283: Taking Lessons From the Hardest Combat Imaginable, And Effectively Pass Them to Your People. Combat Lessons From WW2.

This is Jocko, podcast number 283 with Echo, Charles, and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo.

Good evening.

Jumping into combat lessons. We've done some combat lessons before. We've done volumes one, two, and three on this podcast. I'm skipping ahead a little bit to volume seven. There's a section in here that I kind of got. Kind of got into these. These combat lessons were written during World War II with the explicit intention of disseminating lessons learned rapidly back to the troops to keep more guys alive and kill more enemy. And you might think. And I started thinking, like, why am I reviewing these now? Why am I reviewing number four? Why am I doing that? I'll tell you why. Because I've never heard these lessons before.

Think about that. I was in the military for 20 years and I never heard these lessons before. There's something wrong with that. There's something wrong with that. These guys, these are lessons written in blood in the hardest combat imaginable.

And they're not getting passed on. So I want to make sure I pass on these lessons. And you know what? Obviously, they're not just for combat. Not just for combat. You're gonna see the translation to every situation that a human being in a leadership position can be in.

So combat lessons. The volumes are getting better. So the first one was kind of like a little bit. I'm not gonna say it was haphazardly put together, but now you got the full cover picture. You know, there, if you're looking at this on YouTube, you got the COVID picture up there. Combat lessons. Combat lessons. Number seven. Rank and file in combat. Watch what they do, what they are doing, and how they do it. The intro to this thing, to this book comes from. I'll just read it. Our armies in Europe have won their victory. So this is late in the war. Victory in Europe already. So now we're just fighting in the Pacific theater. Veterans of the campaigns of North Africa and Europe are now joining forces with the veterans of the Pacific for the final assault against Japan.

Can you imagine having that on the horizon?

You're thinking, okay, we're going final assault on Japan, on the Japanese Empire. We're gonna kill all them because they fight to the death. That's what's about to happen. They don't. These. They don't know anything about the atomic bomb yet. That's not even an option. They've seen the Japanese fight to the death on island after island, and. And now they're going to go and assault the Japanese island itself. The island of Japan. Back to the book. They are coming to grips with a foe quite different from the German soldier. Different as an individual fighting man and different in the tactics employed. Even the most experienced soldier of the European battlefields will have much to learn. Humility. You imagine you get done with Normandy, D Day, the battle, the Bulge, and you show up in the Pacific theater. You got a lot to learn, kid.

Dang. We must now bring to bear against the Japanese all the experience we have gained in every theater. The suggestions made in combat lessons are drawn from such expert experience, since to be effective, they must reach the soldier promptly. Publication is not delayed to ensure that they always represent the thoroughly digested views of the War Department. The great combat lesson learned from every operation is the importance of leadership. Our equipment, our supply, and above all our men are splendid, aggressive and determined. Leadership is the priceless factor which inspires a command and upon which success, all success in battle depends.

It is responsible for success or failure. Leadership is the most important thing on the battlefield. By the way, signed by General Marshall. Five Star General.

3. No, 4. No, Five Star General.

Churchill called General Marshall the organizer of victory, the organizer of victory of World War II. Let's think about that. That's a pretty good compliment coming from Churchill. This is a guy that was a platoon and a company commander in the Philippine War.

Ended up being a Secretary of State. Remember learning about the Marshall Plan now? Well, when you were in high school, at some point you learned about the Marshall Plan. You just don't remember. Was like the World War II. It was the recovery, the rebuilding after World War II, overseas in Europe, that the Marshall Plan named after this guy. He got a Nobel Peace Prize for that, by the way. So a very capable man. So kicking it into the book here. Leadership, first section leadership. Too much stress cannot be placed upon the necessity for developing intelligent, aggressive troop leaders in all echelons.

So says General Omar Bradley, commander of the 12th Army Group.

I want to say that again, too much stress cannot be placed. There's no way you can. You can stress the necessity for developing intelligent, aggressive troop leaders and where? In all echelons. In all echelons, squad leaders.

However, to use the battlefield as a schoolroom for the training of leaders is to sacrifice needlessly the lives of our men. The habit of command and the technique of troop leading must be learned thoroughly by all leaders prior to entry in combat.

Not only must leaders learn their own jobs thoroughly, but they must also be given ample opportunity to operate in the command capacity of the next higher echelon in order that qualified replacements will be available. So if you're running a business. I said there's some similarities. If you're running a business and you're not investing in your leadership, you're wrong. And throwing them out to the wolves, throwing them out to the clients, throw them out to a building site without any training and preparation, or without any mentorship while they're out there is the wrong move.

By the way. That's why Echelon Front actually exists. That's why we exist, to help that process take place. The junior leaders, responsibility field leaders constantly emphasize the need for junior officers who will share the responsibilities of their superiors and take charge when emergencies arise in battle. Check this out. Here's a note. You're young. You're new to the company, you're inexperienced in some way or another way.

If you have the willingness to pay attention and then start taking responsibility and start taking ownership of things, you will go places. Now, look, you can't. You gotta be. You don't wanna go overboard with it. But if you see your boss has got some things that maybe you could take over for him, take them over.

I have a question. Go about extreme, extreme ownership. And this might be splitting hairs, but in the spirit of understanding. So let's say, whatever. You come to me and. Or whatever, I'm taking ownership of a mistake that happened. Right. What if.

I do? I am like. I'm not blaming you, but I am defensive. I am whatever. I am all that. But I actually do. At the end of the lecture, or whatever, I do want to. I do. At the end of the day, I do think that the mistake was my fault 100%. And I'm going to take it upon myself to fix the mistake.

Okay.

But I handled the initial lecture wrong. Is that still technically extreme ownership?

Why am I lecturing you?

I don't know. Like a. Like a, you know, I messed up the project. Okay.

You know, failed the project.

And then.

And I come to you and say, hey, Echo, it looks like we're not gonna get this project done on time.

Yeah.

Is that right?

Yeah. Yeah. Like. Or let's say we straight up didn't.

It.

It failed. It failed.

Oh, Echo, I see that we failed to get this project done.

Yeah.

Did you get the support that you need? Is there anything that I should have done a better job of to make sure you had what you needed to get this thing done? Cause this is a big letdown for the client.

Yeah.

And this isn't the kind of reputation we're looking to have. Where did I Let you down.

Okay, so that's you taking ownership, right? Extremely. You know, and you're like, okay, so what if instead of that good lecture, you were like, hey, you messed up. And you. You know, like, you did this, and.

You failed this project. That's pathetic. I'm thinking about maybe demoting you.

Yeah. Yeah. And then let's say, okay, after you lecture me, you think in your head, you know what? This is my fault. This actually is my fault, and I'm going to do everything I can to. To correct this. You do. After you lecture me the wrong way, you.

But then I realize I'm wrong.

Yes.

And then I say, you know what? There's some things I could have probably.

No, no, you don't say that part.

Okay?

You don't say nothing to me. You just kind of at you. Basically, the whole thing. You learned the lesson. You. You failed the first part. But it's like, you know, parts of, yeah, you fail the first one, but you succeed in the second one.

Okay, but then I. But then I opt not to take ownership for some reason.

With your verbal assault.

Yeah, you can see where this is. What's interesting about these questions that you're trying to formulate is how quickly they dissipate when the person legitimately takes ownership. Like when I said, okay, so I say to you, hey, Echo, where did I not support you all of a sudden? You didn't even have an argument. You didn't have a question anymore. It was gone. So you had to get me to say things wrong to you.

Yes.

And then you want me to switch halfway because I'm just a crazy.

That's where we're at right now, which is fine. Okay, so what's the hypothetical point that we're trying to get at?

Well, I guess if I. If I learned anything from you right now and in the past, it is that you do. If you're going to take ownership extreme, if you're going to demonstrate that practice, that there's two parts of it, and that's sort of it. There's two parts of it.

You.

The way you come at the person or whatever, you let them know that it's your fault kind of thing, and then the second part is you for real. It is your fault. In your mind, it is. It is your responsibility to take action to fix those problems. Not the kind of action.

So your question is, when I come at you and say, you failed this project, you go, well, it was a big project, so you get defensive at first, right?

Yes.

Because you take it the wrong way. And you don't remember to take ownership for another two minutes.

The whole thing. The whole time, you forget to take.

Ownership at the lecture. You know what you do? You go, you know what? You know what, boss? I. I'm getting defensive because my ego is getting in the way, and this is actually my fault. And all these excuses that I'm making right now make no sense whatsoever. Here's. Here's the mistakes I made. Here's the things I'm going to do to fix it. I will not let this happen again.

Yeah.

Problem solved.

Yeah. So without that second recovery part, I'm talking about the interaction between the two people. That alone. Not that subsequent actions that you're going to take to solve the problem. I'm not talking about that because you're going to do that anyway.

Yeah.

But that second verbal part, interaction part, without that, that technically does not fit. Does not fulfill the formula of extreme ownership.

What do you mean without that second part? Which second part?

The part where you. Where you explain to the person that you have the interaction with like, oh, that was my fault and my ego's getting in the way. Like, not that part. Straight up. You left the meeting, like, straight up. Like, we got scolded or whatever.

Then. And then you say, this wasn't my fault, and you leave.

Yeah.

You have to take ownership of that. But the point of extreme ownership, in.

Your mind, you're like, wait, it is my fault.

Yeah. Then you go back in, then you say, hey, this is.

That's what I'm saying.

Okay. So you do.

That interaction is part of the.

Yes, yes. Yes, it is. You have to. I mean, otherwise you're just making excuses and blaming other people. And I don't trust you, by the way.

Yeah.

I'm like, oh, Echo screwed this up. But he doesn't even realize that he screws up. He thinks it's everyone else's fault. He doesn't take ownership. Cool. I'm never giving him another project again.

Yeah.

Whereas you come back and you say, you know what, boss? This was. This is completely my fault. And I might let my ego get in the way. And I got mad. My temper and my ego. I will not let that happen again. Boom. Problem solved.

I understand.

Check. All right, moving on. Comments? Major General John P. Lucas, Commander of 6th Corps. Prior to battle, we must develop the feeling of responsibility in junior officers and non commissioned officers. Develop the feelings of. Of responsibility. We want to give them ownership. I suggest doing this during field exercises by suddenly and. And unexpectedly declaring the commander a casualty and placing the second in command, in charge, something we did all the time in SEAL training. Oh, got a good platoon commander. He's doing a great job. Cool, you're down. Oh, platoon chief's doing a super job. Cool, you're down.

