Chad Robichaux On Leading Rescue Mission's In Afghanistan & Ukraine, Mighty Oaks Foundation
The Team Never Quit podcast is brought to you by Navy Federal Credit Union.
Partner with Navy Federal Credit Union to pay down credit card debt.
Learn more at NavyFederal.org.
Yeah, you're going to deal with anxiety, depression, anger,
but you could respond to it in a better way.
That's the legion in the right place.
That's what the Bible had did for me.
It led me to restoration and hope and ultimately to find a new purpose
and that purposefully manifested for me and
distorting a mighty Oaks Foundation just wanting to pay it forward to others.
I want to say that this power here is right in the right place.
Who is Never Quit?
Who is Never Quit?
Who is Never Quit?
Who is Never Quit?
Great deal.
Alright everybody, welcome back to the TNGU podcast.
I'm your host, Marcus LaTrell.
Every week it's my job to fire you up, to ignite the legend inside of you,
and to push you to your greatness.
Join me every week as I take you into my briefing room with some of the most
hard-charging people on the planet.
We're going to show you how to embrace the stuff of life,
teach you the values of working your ass off,
and charge you whatever life throws at you.
This is the Team Never Quit podcast.
Don't fuckle up, buttercup.
Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode of Team Never Quit podcast.
Remember guys, make sure to check out our social media pages at Team Never Quit,
where you'll find all our latest news, see special updates,
and for our Patreon subscribers, some pretty sweet, exclusive drops coming soon.
We have a very good show today for you guys.
We have on Chad Robochow and Dennis Price.
Let's kick this off with our Patreon question of the day before we get into that,
which is, if you were given a one-minute ad slot during the Super Bowl,
what would you fill it with?
Oh man, what kind of commercial?
I'd say for me, I would do something regarding everything I promote,
every time I get a chance to promote something, I promote my dioxes,
or in the server style warriors, because it's one of the biggest crises in our country
right now.
I think our nation needs to know what our veterans are just dealing with after 20 years
of war, and American communities around the world,
it's the ones who sent our troops out to defend our country,
and when they come home, they'd be embraced and welcomed by the same communities.
So I'd be advocate for making sure Americans know what's actually going on
in a better community and how they can help.
Very nice.
I like that.
I feel like you had that one holstered up.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
I'm not going to smooth on that delivery, man.
I feel like Super Bowl commercials are always so they need to be fun.
They either need to be a tearjerker or really funny.
What about you, Dennis?
He pretty much got the same answer.
I promote a nonprofit that helps troops out, that brings the focus back to what is really
important outside of a football game, you know, our freedom, supporting the troops,
and the real stuff that's going on outside of our direct world and part of the bigger
picture and helping out.
I think I changed mine.
Mine would be an anti-woke message.
Yeah.
I freaking hate the woke.
The thing that first hit my mind before answered, because I have a pause for a second,
because I didn't even know he was talking to me.
That's not a pause for a second.
The thing that first hit my mind was like a message of unity, because real unity, because
it seems like everything's meant to divide right now.
It is.
You're welcome, Jim, just meant to divide.
I hate that we can't just be honest and have constructive conversation and solve problems.
I'm naturally a problem solver.
When you have to just skirt through issues, because you might hurt someone's feelings,
that just drives me freaking crazy.
I'm like, let's just cut all the bullshit and just be honest, get it out of the way,
and then work together.
Yeah, truth hurts people's feelings, and it's okay.
Yeah, it's been crazy.
So my Super Bowl would have something to do with that.
Probably meant it a long time.
But it's a very long time.
Yeah, it has.
So I take every motivational commercial that we ever had coming up, those little moments.
Oh, yeah.
That I mean, everyone's ever heard of, American moments, with that good background at League
of Blue Play and or something, like some Jimi Hendrix.
And then everyone I'm flashing through in session, so each generation sees their self
in that commercial.
And the way you deal with something that's designed to cause chaos like that, you've got
to do jit you the crap out of it, man.
You just wait against it.
If you try to go against it, you'll fight all day.
You've got to actually create something that's more powerful and pushing that same direction.
It consumes everything else.
You won't even pay attention to that ever, if there's something else doing it.
For sure.
We've got some good ones over time.
And ever since the YouTube and everything came online, and you can hear that stuff from
we were kids.
We've never had access to.
This generation needs to go back and we were talking before the show started about our
generation.
Go back and watch some American Ninja.
I don't mean American Ninja Warriors.
All those.
Some Chuck Norris Delta Force.
I saw a commercial the other day I had when Van Dam was doing the splits between the two
Volvos and had Chuck in between the two airplanes with the flat attendance hanging off of it.
I thought that was great.
We love Chuck Norris.
He's great, man.
And we actually got to meet him.
Marcus got invited to be the speaker at one of his fundraisers, one of Chuck Norris'
fundraisers.
And they had Marcus come out to actually tell Marcus a story, but he gets up there in the
entire hour that Marcus was to talk.
He told Chuck Norris jokes.
I couldn't help it.
I couldn't help it.
The entire time.
And I happen to be sitting next to Chuck Norris.
And he's like, what?
He couldn't hear what Marcus was.
He can't hear.
He can't hear.
Well, he's like, what is he saying?
And I was like, he's just talking really good about it.
He's bragging about you.
Like you can't believe, man.
I heard one of the other things.
I heard one the other day and said Chuck Norris threw a grenade and killed 50 people.
And the grenade went off and killed 20 more.
I never heard of him.
One of my coolest stories.
I don't have any proof of this, but we were at a function.
I'll leave it at that.
And then we walked into, in the bathroom, three year olds, Chuck Norris, President Bush,
and myself.
Yeah.
And I wanted to ask somebody to take a damn picture.
But I didn't know it.
I was like, oh, Chuck Norris, man, President, man.
It was cool.
It was cool.
Yeah.
That was cool.
It was.
I saw that I was like, I get to my recreate that picture.
Like, girl, I think it would be great.
Yeah.
It's all three of you from the back of you.
I was staring at attention, you know.
It should be with the bubble going, oh, it's Chuck Norris.
Holy shit.
Oh my God.
This is a strain peeling each other's ear.
Yeah.
I got a bottle of Chuck Norris water in the back of my truck.
And I was cleaning it out the other day, and my son acts just throwing all the garbage
up.
I was like, no, no, you got to get a kick.
You got to check Norris water in the back of your red.
Oh, he has some kind of access to some certain water, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
He's wearing his land.
It's like real clean, pure water.
I was like, I'll bet you could run your truck off of it.
That's why I keep it back.
That's what I keep it back.
That's Chuck Norris water.
That's a new commercial.
Poor man.
Poor man.
Chuck, it turns the to from Transformers.
Yeah.
That's what I'm standing up.
For my commercial, I mean, I would definitely have to do what you were saying, go more of
a joke.
Maybe some sort of prank video where we just run around, prank in a whole bunch of kind
of cool people.
Marcus also loves prank videos.
He loves to filly, like almost skit type things.
He's always has some idea of doing some like recreation of Napoleon Dynamite or something.
Well, again, look at what you had to work with.
And then their generation take it to a different level.
Yeah.
Like some of the stuff they do, I'm proud of them.
Yeah.
I'm proud of them.
We were something that these jokers made.
Like all of the guys in Hennors fraternity at LSU got Marcus, he got ahold of them and
he's like, all right, this is what you all are going to do.
And he just gave them all kinds of assignments.
Yeah.
They got a bet.
They'll have a bet.
And loses is that they got to take the damn ACT or the SAT and pass that damn thing.
We're taking it again.
I never took it to that level.
But I was thinking about like our best like if you lose, you got to join the Navy again.
Yeah.
For four years, bro.
Or good to take that.
That's a bet.
Yeah.
You want a bet?
Let's not do that, man.
Yeah.
That's a commitment.
You'll get something out of it.
Yeah, you can survive losing a paycheck, but what's up?
That's what we always do.
You lose a bet that big.
You got to it's like, hey, pay up or join the Navy.
That's a good chance.
John, do you have one?
That's a funny name.
What would I do as a Super Bowl commercial?
I think I'd have to play off of one of my favorites.
The old frogs.
The Budweiser one.
That one.
No, that's good.
I'll ever get commercial cancer.
What if you had like a cover band for every awesome music performance in between the old
for halftime going?
Yeah, you go.
Something like that, you know?
Yeah.
A little highlight reel.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm a halftime show and that one minute, myself, just you know, it's me.
One man show.
So we've got a great guest to store for you guys today.
Chad Rehichow is a former force recombarine and DoD contractor with eight deployments
to Afghanistan as part of a special operational task force.
After overcoming his personal battles with PTSD, Chad founded the Mighty Oaks Foundation,
a leading nonprofit that has served over 450,000 warriors through their faith-based combat
resiliency programs and led life-saving programs for over 4,500 active military and veterans
through the Mighty Oaks legacy programs.
Chad has also served as a special agent with the U.S. Federal Air Marshal Service as a
surveillance detection senior program manager with the U.S. State Department and as a law
enforcement officer where he received a medal of valor for his bravery above and beyond
the call of duty.
Welcome to the show, Chad.
Thanks, man.
Thanks for having me on.
Thank you guys.
Yeah.
Yeah.
What do you read these some of these about loud?
They don't sound real.
Pretty impressive resume.
Think about that.
And we started going back in the day when you were signing up.
Somebody rolled in one of these.
You're like, no.
Pretty impressive.
Just means I'm old.
That's all it means to me.
Yeah, that's all it means to me.
I'm like, go ahead.
Just sound.
It makes me sound old.
Yeah.
That's awesome.
So tell us a little bit about you.
Where did you grow up and what got you into the military?
Yeah.
I grew up in race in Louisiana.
You know, really, South Louisiana.
We're getting blood between your toes and the house south though.
Yeah.
By LaFouche, LaFouche Parish, like Home of the Tabato, that area.
And then my family, 84 years of service from now.
So World War II, Korea.
My dad was the first Marine in my family, Vietnam.
That's where I was going with that.
Yeah.
He was the first Marine line in there.
Yeah.
He was the first Marine.
And both my sons, Hunter and Hayden, both Serbs and Marines.
And even though I did eight deployment in Afghanistan, the hardest deployment was for
me was when my son Hunter went to Afghanistan.
Not bad.
Same war.
Okay.
So we've talked about that before.
Those guys exist.
Yeah.
And which is, we're not letting that go down for the next generation.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It was, I mean, it was a crazy thing.
I had a, I mean, how about that?
I mean, that's unbelievable.
Yeah.
We were kids and our freaking kids strapped up into that.
Same thing.
And then the EVAC, you know, when I will talk about the later, but when we started
to have to do these EVACs, he's like, I don't want to go.
And I'm like, no, man, you can't go in Afghanistan.
He's like, I already went to my, I had interpreter too.
Like, I want to be part of this.
And how could I say no?
Like how can I keep that from him?
And he'll get me for rest of his life.
So I let him be part of it.
And now he's like, he just got back from Ukraine a few days ago.
He's about to go again.
So he's part of our international team.
Wow.
That's awesome.
That's great.
Oh, for whatever reason they come out and they come and turn out like we already got,
you can't deny it.
Yeah.
I mean, I'm like, man, I would, he would be, he would be chewing on that for rest of his
life.
And I was like, if he, I try to, I don't push it on him, but he signs up.
I'm going to kick him in the ass.
He ain't got no choice.
We do things the hard way around here.
Yeah.
You can do it right.
And thanks for your service, man, especially for your kids.
