problems I never had a
racial problem and any unit I commanded
did you know what one of the things that
while you were jumping from school to
school that was problematic although you
would learn in this stuff about human
nature and the way people are you know
one part of the book here you say from
from the time I was 10 my dad had
challenged me to read a book a week and
if and if that did not remedy my
restlessness to try and read two books a
week read read read he urged me and I
had including poetry fiction history and
anything I get my hands on that was
about sports or the military the you
read that much as a young kid constantly
and I thought really saved me in terms
of the you know the differing standards
and whatever in the in the schools that
I was going to and the other thing that
my dad and I would do from the time I
was very young was have poetry contests
you know he was a big big reader too and
so you know all the way through his his
lifetime we would do that even you know
up until you know very soon before he
passed away we would go every summer
we'd get the the males in the family of
the different generations get a fishing
camp in Minnesota for two weeks and hang
out build fire goof around catch fish
clean fish talk talk talk and my dad and
I would always we do Kipling or we do
the British in the Irish poets and you
know one of us had give a line and
another would give another line to see
who really remembered you know and I
always knew when I was I in high school
when he when he was wanting to go go up
to Minnesota even at that point because
he would go and he'd start talking to my
mother
this one is one poem called to you
through the wind do you fear the force
of the wind the slash of the rain go
face it and fight it be savage again I'm
going go cold and hungry
like a wolf I'm okay I think we're going
to Minnesota enough yeah and and you
also say in a book I knew and as I had
always known that I was born to be a
Salter growing up you know we were and
then still are an outdoors family hunt
fish shoo
you know I taught Jim from the time he
was sick Gemstar to 26 years old I got
my first rifle when I was eight years
old it was a part of a long going
tradition from the Pioneer a pioneer
days you know here's your here's your
rifle I loved being an outdoors and I
love all of the mechanics of that part
of the world and of course at that time
post-world War two you turn on a TV in a
weekend and you've got victory at sea
and you know air power and all these
shows and I loved military history I've
watched this stuff and I said I I knew
I'm going to be a soldier and I didn't
know at that time really it was a it was
a close call in high school what I go in
army or would I be a Marine I wanted to
do that and when I got to I didn't know
what college was we do it was not part
of our family heritage at that time you
know directly going to college and
figuring out what school you should go
to and those sorts of thing so I went at
remember when I was fourteen years old
with my dad and I said dad I want to I
want to be a soldier said go to college
I said what are you doing College he
says you're going to be an engineer us
of what our engineers do he said they
invent things I said I don't want to
invent anything that's right I want to
go in the woods I don't want to leave
people I know and so I found out that
the Navy had this ROTC scholarship this
first scholarship full scholarship
program because I could not have gotten
the Naval Academy out of out of high
school my grades weren't that great you
know the other things I had in place I
think but the army did not have an ROTC
scholarship at that time they had a
program where after two years you could
utiful scholarship that you only had a
partial at the beginning so I
I applied to the Navy scholarship
program at that time you took a
standardized test and anybody who passed
a standardized test got into the
interview process and you could go make
your case so I went it was the school
that was heavily military kids in us in
a school we had 12 people from our
school who passed the tests and got into
the the interviews our valedictorian
salutatorian Allstate basketball player
all district football player and me it's
like hey pump your gas yeah come see me
fight and I really lucked out because
the two interviewers the first one was a
Mustang commander who had seen me fight
and just totally by coincidence the name
was commander Lassiter he says you know
where have I seen you before and uh
wouldn't me and he talked about what do
you want to do as I want to do this this
is what I want to do he says what are
you gonna do if you don't get it I said
I'm gonna be here next year you know if
you you know if I don't get it this year
I'll be here next year and we you know
we talked about working through high
schools I worked all through high school
and he would come after this he'd come
over I was packing groceries at the Base
commissary he'd come by and say hello
and the second interviewer was a Naval
Academy graduate who had graduated in
the bottom 2/3 of his class and from
from South Dakota and he was saying we
don't we got enough brains in this world
we need leaders and he threw examples
out you know like things are not
supposed to be able to solve you
probably know this from different
interviews you went through and in your
time in the Navy so he goes we got all
this mud in the Mississippi River what
are we gonna do about the mud and
Mississippi River and I said commander
I've been thinking about this I said
look you know here's what you do you
shut that river down for eight hours a
day and you run a big like a screen
through there like a filter big filter
on on a rotator and on each end you put
like a car wash you know with a the
sprays and so you run you run the
filters through and you spray
the the mud out and you put it in a
culvert and get a truck under there I
said captain that's top soil send it
back up and sell it back to the farmers
yes I know okay and so I got the
scholarship and when you you mentioned
fighting and you mentioned boxing and
you know that you mentioned it a couple
times and well obviously I like fighting
and one of the things I mean I always
I'm more of a jiu-jitsu player but the
things that jiu-jitsu teaches you about
life and about everything really and I
know a lot of those similar lessons come
from boxing you had a nice little lob
nice little thing about boxing in here
and I just wanted to throw it out there
before we jump too much further cuz you
know boxing stays with you through your
through you through your Naval Academy a
career and whatnot
but um here we go back to the book
boxing and the rough-hewn world in which
the sport resided taught me valuable
lessons about human struggle and the
thin line between success and failure in
the ring you quickly learned that life
was not always fair and that it's not
always offer you a face-saving time out
when things were going badly once the
bell rang you're out there by yourself
exposed for all the world to see until
it rang again
no excuses no sitting out for a couple
of players just because somebody hit you
so hard you couldn't see straight and
your toes felt numb when you know my
kids were competing jiu-jitsu a lot when
they were little and and I would see
these kids and we'd go to these
tournaments and jiu-jitsu tournaments
are very popular especially out here in
California at that time and they're
popular everywhere now but I would
notice that when a kid loses you know
because my kids played all kinds of
sports whatever soccer and basketball
and this and that the kid if the team
loses the soccer game the kids you know
they walk off the field when a kid loses
the jiu-jitsu match and this is just not
just my kids but like 90% of kids when
they lose that jiu-jitsu match when
they're 6 years old when they're 7 years
old they're gonna start crying and it
you know it made sense to me instantly
there's two parts of it that make sense
to me number one they're by themselves
there's no one to blame it's not anyone
else's fault on the team it's just them
number two when you get beat in a come
in a combat sport it's there's there's a
a primal thing that you just realize you
got beat by another human being in this
game and and it's not a game and so it's
it's like you said it's like there's no
there's no way out of it and for me
those lessons that people take away from
combat sports are extremely important
and it's the things that you just talked
about right here the absolutely and on a
number of different levels you know and
and one thing about well first of all on
one thing about judo and jujitsu is you
know when I was a kid I used to read a
lot and read a lot about Asian history
and you know you learn the the Japanese
philosophy behind it which is to take
your opponent's strength and use it
against him you know and it was just a
kind of a different thing than boxing
but I've always thought about that you
know and in other areas of my life I've
thought about that and in terms of
boxing you know you never know who the
judges are you know and one you know you
you're absolutely right I mean nothing
nothing is worse than losing when it's
just you out there if it was a team out
there you know you've got you got people
you can pat on the back and whatever but
it's just you or as one of the great
fighters in Omaha when I was fight and
used to say it's just you and other guy
and all that smoke but so you you learn
to deal with in the other one when I say
that you know maybe you may perceive
unfairness you know you you alright you
know I think I won that fight but you
can't talk about it for the rest of your
life you just say alright you got it you
got to swallow it and you got to say
that was that and the other thing is you
have to prepare you know when you when
you say I'm gonna you know like 1516
years I could I could be fighting in
front of 3,000 people you know omaha's
and then I have a lot going on and a
winner and if we you know was cold and
they come into the Coliseum and watch
butts and they're good fighters you know
really go mad
Omaha good fighters impact including a
professional
stable as well but yeah I'm gonna be in
front of 3,000 people and I don't want
to look like an ass you know and so you
put it on yourself
you put Preparation on yourself which
actually is a great learning tool for
being a writer you know you you may
think you're working hard or you may
think you're just passing the time but
when the book comes out you're gonna be
exposed to all these reviews and that
sort of stuff you know so and also it's
kind of interesting cuz I was just
talking to a friend of mine who is in in
government right now who was a very fine
football player and we were comparing he
was talk about how hard it was to deal
with a certain individual because he'd
been a wrestler and he didn't understand
how you know you get the team around you
to solve these problems well you know
you learn to step forward and take
responsibility for solutions you know if
you're in an individual sport I mean
they probably more than any other kind
of a sport you know it's like alright
this is what I believe and this is what
I've got to fight for and if we lose we
lose but this is what we're going to do
and in my life combining that with with
the Marine Corps you know where you are
responsible for the lives of other
people and you have to make decisions
that affect other people there couldn't
have been better training for any other
leadership situation I've been in when
when going back to where you got
selected amongst for this for this
scholarship program you you one thing
you said is here nobody's gonna outwork
me
absolutely as I remember the day I got
that because I said okay I'm gonna wrap
myself a little tighter here you know
somebody up there likes me I remember
that when I you know when you got the
the letter from the Navy in the mailbox
if it was a thin little letter you know
as a know and on I got the packet uh-huh
it was cold I got that packet and I went
I did this and I am gonna bust my tail
you know and then it came alright ooh
back then it was like there were 51
schools that had these programs and you
you listed the top six
in order and then yes-no yes-no will I
go to these others and I'm sitting in
Omaha Nebraska phrasing I put down the
six warmest schools I did not know the
University of California from the man in
the moon but I said University
California sounds warm and I and I put
it on the top and I got into university
California I mean didn't have their
nebraska quota that or something I don't
know and had a great time there did very
well in the military program and my my
marine corps the Marine Corps officer in
the program said you really should go to
the Academy you know and so did my dad
my dad so huh so how much fun I was
having down there I didn't like this boy
off so say you applied then for the
Naval Academy while you're at USC does
and it was that what are you surprised
to get in there well um I think first of
all I had I had ranked first in the
leadership programs at Southern Cal and
I got strong recommendations major unter
Koffler was the the marine and and my
lieutenant Coburn was the naval
instructor and they both wrote strong
letters for me and I had to get letters
of recommendation from high school and
you know when I was in high school I did
really well in the literature programs
even though I've got put in dummy
English my senior year you know and you
know we were like what did you do last
summer what they were studying the great
artists but the woman who was was my
teacher she saw how much I loved to
write and read and the sort of thing I'd
say and so she wrote me a wonderful
letter and and then you know I was on
the presidential appointment side which
was active duty military and I think
they took I can't remember know where
they took 50 or 75 but they took a
certain number from the from the country
and I got in stone so I the you know the
Naval Academy is a is a is a story unto
itself you have one section and I
obviously didn't go to the Naval Academy
of course I worked with a ton of
over the years that that did but I
thought that this little story well I
just thought it might capture some stuff
about the Naval Academy and I'm gonna
read this going again this is still from
the book I heard my country calling
after dinner I reported to the room
across the hall where the four who had
joined evening come around towards its
end took turns beating me with a cricket
bat touch your toes
aye-aye sir I would lean over and touch
my toes they would hit me swinging the
bat as if taking batting practice for
slowpitch softball game
I would then come to attention and
resume my brace which is standing at the
position of attention
beitar me sir did that hurt web no sir
touch your toes aye-aye sir the bat
would connect again Beitar me sir did it
hurt no sir
okay touch your toes aye-aye sir the
blow would come I would straighten up
again Beitar me sir
did it hurt no sir after they had each
hit a couple of slow pitch home runs it
had apparently stopped being fun and
their exuberance diminished one of them
finally told me that if I would simply
admit that it hurt they would stop
beating me but for all I knew even this
guarantee could have been double think
if I told him it hurt would I really be
allowed to leave or want to just bring
yet another lecture in another round or
worse yet did they really want to send
me back across the hallway I had already
dealt with doctor no pain before dinner
I did not want to survive the cricket
bat only you go back to the toothpick
which was another torture they were
sorting through the pain actually left
my body or maybe it was merely my brains
reaction as I would later find out with
Marines who were wounded so severely
that their nervous systems became
overloaded and shut down so that they
could not feel any pain I had I had
detached myself from the moment It was
as if I was watching myself from another
room did it hurt web no sir just tell us
that it hurt idiot did it hurt I could
hear worry in his voice somehow the very
abuse that they were now weary of
perpetrating had inspired me by refusing
to lose I felt that I was somehow
winning
no sir touch your toes another blow
Beitar me sir
behind me I heard them discussing that
the bat had split lengthwise on my ass
all right get out of here Webb
aye aye sir so yeah what year was this
1964 yeah
Naval Academy was a different place
needless to say than it is now
yeah when Bob Tim Berg was writing his
book nightingale song we discussed that
that incident in one of the comments he
made was he
meaning me was not particularly bitter
about it but he could still give me the
individuals names and I so could I'm not
going to but you know that the Naval
Academy at that time you know the
pendulum swings in terms of
indoctrination and the where education
fits in and what type of education etc
etc but that arc this class a class in
1968 depending them in terms of plebe
indoctrination had swung very far and it
was by company really they were like
tribal systems were 36 different
companies and some of them were
relatively loose and some of them were
really you know actually we had two two
companies in in my class that ran out
physically ran out more than half of
their plebs
and these are people who were highly
screened I give some details in the book
about the number of class valedictorians
varsity athletes Eagle Scouts etc which
actually when people have asked me you
know what what's the great benefit you
got out of the Naval Academy and one
thing I said as well I knew that I could
achieve among these people who had
achieved in different ways in high
school I had I learned you know that I
could compete in and you know why was on
the right track attitudinal and
everything but this class I think we
started with 1350 and the first week or
two of a plebe year when some people
resign they allowed new increments to
come in just for very short
time so let's just stick with 1350 I
think we graduated 841 we had the
highest attrition rate of any post-war
Naval Academy war - naval academy class
and there were some really people who
would have been fine officers who were
run out for one reason or left and that
time period - coincided with the very
beginning of the Vietnam War the civil
rights movement a lot of different you
know things that were tearing at the
country aside I can remember coming back
from boxing practice in the summer of
1964 and we had to know the one of the
rates when he went down on the tables
was to know the three top news stories
of the day and they're on the front page
with the Gulf of Tonkin incident in off
of the coast of Hanoi the picture of the
CEO and we were like saying okay I think
this is this is really going to happen
and we the year that I graduated in 1968
was was the the worst year for American
casualties and it also was the year
where in April Martin Luther King was
killed and in June and that night before
we graduated Robert Kennedy was
assassinated it was just an end to back
it up into the Tet 68 offensive happened
beef right before Martin Luther King was
killed so that was just boom boom boom
the last year and different people
reacted in different ways but I think
the majority of the people that I was
with there during that period it it gave
us a real seriousness of purpose we knew
where we were going it wasn't going to
go away particularly for the Marine
Corps we all knew that we were going and
so by the time I graduated there was no
doubt in my mind where I was going to go
was one of the reasons why on
first-class cruise you know at the Naval
Academy you it used to be after your
first year you cruised with the enlisted
folks you know we lived with the snipes
on a CBS after my first yet was a great
learning experience to by the way to see
how hard those guys work down
I hardly ever saw the light of day they
were a trip to in a living spaces I
remember when they you know that we had
like six or seven midship and in this
big living space and you know they're
giving us everything dirty estaba they
could give us you know get down into
villages and scrubbed weather we've
saved this for you etcetera and I said
whatever they want me to do man I'll do
and so I remember the day they accepted
me we had this first-class petty officer
who was kind of like the the guy there
and they had one wall lockers four by
four wall Locker where they kept all of
their different types of books and other
supplies and area okay web come on over
here and they gave me the combination to
that locker and then they broke out a
bottle of booze and they said a boot up
to the to the mess hall and scored a can
of apple juice and came back and we said
okay you know you're alright web you
know and after my third year because I
knew I was going to Vietnam I said it
was like like maybe to see the mid so I
signed up for a med crews got on the
Saratoga USS Saratoga and as I go as I
wrote about in this book we graduated
the the morning after the arab-israeli
war of 1967 began and so we went we flew
to Rota Spain then out to Souda Bay
Crete where the Saratoga came in to pick
us up and they had just medevac the USS
Liberty the hangar deck was littered
with casualties from the USS Liberty and
when we you know we took the small boats
out and started bringing our gear in and
got to the hangar deck and and there
were marine guards around they said do
not talk any of these people and you
know we went up to our 48 of us that
we're on the Saratoga we went up to our
living spaces and that was an incredible
cruise because the Soviet Navy had just
broken down into the Med and we were
playing games with them the whole time
they cross deck to the Liberty
casualties into the America which took
them into
Athens but it was you know constant air
ops on that carrier while we were there
incredible learning experience yeah
that's way if you have it seeing air ops
on it aircraft carrier the first time
that I saw it I was it's it's it's it's
insane is what it is it didn't say that
and that's just normal life on a carrier
and you know the difference is the same
thing talking about my dad and the
missile squad the difference back then
and now was I had a little 8-millimeter
movie camera and you know after EPM you
know I could go sit on the flight deck
and take pictures of flight ops you know
now you know for safety reasons and
whatever other reasons you can't do that
but I've got some great shots of some of
the only ra5 taken off of those things
and we had spats on there and that whole
cruise we had a an a4 they said with a
nuke on it and the front-right catapult
because of the situation that was going
on in the Middle East so yeah that's a
this is a I thought pretty pertinent
here is you're at the Academy and this
is what you're talking about right now
but going back to the book as the