The commanding Officer of the 119th infantry in Germany makes this statement. In battle, nothing is more important than having leaders who will share their commander's responsibility for the accomplishment of the mission. Again, if you're a junior person out there, if you're joining an organization or you're a mid level manager, if you can be a person that starts to take ownership of things and starts to take pressure and jobs and tasks and responsibilities off your boss's plate, they are going to love you.

Nothing more important, he says. Nothing more important than having leaders that will take their share of the commander's responsibility. One of the most difficult tasks for the junior leader is getting the men to move forward under fire. Issuing the orders is easy, but seeing that the orders are carried out may call for every ounce of energy and initiative the officer or NCO possesses. Issuing the orders is easy. That's easy part.

I think Patton said. 10% of the job is issuing orders, 90% is getting them done.

Responsible leadership in actions the next section caps Captain Souter was at his command post CP when a soldier came in to report that two wiremen had been wounded by a enemy sniper about 500 yards away. He immediately took four men and set out to assist the wounded men. Before arriving at their goal, the captain and his men observed a group of wiremen pinned down in an open field by enemy machine gun fire. Captain Souder spotted the enemy machine gun and ordered his men to covered positions, but himself took an exposed position from which he could fire upon the machine gun. He opened fire suddenly and killed six of the enemy crew, making it possible for the wounded men to be evacuated in safety and for the wire men to continue their work. By that time, Captain Souder had observed more serious trouble in the vicinity. An enemy armored car was parked beside a building some distance away. The captain knew that part of another advancing regiment was in the sector covered by the enemy vehicle. He immediately sent back for a.50 caliber machine gun at the command post and for two tanks to cover the oncoming regiment during its approach. While waiting for these reinforcements, he collected a few of his men and resumed fire on the enemy with the result that many were forced to flee and 18 enemy were wounded. While this was going on, Captain Souter was informed that all officers of one company with the approaching regiment had become casualties he immediately took charge and reorganized the company so at the when the other officers came up, the unit was well dispersed and under control. He then gave first aid to the wounded officer officers and saw that they were evacuated to a safer location for further care. The tanks arrived in time to assist the other regiments assault on the enemy positions and the objective was successfully taken. Had it not been for Captain Souter's timely and decisive actions, casualties among our men would have been extremely heavy and the attainment of the objective questionable. For his contribution in this emergency, Captain Souter was awarded the Silver Star.

Initiative taking charge. I love this part where he got wounded. There's a company coming forward and they're wounded officers. So you disperse your company and you put prepare to receive those guys and you'll be able to put them to work immediately.

Responsible leader leadership as the soldier sees it. Another fine example of responsible and inspiring leadership is given in the following account.

Of the part played by Lieutenant William E. Everett, 101st Infantry, 36th Division in action in Italy. This account was written by three of the enlisted men who served under him during that action. Our company led the attack on a hill and took it. The enemy counterattacked, laying down heavy artillery, mortar and machine gun fire that knocked out a large number of our men and every officer except Lieutenant Everett.

Damn. Lieutenant Everett took over the difficult and dangerous job of keeping the company under control without any communications whatever. He had become so short of men that even the runners had to stay on the line, fighting hard to help hold the ground we had won. At the time Lieutenant Everett took charge, the enemy were coming up three sides of the hill and our men were in trouble. The lieutenant ordered us to open fire with everything we had while he took an exposed position on the side of the hill and called fire orders to our mortar. The our mortar finally stopped the advancing enemy. He then located an enemy mortar that had been giving us trouble all day and adjusted our mortar on it, knocking it out with a direct hit on the third round. He personally eliminated two enemy snipers who had wounded several of our men. It was largely through his daring and determination that we were able to beat off the strong enemy counterattacks. For three days and four nights he risked his life by going from one platoon to another under enemy machine gun fire, keeping the men under control and helping him them meet each problem as it came. At times he himself helped carry the wounded to safer places. The lieutenant was sick during all this fighting, yet he never thought of his own discomfort, but stuck by the men who might have lost out if it had not been for his leadership.

Leadership is the most important thing on the battlefield.

Next section, discipline, the first function of leadership.

You know, I'm happy and smiling when I see that section. In the frequent discussions of battlefield leadership, we are often prone to overlook the first function of leadership, the development of unit and individual discipline. The battle is the payoff.

Said Lt. Col. Ralph Ingersoll. And it is exactly that, the payoff on the leadership, which welded individuals into a smoothly functioning team. Discipline applies to all. Captain Jack Gary, company commander of the 11th infantry, writes, Discipline is sometimes the determining factor between winning and losing.

I once listened to a wounded officer back from fighting in Africa who said, forget all the formalities in the field. Forget the officer and NCO distinctions in the field. Keep all the eight balls. They will fight like hell. And I tried to. I looked up this term eight balls, and I, I assume it means like a, like a rebel type guy. The reason I assume that is because the next sentence says so that, that was the guy quoting someone from Africa and he says, I do not believe he had seen very much action or he would not have made such a statement. I had a few, quote, eight balls who did fight like hell. But I have also had a lot of men who never caused me trouble, who were quiet, confident, well disciplined, and these men fought much better. So, you know, you get that in case of war, break glass.

Yeah.

Thing where, look, this guy's a little rough around the edges, right?

Yeah. It seemed like when he was like. I also had guys who were quite calm, disciplined or whatever. It just seemed like this eight ball phenomenon was the opposite of that.

Yeah, yeah. They're like the troublemakers. They're a little bit wild. Now, look, gotta have those guys too. We're gonna need those guys. And they are, they do have it. They can be awesome for sure, because you gotta have a little bit of that. I mean, let's face it, if you're joining the military, if you're joining the military to go into combat arms or you're joining the military to go into special operations, you're going in that you want to do something that's. You basically want to do things that are not legal in the world. Right. Like you're going to kill people, you're going to blow things up, you're going to plant bombs. That's what you're going to do.

You can't really do that anywhere else.

That's, that's, you know, you're a kid and you're like, what do I want to do when I grow Up. Doctor.

Yeah.

Lawyer?

Yeah.

Banker?

Yeah.

Blow things up and kill people. That sounds like a good one.

Yeah.

Right. That's not normal.

I understand. Yes, fully.

Had a conversation with a guy the other day, and he was like telling me that he was having a conversation with a guy that was a seal. And he's like, you know, there's something that made me nervous because when this guy was a young seal, he said, you know, I, I was asking him, hey, you know, you, you, you think you're ready to kill people and, you know, you're, you're going to deploy. And this was kind of as Iraq was going on, and this was like a younger SEAL that was going to be heading to Iraq and the young SEAL was like, oh, yeah, I'm ready. I want to kill people. And he's, you know, the guy says, you know, it just seemed a little bit, Seems like it shouldn't be like that. And I was like, it's like that, bro. I go, you ask, you know, a front line infantry grunt, whatever. Well, I can't, I can't speak for all them. You talk to most, a vast majority of seals, and you say, hey, if the enemy presents themselves an opportunity, the enemy, if there's an opportunity for you to kill the enemy, will you be. Is happy the right word. Will you be, will you hesitate in the moment of truth? They'll be like, one, negative. They'll be stoked. So that's the reality. So there's a little eight ball, you know, let's face it, he's down for the cause. Yeah. Now that's, that's the thing is the, the very good soldier that you want has that capability but has the discipline to keep it under control. The whole, the little clip you made of Jordan Peterson and I talking about the danger, the. Was it. The good man is a dangerous man who has their, their, their danger and their aggression under control. Under, through discipline.

Voluntary control.

Under voluntary control. That's what we're looking for. That's what we're looking for. Yeah, actually, that's what we're looking for.

Next section. Discipline is based upon confidence. Only a few hours later, after he had lost both legs in combat, Lt. Ticknor, who had acted as a platoon leader in 5th Division, 12th Army Group, made this comment to a military observer. Our officers have to be real leaders. Discipline in combat depends largely upon the men's knowing that the officer in charge of them knows his business and is not reluctant to take necessary risks. A battalion commander of the 6th Armored Division in France makes a similar Combat comment. Unless the officer or NCO knows his job completely, the men have no faith in him. Unless the men have faith in their leaders, their battle discipline will be. Be poor.

So when they're talking about discipline there, they're like, is the team gonna do what they need to do when they get. When they get the orders to do it? And if they have faith in the leader, they'll do it. And if they don't, guess what? Which is interesting because you think, well, you know, it's the military. It's the military. And if they get ordered to do something. No, that's what they're talking about here. That's what they're talking about. It doesn't work like that. Doesn't work like that anywhere. Just because I bark and order at you and I have rank over you doesn't mean you're gonna do it, especially if it's gonna get you killed.

Yeah.

There'S a comment here. And in these books, they just, they. The sort of the authority chimes in. The author or whoever the author is. The. The authors chime in and they just write comment. And it says comment. A leader who has not gained the respect, respect and confidence of his men during training has two strikes again when he against him, when he enters combat. The element of doubt in the minds of his men may be the difference between success or. And failure of a mission. Gaining respect and confidence of your men, how do you do that? Do you do that by barking at them? No. Do you do that by yelling at them? No. You do that by listening. You do that by treating them with respect.

Here is a definition of discipline, says Col. E.L. munson, Signal Corps. True discipline is voluntary.

It is based on knowledge, reason, a sense of duty, and idealism. A good leader develops in his men a cheerful and willing obedience that wants to respond, that wants to carry out his orders. This kind of discipline will, in the end, bring combat results as no other kind possibly can. We could probably stop right here because everyone thinks when the military talks about discipline, they're talking about the way if you could beat your people into submission, then you're going to be good to go. No, that's not the kind of discipline we're talking about. Cheerful, willing obedience. That's a totally different thing. Willing obedience. People want to carry out the orders. Totally different.

You don't really think of discipline associated with cheerful.

Yeah, the context that they're using is military discipline is like, hey, do the. Does the team respond and execute what they're told to do with discipline? Right.

So.

In the context of that we there, there's multiple ways to achieve that. One of them is by beating people. That you're going to do this and you beat them and they're afraid and they're doing it out of fear. The other way is they're doing it because they understand, because they're part of it. The result is. The result is similar. But what this guy is saying is that the one that will bring comrade results like no other kind is the kind where it's a positive discipline.

Yeah.

When they're happy to do it, it's a self imposed discipline. We're doing this because we want to.

Yeah.

Not because someone's barking at us.