And that's a horrible thing.
Always back.
He's been Marines the whole time.
It was, I mean, like I said, my dad, my dad, me and both of my sons.
But for me, it kind of sealed story with that.
I was a, I had a brother.
He was a, he was a year older than me.
And we grew very dysfunctional home because my father never really recovered from Vietnam.
He didn't get the help that he didn't get the kind of help you guys do and the kind
of help we do.
They didn't have that for these guys.
And, and my dad didn't get that.
And so it was very dysfunctional and a lot of physical abuse.
And so my, my brother and I, his year older than me, we'd always talked about joining
the military.
We grew up playing, you know, playing military out in the woods and the swamps and by using.
And I remember we saw this video, you probably seen this video too, because we were the same
age of this.
It was filmed down at the Strand and Cornado and they were like, they like, they like came
in on helicopters and boats and they, they, that's the only reason I got in there.
And I was like, we didn't have much back in the 1900s.
We didn't want to watch, we want to watch.
Yeah.
I've seen that video man.
And I'm like, and, and I remember seeing this, this seal come out of the water in the
2080s on his back and his face paint and green, like seaweed hanging off his head and he's
got his, his M16.
And I'm like, I want to do that.
But I was like, I don't want to join a Navy.
And it was my dad.
Everyone says that.
It's not going to be a seal, not joining the, I said the same thing.
I want to be the Navy.
I want to be a seal.
Bro, they go together, man.
You can't.
I was like, my dad was like such a dysfunctional and like angry me being, but the only thing
that ever made him happy was the fact that he's United States Marine.
And I was like, well, what's like that in the Marine Corps?
And I started reading these books of like all the Dreecom Marines and Forcerecom Marines
of Vietnam and as a teenager, I became infatuated with it.
And when I was 14, my brother was 15, we were already like running and swimming and because
we grew up as athletes and, and he was shot and killed.
And so it's devastating to me.
So for me, it was like a promise to my brother.
He was killed before he, before he got to go to the military.
Yeah, he was, he was 15.
Oh my gosh.
He was 14 to 15 and he was shot by a step brother and with a 20 gauge like point Blake
in his chest and so he died right away.
And so my family, what I have left a family fell apart when I'm 17 years old, I'm probably
not going to go to a high school and go to Marine Corps recruiter named Staff Sergeant
Brown.
I remember Staff Sergeant Ronald Brown.
Most people don't remember their recruiters names or maybe they do in the beginning because
they hate the recruiter, but, but I remember him 30 years later.
Yeah, I do.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah, he's the only reason I because he whipped our ass before we got ready.
He still calls and checks in.
He still calls and talks down.
That's awesome.
Yeah, that's awesome.
I would love to get ahold of Ronald Brown because you found him and I haven't found
him.
Find him now.
I need to find a Marine that I had that I've budded up with officer type.
Yeah.
And I've been looking for him since we left airborne.
We went to airborne school together.
Yeah.
And he dropped me off at Bragg and I lost contact with him, which is crazy.
Marines are the worst at keeping in touch with every night.
They know they just they're just the heart most hard.
It's kind of the Vietnam Bulldogs.
The those guys, man, that's the hardest thing because look who trained them.
Mm hmm.
Good God.
I mean the reputation then they went in, which was an ambush war.
Who knew that?
Yeah.
I just learned that the Vietnam was a complete ambush war every time they went out there was
something waiting on them and it wasn't the other way around.
No.
I mean, how tough you got to be then come back and go through all that.
That's why I was always taught to say, Hey, welcome home.
Yeah.
I still that we even want to speak publicly.
I always give welcome home that Vietnam.
If you call them out on that, if you see one of them in town like the old town, we're
getting that line and be like, Hey, Marine, they will frickin stand.
Do it.
Am I right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
You say something about American call them on that Marine thing and they will there's
something that triggers in there.
I guess it's gunny says that to him.
You frickin and they will you know, you know what's crazy, but it's awesome to like you
have someone like from that generation that maybe spent, especially when you know, we
lose in our world or two guys, probably almost lost them all now, but Korea like like Vietnam,
they did like two years in a service in their whole life.
They got the hat.
They got the jacket like the whole way they see the world like through those lenses at
two years of service just shows how impactful like serving services.
You imagine what that's like.
Yeah.
You getting that kind of funnel?
Oh, yeah.
That kind of fire hose.
Hey, here's your whole everything in two years.
Flop.
We had a good friend that was in World War II Marine RV Bergen.
He was there's part of the series, the Pacific is after him.
And then before he just died like within the last three or four years.
But he at 90 frickin years old, he would still wear his like Marine.
You shave with the creases in that new pants.
They were so sure.
Hey, Tommy.
Tommy Ford.
Yeah, I'm wrinkle.
I'm wrinkle.
I was wricking out there chopping that wood 98 94 whatever he was.
I'll stop.
I'll staff rolls in like nine o'clock.
Tommy's been there since six star star star head toe head toe legit man.
When they walked it is cut there.
There's one point.
Yeah.
Must have some point.
I want that.
That's one thing you talk all the smack you want about a Marine Corps.
I mean, I openly everyone knows who that's who's always had to rescue my ass.
I got a stepson kind of thing for him.
Right.
Fucking sharp squared away when it comes to that stuff.
Military bearing.
Yeah.
Frickin military bang when you call them on that frickin they got it.
We kind of messed it up in the recon community because we got it.
We tried to be a little lax then.
That's the bridge between us and y'all.
Right there.
Y'all come in.
That's allowed.
You want to hear it wrong?
How does that work with Marines when you go in as force recon when you signed up?
Did you immediately sign up for that or did you have to transition into that?
In my day you didn't, my day you just had to try out once you were in.
Now there's a, and you go to recruit or you sign a recon contract and then you, when you
go to infantry school, you do a boot camp, then infantry school for four weeks, then
you go over a thing called BRPC, basic recon prep course, which is like an assessment and
selection for a couple of weeks and really just weeds everybody out and then you go in
a year pipeline.
So the year pipeline is basic recon course, then pre-scuba, combat dive, jump school,
year of school, military, free fall school.
So after a year you go to your unit and you'll go to regular recon, battalion and you're
schooled out and you were trained up ready.
I said.
Just like going to SQT.
Oh, I got it.
It's like, yeah, same thing.
You're schooled up.
All right, so you're right.
You're schooled up.
And then they do what the dudes, when you all, they don't make it through, they just,
they need to do the Marine Corps.
Most of them will go back to infantry school and finish out infantry school.
Just making bad dudes, right?
That didn't hurt.
No, everything's like.
But the thing is, they'll probably, actually a lot of people are worried about that and
I tell them, man, you have this high GT score.
So they'll give you the option to say, hey, you go back to infantry school or you could
go be cyber security or like, because you have to have a high GT score to be a seal
or recon, green berry.
So they have, they usually give them, it's not like a, like slap in a risk penalization.
It's like, hey, thanks for coming out.
Yeah, it's completely different.
Yeah.
And you can't understand this when you're young, but like for, if you got guys who by
no fault of their own, got injured, whatever, and they send them back over there, they'll
motivate the other dudes to get, to get their asses over there too.
Yeah.
That's by design.
Yeah.
You don't know that.
They don't tell you that.
No, that's the way it works.
Well, in my day though, it was like you, you go to infantry school or communication school,
then you take an indoctrination and then you go, go to rep program, recon indoctrination
program and then go to basically recon course and then once you're in unit, you'll go to
all these schools, jump, dive, free fall.
I was around, I was around for like three, four years before we went to free fall school.
So it took a while.
They were pipelined out.
Oh, yeah, it's in there.
It's built in.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Which is great.
We've been there for 15 years and hadn't seen that.
Yeah.
And if you came in as a new guy and cut the line, damn bye, I was like a thing.
Yeah.
I remember that.
So did you go in right after high school?
I did.
Actually, I didn't graduate high school.
That's why I say staff started brown, some still thankful.
I was 17 years old.
I was in such a bad position with my family falling apart.
I was living on my own and so I went to the recruiter and was like, hey, this is my situation.
My brother died, my family fell apart and I'm trying to work and go to school and he
helped me get in without a high school diploma in 1993, which you required to have one.
And I made a promise to him that after I'm from school, I get my GED and I did.
And all these years later, I got an MBA.
Always joking.
I'm speaking of like, I can't spell MBA, but I got one.
Most of our generation guys, when they pop out from combat and they go back to college,
they're like, hey, this is, this is just to hang out.
Yeah.
So I ruined the curve.
Yeah.
So it was awesome when you find leaders like that recruiter that made one little, you know,
slip in for you and look what you became.
If he said no, like what if you said F the military and you took another route?
Like that was awesome.
Man, dude, they're the best used car salesman there is.
That should break something off the lot.
It's got some dings and dents and nobody wants it.
And I'd be like, I can find a spot for you.
You should be like that.
Yeah.
You can come back square it away.
Yeah.
Because you can tell the difference between the dog who's been trained and when it had,
when they walk out the way they stand and everything and that's all it is is discipline.
You get that base.
I'm going to just say this the other day.
It's like you can teach somebody a kid every other skill set down here and don't teach
him discipline and he won't do shit.
You can only teach him discipline.
Who do all kinds of stuff?
And he'll do every other thing by himself.
Yeah.
And they broke it down for me like that.
And I was like, that's right.
And the hardest part about doing that is when you become a father.
Yeah.
You got, that's your one job.
Not everybody else is just the one you got dealt with.
And if you do that, we're good.
Yeah.
You know, some, some, it's just, you know, that's good.
I had never done that before.
I had a father break that down for me one time.
I was like, yeah.
That makes sense.
You should have led with that a long time.
You know, you know, man, it's like, hey, as soon as you tell me.
Yeah.
And I, and I see it.
I'm good.
It's not, it's not our fault for walking around.
We don't know.
Right.
But there's something about like so many people nowadays that are in positions like that,
like the recruiter that just all they do is just follow the checklist.
Yeah.
And that drives me crazy because there's so many people with potential that they just
need a little bit of wiggle room to get in there.
That's, it's hard because there's a checklist guy.
There's a checklist soul.
And whenever he shows up and gets put in the line and he, he will make, he's so adamant
about that that the next dude up could be like us.
And he's like, no, no, you got to.
Yeah.
Right.
And it does, it drives them crazy.
Yeah.
That's usually when stuff starts to, because you don't let them do your thing.
Yeah.
And look like that and do that.
Do your thing.
Well, if recruiter Brown is still out there.
Yeah.
Listen.
Yeah.
Right.
We have a brown.
We have a brown.
We have a big, a wanted post.
Start with the right post.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Go old school.
He was air wing too.
Everybody knows that the key to someone's heart always lies in some delicious comfort
food.
If you're looking for the best gift ideas for birthdays, holidays, or even for yourself,
look no further than butcher box.
Butcher box gives you the peace of mind.
And knowing that you're always getting the most premium quality meat, 100% grass fed
beef, organic chicken, and all seafood is caught in the wild.
Nothing they serve has any antibiotics or added hormones.
You can get this delivered straight to your doorstep for free if you live inside the
continental US.
That's right.
No hidden or surprise fees.
They can provide the best recipe inspiration with tips and tricks so you can cook up the
tastiest, most mouthwatering meals for you and your guests.
Butcher box is offering our listeners one of their best deals yet, 100% grass fed chuck
roast and a whole organic chicken for free when you join plus an additional $20 off your
first box.
Sign up today at butcherbox.com slash T and Q and use code T and Q to get a 100% grass
fed chuck roast and a whole chicken free in your first box plus $20 off.