Vietnam War gathered intensity the
leadership of the brigade began posting
pictures and biographies of alumni who
had been killed or missing in action on
a large board in the middle of the
Rotunda just inside the main entrance to
Bancroft Hall the pictures and short
biographies were taken from the lucky
bag the class yearbook from the year
that each alumnus had graduated the
board on which the notices were placed
was large perhaps eight feet high and
four or five feet wide at its top was a
boldly lettered inscription to those who
went before of us before us as the class
of 1968 neared graduation the to those
who went before us aboard had become two
boards and then three a high percentage
of the Alumni listed were either Marines
or naval aviators many of their names
and faces were familiar to all of us
more than a few included friends and
some of these were especially close
so that's a that's a reality for
everyone there especially because in
1964 and that wasn't happening and then
you go to 1968 and you're filling up
this board you walk by it every day and
look at the you know you look to see
what the new faces are and the classes
of 66 and 67 in the Marine Corps were
hit very hard at at 68 you know and I
think I ruined about this but I didn't
one of the on the toughest moments you
know of that period of my life was when
I was the brigade administrative officer
and so you know my job which wasn't much
of a job was to go to one of the things
was to go to the main office clear out
all the correspondents in there sorted
out pass it to the rest of the brigade
staff etc and one of them was bringing
the casualty reps to the brigade first
lieutenant who kept the board on and
without even knowing it while I picked
them up I picked up the casually
reported of one of my good friends and
you you graduate from the Academy and
it's time to go - time to go - time to
go to the basic school and learn you
know I've talked about a bit about the
basical that Marines on here that that
went through it Brian Stann and he gave
us pretty good details on the basic
school and but obviously at this time
for you you know I'm just gonna go to
the book for the Marines combat and
overseas deployments were unending the
greatest burden fell on the privates and
lance corporals fresh from boot camp who
populated the lower ranks of the rifle
platoons and the lieutenant's just out
of the basic school who commanded them
the basic school which we called TBS was
now starting a new class of 250
lieutenants every three weeks in
pre-vietnam war is reduced to 26 weeks
and then to 21
but true to the traditions of long-held
disciplines of the Corps
this reduction took place not by cutting
the quality or the content of the
curriculum but by rather by lengthening
the number of hours spent in class and
in the field every workweek almost every
week TBS companies worked late into
Saturday evening
they spent a high percentage of their
time in the field and a large percentage
of that time was dedicated to night
maneuvers and bivouacs our company was
given the day off on Christmas working
late into the evening of December 24th
and assembling on the tarmac for a field
activity at 0 6:30 in the morning of
December 26th within a month of within a
month after finishing TBS the infantry
lieutenants among us would be boarding
military flights to Travis Air Force
Base California to report immediately
for 13 month tours in Vietnam as
individual replacements in infantry
battalions that were already engaged in
sustained heavy combat well first let me
say something about about basic school
at that time that's probably the best
school I've ever been to day as I wrote
the the course got condensed in its time
but not in the quality of what they were
preparing us to do on the one hand the
Marine Corps had dropped a 60 millimeter
mortar out of its arsenal after the
Korean War they decided that they didn't
need it with more artillery closer etc
they learned early in the Vietnam War
that it was a valuable weapon they put
the 60 mike-mike package back into basic
school so it actually added a tactical
package into the basic school curriculum
they cut out some of the dress and
ceremonies stuff you know they did they
did take that stuff out not not all of
it but but some of it but we worked six
days a week and we worked yeah we worked
on the 24th and the 26th of December we
worked on the 31st and the 2nd of July I
mean of January
and you know it was I think the
intensity actually helped prepare us and
some of the great friends of my life for
people that I that I met in basic school
we were constantly together and by doing
this every day
you know intensely every day you got a
better feel for what you actually were
going to be required to do the
interesting thing about basically school
one of the reasons I say it was the best
school I've ever been to it was it was
like educational it was practical and it
was looking toward the future fronts any
weapon system when we learned every
weapon in the infantry battalion in
basic school they would teach it to you
in class then you would walk out a
symbol disassemble familiarize it and
then you would go shoot it every single
weapon my first day my first night is a
rifle platoon commander
I took the platoon that I just picked up
into a night move night ambush and hit a
North Vietnamese unit with a 51 Cal
machine gun used every supporting arm in
the Marine Corps except for close air a
very first patrol did all the on calls
etc and you know that was basic school
so they did they go out how did they run
problems with you in the field during
the basic school would they take you out
on patrol do they have up for that one
they would attack you planes we ran
close air there weren't any planes
attacking us and it's the same Vietnam
no I said I said role players so you
would when you're doing a patrol in the
basics oh I see how did you simulate and
how well did they simulate it some of it
was was walkthrough you know you would
start with the walkthroughs first of all
we had we had really talented combat
experienced instructors and all of our
we're platoons were a company that's
broken down to five legends
alphabetically you
No you know how that works when you're
sort of at the end of the alphabet you
know we got the worst gear yeah the last
in line for everything and I can
remember one night where we were getting
dismissed or in a company formation then
one of the was a former enlisted marine
and in our platoon we were Roberts
through his L something you know and he
just started yelling this fucking Zoo
and from that point forward a lot of
times we'd marched we go zoo zoo but we
had you know our Ark stat platoon
commander had been seriously wounded as
a rifle platoon commander and fifth
Marines you know all of all of our
platoon commanders had had been in in
combat there were a lot of talks you
know those sorts of things but then on
the tactics side you go out you learn it
and you know you learn it in class you
go out and walk through it and then you
have aggressors you know knobblies were
SDT called SDT aggressors which were
enlisted Marines just back from Vietnam
who just love to mess with the with the
the basically school lieutenants the big
problem and the greatest surprise I have
to say in moving into combat the big
problem was if if you were saved for
this exercise if you're the platoon
commander on this platoon in the attack
exercise you got 49 other lieutenants
sitting there saying no I'm not gonna do
it that way no look come on man you know
that's not which you don't need to be on
line we need to be in a wedge you know
or you know you need to know whatever
whatever whatever you know and I'll
never forget the feeling of actually
commanding a rifle platoon in combat and
being on the move and I just said hold
it up and everything just stopped you
know that we're just right now my god I
mean one that everybody stopped you know
and I went wow this is this is pretty
good yeah but you know the there were
there were things that could have been
taught better the one thing is a
one of the things that I am very proud
of in terms of the way that we did
operate in Vietnam had had a lot of
leeway to innovate and it's that's kind
of been lost I think in the history of
it and there were I'm innocent letters I
wrote back to officers that I knew
talking about we don't really didn't you
have a patrolling package over here you
got a platoon and attack package over
here but really what we do all the time
is we patrol then we assemble then we
attack you know or if we're going to go
into a built-up areas from the the
section you read the excerpt you read
from from fields of fire you know I know
when to go online I know when to put my
troops on I know where to put my guns
that didn't come from from basically
school the separate the separate
entities did we connected it in in the
reality of what we were doing and I'll
tell you there's a long line we're
getting a little ahead of things but
there's a long line of things that the
young leaders in fifth Marines had done
before I got there and and also in what
I was able personally to do as a rifle
platoon and particularly as a company
commander one of the things we saw and I
wrote an article about this concept when
I got back from Vietnam was that the
Marine Corps fireteam this is this is
simple and small but it really is you
know institutionally important the Ricoh
fire teams for for Marines it was built
around the be a our browning automatic
rifle it had it had it had been put into
place in World War two because at the
beginning of World War two the marine
Marines only operated with squats like
eleven eleven marine squads and they
found that a squadron couldn't control
directly control eleven people so they
went into the triangular concept with
the you know the the four marine fire
teams but the problem with that was if
you took two casualties you don't have a
maneuver element and it is built around
an artificial notion because the m16
could be fully automatic you know like I
had I can
some m-14s in my platoon as well so what
what the the young leaders in the fifth
Marines just sort of over time to
started doing was cannibalizing the
third rifle squad and so in in our rifle
platoon instead of having three rifle
squads and in a gun team attached from
this notional weapons platoon we put the
rifleman into two squads and then
brought the gun team in as the third
squad for the triangular concept and
that just kind of happened you know and
no one told us to do it we just said you
you know you can't with the casualties
casualty flow that we were taking he
just couldn't do it any other way and be
effective but with fire teams as
maneuver elements we moved at night
constantly fifth Marines we moved at
night we were known from moving at night
we walked when we moved for the
helicopter assets in in Vietnam for the
Marine Corps were scarce the H forty six
was was built to standards from
amphibious carriers amphibious assault
ships so they were built to deck space
and you know for amphibious assaults but
then when you get in his continuous
ground operations they just weren't
enough of them and it we're very
vulnerable to ground fire so in in areas
where the army would have been you know
picking up with a you know a Huey you
know getting breakfast and getting on
the Huey's and I'm not running him down
this was a great concept to airmobile
concept and moving in on on areas we
walk we have we had for a long time we
had 2h 46 for our entire sector during
the day you know resupply or medevacs
whatever so we'd a lot of walking it it
taught it taught you how to fight at
night but also when something happened
the casualties were high because you're
you know ass hold a belly button when
you're walking along you know if you hit
a you know we it was not not an uncommon
practice they get a booby trap
IAD go off and you get an ambush on
at night you know your people are packed
in etc but and sixty mike-mike mortar I
decided I would there were people who
taught us as a company tactics and basic
school the sixty millimeter mortar is
the company commanders personal weapon
so I decided when I was a company
commander I would get sent and I liked
this I would get sent you know way away
at the edge of our battalions sector
kind of operating independently but I
I'd fire sometimes 600 rounds a day and
I'd send the a a rifle platoon in to
secure an area when we're on the move
you know aim a combat patrol to get a
new spot send a rifle platoon insecurely
or take a resupply haven't drop a pallet
like Mike's in six hundred rounds
no no no it seen us that was you know
that was the tradition beforehand yeah
you can you can hump maybe forty rounds
you know but I'd haven't drop a pallet
in and have them build to sandbag
parapet areas for the sixteen we kept to
the deal was three we kept to and I use
them for prep fires I use them for H and
eyes you know we and and I my guys got
really really good the the the mortar
teams I've been on the field with with
the Marine Corps when they you watch
those guys set up on fire mortars you
know just in training and it's
ridiculous how good they are it's an
awesome thing to watch it's a beautiful
thing to watch
yeah the reason I kind of dug in a
little bit about the training cuz when I
came back from my my left from my last
deployment to Ramadi has took over the
training and so it was it was all that
that's all I was trying to do was
getting guys ready for what they were
about to face and we had we had this
incredible opportunity you know we had
this
you've heard a Myles gear yeah so we had
something that wasn't Myles gear it was
like Myles gear but it was infinitely
better
it was super high-speed multi-million
dollar system had little speakers on
your shoulder so when you were getting
shot at you hear snaps
mmm from these little speakers or you'd
get mortared and there'd be explosions
going off in your ears it was it was
awesome there was no one in seven you
know that they actually had the very
beginning of that concept when we went
live fire early on where they had
targets when top-up energy to the target
that was the most sophisticated we get
in what I found with live fire was my
fire cuz when I came in it was all we
did everything live fire and that was
the big deal and we still we never got
away from laughs live fire but we added
to it
this whole force-on-force training where
you're going against guys with either
with lasers or with paintballs and that
was infinitely more realistic because
the paper targets never maneuvered on
you and same thing when you had the the
guys returning from Vietnam who were
maneuvering on you and you're at the
basic school I had all my seals that had
just come back from combat deployments
and they were the guys that were going
against the platoons that were getting
ready to deploy so it's a it was awesome
and I would get the feedback I would get
was always hey it was it was actually
easier in combat you know - the the
actual death but the the threat of
actual death the maneuvering that would
happen you know they were used to
maneuvering against seals who were
badass and now they're maneuvering in
someone else it's not quite as you know
in the game and also the enemy doesn't
know our tactics as well as we know it
so my guys would know the tactics that
was gonna be used against him so it was
uh it was awesome but it's just when you
talk about showing up in Vietnam and and
your first Patrol you're going out and
you're in that and you handle it that's
that's a complete testament to the
quality of that training cuz it's
freaking crazy you know I think when we
were talking about this last night I had
a to development is the key to
everything you know and getting your
mind right is - in terms of what you're
going to do and knowing the assets that
are available and you know I spend a lot
of time thinking about this - you know
in terms of what what I was going to
face I I had a I had one really terrific
mentor who what when I graduated from
the Naval Academy I spent like two
months as a drill officer at the Neth
and with the new class coming in before
reported to basic school and I was a
battalion drill officer there were six
of us there were six battalions I got
the marine battalion officer
who had just got another hospital from
him been wounded and Con Thien was a
company commander
alpha one one and he was terrific bill
Stensland was his name and you know he'd
been shot he'd been blown up and and he
was like so easy I mean no bullshit easy
and easy as a leader and so the other
the other five drill officers in my
class they they got their own office you
know with their battalion officer and
stenciling goes why do you need an
office he said you don't you know so
you're a lieutenant now you get an
office why do you need an OP want you to
sit in my office
so I'd sat in his office and every day
it was like you know talking back and
forth you know and I'd go out and I'd do
you know let's I go do my for miles and
do all my stuff and he come back and say
what are you doing I'm getting ready to
go to Vietnam he says you want to know
what it's like in Vietnam yes I'm gonna
take you out tonight and we're gonna get
really really drunk and I'm gonna keep
you up all night and then tomorrow
you're gonna work and that's what it
feels like oh please dad sir and then uh
before I before I'd love one of the
things I you know I talked to him about
for Allah for basic school is it what
did it feel like to get shot at he goes
look don't even think about that stuff I
mean it's just you don't forget about
that stuff just do your job you know and
I was a very first thing I thought about
when I took that that patrol out I could
hear spend something going just don't
even think about that stuff you know I
want to take it to the book here for a
minute because well this is the chapter
called hell in this very small place and
it talks about exactly what you're
saying here so back to the book from the
day of my arrival as platoon commander
with dying Delta we have been engaged in
continuous combat operations intensified
in recent weeks by a series of
unpredictable vicious firefights despite
a steady flow of individual replacements
the numerical field strength of our
rifle company have been reduced by about
half
for the past three months this was an
equal-opportunity battlefield
we lost Marines through every
possibility that infantry combat offered
including gunshot wounds from several
different caliber weapons and all kinds
of shrapnel
large caliber rockets rocket-propelled
grenades RPGs different sorts of hand
grenades 61 and 82 millimeter mortar
fire recoilless rifles plus landmines of
every size from a grenade to
large-caliber artillery shells the rifle
platoons were largely made up of young
both officers and enlisted by 1969 the
vaunted ranks of the career and staff
NCOs who historically been the backbone
of the Marine Corps were showing the
effects of four years of heavy combat in
the infantry battalions that impact was
both visible and profound within a few
days of my within a few days my platoon
sergeant the fourth Marine to hold this
key position in the past three months
would leave us a severe case of ringworm
covering his torso including his entire
crotch area front and back my first
platoon sergeant had been hit by a booby
trap while maneuvering one segment of
our platoon onto a Ridgeline during an
extensive firefight suffering suffering
shrapnel wounds in his hands and arms
and stomach area blowing off pieces of
his fingers and slicing his bladder the
second platoon sergeant had served with
us for a couple of weeks and then was
sent by the company commander to another
unit the third had picked up his third
Purple Heart after being hit by an RPG
and thus had been rotated out of Vietnam
the fifth on his second Vietnam tour
became sick of the constant combat and
suddenly decided to leave the Marine
Corps and our rifle company when his
enlistment expired toward the end of
this very operation in practical terms
this turbulence intensified the
relationships between the platoon
commanders and the squad leaders as
daily life and death tactical decisions
would need needed to be made in these
relationships I often ended up being the
oldest and most wizened voice at the age
of 23 I was now on my fourth platoon
radio operator who within weeks would be
shot through his elbow ending his days
in the Marine Corps two months before in
April I'd lost two radio operators in
one day the first shot through that the
hand by the enemy by an enemy sniper as
he held the receiver of our PRC 25 radio
in the middle of a firefight luckily for
our platoon if not for him his hand had
partially shielded the radios handset
which survived the bullet otherwise we
would have been isolated surrounded by
hundreds of mobile and highly adept
enemy soldiers on combat patrols that
ranged far away from our company
headquarters the tactical radio was our
sole means of communicating our position
and to call in artillery support and
medevacs this of course was why the
enemy loved to shoot at it an hour later
the second radio operator have been
blown off his feet hit below the knees
in both legs by a booby trap as we
assaulted a ridge radio operators did
not have much luck in my platoon by the
time I left the platoon I had gone
through six two of my original three
squad leaders had been killed one by an
enemy rocket and the other from a
gunshot wound to the chest the third had
been shot through the lung and in the
liver during the onset of an enemy
ambush
although grievously wounded he had
survived the firefight and was later
medevac to a navy hospital ship and so
it had been for the officers who had
initially staffed our rifle company the
first platoon commander had been killed
three weeks before the second platoon
commander had been lightly wounded less
than two weeks before and within the
next few weeks would suffer a serious
gunshot wound in his upper thigh a
bullet narrowly missing it in artery I
had been lightly wounded and would be
seriously wounded a month later
well let's set the stage let's start the
final couple days in in basic school
because one of the most important what's
in a speech but one of the most
important speeches that I had listened
to during my preparation time was given
that there was a marine lieutenant
colonel who was assigned to the basic
school who asked to talk to the infantry
lieutenant's we had I think somewhere in
the 70s of our 243 who finished basics
who were assigned to the infantry and
this guy was highly respected he had
been an enlisted marine a rifleman on
Iwo Jima he had been a platoon commander
in Korea recipient of the Navy Cross and
had just finished commanding battalion
in Vietnam and he said I I want you to
understand something
Vietnam is the hardest war the Marine
Corps has ever fought not simply because
of the casualties which by the way ended