This little section here, it's replacement instruction. The wrong kind. So in, in, In World War II you had guys getting wounded, guys getting killed and there was replacements coming in. And so this happens inside all organizations. As organizations grow, you got to bring in new people. And as new people come in, what happens to them? Replacement orientation. Right. This is like new hires. How do you treat your new hires? Here's some things that they did. It's called the wrong kind. A lieutenant comments on his ominous introduction to frontline existence. On my way to the front as an officer replacement, I met several individuals who had come back from the front line. Invariably they recounted to me their hair raising experiences. Their outfits had been wiped out or pinned down for days. Officers didn't have a dog's chance of survival, etc. One platoon sergeant went statistical on me. He said his platoon had lost 16 officers officers in one two week period. I expected confidently that I would be blown to bits within 15 minutes after my arrival to the front.

Went statistical on me.

Yeah. That's when you know they're going hard.

Yeah. Later experience has shown me that enlisted men who come in as replacements are subjected to similar morale breaking tales. I've tried to get my old men to give the new replacement a break by being careful not to exaggerate their battle experiences or in any way distort the picture of frontline existence. Give the new men a common sense introduction to the combat zone and there will be fewer men going on sick call before an attack. Non comms and privates of Company K, 11th infantry draw attention to the same problem. Our replacements come to us filled with tenseness and dread caused by stories they have heard in the rear. Special instructors from the front should be used at replacement centers to talk to the new men. To talk the new men out of this unnecessary panic. Of course, the soundest remedy is to have the Replacements occupy a defensive position for a time, but even then, the kind of treatment they are given upon arrival at the front makes a big difference in the amount of good they will do to their new outfit. So how are we treating people that show up at your company? And you can have such a huge influence if you do a good job bringing someone on board in a squared away manner. Don't screw it up. Comment.

Company commanders and platoon leaders should meet, orient and indoctrinate all replacements so that they gain an authentic picture of current battle conditions. This should be done even though battle indoctrination has been started in replacement centers. Knowing what to expect, even when, even when the expected is bad, is better than not knowing and consequently imagining the worst. That's what's going to happen. We're going to freak out. And part of this is, I think, unintentional when people tell stories, right? If you're to tell me, let's say you were in a jiu jitsu tournament and you wanted to tell me about something that happened, that happened to you. Maybe you got caught in a guillotine and look, you were conagazing and it was bad, right? And you got out of it, but it was a like crazy when you, when you want to tell me that you want to make me feel how you felt. And one of the ways you can kind of get closer is by making a little exaggeration, bro. I started seeing, I started. The wall started coming in, bro. And it might not necessarily, I understand what you're doing, I understand why you're doing it, but you weren't really going to get choked out. You were just in a good guillotine, but it wasn't good enough because obviously you got out. So people can exaggerate for the purpose of, of, of giving the feelings that they had, you know, this mortar, like I've been mortared before. Mortar hits, mortar hits. I don't know, I don't know what the closest mortar to me ever was, but maybe let's call it 20 yards or something like that. Yeah, so that's close, bro. That rocks your world. You're like, damn.

Yeah.

And if I'm just telling you this, bro, I got mortared, I want you to feel like. So I might be practically right on top of me. It's 20 yards away, bro.

Yeah, yeah, you're right. And if you don't kind of take, you know, a lot of times we'll take that personal, you know, like, don't, don't lie, don't lie to me and exaggerate like that, you know, like be accurate kind of thing. But you can't. When you really think about it, it makes sense. Because if you're like. Unless you're some. If you got mortared like a thousand times, you know, when it's 20 yards, you know. Oh, you don't have to exaggerate to me because I know. But you know, most people, I can't.

Yeah. If I was talking to someone else, be like, oh, bro, you've been mortified. Hell yeah. Oh, yeah, I was over here. Oh, yeah, man, this one landed close. It was like 20 yards away. You'd be like, damn, I don't need to explain it to you. But if you don't know.

Yeah, exactly right.

Then I start making, you know, I start making it seem like a little bit.

Well, basically you want them to understand how you might. Exactly. But because. And they don't. They don't have the capability to understand what you felt because they weren't there. You know, something you can imagine, like, oh yeah, if I was there, I do this. Like you have a misrepresentation of how it would actually feel in the situation. That's natural. Exactly right. But when you're in the situation. Yeah, you can tell me. I've never been mortared before. I know, surprising, but I haven't.

If you.

We're like, hey, yeah, we got mortared and it was crazy. It was 20 yards away. I'd be like, I know how. 20, I know how far? 20. That's not that close. That's like, I'd be all right.

Oh yeah, whatever.

That's like half of a 40 yard dash. Like, bro, that's kind of far. Yeah, that's not scary at all. But you know, given what you explained, it's not like that, bro. You in that situation, you think you're gonna die or whatever, you know, but yeah, so that's a natural thing. If you're not in the situation, you can't feel it. You never can. So.

So let's put a little more on top of us, pro.

It's basically get the standard of understanding up to where it needs to be for me to convey the story.

You know, that's what we gotta watch out for. So be careful with that.

Be careful like that.

Then it goes into the right kind of orientation. Poor orientation of replacements may seriously affect the fighting ability and survival chances of men themselves and may also endanger the unit with whom they first serve. For these reasons, leaders of platoon, squad squads and companies should find out exactly what orientation and training have been given the men and should provide essential orientation on the spot insofar as practicable before sending them into combat. If a divisional training plan similar to that described below is in operation, the problem of inducting new members, new men into smaller units is much simplified and lower unit orientation can be modified accordingly. And then there's an effect an effective training system described. Our division has received thousands of replacements since it first. Since its first combat experience in normandy. More than 90% of these replacements have been infantry. Many of the replacements came into the division lacking confidence in their ability and paralyzed by the apprehension engendered by loose talk before and upon their arrival. Exactly. Guys are scared shitless.

Some time ago we started a course of instruction for our replacements. It lasts two and a half days and is conducted by battle experienced personnel. Particular emphasis is placed upon how to live in a foxhole. Development of an aggressive attitude, the use of fragmentation grenade, anti take grenade and bazooka throughout the course. These men are trained in groups of 12. They are later assigned to organizations by these same groups. You know what else you got to tell people about is it closes out here by saying we. We found that this course of instruction gives replacements much greater self confidence. It debunks the notions that they have picked up in the rear. The course has definitely improved not only the morale but also the fighting ability of our replacements who expect to continue the plan for all replacements to come to division. You know what else you got to tell people, like, oh, you're going to be nervous. Yeah, like it's okay. You're going to be nervous. It's no big deal. Everyone's nervous. No big deal. It's fine. That helps a lot because I've seen this with fighters. They get nervous and they don't know what nervous feel like. Even really experienced athletes that might have wrestled or they might have, you know, boxed or they might have done smokers or they might even have a decent MMA record. But now they're going in the UFC and they get nervous for the first time and they don't know what that. They don't know that feeling. And all of a sudden they think it's bad. Yeah, something's wrong and you got to say, hey, listen, oh, you're feeling a little like queasy right now. Feeling some butterflies. That's good. That's your body putting your blood into your muscles instead of to your stomach. It's all good.

Common failings.

Says a successful 3rd Army Rifle Company commander, the following failings are common among replacements. They must be Strictly and promptly eliminated if excessive casualties are to be avoided and combat efficiency obtained. Lack of ordinary discipline. Saying, yeah. Instead of saying, yes, sir.

Jumping at the sound of every outgoing or incoming artillery shell.

We acted like we were like straight up nom. Like vets in Ramadi, like, where the guys would show up and sometimes there'd be outgoing artillery from Camp Ramadi and you'd see guys freaking out. We'd be like, it's outgoing. We'd, like, act like we were all just hardcore. So much fun with that.

That's what I was gonna ask, like, is that a thing? Because, like, you know, when you first encounter gunfire, even if it's like, you know, the guy next to you or whatever, shooting, outgoing, you know, as we say.

It can startle you if you don't hear that all the time. It's so loud. So I'll be like this. At the gun range. Bear with me. I know. So at the gun range, you know, when you first. First go in, you start hearing the boom. And then, you know, you got a little jump, you know, but after a while you go a few times or whatever, it's like you don't jump at all. But then let's say you take your friend, it's his first time or something like that. First time, a long time, whatever, and you see him jump. And then. Is that a thing? Like, ah, you jump. You're kind of a, you know, you're.

Going to get startled. I mean, you'll get startled, but you do get used to it.

Yeah, fully. But what I'm saying is, let's say me and you go to the gun range somewhere, you know, Coronado, whatever. And like, boom. You know, shots fired, whatever, like downrange or whatever. And I, like, jump. Are you going to tease me? Is that the culture? You know, kind of like, like, why are you jumping for, you know, kind of thing.

You're asking if I'm going to tease you. Yeah, the answer is yes. That's kind of a universal thing.

Good. Yeah.

Yeah. But. But you do get used to it. But still, like a startling noise. But you get r. You get used to. I mean, we shoot a ton in the SEAL teams.

Oh, yeah.

Just like so much.

Yeah, it makes sense. And again, yeah, I, you know, I haven't shot in a ton in the SEAL teams, but when I go to the. The range, it's the same thing on a different scale where, yeah. When you first go in, you're like, boom. Or when, like, you're about to shoot and you hear the guy next you shoot, you're like, oh, you know, did my gun go off? Or whatever. It's like.

So I heard that question.

This is not very reassuring, bro.

You know, I just hear. And then. But then after a while, it does. It doesn't affect you. I figure that's natural, regardless of the environment, you know.

Did Jason Gardner tell that story on the podcast where the guy. They were doing a debrief. They're doing a debrief. So Jason Gardner's like, at Team five.

And they're doing a debrief after, like a CQC kill house run or something. And this young officer standing there during the debrief, and he just cracks off around. Like, during the debrief, supposed to be cleared and safe, he cracks off around. It goes between two of the guys. They're standing in a circle. He cracks off around. And the dude had like an out of body experience. And he looks up at the group and he says, he was decocking it. He says he was decocking it as if it wasn't him. That's one of my favorite stories from Gardner, dude, because that tells you how people get crazy. They do something and they think that it wasn't even them. He's making an excuse for a person that is someone else. He was decocking it out of body experience me.

So there you go, jumping at the sound of every outgoing or incoming artillery shell.

Here's another good one. Stoner was. Stoner's task unit was going through CQC training, and this guy threw a crash into a room and it like. He threw a crash into the room and then went in the room and then, like, backed out because he was scared to crash. Because it's something weird like that where the guy was basically scared of the crash. And so Stoner was watching. And so Stoner's like. They get done with the run and someone's like, hey, come with me. And Stoner got like seven crashes in his pocket, and he went into, like a small closet and he goes. And he starts talking to the guy all normal. And like, hey, you know, I just want to talk. And as he's pulling a crash out, just undoes it and pulls the pin and just drops it at their feet and continues talking totally normal. Just like, boom. And he does that seven times. And then at the end of whatever he was saying to me, he goes, hey, by the way, don't be scared of crashes. They're not going to hurt you.