That's butcherbox.com slash T and Q and use code T and Q to get this very special deal.
I don't know that this, I'm sure it does exist in an official platform, but I'm trying
to create the platform to like, Hey man, you need to find one of us.
It's not, you come to this place so we can, like yeah, I know where he's at.
The central point.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Like when our DD two 14s, you got guys you check, check out just all that needed your
number and then I can find anything I want.
Well, you guys got to figure out in the teams, you got the bud class number.
Yeah, we got all that.
That's what I'm saying.
The biggest thing with the family.
It's crazy too.
Can you bust people on that?
Like I've busted people on that.
Oh, yeah.
Well, she's better at it than.
Well, there's people who have said, Oh yeah, I did this and this and this and this and I
was actually part of Red Wing or whatever.
And I'm like, really, I've never heard your like that.
You know, they're in the field community.
Yeah.
I would think I'd hear their name.
They're like, yeah, I was buds class.
Three thousand six hundred and thirty or whatever.
I'm like, you're full of shit.
Totally full of shit.
Most of us military, we were, I was like horrible in math, you know, that kind of thing, but
I remember every number and there's more numbers in the military.
You can even stick that.
That's all we know.
Yeah.
And this is like things that I remember like that I had to learn verbatim that pop up.
I was speaking, remember I was speaking in church the other day.
Yeah.
And I said to wear panic and I'm like, yeah, I'm a quiz.
That's what you learned.
And I said to wear panic and I just read it.
My mind just went to definition and just sudden overwhelming tear it, destroys a person's
capacity for self help like this.
And I said that in like 20 years, I'm like, I was like, teaching my kids something last
night and I was like, Hey, say it like this.
This is why we remember him.
She was doing that too.
I was like, man, that's why that's there.
Yeah.
Awesome.
Okay.
So you get in, you got a great recruiter and then what?
Then I go to the infantry school, go to become a recon marine and then I do all these schools
and all this training.
And then there's no wars because I went in in 1993.
And you know, I did, we did some counter drug operations like called JTF six operations
and then a Mexico and on the border and stuff like that, but no wars.
And that's what we were doing.
Yeah.
That was kind of.
And most of you, you couldn't even like one year like we're, I don't even know where they
were.
Like they spread us out to the winds.
They find jobs for us.
Yeah.
Kept kept this busy and in a peace time.
And then the wars condenses.
Yeah.
And then not 11 happened.
I was a sergeant at third force recon company.
I was a, I was the, uh, actually in his bill, but he said now I was a free fall team leader
there and a being a team leader at third force.
I'm like, man, really, when this is what it jumped off, you were running the stuff.
Yeah.
So I was like, my life's about to change.
And, uh, and I obviously we wanted it to where like, let's go.
Let's go do this.
Were you married?
Yeah.
I was, I got married when I was 18.
We were 18 and 19 years old.
So we've been married.
Kathy's experienced.
Everything.
The whole thing.
Yeah.
From the beginning and that's awesome.
And, uh, we're see yet.
Yeah.
We're on here.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
If you want the real story, yeah.
Yeah.
Cause I mean, she, she'd been through a lot.
And if you guys know the whole story of, you know, I went there, uh, I tried out for
a DJ sock task force to go with one of our premier units and work with a lot of your
guys and, and, uh, privilege of lifetime as a Marine to get to go represent the Marine
Corps there.
And I did eight deployments that way and, and, uh, and came home and dealt with, you
know, after, you know, 15 friends, bearing 15 friends and, uh, our confirmation, our,
our operation got compromised and, and, um, you know, I ended up being abducted by
a SSI and, uh, and had a V bed driven in my house and, uh, 12, uh, 12 raga, we're,
we're rolled up, 10 of them were killed Afghans.
Uh, and, you know, these, but these guys are my brothers.
Like I lived in their homes and played soccer with their kids, they're my friends.
And, and, uh, so I, I ended up just dealing with major like anxiety, panic attacks and,
uh, came home, got diagnosed with PTSD and got read out of my program, which was, you
know, just soul sucking for me.
What year was that?
In 2000, April of 2007.
And, uh, and I was just, man, I was dealing with these, the ability to panic attacks
ashamed of what happened.
And, uh, and so when you came out of the military, did you come back here?
So I was, I was at early switch to a contract.
So I came, I was, so I was a contractor.
So there was no like transition out from me.
It was, it was just like boom.
That's, that's a great point.
Yeah.
Because a lot of people, the guys, there was this funny thing that happened with us.
It's a breakdown real fast.
When you talk to a veteran, when they say their war, that's like saying their name,
their identity, their tag.
Right.
You immediately, and something comes with that.
You freaking know it.
So you got the Vietnam guy, after that you had storms and shields.
Right.
Which trained, which was the interim in between now.
And then our guys came online.
Yeah.
And I mean, we trained in terror.
What kind of war you guys fight?
Well, man, we were going against terrorists.
What kind of operators do you think we are?
Well, something happened in the middle of us, where there, where a guy's got out and went
into that civilian contract side.
Yeah.
And there wasn't a detox moment.
No.
Matter of fact, it was kind of the military's link to a detox because those guys were civilians,
but still fight.
You know, it was like having a cool cousin come in and help you whip some ass dude.
Yeah.
They get away, get us some stuff.
For me, it was my same exact same job.
Like I went, my, I had to, I got a contract that I command.
So I'm like, went from, went from staff shortage of paid to, to contract paid doing exact,
that's that same job.
Yeah.
And, and, and so I thought it was great, but it, it, where it wasn't great was that when
I needed help, then it was just like, you're done.
Yeah.
And, and,
Well, even in the military, I feel like if it was kind of before 2010 that you were getting
out, there was really no good transition.
No, no.
They finally, like in the seal, they finally started doing night go at least that, I mean,
which isn't going to solve problems, but at least they're getting like a read on what
guys are going through.
Kind of, I think that was post 2000, it was about 2010, 2011 when they started doing
night go at least, but I feel like before that, like when Marcus got out, I said, what
year was for you?
It was 2008.
Eight cents.
When you was read, when five, yeah, yeah, back afterwards.
Yeah, he went to Ramadi.
And then,
Two, three, and worse, man.
Yeah.
It was awesome.
Yeah.
But we still, like just a year ago, we were still trying to straighten out his retirement
medical paper.
I hadn't heard it.
It sounded like that, but literally our rotation cycle out was to do that.
Like you went off the line to the contour.
That was your boot camp bag.
Yeah.
Same thing.
Yeah.
And, and that unit, that was the plan for everybody.
I thought I was like, okay, so after I get done with this, this is what I have to do.
We follow each other.
Yeah.
It's like an unwritten, like, all right, what am I supposed to do?
Yeah, we're doing that.
Especially in you guys' community and that unit, I was at specifically everyone that
half the guys there were.
And so I was super, I felt super privileged to have the opportunity to do that, but it
bit me in the end.
And so to answer your question, I was already living here.
So this is where I stayed, opened my Jiu Jitsu gym.
It's been about three years, like, you know, professional fighting and teaching Jiu Jitsu
and on the surface, it was like, everything was fine.
But, you know, I crashed and I ended up in an affair.
We separated, filed for divorce, and in 2010, I had to take my life.
And then some amazing people came around me and heard from this community and the church,
woods-edge church down in the southern area of the Woodlands there and came around me
and just helped us to restore our family and rebuild my faith.
And then my life was just radically transformed.
And that's when I started the Mighty Oaks Foundation to help others.
That's awesome.
So how'd your wife handle that?
Well, you know, when we were separated, and I was in a closet, I would try to build up
the courage to take my life.
And I had to block 22 pistol, 40 caliber pistol.
And I put my family pictures on the floor around me and I tried to build the courage to pull
that trigger.
But my oldest son, Hunter, at the time, he was 13 and he only had a key to my apartment.
And so I had this, like, I believe it was divine, like, thought, like, someone's going
to find me.
And so as I was trying to build up the courage to do that, I would thank him for finding
me.
Like, somebody's going to get a gun shot.
Somebody's going to, I'm going to be sure I'm missing.
So he would be the one to help open the door.
So I was enough to pump the brakes.
But I was in such a dark place that I was so determined, like, to rid them of that burden
of what I was putting them through.
And so when I was in that closet and my wife knocked on the door and I wasn't going to
answer it, and I heard Kathy's voice and I kind of panicked.
I don't know why, because she never came in my closet, but I hid the gun under a blanket.
And I was so mad that she was there.
It sounds twisted, but I, like, went to the door and her start berating her for being
there, interrupting me and doing that.
And she's not a very calm argument, by the way.
But in this moment, she was pretty calm, and she asked me a question that changed my life.
She's like, how could you do everything you did?
And the Marine Corps, we were 17 to 18, we met.
She saw me go to recon school and all the schools and training and workups and all the
crazy stuff that we do talk about, like, the discipline to what, to, in the military and
fighting and cutting weight and all that stuff.
She's like, how could you do all of that?
And when it comes to your family, you'll quit.
And never quit.
Right.
She was right.
I've been successful at professional things in my life, but it became the most important
things, like being a husband, being a father, being a young 17-year-old kid, that staff
started a brown game that chance to go and make something of my life.
And I quit all those things, including my will to live.
So that challenge really was pretty, being called the quitter is pretty soul-cutting word
to me.
And that challenge really made me jump back in the fight.
And thankfully, I was, I think, God orchestrated to putting the right people around me, surrounding
me by the right people to challenge me and help bring some accountability in my life
to actually finally get well.
Did she do that?
Or did you already know the people that...
She did that.
She was going to that church in the woodlands.
I was not interested in God or faith or church or anything like that.
But I wanted somebody outside of my circle because I was in...
I was ranked number six in the world at that time.
I was fighting out of this area.
I was probably one of the top fighters out of this area at that time.
So everyone was around me telling me everything I wanted to hear and I would have needed to
hear.
So I didn't have good accountability.
And I was very aware of that.
In fact, I was kind of embracing that.
And so I had to ask someone, I wanted someone outside of my circle.
And so I asked Kathy, is there someone at this church you're going to that could help
hold me accountable to the decision?
And she introduced me a man named Steve Tilt, who's actually...
I don't know if you guys know Steve.
Oh, how does state rep?
Yeah.
And so Steve, he wasn't in politics at the time.
He was just an elder on call at the church.
And I met with him at a Starbucks coffee shop.
And I had this perfect five-prager, four-hour op-order, but I was going to fix my life.
And I slid it over to him like, hey, check this out.
Show it to my wife so I could win her back.
And he slid it back over to me and told me I was going to fail.
And I remember being pretty offended because I didn't even know who he was and he's telling
me I'm going to fail.
Yeah.
I'm like, you ever read this?
And he's like, he's tapped into paper.
He said, this plan, does everything do your relationship with God?
I'm not going to waste your time.
You waste mine.
And at the time of my life, I'd been on other medications.
I've been to VA programs, civilian programs, that professional success, financial success.
And some of those things are good.
Some of those things are bad, but none of those things worked.
And so it kind of led us to saying we have mighty oaks if what you're doing is working
then why not try something different.
And so I made a decision to show him a life to God.
Became a Christian and Steve mentored me for a entire year like biblical living.
And what they really meant for me was like it led me to this realization that all these
bad things that happened to me, I remember losing like Foster Harrington.
He served together for 10 years before he was killed.
He was killed in Al Abbar Province in 2004 in Iraq.
That's right.
Yeah.
I mean, when he was killed, I was like, oh, so pissed off.