up being higher even than World War two
if you combined killed and wounded more
killed in in World War two
but because of the living conditions
that these Marines are facing were you
at this excerpt you were reading was
sort of in the middle of an of an
operation in addition to those types of
experiences people rarely understand in
in America the America of then and
particularly the America of today what
it was like to be in the marine infantry
in Vietnam particularly with all of them
particularly out in Quang Nam Province
were where we fought the Marines fought
in five provinces in in Vietnam in Quang
tree which is where Khe Sanh and up next
to the DMZ to attend which is worth why
was Quang Nam I would the west of Da
Nang or
we fought in Quan Chi when in Kuantan
was also a province then it's not a
province now but a plurality and almost
a majority of the Marines killed in
Vietnam were killed in Quang Ninh
Province and I can't give you a really
major battle I mean there are some
operations that there are notable in
sort of Marine Corps lore but you know
one on the country would even recognize
them
these were squad platoon company size
engagements and we're the constant
constant combat activity and we're the
Marines operated were usually outside of
anything we didn't have tents barbed
wire we didn't have cots we didn't have
electricity didn't have hot food didn't
have clean water it was an
extraordinarily rough environment in
terms of Hygiene potential disease and
just the wear and tear put put on human
bodies so you put that on top of the
combat side and then on top of what
you'd mentioned earlier which is the
constant flow of people through the
apparatus that was the combat unit and
the political tensions in in the country
you put all that together you have a
very very tough environment where where
the Marines lived and also where the
young leaders operated so you know what
I'm taking over a rifle platoon in in
that area called an Wang base and I'm
just off the plane you know with
graduate from basic school at ten days
travel ten days procede a little bit of
leave get on the plane go through
Okinawa for you know to kind of get your
your timezone straight and then I didn't
even know what regiment or what division
I was going to when I hit Vietnam they
we got to actually an on Okinawa they
decided whether which division you were
going to go to okay we're looking at the
casualty flow you
going to third more day of you guys you
going first part it and then when you
got to unanchored or the first Marine
Division David kind of sort us out which
which regiment we were going to you know
a regiment they say okay you're going to
1st battalion or the 1st battalion I
said Delta Delta needs a platoon
commander and get on a convoy take off
the the company had been through some
you know some serious combat and the
previous days I think they had had five
platoon commanders in the previous five
or six months so dying Delta was the
where was the nickname yeah is that like
a derogatory was that just gallows humor
we kind of liked you just got a deadly
dying Delta you know or dog-tired Delta
order but you're constantly on the move
and you know I'm new and they're
justifiably they're gone oh man here we
got a new guy here now what and there's
always in the realm of leadership the
the relationship that you have to put
into place and you don't you know some
some people like to say like to say okay
when a new lieutenant comes in you can
be like the observer for a while and go
along in a patrol and what rarely did
those people ever fully take over their
platoon you're the ready or you're not
ready and so I own I picked up my
platoon I got them on a side of the hill
and I explained you know did you insert
into the field to take home over did you
go right into the foyer yeah they were
on the move that were on the moon from
Liberty Bridge to Henderson Hill on a
company moved the convoy passed by I
jumped off the convoy I'd talked on a
radio to our company commander you know
before and I didn't even get three days
in an awesome you know usually three
days an animal for familiar racing he
said this this guy's class on a manner
and basic school get him out here now
and so I took these guys overhead I'm on
the side of the hill and I said you know
this is it Bob Tim Bergen is booked in
Nightingale someone called this an
audition for a fragging I said all right
I'm lieutenant Webb you call me
lieutenant or you call me sir and this
is what I expect and I laid it all out
you know and and one of the things I
said which i think is very important
when you're when you're leading anything
I said I want you to know something
anything you tell me I will believe
anything you tell me the sky's brown
I'll believe you and if you lie to me
you're dead meat and so there was like
the hell does this guy think he's doing
you know and then we went out that night
you know and I sat down I planned it we
moved to the new perimeter I went and I
called my squad leaders divided company
size perimeter company size perimeter I
got my squad leaders in I said hey and
we got a night act we're gonna go you're
in a it was a fool ox you know got their
input listen listen listen you always
listen you know being a commander
doesn't mean you know all the answers it
means you know how to make a decision
you know and on how to how to follow
through and so I figured out I listened
to them I figured out a place where we
would go I had a really terrific squad
leader who was actually acting platoon
commander that afternoon and said a
series of on calls whatever you know
thing basic school taught you went out
that night walked in you know walked
into a situation used all the you know
the the supporting arms did our did our
thing and that was put to rest which was
actually a good thing and then the other
thing which I think is so important you
know when you say know your people know
you know what's the leaders that
leadership is knowledge know your people
know your job know their job and know
the next job because you never know when
something's going to happen and you're
gonna have that next job and it's
character and part of part of character
is consistency and humility before your
people you know and as you mentioned
from what the excerpt about my dad moral
courage there's different kinds of
courage moral courage is sometimes you
got to take the hits you got to lay out
what you believe is right and you got to
stay with it and you know vision in
other words what even taking over a
rifle platoon you know and I they they
knew fairly quickly I knew what I was
expecting even though I hadn't done it
yet but knowledge of people and
listening to people I would go in the
first you know month or so and I was
- commander I would take three hours to
set my lines and every night sit down
and every fighting hole talked to every
one of my Marines and you find out as
you know you find out really interesting
things about maybe simple things like
somebody hadn't gotten paid or somebody
got married and had a cue allotments not
going to his wife and nobody's taking
care just simple things you know and
then you know then the bonds move from
there you you just just to reiterate the
conditions because I pulled out this
this section here where you talk about
the conditions and just to reiterate
what you're talking about going back to
the book here and in the rifle companies
we spend endless months patrolling ridge
lines and villages and mountains far
away from tents barbed wire hot food or
electricity luxuries were limited to
what we could fit inside ones pack which
after a few humps usually boiled down to
letter-writing material towel soap
toothbrush poncho liner and a small
transistor radio
due to casualties and disease during
this period in the war relatively few
Marines would actually survive a full 13
month tour as members of rifle companies
in the bush of the basin we moved
through the boiling heat carrying 60
pounds of weapons and gear causing a
typical Marine to drop 20% of his body
weight while in the bush when we stopped
we dug chest deep fighting holes and
slit trenches for toilets we slept on
the ground under makeshift poncho
hooches and when it rained we usually
took down our hooches because wet
ponchos shown under illumination flares
making great targets sleep itself was
fitful never more than an hour or two at
a stretch for months at a time as we
mixed daytime patrolling with nighttime
ambushes listening-posts foxhole duty
and radio watches ringworm hookworm
malaria dysentery were common as was
trench foot which in Vietnam was called
immersion foot when the monsoons came
respite for was rotating back to the mud
filled regimental combat base at an hoi
for
four or five days where rocket and
mortar attacks were frequent and our
troops manned defensive bunkers at night
that was your break time and wha yeah
they called it little Dien Bien Phu
they're you know because yeah they had a
sign that said welcome little diem and
food and you know they kept their sense
of humor to virt the other further you
know how you know people gallows humor
here's what gets you through that kind
of stuff and and to sort of set the tone
of the on the on the on the tactical
side you need to remember in terms of
what was happening to the country at
this time this was a war that had been
going on and it had its controversies
but hundreds of people were dying every
week still every week I brought this and
I know we're not on TV but I thought
this is there's a circle on show do you
know you're welcome to keep this and
make copies that if you would send it
back to me but this was the cover of
Life magazine June twenty seventh
nineteen twenty seventh nineteen
sixty-nine
average week in this during this period
this was a period of hamburger hill etc
the two hundred forty two Americans died
that week two of Marines are in in that
but in post post Tet 69 period which was
April May we were losing more than 400
Americans dead a week you know even
though the the war had for the Americans
encapsulate had peaked in 1968 the the
three worst years for combat from
Americans Vietnam were 67 68 and 69
they're like the top of the bell curve
we had in 69 I think we lost twice as
many Americans killed as have been
killed in Iraq and Afghanistan and the
entire war and you know the American
people supported this and I've always
believed in what we were attempting to
do however however screwed up it got but
if you're out here in the in the end
dayson the one thing that a good rifle
platoon or company commander or
battalion commander learned was how to
adapt how to adapt you couldn't rarely
you could rarely plan operations you
know sort of like like Mike Tyson said
about being in a fight everything's
great until the first time you get hit
you know on any given patrol or day in
the end while base and particularly
Arizona Valley you could hit you know
some idiot with not an idiot so maybe
some smart smart individual or small
group of people with a couple of
grenades or you could hit a main force
Vietcong unit which was heavily North
Vietnamese or you could hit a large four
large force North Vietnam which we
fought in in May of 1969 we fought with
the the 90th Regiment in the Arizona
Valley I went on for like eight days and
eight nights we had a North Vietnamese
division in base area 112 right off from
where we were the the mountain started
and up into Laos but the Ho Chi Minh
Trail that sort of thing
we had a very fine of Viet Cong Regiment
which was you know rather rare that an
independent regiment the first VC
Regiment we had the qat third main force
battalion that were operating out of the
Arizona Valley and you had a lot of cats
and dogs and the other thing was this
area had basically been written off by
by American war planners in terms of the
the politicization you know the bringing
them into the South Vietnamese
government at that time they categorized
villages Intel categorized villages a
through E in terms of loyalty to the
South Vietnamese government a was
totally loyal he was totally they on the
other way and then they had category
five which was politically hopeless just
forget it and by 1958
you know the
the country was divided in 1954 a
million people came South including my
wife's entire family not very many went
north basically cadre went north and
they trained and starting in 1958 they
started moving back into central Vietnam
the Ho Chi Minh's idea was over ever was
doing his planning was was to cut off
central Vietnam first UNAM and so you
had these assassination squads move into
into this area and by 1961 they were
killing 11 government officials a day
and that was by John Kennedy's a a count
when he decided to start increasing our
troops there so the villages had had
their fights beginning 58 heavily 58 to
62 that time period and those who were
staying with with the Communists
basically had kicked out the people who
weren't a lot of move to Da Nang and
some of them later to Saigon so out
where we were you know I say this
because operationally the populated
villages that we that we operated in you
know they had big family bunkers they
were very you know there's stoic when we
went through there people were up in the
mountains we had we had no illusions
that they were going to be moving to our
our side at least during the you know I
never thought the war was going to end
the way that it did but at least during
the period that we were there I we were
chatting about this a little bit before
but I wanted to call it this one point
from the book almost every Marine who
has ever fought in close combat can
relay his stories of short round stray
rounds misdirected shots accidental
discharges and other chaos resulting
from friendly fire mortars artillery and
air strikes can easily wander from their
intended targets sometimes due to map
error and other at other times because
of human error historically friendly
fire incidents during mobile close
combat operations make up about 10
of casualties intramural firefights can
break out among friendly units that
misidentified their fellow infantrymen
particularly while moving through enemy
terrain at night and you got one
incident that you call up a ch-46
helicopter approach to the perimeter
ready to drop our days load to Huey
gunship circle overhead flying for cover
behind highly vulnerable resupply
helicopter which would soon be hovering
above the battlefield and slowly
descending into the small dirt clearing
we had scraped out to make a landing
zone at the center of our perimeter the
strobe light flashed showing the pilot
where to land but circling in the weed
beds one of the gunships mistook the
strobe light for the tracer bullets of
an enemy machine gun the Huey
immediately powered toward us in a low
attack line that came in just above our
heads strafing our weary
beleaguered preliminary perimeter it's
machine guns spitting out hundreds of
760 millimeter bullets
I had just climbed a small sand dune to
urinate at an empty spot away from the
perimeter Pancho hooches and radios of
my platoon command post the Huey's
machine guns sprayed back and forth
inside our lines kicking up a trail of
dust spots just below my feet as I stood
in the open after one pass the Huey was
finally waved away back into its
circling defensive laps around our
perimeter exposed as we were it seemed a
miracle that only one marine a radio
operator near the strobe light in our
company command post was hit taking a
bullet in the stomach well I I it's one
among among many and when you're when
you're fighting so so close you know and
actually that that incident occurred not
too long after an arc light strike we
were doing the BDA and an arc light it's
one of the great ironies if I might may
digress just a little bit because I
think it's important to point out that
in in our operational concepts we never
used b-52s north of Vinh we never until
1972 the Christmas bombing
of Hanoi and when I go back I've been
back to Vietnam 28 out of the last 29
years I speak Vietnamese I you know I we
still have our disagreements but you
know I go back there and when I first
started going back to Vietnam in the
early 90s everybody wanted to talk about
that eight days everybody you know when
they did this and they were living under
the illusion that they were withstanding
American airpower when we had these
lighter aircraft like John McCain's
aircraft coming in and you know making
the runs when if somebody had made a
different decision I mean it Wars of war
somebody made a different decision
things might have might have happened
differently but we did use arc lights on
the area that we supposedly were we're
trying to salvage you know go Noi Island
you know we lit that place up we were
our our company was I think three clicks
away when one that when that arc light
landed and I was holding on to the
ground moving to the right and to the
left you know how many how many pounds
of bombs would get dropped there's I've
got some statistics in there but just
thousands and thousands of pounds of you
know three 350 b-52s would go over and
actually I think in there I put the
number I but you know so but to the the
friendly fire incidents and how close it
was you know we the way that we would
mark our areas when we're when you're on
close air in that environment you you
know this isn't about the helicopter
hitting or our guy that was you know
mistaking the strobe for a machine gun
around but in general you always run
your strikes parallel to your lines
because you don't want them to drop
short you know and drop on you so they
have to make a run you know then we put
air panels out usually sometimes we pop
a smoke but it was better with their air
panels during the day and so they'd make
a run before they drop and so they you
know they okay yeah no you're too close
no you're not or whatever and we had one
in during this period where we were
fighting the ninetieth regiment out
there in Arizona Valley in May we were
running an air strike against an NVA
unit at a tree line about 400 meters
away and we had that force coming in you
know an Air Force a fighter it's not a
bomber I mean we use them for bombers
but so the f4 pilots there coming in at
I don't know 450 knots whatever it is
near they're looking out the side of
their window to see to see what's on the
ground so we were running the the F
Force I have my platoon actually was we
had a rear security in the perimeter
while they were doing this and they made
their run and then they came on the
second run and the the f4 dropped on us
and actually it bounced right outside
our perimeter and then you know I mean
what the hell here I hear it going
around over the top of us so I turn
around I start you know I want to go on
the company CP and ask him what the hell
is going on so I'm walking through this
kragle of bushes and I got all these
Marines running running the other way
and this thing had bounced and we called
a snake and nape you know that the snake
was the the way a like a kind of a
propeller would break out of the tail to
arm it okay when you're dropping and
luckily the the tail had broken off of
this bomb when I hit and so but you know
I turned around and these guys were you
know I see this thing flying through
there I thought was a body you know is
this green thing flying through the air
and going down the word that or the CP
and I'm going in and all these guys are
running the other way and and that bomb
had had landed on the pack of our 81
zepho artillery radio operator I'm a
pack of those pack board you know dead
center if that thing had gone off
curtains you know and the other thing is
night moves you know where one of the
things you learn is in in when you we
operate like the fifth Marines did is
always be responsible for the person
behind you not the person in front of
you if you lose the person in front of
you stop don't try to catch
with them as their there were a number
of friendly fire incidents where someone
would get get lost try to catch up end
up to the on the flank of the the main
unit and you'd have an intermural
firefight luckily we didn't have that
happen in my company but it happened in
the fifth Marines so you stop if you
can't find see the guy in front you stop
and then if then if you can't see the
person behind you then you retrace the
exact route that you've been on to go
pick them up so you know there were
lessons that were learned and put into
place yeah we always talked about the
fact that and Lafe was my buddy's
platoon commander with me he wrote books
with me but um he was saying you know if
you had asked him before we went to
Ramadi if we would have blue on blue you
know fratricide situations
he'd been like oh there's no possible
way and and me same thing you know like
it seemed like especially in the SEAL
Teams it was like oh that's never that
will that'll never happen it'll never
happen
and sure enough I mean there in that
book in our in our first book we happen
to write about three different I mean
there's twelve chapters and three of
them concern friendly fire
because you had to be more concerned
about well not more concerned about you
had to be at least as concerned about
deconfliction and you know we would hang
we would hang you know giant aircraft
panels once once my guys would take a
building for a sniper overwatch position
oftentimes if there was any question
about where they were they'd hang giant
air panels right out the whit like as
soon as they started shooting in the
enemy newer we wanted to make sure that
they're friendlies knew where we were
just as bad so yeah the the the the
friendly fire problems that happened but
when I came back and I started running
training I would induce those and and
and they happened to a hundred percent
of the platoons that I put through
training a hundred percent of them had
had blue on blues you know with
paintball or with the laser tag system
that we used because it's it's one of
those things no one thinks it can happen
to them you know the other the other
part of that to be really frank here in
the the areas where we were operating
you know you you done we'd send night
acts out every night you know you you
can move we moved every three four days
new perimeter you send out listening
poses and listening posts and ambushes
after dark and you know you've got
Marines out there they don't really know
where they are
you know I mean they don't have a map
you know we had two or three people in
platoon hood map and sometimes they are
out where they're supposed to be or they
or they think they are and sometimes you
know if you get somebody who's getting a
little flaky you know he'll say well we
don't have to go out there well let's
just go sit in this bomb crater here and
they had an incident before I got to the
company where there was a fire team that
was sitting in a bomb crater about 50
meters out outside the lines and a guy