Oh, man. Wait, so are they? What do you mean? I. Okay, they can't hurt you got it.

But a crash just goes bang.

I mean, what if you hold in your hand?

If you hold your hand, it could hurt you.

Yeah, yeah. So it doesn't emit anything?

Yeah, it doesn't emit anything. It's like a big firecracker, basically. I mean, and look, you don't want to put a firecracker next to your hand or next to your eye.

Right? Right.

But they're not gonna hurt you.

Yeah.

I mean, you crash each other all the time.

Sure.

So I always thought that was a good lesson learned from Stoner to that dude. Probably not great for his hearing, but oh well.

Unwillingness to use the rifle. Many have been told never to fire without direct orders for fear of revealing positions. Lack of pride in self organization or work. Poor physical condition.

A tendency to bunch together when in danger. I wrote about that in leadership Strategy and Tactics. Not just from a battlefield, but also from a mental status. We all just want to like crowd each other. We get, we get, we feel comfort being next to each other. Don't. Freezing under fire.

Slovenliness in care of equipment. Lack of skill with the rifle or other infantry weapons. Fear of the night. Ignorance of squad formations. Ignorance of field sanitation and of personal hygiene in combat. Comment. Replacements who exhibit these deficiencies usually have usually not had the advantage of such training system as described above.

So think about how you're indoctrinating your people. You can probably do a better job of it. Next section is about river crossings. It goes by this whole. This is. These are tactical things trying to help people win this war. These are tactical things about literally how to cross rivers. Very cool to read. I'm not going to cover it right now. It covers assault bolt handling and, and water safety and foot bridges and cable bridges and engineer bridges. It just goes on all these detailed sections.

Then it goes into this story about Roger Young.

And it's got a song. It's got a song with musical notes that you can sing. I'm going to read you the, the lyrics, the first part of it. Oh, they've got no time for glory in the infantry oh, they've got no use for praises loudly sung but in every soldier's heart in all the infantry shines the name shines the name of Roger Young. Roger Young who fought and died for the men he marched among. So this story is about a Medal of Honor recipient and it tells a bit of the story here. That song is about this Medal of Honor recipient, Roger Young. On July 31, 1943, the infantry company of which Private Young was A member was ordered to make a limited withdrawal from the battle line in order to adjust the battalion's position for the night. At this time, Private Young's platoon was engaged with the enemy in dense jungle where observation was limited. The platoon was suddenly pinned down by intense fire from a Japanese machine gun concealed on higher ground only 75 yards away. The initial burst wounded Private Young. As the platoon started to obey the order to withdraw.

Private Young started creeping toward the emplacement. Despite a second wound, he continued his heroic advance, attracting enemy fire and answering with rifle fire. When close to his objective, he began throwing hand grenades, and while doing so, he was hit again and killed. Private Young's bold action in closing with this Japanese pillbox and thus diverting its fire permitted his platoon to disengage itself without loss and was responsible for. For several enemy casualties.

Like I said, Roger Young was. He received the Medal of Honor for this action. And.

I looked up Roger Young, and it's an interesting story. He was from a small town up in Ohio, place called Tiffin, Ohio. And sometime during high school, he was a really good athlete. He was small, but he's a really good athlete. And sometime in high school, I think he was playing either basketball or football. He got in some weird injury, some weird head injury.

That left him almost completely deaf and blind. Like, he could see but not really well. He could hear but not really well. And he was worried about being able to get into the regular Army. So he joined the National Guard. And he was like a really good soldier, despite the fact that he couldn't see very well and he couldn't hear very, very well.

And before this assault in New Georgia and this island in New Georgia, which is in the Solomon Islands, before this assault, he had been advanced in rank, and he went to his leadership and requested a demotion because he felt like he was putting his guys at risk because he couldn't see well enough and he couldn't hear well enough. And at first they thought, or he's just trying to get out of the. You know, he's just trying to not do this. Do this assault. And he said, no, I'm doing the assault. I'm doing the assault, but I shouldn't be in charge of anyone because I can barely see and I can barely hear.

And they said, okay, roger that. They demoted him. They. So he wasn't in charge of a squad anymore, and he just became a rifleman.

Went out there and saved his guys.

Next section is called patrol. Pointers.

Commanders and staffs as well as troops should Be made to realize the amount of detail essential to proper preparation of a patrol for each mission. Emphasize the fact that the patrol leader must be given the means to end time to accomplish his mission. How often do we actually think about what we're tasking people with? You got to realize what you're tasking people with, what time it's going to take, how much time they need to prepare for it.

Contact with the main force. Leaders of flank and security or security patrols should be impressed with the importance of maintaining contact with the main force at all times. Loss of contact has often proved disastrous, so you have to maintain communications.

The opposite extreme, we've got a little dichotomy going here. The opposite extreme, however, can also have serious results. One patrol leader, overzealous about maintaining contact, caused the attack to involve the main body and develop into a major action for which the latter was not prepared. So this guy kept everyone so close that by the time they did the assault, the main body got caught up in the assault as well. So there's a dichotomy. You got to balance.

Patrol leadership. Strictest discipline must be maintained during a patrol operation. Rigid control should be exercised to eliminate unnecessary noise, talking, sneezing, and most important, ill advised firing. All movement must be regulated to take full advantage of of conditions such as rainstorms, temporary obscuring of the moon by clouds, et cetera. So this is what we got to remember when we say strictest discipline has to be maintained. And control. If you and I are on a patrol and you're in the back of the patrol, and I'm the, you're the rear security and I'm the Pl. I'm the patrol leader and I'm number two. So there's 14, 18, 22 guys between us. How do I control what you're gonna do? I can't. And if you see something that makes you nervous, you can start shooting. You know, you might start making a call. You might be doing dumb things. Why is that? Is it cause you're dumb? No, it's because I'm a bad leader. Because I didn't explain to you what the parameters were of what we were doing. I didn't explain to you why we were doing what we were doing. I didn't explain to you the dangers of shooting your rifle if you weren't sure of what was happening. So when they say control, don't think of it like, oh, I've got to sit there and tell everyone exactly what to do. You're going to really lose then what you have to do is you have to utilize powerful and, and, and well executed. Decentralized command. That's what control is.

Back to the book. One patrol had almost completed its mission when its presence and location were revealed to the enemy through an unguarded movement by one of the members. This betrayal nullified the entire effort of that patrol. Particular patrol. Patience is of the utmost importance in patrolling. That's true.

The success or failure of a patrol depends in the final analysis upon the qualities of leadership possessed by the patrol leader. In most cases, the commanders have selected their best officers and NCOs to perform this duty.

Leadership is what makes a patrol successful. Leadership.

Organizing professional patrols. This is an interesting combat concept. Some commanders have gone so far as to organize permanent patrol groups whose principal function is to furnish personnel for battle missions. The officers selected for these groups are volunteers, the most aggressive, tough and rugged officers in the unit. They are permitted to select from the unit men who possess the same qualities. After a period of intensive training in scouting, patrolling, battle drill and physical hardware gardening, the patrol group is attached to the unit headquarters from which it receives its mission. So he's talking. Look, you can make a little element that's made of your best guys. Fatigue and strain endured by battle patrols make it impracticable to assign them more than one major mission every two or three days. Upon completion of a mission, the men should be moved to a rear location, fed, rested and prepared for the next. What I, what I say is interesting about this is if what do you have in your company that's a duty or a mission or a task that maybe it's such of such importance that you put together a little hit team and they get good at it and they do it all the time and you give them the support and you give them the training. That's a very sensible thing to think about. Now, it doesn't mean you have to exclude everybody else because I can have a hit team of four people that do presentations to clients. That doesn't mean I send two other guys. You know, occasionally I throw this guy, throw this guy. So other people learn and maybe they spend some time in the hit team. But it's an interesting concept and a good one to make someone a professional at that particular part of the duty. I mean, you're a football player. That's like what football is, right?

Special team, essentially.

Right?

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, it didn't used to be that way. Used to be like, hey, what, we're gonna play football?

Everybody's playing.

Yeah, we're just playing football.

Yeah.

Now it's like, oh, I'm only going out when this play's happening.

That's an interesting way to look at it. Yeah, Only when this play is happening.

I mean, there's some people that only play one play.

Yeah. Kicker, kicker, kicker. Wedge breaker. Well, that can be kind of versatile. Yeah, you're right. Specialty. There was this guy, actually. He was a wide receiver, but what the heck was his name? He played at UA trade, and he was just. Well, he was a wide receiver for sure, and he did some things or whatever, but he was marginal compared to what his specialty was, was blocking field goals and punts. He was on the outside because he could run real fast. He was the fastest guy on the team.

Yeah, he had the instinct.

He was just so. Yeah, the instinct and his speed. He was the fastest guy on the team. So the way he could just like Dennis Rodman.

Dennis Rodman rebounding.

Yeah.

You know, Dennis Rodman is right.

Yeah. But, I mean, the scenario is a little bit different because it's. It's not like they're like, hey, we need to call the rebounder. You know, Dennis Rodman. I was just playing. You see what I'm saying? But this guy. Hey, they're about to kick a field goal. A freaking. What the heck was his name? Matt. Oh, man. They're gonna be mad at me for not remembering that.

So this guy had good instincts to get that hand on the ball.

Speed instincts.

You know what's weird about this is he must have been really good to actually be identified as that guy.

Yep, he totally was. He was famous for that. So it was, like, the team was, like, kind of known for that. Like, hey, buckle up. When we kick field goals or punts, like, this guy's coming. So there was time they got to the point where they would stack that side, wherever he was, which is dangerous to do because you open up the other side for other guys. But, bro, it's that important. That's how good. That's how good the specialized skill he had developed.

You know, there's something to be said about this concept and specializing and focusing on something. I was watching a thing about Wayne Gretzky, and he was like. He would sit there and watch hockey games as a kid, and while he was watching the hockey game, he would trace the puck, like, with a pen on the. On the. On, like, a piece of paper. Like, he'd draw a hockey rink. And then he would sit there and trace where the puck went, where to go the whole time. And then when the game was over, Three periods later, he would look at the. Where his marks were on this piece of paper and start to think, that's where the puck is. This is where the puck is most of the time. This is where I need to be. And same with Dennis Rodman. He would know where different shooters on his team, what kind of spin they put on the ball, and he'd be able to assess where that ball was going to go. Where's the highest chance of that happening? That's what he focused on.