I remember just being so angry because one of the best human beings on the planet.
And he is one of those guys that really wanted to make a change in these countries and help.
And he just had a heart for that.
When other people was like, who cares about Iraqis or Afghans?
He was one of the guys who's always wanting to do the right thing.
Like, so all these bad things, my childhood deployments, like all these bad things that
happened to me, those things didn't leave me to be in a closet with pistol hand.
When it led me there, well, the choices I was making response to that.
And what Steve was teaching me through his mentorship was, hey, yeah, you're going to
deal with anxiety and depression and anger, but you could respond to it in a better way.
That's the, you know, lead you in the right place.
And that's what the Bible had did for me.
And it led me to restoration and hope and ultimately to find a new purpose and that purposefully
manifested for me and, and the story of mighty Oaks Foundation just wanted to pay it forward
to others.
And obviously we'd never had any idea that in the last 12 years, we've spoken to half
million troops now.
And, you know, and, and with our programs, I speak at Marine Corps boot camp every, every
quarter of the NSW conferences and, and, and then we have our recovery program where,
where our friend Ben worked at and where we have, we do 35 camps a year and, and we've
helped, you know, thousands of people there.
And it's just been amazing to, to watch, you know, just seeing all these other warriors
who've been through the same thing I've been through get better.
And then being in a position to help the next guy and just pay it forward and pay it forward
and pay it forward.
And that's, that's what we, you know, that's what I think the real solution to this is.
I mean, obviously I believe that God's like a centerpiece solution because I think a lot
of things we deal with are spiritual wounds and it requires a spiritual solution.
But the people to, to deliver that or our peers and the Belta, not just get well, be
in a position to help the next person and, and pay it forward.
And that's real.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
This side was delivered to me.
Yep.
Yeah.
And I think one of the most terrifying things that walks by on earth right now, you think
your neighbor is going to come over and talk to you?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Are you kidding me right now?
I mean, that's what you decided to be.
Yeah.
And spend a lifetime doing it.
Every qual that went into it made it.
Yeah.
And if you don't have something badder than you to keep you in check, you're asking to
get off the limb with it.
Yep.
That's exactly right.
And at a young age, you don't know that.
I feel like white dudes have to learn that.
Right?
I just feel like I'm like my brothers, man, they like know that already.
I forget we have to learn that.
Yeah.
So you get to that point to where you're the most dangerous thing down here.
Even Jesus had to come into a woman.
They're not the most dangerous thing down here, but they're the toughest thing down
here and they're designed to love the most deadliest thing.
And we still talk to him the way we do.
Yeah.
How about that?
Yep.
Can you believe that we even do that?
I can't even, when someone told me like that, I was like, hey man, every time they see you,
they want to love on you and take care of you and then something gets a hold of you,
badass, and then you go home and beat up on your wife.
I thought, seal all these backgrounds and what's the fucking tough about you, man?
Yeah.
And I was like, okay, you know, they break it down on you.
I was like, okay, yeah.
So you are, you're the dangerous thing down here.
So now I got to turn around and teach you know, it's, this is where we learn.
It's like to recede, reflect.
And now we have to respond, but the irony with our generation is there has to be some
dark humor in it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So the situations that we get put in aren't designed for us to do what we're really, really
good at.
You got to hit him with the articulate.
Yeah.
And like, hey, I, and the reason you look like that is so you can just make sure you
scare the shit out of him anyway.
Yeah.
Exactly.
And then you have the stories to back it up is over on inside this country, man.
They, they're good with us.
Yeah.
So what else on the planet thinks of this?
That's the, that was the most valuable lesson they learned.
I mean, you got to, you got to be able to remember that part, what you really are as
opposed to what you're trying to do as an opposite thing.
Why exactly just talking about, I used that to keep people at distance for a long time.
Like I came back from Afghanistan.
I didn't talk now at public speaking, right?
Folks is that I didn't tell anybody.
I was in, I didn't want anybody knows in the military.
I just wanted to, I want to like shut that, that chapter of my life and move on.
And now I'm going to try to build myself to be like this macho, like fighter and a, but,
but I didn't want anybody to speak into my life.
I'm like, and I would position myself to where I didn't want, I didn't want any accountability.
And so I had to be willing to make myself, you know, open to that.
It's crazy, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, they made me do it.
Yeah.
Put me on that.
I didn't have a choice.
Yeah.
Okay.
And when they do that, I, I think that's important for us to, is like, I do really well when someone
tells me what to do.
Yeah.
Yeah.
There's a mission statement in order and especially if there's a, the teams doing it.
Yeah.
When we're by ourselves, they kind of idle around.
Because when we were by ourselves, if there was an emission going on, bro, we'd go get
into something.
Sure.
Yeah.
Even if it was bar fight, right?
Get into something.
Right.
Yeah.
So that's the toughest thing for us.
And not only that, we're well trained in it.
It took us out of the country and threw us some Babylon.
It took us to the beginning when everyone else got paradise, when everything came online,
the tech and everything was good here.
I mean, we weren't here.
Right.
We missed that.
So a lot of guys in the coming back, you can see it.
And when they get back, man, I tell people, man, for every 10, you're in, it takes two
to detox.
All right.
And if you got your boys around you, especially if you cut from the same cloth, and if you
not, that doesn't matter because most of us are bastards and we interop.
Yeah.
Especially when we were in the bar and the sandbox, man, guys are just, you'd work with
them for years and not even know that they were in a different branch of service.
Yeah.
That was crazy.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I don't want to go off subject, but one of the things I've seen lately and I've experienced
this book and I've witnessed from before, you know what, that before is how much we support
each other.
But when a guy gets out and transitions away and starts being successful, does something
gets a platform, how we eat, we cannibalize each other.
We go after each other and like, why do we do that to each other?
Absolutely awful.
And it's usually like guys that are like still active or just getting out that just
pounce on whoever.
I mean, I've seen it.
Seen with Marcus, Tim Kennedy.
Yeah.
And it's just my glover.
He doesn't.
Instructors.
It's like when our peers, no one, I mean, I'll get on seals that tear my ass.
I expect that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
If you're not, then there's a problem.
You can tell when team, and that's military wide, especially if you speak the language.
Yeah.
Like, oh, he was talking smack.
What do you say?
Mark does not really think so.
Right?
Wait, what do you say?
Yeah.
There's a difference.
There's a big difference.
And the problem with social media is there's no, you can't see the flare.
Right, right.
You don't know what it's wrapped in when it's delivering that message.
And people get bent on.
I got team guy.
I got the baddest men on the planet of earth.
They get upset over something.
No read and an op-word on that phone.
And I'm like, really?
You get mad about that?
You said that.
No, he gets onto me.
If I get fired up, something I read, he's like, you read it on a phone.
Yeah.
What do you care?
You're fine.
I don't care if people say, y'all do the talking.
Yeah.
Everyone else listens to y'all now.
That's where we're at.
Yeah.
So, but you can get wrapped up in it, especially if it's your life.
That thing right there is.
It does happen.
That should be in the vault.
That's like an M4 man.
It could be dangerous.
It can, yeah.
Yeah.
The worst critics are our own teammates and peers, but...
I love those guys.
I love you.
Marcus never bothered him.
He never bothered me.
It bothered me.
Because I'm like, I thought we were close.
We are.
So, I definitely take offense to it, but he does not.
He's so good at just letting it just roll off his back.
I could use some lessons from him right now.
Yeah.
That's what this is.
Just let it roll off your back.
You know, I'm around.
You get me, I just always look at like, hey, if you and I are standing somewhere.
Yeah.
And somebody walked up on us and even if they did get it out of their mouth, what?
Yeah.
I mean, what, what?
Yeah.
We've been over there, they're trying to kill us every day with our sleep.
You know, I'm talking about much less and everything out of their mouths is how we're
taught from birth and everybody hates us.
Even what, when it comes down to it, that person that's talking shit, if they got into
a bind.
Let me go say it.
Oh, yeah.
You would go 100% 100%.
100%.
What's up, guys?
The holidays are my favorite time of year.
It's prime time for seeing friends and family, gone on vacations and even giving gifts.
It always leaves me with a great feeling until I'm back home and realize that I might have
spent a little too much money.
Luckily, our friends over at Navy Federal Credit Union have the easiest way to pay down
credit card debt.
You can get a low intro APR on balance transfers with their Platinum credit card, which is their
lowest rate card and it's easy to get.
I've been using the Platinum card for a few months now and it's actually really helped
me stay on top of my finances and I really think it could help you out too.
And anybody working on home DIY activities?
Navy Federal can help you get started on your next home improvement project as well.
They offer a home equity line of credit with easy access to funds when you need them at
a variable rate.
You can learn all about this and more at NavyFederal.org.
Navy Federal is insured by NCUA and membership is required.
And I know that.
So I'm just going like, all right, whatever.
And they would come for us.
And they would still do it.
It's kind of like the kind of, it's just like, man, look, and I'm not kidding about
that.
Everyone has taught to hate us from birth.
Yeah.
Don't ever forget it.
No matter how much we bleed, we collect scars in this family.
Came down here to bleed.
I'm not much to do it, man.
It's still going to hate your ass.
It's a dysfunctional family, but you still have each other's power.
We're the outside boards.
Yeah.
That's where they keep us, man.
You know, God's got a table full of them.
Oh, yeah.
Okay, just checking.
So when you started the Biney Oaks Foundation, did your church help you build the platform?
How did you actually?
They got Pastor Jeff Wells and the woodl- he's still there.
Talk about him.
Pastor, he's an amazing human being.
A little background on Pastor Jeff Wells.
He's ran for an Olympic team.
The year he got boycotted, Spatch by Nike.
He came in second in the Boston Marathon, but like a second.
Oh, wow.
Really?
Yeah, he's incredible, incredible, incredible, him being.
You guys know who he is?
Uh-huh.
Woods-ed church.
So that's where we go to church now, but that church just really got behind us and they
believe that, I mean, honestly, they shouldn't do business getting behind us coming in.
God, they were not in a position to help others.
They were still bleeding ourselves, but they just really felt that God was burning our
hearts to go forward and do this.
How they would have patched.
Yeah.
And they, they, they, they wrapped their arms around us, launched us out to do this.
And, you know, 12 years later, it's been, you know, amazing, amazing opportunity to
serve so many people.
And we still get to do it.
Do y'all take, like, how does it work?
Because you don't own all the ranches that you do the retreats at.
Are people just offering that up for the weekend?
They do.
Yeah.
So we have, we have really four things that we do.
For a resiliency program where primarily me, I go to bases around the world and speak
to troops on PTSD, suicide prevention, spiritual resiliency.
Now, are you USO in that or no?
No, I don't do it.
We just right through my...
I was trying to track you with that, yeah.
To directly, directly to friends.
Quiet around all that.
They didn't put you on that?
No, they've, they've tried to, but to do like a USO tour and they can have Afghanistan
one time and I, and it was just...
Okay, because I like who you would.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Would you go with me?
Because some of them have a blast.
Yeah.
And we're ourselves and, and, and we've, like I said, at Marine Corps Blue Camps have me
for every quarter for eight years now.
And, and then we write resources.
So like some of our books, Path to Resiliency, Truth by PTSD, we've given away about 350,000
copies.
And then our recovery program, which you're talking about, legacy programs, we have five
branches, California, Ohio, Virginia, to in Texas.
And those branches, two of them were exclusive for us.
Our two main ones, California, Ohio.
And so we don't own them, but they were built and are exclusive to us.