stood up but like 2:00 in the morning
and take a leak in the marina line shot
him and you know the guy who shot him
ended up being a chaplains assistant I
mean you lived with that the rest of
your life and by the time I got to be a
company commander I I put something into
place which was very effective and that
is the first thing I would do is I would
send out my night acts when it was still
light and I would send in what I called
a day pause the listening posts out to
an outpost further away the ambush to a
site I would have them walk by the site
where they're you know quietly check it
out and then go to a to a pause like a
hundred meters away or whatever so and
then when it got dark they both were
moving into known terrain
you know the lp coming back to Ward the
perimeter so they had a sense of
security there the ambush having
researched the you know the ambush and
moving back into it and then I would
mortar their day pause and the first
time I did that and I had an ambush out
about click and a half away and they
call me and you go be advised you're
dropping mortars on us I say you're not
where you supposed to be doing what
you gonna do if you if you hit something
you know what you know we're we gonna
drop we're gonna really drop rounds on
you you know so they've got everything
real straight it ready doubt drop
mortars under people make sure well if I
mean you with the mortar you're not
where you're supposed to be and it's
going to get a lot worse if you get hit
out there man that's that that'll solve
that problem you talk about you know I
walked it this is back the book I walked
every square kilometers rid of those
ridges and rice fields and fought many
of those villages I was wounded there
and here is where I and my fellow combat
veterans stand on one side of a great
impassable divide with the rest of the
world on the other yeah because every
one of us know is that if our luck had
run out or if someone among us had made
one in inverted mistake we could have
died there no question you could be
that's one thing about you know I've
heard you talk about IEDs before you
know I would say 25 to 30 percent of our
casualties were IEDs most of our gun
shot a lot of shrapnel wounds but with
an IAD there's nothing more demoralizing
or booby-trap as we call it them and the
particularly moving at night the
casualties are large and there's nowhere
to put your anger you know you can and
if you're on that on the outside of that
you go whoa you know that easily could
have been made you can be a hundred
percent right and still be dead we had
one device on a night move every member
of my platoon stepped over it on a on a
narrow trail I was walking 4th 4th
parade 4th Marine in the in a column and
the last I'd had a brand new guy I put
him on tail and Charlie was a company
more actually named battalion him but it
was a company move and it was some
branch on the trail or something and
caught boom and you know there were 19
casualties and an ambush
so yeah for those of you that aren't in
the military when you're moving at night
especially pre night-vision then the
only way you can do it is you have to be
closer to the person in front of you
because you got to be able to see them
and so what that doesn't and you'll be
within within being up and sometimes
when it's really dark you be able to
touch the person in front of you
so therefore if someone hits a booby
trap or an ie D or you get ambushed the
casualties are increased dramatically
because you're just all together to add
one thing about Ramadi on that is uh I
think when we got there they had a
hundred and forty known IEDs on the
board at any given time and there were a
couple of different incidents on one
wooden particular that sticks in my mind
was we were putting in the 17th Street
security station friend of Mines platoon
was out providing external security with
gun trucks and I guess he's his truck
sat on an ie D all night and then right
when they were about to move it went off
and took the front of the truck with it
luckily nobody was killed but it says
you can shoot back at you can't really
prepare for it yeah sometimes you got to
get lucky we had the similar thing where
we we go into a combat outpost and a
convoy of just you know our seals head
into a convoy or heading to a combat
outpost and my point man or lead driver
someone said hey I think there's
something ahead of us in the road stops
the vehicle I'm actually watching if he
gets out looking underneath the vehicle
the flashlight to look and see I'm
thinking myself hmm this doesn't seem
good didn't identify anything we roll
through we get to the combat outpost and
then a couple hours later the dagger
clearance team came through and found a
triple stack you know 120 millimeters
mortars that would have killed everyone
in that vehicle for sure and if not a
few others
so sometimes it's better to be lucky
than good and for those of you out there
if you think you're on an ID maybe not
the flashlight approach quietly walk
away yeah I had I did that it was a my
first deployment to Iraq I'm I'm
standing there and my ye OD guys were
doing a target hit at night my EOD guys
find a a booby trap
it was in a planner box outside perfect
spot where an assault team would stack
up and there was a little plant and it
was filled with two or three sixteen
millimeter mortars that were rigged from
the house and so my yeogi guy found he
was just you plug it into the wall and
it goes off so there was and there was
actually little little hole cut in the
curtain so the guy could actually sit
there and watch it when we rolled up
boom and so he found the wire he saw it
went out the window followed it out
there finds the booby trap and I'm
standing there watching him you know
disarm this booby trap and he looks over
his shoulder and he says you might not
want to stand here sounds like that's a
good point I'll be somewhere else yeah
you know they in in this area in this
area of Vietnam they could become
accustomed to a lot of our operational
decisions you know we like the high
ground we like to get a spot where you
can see some of these rice paddies were
like a mile wide
you know interview and you want a place
where you can have visuals and also
provide you know potential supporting
weaponry for people crossing a paddy etc
etc and so you know they they picked
these out you know and we had one Hill
Hill 11 in the Arizona Valley where you
know we'd send when we be getting these
terrain features the thing you do is
you'd send a platoon to sweep it you
know when you first get up sweep it
secure it not just for booby traps but
you know for putting your your other
units in the platoon swept it was second
Platoon they found a mine moved to mine
I left I was going to put my lines in
and I would I didn't want to bring my
platoon up on that hill but with the
having found in mine so I left the rest
of my platoon on the bottom the open air
panel and magar B's head my radio
operator said do not move I want to see
where you are
I brought my squad leaders we were
clearing lanes down into where we were
going to put our Marines
I heard this kaboom and it looked up
behind me and someone had moved these
people up to the top of the hill I turn
around to see a guy flying through the
air with a big artillery round and I saw
him McGarvey I'm running with his arm
hanging by by a shred
he was standing behind him so we had
casualties on top of that hill pretty
pretty messy after a lot of other things
we'd been through and then the next
morning our 81f oh I mean we set up our
perimeter got mortared that afternoon
and he he rolled over the next morning
in his elbow went down and he reached up
and it was like a piece of little piece
of c-ration cardboard he peeled it
covered with mud like you know like
plastic surgery so nothing lifted it up
and there was a 175 artillery round with
a pressure-release detonator on it that
he had slept on all night if he had just
rolled over a little bit I think they
found 15 booby traps on that on that one
he'll eventually so what a nightmare
and I guess what a what a good job on
him on getting sound night's sleep now
hold over I think he's probably woke up
in the middle night on that one a few
times thinking about her
here's your tart you talk a little bit
about the overall kind of the overall I
guess the overall occurrences that we're
going on or beyond what's just sitting
right in front of you so here we go but
something else was going on it stem from
the reality that on any given day three
different wars were being fought in the
basin the first war involved
conventional combat against North
Vietnamese Army regulars and main force
Viet Cong soldiers the second war was
the daily challenge of an insurgency
dominated by a long-term war of
attrition aimed at driving American
public opinion and troop morale against
our own involvement in Vietnam at the
beginning of what became known as the
American war Communist leader Ho Chi
Minh famously predicted
for every one of you we kill you will
kill ten of us but in the end it is you
will who will grow tired the third war
focused was a focused and precise form
of domestic terrorism at this point in
our history America's top leadership had
yet to fully grasp the power and impact
of a type of terrorism that went well
beyond the traditional notions of
military insurgency nor did the South
Vietnamese government ever find a way to
completely counter it it was sorry a
largely invisible war of terror and
seduction was taking place daily among
the rural populace designed to discredit
the South Vietnamese government and to
drive a murderous wedge between the
people and the government and you go on
to talk about bernard fall and his book
you know he's a french author who wrote
a bunch of books and spent time there
wrote a book called hell in a very small
place and he warned the dick van am I
saying that right
Levon Dick Van Dyck Vaughan or moral
intervention cadres these were groups
and what they were doing was the violent
act for psychological rather than
military reasons which is the source of
the success the Viet Minh and the dick
Vaughn will simply go on murdering
village chiefs youth leaders teachers
and anti malarial teams
thus isolating the Saigon government
from the countryside and you describe
one of these situations there was no
warning from around that unseen bend the
air suddenly belched interrupted quick
explosions piercing our ears and
reverberating like an unseen blast to
wind my adrenalin surged I counted three
quick bursts of rifle fire and then a
whoop of three grenades the entire
platoon became animated tense picking up
the pace to a jog as we strode toward
the noise within a few heartbeats a
young Vietnamese wild-eyed and gasping
for breath collided on the trail with
the point man of a platoon instinctively
the Marine tackled the young
and held him on the ground we did not
know it yet but there had been two
others after its attack the the
assassination squad had split apart we
would not capture the other two more
regrettably we would not be able to kill
them the district Chiefs meeting had not
lasted very long we were the first
Marines to reach the hooch I quickly
deployed my platoon in defensive
positions around it in case there was a
second attack then I stepped inside the
shadowed blood-soaked room my platoon
corpsman and my radio operator came with
me within minutes our company's chief
corpsman stepped inside having jogged
down from the command post on Henderson
Hill their unit one medical bags would
soon be empty of battle dressing in
tourniquet tourniquets together we began
the ugly business of triage separating
the dead from the near dead and the near
dead from those who might be medically
saved inside the hooch my hands armed
arms trousers and boots had quickly
become covered with blood we pulled the
dead outside lining them up in the field
as if they were already under markers in
a cemetery then covered them up so that
the feasting flies might find some other
place to linger we had a problem with
flies on the battlefield they buzzed
everywhere into our food and onto our
open sores on an earlier morning I had
counted more than a dozen floating
inside my canteen cup as I heated a mix
of water and sea rash and hot chocolate
foolishly I had bitten into them
thinking they were chunks of chocolate
we carried out the wounded on the dirt
floor of the hooch we had found them
wriggling and turning like worms among
each other as they had sought to escape
the ankle-deep syrup of blood and
innards
I noticed the district Chiefs young
deputy deputy who stood out from the
others due to his fancy clothes blown
backward into a family altar by the
blast he was frozen in death with one
arm raised in the air as if he were
trying to catch the grenade that had
killed him that hand was gone nothing
but the top of a forearm remained it's
white tendons sticking out randomly like
unsplash select Racal wires I had
approached an old woman who was leaning
back against a mud wall with a stunned
look on her face
her jaw had dropped and her eyes stared
unbelievably at nothing I thought she
was merely in shock I pulled her arm and
immediately recognized the lack of
muscular response of the dead I took a
closer look and saw that she had taken a
square nickel sized piece of shrapnel in
the middle for forehead just above her
eyes and so on as I waited in the muck
it did not get any better this was the
war we were losing perfectly summarizing
Bernard Falls observation on this
morning the Vietcong were not asking for
anyone's support
they were asserting their control for
all of the bombs we dropped many of them
so randomly that they killed people that
they killed the very people we were
trying to help and for all the for all
of us enemy soldiers we killed our
leaders did not understand the cold
focused violence perpetrated by the
other side they had deliberately were
killed a roomful of their own people a
violent act for psychological rather
than military reasons as a warning to
everyone in the basin that it was a
crime punishable by death to even attend
a political meeting hosted by the other
side true let me let me see if I can I
can go back to the three points the that
you read about and just elaborate a
little bit there were three wars and any
given day talked a little bit about it
earlier on the straight conventional
side unit against unit there's there's
no question we we defeated those forces
finally and you know people during the
war we're talking about the body count
the body count the inflated body count
etc etc in 1995 Hanoi admitted they lost
1.4 million soldiers dead 1.4 million
soldiers dead
we lost 58,000 the South Vietnamese who
I really want to say something about
because I think there have been
disrespected by history they lost about
250,000
dead and so we did our job that was our
main job the second war you're talking
about the guerilla war I think we did
well but we could have done better one
of the things that Bernard fall talked
about was how our you know our
supporting arms are we used we used we
heavily use artillery mortars any sort
of things and in the villages it seemed
kind of random and the Communists were
very focused you know not on the
battlefield but how they use stuff
outside the battlefield they were very
focused on who they were who they were
after in addition to like showing that
they could they could meet up with us
but even on even on that war I mean we
adapted and in that area that I operated
in you know by the time I'd been there
four or five months I understood the
tempo of that place I understood where
they were they were where they had been
I could anticipate them and we did some
I think some really great things by the
time I got to be a company commander out
there in terms of knocking knocking them
off balance keeping the morale of our
troops up you know showing them that we
we really we could go where they were
and we could figure out what they were
going to do the third was the key and I
will say I want to say a couple things
about that first you know the this the
South Vietnamese the motivation of the
South Vietnamese I think has been
misunderstood and I didn't understand
this when I was in Vietnam I understood
this a lot better when I got back from
Vietnam I started working with the
Vietnamese community here after 1975
helping them understand the political
system that they were moving into it's
you know there they came they came here
they were very they were organized into
community groups a they knew that you
know they were going to put the future
into their kids you know from day one it
was like you get a job you know but
meeting with them get a job get your
kids in school the next generation is
going to succeed but also they were able
to explain in a way that I never got out
there were
about what it was they were trying to do
and how you know if you could do that
the communist approach to this was very
Stalinist Ho Chi Minh was he may he may
have been a nationalist but he studied
the Comintern in Moscow for like seven
years
he knew the tactics that were going to
be used to eliminate the opposition the
Vietnamese opposition and to also put
the markers down the the South
Vietnamese never found a way to totally
respond to this and they were constantly
getting their leaders they had a lot of
corruption the culture is a Mandarin
culture there's a lot of corruption in
the culture at large when you get you
know people in positions of power it's
very big temptation in the Mandarin
system but they were saying despite what
I mentioned earlier about the
assassination programs that were not
fully understood in our country they
were saying the people who were opposed
the war were saying the South Vietnamese
are so corrupt they won't go out there
you know we have at a district chief in
Danang he lives in his villa he has a
great life he won't go out to the an hua
basin and so our company commander who
part of his first tour he had done is a
you know pacification officer working
with them he said we're gonna get him
out here we're going to get him out here
we're going to protect him and they
found out about that and as as I wrote
in the book I mean they they killed 17
of their own people in one little room
and the district chief and his aide you
know just to send the signal that signal
was well understood you know by the
people in these areas and what we were
doing was not as well understood even by
ourselves one of the you know the most
interesting moments for me was when I
had a I've scored the end of my tour I
had a Marine who was getting
court-martialed into May
for hitting an NCO you would not in my
company anymore but he said I'm getting
a quarter
you know he called on his land light on
the regimental tree shop you know I'm
getting court-martialed on I don't you
know I have a lawyer I can talk to can
you come and help me I sent her and I
got permission to go into dynamic so I
went to the three math headquarters they
had this great dining hall you know that
you had to try to get to so I went over
to the three math and had dinner and I
went into a bar and there's this woman
it's Vietnamese woman who was working
behind the bar and she had a black
diamond sewn into her Al's eye and so
she was you know she saw me an old Ruby
you know mustache my boots are blonde
definitely my hair's a little long I
definitely don't belong in three math
headquarters she said you were you're
from out there I said yeah just where
are you and I said watch he says I'm
from dialogue which is was the major
town at the corner eastern corner of the
Arizona Valley and she said you're doing
so much good really and she said she
said you know why I wear this she said
they killed my entire family she said in
dialogue her father was a police officer
they came in at night they killed
everybody she was shot but you know
everybody but her was killed her husband
wasn't armed and he was just just been
killed she said you know you we you know
we can go places now we couldn't go
three years ago you know you are you are
winning and you know it's the first time
anybody had ever ever said that to me
you know and another comment needs to be
made and that is that the South
Vietnamese leadership the military
leadership my age there were a lot of
really fine leaders in there and even
even david hackworth the you know who
said you know this north vietnamese /
gonna be flying over Saigon by 1975 also
said emphatically to me when I was
interviewing him if you'd gotten these
people into position they would have
they would have I mean I said it would
have woman they would have survived
South Vietnam would have survived like
South Korea West Germany's about for
eventual
better solution so they they have been I
think you know libeled in in history in
terms of the competence of a lot of
their they're really good leaders and
people and soldiers and Marines and that
that's and that's from your perspective
of a were you doing joint patrols with
them well here's the interesting thing
one of the reasons that the the combat
temple went up in early 69 was that
Nixon had been elected president the the
the Communists were very smart at keying
in their military operations to our
politics 64 gulf of tonkin 68 knocked
the president out at 68 72 the Easter
offensive what's your Colonel redrew was
that his name was was talking about so
eloquently on one of your shows and they
wanted Nixon Nixon was going to meet
President to on in Guam in June of 1969
and they wanted the Americans to say
they're getting out of there I don't
notice that I can't I couldn't say there
when I was over there going yeah this is
what's happening but so late April all
of May hamburger hill and I never you
know the place lit up for her and 50
people dying but Nixon announced
Vietnamization it's been mocked it
should not have been mocked in the
Arizona Valley we win seen South
Vietnamese out in the Arizona Valley and
then I was out there as a company
command it brought a ranger to unit out
and it kind of got waxed and we actually
moved in there you know to their their
perimeter and they were jumping on
helicopters to get out
and then they sent a unit all the 51st
urban regiment out there and these guys
were good I mean I would I would have
operated with them any day and I've got
you know many many friends who were
Arvind in Vietnam who will talk to you
about what happened when the Watergate
Congress took over you know in a Nixon
resign and then you know this anti-war
Congress came in and one of the first
substantive votes they took was to cut
off all supplemental appropriations to
the South Vietnamese army there was that
was there was no reason for that
well our forces weren't even on the
ground over there and at the same time
the North Vietnamese refurbished and
they they attacked them when they were
repositioned they had to reposition I I
have a really great friend you know who