So if you can do that with a team and you can get a team focused on a particular item, they're going to excel at it. It's a good concept. And a comment here says the presence of a professional patrol group in a unit should not be considered a complete solution to the patrolling problem, nor should it operate to curtail the training of individual riflemen in scouting and patrolling. Right. This doesn't mean you got Rodman. So now no one else needs to work on the rebounding. The professional group should be used for difficult or special missions while normally normal patrolling continues as well.

Now, this section that I'm about to read, this is kind of. This is one of the ones where when I read these for the first time, I was like, this one's kind of. It's a good debrief because it's a failure. And they actually debrief a mission here.

This section is called how not to Patrol, and it's got notes in it. A sixth army report includes this account of an unsuccessful patrol action in New Guinea. Though some members of the patrol are exhibited splendid courage and initiative, the mission was not accomplished and casualties were high. The negative results of this patrol action were due in large part to several violations of basic patrol principles, as pointed out below. A map of the area is shown on the opposite page.

So the terrain that they're dealing with. There's a sectional terrain, the coastal flat Northwest River. There's a river, and the way the river is, is broken out. The river is covered with kunai grass, 2 to 5ft high. Feet high, interspersed with wooded areas. Traveling is difficult and exhausting. Trees in the wooded areas are not close together, but the underbrush is dense and visibility limited. So you already know this is freaking horrible. This is hard terrain to get through. A track paralleling the beach is about 8ft wide and clear of underbrush. Along the beach is a 4 to 8 foot embedded embankment suitable for cover against small arms fire from inland. The width of the river varies from 15ft in some places to 35ft in others. Its current is swift. The stream bread is rocky and relatively shallow except for the main channel which at the time of this patrol action was more than six feet deep as a result of recent rains.

So the way this is set up, there's, there's like this, they're on an island, they got the ocean, it's a beach. There's an outpost that's to the south end, Outpost A, and then there's a river mouth. And this patrol goes across the river to enemy territory. And they've got these various locations. A is the outpost and across the river you got this coconut plantation. You got a perimeter that gets set up and you got a little village up there. And they've got all these routes that go in and out. Route K, they take in route L, one element takes out, route N, another element takes out. So there's a lot going on in this, in this patrol. And I don't want to get too wrapped around trying to explain like exactly what happened without the visuals. But the patrol consisted of a rifle platoon reinforced by two 60 millimeter mortar squads, one intelligence man, a radio operator and aid man. Second Lieutenant Y, the platoon leader, was in command. First Lieutenant X from WISE Company was attached to the patrol as observer and coordinator. Comment. The higher commander keeps the accomplishment of the mission in mind when he selects the patrol leader. The more important the mission, the more careful his selection must be. A good leader should have judgment, initiative, courage, endurance, and be a highly skilled leader. The attachment of Lt. X as coordinator not only divided responsibility, but also indicated a doubt in the commander's mind as to wise ability to lead the patrol. So you've got, you've got this second lieutenant that's going out there in command, but you put a first lieutenant with him. It doesn't make any sense. And that's what their comment is. You're kind of throwing two people. If you don't trust one guy to run the mission, don't do it. It's just a rifle platoon. Why are you sending two officers out there? Do you not have confidence in one of them? And if that's the case, why are you sending them out there?

Important thing to think about. And what does it do to the minds of the troops? Hey, we. Oh well, there's the boss. Cool. Oh wait, now we got another boss. Wait a second. Why are we getting two bosses?

The mission, the mission of the patrol is to cross the river in vicinity of the battalion outpost, reconnoiter the coastal area.

South of this village and destroy any enemy found. Right? So there you Go.

But I'm going to read that again. The mission of the patrol is to cross the river in the vicinity of the battalion outpost, do reconnaissance of the coastal area and destroy enemy enemy found. And it says here comment. The mission assigned by the higher commander to the patrol leader must be specific and unmistakable. Indefinite missions invite confusion, casualt and failures. One patrol cannot be expected to. To execute efficiently a number of missions. And by the way, they're, they're quoting field manuals from this. That's FM 2175. Reconnaissance patrols are used primarily to secure information, maintain contact with the enemy or observe terrain. They avoid unnecessary combat and accomplish the mission by stealth. Reconnaissance patrols engage in firefights only when necessary to accomplish accomplish their mission or to protect themselves. So you see the dichotomy here. We want you to do a reconnaissance, but we want you to destroy any enemy that you find. That's two different things. That's saying I want you to fight someone and run away from them at the same time. A combat patrol executes missions which they which may require fighting to accomplish or to help accomplish. Every combat patrol secures information as a secondary mission. Then here's the comment the this patrol had been given two primary missions, reconnaissance and combat. Without any indication as to which has priority. Prioritize and execute. We need to know what the priority is. The directive to destroy any enemy found in the area, if taken as a primary mission, will preclude successful. Will preclude successful operation. As a reconnaissance patrol, the mission should have been either combat with reconnaissance as a secondary mission, or reconnaissance alone, in which case the patrol would engage in combat only. Only to the extent necessary to complete its reconnaissance mission. So think about that. When you're assigning someone a mission, make sure they understand what the damn mission is. And don't assign them two missions that are opposed to each other. And when you do assign people two or three missions or tasks or projects, make sure they know what the priority mission is, what the priority project is.

The patrol departed out of the outpost at 10:15, leaving a 1:60 millimeter mortar squad to furnish fire support. A rope secured on both banks were used to help put the patrol weight across the stream. By 11:15, personnel and equipment had crossed and were waiting for scheduled artillery concentration before moving forward. At 11:30, 80 rounds of 105 was fired. After completion of the artillery fire, the patrol reconnoitered along the route to the beach. Except for the killing of three Japs by the rear point, no contact was made and the trip was uneventful. Okay. At 1405, the patrol arrived at sea, which is they. They basically patrol from the outpost, which is on the beach inland a little bit and to the north, and then they get to the beach up north and they set up a perimeter. That's the point C that they're talking about. For purposes of command and control, the patrol was divided into three sections.

Consisting respectively of 2nd Lieutenant Y and 10 men, the platoon sergeant and 13 men, and 1st Lieutenant X and 20 men.

So now we're dividing.

And the comment is actually command and control were not improved by this organization, as was demonstrated later. Lieutenant Y, in addition to commanding the patrol, was also commanding one of the sections. Lieutenant Lieutenant X, as a section leader, was now under the command of his junior lieutenant.

So have you ever heard me say, you probably have. If you want to be in charge of everything, you want to be in charge of nothing. So when you're supposed to be in charge of a patrol and then you take charge of a section, you're not going to be able to control everything. You're going to be focused on the squad or the section that you're leading. So that's why you have subordinate leadership. So they can look down and in and run that little element, and you can look up and out and see what the whole team is doing together, and you can mutually support each other and cover and move for each other.

At this time, radio communications with the battalion commander at outpost was established. However, radio soon went out, did not function thereafter. Contact. The first contact with the enemy came shortly after the reorganization had been completed. About 20 Japs with army armed with automatic weapons attacked the perimeter from the southwest. Apparently this group had followed the trail made by the patrol. In the brief ensuing skirmish, 10 of me were killed and the remainder dispersed. Okay, they do okay through that. One patrol then moved southeast along the coastal track toward Coconut Grove at B. So now they were far up north in the perimeter. Now they start moving south towards this coconut grove. When advanced element of the patrol reached the northwest edge of the coconut grove, they received heavy machine gun fire, rifle mortar, hand grenade fire from their front and right flank. So this is a bad scenario. Cross fire. Three members of the patrol were wounded. It was estimated that about 50 enemy fighters were in the grove. First Lieutenant X assumed command and because the heavy fire ordered the patrol to return to the former beach at position C. Two of the wounded men had been had to be assisted after their arrival. So now they go back to this perimeter that they had after their arrival at sea. The firing stopped and a temporary Primer was organized. So they get back, they regroup, they got two wounded. Lieutenant X, finding the men too closely grouped, ordered two sections to move further inland. Neither section moved as far as Lieutenant X intended, so he signaled them to move further.

So they're in a perimeter. Lieutenant X says, hey, push out from the perimeter a little bit. They don't really move far enough. So he gives them a signal to move further. This signal was interpreted to mean that the sections were to return to the river via separate routes, as had been discussed earlier when the patrol first reorganized at sea because both sections moved out, leaving Lieutenant X by himself with his 20 men. So now we have complete. We have three different sections out here.

Three different elements out there. And you do not want to split forces in the first place. And you definitely won't want to split forces into three groups. And you definitely don't want to split forces forces into three groups. When you got wounded and you've already been attacked by a 50 man enemy force. This is crazy.

The comment the patrol must be directed, regulated and controlled at all times. Patrol members must be familiar with all prescribed signals. The leader may arrange for a few additional signals for special purposes. In this instance, the loss of control can undoubtedly be attributed to the poor chain of command in the patrol organization, to sudden change in command from Lieutenant Y to Lieutenant X while the patrol is in contact with the enemy, and to a failure to reach clear understanding of plans and signals.

You can see how these little compounding problems. And if you look at your organization, if you look at what you're doing inside of your business, what little, what little mistakes are you making? What little, what little things are you compounding? What problems do you have that can be compounding, that can lead to disaster?

Is it communication? Is it chain of command? Are you not mutually supporting each other? Do people not understand what the mission is?

You see, this applies to everything that we do with any kind of team. The trip back. The platoon sergeant with his 13 men followed the route M. So basically they all start going back in different directions.

They crossed the river without incident and reported back to. So they get back. This first group of 13 guys gets back to the, to the command post, the battalion command post. Second Lieutenant Y and his 10 men made it wider circuit and they report back to the battalion an hour later without having contacted the enemy. Okay, so we're doing pretty good. But first Lieutenant X realized that the other two sections had gone. He proceeded to the river to another route. And he's got the wounded guys. One of the wounded died En route and the body was carried. The section reached one point on the river without difficulty, but found the point in the river that they got. The river was 30ft wide and the current was very swift and it would have been dangerous even for excellent swimmers. An attempt to reach the original crossing site was unsuccessful because the enemy was in position.

Because the enemy, they tried to go back where they originally crossed. That's where they try and go back to. And guess what? The enemy's waiting for them there. Obviously they know how hard it is crosses river. They know the crossing points.

Patrol should return from. This is a comment. Patrol should return from a mission over a different route to avoid ambush. Alternate crossing points could have been determined by reconnaissance before the combat patrol was sent out.

It appears that the enemy allowed the patrol to cross the river unopposed and planned to ambush it by closing in behind.