That's cool.
So the one in California, for example, was 25,000 acres, about $10 million facility that
Mr. Wayne Hughes, Jr. of the public storage family, built for us.
And we do, out the, oh, it made amazing people.
And of the, of the 35 camps that we do a year, they're five days long, of the 35 we
do a year, 17 other, other California.
And, and so active duty service members come on PTAD orders, veterans come, first responders,
and we have a spouses program as well.
Are you fine on them?
Uh, well, man, honestly, they found us.
Thank you.
We, we, we get, we recommend it.
It's the words out there.
We're getting like, I think last year we got 1,800 applications.
And so we're doing it.
So we do about a thousand per year, uh, that go through, and we pay for everything, including
travel.
So it's about five million hours a year in programming.
And, uh, honestly, in the, in the, we always need support, but in the last 12 years, it's
been amazing as we grew, uh, the money has always came because we just said, I mean, you
guys know from what you do, we have amazing country of patriots that love our troops
and have supported it.
And it's been incredible.
Hey, if my dad and your dad had set it, had to set that in, if one of them had to do
it, it was that they did it because when we got back, I mean, they're like, I can't,
I can't even drive.
Yeah.
You and I haven't tried to just be the baddest things on the planet of earth.
And the minute we came back hurt or busted up, like we got you.
Yeah.
There's so many, I mean, just 43, 44,000, right?
So basically everybody.
Yeah.
Most people don't know how to do it.
Everyone wants to help.
Yeah.
What a great country you live in where when you come back like that and Americans are
great about one thing.
If they want you to get your ass with form.
Yeah.
And they know it.
Yeah.
As soon as they know it, they'll take care of you.
You're good.
Yeah.
And, uh, it's been, it's been, uh, incredible just to be, just to watch how people, you talk
about people coming together in unity.
Um, that's people that follow me on social media, like don't like West and conservatively,
but when we do efforts like this, Afghanistan, you back to effort.
They're like, Hey, I don't like you, but where can I support?
They'll tell you that.
Yeah.
They'll say it just like that.
I don't even like any of that you may have.
We're gonna support.
Yeah.
What you doing?
You're doing a good, yeah, you're doing a good thing.
Yeah.
Great.
Yeah.
And, uh, so.
Yeah, man, fired unlike water.
You know, there's some things down here that don't get, it's not a lie.
It's the words mean something different.
Yeah.
It's like, man, they just don't coalesce.
They're gonna grow next to each other.
Yeah.
Always look at it like that.
Since Mojo got up in DC, he was talking about, I have been asking about all the Congressman.
Yeah.
And he's like, you know what?
He goes, everyone I run into, regardless of what you see, is when they turn it on, they
can turn it on.
Mm.
And when they turn it off and we're walking around in this business as usual, he's like,
man, they're straight up.
He's like, it's, it's really something to say.
They're professionals.
Yeah.
And that's good.
That is good.
And I'm like, jump on his back.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, you gotta choke him out.
Come on.
Yeah.
There's been a few Congress members I walked through and I was over to Capitol and I'm
like, seeing him walking a hole and I just want to stick.
Malay got dripped.
I'm going down.
That's the key to the nuts.
I really think that's the worst.
The fire.
The fire cage is not in.
What did they do about it?
I know.
I'm like, maybe when your Congress and the Senators are great, now that you have fired
up.
Yeah.
We were at dinner the night before Morgan was, well, before they were supposed to get sworn
in, but ended up being five days later.
But we go to dinner that night before him.
Okay.
If you see this person, do this.
If you see this, he just shook his head at me.
He's like, you're a little fired up.
I was like, get him good with this state and this state and this state.
I said, that's the key to name me.
I just did.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The key to fire.
Yeah.
It's a thing.
There's two more things we do, my deox.
This is a faith-based programs and taking them to testify before Congress and Senate and getting
the successful policy back in place, faith-based programs in 2009.
Actually President Bush signed the opportunity and faith initiative in 2001, 2009, President
Obama signed a policy to override that and take funding away from faith-based programs
and put all the money in clinical.
And this problem got worse.
And so in 2016, I was able to speak to candidate Trump and ask him if he'd overrides that.
Obama did that.
Obama did that in 2009.
And they shifted a lot of money.
All that money to clinical programs stood up, put billions of dollars, stood up about
1,500 new clinical programs and the suicide rate went from 16 to 22 right after that.
So when I had- I was tracking that- You think they're tracking their data?
No, I don't know if they are not.
They are clinical.
Oh yeah.
Oh yeah.
That's what I'm saying.
Yeah.
Yeah.
They're changing.
I hope you're keeping stats.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So in 2016, I was before candidate Trump and I got a chance to ask him a question and that's
become president.
Will you override the opportunity to faith initiative and bring faith-based programs
back?
He said yes.
And I got a chance to become the chairman of the White House's Faith-based Coalition
for that.
And he signed that executive order in 2018.
In addition to that, we worked on a lot of bipartisan policy.
We got a lot of stuff done on the faith-based program side for VA and DOD.
And I got to- I got to advise Deputy Secretary of Pan Powers of the VA on that side.
And the last thing we do is we take our programs that we've been successful with here and
we take them to international partners around the world and allies around the world.
So right now, I've been to Ukraine ten times since February.
Oh my gosh.
Talk about that.
Yeah.
So originally we went out there- How did you get in?
How did you get in the first time?
Yeah.
For the original time.
The first time.
The strove.
I figured it was something.
I was like, bro, I mean, there was nobody stopping people from going in.
I didn't think so.
I said, what's your name, man?
The line was seven days coming one way.
Boom.
But take his act to like that day.
Are you watching it?
It goes down.
I mean, it's like an idea how you got in.
I just drove it.
But are you just sitting on the couch watching on the news and you're like, I'm going to
go.
No, we had just got done with the- We had still had everybody in place.
All of our team in place from the Afghanistan EVACs.
And so one of our guys, he's in the book at Sea Spray.
He's a former Green Beret and had spent some time with our premier at the Graduate
Intelligence Agency.
So he's a very experienced guy.
And so he did a lot worse than Afghanistan.
So he went ahead of time and he was in Ukraine like days before the invasion.
And so we knew it was coming.
And we were thinking, hey, how could we help?
It's a lot different in Afghanistan.
Afghanistan, people can go in to help.
But here you could drive a bus across the border, open the door and people get in.
So mass EVACs went somewhere where we could help.
So we were looking at some different things we could do to help.
So one was be strategic, very strategic evacuations of people that couldn't self-evacuate.
And the other would be we identified that when the communication infrastructure went
down, all these NGOs that were helping would be in the dark.
And so we wanted to build the communications infrastructure in the clandestine network
for communications and distribute that and track it.
So that's what we would never do.
So we build that in days.
That's huge.
Yeah.
So that's how.
So I remember my son's back in the States.
He's wanting to go.
OK, I need you to go like Eridium's GPS's, GoTentas for like the clandestine.
That's square away.
And we just know that.
No one thinks of that.
Yeah, because that's I mean.
What's the first day of the day?
People can't communicate this.
You're a congrid.
Yeah.
Who could say the day somebody could roll in there and throw one up?
Yeah, and we did.
We did within the first weeks of that happening and we put 3,000 about 3,000 kits out track.
We could track where every kid is.
And so instead of us going to have to go help everybody, we could say, oh, this guy's
over here.
That's what helps that.
Yeah.
And so we did that.
And so we did that.
Yeah, all the other logistics and infrastructure.
So so we've been there now what we do and we take an MITO experience or agency program
and we are going to the front lines and like passive front lines.
But we pass like two hours past the Russian line to like special operations troops and
we bring it was back in.
Yeah, we bring small teams like two three man teams and we and we bring in like Dennis
has been there with me and we bring like I fax like really good I fax because they're
not getting the medical supplies they need.
And now we give them that when we last time we went we brought 18 delta special forces
medic doctor to teach them how to use it.
So now we so we're given them that we use it to be a rapport and then we stay with them
and we then we do our spiritual agency program helping them mentally and spiritually be prepared.
We're not to the deltas to get them in.
He's an 18 delta.
I'm sure that guy is looking.
Oh, man, yeah, we take 18 deltas all day long ago.
Yeah.
Yeah.
In fact, that's that's what we need the most for our support is to bring 18 deltas to do
that because that's their biggest need because they even if they get medical supplies, they
have no idea.
I use it right.
They don't know how to.
Oh, yeah.
That's the word.
I do a sucking chest wound.
And so I mean I got some pictures of my son there last what he was there two weeks last
week last week teaching teaching a Ukrainian special operations unit, you know, all that
stuff.
And so when we bring our audio Bible sticks for them and its resources, we got a lot of
translating Ukraine and I've been in a lot of heat like, why are you going over there
helping these Zuenski's corrupt and I don't care like our politicians are buying corrupt
like that none that matters to me.
And these are like these people didn't ask for any of this and they're being invaded by
our super super power.
I mean, I I leaked a box news like mass graves.
I've seen him with my own eyes and and civilian apartment buildings that hit with so what
kind of thing we're talking about when is it like in this all the time in the city going
blocked a block like we did in some towns or is it standoff sniper stuff or I mean is
there army?
No, it's it's very it's something like we never seen before is kinetic uniform on uniform.
I don't know anything about that.
Yeah, so I mean, it's like it's like World War two, right?
TV, right?
Like yeah, like brothers type shit.
Yeah, so I mean I was in the zoom and me and C's pretty written a zoom which Russia had
occupied for six months and we were with the military as they pushed through and we went
about two about our half past you were you were in carkeven.
I was there.