when I was listening to your show that
we're talking about the American who had
spent nine years as a prisoner of war
and lay cow
who's here now spent 12 years on the
battlefield was a regimental commander
aged 28 recipient of their Medal of
Honor and in 13 and a half years locked
up five years on conex box he was down
to two artillery rounds per tube per day
when he was trying to reposition his
forces when this thing hit so it was a
very complicated war and not trying to
like you know re you know reimagine what
was happening but I had always thought
that the the end result would probably
be kind of like what you see in Iraq
just sort of a slowdown and sort things
out rather than what happened
going back to the book while my mother
slept so fitfully and so fitfully
dreamed I was hit by two enemy grenades
while clearing a series of well
camouflaged bunkers the bunkers were
built inside a bamboo thicket at the
edge of a murky stream bed the first
grenade peppered me lightly on the face
and shoulders the second detonated
behind me just after I shot the man who
threw it
and the second soldier who was inside
the same bunker I was hit in the head
back arm and leg the grenades concussion
lifted me into the air and threw me down
a hill into the stream I still carry
shrapnel at the base of my skull and in
one kidney from the blast but the square
quarter sized piece that scored the
inside of my left knee joint and lodged
against the bone of my lower leg would
eventually change the direction of my
life having four months repeatedly seen
far worse among many of my Marines I did
not pay a great deal of attention to my
wounds medevacked into Alcoa and I was
treated for several days at the
battalion aid station some of the
shrapnel and tobacco in my head back and
arm was removed and some was left to
work its way out naturally as my skin
healed over time the scars pushing
shrapnel out onto the surface I returned
to the bush as soon as possible but the
leg wound went deep into the joint and
had not completely healed in the muck of
the rice paddies and the filth of the
basin Vil's it soon became infected I
did not know it at the time but the
infection was moving into the bone
causing permanent septic damage and then
you go to in August your company
executive officer he lets you know that
there's a billet opened up for Force
Service regiment on Okinawa and for
those people that don't know what is
this is like a plush billet and here you
go if I accepted the assignment for me
the Vietnam War would be over within
weeks and an assignment on the quaint
and gorgeous island of Okinawa we
give me several months to decompress
from battlefield combat before I
returned home life's Gamble's are
sometimes settled in mere moments
weighed against years of previous
thought and decades on the other side
where one might reflect on the wisdom
involved in a sudden decision I listen
to the executive officer and fought
inside myself
pressing the radio handset against my
face as I leaned against an old grave in
the middle of a desolate village those
few seconds became as they'd like to say
in the Marine Corps a teachable moment
but I could not say yes after all the
years of preparation and months of
hardship that I had endured with one
infantry battalion in this small but
violent section of a seemingly
never-ending war I could not simply walk
away bonds formed on the battlefield are
often as unbreakable as the strongest
family ties in a word I felt obligated
like my father service to country
defined my self-respect more to the
point I loved leading infantry Marines
with a gritty Elan they faced the
gravest dangers they took the greatest
risk they absorbed the highest
casualties they had the fewest creature
comforts but they also stood face to
face and toe-to-toe with the enemy every
day and they answered in their honor to
no one taking a deep breath I finally
said no then stayed in the bush in
September I was given command of dying
Delta no complaints you know it's
during that time I had served under four
battalion commanders and three
regimental commanders and as you know I
mean as I'd say majority the people who
who go through this experience know
there are there are a few bonds in your
life tighter than the people that you
have served with under extraordinary
circumstances and I once wrote in one
article I don't say I would trust my
life to these people because I already
have and I knew I knew what I was doing
you know I knew the terrain I felt like
I belong there there's a there's a scene
in fields of fire where snake was a
squad leader there getting ready to go
on an operation he goes and sits on a
bunker looking out across the paddies at
the at the fog pouring down the
mountains and says you know yeah this is
where I belong and my third regimental
commander who was a real piece of work
and was noble Bek pulled me in he he
found out I had two Purple Hearts as an
officer in the bush and which was
against the division order and as he as
he said when I had left it he said this
guy came in with tears as big as horse
turds in his eyes and you know other the
the greatest job I've ever had is being
a rifle company commander just enough
independence to really be innovative
Mensa but still totally connected with
your people and I've been very
privileged in in in my life to be able
to maintain contact not only with the
people that but many of the people that
I served with but also with the
operating military and I learned when I
when I was in law school I you know
that's where I finally ended up
because I need to figured I need to
screw my brain on and figure out you
know the rest of my life I had found out
that I could make money by writing you
know it was like the pure formula here
you know I could actually get people to
pay me to indulge my curiosity's and so
I was a I was able among other things to
you know to be with the military our
military in a lot of different places I
was in Beirut in 1983 when I covered it
for PBS and actually I left right before
the building blew up I stopped every
year October 23rd and think about that
that was a good battalion 1st battalion
8th Marines you know you've been around
this long and if you can smell a good
good unit and you can tell a bad unit
and they were a good unit they were well
lit I was able to be in Afghanistan
you know as an embed over there spent
been able to spend time working on
Veterans issues spent five years in a
Pentagon so you can you can take this
sort of you know affiliation and a
camaraderie and and have it still help
in other things you do in your life so
that was that was it right when when the
colonel brought you in and he just said
hey look I don't care you're going home
you're out you're not gonna stay here
anymore and there was no I had robots
about that no there was not you know he
soon as he found out I had two Purple
Hearts and I I was on the regimental in
the regimental three shop for my last
two months and then came home and then
started you know my situation with the
the joint and my leg started acting up
after I got home and by the way you you
wrote this whole book and you spent I
think it was a half or maybe a quarter
of paragraph or maybe three sentences
talking about you attacking enemy
bunkers throwing grenades and getting
wounded fighting on if that's that's the
that's that's what you received the Navy
Cross for
and well I just wanted to point out that
that's uh that takes humble to a new
level for you to write this book and
give yourself a sentence or two
you know I when I was when I decided to
write fields of fire I was I was in law
school there was uh you know there was a
very important concept that stuck in my
mind and it's still there and that is
that the people who went over and
interrupted their lives a lot of them
just spent one one to her in the Marine
Corps what home have never been fully
appreciate I've never been fully
understood you know and what they did
getting that down you know that the
environment in which they served and you
know the the there's a when we talk
about courage that's physical courage
which is maybe shooting somebody in a
walker there's moral courage which is
standing up for what you believe in and
having the courage to say it to those
above you and sometimes you have to say
it to those who are who were below you
you know no you got to do this that's
all there is to it and then there's what
I like to call daily courage you know
and daily courage has taken a hand God
dealt you and doing something with it
you know like Tom Martin who was one of
my squad leaders it was a he's now
passed away he was a nursing it was an
interesting ear for me in the bush he
had been in Van Vanderbilt University
was favored the war I wasn't a debate on
the war and this guy who supposedly was
going to Canada turn around said if you
think this is such a great war why don't
you just go serve in and he enlisted
it's a it was very very smart knowing I
could you know when things would get
down you come talk talk to me about
different stuff and he got shot and he
used to keep on you nobody had this
Zippo lighter you know you know with
your slogan on it and his his his slogan
was life is not in drawing a good hand
but learning to play a poor hand well
and that takes daily courage you know in
we had an R in our platoon had two
triple amputees one one died before they
got him out of Vietnam but Dale Wilson
was the other ones a Silver Star
recipient one of the most positive
people I've ever met if you if you met
him you wouldn't you would know the hit
had lost an arm but you wouldn't you
know and you'd be leaning on a cane you
wouldn't be able to tell he lost one leg
up by the thigh or above the thigh and
the other one down below and it takes
Dale Wilson 15 minutes to get out of bed
that's the daily courage and never never
complains he'll he'll say well I was
going to be in the NFL what else what
else did I be doing here
Mack mcgarvey or I'm blowing off might
below the shoulder God went out got a
tattoo says cut on dotted line when I
ran for the Senate when I decided to run
for the Senate nine months of the day
before the election zero money zeros
campaign staff I just said I'm going to
do this first guy called was mcGarvie he
was the night manager Tootsie's orchid
lounge in Nashville Tennessee and I said
man I need somebody I can trust you know
24 hours a day you got to be my driver
he says I got one Armus I don't care
you're my driver he quit his job moved
into our basement for a year and you
know I couldn't I couldn't have done it
without I mean a great great friend of
son Jim's too by the way so that's
that's daily courage you know and that's
you know that's really when you look at
the ramifications of that place and
having people understand you know what
how this was in many ways positive for
our country too that's my goal
so you sir you're in law school and you
know you've mentioned this a couple
times so far but at some point you
decide okay I'm gonna start writing why
did you decide to write a novel and set
it write a book of your own experiences
and I mean I know and I'm gonna get into
it a little bit I mean clearly there's a
major amount of crossover but is there a
specific reason why you said you know
what I'm gonna write a novel instead of
a memoir well there's two things I
started writing my last year in the
Marine Corps I was put on the Secretary
of the Navy Stefan was on this medical
hold and I you know as we discussed
earlier as an avid reader I loved I
loved to write I was writing from my job
I wrote three magazine articles in that
year one of them was very controversial
was about the roles and missions of the
Marine Corps how they were on paper and
amphibious force and they were doing all
these other things and it did it make a
difference in my bottom line but you
better believe it makes a difference
there's not one marine general on any of
these J staffs anywhere except that you
know if the Navy gives him one and the
Marine Corps wasn't even represented
when they decided that that was their
mission it was the Chief of Naval
Operations and I was 25 years old I got
in big trouble you think I got in big
trouble and some of these other things I
think you know the chief of staff of the
Marine Corps was calling me into talking
to me and the Commandant ordered a
counter article to be written about what
I had said because they were being
accused in a JCS of you know this you
know wanting to start some sort of a
campaign you know so I had learned the
power of the written word and then I
wrote my first year in law school I I
started looking at and I started looking
at Micronesia and what's gonna happen
after the Vietnam War what should the
United States basing system look like in
the in the Pacific and I was reading a
lot of World War two stuff and you know
Rommel in the desert was you know
fighting from what he called the
interior position you know logistical e
shortening logistic lines being able to
hit the Brits when they were after him
and hit the Americans and when they were
after me and I said we need to develop
an interior position in the Pacific Asia
and that's Guam Tinian and I got really
kind of into this I wrote my first book
actually about that and when I worked
for the governor of Guam doing a study
so then I'm saying I'm listening to the
stuff that people were saying about
those who served I think I met three
people in three years in Georgetown Law
School who had been in combat in Vietnam
1,800 people student bodies same age
group something was wrong and I actually
was sitting in constitutional law class
when they were debating the War Powers
Act and it got to be very vicious on you
know the people who served there and all
the stuff they'd never said to my face
they're saying to each eye
his class and by holy shit that's what
they really believe and I started
writing the last chapter of fields of
fire sitting in constitutional law class
and then as I wrote it you know the
first time I wrote this book seven times
cover to cover you know an engineering
degree you know and and I'm you know I
never went to a creative writing class I
started reading the people I thought
were the greats
in a different way not for enjoyment but
for structure and these sorts of things
Hemingway Steinbeck Faulkner Graham
Greene the British and Irish poets
etcetera so the first time through it
was sort of like just you know it was a
very good catharsis and then I got to
the point where I said no I've got a
piece of literature here every one of
these characters is a little bit
different and it is an escalating moral
drama in terms of how they are reacting
to operating in this particular area and
so the the power the literary power of
the novel was it was more important than
me telling uh I was their kind of story
ahead of universality to it and uh Verdi
who came in to help me on this who had
discovered Leon URIs was editor-in-chief
of Patna but one time just really
encouraged me to stay with it and I you
know I'm very lucky that I did because I
did the book survived you know twelve
rejections and everything else and was
still out there
no so uh and and honestly I kind of
answered that question for myself and I
think when people read it they'll figure
out what why you did it cuz it does it
has this power to it that you couldn't
have done just writing your own story
even though your own story is is very
similar and has probably parts that are
just even more impactful but the way
that this ties together and this is this
is like a the iconic novel and I will
say about Vietnam war but really like
you could put this over just war and you
got these characters in it you you know
you you already talked about one of them
you got the snake who's like the
street-smart
kind of badass marine you got lieutenant
robert e lee hodges who's who's the
lieutenant you got the senator who's
this Harvard kid the father who's gonna
play the French horn and the Marine
Corps band and he ends up it in the
basin you got cat man who's the the
Mexican point man you got the Terp the
interpreters we called him Dan
you got cannonball flaky bag or rabbit
Gilliland babycakes sergeant Austin's
and and all these characters and you
know as I read this it was just you know
I probably read this ten years ago or
something maybe fifteen years ago and
when I read it again I mean it's just
infinitely I mean because I'm older and
I understand things more I guess I hope
but just the way that each one of these
characters and and here's something that
I realized as I was reading this book
first of all we know these characters
like these characters they exist in real
life they exist in combat they enlisted
they exist in the SEAL Teams they exist
in the Marine Corps they exist in the
army I met all these characters they're
all out there and they're all out I work
with businesses now they're in those
businesses as well they're in there
these are human beings and and that's
incredible and then you put them in this
you know again I'm I'm interested always
in learning about human nature but you
put this men in this environment that is
what you've talked about and this
environment is gonna is gonna reveal
human nature in incredible ways and you
just capture so much of it and I mean I
want to take a look at when when Hodges
kind of arrives in Vietnam and he sits
down with major auto so here we go this
is fields of fire going back to the book
major Auto the battalion executive
officer sat behind his field desk and
examined hodges record book he was young
for a major in his early thirties he
seemed pleasant enough the Hodges who
had expected a hatchet-faced Rivini
warrior after hearing of the majors
background Auto had been a company
commander during his first tour and was
highly decorated his right forearm was
gashed with a 6-inch purple
trough left by a bone-shattering
machine-gun bullet and yet he had the
inquisitive sensitive demeanor of a
brooding scholar he smiled casually to
Hajus so you think you're ready hodges
stood a loose parade rest in the musty
heat of the tent he was scheduled to
attend three more days of regimental
indoctrination school but he had not
found it helpful and he had learned to
hate the dust filled boredom of anawa
yes sir I'm ready think so good they
need you out there lost another
lieutenant last night the major watched
him closely yes sir I heard yeah good
old dying Delta they like to call
themselves deadly Delta Auto chuckled he
had a beaten tone in his voice as if he
had seen the ritual so many times it had
lost its Mina meaning deadly dying Delta
Hodges watched him dripping with sweat
in the dark heat outside a Jeep rumbled
past leaving a wave of red dirt that
seeped underneath the tent flap like a
creeping frog in the distance an
artillery battery an artillery battery
fired a mission towards the Arizona
Territory the major swiped at a fly then
lit a cigarette as an afterthought he
offered one the Hodges no thank you sir
major Otto side you'll learn he dragged
deeply on the cigarette frankly studying
Hodges yeah dying Delta you're not ready
lieutenant the only reason I'm telling
you is I don't want you to panic when
you get out there and find out nothing
in your entire goddamn life will have
prepared you for the bush not a damn
thing yes sir do you know what I mean no
sir
Jesus Christ the major dragged again on
his cigarette deadly Delta yeah they
really caught the shit last night I
watched it it was almost embarrassing to
admit he still felt uncomfortable about
the irony of sitting on a bunker and
watching someone else's war Otto leaned
forward absently rubbing the purple gash
on his forearm well what kind of person
do you think goes through that shit day
in and day out lieutenant because that's
what it is shit
and that's the way you take it every
stinking day some-something piddly ass
or something heavy this isn't World War
two we can pull you out to Australia and
parade after a month of fighting nope
and it isn't 1965 when we first came
into Vietnam we would send a company out
on a two-day operation then bring the
men back for hot Chow and Liberty yeah
that's right
Liberty lieutenant in Danang then we
started week-long operations then it was
a month now well we just leave them out
there all the time it's more convenient
the major offered Hodges a small
challenging smile they go wild
lieutenant there's nothing you can do
about it you'll go wild too wild as hell
you spend a month in the bush and you're
not a marine anymore hell you're not
even a goddamn person
there's no tents no barbed wire no hot
food no jeeps or trucks no clean clothes
nothing you're an animal
it gets so that it's natural to squat
when you take a shit
you get ringworm and hookworm and gook
sores you roll around in your own filth
you forget how bad you smell dead people
guts in the goddamn dirt miserable
civilian it all gets sort of boring you
cry when your friends are killed but a
new friend comes on a helicopter a few
days later and the dead friend becomes
enshrined a martyr to friendship you
teach the new friend about him and you
all remember him it's very romantic it
doesn't sound very romantic that's after
a month or two but lieutenant when you
do it for six or nine or even longer by
Christ he'll never shake it the bush
gets in your blood and you hate anyone
who hasn't fermented in his own stench
for months or stood inside a dirt hole
all night waiting to kill a man who's
trying to kill him first major Otto
scrutinised Hodges oh yeah I've done a
lot of thinking about it that's
something a grunt isn't supposed to do
he chuckled again a sort of dry bark but
what else can a man do in on howa oh and
it becomes an oasis you like ant ha
lieutenant I hate it you'll like it when
you get back from the bush I guarantee
so what kind of person can take it for
months on end
Hodges felt uneasy he'd expected the
major to wave the flag and talk about he
will Jima and then send him aboard the
resupply helicopter with fire in his
heart someone who is very dedicated sir
either that or someone who's very crazy
well there you are that's in a nutshell
you just hit the nail on the goddamn
head it's been a long time since I would
that I mean it's it's the icon it's the
iconic conversation between the new
lieutenant and the executive officer and
you just nailed it I guess I'm lucky I
wrote that when I was 28 no I I wanted
there there are a couple things here
when I started I said I am NOT going to
write this book unless the third guy
down in the third fire team says this is
true this is real I mean then you know
real however you want to put it this is
real and that was my guideposts in terms
of all of the combat sequences and and
and this sort of thing is you don't want
to go through this and have it be dear
author I love you signed author or the
way I wish it had been or you know the
way I would like to present it I
remember when that when the book came
out there was a marine three-star