So now Lieutenant X goes back. So they get, they get fought away from the place where they originally crossed. He sets up a perimeter anticipation of attack by the enemy. A sergeant was then sent out with the mission of crossing the river and reporting to the battalion commander for help.

The next section is called the rescue. Meanwhile, the battalion commander had received a situation report from the leader of the section which returned. Acting upon this information, the battalion commander had formed a group of 20 men and had proceeded to the vicinity of this island. And this is another thing that screwed up. And when you see it on the terrain where this element wants to cross over, they're going to cross the river, but they're going to cross onto like a little mini island where they'll have to do another freaking crossing. But they don't know that because they haven't done recon.

Believing that this to be the balance of the patrol. So, so this group was preparing to cross the river to aid the remainder of the patrol when they observed Lt. Y and his section crossing back. And so now the battalion thinks, oh, okay, they're coming back now, so we're good. So they all go back to. They all go back to the battalion. And then the battalion figures out, the battalion commander figures out, oh wait, you didn't even bring back all the guy, all the guys. So two groups have come back, but there's a third group out there. And now the battalion commander's like trying to figure out what to do. So he goes back out again and again. This is the battalion commander, this is a very senior guy going out to execute this rescue mission in order to evacuate. And they link up in order to evacuate the wounded. It was decided that a rope must be used. Several attempts by Lieutenant X to cross the river with the rope were unsuccessful. Finally, the battalion commander and four others grasp hands and formed a human chain out into the water. Lt. X removed his clothes and tied the rope to his waist from a point upstream. He plunged in the river and was successful in reaching the hand of one of the men in the human chain as he was carried downstream by the current. As the men in the human chain, with the aid of others on the bank, were pulling Lt. X and the race rope ashore.

And any machine gun opened up from the northwest bank, Although the rope was eventually secured on the island, one man had been killed and five wounded, including the battalion commander. The wounded were evacuated to the outpost where the battalion commander died within an hour.

Comment Although his bravery was commendable, the inadvisability of a battalion commander participating in a patrol action is obviously subsequently back to the event. Subsequently, the enemy subjected the island to heavy machine gun and mortar fire. However, the men on the island. This is that little island of the river. However, the little island. The men in the island stayed in position to cover the crossing of the remaining 17 men on the far bank. One of the two wounded men with this group of the 17 was successfully evacuated, but the other was swept away and drowned while trying to cross.

Of the 15 men only. Of the 15 remaining men, only eight succeeded in getting across the river before the Japs closed in. These men said they had been subjected to heavy mortar and grenade fire and it was believed that the others were killed. So only eight of them. Make is believed that all of the uninjured men in the group could have crossed the river before the enemy closed in on them had they not chosen to stick it out in hopes of getting the wounded across. So there you go. These guys were brave. They wanted to stay with their friends, and they end up losing just about everybody because they're trying to get these wounded guys across.

The comment the patrol crossed a difficult obstacle and moved rapidly deep into hostile territory where the enemy situation was obscure. So start this whole. This whole thing. You start off by going into enemy territory, and in order to get into enemy territory, you're going across a freaking river.

We better have a damn good plan. We don't know what the enemy situation is up there and how deep are we going to go? Like, you know what you do in a situation like that? Equatorials. You put really good fire support on one side of the river and say, all right, guys, you're going to go across. Go ahead. If something happens, we got you, we got Mortars, we got heavy machine guns that we'll be able to get you back. And by the way, we're going to put a rope around the first guy. So when you go across the river or something happens, we're going to put. Pull you right back. That's covered. Move, by the way.

And then you don't go on a lengthy patrol without good support.

There was apparently very little reconnaissance on the part of the patrol, and it was unaware of the enemy strength in the immediate vicinity. The patrol was of sufficient strength to fight its way out against a superior number of enemy. But when control was lost and the patrol was disorganized and split up, it was susceptible to defeat in detail. And just check this out. If you were on patrol with me and you saw me give you a hand signal, like to go out, set up a push out a little bit further, and you saw another hand signal with me, from me, there would be no part of your brain that would be thinking I would be telling you to split forces and go back to base. No part of your brain would think that you would know that I would. That I would want to stick together. You would know that. Everyone would know that. Everyone on the team would think, hey, the only way we're splitting forces, if Jocko comes over and looks at me and says, hey, we're splitting forces, here's the new plan. Other than that we're sticking together, that's like an implied commander's intent from me always. We are sticking together. We will cover, move for each other for sure. But we're not going to get separated where we can't mutually support each other. That's not. That's not a good thing ever. So what kind of implied intent do you have with your team in your organization that people know what to do and they won't make mistakes like this?

So essentially you're. Are you saying, like your example where that's such a rigid rule that you have and it's esta. It would be established?

Like, established.

Like that's kind of the Ethan, like, like if.

If Leif heard me on the radio say, like, split force.

He wouldn't be like, hey, Jocko just told me to split force. He'd be like, wait, something. Something's wrong. Yeah, he wouldn't make sense to him. He'd be like, okay, hey, Jocko, say again. Hey, Jocko, I'm gonna come and talk to you. Because if you're. You've never remotely said anything like, hey, let's split up and see how we do.

Right, right.

Let's get to. For me to say, hey, set up a good cover position. Cool. All day long, provide cover, move to high ground, any of those things. But to say split forces, it would be. He would need to. He would ask questions.

Right. And you're saying that's because there are certain things that are. When you see, you said implied. Right. But there's certain things that are just. This is what we're starting.

And let me tell you what one of them is. Cover and move. If you get cover, move is what I live by. It's a first law of combat. Right. First law of combat is cover, move. If I'm telling you to go away from me, we can't cover move anymore. And Leif hears that and goes, wait a second. Jocko doesn't want me to cover move. That's crazy. Something's going on that I need to understand. Or it's a miscommunication. He's not like, oh, cool, later. No, it violates one of the principles of combat leadership, and it's not going to happen.

So what are those principles inside your organization? Do you have them established correctly, that people know what to do and if a weird signal comes through, they go, wait a second, what are you talking about? This doesn't make any sense. You know, like, Dave Burke gets a request from a client.

Yeah. You know, And I say, don't give the client any support. Like he would be, wait a second. No, something's going on here. You know, something's not clear. There's a miscommunication because we're here to support our clients. We're here to teach them leadership. We're here to give them all the leadership tools that we can. So. And Dave knows that implicitly. So if I all of a sudden say, don't give them any support, he'd be, wait a second, I gotta go talk to Jock about there's something going on.

Yeah. Kind of like if you lost your temper on somebody, it would be like.

Something would be confusing.

Wouldn't come. Yeah, it wouldn't compute.

Right.

Really? You'd be like, oh, that must be like a demonstration or something. You know, check.

Before we jump this next section. That section right there was the section that I kind of wanted to. That. That kind of caught me. Because it's a very good debrief.

Of a little, you know, you read about big battles, and we've covered many big battles. And of course, we get. We get the gist of the battle or we get the experience of battle from one man's vision. But to get an after action debrief like that, and you can imagine how this is. This is just one little tiny example. One little tiny example. And that's why.

When I started this thing off and I said, you know, why do I cover these? Because I never heard these lessons. Every freaking military leader should read that after action report where a bunch of guys get killed, a bunch of guys get wounded. Why does it happen? It's so clear why it happens. They give you the reasons. You have multiple chains of command. You have guys splitting forces. There's unclear communication. Like, you should know these things. You should get taught these things.

And look what else you're facing out there. You got your enemy, right? What else you got?

The river.

The river. Oh, that doesn't sound like a big deal, but people drowned.

Yeah.

This is not, this ain't like a little stream. This is a river where people drowned.

Yeah. And, yeah, and that's the kind of the assumption for us outsiders where, you know, we think of, okay, they got, you know, they got this many guys on their side and we got this many guys, but we got this and we got that. Like, we have these tanks or we got the, you know, it's like kind of nuts against nuts kind of a thing. But you consider. No, no, there's, there's like, we need food. We need to get across that river. Yeah, they're all this stuff that's kind.

Of like the jungle. I mean, just the jungle just getting through there.

Yeah, just.

What about our weapons? Or they're getting, you know, sand in them. They're getting them. It's raining.

Yeah.

Where our feet are rotting. We're starving, by the way. We need water. We have dysentery. Like, what is going on? Yeah, and by the way, there's a bunch of Japanese suicidal fighters that want to kill us all.

Yeah, yeah. Remember Saving Private Ryan?

Right?

Where they kind of.

You know, they, they, they, they come up on the beach and, you know, everyone, guys are jumping in the water, whatever, and then couple guys, they just drowned. Like, it's like, you know, when you, you see that opening shot and you consider it in real life or whatever, it's kind of like, okay, what are we about to get into? This is going to be scary. Machine guns, you know, freaking Germans, bombs, all this stuff. Right? But then, oh, wait a second, what about the actual water we have to go through? Like that's going to kill some of us.

And imagine this. You go and you make a movie and you actually go into the horror and panic of each Individual that jumps into the water with 64 pounds of gear, they're not a great swimmer. They go to the bottom, panicking, fighting and drowning and dying horrible death. And that's happening all over the place on that day. And then meanwhile, if you survive, if you somehow get your shit together and get your gear off and now you get to the beach, you're getting freaking strafed by enemy elevated bunkered machine gun positions.

Check. Last section of volume 7 is called OP&CP Security Observation Post and Command Post Security. This is such a good start. It says even at this late date, needless casualties, delays and expenditures of effort are being caused by breaches of OP and security rules. So what he's saying is like, look, we've been fighting this war for three and a half, four years, and even right now we have to explain what to do, how to maintain security because we're taking unnecessary casualties because people aren't following the proper protocols. The inevitable results of, of security carelessness are poignantly illustrated by three following incidents. Carelessness cost lives. Cost lives. Reported by technician 5th grade Ernest J. Langy, 135th infantry.

We stayed in one CP for two weeks without drawing a shell. And it felt quite secure, for we had been told that the enemy hadn't been shelling in that particular vicinity for the past 30 days.

However, a few of the men either forgot or disregarded their instructions. They washed some white towels and shirts and hung them out to dry, an effective signal for the enemy artillery fire upon our command post. Three of our men were killed in the shelling that followed this breach of security.

Learning security the hard way, reported by an infantry battalion commander.

After being shelled out of two CP locations the first time with severe casualties, we reorganized a sadly depleted CP group and opened for business in another building. A third story battalion OP in the same building could be reached only by passing a large open window on a stair landing. Since the entire village village was under enemy observation and direct fire, it was necessary to crawl past this open window to ensure that this would be done. A sentry was stationed in the stairway. So there's a window you have to crawl when you go by this window. And it's so important that they put a guy sitting by the window going, hey, freaking crawl, buddy. Hey, you crawl.