Yeah, so we went through it was just two of us in the border class about the Russians
class behind us and and it was a craziest thing because I never had air over us to
mix fly over and we're like where those eggs and then they dropped it a gun run and then
and then we had idea of hitting like 100 yards from us like dirt hitting us and and I'm
like I never encountered that before and like I could show you my phone like where we were
like moving with the Ukrainian troops and like we passed like 60 that are dying Russian
soldiers uniform rushing soldiers and that's huh I mean it was one of them like as it like
what's that even like man what's that what's that I never experienced anything like that
in Afghanistan I mean or anything oh no I mean no we know we just have that it was the
most kinetic thing I've ever seen I mean I wasn't participating in it I was just right
there with them but like shoulder to shoulder with them that's gotta be crazy guys were like
see what you're shooting at to be able to tie like the other team stand up like how do
they get I see so much stuff on the news they're actually targeting like orphanages
or hospitals or whatever so if it's not like a make none of that's making mainstream news
like that should be though yeah but if it's uniform supposed to be uniform uniform why
are they targeting the innocent so like so like the best example when I describe as like
the Ukrainians are engaged in a in a face-to-face fight with the Russians and they'll bound
the way and then next thing you know they'll attack like a civilian apartment building
and it's like a it's like a mental like deterrent to like yeah there's like yeah you're gonna
fight with us well we're gonna kill your women and children and I went to this one place
and I have in a video and you get these three apartment complexes and each one of them are
hit the exact same spot from the fifth floor to the ground the whole building is going
is this women and children living in this these buildings like thousands of people like
killed in their you know air striking it what's the only the end game on that because you've
got to either kill all of my because you don't kill every single one of them they're gonna
hate each other I mean they'll hate the hate on for that yeah well I mean and Russia wars
last 20 years yeah they'll keep they'll keep at this I think I think it's it's going to
continue to get worse it kind of has to get worse to oh sure you know whiskey came back
down but Putin's not gonna back down he can't he can't he's Russian yeah he can't yeah he's
got to die yep and so when is the wind skis the Ukrainians believe they're winning so
Zwinski can't far for land and I mean which one of your kids do you give up like save
that out yeah if you if you're watching a fight go down say them two factors yeah do
you think it'll just go on for another how like our wars like the 10 yeah I think so I
think I think it'll keep going I mean I think they'll be they'll be some kind of like line
at some point they'll be established and they'll hold that line and they'll fight there like
you know yeah like yeah yeah do you think we'll ever get involved we are I mean like
we're by proxy like I mean at war Russia right now worse but our troops aren't in the Ukraine
are they no no they're not and but if we would not move them out of Ukraine this would
never happen you know I think because of article five that Putin would have never went into
Ukraine if we would have not moved them out we moved them out and we moved our embassy out
we moved our consulate out and that made old NATO move out which created a vacuum for
any green light for Russia to just come in when did that happen in February like right
oh that's when it happened okay yeah so as soon as we moved out Russia moved in yeah
and so you know and I think I think Afghanistan ties to this right because you show how we
handled Afghanistan and your Putin's like empowered and emboldened and then unfortunately
the next step is China because China's watching this and they're watching this deplete our
military surplus since in billions of dollars and and now they're you know they're looking
at Taiwan and they're waiting to watch us weaken ourselves and you know Taiwan will be
next because they believe just like Putin believes the Ukraine belongs to Soviet Union
Taiwan believes China believes Taiwan belongs to them and so this is a this is a chain like
in the series of events that puts us in a really bad spot so tell us about the fall of
Afghanistan well with my experience with the Z's was probably a little different than most
interpreters most interpreters like experience because at my unit I was what's called the
AFO advanced force operator and so I wasn't like a kinetic assault or on my on my unit
I went out ahead of my unit to do all the clandestine infrastructure to build the the
network that we used to put us alters on targets so usually and when you go in an
on-premises areas there's a AFO team that goes in advance and builds the the way to
clandestinely get on target and so that's what I did and usually work with like one
other teammate I was assigned I had another seal that worked with me and or are you working
a single-ton capacity and so towards most of my time I worked in a single-ton capacity
with Aziz so I worked by myself with Aziz and all of the Afghanistan across the border
in Pakistan and we did all eight for continuity purposes we did all eight of my deployments
together so really yeah so so like most interpreters right you get different
every time for my for so I had I had Aziz for all eight of these deployments so we became
very very close and and he and he was at that command for 15 years as an interpreter
that command for 15 years but I was I was for this operation it was me and him and so
like I say he saved my life specifically on three times he just got awarded by
recognized by Congress for saving operation that he and I did where he he
I mean I was like assigned to be the team lead for this organization operation but he
really led the operation and we went and we went an all-night operation to move
14 guys out that were caught in a and a cure effort of creating more problems and
but he he led this up here here people talking like that like uh Seals they
wouldn't get in there like yeah we do yeah I mean yeah I mean our asses and
figures all yeah yeah I mean those guys it's a thing those four those four team
guys would could have killed they were out of there no problem but to protect
the operation they needed to be moved out and extracted in a clandestine way
and and I was like trying to problem-solving in the disease just like hey let's
eat comedy or vehicle let all-night operation and we got those guys out and
their equipment out and the operation was never compromised because of him so
so Congress just recognized him for that but which was cool because I think it
was the first Afghan recognized by Congress but but he he rec he saved my
life like multiple times and I could even share a couple of stories but funny
stories but but your brother said it best like when he when he gave you
brother spoke at Aziz welcome home party he said you know guys like Aziz they
say our life every day like don't walk there they'll talk to that person and
eat that they just and he would always put himself before me and when we went
out in the mountains operating I didn't go back to my grandma and he went home I
went to his house like hotro his wife would cook my first warm meal out of
coming out of the mountains and I was I held my shoe to my shoe dies as oldest
kids when they were babies I held them there's their family to me and so when
the withdrawal was happening I was worried about a couple of things wanted
it and believe we should the withdrawal should have been done happened the way
it was and but I couldn't do anything about that but I was also worried about
my friend and wasn't going to leave him there and I made a decision to put a
team together go get him it needs to be or is there no but there is it's probably
not streamlined when we when we get sent in do something like this to make the
Terps straps up there's a pipeline yeah just like with anything else and it's
as soon as we we they get done with us they come over there's a spot it's this
that in the other some of those are the best Americans will ever have yeah oh
yeah hardest fighting best guys I mean just well one of the things about Aziz I
been saying this a lot has been speaking about this book is I remember like you
know I wasn't a kid when I went to I've already been around for like you know
nine years in special operations so I had a lot of experience and but I don't
think I thought I was super mature then but I probably didn't have a lot of life
experience that I thought I had but I remember like being on these having the
conversations with them and he'd be talking about like freedom and democracy
and fighting and willing to die for it in a way that I never heard American
talk about it before and this like you're talking about for his daughters to be
educated and I'd be forced to be married he didn't have daughters yet by the time
but he's talking about this and and I'm like this guy's ever been seen freedom
he's never seen democracy before but he understands it's better than I even do
and he's willing to die for it and like so a lot of these guys they they have
such a contrast and and what Americans become naive or or or just accustomed to
and take for granted frankly that I do the same thing with it through it and it's
getting taken for granted it's on the opposite end up yeah the fire and the
taste yeah what he had and when you see somebody that has the original taste
for it you know you understand it yeah I mean he was he was you know 1776
American like we're sitting in uniforms as a cohesive unit which you know how
far it went yeah like we show up with the stuff that we do and then they're in
the original 1776 version of it wanting to fight for it yeah and for us it
taught us a valuable lesson as this is what it's like in the beginning
did you know the average person has around 12 paid subscriptions just let
that sink in there's so many subscription based services these days
that many just slip under the radar and rack up charges without you even
noticing and trust me it starts to add up rocket money formerly known as true
bill is a personal finance app that finds and cancels your unwanted
subscriptions it monitors your spending and helps you lower your bills all in one
place when I first downloaded rocket money and saw those subscriptions that I
was still paying for I couldn't believe it between all the free trials I forgot
to cancel other streaming services I downloaded just for one TV series and
all the ones that I typically use I had over 20 subscriptions it was
ridiculous luckily all I had to do is click the cancel button on the app and
automatically canceled anything I didn't want anymore stress-free stop
throwing your money away cancel those unwanted subscriptions and manage your
expenses the easy way by going to rocket money dot com slash T and Q that's
rocket money dot com slash T and Q rocket money dot com slash T and Q
he the same age as you he's he just turned 40 yeah I'm 47 he just turned
40 for Afghan I'm probably younger than him for sure yeah but uh yeah so we you
know we I'm and by the way like a lot of people don't agree with me on the
withdrawal but I don't feel like I believe American people are lied to to
say that we were in this 20 year war this endless war I mean obviously I didn't
want my son my son's keep fighting the same war I fought in like we're talking
earlier but to say that we had to exit this war in leave Afghanistan in a way
we did it was just not true I mean we were not in a 20 year war when president
Trump dropped that mobe in in 2018 the conventional war was over we had shifted
to support and I advise the role of the Afghan National Army and Afghan National
Police we could have just declared a war over at that time and in the Bagram
Air Force base the most strategic place in the globe between Iraq Iran Russia
and China and we needed that location in international community we're all
participating with us at one point we had 2,500 troops there we're all
participating to support the Afghan National Army to keep the Taliban at bay
in the mountains of Afghanistan it was actually working this international
effort and you know historically we haven't we've kept contingencies after
wars we have 80,000 troops still in Japan and 40,000 troops in Germany and 35,000
in South Korea and for those that think of a warmonger for saying that like like
I think that prevents wars that keeps us from wars by having these contingencies
so they to keep a 2,500 man contingent force in on Bagram Air Force base and
turn it over to international community would have been the right strategy not
to do a full withdrawal and then we moved out our military shut down Bagram Air
Force base we moved out our military before we moved civilians out before we
moved our allies out before we moved our 85 million dollars equipment out and we
gave the new operation from the from the DoD to not combat the evacuation
operation from the DoD we gave it to the State Department and they did not know
how to handle that that's not their job to do it and so we in one of the things
they did the big mistakes they did the White House in the State Department is
they gave a date to withdraw and not terms instead of saying like we will
leave when we get every American out when we get our equipment out when we get
our allies out they give a date in the Taliban did not budget on our day it's
very much common sense and that's why I don't think it was a mistake I don't
think it was a blunder or a debacle like people say I think it was deliberately
done that way for ulterior motives there's always a something like that what
look right here because something else is going down over I mean China had so
much to gain for us leaving the mineral rights in the new Kush Mountains which
I said before that people come here conspiracy theorists but we left on
August 31st and the first week of September China had the mineral rights
to the end of Kush Mountains and trillions of dollars in the day used to be called
Candyland yeah trillions of dollars with the lady and the jewelry the jewels and
the ground every the minerals in that ground yeah before is I didn't know when
Alexander came around did his whole thing all this sounds of Alexandria
yeah Candahar we used to be called Alexandria yeah I didn't know that I
didn't know that either and then you'll further back to it that the overall
reference back in them days was it was Candyland because of all the riches and
then then you have Iran has sanctioned oil China needs oil the only thing that
was between China and that sanctioned oil was a US military in Afghanistan so
now they're already moving that oil and then Bagram Air Force Base the
strategic military location which would have been incredible for us for Russia
and China and Iran and Pakistan ISI all those places we're not there anymore
nor any of our allies there anymore in fact China and our our enemies occupy it
so those there was a lot of things that I didn't agree with but the one thing I
could actually do something about was to go get my friend and and so that's
what you also do well good on you for doing that can you tell us a little bit
about that day yeah well there's a lot to go into that's that story there's a
guy named Bashir who I mentioned earlier he rolled on rolled over to the
Taliban while he's working for us he was a he was a government US government
intelligence trained person I was on our team he rolled flipped over to the
Taliban compromise our operation he's the one that had the V-Bid drove in my
house had me had me abducted by a neighboring country for intelligence