general who had been very helpful when I
was trying to help one of one of my
former Marines who had had been out in
this area and I sent him a copy of the
the proofs and he summoned me working on
the hill he summoned me to his quarters
in 8th and I and he said this could be a
primer on Marine Corps tactics but these
were not my Marines you know I went he
was a colonel when he was over there I
said sir I don't know what to tell you
because that's as honest as I can be and
they were my Marines
and I don't have to try to make it yo
Jima to to give respect to the to the
people who were there but I'll tell you
what I walked out of that meeting with
him thinking oh my god you know this is
going to be really bad if you know the
Marine Corps turns on me for writing a
book about Marines and then there was
another two star general Schultz who had
been a battalion commander and been on
Taylor comm and he was a with third
Marine Division but he'd been on Taylor
comedy right he he read the book and he
called me he read it on a c-130 from you
know and reust Pendleton he called me
said this is the book this is the book I
said will you send me a letter sir and I
said he sent me a letter and so when I
had this little you know command visit
to general Wilson who was a common not
when when the book came out I'm gonna
boy I'm I'm really nervous about this
general Wilson was a hard-ass you know
and so I get in to see general Wilson
might give him a giving a copy of the
book and I said and this is what general
Schultz thinks about it and over time
you know it's it been mandatory reading
and the Commandant reading list for
decades and I can't tell you how many
letters I've gotten from read
particularly staff NCOs you know I
remember when I was in Beirut and you
know as a journalist there in 83 there
was it was one
gunnery sergeant who came they told me I
have read your book 11 times it is a
text on you know on leadership if you
really read it and and at the same time
the the important thing also is if
you're if you're going to write a novel
that lasts you want that universality as
you say this doesn't just Vietnam is
just isn't my experience and so it
really is a very carefully drawn moral
drama and you know some of these
passages reread I haven't heard of many
years and I still remember cuz I've
written on some of these 25 times you
know the one you start off with I knew
the words you know I knew the words that
were going to come out of your mouth so
that is you know that was my intention
of the with with the book and you know
what kind of say it's still out there
and
no you know this is honest as I can be
and I know is you know there are there's
a lot of rough spots in this book but I
don't have to I don't have to put it any
differently the other one other thing I
will say is the dialogue it may be from
the having benefited from living in so
many different places and whatever the
dialect is you know carefully accurate
you know like seven or eight different
American dialects and the way they say
words in there yeah for sure no you you
nail that and it's very clear that yeah
you know these people you know that you
were able to capture it you also did a
great job obviously of capturing some of
the just straight combat and I'm gonna
go here just one little situation
suddenly there were loud explosions
across the river the northern compound
literally erupted
recoilless rifles flashed and boomed
again and again their explosions raising
clouds of dirt inside the compound
machine guns and small arms hammered at
the Marines the two Platoon perimeter
fought back red and green
tracers interlaced careening into the
black air making weaving patterns in the
night the artillery battery on the
bridge compound reacted it turns its
guns north and lobbed dozens of
projectiles across the river seeking to
silence the attack new bright flashes
phases of dusts grouped around northern
compound then a moment of anticipatory
for lull Goodrich knew what was about to
happen he wished he could tell them in
the bridge compound he wished he could
dig a hole in the dirt and come back out
in California watch out he groaned
inwardly too afraid to cry oh shit here
it comes
right now an avalanche of mortar rounds
time from a dozen tubes to land together
on the southern compound then just above
the stranded team the deep pops of heavy
machine-gun Goodrich listened to himself
whimper he could not stifle it it seemed
to him a scream that would give them all
away but he finally realized it was no
more than a scratchy whispering whine
the bridge compounds defenders were
caught unaware having to feel like
spectators in the northern compounds
furious defense bodies went flat
side there bunker seeking cover from the
mortar barrage as they did streams of
sappers poured through the outer wire
sliding pipes of Bangalore torpedoes to
clear pathways through the concertina
for a moment they were unnoticed the
explosions they created blending in with
the mortars they broke through both
sides of the J shaped Hill just at its
hook tossing satchel charges of
explosives into the nearest bunkers half
of the bunkers on the artillery side
unmanned as their defenders had helped
with the fire missions on the North
compound were quickly taken by the NVA
the rest of the perimeter swarmed with
creeping dashing sappers two bunkers
were lost just down from third platoons
last position the sappers manned the
bunkers after killing the occupants with
satchel charges and provided a beachhead
on the lines a stream of shadows poured
into the compound between the bunkers
the first cell of NVA that raced past
the bunkers burned an entrance with a
whooshing flamethrower it ignited the
corner of a nearby tent and drew bright
red answers from a host of rifles fired
from nearby bunkers there was no second
whoosh its triggerman and its mate lay
dead beside low smolders from the torch
lit tent another sapper team crept
quietly into the center of the compound
and encountered two almost identical
bunkers in its haste it demolished the
chapel leaving the compound leaving the
command center bunker unscathed
after the chapel exploded in detonation
that raised a blight bright flash and
leveled the bunker in a smoking heap
another fierce mortar barrage shook the
hill
the North Vietnamese would attempt to
take out more bunkers consolidate then
retreat through the breaks in the they
had made in the wire Speedy's gun team
cringed in the streambed unspeaking
wincing as the gun cut loose again its
explosion seemed to be so close that one
could reach up a hand and lose it to a
bullet each man knew that if you were
made an unworried an untoward move
revealing himself in any way the whole
team would not last five minutes
nowhere to go nowhere to hide
yeah well you know one of the have you
read Anton Meyer Anton Myers books I
have not once an eagle I have uh when we
when the actually I think I have read
once an eagle yeah it's a great great
book you know when when and we sent the
proofs around on on field state you know
prentice-hall didn't quite know what to
expect they you know the book had been
rejected by twelve publishers nobody
wanted to see this side of it in the the
editor-in-chief of prentice hall John
Kirk had been a a naval aviator in in
the Korean War he was a Harvard graduate
which I thought was kind of interesting
because when he asked me to come and
talk to him he asked me to meet him at
the Harvard club you know goodrich's the
Harvard you know he said I think this
can be the great novel you know he said
the the the great novels of different
Wars go against the grain of prevailing
orthodoxy and he made a deal with me he
said you know I'll give you $5,000 I've
been working this for four years they
give me $5,000 open at five thousand
copies but I will put your book on the
cover of Publishers Weekly and I'll send
you on a major tour I said done and he
said actually the draft he had only had
a like a a five page epilogue on
Goodrich and he said I'd actually like
to see more of Goodrich coming back I
said would you like the 28 page version
the 35 pages verse number 62 page
version let me look at that I gave him
like a 30 page typed page a person back
but then they started sending the book
around before publication date for
advance quotes and he got a torrent of
them you know and the one one of the the
advance quotes that I treasured the most
was from Anton Meyer he had been a even
though it was a Harvard guy but he'd
been a marine in world war ii had been
on either Guadalcanal or Jima was
wounded and wrote once an eagle which
there's a marvelous book it's kinda I
haven't read their historic Warren
pieces like a thousand pages long but
he you know he took one character or
actually two characters but from before
World War one all the way into Vietnam
although we didn't call it Vietnam in
his book and you know one of them was a
you know a Nebraska farm kid who was
enlisted and you know and he got a
battlefield commission World War one and
the other was a you know West Point guy
who punched all the buttons exactly
right his name was Massengale another
one was Sam David but he wrote really
good combat scenes and I know and I
loved his book and he sent when he when
he sent he sent this long advance quote
on this book and yeah I just of all of
them I'm like wow you know he said here
at last is that the real story of those
who are in Vietnam you know devoid of
histrionics etcetera etcetera and you
know it with that you know when you read
passages like that I think of you know
people like him
you know reacting to this gamble you
know that at the time because there's
nothing out like this at the time this
is the first revisionist novel and I'll
tell you when I went on my tour I'd
spent a year and a half on I was working
on the house Veterans Committee
developing what I sort of a a factual
basis for discussion on the Vietnam War
you know how long did people really
serve how many were draftees how many
were volunteers what what was the makeup
of the casualties you know and those who
serve etc etc etc just trying to lay the
whole thing out here by year so I went
out and this shows that I did that's
what I wanted to talk about you know I
would talk about this other side but
there were you know I had some real
moments and also by the way had been
representing a so called war criminal
pro bono from my first year in law
school who I represented for six years
he committed suicide halfway through I
clear his name
I have probably four six years but that
wasn't very popular out there but I had
a I was on a radio show in Boston
and in the middle of the show this guy
stopped he said I get I can't it'll hold
us back any longer don't you consider
yourself to be a murderer I mean I went
no and actually what I said it not being
the intro and the American Rifleman shot
or whatever I said no man is by nature a
violent animal and society puts
restrictions you know like new ink it
made me give you a B C here you know and
society puts restrictions on how that
violence is used and I don't consider
myself to be a murderer any more than
you know a police officer okay so and I
had I was on a good morning Boston and
the moment a producer is so nice to me
it said her right before I go no sir she
said we used to hate you guys I said
what she said no really I mean hate you
oh thank you for that I'm now going with
the screaming wolf here you know and
it's interesting because I did a show in
I think was Cincinnati which was a TV
show speaking about the passage you just
read right a little further in that
passage there is a sequence where
there's a an enemy soldier who was in
the what trapped in the wire and he's
all you know like kind of blown away and
he starts yelling - hi - hi - and
somebody yelled shut up and shot him and
it's a woman who was interviewing me she
says how can you put that in a book you
know somebody who was trying to
surrender who was shot and I said well
you know this is the reality of what was
going on so she said I wouldn't put that
to a vote and she asked the viewers how
many of you agree with him 94% of agree
with man I think she I think maybe we're
starting to get somewhere here you know
not you know not the lionizing shooting
wounded soldiers but you know I mean
reality is reality it isn't
once you touch them then that's
different you know but
and speaking of reality being reality
and it's as a to kind of point out some
of the reality that's in this book I got
one more thing I want to read from it
how'd you like to stay in on Okinawa sir
that's right the major smiled Jesus
lieutenant I thought you would have
jumped over the desk by now I'm on the
level we just had a bill it open up
over at Special Services recreation
officer a lieutenant rotated early on
emergency leave he had less than 90 days
on his tour
so he'll be reassigned from the states I
have the authority to fill the bill bill
it from the transients who've been in
country already your ideal combat time
hospital time would you like it
the major jibed him grinning good duty
lots of free time
stick around Hodges will turn you into a
whoremongering drunk a simple yes and
the war would be over but so would
everything else and for the first time
he confronted the truth yes major
thank you sir and the rest of his life
would be anti-climax there was nothing
on the other side what does a man do
when his war is over wondered Hajus
except keep fighting it all expectancies
then lived and if not fulfilled
well at least confronted the bald Red
Hills with their sandbag bunkers the
banter and frolic of dirt-covered grunts
the fearful intensity of contact it was
too deep inside him and he had not yet
done enough to be free of it he suddenly
felt superior to the major a creature
apart capable of absorbing combats
horror without asking for quarter down
south his men were on patrol or digging
new perimeters or dying and he was
nothing if he did not share that misery
he stared deep into the majors face
enjoying the one moment of nobility that
his months of Terror had allowed thanks
major but I didn't come halfway around
the world to referee basketball games
the most powerful and telling scene or
one of the most powerful intelligent
telling scenes in the novel is the way
that I originally ended it which is
which is with Mitsouko taking her son
- can't hands mmm and she's on the one
hand she's trying to some positive
feelings in him about the father he
never knew and the price that he was
paying for being half American in in the
Okinawan society and she says was this
he says you know she takes him to Camp
Hansen and you know because he can she
can see the Marines there he can see the
Marines in there and he says was was a
good thing them I like them and I'll be
a warrior yeah and and that's like whoa
you know and then when I was in the
Senate this is very ironic we actually
had a situation on on Okinawa which was
an exact replay where I was able to help
a family of marine who had deployed to
rock and found out that his fiancee was
pregnant and they arranged for them to
be married on the phone and they had
immigration issues and kid issues and
all this stuff and my counsel Trevor Moe
was when it was handled when he was
handling those like him a coffee field
so far
speaking of sons I want to go here back
to I hurt my country calling talking
about as you were as you were heading
off to Vietnam I would soon drive west
heading for California where Barbara
would rent a house across the street
from my granny and I would catch a
flight to Vietnam my parents would clear
their quarters at Andrew Air Force Base
and that had South to stay for a while
with my dad's longtime friend but
Caldwell as they adjusted to the
unknowns of retirement that awaited them
in Florida alpha had just begun Omega
was not so happily done in less than 20
years our lives had traveled a full
circle I was now the one who was leaving
my dad was the one being left
hind there was nothing left to say it
was time to go we rose from the years
worn couches and began to say our final
deliberate understated goodbyes we
slowly made our way toward the front
door of the farmhouse the radio in the
dining room began playing Danny Boy song
by Johnny Cash I'm not sure that anyone
other than God himself could have
arranged the sweet sorrow of that moment
Johnny Cash was my favorite singer Danny
Boy emblematic of our long-held
scots-irish heritage of military service
is perhaps the greatest song ever
written about the painful anguish of a
father watching helplessly as his son
marches off to war Oh Danny Boy the
pipes the pipes are calling from Glen to
Glen and down the mountain side the
summer's gone and all the Roses falling
tis you tis you must go and I must bide
become ye back when summers in the
meadow or when the valleys hushed and
white with snow tis I'll be here in
sunshine or in shadow Oh Danny Boy Oh
Danny Boy I love you so there was the
first and only time I ever saw my father
cry yeah and then 30 odd years later
you're sending your son into the Marine
Corps the Iraq war is escalating because
this is what 2003
d-doesn't in early 2005
oh so yeah it's full escalation mode at
this point and you're going through the
same thing that's harder going through
it I think it's it's harder having a
loved one gone than it is being gone
emotionally I think
you know my dad was gone a lot I never
expected that he would react that way
you know and then when you know when Jim
was gone you know it was it was hard for
a lot of reasons partly because I was
out there campaigning part of the time
and this was a very private thing to me
I'm a father I refused to talk about it
other than in in general terms but he
was able to call every now and then and
send send emails and that sort of thing
and actually that made it a little
harder
you know because you're getting a bit a
piece here yeah we had just as a as an
anecdote I got to make like I think
three phone calls from from Vietnam when
you get back in and wha you know on
these Mars radio stations where we have
three minutes you stand only got three
minutes and you got it you say something
you go over and then they talk on the
other hand so I go hey hey mom I'm here
in Vietnam over I never wear well I
gotta go now but you know getting some
of the bits and pieces of what's going
on and and you know a Jim was very very
well read and smart about that region so
he was seeing things even as a Lance
Corporal that a lot of people weren't
that was stuff and then you know truly
waking up every morning not knowing if
your kids alive you know I mean that's
the unknowns bother you known unknowns
and the partial knowns bother you more
than actually being there I think but
yeah it's very hard but it's also our
family play you know and so when he came
back it was to tell you a funny story
they got extended on the surge you know
one six got extended on the circuit job
got to stay longer yeah and I think
there was a there was a lot of
fistfights going on that boy there work
and Jim's never back down from one
anybody but uh so I finally said to him
a an email all right when you get back
anything you want
he says Yankees and Red Sox Fenway Park
May 19th
you know we have a great great friend
and I got a lot of great friends and
from South Boston big Marine Corps
community up there hi Tommy Lyons who is
uh ran the veterans programs up there
he got tickets and not only that but Jim
and one of his company mates who was
from Boston they got off the plane at
Logan and there was the State Highway
Patrol waiting for him and uh like a
squad car or whatever I don't know what
it was but they had the sirens going and
coming to come to the Fenway and yeah I
couldn't that couldn't have been any
better
hey Jim so how old were you when you
were like thinking yourself alright I'm
falling in my dad's footsteps earliest I
could think there was two things I
wanted to be a professional baseball
player and a marine both at the same
time and when I was 13 a good friend of
mine we were warming up for a baseball
game told me that could not happen and
so it became kind of a binary choice and
then but the marine corps was always at
the front my dad had a rope hanging in
the backyard the entire time we were
growing up I think was one day he came
home I don't know how old I was but I
climbed it got back down and asked if I
could be a Marine
and his reaction was I needed to get
some sort of organized athletics
immediately need to wait ten years and
when you were when you were going in
Ramadi so you you had paid attention
what was going on in Ramadi and you guys
knew you were deploying there I'm m38
will have done an awesome job and they
take I mean they obviously taken a ton
of casualties as had the whole one-one
ad in the two to eight before them and
and the the three eight actually overlap
between the you know they were there
let's just like the first the five or
six they were there between when the two
to eight left the three eight stayed the
the first of five or six stayed some
what some of the other battalions stayed
I think but so you guys both knew how
bad Ramadi was
you were heading there right and it's
that was go back to when we were
announced that we were going there um
they mentioned last night there was some
rumor that we were gonna go on a booze
cruise there was gonna be a reward for
our battalion haven't done some
seriously good work in Fallujah and in
Afghanistan and there was a fairly I
don't want to say it was dejection
because that would sound wrong but it
was kind of a woe moment because we had
heard what was happening two three eight
and they were in a serious fight and all
the units that have been there before
them had been serious fights and I tried
to get as much information as I could
about the place that I was going to be
going and there wasn't much written
quite yet there was a little bit about -
for one of the first units Marine units
in there that was in in print um but in
terms of press reports they were they
were an eye-opener I believe it was in
bed with 3/8 where they were detailing
an average day of patrolling with these
guys hopping walls and talking about the
the average time to contact from leaving
wherever you were was about five minutes
mm-hmm and it was it was an eye-opener
and and I was at boot at the time um and
one of the one of the things that I
would do would be would be get on okra
Shore liveleak and I wanted to find some
way to rationalize you know the TTP's of
the enemy um could I see like could I
see what they were setting up when
they're videotaping these complex
attacks the AED strikes and there was
really no way to do it you get a
30-second clip of a gun truck getting
hit or a complex ambush and eventually
one of my friends at the time cliff
Collinsworth he's passed you know laid
into me one night about doing that so I
he's like you're not gonna learn a damn
thing
you're just gonna get wrapped up in a