All went well until it was discovered that the sergeant Major had just covered the open with a large sheet of tin so that the sentry could be released for work with the wire team. So he needs the sentry to go do something else. So he says, hey, Just put this piece of tin up against the window.

This might seem like a weird question, or maybe what's a sentry guard? Guard.

Yep, a guard.

As opposed to like you could.

It's literally a guard.

Okay. Is that like a rank, like a position? Or someone like, hey, you're going to be a guard tonight, so now you're a sentry tonight.

Like that you could. You could use the word guard and sentry, same word synonym. Century might have a little bit more tone of military sentry as opposed to a guard of a prison. So a sentry is more like someone that's standing watch.

Gotcha.

So what if you guys are out on a mission and it's like a two day mission, whatever. And then it's like, okay, someone's got a stand watch and it's jocko and you're a Navy seal, straight up, are you the century for that night kind of thing?

We would use the term watch. Like, hey, I got watch. As opposed to saying, hey, you're on sentry duty in the. In the Navy, you generally call it just watch. So even, hey, who's got like in the barracks? I'll be like, who's got fire watch? Or that you have watch because you stand in watch sections on the ship.

But technically you're a century, but you're.

Well, like I said, it's. It's leaning towards. Well, we would call century duty even in this. In the Navy, sentry duty, we'd probably.

Just call it watch, but in other outfits, army. Okay, gotcha. But same. Same duty, though.

Yep. Okay, got it. And you could put. Obviously this century was all he was doing was telling people what do. Hey, get down when you go across that window. So he wasn't actually protecting the perimeter. He was protecting the troops from doing something stupid.

Yeah, but he was a guard in a specific capacity, so there you go. Got it.

So they put this big tin sheet up. We abandoned the CP in haste and moved to an already established alternate cp, the only remaining location the of in town. The last man had hardly left the building before it was taken under direct artillery fire and rapidly disintegrated. This incident thoroughly impressed our personnel with the folly of signaling OP and CP locations to the enemy by altering the outward appearance of the building after occupancy. That particular error was not repeated. They just got lucky that they. And I bet someone's like, wait, Sergeant Major, what'd you do? You put a piece of ten up? Dude, we got to get out of here. You're an idiot, Sergeant Major, with All due respect, you're an idiot. And now the enemy knows we're here, and we got to get out of here.

And the last. The last section here. One mistake is too many. Reported by the Commanding General, 1st Infantry Division officers. This one is so important. Officers visiting the frontline units should be warned against actions that might reveal to the enemy the locations of our installations.

In one case, an observation post was located in a wrecked building. Inside, walls of the rooms had been camouflaged to give a dark background. Instruments had been set well back in the rooms, and observers were careful to move about only in the shadows. All went well until the day some visiting officers stopped by. They moved about freely, even leaning out of the windows in their. With their field glasses. Within a half an hour, the building was completely destroyed by enemy fire. One of our observers was killed.

That's the situation when you roll down to the front lines and you think you're just gonna be cool. Yeah. And in my mind, I'm thinking. I'm not even thinking that they were being stupid, because they might just be being stupid, but they might also be like, hey, I'm cool. Well, I'm not gonna hide. I'm not gonna walk around. Yeah, I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna hide in the shadows.

Leif's got a funny story about going to the government center for the first time in downtown Ramadi, and they, like, pull in the Humvees and they see Marines sprinting from one location to another. They're like. And they. So they did. Just did what they were doing. And like, everything cool. They're like, yeah, there's snipers around here. You gotta move it. Like, roger that.

But that.

That.

That wraps up this. This particular volume, Volume seven. And you. You know that last little section, it's these moments. It's these little moments where we slack off when we get complacent. Just for a minute. Just for a minute.

And that's when we get crushed.

We can't let that happen. We need to always stay on the path. Speaking of the path. Echo trolls.

Yes, sir.

Dang. That's world record podcast speed.

It's good.

This book had some sections that I didn't cover because, look, I find leadership lessons everywhere. But when we're talking about using cable footbridge to cross rivers, I found a little bit of. It was really a stretch. It was really a stretch. I kept it to the leadership principles.

It's good.

So there we go. All right. How do we stay on the path?

Well, part of this, when we hear these accounts and go over these field manuals and learn these lessons from the past, from books, whatever. It is important to even just remember to pay attention to the lessons because you can get caught up in the story, man. For sure. I was kind of concerned about the guys with the guys. Human bridge, link, chain, whatever. I was concerned, you know, but there's a lesson that if you don't pay attention, you might miss it. So that's important too. So, yes, we're staying capable, for sure. We're reading, you know, listening, all that stuff.

We are, we're reading. I know, I'm reading. I'm not sure how much reading you're doing.

Not read. Either way, we're staying physically capable as well. We're training, I'll tell you that.

Nonetheless, we got to keep ourselves healthy and capable. All right, that's important. I think concur. So, yeah. So when you're on this path, you might need some supplementation. It helps.

Oh, it definitely helps.

Yeah, big time. Keep your immunity up, keep your functionality up, keep your strength up, keep your.

Endurance up, keep your cognitive attitude up.

Up.

Yeah, big time.

Let it go down. See, that's no good for nobody. You got people depending on you, including yourself. So, you know, mostly yourself, mostly yourself.

Could be others, I guess. We can't have anyone relying on us if we can't rely on ourselves. That's what I'm saying. That's what I'm trying to say.

What if you're at a capability, two scenarios. One, you're at a capability health level 10, and then the other scenario, you're at a health capability, capability level five. You got, let's say, two kids depending on you. You got, let's say, maybe an employee depending on you. Maybe have, I don't know, some. Someone else depending on you. You want to be level 5, you want to be level 10?

Let's face it, that's not even a really good question. It's so obvious the answer.

Right? But that's, but that's not the point that I'm making. The point I'm making is some of us, we're just like, I'm fine with my number five. You're not doing nobody no favors by being at number five. No, at level 10, you are doing a lot of people.

Some, and there's a weird thing here, some people would rather let. Let themselves down than let other people's down. Some people would rather they don't care about someone else, but they would not want to let themselves down either one of those. Let's not Let anyone down. Let's get that level 10 and keep it. This is what I'm saying.

Slipping off the path and not getting back onto the path is doing no good for nobody. Mm. And you've got people depending on you. You gotta. You gotta do the right thing. Yeah.

Let's do it.

All right. Let's get some supplementation as far as supplementation goes. Jacob. Supplementation. Jocko fuel.

It's called Jocko fuel.com if you want to get it.

Yep. Very reliable, very high quality stuff. This will keep you on the path. This will help you straight up. So the first thing we will go into is discipline. And discipline. Go. Supplementation for your brain and body. Here's the thing. The days of poison energy drinks, which. The thing. I get it. Oh, it's a bad thing, energy. You know, this thing. But you got other bad stuff in there. The days of drinking that kind of stuff are gone.

No, not. No need.

Nope. Not anymore. It's a big deal now. When you drink an energy drink now, it's good for you.

It's kind of like what Mol did to desserts. Right?

That's exactly what happened.

What Mol did to desserts is what discipline goes. Does to energy drinks. Because, let's face it, you kind of like the taste of an energy drink. You kind of like the fact that it gets you a little amped. What you don't like is you crash. What you don't like is it's bad for you. What you don't like is it you get the freaking jitters. And what you don't like is you're giving yourself type 2 diabetes, which also sucks.

That does suck for sure.

So there's no reason for any of that?

No. Those are good.

Kind of like dessert. You feel like crap after you eat a big, whatever, freaking horrible dessert filled with sugar.

Yeah.

You just have milk.

Yeah. Easy money. Yeah.

You.

You pay an additional cost for drinking an energy drink in a traditional sense.

You want to hear a non traditional use of moke that I've been doing?

So I used to go to this restaurant.

And they did this thing called.

Dessert shots. Have you ever heard of this concept? It's just a really small dessert.

Yeah.

But it's kind of cool because, let's face it, you get done with a piece of big prime rib and a Caesar salad, and you're kind of stoked, but then you think, I kind of want something sweet too, But I don't want to get a vegan, you know, whatever. Big, giant dessert. So I'm Just gonna get myself a little. Little Sunday shot at this particular restaurant I used to go to back in the day. Day, which is closed now, unfortunately, because it was a damn good restaurant.

Me and my wife used to go there, and stoner would come, like, he would just show up, third wheel, Just come and get it and hang out all the time, like, every time. But lately I've been doing, like. I'm like, the same thing, but I just been doing shots of mole. Just maybe a little bit bigger than a shot, but just enough where you're like, hey, you know what?

Yeah, that would work.

I think now I'll just keep a molk mixed up in the fridge.

Oh, yeah.

And just pour a little shot and just get a little hit.

Or mix in some, like, dark chocolate chunks.

We haven't done that yet.

Yeah, you put that in the shot so you, like, hit it, and you can chomp up the. The dark chocolate dual hitter. Nice. I'm telling. Because those gourmet, those dessert shots or whatever. Yeah, I heard that. You can get a bit. Little. Little tray of them or whatever, and it's like. Yeah, one's like a little cup of brownie or something. They're just small, right? Is that what you're saying? So, yeah, you want to spice it up, make it more like gourmet and lavish some dark chocolate. I'm here to help. I'm here to help. Also, don't worry about the days of worrying about your joints just acting up. Those days are gone too.

They are?

Yeah. I'm telling you, stay on this thing. We got joint warfare mixed with a super krill oil. Don't got to worry about that anymore. Yeah, Those days are gone, too.

Good to go.

Good to go. Also, vitamin D3. Keep your immunity up, which is an important thing. Maybe you don't think about it every single day, but when you start to get sick, little scratchy throat, whatever. However you get sick, you're gonna be. You're gonna notice it, and you're gonna wish you had the vitamin D3. So, you know, don't forget about that kind of stuff. It's important, too.

Yeah. Yeah. What. What else?

No, I was getting back into mok mochas. True protein in sense or in the replacement of a dessert in the form of a dessert. Yeah.

Let's face it. It's real good. You can get. You can get the drink at Wawa if you're on the east coast, which is. Y' all been crushing it and going. Clearing the shelves. Keep clearing them, let them know what's up. Let them see what's up. We're going to Florida. We're in Florida. Actually, when this comes out, we're in Florida. We're hitting Wawa Daily.