agency went got had some broad guys killed and and then ultimately was going
after Aziz after that happened you got it up to abducted yeah in Afghanistan in
a neighboring country oh my gosh I'll tell you guys with the microphone so okay
but a holy shit that's crazy so this guy Bashir and I write a write about him
in the book he he had a he had a really he really had it out for Aziz we so our
command went after him your your guys went after him and caught him and so we
got him and he had like he had like a journal with like this where Chad sleeps
this where you know so-and-so sleeps this was so-and-so sleeps is there
they're deviating their times and routes and here's the times and routes they're
using and here's where the safes are so he was like months like tracking us and
so so he went to jail at Bagram jail then he went to pull a chalky jail then
went to Saudi Arabia he was released during a prison release in like 2011
when Obama let a bunch of people out and so he goes back to the Taliban and as
soon as like in April he starts going to Kabul and looking for some of our
old guys and so Aziz goes on to run so Aziz was like our ticking clock like
Bashir was like looking for him and so we so we started trying to find ways to
go get him out and put together a car start calling guys that had a ASO or
a FO level backgrounds that had that single-ten ability to work with a lot
of resources and I was also looking for guys and you appreciate this probably
I was looking for guys that heard he already had their wild oats of combat
zone I didn't want a bunch of guys that are out there looking to go fight to
Taliban because that's not work on there to do and you know I knew we
probably wouldn't even be armed and so I didn't want anybody that was to go out
there and you know try to get some and so so much mature guys and so we put
together as team and and we had guys we had some team guys we had a green
berry's for sure kind guys and a few guys from ground branch that it's a
really good precision rescue experts and paramilitary officer their purpose
for rescue experts and so as we put planning together go to go get his ease
wife and six kids that this one of the guys that had run into our attention it
was 3,500 orphans and that was kind of a moment that we kind of paused and said
hey like look at the experience we have we all like pretty strong people are
faith and felt God was burning our hearts to help and so we just said you
know let's help as many people as a can Americans interpreters women children
Christians every persecuted and so we made a decision to do that and honestly
we've gotten a lot of credit sense and and in a Bible with second Corinthians
1130 says if you boast boasting your weakness I can boast them a weakness
here because all we did was probably was obedient to that burden that we had in
our heart and then after that we I believe we saw it to buy a miracle like in the
next three days that there's a series of events that happen that that allowed us
to belt an online rescue his his family but 17,000 people and if any one of those
things didn't work perfectly and none of us had any control over them working
if anyone wants to think that work perfectly would have never been able to
do it the first was that a Sarah Varrotto called contacted joint chiefs and used
her influence to get the joint chiefs to allow us a civilians to fly foreign
military aircraft on the DOD controlled h-kai airport to land it there go outside
the wire which the military wasn't even allowed to go outside the wire go outside
the wire get people bring the back in manifest them and fly them to a third
party country that's like impossible and I believe those a miracle that we were
allowed to do that secondly now we're gonna fly people out in that country
they don't their their SIVs P1 P2 visa applicants but they don't have visas so
we can't fly into the States we and you know a lot of people gave us a hard time
like you guys are bringing people we don't know who they are I'm not the
State Department I don't have the ability to bring people to the United States I
just have to we just had the ability to evacuate people but we needed a legal
place to bring them because if you move someone without a visa to another
country that's human trafficking I've been joking saying the only place you
could do that is Laredo Texas but but but we but we we called we had a
connections with the role family and UAE and we called them and within an hour
call they gave us permission to use their humanitarian center but but we're
all got the right corporates with doctors and resources and everything and
then in addition to that they said we'll give you a C-17 plane with pilots and if
you fill it we'll give you another one then after that going back radio show
host Glenn Beck called me and he said hey I just went into radio to raise I
thought I raised a few thousand dollars to help out but I got in three days I
got 21 million dollars like what do I do with it yeah yeah he wrote ultimately
raised 46 million dollars and and I just said man I need you charter plane so he
he mercury ones as charity Rudy Atala this amazing dude and Rudy Atala
Glenn gave him sign him to us and he just started playing for us and it was
it was just incredible and is an amazing human being incredible he I mean I don't
we could talk all the first one I met when I got back yeah really yeah he was
like he really took Marcus he wrote the forward on this to I did he he's smart
that knows it's something about everything man he is brilliant great family
to gave a speech at our wedding really yeah oh I didn't know that that's awesome
yeah we freaking love Glenn we haven't talked to him in a long time but I have
yeah I'm sure I'm checking with the family just it's been when Marcus and I
met I told you like we met and everything happened super quick but he took me on
this like tour of people to get approval from like I needed it I didn't realize
what was happening you're getting interviewed yeah good to go
Glenn was one of the women his wife were one of those checkpoints of I got passed
around when I got back did she passed the test and I fell in love with that
family they're awesome yeah he talked to me like I was a kid dude like hey look I
need you to get out of it what are you doing hey you know but he has the biggest
freaking heart he does yeah he gave us though he gave me the Bonhoeffer Angel
Award for doing this and and honestly like when Congress recognized the only
thing we did was said was said yes and then like I said I seen God perform
miracle that first 10 days we didn't know how much time we would have but our
ground teams see spray Sean G Tim Kennedy they were going outside the wire
at the airport we had the team in Abu Dhabi and yeah so it was just like but
that's not a lot of people get give him such a hard time and he was why who
does it's crazy oh man the Greenbury community I was talking about earlier
with her like the Greenbury community like went after him and but it's like
this dude like he was offered like a lot of money to go he volunteered to come
here he didn't have to do this you have to do this at all he just and everyone
likes tough smack yeah but he he so we we had 10 days we didn't know how much
time we had but no one stopped man from the ground team the Sarah in Washington
DC if you stop for like five minutes you like somebody's you trading at five
minutes for my life like see spray lost 37 pounds in 10 days and and when that
when the air when the the abigate was blown up and 13 of our service member
died the military well those gates shut and our military is forced to leave but
we didn't have to so we chose to stay and I think there's a lot of reasons to
chose to stay but one of them was the White House saying it was a hundred
Americans left and like without debate there were thousands of Americans still
there the White House is saying all the other questions all they got to do is go
to go to the airport one of our friend what if guy Marcus was in few guys
yeah fun to him actually he was one of the very last to like get out and he
wasn't there like rescuing people he was there working had been there for months
and like no one knew that he was still there his wife was flipping out
well the White House is saying that they just have to get to the airport and
the but the the State Department gave the Taliban the outer perimeter and so
they controlled who got in and out of the airport and they were murdering
people in the streets so like if you're like some 20 year old girl that went
there to do missionary work or medical aid or teach like you're not going to
show your blue passport to the Taliban and so they were trapped there and and
so but the truth is it didn't matter if there was a thousand or a hundred
Americans there like you don't leave one American there and and so we were like
I mean you know where we come from I squarched earth to go get somebody even
like Bobirdle like the idiot trader like we we knew we were gonna lose guys
to go get him and people did anyway like I mean you don't leave Americans
behind the White House even promised they wouldn't but they did and so we
chose to stay with a lot of other amazing nonprofits work together Mercury
Juan Task Force Orgo pineapple like we're all coordinating stuff and and we got
another 5,000 people out over two months from that uh Mazah Sharif and then when
that airlift dried up we knew we still had to do more because the Panjier Valley
became a collective place for all these people that were trying to survive and
I got him if listeners know who Ahmad Masoud is he was the leader of
Northern Alliance which Ben Laden brilliantly killed him the day before 9-11
to break our alliance before it started his son stood up the resistance in
Panjier Valley so everyone's going there and the commandos are trying to
evacuate women and children across the Tajikistan border but we knew and you
know knowing I know you're familiar with this area like the mountains of 25,000
foot peaks the valleys are you know even in the summertime this is like
September but the weather still horribleness in the winter and then
Taliban's saturated this area and then the Tajikistan border is the Panjier
River which is category 5 rapids is ice melt water if it stops moving it
freezes so they had this obstacle the river or cliffs and stuff like that so
worst environment yeah worst environment matter I gotta say yeah and then the
Chinese military were there the Russian military was there the Tajikistan
border guard was there so we like they need information how to cross and so
that's our expertise right you do a route recon or or affording reps and so I
that's where Dennis came in and I reached out to Lieutenant Colonel Tommy
Waller who is his commander at Third Force Recon and the military wouldn't
allowed to participate but I just thought and he's he has all the skill sets to
do this to be my partner on this he wanted to go and so I called him and us
and he said I don't know put in let's put in writing that he comes on humanitarian
mission with you and and they cut him loose and let him come so which is another
miracle and and so we went we did but we flew in a Tajikistan we flew about
drove about 12 hours through his mountains and spent 10 days on that border
did about 90 miles of border reconnaissance and at night we swimming to cross the
river in Afghanistan and and build those 40 routes out with both six routes out
and like literally between like sometimes within 30 yards in the
Taliban and Chinese how about that man doing doing that kind of work is the
sexiest job those are the missions we all signed up for that was you're saying
he's like this is like this is like this is like this is like this is like this
is just I mean honestly it was just route recon's in yeah I know I know I know
but it's cool but it's like but like there's like this is our bread butter
like this was yeah and I had done it a long time I watched like you hadn't done
this a long time what are you going out there and do this for and I'm like and
she was she started crying it was really upset and we were going to airport and
she was okay with the air the evac's in H. Kaya but she was not okay with this
because you're gonna swim into Afghanistan I'm like well but but but I'm but I was
like what if this was us you know like what if it was my daughter that was gonna
be sexually enslaved the rest of her life or my sons had been forced to become
Taliban you know terrorists like wouldn't we be praying someone come help us
and and we had the ability to do it I felt God was opening his doors and so
yeah next time you see one of us walking around on the outside it's be like you
know that's that's probably one of the ones that goes and gets you'll never see
us do anything else other than that man said when them frickin horrible jobs
come up yeah that's where we're for so did Mercury one Glen Beck's nonprofit did
they fund all of that for you staying for so long and no mighty Oaks Foundation
that a lot of the initial funding we stood up Saver allies which share
broader I'm not on the board there anymore best helps that it up and
several orders still there and and so we pushed a lot of funding through them
Mercury one paid charter all those flights and we did some of them
ourself but Mercury one charter most of those flights millions of dollars but
you were just able to get all the funding just from straight up I just I was I was
doing operations I was planning operations I was coordinating fundraising
it was so much 24 7 we go to buy a C 17 by those
probably do it out oh yeah probably I'm not gonna get our guns back yeah I know
we're right yeah and therefore sale to you by the way these are our toys yeah
okay let's come here we're coming to get it back yeah that's it yeah that's what
I have to tell myself we're starting to leave my mind have you stopped and
pinched yourself yet like that you actually lived this you know this is
actually a reality for you it sounds like a crazy ass yeah movie like an
expendable's kind of thing but at the time it seemed like when you're real time
with some flight that it doesn't seem crazy at all right it seems like it makes
sense you know we should look back at it about that but honestly at a at a
moment like flying there because I've dealt with a lot of anxiety panic attacks
like high blood pressure like going to ER like and so I had been fine for a long
time but I was thinking like man like what if I got out there as mountains and
like Dennis got four kids at home is what if I end up in this situation so I
really and for the last 12 years I've been you know speaking these recruits at
MCRD and thousands of troops and talking about spiritual resiliency and I'm and I
said when I went to Afghanistan the first time those four pillars I was
mentally strong physically strong socially I was the right team but I
didn't have the spiritual pillar and how almost lost everything and if you had
all four of them right you would you would have what it takes and and I was
like man I've been teaching that theory I never tested it and so I'm on that
plane and just starting to be worried about that anxiety and I just prayed they
got a guy you burned my heart to be here I need you to take away anything that
physically or physiologically that's gonna keep me from doing this and helping
these people and felt like a tremendous piece I told Dennis about it on our
layover I said hey man I'm dealing with this you said yeah me too and we prayed
together and then we got in a plane and we flew in there and you know what that
is right we didn't have that in the beginning yeah I missed that yeah I was
like because you have all three of those but there's the one missing and it's the
one that makes you feel okay yeah yeah it's the biggest one it's the biggest one