ball knock it off and I took his advice
and just played video games but it was
uh it was it was it was interesting
trying to get mentally prepared for it
um and I remember before we deployed I
was in a hotel room with him and one of
the things that stood out as you've all
these things going on is you know we're
particularly your first deployment
you know her family is trying to be
there for you there's a lot of emotions
flowing around and he said you know if
you survive and that woke me up in a big
way I never thought that was gonna be
even a question and it was something
that was relayed to me by not only my
own father but by someone who had been
through his own very serious combat
experience and as I try to kind of
rehash all this in my head I was I was
brought back to a book that you reviewed
on Vietnam a couple of podcasts ago
where this new lieutenant was talking
about getting ready to leave and you
know how he was eating his meal the
night before and there was absolutely no
desire to be to have the meal to be
involved with it his mind was somewhere
else and the night before I deployed my
cousins lived in Jacksonville um my dad
took us out I believe it was
sharpshooters and it's a burger joint
favorite thing in the world
gyah burger every year on my birthday my
mom would make a special meal and I'd
always ask for a cheeseburger and I got
a bacon double cheeseburger and
basically just stared at it and all I
could think about was where I was gonna
be in 48 hours and how the world around
me there was just gonna keep going on
and it was a very interesting period
although he did make me famous a couple
months later cuz the next morning we're
getting ready to go out and once again
Dale Wilson was there triple amputee he
actually walked up to our barracks room
all the night before we deployed um you
know walked up in a second or third deck
nobody could tell he was triple amputee
hung out in the barracks with my dad and
us for a bit and then in the next the
the next morning get ready to go on the
bus
and somebody I guess it was a whiskey or
moonshine you're on you're on you're on
the Rudy whiskey and did going away
shots in the parking lot
there was a nice picture of it couple
months later in Iraq my company first
Arthur pulls me aside he's a New York
Times article apparently about it really
yeah research better we could have read
that on the house is it was a mention
was anything crazy because I got really
web drinking on the job so he wanted
report moments when it and talking about
being able to communicate when I was
campaigning for the Senate and this was
like a couple weeks before the election
Jim called me and he said three guys
tunes you know were killed and so I'm in
his car you know getting ready to go to
a football game a big football game down
in the Norfolk area and I get that
information you know and I'm like what
do you do you know you put it in a box
you bury the box you go do your thing
and then you can come back and pull the
box out but you know getting that and
that's it you know like two or three
minutes and walking on having to do like
two or three hours saying although to
people and not mentioning anything and
whatever that you know that was really
hard when when he was gone and when I
was going through that let me ask you
this kind of a critical question as a
dad I'm gonna come at you right now so
if my son was getting ready to go on
deployment I don't know if I'd say if
you survive I'm not sure I said that is
that something I mean I could see why
you'd say it to you know as I'm sitting
there trying to think about why would I
tell my son that the reason I would tell
if I was to tell my son that it'd be
because I would want him to stay sharp
and on point the entire time and not
take it for granted and realized what's
at stake so that might be I know I don't
really remember the context in which I
would have said that but uh you know I
mean that's exactly how I took it yeah
it it stripped away the route like all
aspects of the relationship except
marine to marine and I've always been
very cognizant of my dad's experience
and reputation the Marine Corps um and
it was a very clear message that you
know this is going to be different
you're not special
and you'd better pay attention hmm so
you might not remember saying it but it
sounds like some good advice I'll keep
that one in my back bro oh yeah there
are a lot of words going back and forth
one years getting ready to ship out in
and from from your perspective having
grown up like with such a with such a
focus on leadership in your family and
the tradition in your family and shown
up as a Lance Corporal inside of a
platoon and having more awareness then
the normal Lance Corporal would have
because I'll tell you I mean if I'm
picturing myself when I'm nineteen years
old if I was a Lance Corporal I would
have been a normal Lance Corporal I
would have been you know I wouldn't have
had this sort of elevated look at things
I mean even having read your dad's book
over and over again and and just just
that level of understanding how did that
how did that how did that set in your
platoon how did that set with you were
you ever were you ever looking at your
boss thinking or looking at your platoon
commander thinking did he listen to you
did he talk to you did he know who you
were did he it wasn't anything like that
they all knew um I think the the best or
the most amount of time I kept that off
the skyline was two to three days no
matter which unit I was at boot camp I
got pulled out and paraded around and it
wasn't until I started asking questions
this was before they actually kicked off
the training or like hey this is this is
what kid um but I I think it put an
extra like extra demand particularly
once I hit the Fleet Marine Forces for
humility because I could have you know
all the informal training if you like in
the world and it was world class but at
the same time I'm walking into an
environment where I have not been there
and done what these guys have done and I
need to listen mm-hmm and when the
opportunity presents itself you know
then the practical application of what I
had learned growing up would be there
but until you earn your stripes you're
nothing and I think I'd put an extra
layer on him no no question about it
particularly on the officers you know
and the thing is Jim has really really
been smart and thoughtful
about that part of the world so he had a
you know he had a lens on what was going
on that a lot of people that his level
didn't have hey did you okay here's a
here's a here's another question that
I'll throw at you we were talking about
a little bit yesterday but you know what
I covered chesty puller and Lou puller
on this podcast number 121 and number 21
22 if you haven't listened to him go
listen to me if you don't know that
story you should know and everyone
should know it but you know Lou Lou
Poehler got severely wounded as chesty
pullers son you know that that's another
thing that would just I can't imagine
because you were friends with loophole
yes it was and you you know you told me
a story yesterday about you and him
arguing about the draft and his thoughts
about that and I can't imagine that at
some level you're thinking yourself well
I know how I feel I know I'm patriotic I
believe in service but this is my boy
that's a hard choice everyone has to
make you know little polar by the way I
don't think we had a lot of debate but I
never really got into an argument with
him I I want to say that clearly because
he was such a decent basically gentle
guy you know but we certainly you know
we certainly had our disagreements about
policy and service and and uh and wards
in general I think by by the time he and
I were hanging up he was a really really
fun guy my you know for me
Jim going into the military it's a part
of a family tradition you accept the
risk there's a an article I wrote for
Parade magazine years ago about a father
still tending the grave of his son and
our elite I used to walk by it all the
time and it's one of the most beautiful
stories about father and son and Duty
and whatever the father was wounded in
World War two his son
his wounded three times and killed in
Vietnam went back from Okinawa and was
killed and you know it's called the
price of duty and I actually mentioned
Jim was really young when I wrote that
piece but I mentioned you know he had
already said he wanted be a Marine you
know so you don't want to take away from
someone what they believe that they
should do personally and for the country
so I totally respect it and II just
gotta put your hands inside the bobsled
you know and you also uh I know where
were we've been at it for a while but
the one other thing I wanted to ask you
about is uh I talked about hackworth a
lot and I know you you interviewed him
and spent you spent like a week with him
on Australia no I actually or Hawaii
yeah I was thinking I would get the gig
to go to Australia but we met in Hawaii
which is not a bad not like in the
second place I spend about a week with
him when he was you know I guess people
who listen to you know know his
backstory but when he was deciding to
come home from Australia after his exile
for a number of reasons and in his book
had not yet come out and Parade magazine
could not review books but I went and
did a feature a long feature one of the
longest pieces they'd done on him and
and you know read about and be
beforehand talked to people knew him and
then got to know him pretty well kept up
with him for years actually and he was a
he was the kind of soldier that if you
are going into a bad place you want to
be with you know it was the real deal
and and he had a hard time at the end
for a number of reasons that I pointed
out in the article I it in a certain way
and my article you know I think it was a
quote from one of the people who'd
served with him that you know the army
disappointed him and he just decided to
declare war on the army but he was a
soldier and yeah I I thought a lot of
him that part of his life yeah yeah well
it's at some of the stuff you told me
and I read
article in Jim thanks before now me and
I had actually read it before but I
hadn't made the connection you know I
didn't look at the author's name I
apologize I just folded up read the
article I didn't make that connection
but I should have you know obviously
thanks to both of you for coming on and
and and thanks for your service and
we'll put the links to buy these books
and and there's a new version coming out
of fields of fire there's an anniversary
a 40th anniversary edition that they've
put out already in the kindle forum and
it will be out by a say december in in
the paperback it's no different other
than there's a short essay in the front
that i wrote and you know dance the
cover up a little bit
glad to know it's still in print see
them in a while yeah and it's it's it's
in print and there's there's lots of
I'll say there's lots of books and
movies and series and TV shows that I
don't know how to say this but they
could think if they reflect certainly
reflect some of the characters some of
the goings-on inside the book so I'd
love to I'd love to see fields become
probably a TV series I've wrote a
proposal a year ago on it and we you
know it's Hollywood's funny you know
it's a when I was working out there a
lot I think they were registering forty
close to forty thousand screenplays a
year the Writers Guild and were making
two hundred and sixty movies and so you
know you get to that final cut off it's
a pretty competitive but I would like to
see that well it's been a pleasure being
with you it's been a great conversation
yeah thanks for the facial coming on in
and I would maybe propose this and I
know it's a long trip so maybe next time
I'll do the trip but we've done this
once before we did it with the novel
musashi which is told people who are
gonna do it and then once everyone had
the chance to read it we came back oh I
came back on and I had a friend of mine
Tim Ferriss who was a Asian Studies
major at Princeton and and had lived in
Japan and studied judo and we went
through the book and kind of little
parsed it apart but if you'd ever like
to do that let me know and anyway thank
you come back on and we'll go through it
and pull you know I I didn't you know I
like to talk about leadership the
leadership lessons inside fields of fire
or
phenomenal just the pattern recognition
of knowing what kind of people you're
dealing with and you can learn a lot of
that just from the book but I'd love to
hear about you know how you got to some
of those characters one of my one real
obvious character is Austin Sargent
Austin who's like the by-the-book marine
that say it's my way or the highway and
and just the way you know just the way
that ha just kind of handles them and
and and there's a certain there's a
conversation that they're having and you
can see Hodges is pushing that pushing
back up against him a little bit and
then he decides no you know I'm not
gonna push back any further because I'm
gonna create a relationship with this
guy and we'll get him along the way but
those little subtleties that you put in
this book are our phenomenal leadership
lessons one one one small point on that
because I probably should have mentioned
it earlier in terms of one of the
motivations in writing and is there
there was so much out there demeaning
things that happened in Vietnam without
a comprehensive understanding not only
of Vietnam but of warfare in general
that I felt like it was important to to
create characters that could give
context to how some of these things
happen you know that's with sergeant
Austin how do you know the the the
numbers you know when I was in law
school and writing this about everybody
was getting fragged you know and I
remember I had a really good friend it
was a World War two veteran who was
needling me one day saying
tell me about fragging I said screw you
I was raised on stories of a bad
lieutenant in World War two having 10
seconds once the ramp dropped on the
landing craft or somebody was going to
get him out of the way he said well I
shot a lieutenant but you know there
there are leadership lessons in in in
the book and are also in Austin's one of
them I mean how do you how do you create
positive environments if you look at
where these people had been at the time
that he was coming in doing the you know
the the previa tom junk on the bunk
which was probably essential to
developing an attitude of discipline
when you didn't have this stuff but you
know somebody you got one point three
3.7 million people over the 500,000
people in Vietnam at the time a lot of
them from pretty rough backgrounds and
you know there there are ways to
motivate them you know and in their ways
when things go the other way there's
ways to get yourself fragged but it was
not it did happen you know at times yeah
yeah it's probably always happened it
has and in some form or another
yeah that's why it's important to be a
good leadership they important to be a
good leader especially when the people
that you're leading you have weapons so
well again and that's one of the many
multitude of lessons that are in the
book and again we'll put them on the
website so everyone can get them and you
can educate yourself Jim you got any any
final thoughts anything else to say
no just thanks for having us it's
incredible just listening to you to talk
back and forth it's amazing well it's
been a real pleasure well thanks for
coming on obviously it's it's an honor
to have you on and I think anyone that's
going to listen to this or anyone that
does listen to this and you're gonna
hear from a lot of people that do listen
to this
they keep their their minds open keep
their hearts humble as you both have
talked about today
you guys have said a incredible example
for people to follow and thanks for
coming on it's been an honor to talk to
you and we appreciate most of all your
service to the country
and yours and your thinking it Thanks
and at this time our guests have
departed the studio awesome to have them
on and honor to sit and talk with such
men and and it's it's just an honor to
be able to do that a good incredible
story incredible books and get them the
books will be on the website on Jocko
podcast.com under books books from
episodes from episodes is what the
technical name is cool yeah I think
everyone can learn from those books
if you read them speaking of learning
speaking of teaching and what not echo
Charles maybe you could teach us how to
you know get after it a little bit
harder sure
first I'll um okay shift gears to
jujitsu obviously seems obvious seems
obvious yeah and I I think you're in the
same boat where you default to jujitsu
as like a solution or a way to look at
things even earlier today we're talking
about true it is yeah it is it is a
default way to well I've talked about
there before the fact that it's a thread
that ties a lot of things together
yes comparable to a lot of things it's a
struggle life is a struggle
yeah business is a struggle combat is a
struggle all these things are a struggle
and you have to learn to deal with them
and they all have threads in them that
are the same so yes I do refer to
jiu-jitsu from done time if you don't
like that go start your own podcast and
don't talk about jiu-jitsu Danville wait
are you saying me shoot if I don't like
that brother you think you're talking to
okay I'm just making sure I remember
that I'm remembering it right now that
you refer to jiu-jitsu as the solution
to something humility that's what it is
if you want to work on humility use do
Jitsu that's the answer that op you
anyway while you do that you're gonna
need a gate cuz gonna do both key and
nogi so when you get your key no
question go to origin main comm to get
your geek that's where you get it 100%
yep no doubt no doubt and you can get
rash guards there if you're gonna train
yoga you don't have to use a key in
jujitsu you can I recommend that you do
and if you're wondering if you dude
should do to give your no you do both
you know that's just that's just the way
to go you they both will help each other
and they'll both useful and but you can
get rash guards if you're gonna do
jujitsu with a rash guard which is good
thing to do because it doesn't get all
caught up in your opponent's toes yes
there's not too many things in life when
you're worried
you took opponents toes and jujitsu you
are a little bit worried about your
opponent's toes yeah and your own toes
by the way yeah and you can use the rash
guards for other activities such as
surfing cycling you don't recycle I know
but I hear good ok ok yeah well I guess
you can wear them for cycling as well
and battens don't forget about spats
spats which is essentially compression
pants or caution but they're essentially
a rash guard for your legs for your
lower your other 50% of your body I
would say let's Jack plus their got
t-shirt they got close and we're making
more close at origin we are making more
close origin yeah it's like flying on my
way yeah stand by denim you know I
called Pete the other day and you didn't
get yours yet no new jeans and that was
really the topic right critical about
that one so yeah we're gonna make an all
clothes keep just keep paying attention
to that and we'll get them out
supplements we've got some good
supplements things that will help you in
all aspects of getting after it
yeah for instance help your joints with
joint warfare help your joints with
krill oil help your cognitive and
physical capacity yes with discipline
and there's actually so disciplined we
just made a new form of discipline so
there's the discipline powder drink cool
here's the problem with the discipline
powdered drink I'm getting ready to go
into a meeting and I'm gonna be in there
for two hours and I want to get like a
little bit of a cognitive bump yeah you
notice and a little bit of a a little a
little bump if and I don't maybe want to
drink a thousand or drink 500
milliliters of water or whatever a
bottled water and one drink a bottle of
water cuz I'm then you know biologically
what's going to occur in 45 minutes if I
pounded a bunch of water you know I'm
gonna have to quit and stop and use the
head yeah quit I don't have to stop for
a moment can use that which I don't like
so made want you know some pills okay
so actually a capsule so boom it's got
the it's got a little caffeine and get
it's got some nootropics in it get you a
little bit of a just does it doesn't it
have more caffeine than the regular no
okay literally Uslan on the go
yeah it's discipline on the go yeah
discipline on the go okay interesting
yeah I might took some good oh you got
yours oh yeah oh I don't I mean
obviously I don't go not obviously but I
don't go into Mitch's someone if he took
some and you set like a text to me and
Pete and Brian okay so they I don't feel
fired up one well JP feels fired up
anyways right so just like enhance you
can tell JP going on stage everything's
clicking for a long yeah so that's one
go but mark Lamont train yeah mock
trading big time stay on it it's hard to
get the problem of the milk train is you
just ends up just being sort of kind of
a dessert yeah it is yeah and it's
interesting because you know the the
idea that protein powder is it's either
it tastes good or it's good quality
that's it that's sort of it as a
dichotomy that used to exist like that
did the the gap in that dichotomy could
not be crossed you know could not be
brought together it has been brought
together didn't but again I was talking
to my friend Terry okay
big sexy last night no that's the thing
I might as well have just made a
commercial for it cuz you know you start
talking about it then you start saying
yeah and you get yourself kind of fired
up about it you know that's what I was
doing anyway he was like hey man I got
it it's good it's on the mall train
hopefully mint chocolate chip my
personal favorite peanut butter
chocolate Dave Burke's personal favorite
good deal vanilla gorilla technically
named not directly for life babban when
certainly associated with lave yeah and
he said the other day that he mixed it
up and he was like whoa that
he's again that vanilla he was pumped on
the vanilla gorilla and meant it and
then there's the darkness which is just
pure chocolate yes chocolate in my
household the darkness is ascending - oh
really
mint chip chocolate levels dad because
it has like a dark blues oh yeah
interesting I still add peanut butter in
it by the way I should mention that that
I could understand yeah but also you
know we we also just came out with
warrior kid milk we got strawberry and
chocolate right now they have a little
bit less protein mm-hmm I mean because
if your kids eight years old you should
hopefully get in protein from natural
food sources the problem is sometimes
they don't good enough you've got some