Also, all the stuff you can get at Vitamin Shop. Also, if you want to get it delivered to your house, that's going to cost a lot of money, right? Delivery? No, actually, it's not going to cost any money. It's going to be free. If you subscribe to any of these items. So you get your super krill every month. You get your, your joint warfare every month. You get your mulk every month. So you don't run out and go back in time to a, to a. To a horrible scenario where you wake up achy. Don't let that happen. Subscribe free shipping jockerfuel.com get some.

Also at Origin USA.

This is where you can get American made goods. Products. I never like, love the word products. So not what is good enough.

Pete uses. Oh, yeah, Pete. Pete. Hard goods, right?

Durable goods.

Durable goods. That's right. Durable goods.

Oh, yeah. Well, they are durable.

They are durable.

So we got American made denim, boots, jeans.

Jiu Jitsu GI's. Now we're starting to go into the fashion stuff because durable goods is like boots, pants.

I don't think we're doing fashion anything.

Well, I know you'd like to think that, but you know, Pete and I will have something different to say about that. Nonetheless, it's good stuff. OriginUSA.com all made in America. From the beginnings of the makings of the fabric all the way till to the durable goods, fashionable or not, that arrive. It's all made in America.

Also, Jocko has a store. It's called Jocko Store. And this is where you can get durable T shirts with discipline equals freedom on them.

I was running today and there's a guy, I'm like running, and there's a guy sees me and he's running, running at each other and he's wearing a.

Nate Diaz sweatshirt. Represent. Just, you know, it just says represent. But I know, I know what that means. I know that that's Nate Diaz. And he sees me and he reaches down, like, grabs the bottom of the Nate Diaz sweatshirt. Represent. He pulls up the shirt and he's representing while on the path. Discipline equals freedom. T shirt. Freaking legit.

Oh, yeah.

So I was like thinking, that's freaking. That's like a double, double bonus scenario. Not only is this dude down with Nate Diaz, which is fully approved, he's also down with the cause, which kind of Tells me we're aligned with a whole. Like that tells me we're aligned. Like, we got people, you know, like, where it is aligned.

That is good. And what, did you say anything to him or you just gave him the bona f?

No, no, I gave him a little bit more than that. I was like. I was like, hey, you hugged him.

You hugged him.

I didn't hug him because we were running, but I. I, you know, held up my fist and we kind of like, high fived as we passed each other. Yeah, freaking legit.

What's interesting is, like, that's the feeling you get whether you're running or not. You see somebody representing in the wild. Well, wild, let's face it. That's it. That's the feeling you get.

So if you want to represent in the wild, if you want.

Yeah, you can again, jocastore.com we got discipline equals freedom. We got good. We got hats. We got hoodies. We got rash guards on there. We have a subscription situation. Free shipping on this one, too, by the way. A little bit different kind of designs. More interesting. Here's the thing.

Wait, T shirt designs?

Yeah, it's called the Shirt Locker subscription. Yeah. You like the name? I like the name too. Here's the thing about the Shirt Locker for people, because people. People are saying, hey, like, can I get that one design? That was like, two months ago. It's a good design for sure.

We can't. That was like, if you have the membership, you'll get the design for that month, and then it's sort of gone. So I'm just saying, hey, I know. I know you want the past one, but, hey, the future one's gonna be good too. So don't get yourself in a situation where you're emailing or on Twitter or whatever that saying, hey, can I get that design? Just sign up now. You'll get that design. Cool.

Check. I like where you're at. Subscribe to the podcast. If you haven't yet, Also check out Jocko Unraveling podcast with Daryl Cooper. D.C. dropping knowledge grounded podcast. I talked to Dean about getting some of those back online. Warrior Kid podcast as well. You can also join us in the underground at the Underground on the underground. Jocko underground.com. it's an alternative podcast. We've been talking about a bunch of wild things on there. Things that are not quite Jocko podcast material, but they're adjacent material, amplifying material. We've talked about a bunch of psychology. We talk about group dynamics. We do talk about leadership. We talk about and we. And we've been doing Q and A on there as well. So the reason we have that is because we don't know what's going to happen with all these platforms that we're on. And we did get. We did get some. Is it called censorship? We get fully censored, but we got some. Some warnings on one of the last podcasts that we did about the Armenian genocide. So who knows? We can't. I know. I do know. You know, who knows. I know. I know that we can't leave ourselves at the whim of someone having control over what we do. So we created another platform. It's jocunderground.com and if you want to help us build and maintain that platform, it's $8.18 a month. There's some layers behind that, but if you want to help us out, then do that. And you can get this other podcast called Jocko Underground. You can ask questions. And that also prevents us from having to interject advertisements about pillows and. What else?

You know, various things that things might not. Yeah.

Things that you don't want to hear about.

Probably not.

Yeah. When you press play for Jocko Podcast, you know what you're gonna get, and you're gonna get it fast.

So, hey, check it out, Jocko. Look, if you can't afford that, we're here. We're not trying to make like this. We're not trying to leave people out. We don't want. If you're out there with a freaking Nate Diaz T shirt, a sweatshirt and a. And a Discipline Equals freedom T shirt under your Nate Diaz sweatshirt, and you can't afford this, we're good. We got you covered. Email assistanceacaonderground.com we'll get you taken care of. We also have a YouTube channel, which I am the assistant director on many of these really good videos. And then Echo makes some other ones too, which are marginal. Origin USA has one to check out, too. Got some cool stuff on there. Check out those YouTube channels.

It's true. Also, Psychological Warfare, an album tracks of Jocko getting us through our moments of weakness. Seems repetitive when I say it, but it doesn't. It kind of like undervalues really what it is, I'm telling you. So some people listen to music when they work out, so we listen, listen to podcasts. Good. All good moves. But if on those days, let's face it, they do come from time to time, we're saying, man, I really don't feel like doing this. Put in this. Put in the psychological warfare, you'll be in. You'll be in the game. 100 results on that one, by the way. I just had to go statistical on.

You right now with Statistical 100 flipsidecamvas.com My brother, Dakota Meyer, making freaking awesome stuff to hang on your wall. That will also keep you on the path. I've written a bunch of books. Final Spin. I don't know if I'm gonna win this argument with my publisher, but I'm trying to get where it says first edition. I'm trying to get it to say first edition. And I don't know, there's. There's legal requirements about that page. You know, it's like copyright stuff. So I don't know if I'm gonna be able to get away with it, but we're gonna try. At a minimum, it's gonna say first edition. It might even say first edition.

I just finished the. What they call first pass edits. And you're just going through. Making sure that, you know, making sure that the edits are proper. Make sure that it's all good to go.

And how many edits do you got? How many sorry passes.

4. It's ridiculous. But here's the cool thing. That book, I'm reading it, and I'm freaking loving reading it. I'm like. And I get the same thing. I used to have this with Way the Warrior Kid, where I'm reading it, and I kind of forget that I wrote it because it's fiction, so I didn't live it. Where you. When I'm reading Extreme Ownership or Leadership Strategy and Tactics, it's very much me. Yeah, right.

Yeah.

This is. It's me that wrote it. But you're kind of. It's a story. Right? That's in my head. That's almost a different part of my brain now. Look, it's obvious. I think it's real obvious that it's me that wrote it.

You know, I was on Lex. You know, Lex Friedman.

Yeah.

I just. I just did a podcast with him, and he said that I speak.

Like, Russian language, like, so however the Russian language is. Which you can kind of guess when you hear a Russian person speak English, you know, send location, like that kind of thing. He says that I speak English as if I'm a Russian human. So that book is definitely written in a very. Let's say, lean. Lean methodology.

Yeah.

But I'm stoked it's coming out. If you want to get that first a dish, order it, pre order it. Of course, the. The publisher, you know, they don't understand. They're not, they're, they're not going to print enough. And then there's going to be people that get second edition.

Brutal.

And then when you, when I sign the second edition.

I'm. I'm gonna do it right. I'm gonna do it.

Good. That's good.

But let's face it, I might not even say, say anything. But you're going to know and I'm going to know. Yeah, well, you're going to know and I'm going to know and it's, it's going to be uncomfortable. We're not going to like it. But when you, it's sort of like when you got that first a dish. Like, let's face it, we kind of have a connection.

So check it out. The book is called Final Spin. You can pre order it right now. Leadership Strategy and Tactics Field Manual. The code Evaluation of Protocol Discipline equals freedom. Field Manual. Way the warrior kid. 1, 2, 3 and 4. Or Mikey and the Dragons. About Face by Hackworth Extreme Ownership dichotomy of leadership. The OGs echelon fronts my leadership consultancy. Go to echelonfront.com if you want us to bring these leadership principles into your organization.

Hit us up. That's what we do. EF Online, which is revamped.

We just released some new courses. You can take a course about each chapter of Extreme Ownership. We get granular on those and we're on there live all the time. Well, not all the time, but multiple times a week. You can ask me whatever question you want. Go to efonline.com the muster we're executing Orlando. Completed. Completed. Next up is Phoenix, August 17th and 18th, then Las Vegas October 28th and 29th. It's on. It's on. It's on. Can I declare Covid over? I guess I don't have the power to do that. But I can say that I've been doing live events. I can say that people are vaccinated or whatever and we seem to be rapidly approaching the way things used to be. And I'm on board for that EF battlefield. I'll let you know the next time that goes down. And if you want to help service members, active and retired, their families, gold star families. Check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. She's got an awesome charity organization and one of the primary things that she does is she gets medical treatments for service members, most of them seals. One of the big things she does is get people these awesome treatments in pure oxygen hyperbaric chambers. They do like month long treatments, pay for the whole thing, put people up in hotels so they can get it done. It's been hugely helpful to all kinds of people. So if you want to help with that, she does a bunch of other things, too. That's just the tip of the iceberg. AmericasMightyWarriors.org.

And if you want more of my historical harangues or you need more of Echo's bewildering babble, and you got some today.

That opener. That opener was, you know, that opener question.

What? The extreme ownership is bewildering. Okay. All right.

We'll say.

We'll say.

Well, if you want more of that, you can find us on the interwebs, on Twitter, on the gram, and on Facebook. That goes Attica, Charles. And I am @JonQuilink. And thanks to everyone out there in uniform around the world right now, putting all these lessons learned to use to protect our freedom. And the same goes to the people here on the home front. Our police, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, border patrol, secret service, and all first responders. Thank you for your sacrifices to protect us here at home and to everyone else out there. Remember that the first function of leadership is discipline. And that discipline starts with yourself.

It is us.

We have to train. We have to prepare. We have to harden ourselves through suffering. And while it hurts, and it does hurt.

It is that discipline.

That will ultimately bring us.

Freedom.

So go out there and get after it. And until next time, this is Echo and Jocko out.