there's no fear I mean you know how much fun we have even if it's a straight up
fight yeah I mean like brawl to brawl if you know that's your ass is supposed to
that's what you're supposed to be doing but yeah cuz you don't tell us that part
right if you know that's when the boss rings down he's like not only you
supposed to do that you need to do it with everything you get yeah right
there you do yeah you're the one who was designed for that yeah and you can
immediately tell when someone's in there who wasn't who's not listening yeah
I create I mean it's funny you could just see it playing his day it's like I
created you for this and I orchestrated this yeah I mean honestly I was one of
my biggest things that gave me peace is like even if there was bravado inside
me that don't see to go do this which I'm sure a lot of people think that's
what this is about but even if there was there was no way for me to orchestrate
that to happen to get to get on that board at the Jigestan that border was
closed we got we got we had the G-Bao permits like to get on that border that
border was put into that two Americans go in there look like us they go in that
border like I mean it got orchestrated us to be there so just don't knowing
that was gave me that like a piece like we're supposed to be doing this
there's a difference we're talking earlier man there's that there's an age
gap between if you believe in a coincidence and then when you see past
all that yeah and I like when one something happens to you that's a normal
day yeah if one of those what how'd that happen if there's two of those you're
not behind the wheel go it's an open gate right yeah it's really cool when
when you see in that and it's even better when there's somebody next to you
yeah yeah yeah that was cool we're the same page anybody doing his work so yeah
and we're one of the things you're pray for is that we can get tired because we
knew we're gonna sleep for ten days and like we were not sleeping like you know
two hours a day you just never got tired that's cool we have one team guy
that was he was 18 Delta 2 and he's like he was doing our like kind of local
like local like local survey he was like giving us the land he's like you cannot
cross the river he's like you're gonna I was messing with him in the book he's
actually a really cool guy but I was busting him in the book because he's like
he's like you getting at river like it's so cold your body's gonna cramp up and
I'm like well the water freezes the same in Colorado as it does the water
doesn't freeze any colder in Afghanistan and I've been in that cold water before
and but he was bust our chops and we built it across that river and it was
cold I give it that it took it take the breath and you guys hate cold water
yeah I'm not the one you're gonna do it they hate cold water but every year on
Christmas Eve Eve him and Hunter jump in the coldest water every Christmas Eve
and this year Christmas Eve Eve was the coldest day in like history made it
better of the earth yeah and they literally jumped in the pond yeah oh they
do it every year but he hates cold water and he's still subjects himself to it
almost that hard thing I was gonna run back up I was like I used to feel super
tough doing it doing the cold water stuff but now they got like now they got
like you know 15 year old girls doing all that I saw that like the plunges
they think I'm like oh man like it took they took the toughness away I was like
yeah it works yeah it's real it's a thing man
whoo yeah oh my gosh well your story is just incredible so when you were able
to actually get him out were you able to get him to the US yes so I was so
actually I want to make sure I give credit like the guy who actually got
him out was we were coordinating trying to try to eight times because that
that airport was crazy like you seen in the news thousands of people and
people getting trampled to death and people surfing their babies over and
trying to throw the babies over the wall in the constitutional wire like Joe
Joe Robert kind of buy dead babies in the constitutional because as they're
throwing these babies over they didn't know there was constitutional wire on
the side and it's so like the level of desperation like he was getting shot
at he's got my my core is what youngest is six years old at the time he's seven
now and and to 18 years old six kids his wife had just had a pendant surgery and
it was bleeding so it was like and we finally got him until the gate and Sean
G was on one side I was talking to both and was these on the other side so we
couldn't get to him and up we call the guy a par rescue guy who was in the in
the wire and his team agreed to go out and let him in and so they they saved
him and got him inside and I got to meet him in Abu Dhabi and we had to
embrace there and then we got him after nine months in humanitarian center we
got him here and he lives right here and I know yeah he does live in back
oh yeah we have to take him to dinner oh he loved that he loved that yeah in
fact he was he was supposed to come here to meet you and because I was telling
him about I like I said I hadn't told many people about the other thing
earlier but he was part of that and I was like I want to meet you because of
that all the one who rescued me was off the road yeah yeah cool off is in for
earth so that is crazy we should have dinner with your wife oh yeah be great
he's a great how many is with him he says wife and six kids they're all here
they're all here yeah yeah because they're the huge fam is over there yeah
women are UFC champions yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah lots of babies
hot hot hot is like she's awesome she's got such a funny personality and she's
awesome they go to our church with us at Woods Edge now and so you want to know
how wonderful and gany and those women are you know that because they're men
keep them away from us yeah you don't know anything about those cultures or
like that man they are they're they're they're wonderful people man yeah I
tell us what the whole time like that's like it's been sad I've been on a few
interviews that people are like just because people served with you know
with us doesn't give them the right to be you know our neighbors and
it's been real disappointing it's like crimson bloods yeah
yeah and the best way out of cheap breaking down for them we're like I was
nerdy you know I didn't know you're looking at those maps there's the grid
and the city it's like all right man just imagine you're the world police
right and we just threw you in the town these are the bangers you're going to
get yeah I mean it's a different kind of gang but the same principle
only you're highly trained yeah highly highly trained and then you get your
guys that come in imagine a guy on because we have iRAC he's at Gany's
they're American they're sitting there with us one problem is we didn't give
him a uniform right so they knew who he was our
Terps yeah I mean it's they're they got the most most dangerous job there is
oh yeah and we go in when we're not on deployment
they're still there they left behind and their families are at risk and they're
in pastown yeah one of one of the things that they're real good we'll pass them
down oh yeah yeah one of the things that made me so
mad during evacuation was present by the gun and news and said if we if
these people won't fight themselves and why should we fight for them
60,000 of them died fighting for their country that's like the equivalent
racial-wise based on the population like our civil war like 60,000 of people
hundreds of thousands of Afghanistan for they were fighting for freedom and
we were and we and we gave them that for 20 years
yeah we took away. And now look what's happening with all the stuff with the
women and yeah they can't they took medical care away last week they
they said that they can't go see male doctors but they can't be educated to be
doctors and they can't be doctors so there's no women's health care
I mean they're already selling nine in nine ten year old girls again
so it's and no one's speaking up for it now. People understand when when something
powerful is standing in something they can't defend itself right I mean at all
you can't even talk back you know the weakest thing in the planet and the
strongest thing in the room to go they they freaking know it
right and there's there's a not only a separation of money and power there's
that physical power a lot of people we have in power don't actually possess it
we let them hold it and then you got people who actually have power
you know when you're walking the room nothing bothers you no human no
nothing like that's gonna mess with you that is a power yeah it's like being
good looking or smart or something it's the ultimate one actually and
hopefully you know when if you can negotiate then it's then that's a power
too but if you're not really good at it was always this
it ends everything do you think they'll end up doing just a civil war
and just like yeah I've guessed in I think I think it'll be continuous
yeah let's go back to this thing man yeah it's gonna go back to this
they're gonna even a Taliban's gonna fragment because they're not gonna like
doing this guy's leading us right yeah they're gonna start fighting each other
oh yeah it'll just be yeah and then like a hundred years I get tired and then they
go pick a fight with a big one just to show who that's how they do it yes
they do it yeah who's really pulling the strings and all that is
Pakistan ISI they built the new Taliban and they're they're yeah they're
the Pakistan's intelligence agency and they've been feeling McCoy is that
whole area yeah forever ever since then back when
when it rained they can't live without it yeah
well wasn't a lot of the guys that were fighting on the Taliban side for red
wing were Pakistan right I thought I heard that on the Taliban side on that
like in the Taliban oh yeah there was a lot of the Pakistanis in there so
uh I don't know if I write a button to book or not but
I'll tell you a story you'll probably laugh at this story so me and Aziz were
you know what Peshawar is so sorry oh yeah I figured you did so
Peshawar at the time where this was like 2006 like
probably one of worst cities in the planet to be so Peshawar is like right
on the other side to Torcom border of Afghanistan, Pakistan is in the Pakistan
side and me and Aziz were doing our job there and we were just two of us and
rolled up to this little place to get food it's like this Derek Queen
concrete benches and and it's some Pakistan military there and we got
some rice and some quail that's why we always went there the best quail
so we're eating you know while we're eating this uh this trucks pull up
highloxis black flags they're Taliban like vest on
AK-47s PK amount on the top and they're like just got back from they're coming
from Torcom they're just come back from fighting
US troops probably and they're like you know get their mascara on their eyes
and stuff and I'm like and so we're like we're like checking them out we're
still eating and they sit down with them with the Pakistan military like hanging
out and and one of them uh one of them sits on the other one's lap he's
guys AK he sits on other one's lap and puts his arm around them in
the interlaced fingers and he's got his legs crossed like a woman
and he's got a Pepsi bottle uh with a straw in it drinking it like the gayest
thing you ever seen and I'm like I'm like Aziz I got to get a picture
and Aziz is like don't do it brother don't take the picture
I'm like I got you man he's like if you take that picture they're gonna kill us
I didn't take I didn't take the picture but I wanted to do it just the best
picture that covered I wanted it so bad
he just got your own hands in to Lace's and AK in his hand
Pepsi bottle with a straw oh I go I do have a lot of like homosexual
like things that they do over there oh yeah like a lot of it is very the
Taliban's a bunch of dash homos yeah it is like I know they're like I know
they're listening and they are they know it too they know it too
oh my gosh a bunch of child-blessing yeah
rape little they rape little boys and then they they start the generation
generation of it over and over and over again
yeah but there's so many and a lot of the American public does not know about
that they don't know about the little you know man boy parties or whatever
that they have that all of y'all have seen
and it's normal for over there but if if that was happening over here
all hell would break loose it is it is happy well
the library time and yeah yeah exactly it's probably worse
yeah it's awful well I mean you have an incredible story
that's just it's awesome I hope that this book does really well is there
anything else yeah what's next I mean what do we need to do
how do people follow that I mean you buy a movie time
yeah it's already picked up okay yeah it's already picked up okay good I was
going to talk about that online but I mean when that comes down
always ask because we have plenty of dudes out there now
yeah in fact most of our guys have integrated into their world
yeah so that we've set set the chalks okay
yeah always ask okay yeah so yeah saving his ease could be
we have saving his that or are you get anywhere Amazon's probably easiest place
and I think it's the lowest price right now and if you get it get really for
review I know that helps but uh yeah saving his ease is the
book and then a movie is going to be not supposed to
much about it right now but uh probably we won't put you on
they're funny about that but the movie is coming and I can say it's coming
yeah and uh and it's gonna be done it's gonna be done right
I had a lot of offers and uh and uh and we picked someone that's good to it
I think it's gonna do it right yeah because it's so important to it right
it's gonna honor everybody it's just like with anything else in that world
I was blessed yeah but they walked me through with
just yeah the Navy actually side by side okay I was covered down on big time
okay good and uh so much to the point when they're like hey man when the
boy's coming up afterwards make sure you pass this down
so that's what I do man if you if you guys need something like that at least
direct you you got a name you know how we do it yeah maybe seven degrees from
Kevin Bacon with us is one yeah you know what I'm talking about like if you
don't know that dude he definitely got somebody that can
find it yeah period well yeah we gotta fly and I'll tell you more about it
and what um about Sarah because she sounds like a freaking
badass she is yeah and I've messaged with her
quite a bit I feel like I'm already friends with her but I haven't met her yet
um so she's running Save Our Allies is that something that you're gonna keep
up and running for any future conflicts or whatever yeah I'm
they are working in Ukraine right now I'm not sure like what they're gonna do
moving forward but you know Sarah I think mainly Nick
pomishano is running it um and then Tim's still on the board
Sarah's on the board so I'm not sure what they're gonna do moving forward
uh but uh but they're still up and running right now
so people can go on to save our allies so to work and donate
yeah people go ahead and do it we'll take it on the ground make it a secret
society just go in with a crap it's a fan yeah
yeah and uh and everybody made movies about it
just gotta put it together yeah and then and then you know my d oaks we have
our international effort so and uh and so that those you know both I'm
factored at the premiere of the book we promoted both Save
Save Our Allies and Mighty Oaks Foundation promoted both organizations
so yeah well thank you yeah absolutely coming on and yeah absolutely
yeah thanks so much man yeah thanks to make your brother yeah
this is awesome
♪♪♪