protein in there we've got vitamins in
there got some probiotics in there
because we know Timmy well he hears
about probiotics he gets another and
this is the amazing thing
they are delicious they are just freakin
delicious
yeah and so in my house the strawberry
kids mulk is just getting crazy I as
soon as I tasted the strawberry kids
milk I sent Brian a text and said make
adult warrior kid more immediately now
so he's got that comment all right
adults yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah adult
strawberry mean I called it strawberry
Quik the other day your brain was it
tastes that good zits it literally
tastes like strawberry Quik yeah the
chocolates damn good too you know but
anyways that's the warrior kids it's the
only drink is the only thing that you
could you got with your kids that you
want your kids to have it as bad as they
want to have it there's no other thing
in the world that's like that yeah this
is it maybe the warrior kid books yeah
oh so keen mom can do the other day
he'll straight up what is up with you
they just just as have it bear with me
why are you doing problems have
nonetheless I was and I came to kind of
this realization fired
I'm telling you okay all right okay
so bear with me you know I'm not
pounding mountain news every day I'm not
saying that but as I drink this slow
much as I drink this mountain do you
know how you kind of like reflect yeah
and so I'm like okay what am i drinking
it's good I like my I've always liked
about to do since literally the first
time I tasted when I was a kid and so
I'm like drinking it and I'm like you
know what I'm drinking right now it's
liquid candy is what I'm drinking
literally like you know you know like a
jolly rancher
one of these you know that kind of candy
they make lollipops and so you that kind
of candy consider this exact flavor this
exact flavor not more sweet not less
sweet this exact Mountain Dew flavor as
a lollipop or Jolly Rancher it would fit
it would be like yes and I'm just
drinking the liquid form of it literally
that's what I'm drinking as you finish
the camp well it was one of those small
cans did you finish it yeah I was eating
sushi it's the whole deal nonetheless
that's what it is but there's no reason
for this anymore because now we have
more yeah and you can kind of consider
the difference right where the you know
your kid if they're like how I was and
you see the Mountain Dew as a kid you
know but the parents like know that you
don't drink much dude Richard want don't
want you drink chocolate tea instead
bring a can with you well it's you know
I have a bunch of it's a long story
you know and we're working very hard on
the whole situation but nonetheless it
happened and you know we're gonna move
on but if you're a kid you want the
Mountain Dew I noticed now it's a
mountain dew it is right up there with
cotton important nonetheless if this
will you compare the scenarios kid wants
the mountain dew it's like yeah of
course you want someone to taste good
but the merits like no we don't drink
Mountain Dew yeah that's crap that's
liquid candy wouldn't you know that
we're not doing that it's not healthy
for us but the kid wants the mulk boom
parent yes every time every time parents
or say hey do you want some more milk
yeah yes I do actually check cool good
so that's that's origin Mein Kampf or
all that stuff
yeah a lot of good stuff in there also
we have a store called Jocko store
anyway there you can get also get rash
guards some cool shirts if you want to
represent discipline equals freedom few
designs unknown yeah there's some
designs on there on that store in
general so yeah man check them out if
you want to get something get something
trucker's hats
my wife said something about Jocko store
and then my youngest daughter City you
have a store and I said yeah and she
says where is it on the Internet virtual
virtual jaw closed or you know it's
called Jocko store tell me let your
friend know but yeah some good stuff
some hoodies on there as well hats as
chuckles a trucker and flex fit well
yeah I've gone there and you know if you
want something if you like something get
something good way to stay on the path
and represent at the same time mm-hmm
boom do you rep when your does it help
you stay on the path I think so yes
there's there's quite a few people that
feel when they put on the uniform you
know it gets during the game you know
it's a classic are typical part of the
hero's journey is they're getting their
gear on yeah Sudi no no they're suiting
up well that's part of the deal you
watch a movie what do they show that
whether it's a soldier get in his boots
on lock and loaded in his weapon you
know in the movies when they open up
like the war chest oh yeah like I can
liken miking the Dragons to opens up the
war chest right yeah in commando
commando I'm gearing up it gets onto the
shore the final battle scene right he
gets on the shore oh yeah I was like a
whole montage boots a bulletproof vest
uh you know I don't know if it was
bulletproof I don't know doesn't matter
he's zipping it up yeah I think that
vest is more just you know just dope
just Hollywood a hundred percent paint
the face with the thing well you know
the charcoal man can't be paint yeah yes
I'm telling you suiting up yeah because
of that yeah you can you can get suited
up and then you feel like you're getting
in the zone for whatever it is you're
about to go do yeah not that
that says whatever Oh big time yeah when
you get a new rash guard you're that
much more compelled to go train mm-hmm
if you this is a thing that starts when
you're like six years old and you get a
new pair of shoes and it just lasts your
whole life
oh yeah yeah the shoes that's a good
example because remember when your kid I
don't know you might be different but I
think most of us we're kid you know when
you got the new shoes yeah yeah yeah you
want to go to school Astor I want yeah
sissy you're thinking functionality
which I dig by the way but you get the
new shoes that new Chuck Taylors mm the
half red half green ones here it doesn't
know anyway we had those and so you buy
them or you get on whatever from parents
and you're like can't wait to just wear
these to school in like it was gonna see
all this stuff so compared to if you
don't have new shoes do you really want
to go to school sure maybe maybe not but
with the chapter on new shoes you will
want to go that's how same thing with
the gym the same thing with anywhere if
you got some new clothing to represent
with big time check
do you wear dry dry fit is I think it's
what it's called
you were dry fit right well in what like
a shirt way it's called dry fit for it's
like working out yeah yeah yeah yeah
it's like we don't have any that we need
to I know I just thought of that right
now you've just thought about here's the
thing I knew that before because you I
think you and simple John said that I'm
working on we're working on it we're
working on an Origin that we can make
dry fit not compression like loose fit
right yeah who's fit you just fit quick
dry that's what we're making yeah okay
pretty dope red one at the monster and I
was like I don't wear dry fit at all I
put it on I was a gang I like it it's
good mmm boom it's kind of on my radar
now yeah well I think you measure most
shirts by their sleeve size so that
thing must had some small sleeves and
you're stoked
that's that's right anyway also stay on
the path
keep stay on the path keep yourself on
the path by subscribing to this podcast
I know it seems obvious but sometimes
when people are new they're like oh yeah
cool podcast in fact or you're in that
trial period because they're they're
certain podcasts that I'll be like eh I
hear good things I'm gonna go listen to
it and I only listen to it like at the
gym
or something like this sir under certain
circumstances and I'll forget you know
like I won't listen to it at other times
so come back to the gym or something
like that again let me find that putt
and you gotta kind of do the search or
whatever you just subscribe so I can see
that scenario being the case you see I'm
saying four people because you know how
all we say of course I can subscribe
seems obvious it's obvious I don't have
to tell people to subscribe they're
either gonna subscribe if they like it
or not but sometimes you do forget there
are circumstances one thing so here's a
reminder subscribe while you're
subscribing to this podcast also
subscribe to the wor your kid podcast we
have some more warrior kid podcast
episodes coming I apologize that they're
taking long it is my fault for not being
more squared away
prioritizing better and working harder
but I have some almost ready for the
release also while you're looking at
warrior kid stuff you can check out
Irish Oaks ranch calm and get some some
warrior kids soap from American made
soap from a thirteen-year-old kid that
is raising goats getting the milk from
the goats and turning it into soap you
know good soap too but on a farm here in
California a lot of people don't know
that California is massive agriculture
and farming so you can support that with
a little warrior kid soap also don't
forget about the YouTube while you're
subscribing you can subscribe to the
YouTube channel
Jaakko podcasts where you can watch
these podcasts on there if you want to
see us if you want to see a Jim Webb and
James Webb you want to see what their
reactions are and see what they look
like you can subscribe or you can go to
the YouTube and check it out you can
also see echoes enhanced videos which he
is quite proud of
I'm proud that you sit use the word
legit well are legit I will give you a
credit when credit is due and they they
enhance the message functionally sure
like being able to read the words that's
functional usage sooo it's not just is
not just effects for the sake of effects
which I probably wouldn't college it
when walls are exploding yeah it might
be a little bit beyond but sometimes he
goes a little too far let him know let
him know if his videos are a little bit
much he learns it's like the guy that
learned something and they learned the
cowbell they get a new cowbell for the
drum set and they put it in through the
whole album is just cowbell
what's a cowbell it's a it's a cowbell I
mean and but people use it in music
occasionally it should be used sparingly
so it's a rear axle yeah it's a cowbell
okay thing like more like a bong okay I
can't really do the noise sure but
they're there cuz enjoy see drums
actually all instruments really they
have like names for you know like hi-hat
I know but see what I'm saying though
that's like a name for a jack like if
you've never seen a drummer here the
join stone says hi-hat they'd be like I
know what high means and I know what
happened means but a hi-hat is a name
for you same thing I thought that was
the same deal for a cowbell no no it's
it's act now they make I mean I don't
know what the cowbells look like in 1850
but this has definitely been cleaned up
and modified so it's a cowbell little
thing but it's for your you know you
don't go to the farm store to buy a
cowbell for your drum set yeah okay go
to the music store and you say I need a
cowbell I understand and this and then
you start using it in every song and you
think everyone wants to just hear that
cowbell yeah there's a whole skit on
saturday night live about cowbell okay I
was just at one of the patches that guys
had in tu bruiser that eventually got
banned one of the patches was more
cowbell based on the Saturday Night Live
skit
God okay and I always did actually
wonder about that more cowbell now you
know you never know what's going to
learn also psychological warfare that's
an album with tracks where you can stay
the path and we're making another one
it's coming out soon and that's it on
that good also if you want to vary up
your workout get more workout gear go to
on it calm slash Jocko also they got
some good immunity stuff that I actually
took he reminded me because I I just
took some felt a cold coming on shroom
tech immune it's good they like that one
very much like that one never let me
know before you travel take that
nonetheless there's a lot of cool stuff
on there and information that's another
one that like you can get caught up in a
bad way but it's a good resource when
you want to vary up your workouts and do
some new workouts kettlebells even that
that Club
workout which I would highly recommend
looking into what to do don't just speak
that thing up and start getting nuts
know might get you my jam you know you
also got chocolate tea which tastes
delicious and it's good for you I say
again tastes delicious and good for you
that seems to be the theme if we're
gonna put something in our body we want
it to taste good yes and we want it to
be good for us jakka white tea and
there's no doubt that it's good for you
because there's it's the only product
the only product that I've ever heard of
where an 8,000 pound deadlift is
guaranteed a hundred percent it never
failed me too so get you some of that
get your deadlift up also we got some
books first of all the books we read
today and and James Webb's James Webb
has ten books that he's written the two
that we covered today will both be on
the website fields of fire and then I
heard my country calling these are the
two books I read that he also mentioned
a book called the nightingale song which
is a great book and we'll put that one
on as well did you hear me you know
nightingale song Nightingale song yep
great book it's about the the class that
the Naval Academy guys that graduated
with Jim Webb and what they did they all
had a huge impact on the Navy and on the
country and it's well this particular
group that he talks about so we'll put
that book on there as well because it's
a great book and perhaps I'll cover it
at some point obviously for books we
also have way of the warrior kid and
marks mission if you know kids get them
these books
and you know get them on the right path
of of going in the right direction of
doing the right things it's just gonna
be it's it's gonna help kids out the
feedback that I've gotten from around
the world and yes I've gotten feedback
from around the world by around the
world I mean Australia New Zealand I've
gotten a whole package of letters from a
classroom in New Zealand of kids that
are on the path so if you read a book
imagine you you read a book and you're
seven years old nine years old and you
decided that the book was good enough
that you're gonna try and find the
author who lives on the other side of
the world and write him a note and say
thanks cuz I'm on the path now that's
the book right there where the warrior
kid and marks mission also discipline
equals freedom Field Manual this you
know what this is Christmas time you get
to Christmas this book is a gift it's a
gift for people that you know that you
want to help if you have an enemy don't
give it to them because in your enemies
gonna get on the path probably come back
and for whatever defeat you 18 months
and they'll be jacked and they'll be
focused and they'll crush you or or yes
you're right or that could if that will
I guess if they're it depends on their
level of malevolence in their soul
because if they have a little bit of
good in their you know if they're gonna
do they're gonna read that little part
about laughter wins and they're gonna
see that the light is gonna overcome the
darkness and maybe they'll come back to
you in 18 months and like hey I got you
something you know boom yeah we now
we're not enemies anymore we'll move it
in the right direction by the way do you
want to train by the way do you want to
Jack some steel you know by the way do
you want to go out and eat some steak
cuz I'm down yeah so that might actually
be the movie there that could be the
move nicely done I like the way you
think that audio book is not on audible
it is on iTunes Amazon music google play
other mp3 platforms extreme ownership
first book I wrote with my brother Leif
babban that's taking the principles that
we used in combat and then applying them
to business and life and then we
followed that up with another book
called the dichotomy of leadership
another New York Times bestseller which
is super cool and all
but whatever let's face it what we
wanted to do was write a book that
actually expanded and made people better
leaders feedback we're getting on that
one is that's what it's helping people
do the little the little nuances of
extreme ownership that are that are
harder to handle and harder to master
this book will help you do it
the dichotomy a leadership available
everywhere appreciate everyone getting
that of course now we have Mikey and the
Dragons it is coming out November 15th
I'm trying to get as many printers as I
can right now because you all ordered a
lot of them so thank you and it's about
a little kid who's scared of everything
and he finds a book and in the book the
king is dead in this village
in this kingdom and there's a prince
that's gonna have to stand up and fight
so that's what he that's what he does
the prince has to stand up and fight but
he's scared cuz he's only seven so
that's that little little excerpt from
it did a little expert excerpt I do a
little excerpt the King had always been
so strong and brave and protected the
kingdom from the dragon cave the dragon
cave was just over the hill and filled
with scary creatures that were ready to
kill horrible dragons of every single
type who thought people in the kingdom
were especially ripe the people thought
the Dragons had breath of fire and that
the dragon stood twenty feet tall or
higher they fought the Dragons had sword
stopping scales and powerful long
razor-sharp tails but the brave King
never let the beast around he stood up
and fought and held his ground and as
long as the King had been the king none
of the Dragons could do a thing yes the
king always kept the Dragons at bay by
going out bravely into the fray it
seemed without fear the king would go
fight he beat the Dragons and come home
at night but now that the King had died
and was gone there was only one person
to fight and carry on but that person
wasn't beggar mightier strong in fact he
hadn't been alive that long now the
person who had dragons to
chase was just a little boy with a
smiling face yes the person that now
must stand up and be bold was just the
little prince who is only 7 years old so
so there you go
of course the villagers are worried if
this little kids gonna be able to do it
and well get the book to find out what
happens when he goes up to face the
Dragons and and by the way you guys put
this book to number 17 on Amazon of all
books pre-release that's crazy so you
guys called me out and I'm printing as
fast as I can
and well the good news is I'm printing
more of these first editions so the
first editions is gonna continue I'm
gonna print as many as I can and get it
out and get it to you everyone hopefully
by Christmas appreciate it for the
support against against the big boys
yeah speaking of big boys you remember
how you used to talk trash about the
publishing company try to be all
conservative and look at you know yeah
yeah I I was I was conservative yeah and
I was too conservative yeah I didn't
realize how much people were gonna get
after it
and I got text from my buddies that are
saying I just ordered 10 copies I just
ordered 14 copies I just ordered 19
copies for every kid in my extended
family amen and I'm like that's awesome
I will get them printed as fast as I did
I pulled out all stops and I'm making it
a day you know what it's my fault I
should I should have ordered more yeah I
should was those exact things that you
said about yourself were the exact same
things you were saying about the
publishing company yeah yeah I didn't
know how people were gonna get after it
yeah you don't understand
maybe I apparently I do know we all
don't I should have taken my own advice
now we do now we know the books are
being printed as fast as I can print
them see what I like about you so
apologize for that it's my fault I
should have taken my own advice and well
now I'm getting after it yes you are
sure we'll get him out there printing a
ton more also echelon front leadership
consultancy we solve problems through
leadership that's what we do at the
Echelon front team me Lafe babban
Janell Dave Burke Flynn Cochran Mike
Cirelli
and Mike bimah so if you need help in
your organization call us call us now
because we are booked up so if you are
thinking about doing this in the future
call now Ashland front comm go get on
there and we'll hook up also muster 2019
we got Chicago and Denver dates aren't
completely locked yet but check extreme
ownership calm for the information and
the and to find out when it is live and
when you can book and make the
reservations all the musters have sold
out and this one these will too so get
on it early EF overwatch as well we're
connecting SpecOps and combat aviators
to companies that need leaders so the
military produces trains and tests in
combat environment leadership and we're
taking those leaders those experienced
leaders and bringing them into the
civilian sector EF overwatch comm if you
want to get on in the game on either
side so whether you're a spec ops or
your combat aviation and you're looking
for what your next mission is gonna be
or your company that's looking for
experienced trained leaders to come and
help you out folks that understand the
mentality of extreme ownership and what
we do at Ashkelon front go to EF
overwatch dot-com
and if you want to keep discussing these
things with us we are available on the
interwebs on Twitter on Instagram and on
dad
book EKKO is at Echo Charles and I am at
Jocko willing and thanks once again to
James and Jim Webb for their service and
for joining us on the podcast to share
their lessons learned it was an honor to
be able to sit and talk with them and
thanks to everyone else that has served
or is serving in the military around the
world out there holding the line and
also thanks to police
and law enforcement firefighters
paramedics EMTs correctional officers
Border Patrol all the first responders
everyone that is out there doing what
you do for us on the home front thank
you for what you do every day and to
everyone else that is listening thanks
for listening thanks for supporting
thanks for spreading the word it is much
appreciated and in the book fields of
fire one of the main characters Hodges
in part of the book he quotes and old
him and old him that he's thinking about
in his head and that old hymn says time
like an ever-rolling stream bears all
its sons away they fly forgotten as a
dream dies at the opening day so there
you go a little reminder a little
reminder to all of us that time is
fleeting time is short and we only get
so much so don't wait around don't put
it off instead get up and yes get after
it then until next time this is echo and
Jocko out
